PvP and Duskblades

DeathenShada - Archosaur · January 2015

Hello everyone I just wanted to maybe start a discussion around Duskblades and pvp. Over the past few days I've been doing some dueling on my Duskblade with friends and testing out how skill would work in a real fight not in my fictional imagination, and tbh when I first read the duskblade skills I felt like they were going to be the next OP in terms of classes but after all those duels I'm not so sure.

First me and the friend I was dueling were around equally geared, and I actually over leveled her by about 3-4 levels and I won a few and she won the most part of the duels (she's Storm Bringer btw).

The only way that I could win the fights was to make sure that I got my stun lock combo off (Destiny Hunter -> Teleport Stun -> Sleep -> Dragon Trap to make sure mark goes off). If I did that I would win 100% and the only reason that worked was because she never used her CC immunity skill for some reason.

If I didn't use that combo then I would end up being two shoted and die (remember equal gear). I tried about everything CC -> start combo'ing (didn't work combo's took to long to start up and would die), If I tried easier to access combo's like (Galemark -> Strig Dive or Eternity) it still wouldn't do enough dmg to kill her in reaper form before she two shoted me.

I tried reflection which costs two sparks, but then she would just use Lunar blessing (which doesn't cost any chi and heals her + immunity LOL) while putting her spinning death skill on me (ice tornado + clone) and ya I was dead.

I have a good grasp on how the class plays and I'm a godly PvP'er in other games like Swtor, ESO etc. So that made me think and compare the duskblade to other LA classes.

If you look at archers they have enough fire power to match magic classes while still having some good escape and control abilities. Sin's have ton's of control over magic classes and Phy alike. While duskblades have oh look 7? 9? paralyzes? Woop de do. So they can't move, well they still sure as hell can smack you in the face.

We have basically 2 reliable stuns both with incredibly short durations, and the other is only a 50% chance to stun. While our only true long stun (Destiny Mark) requires a long time and pure luck to get off since it can easily be avoided by using your genie to break the debuff.

And overall I feel like all our attacks take too long to start to do anything, require alot of luck (stuns, hopeing the immunity from some skills matches up at the exact time you get attacked), or are just not so great.

Now don't get me wrong I love Duskblades, i'm going to make it my main and R9 it. But after all those losses I kinda feel like Duskblades really don't have proper tools for PvP. Sorry for the rant/block of text.

So what are you Duskblade PvP experiences? Likes? Hates? Lemme know I'm interested to hear.

TLDR: Sorry for the block of text, got my rear end kicked in duels. Now a sad panda all the while contemplating the existence of my life, and debating the relevance of Duskblades in PvP.

wynndyc · January 2015

Remember that paralyzis is not stopped by movement inmunity or it's what I've seen so blinking moment, distant cloud, and Strigimorphic Dive will work. Or it's what I've seen

ba2ka · January 2015

Can anyone tell me where I was wrong? I'm a seeker lvl 42 who has never learned any skill except of 'Rock Splitting Clave'. I don't know I could I come this far, I mean lvl 42 without learning new skills. How can I learn some new skills?

(((

Derressh - Dreamweaver · January 2015

Paralysis isn't just a freeze, it's basically a non-resistable, unpurifiable(?) stun.

Euthymius - Heavens Tear · January 2015

We're still missing some skills. It'll get better as we'll have more things to chain and more options to mess with. We just need to wait.

Destiny being broken by a genie skill sucks, but its still forcing them to use some genie energy and possibly removing a high costing option (Expel/AD) for a bit, so its not all bad news. If you're able to force their genie without using it, then it'll be an option to work into a stun-lock then.

Have you considered trying Occult Ice to help with your combos? I could see it being useful and it might give you a chance for an additional charge up attack like Pride or give you time to set up Const. Arc into Distant Cloud or something.

