Infiltrator vs. Shadow blade - Need guidance

Hi all,

I need advice on the approach when fighting shadow blades on my infiltrator. They just rip me a part when they have purge up (which they have 9/10)
I am currently 50 Thrust, 39 cs, 30 DW.

My current approach is to apply poison and land dragonfang, which is a good start on paper... Then they purge, bum rush me and I die.

What approach are you guys using?

Fri 5 Jul 2019 2:08 PM by Lillebror

I have tried 50cs and 50dw so far and i like the 50dw best so far. But im only rr4 so i guess it doesnt shine jet.

Your DF make them purge your stun but even worse, your poisons.

Also DF mean your thrust and they are strong vs it and they hit back with nuteral damage on you. That and higher con/hits they became hard.

Fri 5 Jul 2019 2:45 PM by Saroi

Your only real option is to drop thrust and go slash. You will do 10% more damage then instead of 10% less. With slash you will do 10% less damage vs. a lot of others like Rangers/NS, but they are still easier to fight than a SB with Thrust.

If you want to stay Thrust, atleast drop it. 50 Thrust for DF is not worth it. You get a 6 sec evade stun from 15 in Thrust. If you ever land your stun without it being purged, that is enough to do damage. You don't get any extra damage from having that much in Thrust, 52 comp is max for damage, everything above just raises your weaponskill but you lose important skillpoints for CS or DW.

Speccing 50 in DW also helps. Dual Shadows has a good Growth Rate, so the Style damage is better than Garotte and you get a 25 bleed. If you count in resists, it bleeds for 19 damage on the first tick. Your Offhand will hit more, which means more damage from it and you gain more attack speed because your offhand will be calculated in your weaponspeed for your next swing.

As for the stun it is mostly a downside because like Lilliebror said your poisons are gone. I can only give you the advice that if you land your stun to immediately switch to backup WS/COn and disease debuff to apply them after the purge. Otherwise, the enemy is able to get full damage on you because your poison lower the damage. Like disease reduces 7.5% Strength.

I am currently rr5 with 50 CS, 37 Slash, 35 Env/Stealth, rest in DW. I am waiting for rr6 to go 50 DW and have 34 in CS for PA/CD and weapon comp at 52 and stealth/env comp at 50.

Fri 5 Jul 2019 9:28 PM by Zergcaptain

Thanks for the advice ;-)

Mon 8 Jul 2019 8:42 AM by Sepplord

Saroi basically already mentioned most important advice, i just want to stress the poisoning and repoisoning a bit more, as it doesn't sound like you are utilizing this enough.
When fighting an SB the bare minimum of poisons you want to apply to them is: WS/Con-debuff, lifebane and desease.
If wanted you can also apply the lvl17 version of the WS/Con-debuff, since it is a str-debuff at that level and thus stacks.

If the enemy purges, you must reapply all those poisons, otherwise you are fighting at a HEAVY disadvantage

Saroi wrote: ↑
Fri 5 Jul 2019 2:45 PM
You don't get any extra damage from having that much in Thrust, 52 comp is max for damage, everything above just raises your weaponskill but you lose important skillpoints for CS or DW.

While i agree that it isn't worth it, you do get more dmg too, for the thruststyles you use. Saroi probably knows it, but many people misunderstand this (i even had people in advice discussing only going for comp52 spec on a warrior...) so i want to stress this.
Comp. weaponspecc 52 is only the dmg-cap for styles from a different specline. Aka an infiltrator using CS/DW-styles. While using thruststyles thrustspecc up to speclevel50+items+RR is still a damage increase

Tue 9 Jul 2019 12:29 PM by SlowMo

Only thing to do as Thurst Inf vs SB is pray to RNGesus for your procs and evades :-)

I really can´t remember that the results of this matchup were so much in favor of SB´s back in the days.

Right now I even prefer facing Ranger over SB - and these guys a a Pain in the ass for sure...

