True charge great sword question.

[Kashra Fall]

So it is no doubt in my, or anyone's mind that true charge is the way to go on great sword. However, it's hard to land it, but when you do, where do you go from there? I've thought about using the roll into the side slash, but it doesn't have enough "OOOmphf." So, I've recently started to roll into a tackle, back into a 2nd charge and back into the true charge. I'm kinda surprised as to how quick this happens compared to the intial first time you use a true charge. The roll, tackle, 2nd and then true happens in around 2-4 seconds, giving plenty of time to land another true charge before the monster strikes back, also tackles through moves and knocks over (Sometimes.)

Granted, I am still fairly new to GS (Around 50ish missions.) so I am still learning things. I would however like to know any veteran's insight on this.

[TyresTyco]

You actually answered your own question. I never use the first charge. After TCS I roll>tackle>Strong Charge/TCS. You can ofc skip strong charge but I refuse to only use TCS.. gets boring after a while.

The real question for a good GS dude is.. focus.. yes or no?...

Without focus you have more time to snipe and timing your tackle to superarmor through everything. But charge and actual hit animations are far longer.

WIth Focus.. you have a shorter tackle window but hit animations and charges are faster which results in overall dps increase (if you hit)

[Chompski]

Im playing with crit boost/crit draw so first charge is important to me, as long i hit that, it would be at least 350-400 and TCS fully is around 500 so im fine with landing the 2 first hit

[Kashra Fall]

Originally posted by TyresTyco:

You actually answered your own question. I never use the first charge. After TCS I roll>tackle>Strong Charge/TCS. You can ofc skip strong charge but I refuse to only use TCS.. gets boring after a while.

The real question for a good GS dude is.. focus.. yes or no?...

Without focus you have more time to snipe and timing your tackle to superarmor through everything. But charge and actual hit animations are far longer.

WIth Focus.. you have a shorter tackle window but hit animations and charges are faster which results in overall dps increase (if you hit)

So I am on the right track then! Awesome! Yeah, I wasn't seeing too much utility in the side swing. While it is useful for knocking over targets, it isn't so useful in groups because the targets aren't as vulnerable due to higher HP pools. I happened to do the roll, tackle, TC2 earlier to val and I was like...Why haven't I been doing this? Standard 500-700 shots with downtime turned into multiple of the same with hardly any downtime. Suffice to say, I was quite surprised, but I felt I needed to ask anyways!

As for the focus? I've never used it, but I think 30% faster charge would be more handy in groups than in solo, primarily because groups you don't have to tackle through as much, least from my experience.

[Lusus Symphonia]

All situational depending on what you're fighting, I usually tend to mount as much as possible for that free 300+200+300+500 damage then I'll roll and tackle, charge attack, charge my third attack and tackle a few times until the monster is stupid enough to come near me and then I release my true charge resulting in a topple, do my whole routine again and the tackle eventually knocked the monster out too so even more free damage!

[TyresTyco]

Originally posted by Kashra Fall:

Originally posted by TyresTyco:

You actually answered your own question. I never use the first charge. After TCS I roll>tackle>Strong Charge/TCS. You can ofc skip strong charge but I refuse to only use TCS.. gets boring after a while.

The real question for a good GS dude is.. focus.. yes or no?...

Without focus you have more time to snipe and timing your tackle to superarmor through everything. But charge and actual hit animations are far longer.

WIth Focus.. you have a shorter tackle window but hit animations and charges are faster which results in overall dps increase (if you hit)

As for the focus? I've never used it, but I think 30% faster charge would be more handy in groups than in solo, primarily because groups you don't have to tackle through as much, least from my experience.

Oh you should try it out with focus. Damaskus just asks for that with all the deco slots.. the main appeal for it isn't really the tackle but the overall faster animations... far better flow imho same with CB. People often dismiss focus because 2 fully charged slashs are enough to have red phials but people always forget the faster animations.

Both weapons are slow and clunky without much flow to it. But with focus.. oh god.. night and day.

