What class to pair with a skald using the singing scimitar?

[grasida]

This game probably gives me the worst restartitis of any game I’ve ever played, and I probably enjoy planning out builds and messing around testing things in the console than I do actually playing the game. My current idea is to build a skald around sasha’s singing scimitar. I know troubador is probably a better match for the scimitar and that a skald will likely be far better off with sun and moon or an AoE melee weapon, but I like the flavor of a skald with the scimitar and want to build around it. I have basically two criteria for the builds. First, the builds should feel fairly reactive and fun to play with varied options and lots of stuff to do in combat. Second, it doesn’t need to be the most powerful possible build, but it needs to not feel completely worse than other options. The scimitar may generate phrases at less than half the rate of better choices, but it at least has some particular advantages (the shocking lash applies to invocations, and it refreshes phrase count after empower), so it may not be best, but it still offers something other weapons can’t offer. I’d like my build to not feel like some other equipment and class choices would do the exact same thing, but better. I want to either use the scimitar by itself, with tuotilio’s palm or paired with grave calling for a stacking lash that applies to my damage invocations. Here are my choices in rough order of interest.

 

Skald/Devoted:

Pros: Less dependency on full attacks means I don’t feel as punished by avoiding two sabers, which is a little silly looking for my tastes. Clear out should have great potential for generating phrases. It gets good, reliable hit to crit and accuracy and should have excellent attack speed with mob stance and armored grace. Durable and reliable.

Cons: Less versatility than other options, mob stance wants you to be surrounded, but clear out and black thunder, some of your best skills, push enemies away. Into the fray is too expensive to be a reliable way to suck enemies back in. Damage output might not be amazing.

 

Skald/Kind Wayfarer:

Pros: Flames of Devotion. 20 Accuracy, cheap full attack should lead to lots of high damage crits that also heal the party and add even more lash damage to my spells. Lay on hands is awesome and really adds versatility. It’s exactly the kind of reactive skill I want on my character.

Cons: Heavily favors two sabers, which is silly looking. Less sustained crit output and thus phrase generation compared to other builds. Therefore, I’ll feel more stupid for not choosing a troubador.

 

Skald/Trickster:

Pros: Riposte. Generate phrases passively while casting invocations. High damage per hit. Can use a buckler to great effect and is a great build for binding block, since it has no on class accuracy buffs, attacks passively with less need for attack speed with riposte, and binding block doesn’t slow down recovery of invocations. Has great utility with trickster spells.

Cons: Chanter offers no deflection buffs that stack with trickster, so I’m not sure it can manage enough deflection to make riposte do good work.

 

Skald/Ghost Heart:

Pros: 20-30 passive accuracy against a single target with a 20 accuracy full attack means the highest crit rate of any combo.

Cons: Otherwise pretty bland. Favors two sabers. I’d like to play a ranger at some point, but hopefully after the companion gets buffed.

 

Skald/Berserker:

Pros: Great crit rate and attack speed. Carnage.

Cons: Not much to do or manage on the barbarian side. Favors two sabers. Definitely less crits than the ranger and possibly less crits overall than a fighter. I hate the name “howler”.

 

Skald/Soul Blade:

Pros: Great for a saber and buckler build with soul annihilation. Cipher can boost accuracy very high, has a better single target paralyze than chanter and a powerful option to break down deflection with psychovampiric shield.

Cons: Poor action economy synergy. Casting cipher spells doesn’t generate crits and casting chanter invocations doesn’t generate focus. Each class’ powers cuts into the other classes resource generation.

 

Skald/Helwalker:

Pros: Stat boosts contribute hugely to effectiveness of chanter powers. Swift flurry generates more hits, which generates more crits. Turning wheel adds even more lash damage to spells.

Cons: I’ve played a ton of monks already. I’ll feel even more stupid for not using fists or sun and moon. Helwalker would be extremely frail. No reliable accuracy or hit to crit bonus on either class.

 

I know there are other options. Wizard might work, for example. And I know this is a really long post. But does anyone have any thoughts on which class would be the most interesting to play and still feel effective? Which weapon configuration would you recommend for your choice?

[arkane83]

I personally like troubadors better for double buff stacking (look up the sir sit a lot build for an example).

