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Intimacy wrote on 2015-09-23 07:39
I Appreciate any and all help, sorry if it sounds like I'm being very contrary with any of the help, i'm just trying to get my questions answered and any head up my ass falsities i have in my head torn down before i ultimately decide which way i go.
Okay so it basically comes down to this, i'm level 4k with roughly 11k ap to throw around, my current stat spread looks like this.
http://i.imgur.com/6lz55af.png
I feel weak as shit, my puppets aren't bad but my bow damage feels really disgustingly low and i'm not sure mag 20 gloves will fix that, currently no mag reforge on my gloves. Range as a whole has felt really lackluster lately
Now my question here is i still have 1 100% ap reset cap, should i throw in the towel and just pump all of my ap into int strength will and luck? Since i know guns are heavy crit reliant.
I'm fairly sure 11k ap sunk into just those would put me farther ahead than where i am now as far as damage goes, even without a godly gunner set, i could reuse my entire enchanted set atm because it seems like most endgame enchants are the same unless you're using magic, and nothing of mine is perfectly reforged so i could just aim for a different reforge lol
The pro's about this skill set that i like, it's flexable, it's ranged, IT DOESN'T MISS, OH GOD I HATE MISSING, DYING BECAUSE A MAG MISSES MAKES ME CRY EVERY TIME and quite obviously it does great damage.
I don't know enough about it to know all the cons, please list them for me before i go jumping head first into something i may just regret lol
I've never done anything magic related so this'll be entirely new to me having to rank that shit for int if i do go through with it, are there any really good gimme int skills? like 100 ap for shit loads of int, i think composing is one of them, but i don't really know anything else.
*Edit* I'm probably resetting all my ap later tonight anyways because i want to 100% train ninja during the 4x ninja exp week
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Darkboy132 wrote on 2015-09-23 10:32
I would say stay with puppet for an actual meatshield and strong damage. Guns require significantly more stats to even compete with anything, and it puts you in danger because even Shooting Rush forces everything to aggro you. The skillset barely provides stats, and higher Crit is unnecessary as Shooting Rush and Way of the Gun ignore protection for crit calc.
On top of that, the entire skillset has more flaws to the point where almost every skill it has is arguably worthless. It generally centralizes around SR, WotG, and Mastery, and even then some of those have cons.
- Normal Shots: Something you wouldn't exactly be using that often, unless WotG of course. The shots stun very briefly even if they crit, and you have to be in close proximity, so you're very liable to getting hit with this. Also it can miss randomly for some stupid reason (luck evasion?)
- Reload: Just shortens reload time. Decent, but not that much of a big priority.
- Grapple Shot: Reels you in closer to someone. This skill is outright terrible for numerous reasons: range isn't that big (to the point where you're still in aggro range), doesn't damage until the end, doesn't root enemies in place, and the execution is slow. Meaning you're very liable to get hit or the enemy can move too far away for subsequent attacks.
- Flash Launcher: "Sweet damage"? Gotta get in very close, and gunner can't approach reliably.
- Bullet Slide: Single target pushback. Decent, but with Shooting Rush you're almost always in multi-aggro situations, plus you're better off Windmilling instead.
- Shooting Rush: "Bread and butter" with high damage and relatively short cooldown over a wide area, only issue that it forces aggro on everything it hits. There's also some weird "lockdown" thing that happens if you button mash, forcing your character to face where the cursor was when it happened and can only attack in that direction, until you cancel loading.
- Bullet Storm: Fairly powerful, but it's longer cooldown makes it harder to compete with Shooting Rush, and it's small range makes it difficult to land. Also has the "lockdown".
- Way of the Gun: "Final Hit"-esque, forces all normal shots to be crits with no dura usage (in-game says all gun skills crit but that's a lie.) This is probably the only skill that doesn't have any notable issue.
Gunner is really more of an endgame thing. Even if you were to reset I doubt it'd be any better than any other skillset with a proper stat build at the current moment. It won't bode well when you're practically killing yourself with Shooting Rush and squishiness.
