Jibikao

The thing with Commando is that if he stands far, it benefits Full Auto (more coverage) but to get the most out of Buckshot and Flamethrower, he needs to stand at like 40' range.

It's frustrating that the Soldier's full auto only has 20' arc. That is so narrow.

This makes Commando's Full Auto looks really sad.

Commando on paper looks good. He has several aoe but they are cones and it's much easier if it's a target aoe like the missiles.

That is a good point. I forgot about patron not giving Focus. My Spine has burst. I mostly only use it for set mule. I don't use it unless it's a big group of enemies around me.

Oh, I am thinking of putting both ATO and cash Purple proc in Assassin Strike. That way you get re-hide and a guaranteed purple proc damage which is pretty high. Holy !@#$

So even in a 6s recharge attack like Ablating, the SBE is a lot better? Mmmmm, I guess it is a bit "pay to win". lol But it's not to the degree of overpowering (or is it?). And Ablating is good because it has shorter act. time.

Oh my... I really should follow those cash item threads. I have no idea they are changing the new ones to that. This is very useful info.

I am so going to buy Purple procs then! 4.5 PPM means each time you use Assassin Strike, you are guaranteed to get a purple proc damage? Holy s@#$!

So the standard proc like Mako's is 3 PPM. Mmmm... is this better than the old 20% fixed rate? Let's take Ablating strike for example. It only recharges in 6s. I suck at math. If you put it in Ablating, which proc is better?

And also, I am not familiar with damage proc in PPM. Is that the "average" chance to happen or it's fixed like Stalker's proc where Guile proc can only happen once within the time limit? The only ATO damage proc I've tried is in Blaster's Dark Blast Gaze which has 20s base recharge. I know whenever Gaze hits, I see the fire damage proc.

Oh?! I thought it's just ATO procs that are based on "per minute" system, which I do think is better than the old 20% flat chance because that makes slotting very boring as you always want to put in an attack that recharges faster.

So cash Mako set's Lethal damage proc is based on "per minute" as well? Oh my, I have not followed any of the cash sets. I have no idea they are changing it to "per minute" system. So the basic proc happen like 4x/minute right?

If you put proc damage in Fearsome stare, don't you get hit when the proc happens initially?

Wow... Shadow Field proc that often? It must be nice to have negative damage from Cloud Sense.

This is why I've been petitioning Pet Recharge sets in all primary sets. I don't see why some sets should have the advantage to get two more pet unique and even if they allow Ninja to have Pet Recharge, we still need to find room for them.

So not only Ninja is inherently weaker on paper (having the worst survival of all and being majority melee), but they are also weaker due to the lack of two pet unique sets.


Oh and you are right that Assault Robot's -500 regen is definitely the reason why Robots can solo AV easier. Robots, on paper, have lower DPS but that -500% regen is going to make up so much for it. It's annoying that an all-range primary set with the best survival has -500% regen. It's like WTF?? Hello? To me, Ninja and Beast should have huge -regen. Jounins have some but poison darts suck.

Ok, I am a bit confused. What is the term PPM? SBE is Store Bought Enhancements. PPM is?

I am glad they are adjusting SBE enhancements. There is no reason why cash sets should perform better. That's bad for business. Cash enhancements are good if you are low on playing time and don't want to grind for them.

/Ice is really good. I love it so much more than /Nin.

Damn, maybe I should respec my old Db/Nin. I like Db, but I don't like Nin. lol

429 is nice. By the way, which one is the SBE proc? You put the procs in Ablating right?

I do believe Ninja should get some S/L resistance just like Beasts'. Not much..but it may prevent getting one shotted.

I don't know man. As a game developer, what would you do? Buffing Ninja's defense so it becomes more Beast or buffing their damage even more? I am sure they can add a bit of defense and resistance but I do hope they can buff Ninja's damage even more because Beast has Fortify Pack that turns them into god-mode. Ninja has smoke flash but it only works on one target and it costs quite a bit of endurance.

I have a good list of ideas for Ninja. Maybe I'll create a new thread for it. I know you play Ninja too and may be we can come up some good ideas.

Are you leaning towards giving them more survival or more offense? I think the basic survival is what the Wolves have 12%ish defense plus 16%ish S/L resistance. This is a given IMO. I want to give Ninja even more damage. I think we already have primaries that survive better. What we need is an even better Glass Cannon. Glass Cannon has its advantage when survival is not a big deal (like having a tanker on the team, etc).


