Have you seen my guide? I'm told it's pretty good for this.
Where to now?
Check out all my guides and fiction pieces on my blog.
The MFing Warshade | The Last Rule of Tanking | The Got Dam Mastermind
Everything Dark Armor | The Softcap
don'T attempt to read tHis mEssaGe, And believe Me, it is not a codE.
I have, yeah.
Actually, it was one of the things that inspired me to go for a Warshade over a Peacebringer - it's in-depth, and full of helpful information. But even following it, I've died. A lot. xD
Well... yes, that will happen, inevitably. Pre-eclipse Warshades will be rather... fragile. Mostly you need to rely on controls rather than defenses.
Stygian Circle isn't just for cleaning up after mobs. As long as there is a single corpse near you, it's worth using if you think you're about to die. It has a quick recharge, so don't feel like you're wasting it on just a body or two.
Eclipse is a game changer. Perma-Eclipse and you're a tankmage. I would suggest at least toughing it out until you can get Eclipse slotted. If by then you still don't like it, I know of a decent mental hospital that might be able to admit you. 
Paragon Studios, thanks for all you've done. You've made this a great game, and a great community. I see this as six years well-spent. NCSoft, I'm seriously disappointed in you. This is not how you get or keep customers.
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While this is true, I actually feel it's overstated. |
Originally Posted by Anilo
Perma-Eclipse and you're a tankmage.
|
Playing up Eclipse as this god-making ability is accurate, but it makes people forget how important Gravitic Emanation is. I tried to bring that out in my warshade video.
Where to now?
Check out all my guides and fiction pieces on my blog.
The MFing Warshade | The Last Rule of Tanking | The Got Dam Mastermind
Everything Dark Armor | The Softcap
don'T attempt to read tHis mEssaGe, And believe Me, it is not a codE.
I'm curious, what difficulty are you running at, Hermeneas? I find that there is a delicate balance while soloing--too little and there aren't enough targets to use Stygian Circle to keep yourself alive, too many (pre final build) and you go splat.
Beyond that, your build and chain/strategy (and what types of enemies this is happening to you with) will explain the rest.
I'm running at +0/x3 right now. I attempted to bump it up a bit higher in the hopes of having more corpses to fuel my Mires/Stygian Circle, but that only led to me faceplanting faster.
Generally, my strategy is as follows:
With a combination of Shadow Cloak and Sprint with a +Stealth IO, I get myself into the best possible position to target the majority of any given group. I then use Gravitic Emanation to stun them/knock the stragglers into the rest of the group. That's followed up by my Mires, and then a quick shift to Nova to lay down the AoE goodness. Then I use a mixture of Nova and human attacks (I'm only recently finding slots to spare to devote to the Dwarf attacks, so I believe only Smite is enhanced) to mop things up, assuming that I haven't been beaten to death yet.
Generally, that works fairly well. Things die, I move on with my life. But there are times that, for reasons that I can't begin to fathom, things are killing me before I can kill them. It happened occasionally earlier on, but it's happening more and more often as time passes.
I don't actually have access to Mids right now, but if I recall correctly, I'm running with about ~40% global recharge and Hasten. That's the most noteworthy thing, as my build was centered around recharge bonuses - I'd like to get some more defense in there, but given my budget (read: I'm broke as hell), I can't afford purples, so getting the amount of recharge I wanted meant that I couldn't fit in many defense bonuses at all, let alone ones that I would have room for at my current level.
Honestly, I'm thinking that it might just be that the play style isn't compatible with my way of doing things. The closest I've ever come to relying on bodies/enemies to consistently heal/buff me was using Dark Regeneration on my Staff/Dark Brute, and even taking that into consideration, I'm not used to branching out of my 'toggle up and hit things until they die' mindset. Could that be the problem?