 

That being said, I tried both warcaller and howler skalds. I really like the howler version. Try this setup;

 

Dual wield sashas singing scimitar and an upgraded Modwyr. This let's you use berserker without intellect debuff. Frenzy is and barbaric blow will now feed you a great stream of crits. Meanwhile, modwyr is insane and sadistic and loves to yell out in combat. She adds a ton of flavor to your madman (or woman) crit machine.

 

I think warcaller is great too. You will be more survivable and have great crit rate as well.

 

The other classes dont really give you as much crit chance. Fighter can get disc strikes that gives intuitive inspiration. Berserker builds have even more hit to crit with frenzy and barbaric blows, but gives up some survivability.

[gkathellar]

arkane83's pretty much got it - Skald is not very good but works best, by far, as a Howler for Frenzy nonsense or Warcaller for fighters being generally pretty badass.

[grasida]

Thanks, I was already leaning heavily towards fighter, but I suppose this pushes me even further. I feel like fighter has more stuff to do or manage than barbarian, like using mule kick, clear out, managing positioning for mob stance, maybe using the occasional penetrating strike, etc.

 

Strictly in terms of crit generation, ranger should win out, right? Berserker frenzy gives 30% hit to crit and barbaric blow gives another 30%. If you’re using fair favor and the bone setter’s torc, you get totally around 60% hit-to-crit (.7*.7*.9*.9). That influences about 30% of hit rolls total if you’re at least at 50% hit rate. But you’re probably only using barbaric blow to kill enemies, so actually it’s 21-22% of attack rolls most of the time. Rangers, on the other hand, get 20 accuracy all the time, better than what berserkers get from frenzy, eventually get another 10 against targets under 50% hp (meaning it’s relevant more often than barbaric blow, since you’re presumably mostly using that for killing blows), then get another 20 from accurate wounding shot. So, if you’re getting all your bonuses, which you can quite frequently, you’re improving your crit rate by 50% compared to the berserk’s maximum of 30%. Of course, berserkers also get a big speed boost and eventually get blood thirst, which speeds them up even more, so maybe they do come out on top.

[Dorftek]

Thanks, I was already leaning heavily towards fighter, but I suppose this pushes me even further. I feel like fighter has more stuff to do or manage than barbarian, like using mule kick, clear out, managing positioning for mob stance, maybe using the occasional penetrating strike, etc.

 

Strictly in terms of crit generation, ranger should win out, right? Berserker frenzy gives 30% hit to crit and barbaric blow gives another 30%. If you’re using fair favor and the bone setter’s torc, you get totally around 60% hit-to-crit (.7*.7*.9*.9). That influences about 30% of hit rolls total if you’re at least at 50% hit rate. But you’re probably only using barbaric blow to kill enemies, so actually it’s 21-22% of attack rolls most of the time. Rangers, on the other hand, get 20 accuracy all the time, better than what berserkers get from frenzy, eventually get another 10 against targets under 50% hp (meaning it’s relevant more often than barbaric blow, since you’re presumably mostly using that for killing blows), then get another 20 from accurate wounding shot. So, if you’re getting all your bonuses, which you can quite frequently, you’re improving your crit rate by 50% compared to the berserk’s maximum of 30%. Of course, berserkers also get a big speed boost and eventually get blood thirst, which speeds them up even more, so maybe they do come out on top.

Yeah if you wanna crit a lot to generate phrases ghostheart is ur friend! Accurate wounding shot cost only one bond and is awesome for this job.

 

I'd also suggest Squids Grasp or Rännigs Wrath as ur offhand weapon with the modal turned on

 

Consider using Captains Banquet food or at least coral snuff drug for this character tho because u won't have much of any other atk speed modifiers.

[dbarbarian14]

Druid/Chanter (theurge) is quite good, melee sword+board does decent or you can dual wield with chants linger effects, druid spells. devastating in my opinion.

Check Sin Tee build of Tekehu https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1394145549

[Boeroer]

If you plan around Empower use (which is good for Invocations) then the Singing Sabre is very powerful. You can get EMpowerment back from using Empower - I mean wow.