I've leveled my NInja/FF to +3 so it's definitely doable. With a very large team, your Ninjas can get covered with defense and even resistance.

I made that Ninja/FF years ago. I think that's good enough for me. I am working on Beast/Time right now (lvl 35) and I can already see a huge potential once I can get Farsight perma and Powerboost. /Time is just so much more versatile than FF.

I like to compare Beast to Ninja. So far, Ninja has better aoe than Beast because majority of Dire Wolf's aoe comes from long range cone and yet he runs in, so only the initial two cones can hit a few targets.

Beast's ST damage is pretty high with 10 stacks of PM. Once I hit incarnate, I'll try to solo GM/AV with Beast and see how they fair.

I'll keep bugging Synapse about Ninja and Merc though! I think Ninja should at least match Beast's base defense.

Finally see somebody that understand Ninja the way I do! I am a long time Ninja/FF user and he is +3 Incarnate now.

You are correct on a lot of things.

Putting survivability aside (Synapse said he is looking into Ninja, Merc and Necro), Genins do more damage than Jounins and the reason is that Jounins use caltrops that fear the mobs away. Jounins would chase and sometimes shoot that low damage Poison Dart. I would say their overall AI has improved over the years but Genins, on the other hand, are very aggressive. They use attacks almost as soon as they are recharged.

I used to think what it would be like if MM pets only have melee. Well, Beast answers my question. I think if Jounins only use swords, they'll perform even better. We don't need to see how they waste Hidden with that low damage Poison Dart. Poison Dart needs to be changed to what Victoria pet has...that high damage Eye Beam.


And you are completely right on Oni. On paper, Oni should do amazing damage because he has so many attacks available to him but he doesn't always cycle them the way other pets do. I've PMed A. Hawk about this and he knows about it. I've even calculated that Oni's best DPS is just simply cycle Fire Blast, Ring of Fire, Char and throw in Breath of Fire/Rain of Fire in between. The fireswords, while looking cool, actually lowers Oni's dps because once he draws his sword, he seldom cycle fire blast. Fire Blast has very good DPA. And in honesty, Ninjas need all the control Oni has to help them survive better. I don't like it when Oni draws his sword because that also means he uses immb/hold less.


If Oni truly cycles Fire Blast as soon as it's recharge, Oni has good damage.


There are other factors that reduce Ninja's overall damage and usually involves the "fear" factor in their caltrops and roa and how Genins would knock back and the ninjas "wait and watch". The DoT damage also ends as soon as the target is dead.


Ninja is a really problematic set but potentially, Ninja has very good ST damage. I've beat Black Scorpian with Ninja/FF and beat a Giant Monster on Monster Island with incarnate powers (without my Vanguard pets, who actually deal one of the worst ST dps, my Ninjas run low on endurance and couldn't keep up with the dps).

One thing about Spine Burst is that you can easily replace it with a patron aoe. Spine Burst only has 30% critical from Hidden, which is lower than patron aoe. You are right. Spine Burst is slow and I mostly only use it on trash enemies. If I have good recharge, I don't even use Spine Burst. I just use Throw Spine whenever it's up. Hey, at least Spine Burst can take pbaoe sets. Lots of good choice in pbaoe sets.

I find it funny that you always talk like your opinion is the absolute truth. People debate with you because they don't agree and then you ask them why they don't agree?

Spines is a late-blooming set for sure. It starts out very weak (to the point of torturing) but it's one of the better sets for Stalker especially with the new AS change. It now has a great ST attack that it didn't have before. Also, I love purple chance for knock down in Throw Spines. It works quite well when you open the battle BU + Throw Spines and 25% of the target gets knocked down. Spines has very good complimentary secondary effects. In fact, I believe Castle said Spines has a bit "too much" secondary effect. Spines has slow debuff, immb, and knock down.

Spines has much better sustained aoe damage, and Elec is better at burst aoe damage.

And Thunderstrike is one of the weaker powers in set IMO. Yes, it's a good follow up after Lightning Rod but that's about it. It is slow and its radius isn't big and the aoe damage part isn't high. I do like Chain Induction a lot. I think it has a great potential with damage procs. I think you can easily substitute Fireball with Thunderstrike in pve.

A critical Uppercut is close to a critical Assassin Strike from hidden (interruptable version). That's all you need to know. :P

Now if you use Placate and then hit a Double Critical on a combo 3 Uppercut... that is just beautiful.