Dual Wield 101: Introduction, Skills, Possible Dual Wield Playstyles, Builds, and Themes

Hi Guys, It's me again, Cypherian.

Well, it's been a long time since my last post regarding my own build and solo ventures, and I have come up with some ideas regarding Play styles, Builds, and Thematics with the Dual Sword.

First of all, the Dual Sword Skill tree was released as an extension skill tree for the Blade Skills that use 1h and 2h.

The Main stats are Dex, Agi, and Str
Stats:

• Dex
  • Increases Atk by 2
  • Increases Hit/Accuracy
  • Increases your Main Weapon Damage only.
  • Increases Crit Rate(?) (clarify me on this)
• Agi

• • Increases Atk by 1
  • Increases Flee
  • Increases ASPD
  • Increases your Sub Weapon Damage only
• Str

• • Increases Atk by 1
  • Increases ASPD
  • Increases CDMG(?) (clarify me on this)
  • Increases both Main and Sub weapon damage by half of what you would gain when you put 1 point in either Dex or Agi

What makes the Dual Sword, Unique:

• Unique Attack Animation

The DS' Attack is considered to be called as a Normal Attack Set, rather than a Normal Attack. This is because the DS hits multiple times in every attack rather than once or twice like when equipped with Bow or Knuckles or Magic Devices.

The Dual Sword has a unique attack animation, including their First Attack and Evasion Attack.

The First Attack consists of a slicing animation by drawing the sword from their sheaths from the back of the player's avatar, The damage consists of three (3) strikes, One from the Main Hand, One from the Sub Hand and the Third strike is the Total damage of the damage from the Main hand damage and Sub hand damage.

The Regular Attack animation consists of five (5) swings with the 2 swords, 2 from Main Hand and 3 from Sub hand. Damage from each hand is unique, but remains the same through out the attack. Meaning, If your main hand damage hits for 1000, and your sub hand damage hits for 600, you hit 600-1000-600-1000-600 through out the animation.

The Evasion Attack is similar to the First Attack, It procs when you Evade an attack and do an Evasion Attack.
​

• Increased AMPR(Attack MP Recovery)

Compared to other Weapons. The When Equipped with Dual Swords, You also gain increased AMPR. My theory on this is because of the Unique Attack animation. The DS' regular attack set consists of 3 attacks of a 1h. The Attack set consists of 2-2-1 hits, thus considering it as 3 separate attacks.
(This is just my theory, based on observations and research)
Skill Tree that exploits(?)/relies/enhances the Evasion
With the Skill Passive, Godspeed (explained further later on), This is what gives the DS their unique Attack Animation and Evade Attacks. Also, the Skill, Reflex enhances your Evasion Rate, at the cost of Def and MDef, this is to say that DS really relies more on counter attacking and dodging rather than getting hit.​

Skills: (Quoted most from @Argo, Thanks bud)

• Dual Sword Mastery

This passive lets you equip a sword on the Sub Hand. Equipping a Sword on a sub hand decreases your accuracy and crit rate. But maxing this skill passive, negates the drop in Accuracy and Crit Rate.​

• Twin Slash

This is one of your Main Damager Skill. This skill has a passive that increases this skills Crit Damage. Based on my Observations and, without added crit damage. This Skill increases its own Crit Damage by 250% at level 10. Without added Crit Damage, having 150% base Crit Damage. you get 400% Crit Damage on this Skill.​

• Cross Parry

This is a good skill in my opinion. It lets you charge up to attack the enemy twice, with a chance to tumble the target, and after the skill is done. It gives you the Parry Buff. a buff that let's you negate 90% of the damage you receive on the next attack.​

• Reflex

A Buff skill that Gives you increased evasion for 100 seconds. But decreases your DEF and MDEF by 90% at level 10. I personally use this skill because i have a high evasion rate base and flee stat, when used, makes me evade 5 out 10 times.​

• Dual Sword Control

This passive gives you +50 Aspd per level, and also reduces some of the reductions on accuracy, and critical rate, the same with Dual Sword Mastery.​

• Spinning Slash

Your Main/Only AoE Skill on the skill tree. Slashes quickly to hit enemies around you and knocking them back, then generating a whirlwind that causes damage over time in that area. The DPS in the AoE is good. It can hit hard at the initial attack, and also hits hard at the per tick damage in the whirlwind. This is one of my favorite skills to use when i'm soloing bosses.​

• Charging Slash

Charges up, and dashing through the target and deals damage in a line. This skill hits really hard but the cast animation takes a long time. It's also a good disengage skill. Sometimes I use this when I want to disengage from a boss using a wide AoE skill.​

• Godspeed

Increases Agi, +14 at lvl 10, Also gives you the unique evasion and first attack, increases their damage, along with some skills on the Dual Sword tree.​

Playstyles and Builds
Regarding play styles, this is where the true power of a Dual Sword shows.

