Official Thread for Stalkers: Dark Melee
By
Angry_Angel_,
Posted on: 2006-05-01 24:05 in Developers' Corner
Whoever said Shadow Maul had bad accuracy, you must have bad luck. It has the same accuracy as any other attack that doesn't have a bonus.
But it has always SEEMED that it missed alot more than other attacks, I went to lvl 50 with it 
So far, my DM/DA is lvl 5 with Smite, Shadow Maul, Hide, and Dark Embrace.
If Shadow Maul crits from Hide, they're dead if they're a minion, and Smite brings them down to really small HP, small enough that if I use Brawl, they die.
He's really fun, but I think I'm going to go DM/Ninjitsu on live. Maybe make a Claws/DA.
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I'm really disappointed that Shadow Maul doesn't just have bad accuracy, but the cone is too small. The enemy has to be standing directly right beside the other enemy for it to work. I understand that it's a melee attack but it wouldn't be unreasonable if the cone was made bigger or wider.
That, and the auto-crit problem.
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Having played DM for a long time, the cone is not too bad once you get used to it and try to pull the targets into melee range with you. I've just tested a el/el brute and a dm/da stalker over the past two days. The cone for Shadow Maul is much larger it seems than for Jacobs Ladder.
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Frankly I'm surprised Shadow Maul didn't get the axe... that was the power I thought looked most tempting to drop in favor of a more stalkery one. It's high DPS sure; but... it's just not... stalkery to me <,< oh well. (And no; I don't think it was ever a "signature" power of the set... I always felt Siphon Life was more signature of the set honestly).
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I like Shadow Maul and am glad they didnt drop it. I have mixed feelings on what should have been dropped instead of Dark Consumption. Last night I was testing a dm/da stalker and we were working up towards our first mayhem mission. We got in and found that the mobs were -1 due to us having levelled in the previous misison. Our group consisted of 3 thug MMs and myself. To speed things up, I went to the back room of the warehouse and grabbed the glowie only to find that we had to defeat the mobs in that room as well. The others asked if I needed help and my response was "we'll see"
Shadow Maul is what gave me the edge - and a lot of insp use. I was able to defeat three seperate spawns of 4-man team size (and -1 lvl). Mainly by ASing the one of the LTs and then grouping the others to fit within the SM cone.
So needless to say, I really hope they don't drop it for stalkers as it is our only multi-target attack now.
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The AS animation should be some type of Siphon Life one... where you suck the soul out of your target.
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I so hope they do that. I hated the squatting/constipated animation of EM's AS and I hate it on the DM set. The skull flash is cool but the wind-up animation has to go. We're dark melee. Allow us to reach up and touch our target's chest and suck his soul right out of him.
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Whoever said Shadow Maul had bad accuracy, you must have bad luck. It has the same accuracy as any other attack that doesn't have a bonus.
But it has always SEEMED that it missed alot more than other attacks, I went to lvl 50 with it
So far, my DM/DA is lvl 5 with Smite, Shadow Maul, Hide, and Dark Embrace.
If Shadow Maul crits from Hide, they're dead if they're a minion, and Smite brings them down to really small HP, small enough that if I use Brawl, they die.
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Same with me, but one of the most (unfortunate) memorable time for me is when it didn't land 5 times in a row. I was fighting a +1 Snake. Smite landed more often but man if SM is just like any power, that was some bad streak I had. I just remember getting frustrated everytime I unhide myself just to SM someone and it doesn't hit. Maybe it's just sticking out because it's a bad highlight, but meh, that's just me.
I started with Smite and Shadow Maul and I was just standing around to much after my attacks and felt like I was talking to much damage for just fighting to equal minions. So I created another and took Shaodw Punch and Smite and that provide much better results and I actually hardly took any damage after getting a couple tohit debuffs stacked. Endurance did seem a little bit high for just using Shadow Punch and Smite though as I was able to run through a the bar in a mission at level 3. Right now claws does just as good but uses less endurance so I would like to see a bit less endurance cost on Dark Melee now that the set doesn't include Dark Consumption.
Overall though having played a DM scrapper to 50 I think I could make it work for a Stalker aswell. Won't be as much burst damage as other sets but should be a little more scrapperish with the tohit debuffs and the dot's.
I'm building my DM/DA to be a messed up Scrapper kind of.
I will pick up Shadow Punch eventually, for the great DPS it has.
I'll probably go AS--> ToF --> Placate--> MG (MG is fast, so hopefully I can get this off before they hit me from Placate) --> Smite --> SP...etc.
In PvE, I'll go AS--> Placate boss -->MG --> CoF --> Rehide -->Repeat
I would have expected the AS to be a swipe through the victim, pulling a bit of thier soul out to be crushed in the stalkers hand.
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I would have expected the AS to be a swipe through the victim, pulling a bit of thier soul out to be crushed in the stalkers hand.
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Yeah, if I had a choice...
Stalker croutches down and pulls back his open palm. Then pushes his arm clear through the Foe, grabs ahold of his soul, and wrenches it free.
...Its fun to dream...
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I would have expected the AS to be a swipe through the victim, pulling a bit of thier soul out to be crushed in the stalkers hand.
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Yeah, if I had a choice...
Stalker croutches down and pulls back his open palm. Then pushes his arm clear through the Foe, grabs ahold of his soul, and wrenches it free.
...Its fun to dream...
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*joygasm*
Saw the AS animation for DM today.
I must say I LOVE it. While the crouching-tiger-taking-a-poop isn't cool, the skull flash is.
Keltic, I want your Avatar to say "I'm super serial!" in it. I would never stop laughing, lol.
