1. Are there any tricks besides letting the dances run completely out before redancing to preserving mana on a bladedancer, it seems like regardless of what you do, you get drained alot when using 3+ dances and eventually run out of mana.
2. Whats the best a-grade set for a bladedancer, several of them look good, but Tallum seems best with its increased attack speed (faster crits), increased strength and increased carrying capability. But could use advice from other high level bladedancers.
I dont know what level we are talking about so its hard to say if your problem is normal for your level or unusual.
At 75 I can keep 3 dances up and regen full mana even while using hex, I can also keep 4 dances up though if I will eventually run out of mana.
What I do to preserve mana is exclude 1 dance in one dance round every now and then to allow regen, for example when there isnt a SWS I would dance Fire/Fury/Warrior/Vampire, some rounds I leave warrior out as its clearly the least useful/noticeable of the 4.
Another trick if the problem occurs when in party with a SWS is alter the order in which you dance/sing, there are ways to tweak the order for less mana waste.
As for the best armour set for PvE is clearly tallum, the extra att speed bonus is hard to beat.
Tallum or Majestic. If you solo you might want to avoid the stuns (not that its a huge improvement)
As for dances. A bd can hold up 3 continuous. 4 and they have to eventually med. That is how the class is designed. You are not supposed to be an infinite mana pool of 10 dances all day long.
walking works well. If you have a rechargers, two recharges each 5 min or so solves the problem too.
You can always alternate 3 dances then 4 dances, cause we regen mana pretty well doing 3 dances. In fact, you can do 4-4-3 dances.
And remember, never drop fire or fury. Some of best dances around =)
for gear, I use tallum and dual keshs and love it.
Also if you can , party up with an ES willing to use his Seaphin.
In my latest rift party, I asked if the seraph was of any help with its lvl2 mp regen. The first answer came from the DB*: yes, I can keep up 4 dances instead of 3 while being full mp at the end of each 2 min rounds.. I asked then to try with 5 songs at the same time, pusing* the limit. The melee DD answered: Noooooooo, I need my other buffs! Haha, so we did not test this out, though I'm sure 5 could be easilly done.
So, really try an ES/Seraphin.. though being mainly a soloer I fail to see the difference with or without it, most ppl in every party says the opposite. I'll put numbers but the MP regen is close to a mobile clan-hall apparently.
On a side note: if you choses to walk.. won't you have hard time getting to the mobs, except in dungeons?
*Edit : DB= BD ;)
Edit bis : pusing= pushing.. lol, hopefully I did not use a double s :o
In my latest rift party, I asked if the seraph was of any help with its lvl2 mp regen. The first answer came from the BD: yes, I can keep up 4 dances instead of 3 while being full mp at the end of each 2 min rounds.. I asked then to try with 5 songs at the same time, pusing the limit. The melee DD answered: Noooooooo, I need my other buffs! Haha, so we did not test this out, though I'm sure 5 could be easilly done.
Always walk if you can. In party, walk period.... solo or duo.. well you decided.
Dance your fury and criticals always first... warrior is usually 3rd place.
Got another BD or SWS in the group, time your dances, if you can.. take advantage of the "Ghetto Dance".....
If you and another BD or SWS can dance/sing at as close a time as possible, neither of you will be effected by the others songs/dances for MP. You have to query the dances up fast though and you'll never do it using a macro..
Macro's.... no, don't do it, BAD.... only use macros related to initial "cast single spell then attack/assist/attack" combinations.... never use macros for dances... it isn't wise.
let either 7-12 or 6-12 of your hot bar be your dedicated dances that you can easily click or hit at will when it's needed. Try to figure out which dances and in which order you like them in and make every hotbar have at least the 3 major dances... and maybe out of them all, 2 of which you could use for mages or for other purposes..
Tallum if you PvE.... majestic if you PVP (or dark crystal/nighmare... which is less likely to be seen on BDs)
hm, about hot bars...
I have no dances on my hot bar 1 (the main one)
all my dances are on bar 10 (just one click away).
While youre dancing, youll have time to go back to bar 1 no problem. So you always have all your dances at hand
Got another BD or SWS in the group, time your dances, if you can.. take advantage of the "Ghetto Dance".....
If you and another BD or SWS can dance/sing at as close a time as possible, neither of you will be effected by the others songs/dances for MP. You have to query the dances up fast though and you'll never do it using a macro..
Everyone's favourite SwS, Taraza, wrote on this subject. I can't be arsed to search, but here is the jist of it:
Overlap the dances, so that when the first dance has started (and MP has been charged for it) but is not yet in effect, you start the first song. The first song is then charged as if it weren't the second song/dance up but the first, since the swordsinger is not yet under the effect of the first dance.
Then, immediately dancet he second dance, which will be charged as if it were indeed the second, as the sworsinger's first song is not up yet. The swordsinger will then get charged as if it were the third for his second song, etc.
