Talisman question
- Thread starter Demetry07
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khajja
Master
if your goal is to do well at champs or other end-game content, go berserker. it can hang with rogues and tamers. the defensive dexxer can't put up anywhere near the same damage numbers.
Is it all about dealing massive damage then? I was worried about dieing to fast to even get a hit in.
AreYouKidden
Grandmaster
For CHAMPS, damage determines your score, and while I haven't done either talisman, from what I understand berzerker is your offensive build, when leveled up, you can take down high end mobs in a few hits, but you can't stand toe to toe with them, it's an active playstyle, you hit, and run, while you bandage (if you get hit), and basically close your gap based on your swing timers... With the defensive talisman, you can tank a ton of damage, and stand toe to toe with mobs, they'll take longer to kill, but it can be a very viable method for farming high end mobs for gold, but like khajja said, on champs, it's not going to hold a candle to tamers/rogues.
Don't forget the path of the Magi! That's one I do have experience in, and if magery is your thing, it can put up some great numbers at champs, give you lots of survival with being able to heal using bandages, pots & magic, and is a great all around build. Zerker can out damage them, defenser can out tank (though it does come with a meta daemon tank)... but all in all, good all around build.
Don't forget the path of the Magi! That's one I do have experience in, and if magery is your thing, it can put up some great numbers at champs, give you lots of survival with being able to heal using bandages, pots & magic, and is a great all around build. Zerker can out damage them, defenser can out tank (though it does come with a meta daemon tank)... but all in all, good all around build.
Ludwig
Grandmaster
Zerker is an extremely active style of play, the most engaging of any talisman in my experience (although I can't speak for rogues). You can wear armor whenever you like, you just get crap xp (so level 10 is inherently quite nice to attain for this reason). I die a lot on my zerker. You learn how to joust and you learn what to avoid no matter what (dragons? Easy. Paragon dragons? Nope, nope, nope.).
Defensive is pretty boring because, once you're leveled up with some relics, you can't really die to very much in the way of monsters. Ogre mage and ancient wyrm paragons? Pft, nothing. It's pretty obscene the stuff a defensive can take on and you're oftentimes just sitting in the middle of a group of mobs at a champ and hacking away with a katana.
I don't recommend LJ for either template but do what you want since a zerker in particular has a lot of skill flexibility. Sure, feel free to keep LJ but as a zerker levels up, katanas are the clear winner. Axe whiffs feel like an eternity while caster mobs are lighting you up and you become increasingly dependent on potions as you get Tread leveled (best relic in the game aside from maybe QS). Disarm/rearm potion-drinking macros for LJs are pretty fast but unequipping an axe means any melee hits you receive during that time are going to land 100% (unless you have anatomy and eval). Slayer axes hitting for 200+ is sweet but I'd rather be using the best DPS weapon in the game: katanas.
Meta mages are kind of a middle ground between boring and active. The mana downtime is a real bummer (zerkers never stop, you'll get dizzy at invasion spawns phase shifting everywhere and obliterating stuff in one 300 damage Tread). But being at a distance can be a real relief and your ebolts land for some serious damage if you're rocking a slayer spellbook (don't let people tell you these are too expensive, you'll make the money back in 10 minutes). The Focus relic badly needs a buff.
Oh and cost. You could pick up every defensive relic for less than the cost of Double Strike which isn't even as good as Tread. Meta mage is starting to rise significantly but falls between zerker and defensive.
Defensive is pretty boring because, once you're leveled up with some relics, you can't really die to very much in the way of monsters. Ogre mage and ancient wyrm paragons? Pft, nothing. It's pretty obscene the stuff a defensive can take on and you're oftentimes just sitting in the middle of a group of mobs at a champ and hacking away with a katana.
I don't recommend LJ for either template but do what you want since a zerker in particular has a lot of skill flexibility. Sure, feel free to keep LJ but as a zerker levels up, katanas are the clear winner. Axe whiffs feel like an eternity while caster mobs are lighting you up and you become increasingly dependent on potions as you get Tread leveled (best relic in the game aside from maybe QS). Disarm/rearm potion-drinking macros for LJs are pretty fast but unequipping an axe means any melee hits you receive during that time are going to land 100% (unless you have anatomy and eval). Slayer axes hitting for 200+ is sweet but I'd rather be using the best DPS weapon in the game: katanas.
Meta mages are kind of a middle ground between boring and active. The mana downtime is a real bummer (zerkers never stop, you'll get dizzy at invasion spawns phase shifting everywhere and obliterating stuff in one 300 damage Tread). But being at a distance can be a real relief and your ebolts land for some serious damage if you're rocking a slayer spellbook (don't let people tell you these are too expensive, you'll make the money back in 10 minutes). The Focus relic badly needs a buff.
Oh and cost. You could pick up every defensive relic for less than the cost of Double Strike which isn't even as good as Tread. Meta mage is starting to rise significantly but falls between zerker and defensive.
khajja
Master
Ludwig, at champs I do better on leaderboards with an axe vs a katana as an LJ, considerably better. I think without relics it's a wash. But doublestrike and phaseshift are that much stronger on an LJ...
AreYouKidden
Grandmaster
I agree fully the mana downtime is a real bummer, however, you can manage that at champs as long as you have a shadowy relic, and produce great scores, timing FS's on low level mobs with Dispersion (wiping out 10 mobs at once).