 

Berserker/Skald is not only a pretty great combo (30% crit conversion from Frenzy, 30% from Barbaric Blow and 25% from Killer's Paralyze and you are already at 63% crit conversion) but also fits the whole nordic warrior/runesinger type of style. Boreal Dwarf or Pale Elf, some Junvik armor and a Draugr helmet et voilá - Dovahkiin (in this case elven)

 

Edited July 21, 2018 by Boeroer

[grasida]

It turns out the accuracy bonus on lion's sprint applies for the duration of the ability instead of just for the next attack, as the description suggests. The duration is very short, but you attack so fast that it will still apply to a solid number of hits. It's also a nice mobility tool. That makes it hard to justify choosing anything other than barbarian. I'll probably just have to grit my teeth whenever I level up or enter the character sheet and see my class name.

 

Regarding killers froze stiff for hit to crit conversion, a paralysis machine is probably the strongest use for a skald, since they're practically guaranteed to cast low level offensive invocations much faster than a troubador could, but it feels like a really boring way to play. I'd rather just skip the ability and focus on damage invocations instead, since one or the other are all better at different occasions, which means you have to make interesting choices in combat.

[rheingold]

Yeah I’d also go boreal dwarf howler. Reminds me so much of Poul Anderson’s classic ‘the broken sword’ chanter and barbs are still huge fun in Deadfire, multi or single...

[Enoch]

I know the singing scimitar is great and all, but I kinda want to make my next character a dwarven Skald/Devoted War Caller who fights with either single-weapon or dual-wielded Warhammers. 

 

Warhammers do best-of Crush/Pierce, both the uniques are available early (you can get Last Word immediately after Port Maje if you can get somebody's PER up to 20), and both of them have interesting on-crit effects. 

[grasida]

Here's an offbeat idea for a skald build: disengagement riposte harbinger. It's unlikely the harbinger can stack enough deflection on its own to get a significant number of ripostes while standing still amidst a group of foes, but it can certainly stack enough defense against disengagement attacks to be almost untouchable. With swift runner (+5), tumbling (+20), gipon prudensco (+25), magnificent escape cape (+20), boots of speed (+15) and the fox from the farmer did leap and run (-20 enemy accuracy), you could get a swing of 105 deflection vs accuracy on top of tuotilio's palm and the trickster's deflection buffs. So the idea is to escape into a group of enemies with engagement, cast empowered white winds while riposting whatever attacks you can, then once escape times out, run away and trigger disengagement attacks and subsequent ripostes to rebuild phrases. Binding block works beautifully with this build, since you get the accuracy with almost no penalty and you can use the sabre modal with nearly no penalty as well. This build looks like a great pair for arterial strike, too, since you're running around constantly trying to get enemies to follow you.

 

Of course, there are issues. I've never really payed attention to which enemies have engagement and which don't. In fights where there aren't a bunch of enemies with engagement, you can't use your gimmick, but you still do have powerful trickster stuff to do along with the occasional invocation. And enemies aren't always going to cooperate and engage you, You only get 2 engagement slots yourself unless someone buffs you to have more and you don't have something like into the fray to suck them in. But you can push enemies engaging another party member away with thunder rolled on black seas, and you might even find a reason to take coordinated position (probably not).

 

I don't know how the build would work out in practice, but I love the concept. Using movement to trigger ripostes with a scimitar has a really cool bagua zhang feel and a lot of the skald invocations have a wind/weather magic theme that fits well with an a character whose main tactics are to avoid and evade.

[Boeroer]

Disengagement attacks are really clunky and unreliable to trigger. In theory your idea works - but atm it's a bit fiddly to intentionally trigger disengagement attack by leaving the enemy. Also I had lots of problems with Riposte + Disengagement attack (miss). Sometimes I have the impression that it doesn't trigger at all. Maybe that got fixed though. It was right after release when I wanted to do a disengaging Riposte build.

 

In order to reach higher deflection but still do good Riposte damage you can use Akola's Apex Ward. It has an enchantment that does a crush Riposte on miss (25%). If you then also blind the enemy you can expect a lot of misses. But I don't know if crits with Akola's Riposte counts for Skald's phrase generation.

