Looking for a (written) Guide on Double Blade

[Aletía]

Hey fellow players, new player here. First of all I'm awed by the sheer beauty of this game - as well as overwhelmed by its complexity. I've found several guides already:

general guide: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1SrThoDcswFk3s-12K-jdh7IZDU6EAxhSkxUl2Q5j8-4/edit

gearing: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1XCdTWE7K_g9H9LkVeaAOXTwBvUD7dReFN5JkAeB2Vf8/edit

But I can't say I really understand the gearing/upgrading process yet. Which is not that much of a problem, being only level 15 on my double blade.

 

My first goal would be getting to know the class and its rotation and situational ability usage by heart. I've already found out that macroeing is a thing in this game, I have to say that this is something I generally don't do in games, as I don't find it to be fun and, most of all, I think I have mastered the classes I played in MMOs by simply playing them a lot with as few addons as possible...

 

So I'm looking for a good guide on both double blade specs, preferably a written one. I'm surprised the latest class added to the game is the only one that doesn't have a subforum under "classes" here and forum search didn't really help either. Google only gave me video guides, which I'm not a big fan of. So if anyone of you could point me to a good source of information about double blade class, that'd be much appreciated. 🙂

 

Have fun, everyone, and hope you enjoy the poetry of this game as much as I do 🙂

Edited June 16, 2022 by Aletía
typo correction

[Crona Darkdance]

Best you could do is join the Academy Discord. I would assume it has some base guide, but im not in it so i wouldnt know. DB as a class is pretty hard to play good on both specs and often unenjoyable, so only really go for it if u really really like the class.

 

I personally play Lotus as it can be played decently manual with simple mode. As for Shifting without xml and such its pretty horrid to play, but i know someone who does it really well manually. The constant v+3x rmb is just to terrible for me to really play it though.

 

Lotus is rather simple, but not really easy to pull off. Talents are 3 2 1 1 3 and skilpoints wildfire>lotus slash>cyclone slash. 5-3 is a 6% dmg increase party buff and generally better.

 

As for combos you are basically constantly in primordia til the end, build up 3 cyclone slash stacks for max wildfire damage on 1st one and usually fire it close to end of rotation. 

 

Your opener is usually petals before fight and wait for its cd to be done then 2>tab>c>rmb spam>petal after cyclone or when 4 is used with V at end of rotation then reenter primordia again.

 

Wildfire Damage is range based and u have to stand at 4.9-5 meter for the optimal 8 hits as the hits go down the closer u are, which is what makes it hard to play.

 

Petals is used to get the AP buff 5 stacks back, also as a resist and to lower prim cooldown.

 

C is used inbetwetween rotation as lifesteal, to trigger badge/brace and the c rmb 4 combo is used as a resist to stay at 5 meter.

 

Your main resist will be ur X bubble for long cc hits and otherwise the c rmb 4 combo the C and rmb being the main ones u time for as cc resist.

 

As for wind and earth stance you usually never use 4 rmb c to enter earth stance as c rmb 4 wind stance is just superior. You only use it if u really need that 3 second cc resist.

 

You also generally dont wanna use q, ss, e as resist unless u really need to, because of the 5 meter wildfire requirement.

 

If you are on NA i can help a bit better, but this should be decent enough to get the basics and most is just learning, cuz its mostly a manual spec with quick decisions.

Edited June 17, 2022 by Crona Darkdance

[Aletía]

Thank you SO MUCH, this is extremely helpful! I had actually joined the Discord you mentioned, but couldn't find class guides there.

From what I had found out about the specs, I planned on primarily playing Lotus, especially for the frequent loss of ones own HP in Shifting, which just doesn't sound like a class mechanic I would want to deal with in an MMO, especially on more difficult content later on... Being level 15 only, I haven't been able to try Lotus yet (I believe it unlocks at 20) and am eager to try what you wrote here then. Only thing is, I'm a lefty, so I use Arrow Keys for movement and remapped all the skills on keys I can reach with my right hand, (i.e. mainly keys on number pad). I will have to "translate" the keys you wrote back to the corresponding abilities, but that'll be manageable 🙂

 

Standing at a fixed distance to my target, as you explained Lotus requires you to do, sounds challenging, I'll give it a try. One of my melee characters in SWTOR required you to be behind your target at all times, which took a while to get used to as well...