I'd love to see Focus turn into a mana recovery item, 2x active mana regen speed at level 10, every 40 seconds. It would really make the mage playstyle a lot more fun, as your down time would be cut in half between mana dumps, waiting 40 seconds between mana dumps is a real pain.
#FixFocus:
Focus:
Dispersion
The disparity is disgusting.
I'd love to see Focus turn into a mana recovery item, 2x active mana regen speed at level 10, every 40 seconds. It would really make the mage playstyle a lot more fun, as your down time would be cut in half between mana dumps, waiting 40 seconds between mana dumps is a real pain.
#FixFocus:
Focus:
- Level 1 - 5% damage increase (one mob)
- Level 10 - 50% damage increase (one mob)
Dispersion
- Level 1 - 100% damage increase (one mob)
- Level 10 - 1000% damage increase (ten mob)
The disparity is disgusting.
halv
Grandmaster
Zerker is fun, Defenser is boring to level and Meta Mage means flexibility.
At zerker i tried Axer with LJ and i hated the unequip/equip delay for potions. DS dmg is awesome, but it's slow and 2-handed and a zerker is depending on pots a lot.
I tried a Zerker with Archery at level 10 - you miss to often and you'll need open areas to kite the high tier mobs. Sure, you can drink potions with a bow equiped, but even with arms lore you will still miss your target very often.
I dropped Archery for swordmanship and Katana and finally put a phase shift relic on the Zerker tali. It's pure fun. Tread, DS and Phase Shift are awesome relics. I use deadly poison potions for infected wounds relic too, but i really don't like it. It's fun to see the dmg tick when you are bandaging and hiding around the next corner, but that's it.
Defenser is pure grinding. It's boring. At level 10 i dropped parrying for lumberjacking and used the huge stock of double axes from my zerker. I like LJ on a Defenser. It's the only meta talisman you can seriously use for axer pvp.
I started meta mage with Vivify relic. For me it was more important to have a strong tank for dragons and other dispelling mobs then having a mana leech from Shadowy relic.
Playing a Meta mage is awesome. You got diversity and flexibility. Vivify is the cherry on the top. Focus is kind of weak, but dispersion relic procing on a champ will give you this kind of endgame climax.
At zerker i tried Axer with LJ and i hated the unequip/equip delay for potions. DS dmg is awesome, but it's slow and 2-handed and a zerker is depending on pots a lot.
I tried a Zerker with Archery at level 10 - you miss to often and you'll need open areas to kite the high tier mobs. Sure, you can drink potions with a bow equiped, but even with arms lore you will still miss your target very often.
I dropped Archery for swordmanship and Katana and finally put a phase shift relic on the Zerker tali. It's pure fun. Tread, DS and Phase Shift are awesome relics. I use deadly poison potions for infected wounds relic too, but i really don't like it. It's fun to see the dmg tick when you are bandaging and hiding around the next corner, but that's it.
Defenser is pure grinding. It's boring. At level 10 i dropped parrying for lumberjacking and used the huge stock of double axes from my zerker. I like LJ on a Defenser. It's the only meta talisman you can seriously use for axer pvp.
I started meta mage with Vivify relic. For me it was more important to have a strong tank for dragons and other dispelling mobs then having a mana leech from Shadowy relic.
Playing a Meta mage is awesome. You got diversity and flexibility. Vivify is the cherry on the top. Focus is kind of weak, but dispersion relic procing on a champ will give you this kind of endgame climax.
Ludwig
Grandmaster
If I'm only paying 70% attention at a champ, I'll hit #1 score butt naked with a bronze katana if I show up when it pops. Phase Shift damage isn't even worth mentioning but it helps no matter your weapon. Again, axes swing big but caster mobs eat you alive when you hit a string of misses. Much less likely on katana and if you're treading nonstop for 300 damage (which you should be), you're guzzling total refreshes like mad. With katana, you're getting hit half as much as an LJ drinking pots. And it frees up a skill point. I gave up the idea of pvp and run sword/tac/anat/heal/mage/resist/hide. Best invasion/champ/motm farmer template ever.
Athrez
Grandmaster
I have a maxed defensive talisman and when I am doing a champ from the start I am always finishing in top 3. I rarely die. On first stages I feel the defensive talisman has the biggest impact dmg wise. I can just sit in the middle of the spawn while all monsters on me and still be able to deal good sustain dmg while the relics of the talisman heal and do dmg to all monsters near by. Def talisman is also great if ur getting pk'd or someones pet is attacking you (or ur attacking it 
). Think it this way; if you stay alive you don't get breaks in to dps and you also don't get cooldowns on talisman or have to pay money to get back in the fight with a renewed talisman. Ofc berserker does more dmg, especially on last stages where the monsters have more health but that dmg difference is imo compensated in the early stages where def talisman can really do some nice work.
Ps. Def talisman was a pain in the ass to train, but it was worth it. One of the best feelings ever is when you kill good pvpers who are in a team of 5 all alone in dungeon.
). Think it this way; if you stay alive you don't get breaks in to dps and you also don't get cooldowns on talisman or have to pay money to get back in the fight with a renewed talisman. Ofc berserker does more dmg, especially on last stages where the monsters have more health but that dmg difference is imo compensated in the early stages where def talisman can really do some nice work. Ps. Def talisman was a pain in the ass to train, but it was worth it. One of the best feelings ever is when you kill good pvpers who are in a team of 5 all alone in dungeon.
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khajja
Master
you playing again heli?