[DW] Khia's Blade Dancer guide: Now you're playing with power!

it was an exciting patch, it really was, after all
dual wielding is about speed, killing your enemy with an endless flurry of attacks!
and there's nothing more exciting than racing your foe to the death, matching their massive HP with an onslaught of deadly strikes.

Spoiler

but... our auto attack sucks, we have only 1 decent damage skill, and thus the dream was shattered for many, but what can we do about it?

we ignore it. all of it.
dual sword is obviously a utility tree, and don't let anyone tell you otherwise.
dodge, blind, break, parry, aoe, first strike bonus, evade attacks.
great for solo players, great for evade tanks, great for everything except dealing tons of damage.

but there is one piece of utility I didn't mention above.
your auto is 4 hits, it comes at a cost to damage and mobility.
BUT it's the most OP thing I've seen since Putin's nuclear battleship.

why? 4 attacks means 4 on hit effects.
go equip one sword, spend your mana. and watch it slowly refill.
go equip two swords, spend your mana, and then spend it all again.

that's right, mana regen is done per hit! (albeit at a lower rate per hit than a single sword)
(we gain 5 mana per hit in out attack, so one auto attack = 20 mana)
and thus we have the perfect piece of (super broken) utility.

in a nutshell, we're going to be getting between 60 and 100 mana* every auto attack.
60 mana: combo>auto>combo>auto>combo>auto>auto
100 mana: combo>auto
right up until the cows come home.
this eliminates the need for attack speed all together*, so say hello to heavy armor! (which helps with your lack of mobility)
that's right, we get to look awesome, deal more damage, break more faces, and steal more limelight than any of the classes that were built to do it!

*(you'll find the thresholds for more combos in the skills section of this guide.)
**attack speed reduces time *between* auto attacks, no effect on combos or the attack animation itself.
hell, lower attack speed is better for us, as we get very little time to dodge things as it is.


this guide is targeted to the dedicated (or rich), if you're casual go roll a mage or 2h!
(this build is entirely item dependent, and is built around some of the rarest items in the game)

things you need;

Spoiler

drops to farm:

Spoiler

eerie xtal - 1
flower headband (boss)(slot) - 1
sword of sin (boss) - 1
warmonger xtal - 1
Ooze Armor (slot) - 1
rainbow stone - 10
gluey skin - 30
luminous magic water - 20
Potum Fin - 15
Goblin Claw - 25
small article - 5
s. roar xtal - 1
m. potum xtal - 1 //you'll need orbs to remove it from the weapon
orb + 4 // you can get it from logging in each day for 2 months

the following are for stat boosts, you'll need them;
apple - infinite
fairy feather - infinite
cracked stone - infinite

your end game equips will look something like:

Spoiler

Recommended Version: (6 combos)
Adel Sword (slot) - m. potum xtal //crit +6, critdmg +6, pierce 4%
Sword of Sin (boss v.)
flower headband (boss v.) (slot) - warmonger xtal
ooze armor (slot) - s. roar xtal //crit +6, critdmg +6, stability 4%
warrior's bangle (smith v.) (slot) - eiree xtal

budget version: (3 combo)
adel sword (slot) (smith version) - strength 2
adel sword (no slot) (smith version)
flower headband (blacksmith ver) (slot) - strength 2
ooze armor (boss ver) (heavy) (slot) - strength 2
strength (or vit) talisman II (slot) - eiree xtal

No Life Version: (infinite combos)
Adel Sword (slot) - m. potum xtal //crit +6, critdmg +6, pierce 4%
Tomahawk (boss v.)
brutal dragon crown (boss v.) (slot) - s.roar xtal
ooze armor (smith v.)(slot) - s. roar xtal
proof of victory (slot, slot) - eiree xtal, s.roar xtal

now that we have our wishlist,
let's go onto

skills and explanations.

Spoiler

Blade Skills:
Hard Hit, 10 - we only have 100 mana to work with, so this sets up consecutive and provides some breathing space for the next hits
Astute, 10 - Critical is the bread and butter of all dps, and our second 100 mana skill
Trigger Slash, 10 - more mana per hit? and it hits hard? get it!
Sword Mastery, 5 - doesn't take effect when dual weilding.
Quick Slash, 5 - we don't care for attack speed.
Sword Techniques - 10, 3 of our 4 skills are 1 handed - use it!