I keep reading about "Simple Mode" and XML. Is Simple Mode something you can select as a game option or does it just refer to a basic kind of rotation you would use? And is XML some kind of Macro like function or tied to an addon?

Thanks for offering more assistance, that's really nice of you! I do play from Germany, though...

 

[Rhiakath]

Oh that's against TOS actually, you can't talk about that here.

[Rhiakath]

10 hours ago, Aletía said:

I keep reading about "Simple Mode"

 

Simple mode is game feature you can toggle with Shift+F3, and it puts several essential skills into rotation on RMB. However, it is rarely a complete set of buttons you need to press in your rotation, and is not really optimized in any way, shape or form. In its original format, it's somewhat usable on some classes/specs, but definitely not all.

[Aletía]

17 hours ago, Rhiakath said:

Oh that's against TOS actually, you can't talk about that here.

Ups ok, thanks for pointing that out. Kinda hard to know what crosses lines in different games, since there are so many different policies. I kinda like the no-3rd-party-stuff-whatsoever approach that e.g. BDO has. I was just trying to understand what people are talking about in some places other than this. I'm not interested in doing that kind of stuff anyway 🙂

[Aletía]

So at level 19 I actually switched to Lotus - and found it pretty boring to play in comparison to Shifting, I hate to admit. Shifting is pretty complicated, but also a lot of fun to play, since at that level it's a lot of different options when handling trash, which is what leveling pretty much consists of. Whereas Lotus is pretty much LMB/RMB and everything's dead, before you can do any of the other stuff (at least since I don't have petals yet). Since I also like bursty specs a lot, I will probably stay with Shifting for now, at least until I have unlocked Lotus' key abilities. Looks like I will decide on which spec to play after having reached 60 and tried both in their final form...

 

That being said: Can anyone point me to a written guide on Shifting as well, maybe?

 

Thanks everyone for helping out an undecided newby 🙂

[Draknalor]

2 hours ago, Aletía said:

level 19

Please don’t judge a class based on level 19 against quest mobs

[Aletía]

10 hours ago, Draknalor said:

Please don’t judge a class based on level 19 against quest mobs

I wasn't judging the spec as a whole, just how much fun to play it currently is in that level range. That's why I wrote that I will wait for all skills to get unlocked until I eventually decide. (Maybe I'll even switch specs situationally if this game lets you - generally not a good idea in games that have you acquire different kinds of gear sets for the same class in different specs, but I can't tell here yet). I assume that at level 60 it won't make sense for me to try and decide on which spec to use if I only know rotation/situational combos for one of the possible specs, cause that one will always "feel" better. That's why I'm looking for info to get a rough idea on how to play Shifting as well, practice both a bit and then decide. Until then I will obviously continue leveling, and simply decided no to do it in the 2 button spec, cause it's not much fun for the time being. That doesn't alter my long term plan, though 🙂

[Aletía]

Can anyone provide info on how to play Shifting Blades properly, pretty please? 🙂

[Ruthis]

On 6/17/2022 at 6:52 AM, Aletía said:

Thank you SO MUCH, this is extremely helpful! I had actually joined the Discord you mentioned, but couldn't find class guides there.

Just head down to the "Bot Channels", click on "class-requests" and type in ">iam Dual Blade"... this should add you to the Dual Blade class channel where there should be some pinned guides/references and you can always ask any questions you may have there. Hope that helps 😉

[Aletía]

On 6/27/2022 at 12:19 PM, Ruthis said:

Just head down to the "Bot Channels", click on "class-requests" and type in ">iam Dual Blade"... this should add you to the Dual Blade class channel where there should be some pinned guides/references and you can always ask any questions you may have there. Hope that helps 😉

Ah, perfect, everything I was looking for and more. Much appreciated 🙂

[Ruthis]

2 hours ago, Aletía said:

Ah, perfect, everything I was looking for and more. Much appreciated 🙂

No problem 😉

[Aletía]

So thanks again for everyone who helped here. I now play Lotus mostly, since it's very reliable in sustained dps, has decent burst windows and is pretty stable for soloing stuff with the long iframe. I must say that using XML or even easy mode associated with it means substantially lower dps in real fights than playing it manually, so that's what I'll be sticking to.