Devoted or Unbroken?

[masterty66]

Thinking of doing a full series run soon and was toying with the idea of doing a Fighter based character. I don't think I've ever done one.

Can't decide between Devoted or Unbroken. Anyone have experience with either? For Unbroken I was thinking Unbroken/Trickster so I can fear enemies and get huge disengage attacks on them all while being a tanky monster. Probably use Kapana Tanga for that and Cladhu Scalth I guess? That way I'd get a ****ton of enagement slots which means if I get a terrify off I'd be slamming a bunch of enemies for huge hits. I'm sure Unbroken/Blood Mage would be good too but I've not done a Rogue in these before so I thought Trickster might be fun to pair with it.

For Devoted...no idea. There's lots of fun weapons. Chromoprismatic Staff is awesome but comes pretty late I guess. Hard to rush that weapon. And I'm not sure what multis well with it.

Suppose I could do two runs and try a couple different things here. The two classes should play fairly differently.

Edited May 21, 2022 by masterty66

[NotDumbEnough]

Unbroken doesn't get THAT much of a bonus for disengagement attacks. It's only +10 penetration iirc. Penetration is good but +10 is overkill. It's more about the +1 armor rating IMO.

[masterty66]

3 minutes ago, NotDumbEnough said:

Unbroken doesn't get THAT much of a bonus for disengagement attacks. It's only +10 penetration iirc. Penetration is good but +10 is overkill. It's more about the +1 armor rating IMO.

True the tankiness is nice. I just think combining the disengages with terrify is a cool gimmick too 

[Boeroer]

The terrify/disengagment thing does work, it's just not 100% reliable because the movement of enemies when terrified is erratic. So sometimes the just move laterally or donÄt move at all and thus they won't trigger disengagement attacks. But if they do it's quite the dmg. Especially if you get Deathblows + Overbearing Guard at some point. 

The +10 PEN leads to overpenetration pretty regularly (especially with crits which are common, too because disengagement attacks get a big ACC bonus in general) so that you will get the +30% dmg bonus very often, too. 

Unbroken also get +1 engagement which can be cool because you can afford to pick Warrior or Mob Stance and still get a decent amount of engagement slots even without Guardian Stance.

Kapana Taga + Cadhu Scalth is a nice tank setup but it isn't very exciting offensively to be honest, not even with Rogue as second class. Because disengagement attacks are a one-time attacks with no animation and recovery you will get the most out of them with heavier hitting weapons, not light, fast ones like clubs. In other words: it's the dmg per hit that matters, not the dps. Battle Axes + modal can be nice, Swords, maces, spears, esp. Stalker's Patience (also +engagement with the modal) but also two handers (although then you can't use a shield which means you won't get the +1 AR which is pretty nice).  Amra with 25 MIG is nice, too because (as I said above) the disengagement attacks will have very high ACC which leads to crits often, triggering Amra's Riven/Wanton Gore. 

 

[masterty66]

2 hours ago, Boeroer said:

The terrify/disengagment thing does work, it's just not 100% reliable because the movement of enemies when terrified is erratic. So sometimes the just move laterally or donÄt move at all and thus they won't trigger disengagement attacks. But if they do it's quite the dmg. Especially if you get Deathblows + Overbearing Guard at some point. 

The +10 PEN leads to overpenetration pretty regularly (especially with crits which are common, too because disengagement attacks get a big ACC bonus in general) so that you will get the +30% dmg bonus very often, too. 

Unbroken also get +1 engagement which can be cool because you can afford to pick Warrior or Mob Stance and still get a decent amount of engagement slots even without Guardian Stance.

Kapana Taga + Cadhu Scalth is a nice tank setup but it isn't very exciting offensively to be honest, not even with Rogue as second class. Because disengagement attacks are a one-time attacks with no animation and recovery you will get the most out of them with heavier hitting weapons, not light, fast ones like clubs. In other words: it's the dmg per hit that matters, not the dps. Battle Axes + modal can be nice, Swords, maces, spears, esp. Stalker's Patience (also +engagement with the modal) but also two handers (although then you can't use a shield which means you won't get the +1 AR which is pretty nice).  Amra with 25 MIG is nice, too because (as I said above) the disengagement attacks will have very high ACC which leads to crits often, triggering Amra's Riven/Wanton Gore. 

 

Interesting. I think I think I'd want to use a shield with this build for the theme if nothing else. Stalker's Patience sounds interesting. An Adyrean Elf with a spear and a shield seems thematic and would probably be pretty good too.

[Kaylon]

Yes, trickster/unbroken with Guardian Stance and equipped with One Dozen Stood, Magran's Blessing (with modal), Magran's Favor (with modal) can be very effective. The modal of a medium shield ensures at least 30% misses vs any enemy, your ripostes/disengagement attacks will be full attacks and the damage shield hits get all the rogue bonuses. Another nice one is forbidden fist/trickster who can spam FF while getting free ripostes, disengagement attacks, damage shield hits which can trigger further flurry/heartbeat drumming attacks (however you need Champion's Boon/Tactical meld if you want to deal with multiple targets).

