I have been thinking about this....
Im too lazy to be swaping between DW and shield.... But I guess I will have to do it anyway...
The utility diference between having or not slam is huge...
A Cleric friend told me... its amazing the amount of mercs that died trying to chase suppot classes kiting them and going out of range heal....
As Far I know Mercs dont have any snare... as style.. (I have looked really fast and only found 2nd style chain in thrust or side style in crush lol?) what makes mercs (once charge ends charge of course) pretty kitable.
One slam and then how many time you can spend swaping... 1 second? and then again dw! eheheh the dmg doesnt change

Please let me know if I am wrong

there are a lot of options for stuns that dont cost so many spec pts as slam.

1) spec crush. 2 part stun chain is win.

2) 23 shield (only lose some parry). this is a rear positional stun, but really thats the only stun you need. if you ar in front or beside, positional away. if they are runnign from you, stun, then positional away. this spec was pretty popular for strict 8v8 mercs on live for a lot of time. its helpful when the merc is playing the role of a peel tank in a conventional alb hybrid setup (3-4 tanks/2-3 caster/2 cler)

Galdarn wrote:

Disdain wrote:You don't cap damage at 51 spec.

If you just use DW styles, you need only 51 in your basic weapon skill to get the smallest variance. Your damage and weaponskill is calculated only by the DW skill (and stength, weapon speed and so on of course)

Yeah , if you use DW styles , but a crush merc for example will need as much + to skill to Crush as he can to raise his dmg, 100-140% variance will always exist but you will hit for more !, the words " you cap dmg at 51 spec" without further more info are incorect .