Dual sword skills:
Dual Sword Mastery - 10, can't be having reduced crit, or to a lesser extent accuracy.
Twin Slash - 10, it hits them very hard!
Dual Wield Control** - 1, reduces dex needed to gain 1 hit by 1.3 (first level only)

Knight Skills:
Assualt Attack - 1+, haha! no more guard for the fiendish demon gate!
seriously helps with damage output on gate, and as an added bonus can used against those pesky high mobility bosses to make our life a bit easier (looking at you Big Coryn!) - I still prefer hard-hit against most bosses though.
1 is recommended, but if you find yourself using it more often than hard hit, you can put your extra points in here.

Battle Skills:
Attack Up - 5, good, but bonus is small
Smash - 5, not entirely sure how this works
Crit Up - 10, 5% crit and crit damage? Sign us up!

Survival Skills*:
Short Rest - 5, i guess out of combat regen is useful?
Sober Analysis - 1, level 1 gives us +3 mana per hit. (and 1 mp every 3 seconds, which is irrelevant)

*not necessary for budget version, instead take Dual Wield Control level 6**
**

Spoiler

Dual Wield Control gives the following benifits each level:
50 attack speed
and reduces the amount of dex needed to gain 1 hit by 0.3
with the exception of level 1, which reduces the dex needed by 1.3
level 1 - 3.7 dex per hit
level 6 - 2.2 dex per hit
level 10 - 1 dex per hit

Your Last 10 points:
You Have a few options with your last 10 skill points.
Personally I recommend one of the following three;
Survival Skills - Drop Rate lvl 10, because who doesn't like more loot?
Guard Skills - Heavy Armor lvl 10, a good choice if you're farming high level bosses, saves revitas.
Battle Skills - ATK up & Smash lvl 10, you already have both at level 5, so max them both - hitting harder is awesome!

Combo:
Combo 1: Astute, Hard Hit (consecutive), Twin Slash (consecutive), Trigger Slash (consecutive)
-this is your main damage sequence, cause you auto attacks suck.
Combo 2: Hard Hit, Astute (consecutive), Trigger Slash (consecutive)
-for when you need that quick flinch (if you just use hard hit, you have to auto twice to refill mana, takes longer and does significantly less damage)

High mobility/Demon Gate Combo:
Combo 1: Assault Attack, Astute (consecutive), Twin Slash (consecutive), Trigger Slash (consecutive)
-GET IN THERE!
Combo 2: Hard Hit, Astute(consecutive), Trigger Slash (consecutive)
-same deal as your standard combo, sometimes staying alive is more important than dealing tons of damage.

the thresholds for additional combos occur at*:
13mph (total of 56 per auto attack) - 3 combos
20mph (total of 80 per auto attack) - 4 combos
23mph (total of 86 per auto attack) - 6 combos
25mph (total of 90 per auto attack) - 8 combos
30mph (total of 100 per auto attack) - infinite combos

*assuming level 70 and a mana pool of 170

Stats:

Spoiler

51 in dex,
everything else in strength.
*budget version can opt to take 31 dex instead due to extra points in DWC
** if budget version is your final target you should opt for full dex however, as with low gear levels, it outperforms str.

stat point explanations

Spoiler

dex is in there for hit rate, until we can effectively stat 50 crit on our gear, hit is still valuable.
strength = 1 damage and .2 crit damage, so better than dex once we hit a certain hit rate
agi is useless, 2 damage (offhand) and attack speed.
vit is a wasted stat, nothing hits you for 2k, vit+ II pots are enough.
crit unfortunately is 0.3 crit per point, until we hit 600 attack, it's not cost effective.

about dex vs str;
dexterity will out perform strength at medium - low gear levels, and high evasion bosses regardless of gear levels.
the reason for this has to do with the way .2 crit damage scales with gear, and stats only providing 40-70% of your total attack damage.

things to note:

Spoiler

astute provides 25 crit, combined with our base makes 50% crit - we have 100% uptime on this.
crit (player stat) provides 1% per ~3.5 points
crit on gear is 1 point 1%
crit% on gear gives you a % of your crit rate (2 crit % with our default would be 0.5% crit) - so don't stat for that.
trigger hit and astute still provide their buffs even if the attack misses or is guarded, but not if it gets interrupted or evaded.
5 strength gives 1 crit damage.
crit damage % works the same way as crit%, with current gear levels it's not worth it.
5 dex gives 1 hit, so that fairy potion is worth 100 dex, giving us an acceptable hit rate.