Devoted works best with monk for a crit build triggering many cleaving/flurry attacks (with fists as a very strong back up weapon). Later you can add the Left Hand of the Obscured for free disengagement attacks too. Fair Favor + Scordeo's Edge + Grave Calling / Tarn's Respite / St. Drogga's Skull / Aldris Blade of Captain Crow are all great combos.

Edited May 22, 2022 by Kaylon

[Boeroer]

8 hours ago, masterty66 said:

Interesting. I think I think I'd want to use a shield with this build for the theme if nothing else. Stalker's Patience sounds interesting. An Adyrean Elf with a spear and a shield seems thematic and would probably be pretty good too.

Yes, Stalker's Patience also has the potentially exciting enchantment to skip recovery on 20% of crits. This can also trigger from disengagement attacks. So it can happen that you do a "passive" disengagement attack which might crit and set your current recovery to 0 - so you can strike immediately again. Riposte can do the same - so this actually happens often enough to be fun imo. Add Mob Stance in order to strike immediately after a killing blow and to become faster when engaging more enemies. With Hold the Line, Shield, Unbroken Passive, spear modal and Persistent Distraction you will already have 5 engagement slots even without Guardian Stance. More than that isn't practical imo. 

I was playing an Unbroken/Streetfighter recently to emphasize on the offense (when surrounded) a bit more and it was a lot better than I thought it would be, even with the seemingly very defensive Gladiator Sword/Bronlar's Phalanx setup I chose. Initially I wanted Devoted/Streetfighter but you can't have sword AND shield proficiency as a Devoted (which sucks) so I went with Unbroken. 

 

Edited May 22, 2022 by Boeroer

[mjo2138]

On 5/21/2022 at 3:45 PM, masterty66 said:

True the tankiness is nice. I just think combining the disengages with terrify is a cool gimmick too 

I have found that Devoted is not truly necessary, because using a fighter + penetrating strikes, you have a cheap way to get +3 pen. If you eat Hot Razer Skewers, then you pen goes up even more! Also, slash attacks are usually easier to land in deadfire since most mobs will have higher pierce or crush armor (but there are exceptions!) 

 

If you want to try something different , unbroken could be fun. I am trying a 'terrify' focused party that stacks on engagements now.

[NotDumbEnough]

Unless you have 15 pen or more, more penetration is extremely valuable in PotD. With an 11 pen weapon and Hot Razor Skewers you still only have 13 pen, which is often insufficient in PotD. You don't want to spend discipline spamming Penetrating Strikes.

[mjo2138]

6 hours ago, NotDumbEnough said:

Unless you have 15 pen or more, more penetration is extremely valuable in PotD. With an 11 pen weapon and Hot Razor Skewers you still only have 13 pen, which is often insufficient in PotD. You don't want to spend discipline spamming Penetrating Strikes.

That's true, having +1 pen makes it even easier to open up you resource pool to other skills. However,  I find that having a fighter/rogue, or 2 martial classes, usually means I have two rather large resource pools, which is more than enough for almost all fights in the game, even along with self buffing (discipline strikes, refreshing defense, escape, etc. etc.) . Likewise, there are a lot of nice items that add + discipline for fighter (DoC breastpalte, those +2 fighter resource gloves, to name a few. 

Still, the +1 pen is really nice, but I think if you are using hot razor skewers + pen. striking (or debilitating strikes) you go beyond the threshold of most enemies AR. 

 

The other option is using elementral weaponry (Firebrand, Lord Darryons Volgue (sp), which is really great because a lot of enemies have lower shock resistance. 

[NotDumbEnough]

Devoted has a +2 pen bonus, not +1. If you compare the different weapon types you'll see that +2 pen is "equivalent" to a +20% base damage bonus. Dealing a multiplicative 20% more damage is pretty huge.

[mjo2138]

14 hours ago, NotDumbEnough said:

Devoted has a +2 pen bonus, not +1. If you compare the different weapon types you'll see that +2 pen is "equivalent" to a +20% base damage bonus. Dealing a multiplicative 20% more damage is pretty huge.

Ah you are right. For some reason I thought it was + 1 PEN. Yeah in that case it makes a huge difference for sure.   

[limaxophobiacq]

I'm late but for another option Devoted (axes)/Priest of Wael is pretty solid. You can push your deflection very high and Tactical Barrage + Champions Boon is a good buff both for spellcasting and melee.  Magran's Favor helps your priest fire spells like Shining Beacon and Storm of Holy Fire to clear mobs, while Divine Mark -> Bleeding Cuts (with +4 Pen from Devoted & Champions Boon) works well on strong single targets.