Initial Thoughts On Rune Mastery

[VeritasWaits]

I've seen a lot of questions about the new Ragnarok mastery, and I have a lot of my own as well, but so far not too many clear answers. I feel like many of the skill descriptions are vague enough to leave room for doubt about how exactly they function, which makes build planning difficult. I wanted to share my initial thoughts and impressions on the mastery so that you guys can add your opinions, correct me if I'm wrong, and we can start getting some clarity about how effective Rune Mastery is and how it can best be used.

- General Overview
As a whole I think Rune Mastery falls a bit flat as a stand alone mastery, and seems designed almost completely as a support mastery. It's active skills seem underwhelming and clunky, but it has some very strong passives. It looks to me like the devs just designed a mastery to make a true hybrid melee/magic character more viable, which is necessarily bad but does mean that the number of viable combos with other masteries is probably low.

- Rune Weapon
The default attack replacement skill is pretty much the entire reason for Rune Mastery to exist. It adds some good stacking elemental damage (which helps vs resistence since it's 3 elemental types instead of just one), health and energy leech, and some other bonuses.

The REAL thing it adds is the final skill in the tree, which converts 63% of your weapon's damage into elemental. Given that elemental scales off of INT, a hybrid can actually prioritize INT now and do solid damage with their weapon attacks AND spells, which has always been the Achilles Heel (see what I did there?) of hybrid classes. Building up charges with your weapon attacks buffs elemental and total damage for your further weapon attacks AND your spells. The playstyle here seems like "hit things with a fast attack speed weapon, then cast buffed spells. Repeat."

Of course that means that any mastery that either has a main attack replacer you want to use or that wants to deal physical damage doesn't really gain much from Rune Mastery. Onslaught is still better for pure physical combat. Marksmanship is still better for archery. Essentially what I can see this being useful for is comboing with one of the magic masteries and focus a lot more on INT and spells than you used to be able to do for melee combat. I have serious doubts about how effective that will be in Legendary difficulty, but that's what it does.

Question about Rune Weapon:
- How do the charges function exactly? At max level it has "10 charges", but what kind of scaling does each stack of a charge give you for the base skill and its add ons?

I'm still experimenting with the active and passive skills, and will update this thread with specific thoughts about them once I have more info.

Please share your thoughts. Am I wrong about anything I've said here, or missing something? What has your actual play experience with the mastery been?

[Steelwind]

I would assume it works similar to Onslaught in that each hit adds a charge up to your skill level.

For my first go I am going to dual wield as a Berserker (Warfare/Rune). With only the banner, Dual Weild & Weapon Training lines from Warfare. Maybe a couple in the horns for utility/survivability. And Rune Weapons, Sacred Rage, Thunder Strike, Rune of Life and Reckless Offense from Rune.

As it is my first time with the class I am sure I will play with the other skills but the above seems the most synergistic for the playstyle I want this time around.

[Gurggulk]

I'm also working on a Berserker. So far having great fun with Thunder Strike. Charging into groups of mobs and cutting them down is most satisfying. Just have to make sure that healing potion is rdy on demand.
Overall liking it greatly.

[Steelwind]

It is squishy as expected but it cuts things down quickly. This early on it is hard to tell but I think it will shape up nicely.

[CrackeR]

Wow lighten up and just play the game man! Really, you take this $hit way to seriously! Do you take xanax to relieve your stress? LOL
Seriously though, i just play the game to have fun, i choose my path and make the most of it. Even if it happens to be considered lame by one person, another my master it with different strats. I am not belittling or badgering, just thinking you guys are trying to over think a process which is more simplistic than complicated!!!! >>>Just my 2 coppers worth!<<<

[Steelwind]

For some the fun is in the min/max and finding the synergies of a class combination. Don't see why you'd need to troll someone for liking to play differently than you do. That said my preference is the same as any other RPG. I pick what I want a character to be then pick the classes and skills that fit that even if they aren't ideal. Having played a game long enough though even I will avoid things that would break a character or make them overly hard to play unless that was my purpose from the start.

[claudius]

I was thinking of trying a staff wielding character. Took a brief look at Runemaster. Any ideas on making a staff wielder?

Edit: crap rune weapon doesn't work with staff :(

[Steelwind]

You could certainly go with the rune skills then take another class that has a good weapons skill. I was looking at Dream/Rune with Psionic Touch for the active then the ground based rune skills.