Here are some of the Play styles that I have discovered and played through out the existence of the DS Skill Tree.

Standard Damager

This is the most straight forward Playstyle that most players opt for, maxing out Dex because of the high atk increase per dex.
Your normal attack on Sub Weapon is very low, but your skill damage is very high.
You only rely on full on damage from skills. Mostly using Twin Slash as a damager.
You don't get increased ASPD, Flee, or Crit Damage because of this.​

Maximized AMPR

This is my favorite build personally, basically you build around increasing AMPR by equipping xtals like S.Roar, Moonlight Potum, Equipping Magic Scarf, Warrior's Bangle, Brutal Dragon Crown, Flower Headband. Maxing Sober Analysis and Trigger Slash for that AMPR and MP Regen.
With my current build, without trigger i can regen a full bar per attack set, and with trigger, i can regen around 130% of an mp bar.
Allowing you to Skill spam 1mp combos and prorate them with one or two attack sets, making you quickly regen your mp also gives you the chance to dish out high mp combos more quickly.

Refer to this link for more information*​

Full Evasion

This build, same with the Maximized AMPR Build, makes you build around Evasion. Since Evasion is a counter attack. It relies heavily on high flee rate. Evasion is the number of time you counter attack from an attack from the enemy that misses you. You gain Evasion from Light Armor Remodel, Light Armor Mastery, Xtals and equips, and Eva Up. There are Evasion Xtals such as Eva+4, Forest Wolf. Armor like Forest Wolf Garb, Adds like Mole Eyes that give Evasion +10% and Rings like Sand Veil Ring. There are also pots that give evasion like Black Clot Mist that gives 10 Evasion. This playstyle and build let's you Evade most of the time, thus making you not get hit and Counter Attack most of the time.​

Eva Tank

This is also Similar to Full Evasion. But on this playstyle and build, you're team relies on you to tank most of the time.
Building Off of Agi and Vit and increased Evasion and HP Items are a must on this build. As well as getting Aggro equips like Hero Scarf.​

Magic Blader

This is one of the fun builds that i tested out but only saw it's potential in the Late to End Game status of the game.
This By Building Dex and Int. Dex Gives you MATK and CSPD. Int Gives you MATK.
The time i built this, i concentrated on using bombard spells like Arrow Lance Storm and Impact, the typical mage skill spams.
Utilizing your DS attacks to regenerate MP through increased AMPR and Prorate the Magic Damage you deal with Normal Attacks.
You may also use the Hard Hit Astute Trigger slash Combo for your Physical Damage Combo and increase your AMPR
then your main damage combo is Astute Impact Storm Trigger.​

Unstoppable DPS

This is also a fun build. You mostly use Spinning Slash and Tempest on this build because.
Along with the multiple hits from your normal attack, the DPS from Spinning Slash, you also use Tempest Slash to group enemies together when they are inside the Spinning Slash AOE. Crit Reliant and high Damage, but costs a lot of MP.​

The Soloist

Along with Maximized AMPR, I also like this build because you rely mostly on utility and survivability along with Medium to High Damage Outputs. With this build, you max out HP Boost along with Fighter's High and using HP and Resistance Boosting equips and/or xtals. This makes you non-reliant on HP Pots like Vita Plus and Revitas and Regeras. This can make you solo most bosses and mini-bosses.​

Force Blader

This is a fun build, the most fun I've ever had. I saw some potential on this build, you don't rely on your auto attacks to deal damage. Because this build makes you use Power Wave from the Mage Skill Tree. You only use auto attacks to regen mp from AMPR. In this build, you utilize the Charging Slash here the most with your Astute Spinning Slash Charging Slash Combo. Astute for high damage, and increased Crit Rate, Spinning Slash for the knock back and Damage Over Time and Charging Slash as a High Damage Disengage Skill. What's also good with this build is you can attack enemies from 10 meters away. Although your normal attacks don't hit that hard. your skills still hit hard.​

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Welp, That's it for my post.
Enjoy reading
I will update this from time to time when i think of new themes and build based on the current meta and for future metas.
You can PM me if you want some help on building your DS,
Thanks for Reading. BYE!

 

Very good guide that covers the small differences between 1H/2H and DW and how you can utilize them.
However, I expected no less from one of the DW masters
Thanks for making this guide!
PS: Yes, I am a quick reader.

 

Well, This is just part 1. More of an Introduction.
I'll be going deeper into the builds and themes i mentioned above in future posts.

 

Well, lemme grab my tent, cause I'm camping here until the next part!

 

nice detailed guide dw king
does godspeed increase evasion rate? i'm pretty new to dw, only started building one today.

 

aw schuuuucks :3
apparently no, it only increases agi by 14 points, and inturn gives flee.