Reaper form will also be useful since you can do the shorter stuns a lot faster since Gale will only be a 1 sec CD skill (Reaper>Gale>Eternity>Gale>Strig>ect)

>Lunar Blessing made them immune
In Silence Dread might help with that. You're not necessarily immune or 100% safe, but your enemy wont be able to target you while they're invulnerable at least. Not sure how it'll affect the clone, though.

iperen · January 2015

If it's a duel while being in the proces of leveling, it doesn't really surprise me. It's usual for duels to be "if melee get's cc lock of right away, they win. If not, ranged wins", simply because :
1) When leveling is very usual to have a better weapon and slack on armor/ornaments.
2) Before reaching 100 and multiple reborns, the constant damage add is a big factor and casters win on that point.
3) 1 of the stuns duskblades have is broken, so you have a handicap.

But yeah, usually those duels are over in 1min tops. No charm and I doubt either side uses def charms or pots of any kind. Maybe you also just were expecting to much of the class by stating it would potentially be the next OP class ?

I'm quite happy how things look and the perspectives. The class looks balanced from what I can judge now and I can't wait till I climb up level/gear wise to not be a random 1shot and see how it will be for real.

Btw, paralyze is an "advanced version of stun" that looks like the opponent dropping on the ground. They can't cast. It also goes through anti-stun, which is probably why the stormbringer didn't use it. Which also indicates your friend had better knowledge of your class, making it obvious that you would get wrecked most of the time. Might be a bit to much assumptions though b:laugh

ba2ka · January 2015

Guys, I'm really confused. I only have one skill. I don'tknow how I learned it maybe it was given me at the beginning but I've read it somewhere it says if you have the book you can learn the skill. OK but, where is that freaking skill book?

DarkSkiesx - Dreamweaver · January 2015

ba2ka wrote: »

Guys, I'm really confused. I only have one skill. I don'tknow how I learned it maybe it was given me at the beginning but I've read it somewhere it says if you have the book you can learn the skill. OK but, where is that freaking skill book?

Press R. Loads a skill list. Click the little upward arrows to the right to level/learn skill. Make sure you're on top of your culti quests (gold/orange quest) be stationary and not inside an instance when clicking the arrows.

Mayfly - Dreamweaver · January 2015

Open up the skills menu (R) and use that to learn new/new levels of skills.

dynged · January 2015

DarkSkiesx - Dreamweaver wrote: »

Press R. Loads a skill list. Click the little upward arrows to the right to level/learn skill. Make sure you're on top of your culti quests (gold/orange quest) be stationary and not inside an instance when clicking the arrows.

and to add to that, be sure you have enough spirit points and coin to learn said skill.

You gain spirit points alongside exp.

ba2ka · January 2015

Thank you guys all who answered my questions. I think I figured it out.

DeathenShada - Archosaur · January 2015

Euthymius - Heavens Tear wrote: »

We're still missing some skills. It'll get better as we'll have more things to chain and more options to mess with. We just need to wait.

Destiny being broken by a genie skill sucks, but its still forcing them to use some genie energy and possibly removing a high costing option (Expel/AD) for a bit, so its not all bad news. If you're able to force their genie without using it, then it'll be an option to work into a stun-lock then.

Have you considered trying Occult Ice to help with your combos? I could see it being useful and it might give you a chance for an additional charge up attack like Pride or give you time to set up Const. Arc into Distant Cloud or something.

Reaper form will also be useful since you can do the shorter stuns a lot faster since Gale will only be a 1 sec CD skill (Reaper>Gale>Eternity>Gale>Strig>ect)

>Lunar Blessing made them immune
In Silence Dread might help with that. You're not necessarily immune or 100% safe, but your enemy wont be able to target you while they're invulnerable at least. Not sure how it'll affect the clone, though.

Ya for sure i'll look into getting that genie skill for actual PvP. When we fought it was for fun and we didn't use genie skills but i'll remember that for TW/NW. Also thank you for your optimistic feedback, the part about making them waste genie energy at least gave me a lol.

iperen wrote: »

If it's a duel while being in the proces of leveling, it doesn't really surprise me. It's usual for duels to be "if melee get's cc lock of right away, they win. If not, ranged wins", simply because :
1) When leveling is very usual to have a better weapon and slack on armor/ornaments.
2) Before reaching 100 and multiple reborns, the constant damage add is a big factor and casters win on that point.
3) 1 of the stuns duskblades have is broken, so you have a handicap.