[Renaud]

I've been trying Thunderer (Rune - Storm) with Runemaster as a main class, so far I'm only level 16, but it is extremely fun, it is important to know that Thunder Strikes can be used with staffs, and as a left mouse skill it is quite powerful. Menhir Wall to stop enemies while Seal of Fate charges is really strong and fun, so far it even feels more powerful than even my Oracle when it was at the same level!

Important to know: Runemaster do not give flat energy bonus with Mastery Points, therefore high energy regen is more than required for Pure Caster, but with it, it's a blast!

[Kiribri]

I just started a new character with the new mastery and honestly idk what to take. I took Rune Weapon (assign on your left mouse skill).

Do i go caster with another mastery or melee with Thunder Strike, do i take inteligence or strength, the passive -str% requirment on weapons is pretty strong, some tips guys please :p

As somebody said there is no energy per skill point passively, so i'm thinking of a melee fighter with more passive abilities because i wanna dive into this new tree fully.

[claudius]

Britard if you go passive minus strength requirment you could pair that with defense mastery which gets - strength on shields and armor I believe. Then make a tank that deals elemental damage?

[Steelwind]

Maxed out Runeword: Feather is -42% off str requirements for weapons, FYI that includes shields/offhands. The Rune of Life maxed out gives +10% to Str. Those two go a long way to getting you into gear if you go mage heavy hybrid to maximize your elemental damage.

As claudius mentioned, pairing this with defense is even better. The Armor Handling skill when maxed gives you -20% to requirements for amror/shields. That with all the shield passives and a good shield would be pretty impressive and you could still pump most (maybe all) of your points into Int and what you need in Dex for your OA/DA.

[Izanagi]

Yeah, so, as a full STR Runesmith, should I *not* take Transmutation?

STR increases weapon damage -> weapon damage is turned in to elemental -> elemental damage is boosted by passives? So I *should* use Transmutation?

I really like Runemastery so far, but most of this stuff is really not very clear.

[Kiribri]

Originally posted by claudius:

Britard if you go passive minus strength requirment you could pair that with defense mastery which gets - strength on shields and armor I believe. Then make a tank that deals elemental damage?

Originally posted by Steelwind:

Maxed out Runeword: Feather is -42% off str requirements for weapons, FYI that includes shields/offhands. The Rune of Life maxed out gives +10% to Str. Those two go a long way to getting you into gear if you go mage heavy hybrid to maximize your elemental damage.

As claudius mentioned, pairing this with defense is even better. The Armor Handling skill when maxed gives you -20% to requirements for amror/shields. That with all the shield passives and a good shield would be pretty impressive and you could still pump most (maybe all) of your points into Int and what you need in Dex for your OA/DA.

Yea probably gonna go Runes + Defense but max str anyway for damage and go with a fast melee weapon cause the left click ability turns the dmg into elemental anyway, or mix it with dexterity

[Ace Ackbar]

Originally posted by Izanagi:

Yeah, so, as a full STR Runesmith, should I *not* take Transmutation?

STR increases weapon damage -> weapon damage is turned in to elemental -> elemental damage is boosted by passives? So I *should* use Transmutation?

I really like Runemastery so far, but most of this stuff is really not very clear.

This is one of the things I find fascinating about the class... Being able to use both strength AND intelligence for your weapon attacks is possibly quite a powerful deal.
Your strength increases the physical damage you do -> a large chunk of that then gets converted into elemental damage, which is further increased by your intelligence.
Give it a go!

[Izanagi]

Originally posted by Ace Ackbar:

Originally posted by Izanagi:

Yeah, so, as a full STR Runesmith, should I *not* take Transmutation?

STR increases weapon damage -> weapon damage is turned in to elemental -> elemental damage is boosted by passives? So I *should* use Transmutation?

I really like Runemastery so far, but most of this stuff is really not very clear.

This is one of the things I find fascinating about the class... Being able to use both strength AND intelligence for your weapon attacks is possibly quite a powerful deal.
Your strength increases the physical damage you do -> a large chunk of that then gets converted into elemental damage, which is further increased by your intelligence.
Give it a go!

I am giving it a go, but there's just no way to tell if it's a waste of skillpoints or not. *shrug*