we will agree to disagree

so much focus on what you are doing to the zerker, and not what you are doing to their support. on previous heros I have played, you hope for the zerker to zerk, start licking my chops with their defenses down. with old PF, I just dont feel like the spear is worth. but we will see once pvp picks up.

ps, dont know about the chanter, but a good eld should rarely be touched by a zerker now that charge is gone...

ntc wrote:we will agree to disagree

so much focus on what you are doing to the zerker, and not what you are doing to their support. on previous heros I have played, you hope for the zerker to zerk, start licking my chops with their defenses down. with old PF, I just dont feel like the spear is worth. but we will see once pvp picks up.

ps, dont know about the chanter, but a good eld should rarely be touched by a zerker now that charge is gone...

Totally understand what you are saying. But worrying about their support is not your job in a decent group. You will have 2x druids and a bard for rupts. Plus either a BM train or other casters that can use their utilities far better to control the support.

With the high spear it gives you 3 dmg types too, remember that. Which I think easily outweighs the need to get the side style in 1h. I think unless you are going for a high 1h spec for maybe PvE or whatever, then I think its a HUGE waste of points going for 10 blades.

You want to have the Blades sidesnare to peel while guarding. The spear backsnare is mostly used vs alb offtanks since they have no backsnare. If you just go for 42Shields then offtanks can penetrate your Guard alot easier, there is absolutely no reason to not go 50Shields for Grp RvR.
Speccing High spear is not worth it because the growth rates of styles are alot lower than annihilation, and you're always hitting on at least Neutral armor. The 10% Pierce bonus is diminished from having worse Styles.

50LW 50Shields 10Blades 6Spear rest parry is the one and only spec for grp rvr

Nef Melody wrote:You want to have the Blades sidesnare to peel while guarding. The spear backsnare is mostly used vs alb offtanks since they have no backsnare. If you just go for 42Shields then offtanks can penetrate your Guard alot easier, there is absolutely no reason to not go 50Shields for Grp RvR.
Speccing High spear is not worth it because the growth rates of styles are alot lower than annihilation, and you're always hitting on at least Neutral armor. The 10% Pierce bonus is diminished from having worse Styles.

50LW 50Shields 10Blades 6Spear rest parry is the one and only spec for grp rvr

I guess it's safe to say that there are a few viable specs depending on what you want the hero to do. If you wanted a focused peeler that can do some decent damage while peeling and not having to worry about "trying" to hit side style then 50LW, 42 Shield, 39 CS, 6 Blades is the way to go.

I you want to rely a little more on guard while "trying" to hit side style the go for 50 Shield 50 LW 10 Blades. Of course you can use the 6 CS style, but it will be very weak and low weapon skill.

The 10% Pierce bonus is diminished from having worse Styles

That's true, hence the 50 LW for doing your dps. 39 CS backstyle is killer.

Peeling albs and warriors is nice with the thrust damage which is where the high CS will really shine. You'll also look good peeling warriors and Skalds. Zerks and Savages will be resistant to thrust but will be obsolete when an easy to land back snare is applied.

I guess it depends on your playstyle and the way your group behaves. A decent group will know how to kite so personally I feel the higher CS will be better most of the time but also having the 50 LW will give you maximum dps when its necessary.

Each to their own, it's all about playstyle.

Firby has the best stats since they have a significant strength boost. This gives the highest burst dps. Celt might dish out more dps over time due to the faster swing speed.

That being said, I always went Celt out of preference. I may switch to Firby on live.

I think we are in agreement with 50 LW 42 shield. What we do with the rest of the points is open to debate. I went 50 LW 42 shield 39 blunt so that I can farm gold and pvp. Also for aggroing guards. I totally understand why a player would want to go with 39 celtic spear. All the best heros I grew up watching in old frontiers though all used 2h hammers and I never saw them switch to a spear. So it makes me a bit biased. It makes me want to believe that the backside stun is so powerful that it overrides the favorable resistance of pierce on chain mail.

nice theorycrafting with the 10 blades for snare, but you will lose the slam duel vs mid/alb shieldtanks too often. needing to purge at the start of evry fight puts you in a really bad position.

my preferred Spec at the end of uthgard with +11 temp was 50 spear/LW 42 shield rest parry and weapon split. dont forget, Weaponskill changes defense penetration!

50 LW/CS, 50 Shield, 26 Parry, 10 Blades, 6 CS (if 50 LW) would be my spec... slam isnt influenced by your blades skill.

the only class with higher defense will be the warrior (50 weapon, 50 shield ,28 parry).. Armsmen have to put points into their dmg type, so they will end up with 42 shield and very little parry (gets better with higher rr).

you wont land much hits with your 10 blades against a tank from the front, but you arent supposed to use anything other than sidesnare with blades anyways..

Shinyuka wrote:50 LW/CS, 50 Shield, 26 Parry, 10 Blades, 6 CS (if 50 LW) would be my spec... slam isnt influenced by your blades skill.

the only class with higher defense will be the warrior (50 weapon, 50 shield ,28 parry).. Armsmen have to put points into their dmg type, so they will end up with 42 shield and very little parry (gets better with higher rr).

you wont land much hits with your 10 blades against a tank from the front, but you arent supposed to use anything other than sidesnare with blades anyways..

you are wrong there. your weaponskill with shieldes comes from your 1h line. and since low WS gives you a hard time vs defense, you better have a decent amount of WS.

i was also in favor of the 10 points into blades spec, until i tried it. In a head on battle agains an Tank with a shield out, i lost the slam duel most of the time. not because i fumbled, just because the slam got parried, evaded or blocked.

So i went and tested a bit with a guildie, and found out that more WS from blades also helps your slams.

I dont expect you to believe it, just try out yourself. Biting your keybord at the start of almost evry fight because you got slammed right in the beginning is bad for your hardware

How was the test like? Against same spec, same starting stats, same race hero? How many times did you try to slam while facing each other? 10? If you think shield styles take bonus to hit from your weapon spec and strength, you should also test 50 weapon/3 shield against each other. Shield has its own weapon skill which is about your composite spec and dex.

One question to my fellow hero colleagues: will you be able to hold aggro in pve with 10 blades (considering the rvr spec 50LW 50Shield 6CS 10Blades rest parry) or do you just taunt with lw?