Hi Hermeneas..same idea as me.. I have been on and off since ED and had a few Khelds into low 20's and went Meh!!.. read Dechs and other guides and said.."Ahhh.. now I understand...you need to think differently"
I think that your +0/3 is about right as this was where I was running, less mobs then less corpses "FIND MORE CORPSES"..and too many more just seem to get that one lucky shot and bamn.. you are dead...You mention not much slotting in Dwarf...have you slotted any of the Human stuff yet, at that level I had slotted most Dwarf attacks to 4, nova AOE to 5, mire 4 and grav hold to 4... used only so's or straight up io (no sets).. have just got 3 lotg's recharge now and kheld set and am purchasing oblits now (not worried about waiting until 50 as not much % and the set bonus is good.. off 5 purchase is cheap as mostly) I found that i used the Human at the start (mire/grav minion for a corpse) then dwarf mire..then maybe.. TP away/switch nova aoe blast/dwarf tp back in and then stygian and grav another minion.. worked a charm limited deaths but really stygian return is great on a 3 minute timer atm. Human is not fun in the early and leads to many deaths as res is nothing.. dwarf 3 slotted with io res buff is brilliant and helps heaps. I slot the dwarf e/drain as an attack and have 3 single, 1 aoe in dwarf, 1 shot minion kill in human when i drop to heal or mire and only use nova on bigger spawns or ones farther away. I find mez hurts when in nova and once on the downward spiral death follows.
Eclipse is great however not a sure life saver as it does run out...am now lvl 42 and loving it. Worth the hard work early on to understand the AT so you can shine when the good powers come along more often
(Peace Shade LVL 42 Justice)
p.s. thanks to all for the guides I have not looked at builds as they do not matter.. My shade kicks when I know what I am doing not following the numbers.. enjoy
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It's a good thing that you said "Generally". Whatever you do, you must adapt. I always look to my combat tab to see what it is thats biting me. I might look for mezzes, and ask myself "Who did them? Can I put them out of action asap? I look for damage types and think "which is worst in my case? Who did that? Can I put them out of action asap? |
Originally Posted by Hermeneas
Generally, my strategy is as follows:
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The entire enemy group, what attacks do they have? What are the limitations of their attacks? If I am doing a stupid amount of mobs at low level how can I split them? On their travel powers? On Line of Sight? On Range?
All the time when thinking, it's not just about fixing the build. It's making changes to how I play, it's looking at the enemy and trying to get to know them.
Options are there, 2 Khelds could probably wander into RV defeat all the AVs between them and not get killed at all themselves if they wanted.
He will honor his words; he will definitely carry out his actions. What he promises he will fulfill. He does not care about his bodily self, putting his life and death aside to come forward for another's troubled besiegement. He does not boast about his ability, or shamelessly extol his own virtues. - Sima Qian.
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The AT (when played triform) does require a certain amount of mental flexibility that I dare say few other (if any) ATs require. Right off the bat: In Dwarf, you have access to 1) additional survivability in the form of +res & +HP, 2) a heal, and 3) an AoE attack you can use that also makes said heal do more damage, if only for a little while.|
Originally Posted by Hermeneas
I'm running at +0/x3 right now. I attempted to bump it up a bit higher in the hopes of having more corpses to fuel my Mires/Stygian Circle, but that only led to me faceplanting faster.
Generally, my strategy is as follows: With a combination of Shadow Cloak and Sprint with a +Stealth IO, I get myself into the best possible position to target the majority of any given group. I then use Gravitic Emanation to stun them/knock the stragglers into the rest of the group. That's followed up by my Mires, and then a quick shift to Nova to lay down the AoE goodness. Then I use a mixture of Nova and human attacks (I'm only recently finding slots to spare to devote to the Dwarf attacks, so I believe only Smite is enhanced) to mop things up, assuming that I haven't been beaten to death yet. Generally, that works fairly well. Things die, I move on with my life. But there are times that, for reasons that I can't begin to fathom, things are killing me before I can kill them. It happened occasionally earlier on, but it's happening more and more often as time passes. I don't actually have access to Mids right now, but if I recall correctly, I'm running with about ~40% global recharge and Hasten. That's the most noteworthy thing, as my build was centered around recharge bonuses - I'd like to get some more defense in there, but given my budget (read: I'm broke as hell), I can't afford purples, so getting the amount of recharge I wanted meant that I couldn't fit in many defense bonuses at all, let alone ones that I would have room for at my current level. Honestly, I'm thinking that it might just be that the play style isn't compatible with my way of doing things. The closest I've ever come to relying on bodies/enemies to consistently heal/buff me was using Dark Regeneration on my Staff/Dark Brute, and even taking that into consideration, I'm not used to branching out of my 'toggle up and hit things until they die' mindset. Could that be the problem? |
A few more things:
If I recall correctly, Dechs doesn't do this himself, but I 6-slot both Emanations and put a +range in the 6th slot. That's so I can target more things from farther away. You'd be surprised what a difference that makes, but you can always un-slot it later if it's not to your liking.
Building for defense is a bit overrated for a Warshade because of your other mitigation tools: stuns, heals, resists, mez protection, and, of course, damage. You can also make use of purple inspirations when they drop, as well as insp_combine binds for when you have a bunch of inspirations that aren't purple.