Edited July 24, 2018 by Boeroer

[grasida]

In my approximately 5 minutes of testing I noticed that disengagement attacks are clunky. Sometimes they just don’t happen. Engagement doesn’t “take” immediately either and maybe sometimes the game tells you you’re engaged when you’re really not, since it seems enemies have to be standing still and attacking you in order to engage you. So this build can’t just run around everywhere and passively deal damage, unfortunately. It needs to pause and let enemies attack it, then run away. I noticed riposte triggering pretty reliably, though.

 

I know someone posted a disengagement riposte build for Pallegina in this forum using whispers of the endless paths, maybe I’ll ask in there about they made that work.

 

Tuotilo’s palm also has a riposte chance, comes with binding block and doesn’t penalize accuracy. But it also provides much less deflection. I’m not at home, so I can’t check the apex ward’s other enchantments to really compare.

 

Edit: Of course, it also makes sense to use both. Tuotilo’s when you’re running around, casting or attacking, apex ward when you want to turtle or are under heavy fire from ranged enemies.

Edited July 24, 2018 by grasida

[Ophiuchus]

I know the singing scimitar is great and all, but I kinda want to make my next character a dwarven Skald/Devoted War Caller who fights with either single-weapon or dual-wielded Warhammers. 

 

Warhammers do best-of Crush/Pierce, both the uniques are available early (you can get Last Word immediately after Port Maje if you can get somebody's PER up to 20), and both of them have interesting on-crit effects. 

Touch off topic but can you disable the traps in Sandswept Ruins by using a Ranger pet?

 

 

 

Here's an offbeat idea for a skald build: disengagement riposte harbinger. It's unlikely the harbinger can stack enough deflection on its own to get a significant number of ripostes while standing still amidst a group of foes, but it can certainly stack enough defense against disengagement attacks to be almost untouchable. With swift runner (+5), tumbling (+20), gipon prudensco (+25), magnificent escape cape (+20), boots of speed (+15) and the fox from the farmer did leap and run (-20 enemy accuracy), you could get a swing of 105 deflection vs accuracy on top of tuotilio's palm and the trickster's deflection buffs. So the idea is to escape into a group of enemies with engagement, cast empowered white winds while riposting whatever attacks you can, then once escape times out, run away and trigger disengagement attacks and subsequent ripostes to rebuild phrases. Binding block works beautifully with this build, since you get the accuracy with almost no penalty and you can use the sabre modal with nearly no penalty as well. This build looks like a great pair for arterial strike, too, since you're running around constantly trying to get enemies to follow you.

 

Of course, there are issues. I've never really payed attention to which enemies have engagement and which don't. In fights where there aren't a bunch of enemies with engagement, you can't use your gimmick, but you still do have powerful trickster stuff to do along with the occasional invocation. And enemies aren't always going to cooperate and engage you, You only get 2 engagement slots yourself unless someone buffs you to have more and you don't have something like into the fray to suck them in. But you can push enemies engaging another party member away with thunder rolled on black seas, and you might even find a reason to take coordinated position (probably not).

 

I don't know how the build would work out in practice, but I love the concept. Using movement to trigger ripostes with a scimitar has a really cool bagua zhang feel and a lot of the skald invocations have a wind/weather magic theme that fits well with an a character whose main tactics are to avoid and evade.

I really like this idea and was just about to request a light weapon/buckler riposte Harbinger. Much appreciated.

Edited July 24, 2018 by Ophiuchus

[Enoch]

 

I know the singing scimitar is great and all, but I kinda want to make my next character a dwarven Skald/Devoted War Caller who fights with either single-weapon or dual-wielded Warhammers. 

 

Warhammers do best-of Crush/Pierce, both the uniques are available early (you can get Last Word immediately after Port Maje if you can get somebody's PER up to 20), and both of them have interesting on-crit effects. 

Touch off topic but can you disable the traps in Sandswept Ruins by using a Ranger pet?

 

Don't know.  But I do know that you can turn them all off with a hidden switch in the room with the Death Sigils (20 PER required). 

[mosspit]

Sigh... I wished I knew that. In my Ironman run, I had Eder failed the Athletics check and got permanently killed when trying to escape the trap room. Was super close to restarting the Ironman run but decided to bite the bullet.