It takes some coordination though - I hear people usually use vent to pull it off, or are otherwisely really used to each other. :)
This trick has been confirmed by a few others.
I believe this is what Akash is talking about too. ;) Obviously a song or dance that's not actually up yet and could still be interrupted can not be counted towards MP consumption. :p
Everyone's favourite SwS, Taraza, wrote on this subject. I can't be arsed to search, but here is the jist of it:
Overlap the dances, so that when the first dance has started (and MP has been charged for it) but is not yet in effect, you start the first song. The first song is then charged as if it weren't the second song/dance up but the first, since the swordsinger is not yet under the effect of the first dance.
Then, immediately dancet he second dance, which will be charged as if it were indeed the second, as the sworsinger's first song is not up yet. The swordsinger will then get charged as if it were the third for his second song, etc.
It takes some coordination though - I hear people usually use vent to pull it off, or are otherwisely really used to each other. :)
This trick has been confirmed by a few others.
I believe this is what Akash is talking about too. ;) Obviously a song or dance that's not actually up yet and could still be interrupted can not be counted towards MP consumption. :p
i mentioned this probably a full year ago..
Usually the BD is to go first, got more then one in a group... great.... pick one to fire up the first dance.
pay attention to the one that is to dance first, and the second you see the animation start, start your dancing as well..
both have to emediately click or use the next dance they want to use.... query it up.... (click one, emediately click the next even though you JUST started the first, soon as the next JUST starts, click the next dance.... and so forth)
I would not risk putting A, not even S grade weapon on buffbox. Not to mention important dances are at 48 and 52 which is away from A, not even S. Plus you cannot use any other weapon beside duals for dancing.
Complicated. If it is just buffbox for mage and occasionally group, get some MP+ armour then (robes?) - assuming he/she will stand beside not doing any damage.
Being active player is another thing - 4 dances are possible to keep up, with walking and occasional recharge-two from SE or EE.
Sorry a bit off the topic I just really wanna know how good is a blade dancer at pvping like say in the arena? I've heard mixed comments in the game some say they have a level 57 Blade Dancer who PVP's extremely well, while others say they are good against other melee classes but they don't pvp as well So basically I just want the opinion of people in the game some who have fought with or against a Blade Dance and others who might have one? Thanks in advance!
a BD with good dex and running skill can rarely kill an archer.... rarely ever kill a mage even if they are 10 lvls lower... But can drop a galdiator... SWS.... or other DD types...
If played well enough, they can manage just about any other class, it's a toss up though.... if hex lands.. and power break against a malee.. you've got a **** good chance of walking away even if 2 of them are whailing on you.... but like i said, it's **** iffy..
BD should be loaded with SS and BSPS to make sure debuffs land.. and to make drain health more effective..
Nothing better then starting off with a your mystic dance followed by fury/warrior/fire ... then fire off freezing strike combined with a few other nasty spells like poison... this being if they are still from a distance.. when they get close.. wait for them all.. and shoot of a poison blade dance to make sure poison has a good chance of landing on them... hex them.... wack away... got room to fire off powerbreak... do it....
most BDs i see don't seem to use powerbreak, it makes sence mind you.. but in pvp if your going at it alone, you wanna try and get powerbreak to land just as much as hex... both in effect make for a totally useless fighter....
If your assiting, specially in seiges, it can drive DDs nutz when they've been hit by hex and powerbreak...
I've gone to a seige with a homu sword, a dozen or so BSPS's.. and just be a BD nuker for a party.. dancing when i need to...
So a BD could actually pvp if you know how to use them and if you know what skills to use on what char class! Thats cool to know so maybe if I try my BD out and bit see what works well and what doesn't that I might be able to pull it off! Thanks again for the advice if you have any other pvp BD tips please let me know I kinda don't want to make a fool of my self a level 54 BD in BG running out there and getting killed by a level 30 LOL that would suck :(
You cant interupt a dance. They are skills, not spells.
Hate to tell you but yes they can be interupted by sleep or stun it happens to me all the time (the stun mostly when Im fighing the doom knights)(sleep mostly in pvp
the setup that I have for my bd is tallum and dual kesh but some for with majestic jsut really depends on twhat you want for speed Tallum and dual kesh combined add a 16% increase
My attack speed with Zerk haste and dance of fury is 911 at lvl 67 so its all up to what you want
You cant interupt a dance. They are skills, not spells.
Hate to tell you but yes they can be interupted by sleep or stun it happens to me all the time (the stun mostly when Im fighing the doom knights)(sleep mostly in pvp
the setup that I have for my bd is tallum and dual kesh but some for with majestic jsut really depends on twhat you want for speed Tallum and dual kesh combined add a 16% increase
My attack speed with Zerk haste and dance of fury is 911 at lvl 67 so its all up to what you want
how in the hell
i've got +5 Dex tatoos, +4 Str tatoos, (built specific for speed over dmg.. over hp..)
i've got Tallum Heavy set... i've got Dual +4 Keshes... with Zerk 2 and haste 2 and fury, patk speed is 742....