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alwmiioktm wrote on 2015-09-23 13:33
Well your str and dex are a bit lopsided for puppet to be doing crazy crowd clearing numbers. Also yea range is a pretty gear heavy investment, but once you invest in said gear the difference becomes pretty big. Magnum shot/ crash shot gloves and a decent Bow or Xbow make a world of difference and I wouldn't judge range until you've been able to see it at full potential. That is if the only thing is bothering you is the damage aspect rather then mechanical aspects of it. Otherwise magic is a class id recommend that is a lot less gear dependent aside from having a decent magic attack staff.
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Intimacy wrote on 2015-09-23 14:09
Quote from alwmiioktm;1287230:
Well your str and dex are a bit lopsided for puppet to be doing crazy crowd clearing numbers. Also yea range is a pretty gear heavy investment, but once you invest in said gear the difference becomes pretty big. Magnum shot/ crash shot gloves and a decent Bow or Xbow make a world of difference and I wouldn't judge range until you've been able to see it at full potential. That is if the only thing is bothering you is the damage aspect rather then mechanical aspects of it. Otherwise magic is a class id recommend that is a lot less gear dependent aside from having a decent magic attack staff.
It wasn't exactly just that, constantly missing mags really does annoy me, guns don't seem to miss and honestly I'm finding them very fun to actually play lol, i'm resetting my entire account later after maint because i want to destroy ninja with 4x exp anyways, so I'll have a week or two before i make my final choice, off the top of your head would you be fully able to say the difference between mag 15-20 gloves and no magnum gloves would be enough of a power spike to change my mind on my magnum damages?
Following along on that path, if i take the 2-3k ap i invested into my martial arts, take the hit to my crit and focus on just boosting my strength to much higher levels to match my dex would i see a much higher investment for damage overall with my puppets? Because i know not having 30% crit rate on everything lowers your damage really drastically, especially when you're relying on redstones.
If i had to guess off the top of my head, adding ninja and 2-3k more ap worth of strength might make me hit 800-1k? strength
Guns are easily the most fun to play with skill set I've tried, i enjoy them more than my ranged, and puppets seem to be entirely useless in alban lol they get 1 shot by everything so that instantly limits my ability to run that dungeon since i don't melee and have 500 strength essentially sitting their useless for my alban runs, while a pure int/str build might just make me hit 1k 1k with str/int
If it sounds like i'm talking with a hole in my head please call me on it, I'm not trying to pull back from what you suggested or to be contrary, i do honestly fully agree with you, I'm just making counter points so i learn more and get all the information i need for when i make the choice
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callback wrote on 2015-09-23 14:19
Go for str-giving talents. You mentioned wanting to train ninja, that's good. Round out melee for str and so you can bash your way through anything tough. If you have the AP to spare, throw it at lance just to get the talent-bonus str. And work on important outside skills (mining is insanely easy to r1, and carpentry+dischord can be worth the grind).
High str lets you keep your puppets which you seem more comfortable with for now, gives you a good abusable bash spam for tough single mobs, and starts your baseline for gunner. Gunner, as stated above, is a talent that wants you to have a good statline *before* going in. I say to go for str because it fits better with what you already use as a puppeteer, and because it's the harder one to earn. Going for int is super AP- efficient and can be done after.
Oh, and as for grapple and flash launcher? It's a counter counter combo. Grapple hits through counterattack(non-NS mobs) as a ranged move, applies a large hitstun, and puts you directly in flash launcher range. FL is also your followup if you ever have to use defense with guns, and def->FL->WM->Def... is your ONLY gunner way of dealing with oversized hitbox mobs. Melee attacks go from the edge of the hitboxes while ranged go from the centers. When a mob outranges you with its melee, gun's lack of hitstun means you get smacked every time. FL, as a melee skill, is the only thing you can counter them with from the edge of their hitbox, but since it's a smash you need to bait them into proccing or using defense for it to do any good.
