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Class Discussion

Introduction

We all have our favorite weapons among the three types, and many of us choose to specialize or lean toward one of the three. But have you ever found yourself thinking, “Hey, that calibur charge attack is knocking enemies all over the place!” or, “Now I know why they call the nitronome the blue screen of death!” or, “I can’t see anything from the polaris spams!”? This is the place to express your views on the annoying, and occasionally fatal, attacks of other classes.

Note: This page is intended to foster goodwill and understanding between ‘classes’. If you are offended by some of the content contained on this page, you are free to discuss it on the talk page.

How Bombers Feel About…

Gunslingers

As a bomber, I personally don't like it when gunners shoot wolvers in my range. When they do, the wolvers would simply get an easy dodge before they are even hit, whether by a blast or haze bomb. Shooting while we're charging the bomb is good but once it lays down, don't let them escape easily. At higher tier, you could easily use their bury ability to your advantage if you just stand in the bomb radius and watch them dodge into it.

Sword Masters

Don't constantly thwack your enemy in one direction. I see this slot. Although your keeping them away from us, you're also rendering the bombs useless by doing so. Also since you're up close, consider shield bumping them into the blast radius when you have a chance.

How Sword Masters Feel About…

Bombers

It all depends on the bomber in question and what bombs they are using. If a bomber is simply spamming Nitronomes everywhere, it will be unwelcome 99% of the time. Sword users love it, however, when a bomber uses a support bomb to help strengthen their attacks. Shocking and freezing enemies can make it easier for sword users to hit them, and enemies under these statuses can be hit by all three dash attacks from the Warmaster Rocket Hammer. Venom Veiler is a great bomb for allowing the whole party to deal more damage, including gunners as well as sword users. The best swordmaster bombs, however, are the Graviton and Electron Vortexes. They group together multiple enemies and allow a sword user to pull off a highly damaging (if not fatal) charge attack or sword combo. Swords that work well in combination with their weapons include:

• Leviathan Blade charge
• Cold Iron Vanquisher charge
• Fang of Vog charge
• Lionheart Blade charge
• Scissor Blades charge
• Brandish charge
• Troika combo/charge
• Divine Avenger combo/charge
• Gran Faust combo/charge
• Final Flourish charge
• Fearless Rigadoon charge
• Furious Flamberge charge
• Barbarous Thorn Blade charge (though less damaging than the Final Flourish)
• Warmaster Rocket Hammer charge (not very effective though, as only one smash will typically hit)

Gunslingers

Gunslingers are best at suppression fire and specialized damage. Knowing when to switch between the two can keep your sword-master friends alive for that much longer. From my experience playing as a gunslinger with a sword-master friend, there are a few golden rules for a gunslinger.

• 1 : When the sword-master uses an AOE weapon (Calibur sword line, etc) use a specialized gun (Alchemer line, Autogun line). In this situation, your role is in damaging the monster while the sword-master keeps the monster away from the gunslinger.

• 2 : When the sword-master uses a specialized weapon (DA, GF, Barbarous Thorn Blade), use a high knock-back gun (Supernova, Valiance). In this case, your role is in helping the sword-master to concentrate on a few targets while you suppress others. Also, when the slower combos complete, even with shield canceling, the sword-master is vulnerable for that moment. Suppressing the enemy for that instant, and the life of your sword-master friends, falls into the hands of the gunslinger.

• 3 : When the sword-master is retreating, cover your friend's rear and bombard the monsters with a high knock-back gun. You can move when you attack, sword-masters cannot.

A Swordmaster's Perspective

I use swords almost exclusively, but while grouped with gunners I've noticed several things they often do that make life harder for me. Perhaps there are reasons for these that aren't apparent to me, but I thought an outside perspective might be helpful for seeing how gunslingers interact with other knights. I'm not sure how to incorporate this into the guide, though (or if it should be), so I'll put it on the discussion page for now.

Don't Shoot My Target

Based on the wiki numbers, it looks like a pure damage gun targeting an enemy's weakness does roughly similar damage to a pure normal sword. I'm sure not every sword-user is in my position, but I use specialized-damage swords and I have sword damage bonus: maximum, so I could easily be doing double your damage, and I kill most enemies in 3-4 hits, even in large parties. Attacking the same enemy as me won't necessarily reduce the number of swings I need to kill it, and even if it does, I'll likely waste a swing because I don't know when it will die (which I would if I were the only one attacking it). So providing support fire against the same monster I'm attacking is probably not actually saving me any time.