I know most people won't agree with me, but a SwS friend and I worked out a way to use the macros for dancing/singing. the rule is, I go first, and he uses only two songs.
The trick is the FIRST part of my macro is me saying something. (*strangles Lacoi*) As soon as he sees it, he hits his own macro button, replies with (*Turns blue*) and the macro times it so that our dances/songs mesh and go off at the same time, and thus are not counted as an already present song or dance. It takes a while though to get into the rhythm, and Lacoi and I used to work very well together.
As a BD, I like my Dark Crystal, and I would like a Nightmare Heavy set, as I'm PvE. Tallum might be nice, but for me it would be the luxury set. ^^;
Dual Kesh + 4 would be ideal, but right now I'm still happily using my dual Swords of Limit +4(I just crit soooooo often with dances, plus critical damage SA? I whoop ***.)
You were implying so. And Lothien clearly took it as such or he wouldn't have been correcting you that its a skill, not a spell. (because damage disruptions and such are the only difference between the two, both can be disrupted by sleep/stun/paralyze and such)
You know that I'm not dumb enough to think that a physical skill can be interrupted by damage. I'm very used to (and have advocated in the past) sleeping monsters to interrupt their specials - why would I think differently about dances and songs?
Yes, you apparently both misunderstood me - because you possibly don't see sleep/stun being used as specific skill disrupts that much but only think of them in terms of their status effects. For me as a summoner, I almost always have something wailing on the target if I sleep (that's my pony), so there's little point in thinking of it as pure CC when it is, in fact, 50% of the time or more, an interrupt.
Now if you go back and re-read, you'll realise that there is no implication to the kind of disruption, and in light of what I wrote above it's obviously not damage disruption that I meant.
i've got Tallum Heavy set... i've got Dual +4 Keshes... with Zerk 2 and haste 2 and fury, patk speed is 742....
That can't be right, I have a better attack speed on my dwarf, and she doesn't even have dex tatoos. (ok, so she does have haste SA)
I know alot of people with faster atk speeds then a BD with full tallum/dex/kesh set. Why? Because duals are rated as Normal for Atk Speed... while single hand swords, blunts and then there is daggers in a completely different super fast area..
A dagger user with full dex..tallum set... has insane atk speed.... hell even a tyrant with some **** good set of dual fists with haste....
INT and WIT aren't irrelevant, but by all accounts well balanced - it's difficult to push MAtk (might use a Magic: Power weapon for it though if you can afford one for switching in, they're good for fighters).
Some swear by DEX, some by STR. Either way, -CON (usually for STR) in PvE, +CON for PvP survivability - but then, that depends heavily on how people on your server PvP - i.e. on whether the whole "by the time anyone hits the BD, the rest of the party is already wiped anyway" thing is true where you are or not. :p
+5dex and +4 str... adding an additional +1str and removing -1 from dex is quite noticeable... (patk goes up, but your critical chance decreases along with just about everything else) Just for that extra hit power, i never found it even slightly worth it..
move people actually try it, the more people that agree with me. (i've tried various combinations...
+5dex and +4 str... adding an additional +1str and removing -1 from dex is quite noticeable... (patk goes up, but your critical chance decreases along with just about everything else) Just for that extra hit power, i never found it even slightly worth it..
move people actually try it, the more people that agree with me. (i've tried various combinations...
ever try doom light? mmmm love +7 dex. I need to get another +1 -1 dex though...
anyway my bd is in doom light +4str +4dex and focus duals. PvE he is a god. PvP he is a god until he gets targeted. Then he is 1 shoted by a TK! ok not quite THAT bad...
Tats r a great issue with many bd´s. these r the popular ones ive seen:
+4str -4con, +4dex -4con = +4str +4dex -8con
+4str -4dex, +4con -4dex = +4str +4con -8dex
a combo of +dex alone +4dex -4con = +4dex -4con.(could also add another +1dex -1con tat for those who really want that small boost)
I like using the +4dex -4con way cus of the great increase in crits, speed, evasion, accuracy, and attack speed. the additional attack speed serves more than just attacking faster but it also contributes to how fast you dance your dances. Also the problem with the +4str, +4dex -8con is that the great increase of the overpowered mages can just bring you down much easier with the great decrease of con. The problem with the +4str +4con -8dex is that any dagger or bow class will become a great hastle because of the -8dex. you will miss like crazy. so i find the +4dex -4con a nice balance.
Anyway this is my gear for my bd:
Tallum heavy set
+4 kesh*kesh
+4dex -4con
some will dissagree with my preference but its really all about how you wanna play your BD.
Experiment a little if u got the budget if not just go with your gut instincts and by all the tips your getting.