Edit: If you reset fighter, keep chain mastery. It's ultra-AP efficient for will/crit.
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Intimacy wrote on 2015-09-23 14:31
Quote from callback;1287237:
Go for str-giving talents. You mentioned wanting to train ninja, that's good. Round out melee for str and so you can bash your way through anything tough. If you have the AP to spare, throw it at lance just to get the talent-bonus str. And work on important outside skills (mining is insanely easy to r1, and carpentry+dischord can be worth the grind).
High str lets you keep your puppets which you seem more comfortable with for now, gives you a good abusable bash spam for tough single mobs, and starts your baseline for gunner. Gunner, as stated above, is a talent that wants you to have a good statline *before* going in. I say to go for str because it fits better with what you already use as a puppeteer, and because it's the harder one to earn. Going for int is super AP- efficient and can be done after.
Oh, and as for grapple and flash launcher? It's a counter counter combo. Grapple hits through counterattack(non-NS mobs) as a ranged move, applies a large hitstun, and puts you directly in flash launcher range. FL is also your followup if you ever have to use defense with guns, and def->FL->WM->Def... is your ONLY gunner way of dealing with oversized hitbox mobs. Melee attacks go from the edge of the hitboxes while ranged go from the centers. When a mob outranges you with its melee, gun's lack of hitstun means you get smacked every time. FL, as a melee skill, is the only thing you can counter them with from the edge of their hitbox, but since it's a smash you need to bait them into proccing or using defense for it to do any good.
Edit: If you reset fighter, keep chain mastery. It's ultra-AP efficient for will/crit.
I guess that does make sense, Maybe i'm too zero'd in on endgame thinking with my ap i COULD hit endgame int/str combos after i burn through it all
After running alban heroic with some friends my ranged damage just felt so god damn weak vs their magic/gunning and i've been hearing non stop about how ranged got shafted really hard with the combat reworks, and as said above, i couldn't even use my puppets in alban because those stupid things get 1 shot, so my strength feels wasted at endgame content :C
My thought process was focusing 100% on guns would lazer focus my entire build so hard none of my extra stats get wasted making me stronger overall.
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Rynn wrote on 2015-09-23 14:44
Most ap/effort/equipment efficient skills for alban are magic (firebolt/ball/lightning rod) and final hit.
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Darkboy132 wrote on 2015-09-23 18:59
Quote from callback;1287237:
Oh, and as for grapple and flash launcher? It's a counter counter combo. Grapple hits through counterattack(non-NS mobs) as a ranged move, applies a large hitstun, and puts you directly in flash launcher range. FL is also your followup if you ever have to use defense with guns, and def->FL->WM->Def... is your ONLY gunner way of dealing with oversized hitbox mobs. Melee attacks go from the edge of the hitboxes while ranged go from the centers. When a mob outranges you with its melee, gun's lack of hitstun means you get smacked every time. FL, as a melee skill, is the only thing you can counter them with from the edge of their hitbox, but since it's a smash you need to bait them into proccing or using defense for it to do any good.
In early games, sure. But in Alban, it's basically rushing straight into hell's gate, with no bullets making it inside.
Unless you're fighting a derpy AI, GS isn't completely reliable due to various flaws. In addition to the mob running away, displacement can put your character even further away, so by the time you reach them their hitstun would end and they can hit you out of FL.
Also a few years back, Grapple and Slide targets the mob's hitbox edge instead of their center like melee; for a Giant Spider on the other side of a regular dungeon room, you were "too close" to use GS but "just close enough" to use BS. However, last I checked a couple months ago, they might've changed it to their standard "target hitbox center".
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ironwoman wrote on 2015-09-23 22:14
There's also an issue of simply being able to shoot from afar, which is nothing to scoff at in places like Alban. Whenever people think about resetting after level 1k, I say nope. Why? You're going to rank those skills anyway, I really don't think you'd get much further ahead.