One more thing: you're a level away from having fluffies. That's a nice buff to your other mitigation tool-- insane amounts of damage.
All that said: at what point in your tactics do you usually find yourself defeated?
Something to consider would be doing a respec.
As a tri-form it's not a bad idea to do one once you're in the mid to late 20's and focus slots in your control powers in human form (g. emanination and g. well). Specifically I found slotting g.well as a hold or frankenslotting it for damage/hold helped while leveling up to help. As anything that wasn't stunned I could throw the hold on immediately after and keep blasting away in nova, this came in handy when i'd stun most of the mob but the mezzer or sapper would be missed.
Slotting dwarf attacks as to use this form for your ST damage while you level up. This will help with your problem of always feeling like your dying, pre-eclipse. So if it comes down to you fightning stragglers with no bodies nearby, you'll have an easier time staying on your feet.
You could also consider taking any slots you put into your ST nova blasts and only slotting the cone and aoe. Thus leaving you with additional slots to put into dwarf attacks, leaving you with dwarf for ST damage, nova for aoe and human form for control at the moment.
Last but not least, inspirations. Not just managing your inspirations but using them regularly and making use of inspiration combining macros will no doubt make things easier. Anytime you have to spend combining inspirations manually, is time you should be spending finding more bodies. Hesitation will kill you.
Hope that helps.
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Part of it might be that the game is just simply tough on warshades before you get your pets and unchain, but that is only a factor. Tell me, do you leverage Gravity Well to knock out the problem targets before you start the AoE madness? And are you making sure to switch back to human to use Stygian Circle whenever you start to lose health? I've found that it's easy to get into the mindset where you just want to race them and blast them before they kill you--but if you forgo switching back and forth to keep yourself healed and such you suffer a greater DPS loss being dead than you would by switching to keep yourself alive. |
Originally Posted by Hermeneas
I'm running at +0/x3 right now. I attempted to bump it up a bit higher in the hopes of having more corpses to fuel my Mires/Stygian Circle, but that only led to me faceplanting faster.
Generally, my strategy is as follows: With a combination of Shadow Cloak and Sprint with a +Stealth IO, I get myself into the best possible position to target the majority of any given group. I then use Gravitic Emanation to stun them/knock the stragglers into the rest of the group. That's followed up by my Mires, and then a quick shift to Nova to lay down the AoE goodness. Then I use a mixture of Nova and human attacks (I'm only recently finding slots to spare to devote to the Dwarf attacks, so I believe only Smite is enhanced) to mop things up, assuming that I haven't been beaten to death yet. Generally, that works fairly well. Things die, I move on with my life. But there are times that, for reasons that I can't begin to fathom, things are killing me before I can kill them. It happened occasionally earlier on, but it's happening more and more often as time passes. I don't actually have access to Mids right now, but if I recall correctly, I'm running with about ~40% global recharge and Hasten. That's the most noteworthy thing, as my build was centered around recharge bonuses - I'd like to get some more defense in there, but given my budget (read: I'm broke as hell), I can't afford purples, so getting the amount of recharge I wanted meant that I couldn't fit in many defense bonuses at all, let alone ones that I would have room for at my current level. Honestly, I'm thinking that it might just be that the play style isn't compatible with my way of doing things. The closest I've ever come to relying on bodies/enemies to consistently heal/buff me was using Dark Regeneration on my Staff/Dark Brute, and even taking that into consideration, I'm not used to branching out of my 'toggle up and hit things until they die' mindset. Could that be the problem? |
Which is why building defense before you're adept at playing the AT could be a bad thing, and handicaps you from learning key survival traits.
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I definitely agree. |
Originally Posted by Dechs Kaison
While this is true, I actually feel it's overstated.
Playing up Eclipse as this god-making ability is accurate, but it makes people forget how important Gravitic Emanation is. I tried to bring that out in my warshade video. |
I had a great paragraph typed out with some pointers, when I accidentally hit back and it all went poof. I'll give a condensed version.
If you're worried you might go down, and for some reason you can't Stygian Circle (no bodies, no end, mezzed) you could take/use Nebulous Form. It's not a game changer, but it'll help out in the times where you really need a second to recover. I mostly use it to get through crowded doorways (curse you MMs.)
Maybe find/create a bind for your targeting that auto-targets mobs of interest for you. (Cysts, Voids, Quantums, Sappers, Surgeons, are what I target first.)
