Increasing Night Avenger survivability?

unangbangkay · September 2012

Hey everyone,

I've been experimenting with the Night Avenger archetype and I'm having a blast so far as a melee-focused character, but I've also noticed that I'm dying a lot more compared to my usual Grimoire and Invincible, due to lack of heals and general squishiness.

Now I did expect to be squishier, since the NA is more of a pure glass cannon (glass claw?) class compared to the Grimoire and Invincible (especially the Invincible, which is a tank), but I was wondering if there was anything I could do to die less often. Does anyone have tips regarding gear, advantages, talents, or even just tactics?

Below is the build and spec I'm planning. I'm not at 40 yet so I haven't played with all the toys or gotten all the ranks and such. Please tell me what you think of the build and any advice you have.

Thanks!

Powers:

1 - Hawk's Talons (R1)
1 - Viper's Fangs (R3)
6 - Smoke Bomb Lunge (Nailed)
8 - Night Warrior (R3)
11 - Rend and Tear (R3)
14 - Form of the Tiger (R3)
17 - Throwing Blades
21 - Parry (R2+Monk)
25 - Grapple Gun
30 - Tiger's Bite (R2 + Mouth of Madness) for synergy with Viper's Fangs and Rend
35 - Bolas (R2 + Nailed)
40 - Strafing Run

Talents and Specs:

Specs:

Dex: Gear Utilization 3/3, Brush It Off 2/2, Evasion 2/2, Quick Reflexes 3/3
Guardian: Fortified Gear 3/3, Ruthless 2/2, Best Defense 3/3, Retribution 2/2
Vindicator: Rush of Battle 3/3, Aggressive Stance 2/2, Focused Strikes 3/3, Modified Gear 2/2
Mastery: Dex Master

Talents:

STR/DEX
STR/REC
STR/EGO
DEX/EGO
DEX/REC
EGO/REC

promnight · September 2012

PowerHouse

Archetype: The Night Avenger

Super Stats:
Level 6: Dexterity (Primary)
Level 10: Strength (Secondary)
Level 15: Ego (Secondary)

Talents:
Level 1: The Night Avenger
Level 7: Martial Focus
Level 12: Shooter
Level 15: Professional Athlete
Level 20: Acrobat
Level 25: Physical Conditioning
Level 30: Ascetic

Powers:
Level 1: Hawk's Talons
Level 1: Viper's Fangs
Level 6: Smoke Bomb Lunge (Crippling Challenge, Nailed to the Ground)
Level 8: Night Warrior (Rank 2, Rank 3, Silent Running)
Level 11: Ricochet Throw (Rank 2, Rank 3)
Level 14: Form of the Tiger
Level 17: Throwing Blades (Rank 2, Rank 3)
Level 21: Parry
Level 25: Grapple Gun Pull (Rank 2, Rank 3)
Level 30: Dragon's Claws (Rank 2, Rank 3)
Level 35: Bolas (Rank 2, Rank 3)
Level 40: Strafing Run (Rank 2, Rank 3)

Travel Powers:
Level 6: Teleportation
Level 35: Acrobatics (Rank 2, Rank 3)

Specializations:
Dexterity: Gear Utilization (3/3)
Dexterity: Brush It Off (2/2)
Dexterity: Deadly Aim (2/3)
Dexterity: Quick Reflexes (3/3)
Warden: Fortified Gear (3/3)
Warden: Ruthless (2/2)
Warden: Tenacious (2/2)
Warden: The Best Defense (3/3)
Vindicator: Aggressive Stance (2/2)
Vindicator: Merciless (3/3)
Vindicator: Focused Strikes (3/3)
Vindicator: Modified Gear (2/2)
Mastery: Dexterity Mastery (1/1)

My stats:
http://i48.tinypic.com/34yr98w.png

Fast explanation:

Viper's Fangs - the combo Fangs/Tiger's Bite is very, very slow. Dragon's Claws is a non-setup-power, just get critical hit and "WOW", huge dmg.

Ricochet Throw, Throwing Blades, and Strafing Run - both rank 3, both AoE powers, abuse of these powers in PvE.

Bolas - this power help you to get Shadow Strike/Strafing Run in PvP.

Lunge > Dragon's Claws > Bolas > Sneak > Shadow Strike

Lunge > Dragon's Claws > Bolas > Strafing Run

theravenforce · September 2012

unangbangkay wrote: »

Hey everyone,

I've been experimenting with the Night Avenger archetype and I'm having a blast so far as a melee-focused character, but I've also noticed that I'm dying a lot more compared to my usual Grimoire and Invincible, due to lack of heals and general squishiness.

Now I did expect to be squishier, since the NA is more of a pure glass cannon (glass claw?) class compared to the Grimoire and Invincible (especially the Invincible, which is a tank), but I was wondering if there was anything I could do to die less often. Does anyone have tips regarding gear, advantages, talents, or even just tactics?

Below is the build and spec I'm planning. I'm not at 40 yet so I haven't played with all the toys or gotten all the ranks and such. Please tell me what you think of the build and any advice you have.

Thanks!