 

Nice thread Cyph XD
Btw, that twin slash crit damage modifier really piqued my interest! 400 crit damage? Whoa.....
Can you please tell me what the best stat for the highest twin slash damage? I got a really nice build inside my head that I wanna try XD

 

You can go for full dex for consistent damage, crit and non crit. Or you can go str dex for damage and cdmg.

The reason i can say that it is 400% cdmg is because i tested it out on seltirio and forestia. At a certain hp point, i was hitting 10k crit Swift Twin Slash on them. But when it didnt crit. It was doing around 2.3k to 2.5k. I tested this out around 100 times.

I cant say that it does or it does not tumble when it parries an attack because the animation is slow. Sometime the boss can do 2 attacks on you before the skill finishes its animation. And i tried it out using it on bosses whenever they line up their redzone attacks. It doesnt seem to tumble them, however, i noticed that it does tumble them whenever i use it after theur attack.

After cross parry's damage hits and the animation is done. It leaves the cross parry icon as a buff on you, blocking/reducing the next damage dealt.to you. I tested this out on forestia's mobs. The mobs usually hit me for around 400 damage. But when hit with the cross parry buff, i usually receive around 40-90. So meaning it can block around 75-90% damage. Which can be good when partnered with reflex because the buff doesnt leave when until damage is dealt to you, so if you evade so much, you only need to use cross parry once, as it is a situational skill, not a damaging skill.

 

im curious as to the stat distribution for the unstoppable dps build you posted wich is based on spinin slash and tempest, and also what would be the most benefitin armor/accesories and xtals, i would greatly appreciate your help hence im fairly new

 

Well the reason it's called Unstoppable DPS is because you utilize most skills that have Damage Over Time like Spiral Air, Spinning Slash and Tempest Slash. You can Build pure DPS dex or DEX Agi for faster attacks. The goal of this build is to bombard the target with unstoppable damages. using minimal mp as possible to regen your mp faster between attacks while the DPS from Spinning Slash, Spiral Air, and Tempest Slash are still present, attacking until you regain enough mp to cast another combo.

i would suggest you balance your equips between Crit/Damage and your xtals between AMPR/Crit/Damage.

 

Ty for the pointers, now its farm time!

 

I have one build you probably didn't try yet. I have a Support/Tank Dual Sword build xP
It has Shield Skills, War Cry, Bless, and I'm planning on adding Power wave next. I'll prolly put in Sanctuary in it too in the future. After that, it's all gonna be passive skills to the end xD

 

Its really amazing to read this posting..
Got more information that i need
Thanks cypherian..
But I have questions here
My level is 64
Im focus on dex and agi but the atk only produce max 500 dmg
I try focus on str only and more worst there.. atk below 110
So, my question is what stat i must spending on to get highest atk? how about personal stats CRI?
And Also i delete my blade skill.. and now i just have dual skill, survival skill and battle skill.. its okay?
Thank you very much for advice cyph..
I really mess here.. :'(

 

I actually thought of building a support blader. Was gonna call it Heaven's Blade because you help with the offensive front line while maintaining buffs and heals through out the battle.
And let me ask, shield skills wony work if you dont have a shield equipped right. So you really cant use shield skills. Although knight skills would be a good choice. Assault as an Initial Engage, cast Sanc, Buff up, spam hard hit astute ragesword trigger to maintain aggro and ampr. But I havent made one yet because im so busy with work right now.

 

Niiiiiiiice! Good guide Cyph! Told ya... JUST DO IT!!!! XD

:3

 

Well, you can actually use the skills from the bottom branch of the shield skill tree. I have both Aegis and Protection at Lv5 atm. (Both skills' description says "No Limit")

I call the character build "the enchanter". Coz that's what they do: buff a lot then swing a weapon like a madman.

 

Standard Damager/Build Guide.

As the name goes, this build is for those who want to test out the DS in terms of damage dealt. I felt doing this first would be great since most players in the game are damage oriented and build heavily on the DPS side.

So this build focuses on building Damage, nothing more, nothing less. Although there are multiple ways to build something like this, going either increasing atk stat directly or going for cdmg or adding up the main stat which is Dex. Either way you build it, the main purpose is to raise the damage you deal.​

Stats

Stats will be pretty straight forward: Full DEX.

If you have read above. Dex is the only stat that increases your atk stat by 2. In this stage of the game, you’re damage is higher than a full dex or full str 1h swordie. Even though 1h swordies gain 2 atk from both str and dex, you gain 2 from dex and only from atk. The reason you are stronger in terms of atk stat is because you’re sub weapon increases your attack. I don’t know the amount of increase if it’s base on your sub weapon’s atk or based on your agi, but what I do know is, the atk that you gain from sub weapon is the same no matter which weapon you use, may it be a wood sword or tomahawk.