Instead of TPing in/out of mobs all the time, try jumping out from Dwarf (after miring) and shift to Nova in mid-air. This gives you some backwards inertia and lets you get a good view of the mob for AoEs.
Hope this helps!
Paragon Studios, thanks for all you've done. You've made this a great game, and a great community. I see this as six years well-spent. NCSoft, I'm seriously disappointed in you. This is not how you get or keep customers.
Even at level 50, mez protection for Human form isn't that great. I'm in the habit of converting inspirations to Break Frees. If I get mezzed, I can pop to Drawf quickly, fire a heal and a mire, pop a Break Free, then go back to Human form to do whatever I need to do.
Actually, Dwarf form provides kind of a nice breather in general. I tend to use it most when fighting EBs while soloing and there's aren't any more bodies around to Styg Circle from.
Lady Deacon, 50 ill/ff
Cinder Imp, 50 fa/wm
and many more!
Utilizing Gravity Well effectively is one of the reasons that I'm constantly stealthing around in a mission. It lets me take a good look at the group and see what they have to offer - if I spot an enemy that happens to con a bit higher than the rest, a void/quantum, a mezzer, etc. they're subjected to a mired Gravity Well before the AoE barrage.
While that generally works fairly well (at least to hold them, given that it doesn't kill them in one shot, more often than not), it's generally futile. I either a) can't kill things fast enough to generate enough corpses to heal myself, or b) don't yet have the reaction time required to react to any given shifts in the battle.
As far as the switching back and forth thing goes, don't get me wrong, I don't linger in any one form for an extended period of time. I have the recharge to pull off a Nova cone--aoe--cone fairly quickly, and then, depending on how many enemies are still alive (again, assuming that I'm not dead by this point, which, let's be real, I usually am), I switch to the appropriate form: either Human for better damage at the cost of high resistances, or Dwarf to deal a bit less damage, but to attempt to handle the attacks being thrown at me.
I'm starting to think that I just suck. xD
I definitely don't think it's an issue of whether you suck or not. To clarify, you're not trying to take the alpha when you're grouped, right? That can be done with little to no problems when you've got Eclipse and your strategy down, but it can be an issue without those two things.
Paragon Studios, thanks for all you've done. You've made this a great game, and a great community. I see this as six years well-spent. NCSoft, I'm seriously disappointed in you. This is not how you get or keep customers.
It sounds like you're doing things right. I imagine it's either your build or certain enemies giving you issues. And sometimes, just plain bad luck. Hang in there, it'll get better...and in the meantime, try to get us your build when you can so we can look it over for you.
And also, if you're on Freedom, I'd be more than happy to run a few missions with you and give you pointers along the way. My global is @Anilo
Just let me know!
Paragon Studios, thanks for all you've done. You've made this a great game, and a great community. I see this as six years well-spent. NCSoft, I'm seriously disappointed in you. This is not how you get or keep customers.
It looks like you main out of Virtue, so you may want to look up Dechs and hang with him, see if he can spot anything out of the ordinary. And of course, I would be remiss not to add an invitation to join Kheldian Fridays on Protector if you ever get the chance.
I tend to solo more often than not, but I've only ever taken the alpha on one particular team, when I was the only non-squishy around. Generally, I'll let the meatshields take the alpha before porting in and getting my mire on. Most of my survival problems exist when I'm soloing, really.
Now, semi-related question. Would trying a Peacebringer be a horrible idea? I know that the majority of people seem to prefer Warshades, but as I look over what Peacebringers have to offer, they really seem more up my alley - self-contained, and more of a toggle and go mindset, particularly if I go human-form.
Perhaps trying my hand at one of them would prove an easier transition than going straight to Warshades?
Do you have Starless Step? I am not saying it will solve your problems but often leveling up builds do not often have the high level of defense most people have when they talk about succeeding with their Warshades. I would sometime TP a Void out, do him as a few of the entire group come if any and do them then finish off the rest abit more safely. It's that or hang out in Dwarf or use BFs.
Do you have a macro to combine BFs quick?
Do you have a macro to pick out key targets quick?
He will honor his words; he will definitely carry out his actions. What he promises he will fulfill. He does not care about his bodily self, putting his life and death aside to come forward for another's troubled besiegement. He does not boast about his ability, or shamelessly extol his own virtues. - Sima Qian.
Being mezzed isn't the problem. I've always made sure that I have a healthy supply of break frees on characters that don't already have any form of mez protection. While I'm not entirely sure what, exactly, it is that's causing mobs to eat me alive, I know for sure that it isn't mezzers.