[Kashra Fall]

Originally posted by TyresTyco:

Originally posted by Kashra Fall:

As for the focus? I've never used it, but I think 30% faster charge would be more handy in groups than in solo, primarily because groups you don't have to tackle through as much, least from my experience.

Oh you should try it out with focus. Damaskus just asks for that with all the deco slots.. the main appeal for it isn't really the tackle but the overall faster animations... far better flow imho same with CB. People often dismiss focus because 2 fully charged slashs are enough to have red phials but people always forget the faster animations.

Both weapons are slow and clunky without much flow to it. But with focus.. oh god.. night and day.

I certainly will if the game will be nice enough to give me the deco's I need xD. Right now am running 45% affinity, with WE and crit boost. Seems to be nice, but I do like variation. I do wish the loadout thing saved the gems in the items though so they switched when you switched. Maybe it does and I just don't know it?

[Skiptro]

Originally posted by Kashra Fall:

Originally posted by TyresTyco:

Oh you should try it out with focus. Damaskus just asks for that with all the deco slots.. the main appeal for it isn't really the tackle but the overall faster animations... far better flow imho same with CB. People often dismiss focus because 2 fully charged slashs are enough to have red phials but people always forget the faster animations.

Both weapons are slow and clunky without much flow to it. But with focus.. oh god.. night and day.

I certainly will if the game will be nice enough to give me the deco's I need xD. Right now am running 45% affinity, with WE and crit boost. Seems to be nice, but I do like variation. I do wish the loadout thing saved the gems in the items though so they switched when you switched. Maybe it does and I just don't know it?

in my opinion, and remember just my opinion, you only need 3% crit for great sword, you are better off with weakness exploit, part breaker, and crit boost over crit chance.

[Kashra Fall]

Originally posted by GungZA:

Originally posted by Kashra Fall:

I certainly will if the game will be nice enough to give me the deco's I need xD. Right now am running 45% affinity, with WE and crit boost. Seems to be nice, but I do like variation. I do wish the loadout thing saved the gems in the items though so they switched when you switched. Maybe it does and I just don't know it?

in my opinion, and remember just my opinion, you only need 3% crit for great sword, you are better off with weakness exploit, part breaker, and crit boost over crit chance.

What exactly is the modifer in terms of crit for GS?

[TyresTyco]

Originally posted by Kashra Fall:

Originally posted by TyresTyco:

Oh you should try it out with focus. Damaskus just asks for that with all the deco slots.. the main appeal for it isn't really the tackle but the overall faster animations... far better flow imho same with CB. People often dismiss focus because 2 fully charged slashs are enough to have red phials but people always forget the faster animations.

Both weapons are slow and clunky without much flow to it. But with focus.. oh god.. night and day.

the loadout thing saved the gems in the items though so they switched when you switched. Maybe it does and I just don't know it?

It does. You dont need to switch the gems as long as you saved the gear loadout.

[Kashra Fall]

Originally posted by TyresTyco:

Originally posted by Kashra Fall:

the loadout thing saved the gems in the items though so they switched when you switched. Maybe it does and I just don't know it?

It does. You dont need to switch the gems as long as you saved the gear loadout.

Dear lord, you just made my night. It was driving me crazy changing my gems to fight val all the time.

[Vagrant]

Originally posted by TyresTyco:

The real question for a good GS dude is.. focus.. yes or no?...

When you transition from Strong Slash into True Charged Slash, the first charge actually occurs as soon as you hit the stance. so taking Focus cuts the listed percentage off that entire animation and not just the part where he stands still building charge. Combined with the fact that the Damascus Armor and Coil gives Focus 3 and 6(!) level 1 deco slots, I am firmly in the Focus camp.

Also, charge levels carry over to tackles and horizontal swipes, improving their damage - so it's improving your DPS on that side too. Which carries onto my next point:

Originally posted by Kashra Fall:

Yeah, I wasn't seeing too much utility in the side swing.