Tue 9 Jul 2019 2:08 PM by Turano

There are many reasons why thrust Infils have a hard time versus SB's compared to classic daoc

1. LA and therefor SB's got a massive damage boost here on phoenix.
2. Debuff poison is now ws/con instead of str/con, hitting thrust specs harder than before.
3. In classic only clerics had spec af buff, so albs kinda had a buffbot advantage over mids
4. Everyone has at least 15 minute purge, so your evade stun will be purged way more often

Tue 9 Jul 2019 3:36 PM by Sepplord

DW got boosted similarly just with swing-chance instead of damage didn't it?
And there have always been SpecAF charges.

I agree on the other points

Tue 9 Jul 2019 6:36 PM by SlowMo

Maybe a dev can clarify about LA and/or DW boost ?

If thats the way its supposed to be, well then only chance is to avoid sb, which is pretty much impossbile.

So back to praying :-)

Tue 9 Jul 2019 7:13 PM by Lillebror

There is plenty of targets that Get nightmare hard with slash. So i will propose to spec both =)
At rr 5 i wanna test thrust and slash since we got ALOT of points.
https://playphoenix.online/charplan/?class=Infiltrator&level=50&realmRank=30&view=skills&s13=35&s14=36&s31=35&s33=34&s47=36&s55=34

With switch macroes it should be easy enough to swap the correct weapons for your target.
Pluss damage vs mid chain and leather......

Wed 10 Jul 2019 4:15 AM by Saroi

SlowMo wrote: ↑
Tue 9 Jul 2019 6:36 PM
Maybe a dev can clarify about LA and/or DW boost ?

If thats the way its supposed to be, well then only chance is to avoid sb, which is pretty much impossbile.

So back to praying :-)

They are in the patch note archiv.

But for instance:

LA Mainhand starts with 77,3% damage instead of 62,5%. Offhand starts with 52,5% instead of 62,5%. Offhand scaling got buffed from .34 to .52.

With the Mainhand LA buffed, the hit chance from DW/CD got buffed too but they didn't tell some numbers. Only number given out was, that with 73 CD/DW you have a 5% better hit chance.

On another patch they buffed the scaling from offhand. You now gain .86 instead of .68 per skill point.

So both LA and CD/DW got buffs but the LA buffs are consistant damage while CD/DW is still a lottery with Offhand hits, especially with low CD/DW. Allthough as an Inf you do not have big problems like NS because of your more skillpoints and better styles in the DW line to spec in there.

Wed 10 Jul 2019 4:22 AM by Saroi

Lillebror wrote: ↑
Tue 9 Jul 2019 7:13 PM
There is plenty of targets that Get nightmare hard with slash. So i will propose to spec both =)
At rr 5 i wanna test thrust and slash since we got ALOT of points.
https://playphoenix.online/charplan/?class=Infiltrator&level=50&realmRank=30&view=skills&s13=35&s14=36&s31=35&s33=34&s47=36&s55=34

With switch macroes it should be easy enough to swap the correct weapons for your target.
Pluss damage vs mid chain and leather......

I am not sure if that is a good idea. You may have both damage types then but your style damage will be very low and should in the end be about the same damage if you take like slash vs. mid chain and higher CS. With RR 5 it is hard anyway, especially if you want to keep PA/CD. The goal is to become RR6 and then be able to spec 34 cs with 50 DW. At this point you have a good style with good growth rate and that gives 19 extra damage from bleeding so you can do good damage vs. targets that are resistant to your weapon type.

Testing a hybrid spec with both weaponlines would only be worth at rr9+ so you can have 44 CS with 36 DW for around 70% Offhand hits.

Thu 11 Jul 2019 9:09 AM by Zergcaptain

I can see that the post has continued some after I thouht it was finalized, so I thought to give an update.

I respecced to 50Dw, 35 thrust, 35 envenom (currently RR5, will respec to 36 thrust @ RR6) and I believe it switched the scales from 10 Loss/90 Win ratio vs. SB to 50/50% depending on evades, poisons, procs and maybe even strenght relics.
Versus other classes it was massive. Maybe 30/70 to 70/30% vs. nightshades or rangers.

The 50DW was definately a game change for me. Using stun as emergency later in a fight instead of trying to land it provoking a purge also gave me an edge.

Now I am zoomed in on my RA's and could use advice here. Currently I am purge 2, vanish 1 and rest into aug dex, qui, str + MOA.
- Considering I am not getting purged, would Viper be feasible?
- Is Aug dex/str worth the investments?

