This post is inspired by Dukesloth’s “sword and shield issues” video. In this he lists all the problems with SnS’s abilities (namely the left tree. I’m going to try to add to the discussion.)
The sword master tree doesn’t seem to have a goal and most of the perks seem to be almost randomly tossed in. There isn’t a clear goal if its meant to be a durable sustain fighter, a squishy assassin or a more utility tree, so I’ll dissect it to the best of my ability one talent at a time.
Start from the top row and skipping abilities and their upgrades we start off with:
Empowered stab: Successful heavy attacks give you 30% empower for 5s.
This is fine. You preform a successful heavy and gain a fairly large benefit, and given how fast SnS light attacks are its a solid duration.
Achilles’ heel: The final hit in your light attack chain inflicts a 20% slow for 2s.
Normally this would be a bit of a joke if it weren’t for a perk later on. 20% slow only after getting 3 successful attacks off doesn’t feel that great to put a point in, but the point later on is helpful.
Precision: Sword and Shield critical strike chance increased by 10%
Solid perk. Just a pure stat increase but has nice synergy with a perk later on in the tree.
Freeing Justice: Successfully hitting a heavy attack causes you to lose 1 debuff.
Not my favorite. It can be helpful in some scenarios but not exactly one of my top priorities to put points into for PvE. In PvP it can be passable.
Mobility: Move 33% Faster while blocking.
This perk feels like it wandered into the wrong tree. Without a doubt it belongs more in the defender side than the swordmaster. There is nothing offiensive or DPS about this specially when you consider successfully blocking something will stop your movement. Even as a PvE tank I usually opt out of this. This perk is just bad.
Counter Attack: When you block an attack gain 3% empower for 5s (Max 5 stacks)
This is a great one. Even when I’m running light armor and round shield I tend to pick this one up. Getting rewarded for blocking with an extra bit of return damage is nice. Great perk I always get it in PvP and PvE.
Opportunist: Deal 10% more damage to slowed foes
This is what makes Achilles’ heel worth getting. In swordmaster you get a slow from leaping strike (30% for 3s) and the 2s slow from Achilles heel. This has great synergy with malachite gems and the 200 str perk. You can also pick up Intimidating shield rush for the 30% slow for 4s to help add to the count. Unfortunately this will make you realize most people aren’t just going to let you get 3 lights off on them to get that 2s slow for an easy proc. Amazing perk that stands out in the swordmaster tree.
Confidence: While at full health, deal 15% more damage.
Garbage. There is no scenario in PvP or PvE where you’re going to have this perk for more than MAYBE one attack if you’re lucky. Most of the time you’ll just lose this to a stray attack. Sure it has synergy with the same gem but this is just a bad idea. Even stacking lifesteal isn’t going to help this perk because as a melee you will get hit. Its unavoidable.
Critical precision: On critical, gain 20% haste for 5s
This is a solid perk. Between this and Opportunist there seems to be some semblance of an idea that sword and shield should be a sticky prolonged fighter.
Leadership: While holding a sword all members of your group deal 10% increased damage>
I have mixed feelings on this, yes it is outright amazing for stats and having one on your team is absolutely noticeable this really doesn’t feel great to have when you’re the one using SnS. You don’t feel the full benefit and its just another ‘increase damage’ function SnS has. I’d much prefer to have something a bit more active than this but I’ll keep it. Its still pretty good
So this leaves us with: 3 Perks in swordmaster that don’t give any additional damage. 4 Perks that leave us with conditional damage increases (Empowered stab, opportunist, counter attack and confidence) and only 2 talents with any significant gameplay changing impacts (opportunist and empowered stab)
This also means the series of events is a bit contradictory for SnS.
You want to start off with leaping strike for gap closing and it has a slow… but you should start with a heavy attack for that 5s empower so that you are double dipping in two different empowers. Additionally leaping strike itself is condictory being a leap that deals more damage to lower health targets, do they want you to not use this until your target is low? Or is this your starting gap closer to get into range? Or do you use it exclusively to slow your opponent?
Reverse stab is unlikely to land unless your target is stunned and you’re always better off with just light attacking instead.
Whirling blade is a joke that is actually smaller than your 3rd light attack hit.
In fact when speccing for dps most of the time you end up having to spec into the defender tree to get abilities that actually sync BETTER with the goal of swordmaster. Shield bash helps land that heavy and shield rush can be used for a slow in the fight after using leaping strike.
So clearly this tree was meant to be some sort of sticky… something build but isn’t clear enough what its supposed to do when you have things like whirling blade, confidence, reverse stab and mobility on top of a group buff.
So when you have all these different empowerments on basic attacks, is it any surprise that the scorpio backstab build has ended up as the main SnS damage strat?
EDIT: and none of this is to mention nearly every single SnS ability has its damage being lowered forcing any PvE DPS SnS to just not use abilities in fear of actually lowering their dps more than it already does.
hat about whirling blade? 