even though our auto attack is 4 hits, it does not give us 4x the mana of a one handed sword
but rather 5 per slash, resulting in 20 per attack.
trigger slash multiplies our total by 2.
the most additional mph we can gain is 33, using:
1x sober analysis
4x s. roar xtal (weapon 1, armor, helm, proof of victory)
1x ooze armor (smith v)(slot)
1x flower band (slot)
1x eiree xtal (in proof of victory)
30 is the max you'll need however.

playstyle:

Spoiler

drink your medicine (fairy eye, vit+II, guard potion)
find a boss, look him in the eye, and then astute his face off!

you're going to be playing race to the death with everything you hit.
luckily, we're very, very good at it.
after every single attack, use combo 1.
and if you can't move out of the way, you use combo two to interrupt the red circles of death.

nothing dangerous I've seen casts as fast as one auto > hard hit, so you really shouldn't have to move very often.

and that's all!
please leave comment, questions and thoughts below ^^

thanks for reading,
Khia

Changelog:

Spoiler

29/11/15
added last 10 skill points section;
changed overheat with guard potion, as it is significantly more effective with heavy armor.
expanded on stat point explanations, to advise that full dex is an acceptable variation at this stage in the game.
changed offhand to tomahawk for the no life build.

24/11/15
added knight skills: assault attack;

22/11/15
altered no life version to account for the impossible double eiree xtal (thanks @Cryous)
addressed DWC in the guide (thanks @Riorden & @Alleura)
changed dex values, added a point to DWC for all builds.
added additional DWC explanations.

21/11/15
updated incorrect info on mana regen.
added combo thresholds to the combo subsection of skills
replaced flare volg xtal with silver roar xtal to account for revised mp regen.
re-worked budget version to total 13 mph (3 combos) as it seems more attainable for casuals.
added no life version, totals 30 mph and gives consistent combos every attack.

20/11/15
added dark sword as recommended offhand.

 

Nice sword guide

 

YAY! Thanks for using potions! There is some misguided purists here that feel it's cheating (they are silly)
Thanks for giving love to strength (also unpopular) (critical damage is the once and future king! )

Not keen on sober analysis (ugh, short rest) as it is not attack MP recovery.
Partial to leading with hard hit in combo 1 (astute 2nd), and then retiring combo 2
I think cross parry is cool, but that is likely do to my misfortunate upbringing (brawler)
A new 2nd combo could include a smited twin slash. Admittedly it would be a 300MP combo, but still feels right

Anywho. Thanks. Have fun. IDK. I lie.

 

I prefer an evasive build for more survivability and low costs, plus with all the passives maxed out on dual wield skills, your evasion attacks will hit super hard. That's why I prefer evasion over strength, but this build seems like it would be very fun to use, and can probably hit nicely.

It's also probably better than an evasive build, but I personally like evasion, it's cool haha.

 

Crits have the bonus of not missing, so crit heavily devalues hit (dex bonus stat), hence my preference for strength (and there's no crit pot)
Sober Analysis gives +3 attack regen at level 1, you could replace this with ooze armor (boss v.) but I'd rather have the player stats.
it does suck that we need 5 in short rest to get it though.

edit: more incorrect mana info below, but the gist of it still applies
300 mp combo is too slow (need 3 autos to do it, so our dps would drop drastically), also we have 100 max mp ^^
plus if we don't end with trigger hit, our mp per attack halves, so astute>smited twin slash would take 6 auto attacks to charge @.@
I lead with astute for the damage, the crit bonus (which also functions as a 25% hit bonus) and so that hard hit helps cover the transition to twin slash trigger hit.

thanks for the feedback ^^;

 

My 2 cent,
DS mastery is not enough to negate all accuracy + critical rate reduction.
You still need one more DS passive skill: DS Control.
Or you will be suffer high amount of Accuracy + critical rate penalty.

 

Are you sure?? I readily concede that I am so very often wrong, but I was of the mind sober analysis is a "fixed rate over time", not "additional MP recovery per attack" (would happily be wrong)(don't think I'm wrong). Honestly if dual wielders weren't so stat starved to begin with, I wouldn't care.