Thu 11 Jul 2019 9:29 AM by Saroi

Zergcaptain wrote: ↑
Thu 11 Jul 2019 9:09 AM
I can see that the post has continued some after I thouht it was finalized, so I thought to give an update.

I respecced to 50Dw, 35 thrust, 35 envenom (currently RR5, will respec to 36 thrust @ RR6) and I believe it switched the scales from 10 Loss/90 Win ratio vs. SB to 50/50% depending on evades, poisons, procs and maybe even strenght relics.
Versus other classes it was massive. Maybe 30/70 to 70/30% vs. nightshades or rangers.

The 50DW was definately a game change for me. Using stun as emergency later in a fight instead of trying to land it provoking a purge also gave me an edge.

Now I am zoomed in on my RA's and could use advice here. Currently I am purge 2, vanish 1 and rest into aug dex, qui, str + MOA.
- Considering I am not getting purged, would Viper be feasible?
- Is Aug dex/str worth the investments?

Good to hear that it helped. As for the RA's. I think viper is helpful, especially vs. SB's in that regard. Also if you lose a fight you can reapply it at the end and take the enemy with you to death. I am not a big fan of MoP because you already have enough randoms with resists and evades. That is why I like more consistant damage.

Aug dex/str is not that good because with thrust you only gain 50% bonus instead of 100% like slash with aug str. That is also why viper is better for thrust.

I would get rid of vanish, you can rejoin the battles quickly with port and boats, so just take your loss if you really are getting zerged down and maybe go with purge 3. 15 min timer on purge is too big in my opinion. This will also improve your fighting power a bit.

Thu 11 Jul 2019 9:36 AM by inoeth

SlowMo wrote: ↑
Tue 9 Jul 2019 6:36 PM
Maybe a dev can clarify about LA and/or DW boost ?

If thats the way its supposed to be, well then only chance is to avoid sb, which is pretty much impossbile.

So back to praying :-)

la was implemented wrong in the first place, then got corrected but in that patch cd/dw got buffed ... so in the end cd/dw is even stronger here than on live... even though gruenes would not confirm me here.

still sb seem to be kind of strong now

Thu 11 Jul 2019 11:28 AM by Kemoauc

With regards to MoP and Aug Stats for dmg:
I think people generally overvalue the Legion heal charge item in fights. I would argue that especially if you are a dual wield class the use of the dmgadd charge plus some defensive RA's to compensate the lost hps from the Legion charge will be better than investing in offensive RA's and using Legion charge.

In my case (2hand pala) the dmg add is somewhere between 10 and 20% additional dmg depending on my target. In comparison MoPain9 gives you a 39% Chance to do additional 30% dmg on average which is only a 12% increase in dps.

You could get 400 flat HP for that many points and switch from Legion to dmgadd charge infight. Dmg would be similar but less variance and you get tons more HP on top of what using the heal charge would give you.

Thu 11 Jul 2019 12:20 PM by Saroi

Kemoauc wrote: ↑
Thu 11 Jul 2019 11:28 AM
With regards to MoP and Aug Stats for dmg:
I think people generally overvalue the Legion heal charge item in fights. I would argue that especially if you are a dual wield class the use of the dmgadd charge plus some defensive RA's to compensate the lost hps from the Legion charge will be better than investing in offensive RA's and using Legion charge.

In my case (2hand pala) the dmg add is somewhere between 10 and 20% additional dmg depending on my target. In comparison MoPain9 gives you a 39% Chance to do additional 30% dmg on average which is only a 12% increase in dps.

You could get 400 flat HP for that many points and switch from Legion to dmgadd charge infight. Dmg would be similar but less variance and you get tons more HP on top of what using the heal charge would give you.

Please don't give away my strategy

But in general, that is something I have been saying for month, especially as SB. You hit with both hands, the damage gain from damage add is just huge. Before the Charge changes I said dex/quick is not worth it and rather go damage add. The damage boost will always be bigger and same applies now to legion charge.

