What weapon path should I choose?

[Saiyun]

Well first of all I don't spend much time playing games, so I want some mediocre chilly weapon upgrade path but still be viable in endgame dungeons but I don't know which path to choose.
So far I've asked fraction chat which should be my starting weapon and the answer was baleful but later on one suggested to me that I should have gone Seraph since Riftwalk is better than DawnForge and after upgrade to Raven.  Is this correct? and what are your opinions? 

Thanks.

[Stormpooper]

While I have a massive feeling of deja vu, I couldn't find myself answering something almost exactly like this on forums, so:
We do not have any real choices in terms of weapon upgrade paths. Before the recent updates, people went dawn/rift over raven because it was the cheaper path, but now I don't really know but i'm 99% sure there was a spreadsheet somewhere comparing prices and going to max stages added up to somewhere around the same, orienting on how you get your raid materials. You might find that on forums here somewhere.

As for BM specifically, BT (Black Tower or Skybreak Spire) 8 soulshield set + riftwalk weapon reduce the cooldown of V to 24 seconds. Adding the effect of Dragon (I think that's the one for Lightning Rod) bracelet paired with eternity (the one that resets Blade Storm on Lightning Rod, didn't bother remembering names) Soul Badge, the damage is comparable to Raven weapon, though I'm not sure about the specifics.
These are the reasons why people tell you to go seraph > riftwalk, but you should check out the prices for yourself and then decide. And besides, you can switch between baleful/dawnforged and seraph/riftwalk using 1 Sacred Oil and some Void Fragments. Not hard to get, just that Oils are also used for Soul upgrades.

And just saying, but you won't get far without investing time (money) in this game.

[Strawcherry]

Im a fire BM with a Baleful Stage 12 weapon and going Raven 3 soon

I've calculated the cost differences between rift/dawn and raven with the result that thw raven path is much cheaper ( I wanna add that going from bale/seraph 10 -> Raven 1 is much cheaper that going from bale/seraph 12 -> Raven 3. But my luck is amazing and they reduce thw upgrade paths always after I upgraded my weapon and stuff, rip)

 

If you are a fire BM definitely go Raven, since the Raven weapon gives better 'Bonuses' for your skills and its also much cheaper than the other upgrade path. You will habe to spend more Elysian Crystals, but therefore save over 1k soul stone crystals and you will need soul stone crystals foe other upgraded as well, unlike elysian crystals.

 

Thats my opinion, I hope I helped you?

[Laseen]

Hi, as mid-core BM I'd suggest to stick to the Raven weapon. Nowadays it's quite cheap and very effective. In the past I had Riftwalk, then Raven and I noticed around 12k/s dps increase testing in the training room (without the Raven SS and badge combo).

Now, in the matter of the combination of Riftwalk + Raven SS + Combined Badge: here is an extensive topic on dps comparison vs Raven: https://www.reddit.com/r/bladeandsoul/comments/6aboft/riftwalk_vs_raven_for_bm_tests/ .

I believe it's a really cool playstyle, in fact, from Raven I jumped back to Storm Dragon weapon path. Do-not-make-this-mistake. Even with the best gear scenario for the 24sec V cooldown, my dps increase wasn't significant from when I had Raven +9 BUT I lost a lot of punch in the start of boss fights and this is the worst thing it could happen to us. Keep in mind that nowadays you have to play with extremely high burst dmg classes like Gunner...we cannot afford to wait to build stacks. Furthermore, if you play casually, you won't have the luxury to pursue the fused badge anyway AND, probably, by the time you reach the stage 9 on Raven, Aransu weapon will be more accessible so you can smoothly keeping the natural upgrade path.