Powers:

1 - Hawk's Talons (R1)
1 - Viper's Fangs (R3)
6 - Smoke Bomb Lunge (Nailed)
8 - Night Warrior (R3)
11 - Rend and Tear (R3)
14 - Form of the Tiger (R3)
17 - Throwing Blades
21 - Parry (R2+Monk)
25 - Grapple Gun
30 - Tiger's Bite (R2 + Mouth of Madness) for synergy with Viper's Fangs and Rend
35 - Bolas (R2 + Nailed)
40 - Strafing Run

My NA AT is lvl 40 and your build looks similar to mine accept I'm not PvPing at all with my NA AT. But she is melee based.

What I would suggest to you is to change some things around. For example Dragons Claw is much better damage wise due to what I like to call "death crits" also it procs Focus stacks very easily and grants a rush buff which is a generous boost to energy generation which is something this AT isnt that good at. Overall especially when fired from stealth Dragons claw can be very effective, I usually get crits ranging from 4-10k when I use it.

Another advantage power is Gas Pellets, although they land in a stupid fashion most of the time and are a bit odd, if planned right and thrown correctly, they are very useful. They do not remove you from stealth and they do very good damage. Also attacked enemies look confused and it is just a funny bonus

Another potential great power which you have planned to neglect is Strafing Run. Most of the time for me this power crits, and with only 152 Ego it wipes the FLOOR with any targeted group and also does not remove you from stealth. Which is a useful bonus if it doesnt go as planned.

I only ranked certain powers half way like Viper's Fangs and Rend and Tear, I only got rank 2 on as I dont use them much.

Throwing Blades (even though you are melee based) is an excellent rank 3 power, it does an excellent stealth job and grants a +20% bonus crit chance when fired from stealth.

This AT generally screams Squishy but Deadly Assassin.

You have to really utilize stealth as it is this AT's central Mechanic.

If you are PvPing I'd recommend promnight's build, as it seems very effective.

Also you must remember the access to HoT specs which you can gain, namely Rush of Battle and Retribution which are very good and potentially life saving.

Don't forget your passive's minor defense mechanic! Dodge/Avoid. Currently the best defense in game apart from flat damage mitigation. Try your best to maximise this, My Night Avenger ShadowAssassin currently has 57% dodge chance and 40% avoid and this can be increased when The Elusive Monk procs, couple that with your HoT specs and you have your own mini BCR xP.

Also Defense is always a good idea ontop of dodge, throwing in some CON like Promnight did is a good idea, I know I didnt but I added HP via gear and still managed 5.3k hp.

It is a shame that the dodge/avoid on Night Warrior passive isnt innately higher, but that being said, it is an offensive passive, the meer fact it gives SOME form of defense, especially one which is well sought after is very nice.

secksegai · September 2012

Problem is that gear is substantially inferior till the late 30s, so there's only so much survival to extrapolate there.

Your grim has self-healing and aopm, so that isn't a surprise.

The invincible is runs invul, so the difference will be like night and day

Glass cannons work with the premise of killing anything it fights faster than it gets killed.
When you don't have that luxury, you're depending on teammates for support, whether it be them tanking or healing.

It's less about gear, although adding con helps.

It's really about how you fight, like not initiating on groups larger than you can handle (ie don't attack first).

Even the best of us die on occasion without self-healing. Heck, we can die even with it =P
There are always limitations, just familiarize yourself with them.

unangbangkay · September 2012

Thanks for the advice, folks! I'm going to try out promnight's build for a little bit as I've found that chasing backstepping bosses around because we had an inadequate tank wasn't much fun, and that ricochet throw looks cool.

My question to promnight is that if he's using Ricochet throw without concentration, doesn't that mean he doesn't benefit from the Focus stacking that comes with Form of the Tiger/Rend and Tear?

theravenforce · September 2012

unangbangkay wrote: »

Thanks for the advice, folks! I'm going to try out promnight's build for a little bit as I've found that chasing backstepping bosses around because we had an inadequate tank wasn't much fun, and that ricochet throw looks cool.

My question to promnight is that if he's using Ricochet throw without concentration, doesn't that mean he doesn't benefit from the Focus stacking that comes with Form of the Tiger/Rend and Tear?

Even though this is to promnight, I'm going to tell you xP:biggrin:

Yes you are quite right..using FoTT + Ricochet Throw isnt good synergy wise. But Rend costs a considerable amount more than RT does. But for later levels...Dragon's Claw is sort of your main attack, along with the debuff from Vipers Fangs (Shredded) I have managed to get 11k crits, and Dragon's Claw Synergyes very well with FoTT

unangbangkay · September 2012

theravenforce wrote: »

Even though this is to promnight, I'm going to tell you xP:biggrin:

Yes you are quite right..using FoTT + Ricochet Throw isnt good synergy wise. But Rend costs a considerable amount more than RT does. But for later levels...Dragon's Claw is sort of your main attack, along with the debuff from Vipers Fangs (Shredded) I have managed to get 11k crits, and Dragon's Claw Synergyes very well with FoTT

Thanks for the info, and you're totally right! I've been testing Richochet throw (R3) in alerts and such, and boy am I glad I took it. Now I can actually hit bosses when they dance (without having to rely on the lunge and hoping for NttG to proc, the damage can be crazy!

Of course, sometimes that results in every enemy giving me the stink-eye (esp. if it richochets into the worms during a Soul Siphon) and killing me, but it was worth it. I love the melee abilities, but this ranged one was definitely a good buy.

Thanks!

Increasing Night Avenger survivability?

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