ShadowDancer: Dark Imbuement and Paranoia don't affect Offhand?

[Ahpuch]

I brought my rogue out of its Racial TR journey and moved back into epics for the first time in a while. While trying out Dark Imbuement and Paranoia to see if one makes more sense than the other, I noticed that the offhand attack was not getting the untyped bonus damage. Is this what everyone else is seeing? The description says "you imbue your weapons" which implies it should work for both. Does anyone know if this a bug in description, coding, usage, or a faulty interpretation on my part?

 

[FVSHasBeenEvenMoreGutted]

heres what you dont want to hear, the damage on EVERY SA dice on something in shadowdancer has a 1 second internal cooldown. this means it will only ever hit once. this also means the melee cleave epic strike gives a buff that only does damage to 1 target. go figure. this means SD epic strike is useless unless doing raids, or u want meld for defense

 

[Ahpuch]

Thanks for the update. So the description is very wrong. Back to a different epic strike then.

 

[FVSHasBeenEvenMoreGutted]

yeah its horrible

 

[FVSHasBeenEvenMoreGutted]

its good on assassin rouge and bow rouge in raids. thats about it

 

[Kyrr]

its good on assassin rouge and bow rouge in raids. thats about it

I would not consider Shadowstrike a very good option for bow rogue. Hunt's End is going to end up doing more damage overall.

 

[FVSHasBeenEvenMoreGutted]

I would not consider Shadowstrike a very good option for bow rogue. Hunt's End is going to end up doing more damage overall.

i agree, but this is the only other character that gets lots of SA dice

 

[Kyrr]

i agree, but this is the only other character that gets lots of SA dice

Shuriken Thrower can also pull some high sneak dice, but like bows-they also use Hunt's End.

 

[FVSHasBeenEvenMoreGutted]

Shuriken Thrower can also pull some high sneak dice, but like bows-they also use Hunt's End.

forgot about throwers, mb

 

[Blerkington]

Another suboptimal (being kind here) feature of this epic strike is the way the damage scales.

The bonus damage is usually significantly higher on a TWF rogue using a spell power augment than using melee power, even with a decent base MP score like 250-300.

I think whoever designed it didn't understand how much easier it is to get SP well above 300 than MP on TWF rogues. MP and SP might appear to be on the same scale but they aren't, especially not for this type of build. So as things are the strike is better when scaling off spellpower even for melee builds and likely to stay that way.

It's just another failure in how this destiny was set up, with it trying too hard to accommodate casters while not working as well as it should for rogues. Allowing the proc to occur twice per second, such as on offhand hits, or adding a scalar of 2 for MP, would go a long way to improving this.

 

[Thor]

Just brought my main back to Assassin after years of playing as a ranger and getting burned out on that. I knew the shadow tree was bad, but it's bloody terrible. I thought the epic strike was pretty good, until I started using it... Sad. So what epic strike to use?? I know everyone seems to hate
dire charge because of it's wonky targeting, but at least it's useful. Is there an epic strike other than these two for an assassin? I know some like the Gmof strike, but it's a 15 second cooldown which I don't like much, and I'm not a big fan of that tree either.

 

[Smelt]

Gmof isn't as good any more since they fixed it to work with hand wraps and so that it only hits twice now not three times. the bard one is reasonable especially with the stun effect.

 

[Thor]

Yes, just watched a vid on that.. The nerf to Gmof epic strike... I just started using the epic strike from fatesinger at lvl 24. It's okay, and I think I'll use fatesinger as my third tree. These epic strikes could use a bit of fixing and a pass. Shadow tree could use a rebuild. Guess i'll T5 in dreadnaught.

 

[saekee]

Just brought my main back to Assassin after years of playing as a ranger and getting burned out on that. I knew the shadow tree was bad, but it's bloody terrible. I thought the epic strike was pretty good, until I started using it... Sad. So what epic strike to use?? I know everyone seems to hate
dire charge because of it's wonky targeting, but at least it's useful. Is there an epic strike other than these two for an assassin? I know some like the Gmof strike, but it's a 15 second cooldown which I don't like much, and I'm not a big fan of that tree either.