There can be two ways that you can build this based on what if have experienced, built and done along the way.​

1. Maximized Attack.

First up is Maximizing Attack Stat.
This is fairly straight forward, Maximizing the atk stat to as high as you can get it.
This means you only get a high normal attack damage from your main hand and not in your sub hand because dex increases damage on the main hand only.
You will be relying so much on skills to kill bosses, and utilizing a high amount of mp because you’ll be going for +Atk% xtals rather than utility other than B.Roga xtal if you want.​

Equips

Sword = High Attack (better if Refined) Atk% Dex/ Atk% Crit/ Atk stats or Rapier BS NPC For physical pierce and Evasion. Tomahawk for that high damage base and crit increase.
SubWeapon = Any High attack weapon (possibly refined)
Armor = Dex/ Dex% Flat Crit/Flat Crit Damage, Or Gamble an Atk4% CR8 armor, Ooze Armor Boss Drop, BBGarb for that 9% Short Range Damage, would be good if you’re on a budget.
Add Gear = War Helmet/ Brutal Dragon Crown/ Fur Cape, or any add that you want that increases your ATK Stat or over all damage.
Talisman/Ring = Dex Talisman, Don’t use Muscle Talisman, ever.
*Note how Highlighted the equips are that give a huge increase in overall damage, increase in ATK, Damage​

Crystals

Sword = Ganglef/ Masked Warrior/ BBGob/ BDD
Sub Weapon = (Xtals don’t work here)
Armor = Boss Roga/ Masked Warrior/ BBGob/ BDD
Add Gear = Masked Warrior/ BB Gob/ BDD/ GSkel(for ASPD)/ Giant Boar.
Talisman/Ring = Ooze/ Masked Warrior/ BB Gob/ BDD.
*Most xtals are with Atk% increase.
**BBGob if you want to hog aggro/ Masked Warrior if you want AMPR​

Skill Set

Combo Set-Up
Standard Combo

Hard Hit > Astute (Cons) > Twin (Smite) > Trigger (Cons)
Astute > Twin (Smite) > Trigger (Cons)​

Recommended Combos

Hard Hit > Spinning Slash (Swift) > Trigger (Cons)
Astute > Twin (Smite)/Spinning Slash(Swift) > Trigger Cons.
Astute > Spinning Slash (Swift) > Twin (Smite) > Trigger Cons​

2. Maximized Crit.

Maximizing Crit Stats, or Crit Rate Crit Damage for that Matter.
The most important thing in this build is that you gotta maximize CRIT, not the CRIT as a Personal Stat, but CRIT as Crit Rate and Crit Damage.
The Stats you will be using is still DEX. All you Items are gonna be loade with Crit Rate and Crit Damage.​

Equips (will be similar to the maximized atk build, only difference is on the stats of the weapon and the armor)

Sword = High Attack (better if Refined) C888 or CD8 CR8 stats
SubWeapon = Any High attack weapon (possibly refined)
Armor = Flat Dex Crit Damage or C888 Armor. Don’t. EVER. Use CD4%
Add Gear = War Helmet/ Fur Cape
Talisman/Ring = Dex Talisman or Pendulum (Crit 5), Don’t use Muscle Talisman, ever.
*Note how Highlighted the equips are that give a huge increase in overall damage, increase in ATK, Damage​

Crystals (highly recommend Mauez/MW for Weapon and Armor, Warmonger for Add.)

Sword = Ganglef/ Masked Warrior/ BBGob/ Mauez
Sub Weapon = (Xtals don’t work here)
Armor = Boss Roga/ Masked Warrior/ BBGob/ Mauez
Add Gear = Masked Warrior/ BB Gob/ Mauez / GSkel(for ASPD)/ Giant Boar/ Warmonger
Talisman/Ring = Ooze/ Masked Warrior/ BB Gob/ Mauez.​

Skill Sets and Combos are the same as above​

Skill Set

Combo Set-Up
Standard Combo

Hard Hit > Astute (Cons) > Twin (Smite) > Trigger (Cons)
Astute > Twin (Smite) > Trigger (Cons)​

Recommended Combos

Hard Hit > Spinning Slash (Swift) > Trigger (Cons)
Astute > Twin (Smite)/Spinning Slash(Swift) > Trigger Cons.
Astute > Spinning Slash (Swift) > Twin (Smite) > Trigger Cons​

 

Thank you so much! This really helped me out a whole lot. Now I'm faster at killing!

 

thank you i'm glad it helped you
I'd appreciate it if you'd have any questions or suggestions or comments to post so i can address them as best as i can

 

I'm still a newbie to all this so it's all a big question mark but I'm slowly understanding...slow and steady XD
I messed up my characters stats at the beginning but since I've read this I added more to Dex and reset my skills tree! It was awesome I killed a savaran with one blow
I wish I had suggests to offer...
But I have one main question: does the armor you wear matter? I like the aqua garb...but ooze is the one I should be using.