300MP is a stretch for this style of play, but BIG NUMBERS are COOL! For DPS the 100MP combo spam likely wins out (I play 100MP combos myself)

As to astute 1st or 2nd in the combo- the astute buff has sufficient duration to bridge combos, yes? So aside from your very 1st hard hit at the start of battle, the rest of your hard hits benefit from astute. As always, I'm often wrong. So this question is not rhetorical (hoping I'm right this time)

Keep having fun

 

Stat starved! Good luck guys (gal)

 

stat? what do you means?
Critical rate is important in this build right, So any resource to increase critical rate is important.
It is not actually increase, it's negate the critical rate penalty because of wielding two sword.

 

Overall, this is an impressive guide and focus on a different path than that of its more traditional counterpart. My problem will most likely be the potions. I normally never use them, which means it will take some time to get use to them!

 

?!#* it. SKILL STARVED. anyways... Yeppers. I agree

 

DS control is attack speed ^.^ Mastery is all you need for the crit rate, can't garuntee that with hit, but we have plenty of hit anyway

 

You're correct about astute, but remember 10% of astute damage is a lot higher than 10% of hard hits (consecutive penalty). There's a great guide called "numerical mp management" somewhere on these forums, it's prior to dw patch, but it's a great source, and I did verify the SA one too, as I was also skeptical ^^;

 

Hey @Khia, my favorite dw guide so far! Loved the originality and your writing style! But regarding the 5 dex = 1 hit you mentioned; normally you get 1 hit per dex, so if you are seeing such low hit, it could be due to the lack of the DS control skill.
With ds control maxed, you would have higher hit rate than other weapon users of the same dex and level.
The same probably also applies to crit rate.

 

1 hit per 5 Dex is my rate, it could well be that ds control is both hit and attack rate, I can confirm crit is not affected by DSC, however unless your using the casual build DSC just isn't worth the skill points (fairy eye let's you 100% hit all but 2 bosses).

I'm glad you like my guide. Thank you so much for the compliments. I'll look into DSC and hit in a few hours and update the casual option to accommodate that in lue of support skills ^^

edit: the first point gave my level 63 aoe dw 5 hit, the next 3 skill points gave 2 each.
this is at 1 dex (all luck char). I'll make a new char and find out if it's a flat rate or a % of current hit you're gaining.
as well as stats for all 10 skill levels.

 

Just a little downer on your no life build. You can't equip two of the same xtals on a single piece of equipment so you can't eerie+eerie

 

huh, did not know that. Easy fix tho, swap flower headband for bad dragon crown, and put a silver roar in that and proof, and swap weapon xtal for m potum again. I'll update when I get to my laptop >: /

 

No sir, I must correct you. Dual wielding is not about racing your foe to the death. It's about how long you can survive until being hit by red zone attacks while dealing about 16 damage! As I dual wielder (and a fed up one at that) I know that for a FACT.

This class is pathetic.

 

I'm sorry you're bad, but don't worry - there's a great guide above that allows you to deal a significantly larger amount of damage than 16!
as a bonus, with heavy armor, vit II and rev III, you can ignore the vast majority of red zone attacks, and flinch out those you can't.

even someone as technically challenged as you can succeed!
I'm such a nice person, writing a guide that can help cute little nublets like you, and without even asking for the slightest bit of gratitude or courtesy!
(which are both cost you nothing to give surprisingly)

<3 Khia

 

Actually, I completely rebuilt my char using this guide. I was fighting the Demon Gate and my auto attack was doing about 0-16 damage.
Which I was doing to recover MP to use the combo I set up using this guide.
And I quote you "this guide is targeted to the dedicated (or rich), if you're casual go roll a mage or 2h!
(this build is entirely item dependent, and is built around some of the rarest items in the game)". This is absolutely true. I wish I could sit here and farm my bum off almost 24/7 to get this stuff but I'm not gifted like that. And I don't have millions of spina to buy it.
The issue is, in order to get the equips and items to defeat the bosses you have to defeat the bosses first to get the stuff to defeat those bosses.
And who drops apple, fairy feather, and burning liquid?
And I do apologize about the wording of my first post; I was quite angry at the time. I hate the Demon Gate.
And as far as me being technically challenged and a nublet? Well, I'm sorry I'm not an "elite" player like everyone else. At least I do consult this forum pretty much every time I've played Toram. So you tell me; am I really a nublet? Or just a really frustrated player.

And yes I do really appreciate you writing this guide. It seems like the most logical and straightforward guide in the entire forum.