A fencing mini-set

chalupaoffury

I started discussing this in another thread, the gist of it is: Not all martial arts have an Asian vibe. It'd be nice to get some european fighting in there, and I feel like fencing is the best first step. It could be a mini-set, tied in with single blade for extra functionality, that has a bit more of a swashbuckly feel to it. It'd be all single target, barring redoublement which would be a small cone, because that's what fencing does. I've suggested a few fencing variants, but I feel like this one might strike the best balance of offense/defense, while having more of an authentic feel. Suggested powers:

EB: Allez: Basic energy builder, it'd probably work a lot like the archery EB, but melee. Bonus to dodge on advantage, the hits build energy pretty strongly but come slowly. Much like in real fencing, the EB would involve poking at the enemy's defenses.

Lunge: Balestra: A diving thrust, lunging from a distance would result in the target being snared. adv: Feinte: The Balestra contains a misdirect that leaves your opponent Disoriented.

Froissement: an attack that does moderate damage, and increases the chances of the next melee attack scoring a critical hit. Charge increases both, or it could be stacking and a combo, with dps increasing per hit. Adv: Fausse attaque: The attack leaves a noticeable false opening in your guard, decreases opponent's defense as the "opportunity" is too good to pass up. You've got me where I want you.

Redoublement: like a 100 hands attack, one handed, thrusting with a sword. Chance to cause bleed per tick.

Phrases D'armes: An active defense that greatly increases dodge and avoidance, with a moderate increase to move speed. advantage: decreases charge speed.

Fleche: The bleed rupture. A powerful thrust that does massive spike damage. Each stack of bleed adds less damage to the original attack than other bleed ruptures, but increases the chance of scoring a critical hit.

Passive: En Garde: Increases melee physical damage, other melee damage to a lesser degree. Stacks on hit to increase critical severity and dodge chance. Mild increase to avoidance. Basically a melee Quarry. 1 point adv increases movement speed by 10%.

It should also get a reskin of parry from MA, with the "riposte" coming from the weapon itself. If it needs an energy unlock, the unlock should happen when bleeds are applied.

dialamx

I'm down with this. It'll allow for multiple single blade characters that won't feel exactly the same. You can have a character a single blade ninja, the other a single blade swashbuckler, and they would feel like different characters.

maleb666

/Signed!!

Single blades really some adjustments and AoE attacks!

chaoswolf820

I approve of single-blade getting some fencing/swashbuckling moves instead of just cheesy-dubbed-kungfu-movie ninja slice-n-dice.

meedacthunist

Totally. There should be some kind of western swordplay moves to pick for swordfighting heroes, so you are not forced to be ninja. Or samurai. Because I barely give any damn to eastern sword arts.

bluhman

Current single-blade's kind of already like a sort of bastardization of Samurai/Fencing techniques, so there is that. Stuff like the EB seems more fencing related, while Dragon's Bite and Reaper's Embrace are way more eastern.


As for the actual suggestion, I like it! Though I got a few streamlining comments:

Phrases D'armes should just be an advantage on Masterful Dodge. Its current advantage doesn't even work right, and having a speed boost as an advantage could be a good option for an AD that's for people that want to run out of the way of attacks.

Redoublement should have an advantage that makes it apply a damage shield. Use that rapid blade movement to deflect bullets and stuff.

Froissement strikes me as a bit odd; mechanically it strikes me more as a Dual-Blade attack. I guess that's ok, and related to Fleche it also gels since they both will boost critical chances, but part of me wants to keep it simple; have the fencing moves be all about either crits or bleeds, but maybe not both.

Its general similarities to WotW in role make me a bit leery of En Garde, simply because that speed boost makes it a little too likely to entirely substitute WotW entirely in preference. It's cool/useful to move faster, but maybe a bit too useful. It's one of those situations where the tradeoffs might be a bit too subtle, that it ends up being so that everyone ends up taking one or the other.
Or generally speaking, it becomes easier to balance stuff when they fill wildly different roles.

Otherwise, this is all stuff that could benefit SB a lot. Stuff like the Super-fierce bleed cone is essential.

chalupaoffury

If I had to pick, I'd probably say crits are better than bleeds. A stacking DR buff would probably be the best option, thematically, and might even work better on the passive than dodge would. It'd make it more unique in the ma set, so definitely might make sense.

Yeah, you're right about the movement. On an AO it makes sense, it might overpower a passive.

I was considering a fencer as a hybrid style, the passive would be part defense and part offense, not really going overpoweringly strong in either direction. The crits make sense to me because a fencer's all about creating an opening and giving one really solid blow. Ideally, barring a flurry of thrusts, the set would literally just do one really big spike after a bit of angling and be hard to hit the rest of the time.