I have toughness 9 and using damage add in every fight. On top of that I am axe with the double dot proccs from the weapons + lifebane. Especially vs. you that helps a lot. Add a 34% haste debuff and all I need to do is just survive and all my bonus damage and dots will do their work.

It is a bit more tricky though as an Inf since you do not have that and don't always hit with your offhand but with 50 DW damage add should be more priotized than legion heal for sure.

Thu 11 Jul 2019 12:59 PM by Sepplord

not much to add to the current DA<->legionheal discussion but i saw viper being mentioned further up.

I also don't have much to say about Viper, but one thing i think is important to recognize when toying around with viper:

It is one of the very few RA that doesn't have diminishing returns on points spent, but actually gives you less for the first points spent than the last ones
(for example: first lvl gives 10% for 5points = 2%/point, last level gives 25% for 8points= 3,125%/point)

So IF you go Viper, go full viper

PS: anyone got a theory or even knows why this is like it is? To me it doesn't make sense, since almost all RAs follow the rule that you have diminishing returns the further you specc into them

Fri 12 Jul 2019 6:42 AM by SlowMo

I don´t know... I am getting really frustrated.
I just can´t win 1 1on1 vs SB - had several occasions yesterday and all end up in a big loss for me. Even landing PA chain isnt advantage enough.

I have beaten Warri, Fian, hell even a champ but I just can´t win a fight vs SB. I know you can´t win em all, but none ever? Come on...
It´s getting ridiculous.

Fri 12 Jul 2019 6:57 AM by Saroi

SlowMo wrote: ↑
Fri 12 Jul 2019 6:42 AM
I don´t know... I am getting really frustrated.
I just can´t win 1 1on1 vs SB - had several occasions yesterday and all end up in a big loss for me. Even landing PA chain isnt advantage enough.

I have beaten Warri, Fian, hell even a champ but I just can´t win a fight vs SB. I know you can´t win em all, but none ever? Come on...
It´s getting ridiculous.

What is your spec and RR? What Realm points do you have and also what weapons/charges do you use?

Fri 12 Jul 2019 7:52 AM by Sepplord

SlowMo wrote: ↑
Fri 12 Jul 2019 6:42 AM
I don´t know... I am getting really frustrated.
I just can´t win 1 1on1 vs SB - had several occasions yesterday and all end up in a big loss for me. Even landing PA chain isnt advantage enough.

I have beaten Warri, Fian, hell even a champ but I just can´t win a fight vs SB. I know you can´t win em all, but none ever? Come on...
It´s getting ridiculous.

you must be doing somehing wrong then....it feels like that for me too sometimes going against NS on my SB...but even then there are fights where RNG goes totally in my favor and i stomp them. Assassin fights are RNG-shitfests very often and if you are always getting obliterated then there's probably something that can be done to improve your results.

Saroi already asked about your details, he is a pretty helpful guy and quite knowledgable imo

Fri 12 Jul 2019 8:14 AM by Hangel

I have tried different spec and with slash was really easy to kill sb, but I come back to thrust because I prefer a direct 6 sec stun than a combo one.
I test the damage too but personally I still think Garrote is better damage than other style, can snare too and you can have a good combo for damage and speed debuff.
Actually I'm 42CS 44Dual, my goal is to arrive to 44/44... good CS damage and good chance to hit too.
About RA is hard, I have purge4 vanish1 mop5 Moa3 and AOM3, I will drop AOM when I can get EM. I don't think aug str or dex are necessary here.

Fri 12 Jul 2019 8:35 AM by Lillebror

Kemoauc wrote: ↑
Thu 11 Jul 2019 11:28 AM
With regards to MoP and Aug Stats for dmg:
I think people generally overvalue the Legion heal charge item in fights. I would argue that especially if you are a dual wield class the use of the dmgadd charge plus some defensive RA's to compensate the lost hps from the Legion charge will be better than investing in offensive RA's and using Legion charge.

In my case (2hand pala) the dmg add is somewhere between 10 and 20% additional dmg depending on my target. In comparison MoPain9 gives you a 39% Chance to do additional 30% dmg on average which is only a 12% increase in dps.