Real talk, like you said, your bow damage simply isn't strong yet, well... because your stats are lacking and so are your gears. My view is that range generally gets to be useful once you can reach 1k dex (with or without talent, doesn't matter), and you have magnum 20 gloves to back up for it. Oh, and also CRC or Bhafel Combo.
That being said, even if you reset your skills into str and int, I don't think you would be very far in guns either. For one thing, it's probably as grindy if not grindier as range. Most str and int skills are as easy as pie, but then you go into hills called gunner, ninja, engineering, and magic craft. AND you still need gears for guns. For magic, without a decent staff, you still won't be providing much, and for firebolt, you still would want a max damage set. You can always beef up your str for the FH meta as well, but resetting in general isn't a great idea right now. Best you can do is up your gear game.
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Intimacy wrote on 2015-09-24 02:04
After mauling this over I think i've figured out a game plan, talked to you guys, talked to my guild leader, talked to my old guild leader, what i've settled on is reranking everything i had, trading the ap from fighter to ninja, so that's a huge str boost with a 75 will loss, putting me roughly at 800 dex 800 str without titles.
From there i was told WOTG, shooting rush, bullet storm, reload and dual gun mastery are the only real skills i'd require from the skillset to really use it, after that i may throw any spare ap into my int for bonus damage for when i want to use guns. since dexwhoring takes forever i should have the ap in great amounts just sitting there waiting to be thrown into reranking my magic tab.
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Darkboy132 wrote on 2015-09-24 07:10
Cross off Bullet Storm or put it last on the priority list. It's very difficult to use it to its full potential due to its tiny range, enemy count requirement, and extremely high ammunition cost, and even then Shooting Rush outperforms it.
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Esileruf wrote on 2015-09-24 12:11
Not having bullet storm severely hinders the aoe damage burst that gunner has. I don't use it in normal running, but when you get high monster counts in dense areas (Lord missions or MA), it with SR do quite a bit of damage together, high enough with 1000+ window damage that a crit on either or both can clean house.
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callback wrote on 2015-09-24 14:54
Quote from Darkboy132;1287254:
In early games, sure. But in Alban, it's basically rushing straight into hell's gate, with no bullets making it inside.
Unless you're fighting a derpy AI, GS isn't completely reliable due to various flaws. In addition to the mob running away, displacement can put your character even further away, so by the time you reach them their hitstun would end and they can hit you out of FL.
Also a few years back, Grapple and Slide targets the mob's hitbox edge instead of their center like melee; for a Giant Spider on the other side of a regular dungeon room, you were "too close" to use GS but "just close enough" to use BS. However, last I checked a couple months ago, they might've changed it to their standard "target hitbox center".
It's for 1v1s. Obviously you don't use it against hyper multi like alban, or normal multi like if you SR a room. Gunner has 2 main modes: AoE kiting, and 1v1 lockdown.
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Darkboy132 wrote on 2015-09-24 18:39
Quote from Esileruf;1287324:
Not having bullet storm severely hinders the aoe damage burst that gunner has. I don't use it in normal running, but when you get high monster counts in dense areas (Lord missions or MA), it with SR do quite a bit of damage together, high enough with 1000+ window damage that a crit on either or both can clean house.
Those are pretty rare situations, but in areas like hard Shadow Missions, Abyss, or Alban where enemies are scattered everywhere its effectiveness is pretty small. I'm not saying it's completely useless, it's just something not really worth prioritizing over.
Quote from callback;1287330:
It's for 1v1s. Obviously you don't use it against hyper multi like alban, or normal multi like if you SR a room. Gunner has 2 main modes: AoE kiting, and 1v1 lockdown.
I won't deny that it's a good first strike tactic provided the target does not have instant aggro, but it's very difficult to consistently land in the middle of combat due to how easily interruptible it is.
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callback wrote on 2015-09-25 13:39
Quote from Darkboy132;1287348:
I won't deny that it's a good first strike tactic provided the target does not have instant aggro, but it's very difficult to consistently land in the middle of combat due to how easily interruptible it is.
which is why I said grapple->FL combo is used exclusively as a counter counter.