I’ve been playing around with melee auto attack builds and I’ve came to a conclusion that they are absolutely pointless. Let me elaborate:
Scout - Double Attack - Swords, Daggers and Pistols
Temporarily increases your critical rate. Subweapon basic attacks have a chance of applying as multiple hits.
Critical Rate: +20%
Additional Damage: 25%
Multi-hit Chance: 40%
Duration: 300 seconds
Corsair - Double Weapon Assault - Swords, Daggers and Pistols
Allows you to quickly connect main weapon and subweapon attacks. Connects main weapon (one-handed sword) and subweapon (dagger, pistol) attacks with no delay.
Additional Damage: 105%
Duration: 300 seconds
Corsair - Brutality - Swords, Daggers and Pistols
Applies a buff that increases the damage of your Pierce and Missile attacks.
Pierce and Missile Attack Damage: +20%
Duration: 300 seconds
Corsair - Jolly Roger - Swords, Daggers and Pistols
Place a flag that raises the combat abilities of the pirate crew. A combo is activated if multiple enemies are defeated near the Jolly Roger. Achieving a combo of 100 activates a fever buff that grants additional damage to physical attacks.
Flag Duration: 30 seconds
Physical Attack Damage: +40%
Fever Duration: 10 seconds
Thaumaturge - Quicken - Swords, Daggers and Pistols
Temporarily increases attack speed for you and your party members.
Attack Speed: +165
Duration: 120 seconds
Thaumaturge - Swell Hands - Swords, Daggers and Pistols
Enlarge the size of your and your party members’ hands to momentarily increase maximum physical and magic attack. Characters with a subweapon in their left hand have their subweapon attack increased.
Maximum Attack: +292
Duration: 300 seconds
Enchanter - Enchant Lightning - Swords, Daggers and Pistols
Grants a Lightning property damage buff to you and your party members. Changes melee and missile attacks to Lightning property. Additional Lightning property damage increases in proportion to the caster’s DEX.
Lightning Property Additional Damage: +1010*
Duration: 300 seconds
Enchanter - Lightning Hands - Swords, Daggers and Pistols
Applies an additional Lightning-property attack to your subweapon basic attacks.
Additional Lightning Skill Factor: +36%
Duration: 300 seconds
Enchanter - Over-Reinforce - Swords, Daggers and Pistols
Increases the enhancement values of subweapons equipped by you and your party members by a value equal to skill level.
Enhancement Values: +5
Duration: 300 seconds
Assassin - Hasisas - Swords, Daggers and Pistols
Drink a Hasisas Potion and increase your basic attack speed. As a side effect, the potion continuously consumes your HP.
Basic Attack Speed: +255
Reduces 1% HP every 10 seconds
Duration: 300 seconds
Schwarzer Reiter - Limacon - Pistols
When mounted, boosts you mobility to shoot the enemies rapidly. While Limacon effects are active, pistol attack becomes available.
Duration: 300 seconds
Pistol Basic Attack Damage: +100%
Bullet Maker - Double Gun Stance - Pistols
Take the weapon in your right hand and place it in your left, assuming a stance. Your basic attack changes and you become able to use Bullet Marker skills.
Basic Attack Damage: 113%
Basic attack changed
Maximum Level: 5
Bullet Maker - Tase - Pistols
Fire an electric bullet into the enemy’s body, causing the target to take additional Lightning-property damage when attacked.
Skill Factor: 166%
Duration: 60 seconds
Duration: 10 hits
Bullet Maker/Schwarzer Reiter - Revolver Mastery - Pistols
Grants 5% chance of applying an additional hit when attacking with a [Pistol]
All in all, there isn’t a single buff in the scout tree that isn’t usable while using a pistol, so why even bother with melee range? Double Weapon Assault isn’t worth arguing over, unless you are somehow able to time your main/sub weapon combos perfectly, but you would have to forsake either the Double Gun Stance (even though you could technically pull it off with the Double Gun Stance) or Limacom for it. Limacom doubles your damage and enables your to spread your auto attacks, but comes at an SP cost, Double Gun Stance seems to have 0 drawbacks, and essentially doubles your damage (as far as I’m aware you can get multiple triggers on a single auto attack).
So unless they change the Double Weapon Assault into something completely nuts, I don’t see a single reason to put yourself in melee as an auto attack build.