Return of Reckoning

Hello,

With the upcoming release of tier 2 and the rank cap of lvl 20, there comes a new influx of abilities. The most powerful abilities for the Swordmaster are the perfect balance ones and I was wondering if more experienced SM players could give some tips on when to use which ability.

My findings so far and expected for T2:

- Dazzling Strike: Highest burst damage ability, increases buildup time by 50%, useful when fighting careers that have many casted abilities.

- Dragons Talon: Does slightly less damage than Dazzling Strike but you can permadebuff 1 target for -20% damage. Good against nukers and melee enemies.

- Blurring Shock: Does the lowest initial damage but makes it so every crit on that person does an additional amount of spirit damage. This ability I found underperforming unless you ran with larger and/or coordinated groups.

I know not many people play Swordmasters right now, but I just wanted to start a small discussion

Thanks.

My rotations right now in this state of abilities:

*Vs Casters or purely defensive:
Ensorcelled Blow---->Eagle's Flight---->Dazzling Strike
*Vs tanks or purely offensive:
Gryphon's Lash------->Eagle's Flight---->Blurring Shock
*Snaring rotation, most of the times opening rotation or in-mid-of rotation, good also cause place a DoT:
Grafefull Strike------>Quick Incision--->Dazzling Strike (Will be changed for Dragon's Talon once possible)

By themselves Perfect Balance skills are nothing, the hard way is normally to reach them in "balance". The AP drain of all the rest of skills is damn high, so better give a good trade-of for it. Perfect Balance skills are cool, but failing to hit the correct one can be a huge not easily character-forbidding mistake. U can ill-afford more than one mistake. Fast thinking and general information gathering from all sources is more than required to play SMs at their best.

Tesq wrote:I create a sm from few, but i found his snare one of those skilled part of SM that you need to master.*
have a snare with no coldown basicaly make you able to be a very good cc tank, it's can keep easily snare 4+ ppl also the snare is avaible in balance stance so this make that even easier to use. The change stage skill make it almos usable every 1 sec

This is what i thought when i started here my Swordmaster, working it around "Sudden Swift", best ability ever for the class!! But the AP cost makes it a little miss if u dont throw away some Perfect Balance hit to restore a little ur AP/DPS ratio. Without Perfect Balance hits its just too low. "Quick Incision" costs a hefty 35 AP for very little dmg. But yeah, its a great ability that i normally use in cooldown to get Perfect Balance free hits =)

Tesq wrote:I create a sm from few, but i found his snare one of those skilled part of SM that you need to master.*
have a snare with no coldown basicaly make you able to be a very good cc tank, it's can keep easily snare 4+ ppl also the snare is avaible in balance stance so this make that even easier to use. The change stage skill make it almos usable every 1 sec

Once you get protection of hoeth you can have it up almost all the time since it shifts stance as well.
(also can get every knock down boss 1 tovl with sm with the blurring shock kd tactic long as you have ss/poh only use for the tactic imo)

Ototo wrote:

Tesq wrote:I create a sm from few, but i found his snare one of those skilled part of SM that you need to master.*
have a snare with no coldown basicaly make you able to be a very good cc tank, it's can keep easily snare 4+ ppl also the snare is avaible in balance stance so this make that even easier to use. The change stage skill make it almos usable every 1 sec

This is what i thought when i started here my Swordmaster, working it around "Sudden Swift", best ability ever for the class!! But the AP cost makes it a little miss if u dont throw away some Perfect Balance hit to restore a little ur AP/DPS ratio. Without Perfect Balance hits its just too low. "Quick Incision" costs a hefty 35 AP for very little dmg. But yeah, its a great ability that i normally use in cooldown to get Perfect Balance free hits =)

QI would be filler in a dps rotation PoH+SS norm keeps ap cost down going from balanced to perfect in a normal tank build i wouldn't even keep QI on the keyboard. the devs made a fix for the ap drain on Live pts which made it actually restore ap instead of just draining it which makes up for using QI

Rebuke wrote:Hello,

With the upcoming release of tier 2 and the rank cap of lvl 20, there comes a new influx of abilities. The most powerful abilities for the Swordmaster are the perfect balance ones and I was wondering if more experienced SM players could give some tips on when to use which ability.

My findings so far and expected for T2:

- Dazzling Strike: Highest burst damage ability, increases buildup time by 50%, useful when fighting careers that have many casted abilities.

- Dragons Talon: Does slightly less damage than Dazzling Strike but you can permadebuff 1 target for -20% damage. Good against nukers and melee enemies.

- Blurring Shock: Does the lowest initial damage but makes it so every crit on that person does an additional amount of spirit damage. This ability I found underperforming unless you ran with larger and/or coordinated groups.

I know not many people play Swordmasters right now, but I just wanted to start a small discussion

Thanks.

not many playing them because there are easier more balanced classes in early tiers sm takes off near end of t3 for 2h dps and end of t2 for SnB tank/dps the 2h tank spec starts at 40 when wods is unlocked

Trust me. Keep allways ur snare abilities in the keyboard, and the closer u can have them, the better. No matter the damage they do, no matter the AP they cost, no matter if they are casts, just keep them close, allways. CC for free in immunity terms...