As far as any macros to pick out key targets, no, I don't have one. But as I've said, they're my first targets if they happen to be there. I use a combination of Shadow Cloak and a +Stealth IO to scout out groups before I fight them, and any particularly dangerous enemies are held/stunned/promptly dealt with before I turn my attention to the rest of the group.
On that note, no, I haven't taken Starless Step. While it might be handy to have it in order to teleport high priority targets, they're generally dealt with before the rest of the enemies start to beat me to death. =P
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You should definitely give it a shot. They're quite different beasts, you may find you like one more than the other. But I would recommend taking that shade as far as you can, and don't give up early. The lower levels can be harder on newbie kheld players.
|
Originally Posted by Hermeneas
Now, semi-related question. Would trying a Peacebringer be a horrible idea? I know that the majority of people seem to prefer Warshades, but as I look over what Peacebringers have to offer, they really seem more up my alley - self-contained, and more of a toggle and go mindset, particularly if I go human-form.
Perhaps trying my hand at one of them would prove an easier transition than going straight to Warshades? |
Lots of great advice from the best here.. Sometimes in a mob it is not good to target the toughest first with GW..4 slots in GW (even 1 acc, 2dam and a rec) single shots most even con minions..thus a corpse..I am remembering pre-eclipse my pattern
Check out the mob..mez/sappers/quants etc.. click through all of them (slow but gives me a number and an idea)...if it is ok then stealth in..GW one..dwarf..mire (take alpha) humab mire...dwarf mire..nova aoe madness (1 of each)..stygian circle ...then usually dwarf last man standing...worked very well... check out dechs guide as he has some great binds in there (i use TP, insp combine to BF's, auto change tray when switch bind, unchain essence bind (drops to human, targets corpse and turns soul to bomb...) styg circ bind (drops to human fires off styg circ ) Human Mire (drops human and fires off mire).
These are game changers as i do not have to click 2 buttons...(1 button to human and fire off power and then 2 to back into what ever form I now require). I also use the fluffy bind and now an eclipse as well.. try those binds as it can speed up life saving powers...
p.s. persist it is much more fun than my ss/shield tank with capped def and res to everything.. sitting in +4/8 and mashing a few buttons as they never seem to drop his hp below 80%...this toon is one that feels like a super...the fun of mob to mob bouncing from near death to full life is a blast...
Hey there, everyone! As the title states, I'm new to Kheldians - I did try my hand at a Peacebringer a while back, but they quickly fell to the sidelines for reasons that I can't recall at the moment. Recently, however, in my attempt to take at least one of every AT to 50, I thought that I'd give Kheldians another look.
I've always found myself fascinated by Warshades. While, indeed, the playstyle of Peacebringers, from what I've heard, seems more up my alley (relying more on the buffs/heals/whatever they can give to themselves without having to rely on corpses), I've seen Warshades do amazing things, and thought that I'd give one a shot.
Thus, my newest character was born: Epstein. I've taken him to level 31 thus far, and while he is indeed somewhat fun, particularly given the insane damage bonuses I can rack up from double miring and then switching to Nova to lay down the AoEs, I find that it's not quite what I had hoped.
Perhaps I've just been spoiled by soft-capped the Brutes/Scrappers/Stalkers that I normally play, but I find myself dying. A lot. It seems that no matter what I do, what combinations of attacks I use, what stuns or holds or other mitigation that I attempt to utilize to prolong my survivability, I inevitably end up faceplanting.
Is this something that is natural for Warshades pre-Eclipse? Is it something I'm just going to have to deal with? Indeed, when working up my build (which I can post up later, if it matters at all), I didn't have much room to work in defense set bonuses with all the recharge I was going for, but I've never died this much, on any character.
I'm not on a particularly high difficult setting, either (I'm presently attempting to play on +0/x3, in order to give myself larger mobs, and, consequently, more bodies to feast of off), and there isn't any particular enemy group that is causing me problems. Save maybe the Council, I'm getting my Kheldian behind served to me on a silver platter.
So, long story short, I'm looking for help. I want to love playing a Warshade. I'm having some fun playing a Warshade. But this constantly dying thing isn't fun at all. So, I'm turning to you. If you can offer any advice, personal experience with such problems, or whatever, it's greatly appreciated. While I may indeed have to face the fact that Warshades just don't play the way that I'm used to, I don't like giving up. Thanks in advance!