More importantly, if your gunfire causes the monster to dodge, or if your gun has knockback, you may cause a lot of my sword strikes to miss, in which case you are effectively dealing negative damage, because you are replacing my sword damage with your weaker gun damage. Knockback or bright flashes also makes it much harder for me to defend against enemy attacks, since I might not be able to tell where or when a monster attack will hit. Pulsar line, I'm looking at you.

Whenever possible, please try to attack an enemy that isn't already being attacked. However, when you do...

Don't Lead Enemies Behind Me or Away from Me

I see a lot of gunslingers get a monster chasing them and then just keep backpedaling...and backpedaling...until they're not even in the same room. This causes two problems:

1. It's very hard for a sword-user to hit a monster moving away from us; we waste a lot of time chasing them, and then even a tiny bit of lag can make us miss. If that's the last monster, or I have to run farther away to find another monster to attack, you're wasting my damage potential and making it very hard for me to help you.
2. A lot of the time, the monsters don't all continue chasing you forever--you get far enough away, and they decide to go after me instead. But you've just lead them behind me, so now I'm getting attacked from an unexpected direction and have a much higher risk of being surrounded. This can be even worse than fighting solo, because I still have to defend against almost all the monsters, but now I don't know where or when they're coming from. This is especially likely if you lure them behind me and then knockback them towards me.

Could you maybe shield-bump them away instead? Or circle? Or at least pick a direction to run that won't lure the enemies behind me?

If you can't deal critical damage, bring a sword or bomb

As noted earlier, a pure damage gun exploiting a monster's weakness looks to be roughly on par with a normal-damage sword. There are also a few situations where ranged attacks are really important (e.g. enemy on top of spikes) and it makes sense to use one almost no matter how poor the damage is. But if we're in a "normal" fight and you're using a gun the enemy is neutral or resistant to, that looks like you care more about protecting yourself than contributing to the group (especially if you also are not holding the line, see above).

If the stratum has a monster theme, two damage types is probably enough. In a status-themed stratum, I would suggest you either shell out for a third weapon slot or bring one gun and one sword or bomb. I sometimes see people using normal damage guns, or even two guns with the same damage type, and they just don't seem to pull their weight.

This is just what it looks like from the other side of the looking glass, but I hope it's helpful. Feel free to drop by the Swordmaster Guide and tell me everything we do that you hate. --Antistone 22:01, 16 October 2011 (UTC)

How Gunslingers Feel About…

Bombers

Sword Masters

I used to be a sword-master, but since the battle-sprite update, I've switched to becoming a gunslinger. And boy, do I love working together with a sword-master.

First, let us get some things straight:

• A sword-master is a high-damage, point-blank, knock-back machine.
• A gunslinger is a medium-damage, long-range, specialized tactics user.

The problem is when one tries to be the other. Swordmasters often spam charge attacks for swords with ranged effects (Brandish line, Caliber line, Sealed Sword line) whilst Gunslinger close-in with the target and attempt to use specialized guns at point blank. Mixing oil and water doesn't work.

Both have to make up for the other's weaknesses. A swordmaster can keep a monster pushed into a corner, deal massive damage in a combo, interrupt enemy attacks, generally kicking-ass at close range. The problem is dealing with ranged attacks.

A gunslinger can deal critical damage, be a hard-counter for different enemy families, be a decoy. The problem is dealing with enemies that close-in on you.

To solve this problem of inherent weaknesses, a gunslinger and swordmaster must work together, to compensate for each other's weak points.

Sword-masters MUST be willing to take some hits for the team. Push a monster into a corner, keep it hemmed in there and let me pelt it from afar. Be a meat-shield for just a moment, and the horde will be dealt with.

Sword-masters MUST be willing to escape and let a gunslinger defend you while your shield recharges. Tag-team monsters, why don't 'cha? Narrow corridors can be pelted by gunners with Pulsar-line guns, or the Blaster-line guns for single targets. Trust in the ability of a gunslinger to keep your arse alive.

So don't worry when you're surrounded, for my suppression gun will take care of it. Or even if a turret is spewing bullet hell from afar, because my specialized gun and I will solve that. Do what you do best, dealing high damage to a single target and keeping it in a corner, because my long reach will make up for your deficiency, and in return, give me a defense that I cannot provide for myself.

A Gunslinger's Perspective

This is a late response to the "A Swordmaster's Perspective" on the gunslinger guide. More specifically, I'm replying to the last line, "Feel free to drop by the Swordmaster Guide and tell me everything we do that you hate." I use guns exclusively (only having one Final Flourish which is rarely even put in my loadout unless Greavers might be present). Like Antistone, I'm not sure how to put this into the guide (or even if it should be), so I'll just leave it in the discussion.