You could get 400 flat HP for that many points and switch from Legion to dmgadd charge infight. Dmg would be similar but less variance and you get tons more HP on top of what using the heal charge would give you.

Dont give it all away....

Fri 12 Jul 2019 8:37 AM by Sepplord

Hangel wrote: ↑
Fri 12 Jul 2019 8:14 AM
I have tried different spec and with slash was really easy to kill sb, but I come back to thrust because I prefer a direct 6 sec stun than a combo one.
I test the damage too but personally I still think Garrote is better damage than other style, can snare too and you can have a good combo for damage and speed debuff.
Actually I'm 42CS 44Dual, my goal is to arrive to 44/44... good CS damage and good chance to hit too.
About RA is hard, I have purge4 vanish1 mop5 Moa3 and AOM3, I will drop AOM when I can get EM. I don't think aug str or dex are necessary here.

Could you elaborate why you think AoM and EM are needed? At least more needed than aug-stats?
I have considered picking them at all on my stealthers (which doesn't mean that they aren't worth picking, i just learned about the usefullness of toughness simply because i had never done the math...)

MoP is also a bit overrated, the average dmg increase really isn't all that great. Though it is an RA that can possibly add a lot of dmg if RNG goes your way. Especially with MoP you should get lucky fights where your dmg is huge (but also fights where you don't get crits or high-damage crits at all). Crits in PvP only go up to 50%, so on average it's only +25% with a chance of 39% happening at MoP9. Overall it's not even 10% damage

Fri 12 Jul 2019 8:49 AM by Lillebror

When i dinged 50 i did some testing due to 24hour fred with respecs, i was low rr so couldnt spec all out in a line.
My testing showed that the offensive ras, Aug Str, MoP, MoA, Viper. My finding was that they avg out about same, AUG str gave little less return pr/s and MoP could give more if spiking (lucky with often and high crits).

So i think i will rather spread my points even out instead of going deep into one. (10p deep into one ra).

Im still low rr (4L7) but Cs have been crap imo and i have loved DW. I ended slash due to offhand 56 str/con debuff proc (but im not sure its worth it since its 3.1 speed so i feel i hit every decay. And a ton mid chain targets thats really rough already is close to impossible with slash.
Hey crush specced Thane, Skald, Warrior, Champion, Hero (though last two is slash weak)

Fri 12 Jul 2019 3:35 PM by Hangel

Sepplord wrote: ↑
Fri 12 Jul 2019 8:37 AM
Hangel wrote: ↑
Fri 12 Jul 2019 8:14 AM
I have tried different spec and with slash was really easy to kill sb, but I come back to thrust because I prefer a direct 6 sec stun than a combo one.
I test the damage too but personally I still think Garrote is better damage than other style, can snare too and you can have a good combo for damage and speed debuff.
Actually I'm 42CS 44Dual, my goal is to arrive to 44/44... good CS damage and good chance to hit too.
About RA is hard, I have purge4 vanish1 mop5 Moa3 and AOM3, I will drop AOM when I can get EM. I don't think aug str or dex are necessary here.

Could you elaborate why you think AoM and EM are needed? At least more needed than aug-stats?
I have considered picking them at all on my stealthers (which doesn't mean that they aren't worth picking, i just learned about the usefullness of toughness simply because i had never done the math...)

MoP is also a bit overrated, the average dmg increase really isn't all that great. Though it is an RA that can possibly add a lot of dmg if RNG goes your way. Especially with MoP you should get lucky fights where your dmg is huge (but also fights where you don't get crits or high-damage crits at all). Crits in PvP only go up to 50%, so on average it's only +25% with a chance of 39% happening at MoP9. Overall it's not even 10% damage

I used EM on live but I think is really a good RA here versus class like skald, thane or caster. Magic damage is a problem here considering there are no cl buff, AOM is too low mitigation so I prefer to get EM when I can. MoP is the only offensive RA to train x me here, Aug Str or Dex increase really low damage, Viper need to much point and if you want it you need at max level. Sure the best will be to run with theu buff (haste and add damage), when possible

Fri 12 Jul 2019 4:01 PM by Campjr

PM me your discord and i can help you bud. A lot of very basic assassin must do’s that 90% of the players don’t capitalize on.