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Keltic, I want your Avatar to say "I'm super serial!" in it. I would never stop laughing, lol.
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I suck at editing images. If you (or someone) can edit it, I'll be more than happy to use it!
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Saw the AS animation for DM today.
I must say I LOVE it. While the crouching-tiger-taking-a-poop isn't cool, the skull flash is.
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Yeah, it's making me want to start a DM Stalker myself for live. I love how the big black/purple skull with red eyes just pops out for just a few moments. Like you're pushing their soul out or something.
would someone mind posting a pic of the skull flash? 
Here is the Assassin's Eclipse - Skull Flash
I was worried when it was said to be like the MA/EN animations but the skull flash and dark graphics make it ok as you don't really see your toon hitting below the belt.
sweeeet that looks friggin awesome cant wait to use it in my videos...ty for postin it 
first off, yes dark maul is still my faveorite attk from the dark melee line, but build up insted of life tap? i knew we would lose something, but life tap is sooo stalker, isnt the assassin strike enough? we need build up too?
I would like to see a bit of width on the cone, i can see it not have more range, altho any chi attack could have range melee or otherwise, but with the energy melee you just let them all suround you, it takes a bit of work to get the mobs lined up for dark maul but thats the price (+long animation) for the dmg it does, I too consider it a sig move that and the life tap.
my first and faveorite charactor is still my DM/Reg scrapper and the stalker just dosent hold a candle. the dark armor is fun but i dont like toggles, and i lost my life tap and my end regen, some days it don't pay to be evil...
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I've got the Assassin's Eclipse and I'm going to have to agree with some others, it really needs it's own defining animation that speaks of a dark assassination. Would be nice if sometime down the future MA, EM, and DM could get their own unique animations - these AS are the very defining thing about Stalkers so I believe animation time should be given priority on getting them the unique animations they deserve.
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first off, yes dark maul is still my faveorite attk from the dark melee line, but build up insted of life tap? i knew we would lose something, but life tap is sooo stalker, isnt the assassin strike enough? we need build up too?
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What is life tap? Do you mean Siphon Life or Soul Drain?
Siphon Life is in the set, and Soul Drain would make the set horribly gimped damage-wise.
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I would like to see a bit of width on the cone, i can see it not have more range, altho any chi attack could have range melee or otherwise, but with the energy melee you just let them all suround you, it takes a bit of work to get the mobs lined up for dark maul but thats the price (+long animation) for the dmg it does, I too consider it a sig move that and the life tap.
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Lots of enemies spawn close enough together to use Shadow Maul on both of them at once from Hide, not that this is necessary past 6th level or so.
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Well, gone through 18 levels of dark melee so far for stalkers and I am loving it so far. I've picked up every dark melee skill except shadow punch. I'm probably going to end up dropping siphon life on live. The endurance is pretty high and I've found I don't need the miniscule heal all that often, and it's not like it fits into an attack chain all that well really. I noticed something on the power list when I hovered the mouse over midnight's grasp. It said Superior Damage (Negative), but it made no mention of DoT. Is it possible that stalker midnight grasp isn't a DoT and is 100% frontloaded damage? Can anyone confirm my speculations? Anyway, so far I am loving dark melee for stalks and I am ripping through enemies very easily anyone else loving the set as much as me?
Well, I can't confirm or deny anything about the Stalker version. I just logged in my DM scrapper on test who I have MG on.
The short popup description doesn't list DoT. The long description info lists the DoT.
So, it's likely unchanged and the short description just leaves out the DoT part of the info for brevity.
It was mentioned in the Stalker forums that the Description of Midnight Grasp doesn't mention DoT damage. Could a Red name confirm if the Stalker Midnight Grasp is the same as the Scrapper version or has it been changed to avoid any issues with re-hiding?
I just wanted to ask how are the end cost on the powers so far. For those that are Dark/Dark are you having extreme end issues that scrappers and brutes get with this set? Also is the AS 100% dark damage or is it split smashing/dark?
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Well, so far after 19 levels of dark/dark, I'm not having any end problems at all. I slotted an end reducer in each toggle and I only run the toggles that I need for the particular fights that I am in. My attacks consist of smite, shadow maul, assassin's eclipse, and the occasional siphon life. So far the only time I've really run low on end is when I end up aggroing more than 1 group due to them being so close to each other and I then need to scrap it out more. A dark/dark stalker will definately need to be played hit and run more so than some of the other stalker sets if you don't want to have end issues. The devs should really consider lowering the end costs on stalker dark melee attacks to compensate for the lack of dark consumption though. But overall, I'd say that dark/dark is pretty sweet. I'm loving it anyway
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I think the AS is the same as MA and EM.
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Boo!
It should have been the old soul sucking animation from Twilight Grasp
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I agree 100%. I was actually very sad to see that animation on Twilight Grasp go, regardless of the time it took to get a heal off. I think it would fit perfectly in this context without much tweaking (apart from adding the skull burst). Either that or put it on a Dark snipe... it's just too good to be cut from the game completely.
For those who never saw it, I'll try to describe it. First your head turned and watched your right arm fill with dark energy as you pulled it up and to the side in a sort of ;flex1 pose , then your head turned to the left arm as it did the same, then both arms were thrust forward. The whole thing was very ominous, as though your body was being taken over by the dark forces.
Please, developers... let's not recycle that horrible squatting animation anymore until the Sumo secondary for tankers is released, ok?
I'm not finding that shadow maul misses all that much, and it does a lot of damage. It crits fairly often (although not all the time). It's not a bad power.
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