I do the following:
1) before being at cap, I do The Sword Sings and pair it with the cleave one in the tree. I also like to have that tree’s mantle as it dishes out bits of damage and a tiny bit of temp hp
2) At cap I have tier 5 SD. Since my points are tight, I am not in SD’s mantle so that lets me get a lot in the tree and only a couple things in tier 5. I take up to tier 4 of Fury for adrenaline destiny strike. This will drop most mobs and is great for a stealthy player in that often you find yourself picking off isolated mobs.
I then take the US for renewal
and Guard Up. Guard up has been a lifesaver.
My technique is to use From the shadows—assassinate—adrenaline Rapid Slash as my combo fun. From the shadows is a mini epic moment and I do the non-meld version. This is what works for me anyway. In end fights I am using the SD epic moment.

 

[Fisto Mk I]

Shuriken Thrower can also pull some high sneak dice, but like bows-they also use Hunt's End.

Only Ranger hybrids. Pure Monk use SD Shadowstrike or Fatesigner The Pluck of a String, build depends.

 

[Tilomere]

The non-ranger shuriken still use hunt's end, but with shoot later (crit halfling, crit multiplier kensai, T5 HW, T4 Inq, c2 NiS), or (weaker) pure monk (NiS/Inq) still uses hunts end + shoot later. You can't beat 3.25x damage x 5 crit multiplier x 1.5 (+50% dmg) = 24x damage with some sneak imbue. Hunt's End + X is more than half your dps, an imbue with an ICD is just something nice to have.

Over the time of a pair of hunts end (one with pin, one with shoot later), a shuriken thrower will toss out around 25 attacks worth of dps (after adjusting up a bit for poor crit profile). The 24x and 14x damage shots of hunts end will add another 23 and 13x multiplier on top, bringing it to 60 attacks worth of dps.

So overall auto attack is ~40%, hunts end + X is around 60% of dps. Don't trade in 60% of your dps for an imbue with an ICD or a sonic proc.

 

[saekee]

The non-ranger shuriken still use hunt's end, but with shoot later (crit halfling, crit multiplier kensai, T5 HW, T4 Inq, c2 NiS), or (weaker) pure monk (NiS/Inq) still uses hunts end + shoot later. You can't beat 3.25x damage x 5 crit multiplier x 1.5 (+50% dmg) = 24x damage with some sneak imbue. Hunt's End + X is more than half your dps, an imbue with an ICD is just something nice to have.

Over the time of a pair of hunts end (one with pin, one with shoot later), a shuriken thrower will toss out around 25 attacks worth of dps (after adjusting up a bit for poor crit profile). The 24x and 14x damage shots of hunts end will add another 23 and 13x multiplier on top, bringing it to 60 attacks worth of dps.

So overall auto attack is ~40%, hunts end + X is around 60% of dps. Don't trade in 60% of your dps for an imbue with an ICD or a sonic proc.

Does Holy Sword from Pally or cleric domain affect shurikens? At some point they were classed as ammunition and borked stuff. Anyway with those classes you can save the AP from halfling and kensei, maybe go 6 monk

 

[Tilomere]

Yes that would save AP if you don't have racial AP, but it all fits smoothly:

Racial Halfling crit range
11 Kensai Crit multiplier
39 + tome HW capstone T5
21 Inq Shoot Later
6 NiS Core2
3 WS Divine Will (CD aligns to 10K and ICD of affirmation on IOD bow swap to unload 5 manyshot charges)

 

[Fisto Mk I]

No any imbues at all? 8)

 

[Tilomere]

I'm sure a kensai nerf, erm I mean adjustment, to the imbue 20 power standard is coming soon. You can pick your imbue up then.