Firstly, allow me to explain the main reason gunners don't always like working with swordsmen. Simply put, for the team to work, a swordsman needs to watch where he's swinging that thing.

Prime example: The party encounters a sizable mob. A couple of the foes about are Lumbers, and thankfully one's at the far corner of the group. Knowing these are prime targets for guns over swords, I whip out my elemental gun and find my angle, keeping a safe distance so my Polaris shots can deal their most damage (the shots expand and do more damage after about 4 squares). For some reason, one of the sword-wielders in the part goes about to the Lumber's far side--ignoring Silkwings in the back which I can't easily target in the process--and proceeds to unleash a charge attack to its backside, knocking it right into me so I can get stunned and take one of the hardest hits common enemies are capable of dishing out. This highlights almost everything a bad swordsman will do.

Know Your Targets

Needless to say, swords in general are better suited for some enemies--particularly healers who like to hide behind other foes, Greavers who like to get up too close for comfort and stay there, etc. In a group, anyone should should pick their prime targets before approaching--those who possess the most threats (like healers and greavers), or the best targets for their current loadout's specialty.

If there's a gunner in the team, the last thing a pure-swordsman should do is first approach ideal gun targets, like Lumbers, or turret enemies such as Gun Puppies. Yet, I see it happen in virtually every group I join.

Know Your Allies

A good swordsman needs to plan out where knockback is going to send his chosen target before he starts wailing on it. A good swordsman does this, and usually narrows it into a corner or at least away from the center of the fight; but really, it could be just about anywhere another one of his teammates isn't, especially not one in the middle of reloading a Polaris. Gunners tend to try to either stay in one spot or backpedal predictably, so this really shouldn't be very difficult.

If there's only one enemy left, and a gunner's backpedaling away from it as he fires, the absolute LAST thing you should do is come up behind the enemy and knock him forward into the gunner. Personally, I'm very good at avoiding damage (and reviving those who aren't, as what seems to be a distance gunner's purpose at times), so it becomes all the more apparent to me when a swordsman carelessly knocks an attacking foe into me when it wasn't even a threat to anyone a moment ago. Ideally you should either run between the gunner and the enemy or let him finish it off, but if you must knock it away, at least don't hit it towards the gunner. That should be obvious, but it happens with eerie regularity.

Spread Out

Assume there's a widespread mob in play; I took a few shots on a Lumber, and am reloading for another round or two of bullets to shoot it dead. As I fire from a very safe distance, my Polaris bullets--while potent and surely able to meet their mark--completely miss after a swordsman arbitrarily knocks the Lumber away with a charged sword attack... which coincidentally will do less damage than three consecutive shots from a super-effective gun.

The swordsman presumably continues battering it around (God help him if he hits it with that and then moves onto a different target). Meanwhile, not only was my time and effort on those shots wasted, but I'm forced to waste more time and potential vulnerability reloading, then choose a different and presumably less ideal target.

The way SK is built, only bosses or turrets make decent targets for multiple knights. It's good idea to keep this in mind, especially when you're a swordsman whose every attack can cause knockback.

Even if this doesn't make it into a guide, I hope at the very least it might cause a few less headaches between gunners and swordsmen. --DekuSamurai 02:00, 6 February 2012 (UTC)

Although teamwork is important, you've missed multiple errors that you have made.

Firstly, It is much more effective to fire two rounds and then wait for the cooldown rather than to fire 3 shots and reload. Your damage output will be higher, and you'll be mobile for a longer period of time, and have the ability to shield.

Secondly, you need to account for teammates attacks and movements, especially monster aggro, when firing or just attacking in general. (and especially so for bombing) Remember that your pulsar has more than likely knocked enemies out of your teammates reach countless times at other points in the dungeon. It is wiser to watch for a moment your teammates actions, and plan accordingly. For instance, if a teammate is knocking an enemy back, you place a bomb behind the enemy so that they knock it into the radius. Same goes for guns, the pulsar more so than other guns.

Thirdly, remember that certain targets are a higher priority to different knights, and it is more important to target an enemy with multiple knights, regardless of the inefficiency. In times when there are no other enemies nearby, sometimes this is the most desirable choice.

Fourthly, although gunners focus on damage output, the ranger class is generally a SUPPORT class. Our attacks don't knock enemies around, so we can do damage without causing inteference. With the exception of the Pulsar and Nitronome, which are widely known as the two most interrupting weapons for all players alike in the game. --HexZyle 02:31, 10 March 2012 (UTC)