[skill]Leaping Mantis Sting[/skill] [skill]Jungle Strike[/skill] [skill]Trampling Ox[/skill] [skill]Palm Strike[/skill] [skill]Blades of Steel[/skill] [skill]Shadow Walk[/skill] [skill]Healing Signet[/skill] [skill]Dash[/skill]
Dagger: 12 +1 +1
Tactics: 8
Critical Strike: rest + 1 (Around 10 points if I recall correctly)
Insigna are all Radiant
Basically, generally stick with your group, and dash to cap points as soon as possible. For battles, be patient. Shadow Walk to a moving target; either someone retreating, or someone approching but that doesn't have you as their target and throw Leaping Mantis Sting for the cripple, then do the rest of the chain. Note that if necessary, you can use the whole chain without the cripple: You simply will have less damage and no knockdown. The chain (with the cripple) is usually enough to kill the standard AB caster. Feel free to target anything that is moving that your team mates are also attacking, of course. Note that since the whole chain has 5MP cost and the refresh time is relatively low, it is perfectly possible to throw a second chain a short time afterward to finish the target or to get another one. Oh, also note that you can go Palm Strike-> Trampling Ox to save time on an already-crippled target if you want a quicker knockdown. As soon as the target is dead, use Dash to cancel your Shadow Walk and resume the shrine capping/head for another shrine/help with the current remaining fighting while waiting for your ressources to come back.
Just keep in mind that even if you are at very low hit points, you are still a threat to an enemy group as long as you are alive. If you get under heavy fire, or get blinded or similar things, use Dash to return to your original point, run away as far as you need to be safe, and heal up between fights with Healing Signet. Use the same strategy for capping shrines, as you can actually solo-cap most shrines if necessary. Shadow Step in, use the chain to kill an NPC, Dash to cancel and run out of range, Healing Signet yourself, and run in to kill the second. Try to avoid using Healing Signet during fights for obvious reasons.
If capping with a group, use the same strategy, and it's just fine if you are the one taking the damage for the group: While you are waiting for the capping bar to fill, you'll have more than enough time to get back to full HP with the signet, MP getting back to full by itself in that time.
To conclude, you have great killing power, the always useful cripple, and good survivability as long as you remember not to over commit and to bail out before it's too late. Better to live and not make a kill than try too hard and die... You'll get another chance before 30 seconds anyway.
Okay, sorry for overexplaining... Okay, here are the problems with RA and TB:
1) Need a [skill]Resurection Signet[/skill] of course, but pretty much every skill in the current bar is necessary for the build to work.
2) To survive and be effective, this build needs a lot of space for movement. It's not really available in those modes.
3) Fights are usually longer than in AB, due to res signet and so on. So, MP is a problem.
4) Due to point #2, Shadow Walk is pretty meh in that format. But without Shadow Walk, it is much harder to actually land Leaping Mantis Sting on a moving target, and if you can't land Leaping Mantis Sting then you lose part of the use of the build.
5) Blocking is a pain. Yes, you can avoid the stance-tanks and keep them for last, but you can't really avoid Ward against Melee and Guardian and the like. Sure, Palm Strike will land against everything, and although it has some damage, it's not amazing by itself.
So... am I wasting my time trying to tweak a build that can't possibly work in RA/TB? Am I deluding myself in thinking that my AB build is actually pretty decent?
All comments and suggestions welcome! If you think it's pure junk, go ahead and say it, as long as you give an explanation as to why
Thanks!