The horizontal swings inherit the charge level of the previous vertical slash, so charged Slash > Wide Slash increases its damage considerably. In fact, charging Strong Slash and canceling into Tackle and then Jumping Wide gives them both the canceled charge level, which means you can do stupid numbers like 100+ tackle into 300+ jumping wide.

In general jumping wide is really underestimated because it has an enormous range and excellent damage, and also moves you forward and past / under monsters at the same time, taking you out of their strikes zones.

This said, Kick (can be thrown from block) is mostly garbage and so is Side Blow, the weird slap with the GS flat that comes out after Jumping Wide and occasionally on accident when you forget to hold forward during your vertical slash series. Don't use them.

Rising Slash is useful for two things: standing precisely beneath tail and waving back and forth between slash > rising slash, which holds you perfectly in place and hits a vertical 180 degrees, and for launching paralyzed or asleep teammates off the ground, which gives them back control of their character.

Originally posted by Kashra Fall:

What exactly is the modifer in terms of crit for GS?

I don't know precisely what you mean, so I'm just going to throw some numbers here:

Affinity is a percentage chance to do a crit that deals +25% damage, and that remains the same regardless of weapon type. GS just gets a lot more benefit out of this than anyone else because of their crazily high raw and weapon class modifier (4.8x) applied to the raw shown in stats.

[Skiptro]

Originally posted by Kashra Fall:

Originally posted by GungZA:

in my opinion, and remember just my opinion, you only need 3% crit for great sword, you are better off with weakness exploit, part breaker, and crit boost over crit chance.

What exactly is the modifer in terms of crit for GS?

The thing is you don't need to rely on raw crit chance, you have skills where hitting weakspots gives you crit chance, having full stamina gives you crit chance etc etc, i think those skill slots can be more effectively used rather than having pure crit chance, on a fast hitting weapon sure, but on gs where you should be hitting weakspots anyway and playing slower and more deliberate you might get more mileage out of situational crit and crit damage multipliers

[Kashra Fall]

Originally posted by Vagrant:

Originally posted by TyresTyco:

The real question for a good GS dude is.. focus.. yes or no?...

When you transition from Strong Slash into True Charged Slash, the first charge actually occurs as soon as you hit the stance. so taking Focus cuts the listed percentage off that entire animation and not just the part where he stands still building charge. Combined with the fact that the Damascus Armor and Coil gives Focus 3 and 6(!) level 1 deco slots, I am firmly in the Focus camp.

Also, charge levels carry over to tackles and horizontal swipes, improving their damage - so it's improving your DPS on that side too. Which carries onto my next point:

Originally posted by Kashra Fall:

Yeah, I wasn't seeing too much utility in the side swing.

The horizontal swings inherit the charge level of the previous vertical slash, so charged Slash > Wide Slash increases its damage considerably. In fact, charging Strong Slash and canceling into Tackle and then Jumping Wide gives them both the canceled charge level, which means you can do stupid numbers like 100+ tackle into 300+ jumping wide.

In general jumping wide is really underestimated because it has an enormous range and excellent damage, and also moves you forward and past / under monsters at the same time, taking you out of their strikes zones.

This said, Kick (can be thrown from block) is mostly garbage and so is Side Blow, the weird slap with the GS flat that comes out after Jumping Wide and occasionally on accident when you forget to hold forward during your vertical slash series. Don't use them.

Rising Slash is useful for two things: standing precisely beneath tail and waving back and forth between slash > rising slash, which holds you perfectly in place and hits a vertical 180 degrees, and for launching paralyzed or asleep teammates off the ground, which gives them back control of their character.

Originally posted by Kashra Fall:

What exactly is the modifer in terms of crit for GS?

I don't know precisely what you mean, so I'm just going to throw some numbers here:

Affinity is a percentage chance to do a crit that deals +25% damage, and that remains the same regardless of weapon type. GS just gets a lot more benefit out of this than anyone else because of their crazily high raw and weapon class modifier (4.8x) applied to the raw shown in stats.

Thanks for the info! As for what I meant, I meant the modifer. Like, what would base damage be vs the crit it could do without crit boost etc. Your numbers helped to clear some of it up!