But yeah, usually those duels are over in 1min tops. No charm and I doubt either side uses def charms or pots of any kind. Maybe you also just were expecting to much of the class by stating it would potentially be the next OP class ?

I'm quite happy how things look and the perspectives. The class looks balanced from what I can judge now and I can't wait till I climb up level/gear wise to not be a random 1shot and see how it will be for real.

Btw, paralyze is an "advanced version of stun" that looks like the opponent dropping on the ground. They can't cast. It also goes through anti-stun, which is probably why the stormbringer didn't use it. Which also indicates your friend had better knowledge of your class, making it obvious that you would get wrecked most of the time. Might be a bit to much assumptions though b:laugh

I agree dueling while leveling is a bit unfair, though we were in the upper end I was 93 or so and she was 90. But ya she isn't a good player so in regards to your comment about anti-stun you miss read I was talking about how she wasn't using it to resist my sleep/actual stuns. She's one of those button masher pvp'ers which makes it more embarrassing. Also I have a Stormbringer level 80 ish so I know what skills she has and how to use them as well. So in actuality I had a better understanding of both classes then her since she doesn't have a duskblade.

Also I wanna call you out on your comment about paralyze being a "advanced version of stun". I personally took the skill at dictionary face value and took it to mean that you can't move (like a freeze). If like you said it prevents casting then it would be more similar to paralysis from like pokemon. But then again would it even effect instant cast skills? If it affects both (so you can't move, and can't cast skills) then why call it paralyze it's already a stun in that case.

That's my logic anyhow, so do you have any proof or did you test it? Or are you basing that statement on hearsay? Cause I didn't notice it really affecting mobs, and I didn't see any animation of my opponent dropping on the ground. Either way i'm curious so let me know.

Edit: I asked world chat about Paralysis and they agreed with what you said. Thanks for the feedback, i've been gone for a while from the game so I didn't know about the new status effect. Taking that into account Paralyze isn't that bad!

CapnK - Sanctuary · January 2015

It's a bit confusing because they used to use the word paralyze for what is now called freeze (can't move). But what paralyze now means is the condition where you're knocked to the ground and can't do anything (and which bypasses stun immunity, etc.).

iperen · January 2015

DeathenShada - Archosaur wrote: »

Also I wanna call you out on your comment about paralyze being a "advanced version of stun". I personally took the skill at dictionary face value and took it to mean that you can't move (like a freeze). If like you said it prevents casting then it would be more similar to paralysis from like pokemon. But then again would it even effect instant cast skills? If it affects both (so you can't move, and can't cast skills) then why call it paralyze it's already a stun in that case.

That's my logic anyhow, so do you have any proof or did you test it? Or are you basing that statement on hearsay? Cause I didn't notice it really affecting mobs, and I didn't see any animation of my opponent dropping on the ground. Either way i'm curious so let me know.

I base it on the game terms used, even though they are not always consistent over time and even over classes. There used to be "stun" only, that had a yellow/golden icon on the target. With New Horizons, they made something I call an "advanced version of stun" because it was an update of stun skills from BM and Barb that gave a purple/blueish icon. It is a better version of stun, because it does everything a stun does + go through anti-movement + it can't be broken/purified by genie. If you look at the barb skill, it has a chance to paralyze and if that doesn't proc it will freeze.

On the dictionary you're right. Heck, even on archer they never updated their skill the "paralyze" notion on a freeze. But the game is translated and things evolve. That doesn't change what the skills do. You mentioned that the paralyze skills left them able to hit you, which isn't true. "immobilize" and "freeze" do, but "paralyze" doesn't in duskblade skill descriptions.

Duskblade has the paralyze (so purple/blueish icon) on most skills, except for relentless drift (1sec), eternity (chance) and destiny hunter (broken skill). With so many stuns that go through anti-movement, I can understand why someone wouldn't use an anti-stun that requires chi and rather tries to get you cc'ed. I can understand a "if I anti-stun, he'll paralyze anyway" idea.

PvP and Duskblades

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