so reset event is almost over and i really can’t decide on final pve build.
swordsman 1 > peltasta 3 > hoplite 3 > retiarius 3
or
swordsman 1 > peltasta 3 > hoplite 3 > retiarius 2 > murmillo 1
basically it comes down to ret’s c3 skill blandir cadena vs murm 1 to boost pelt skill damage and to make hoplite’s synchro thrusting skill worthwile.
thoughts?
I think ret2 murm1 has more dps in its rotation. You’ll probably even have a rotation gap for the ret3 variant and offensive pel skills will be too weak.
How about goon3 ret1?
@ZeroFoxGiven i’m just gonna keep it reset for now as i really can’t decide. goon3>ret1 isn’t an option though. pull rete and throw rete’s target limit is far too low at only c1 retiarius. level 5 nets are only 8 targets, where as level 10 nets are 13. considering the nets are what double trident finish damage (and blandir damage if you got ret c3), it would feel like a disaster to so drastically limit how many enemies i can hit at a time with the nets. i have gear/cards boosting trident finish to 22 aoe ratio, and blandir is even higher - so landing the attacks on every enemy i hit with the nets isn’t an issue. the question is what offers better damage; higher damage on pelt skills with murmillo c1, or blandir at ret c3 which is 5 hits of 1000% factor damage with 2 overheat - of which is doubled by the nets to the equivalent of 2000% factor (2000% x 10 every 25 seconds) i know the ret3 version has some downtime, but is higher damage with the pelt skills from murm c1 able to compete?
I think people are taking Goon3 Ret1 for Throw Rete + D. Fall combo. I’m considering trying it out as well.
Ret3 has been fun so far and I’ve already tried Ret1 Murm1 before which is probably plays similar to Ret2 Murm1, so I’m gonna see how Goon3 Ret1 fairs.
Blandir wins on that, but you are right about the downtime.
On my Hop3 NakMuay Ret3 I even have some window to use Muay skills due to that said downtime. This is with a Hop with Stabbing & Pierce and a Ret with all attack skills including Dagger Finish.
Based on that, as I previously mentioned you’ll have a more or less better rotation with no downtime on a Ret2 Murm1.
@ZeroFoxGiven i guess i need to calculate the total damage over 25 seconds that having murm1 would add compared to having stronger trident finish (level 15 instead of 10) and blandir. i’m fine with downtime if the damage works out the same or higher. at the end of the day lots of small numbers constantly is no different to a giant burst every 25 seconds if the output in damage is the same. i’m mostly a little reluctant to take murmillo because of how it would add another 6 skills to my hotbar (murm skills + low level skills which i otherwise don’t value enough to get, such as synchro thrusting).
ho are you liking your nak build? i tried it myself (pelt 2 > hop 3 > nak > ret 3) it was my original build plan when i began the character. but i dropped nak as it simply didn’t seem to add enough. it did serve okay as filler though.
That too. I hate having way too many skills to keep track off - I might as well learn to play the piano if that was the case. 
It’s ok as filler as its skills have decent multipliers. It has one reliable CC as well (spins enemy then knocks them down in place similar to Rod’s) with very low CD (10s, sometimes less if you use Muay Thai buff) which is sometimes better to use than bash.
One other option I’m looking at is Dopel1 which might be good for PVE. +13% damage IIRC on everything from DoV alone is already good and you get Cyclone as filler. You can use DPE against shard and colored mobs as well with Trident.
On that regard, I have a question: Does Mordschlag really knocks the enemy down based on its description? Can I use it with any other weapon (not restricted to 2h sword)? I forgot to test this with my DopGoon3 before.
@ZeroFoxGiven yeah it knocks down enemies: http://www.tosbase.com/content/video/skills/11004.mp4
and it can indeed be used with any weapon.
speaking of doppel, i’ve wondered about sword 1 > pelt 2 > hop 2 > doppel 3 > retiarius 2 (or pelt 1 > hop 3). you’d get +33% damage for all attacks with level 15 deeds of valor, the huge area cyclone skill (which is being reduced from 5.5 second duration to 3.5 second duration soon, but having its skill factor massively buffed) and punish is a 10 second CD skill with around 1k sf that hits 3 times with the attribute at doppel c3 - so you’d bash (or umbo blow with knockdown attribute) and then use punish for 3x 1000% damage, which would be doubled if you used one of the nets, and would also be boosted 50% by spear lunge. it’d be weird but it seems to come together on paper. edit: basically you sacrifice blandir (5x 1000% factor with 2 OH and 25 second cooldown) for punish (3x 1000% factor with 10 second cooldown, and you gain max cyclone with area/size attribute and +33% damage with deeds. seems like a good trade-off? dunno.
Thanks for info on Mordschlag.
For PVE, definitely Pel1 Hop3. Doppel3 Ret2 seems fun and might actually be better than you previous options. That +33% alone is pretty much perma Glass Mole. Do note that Cyclone has 45s cooldown but it has 2 OH.
I’ll probably try Dop1 Ret3 next instead of Goon3Ret1 to see if it’s more fun than my current build.
@ZeroFoxGiven just thought~ you’d get level 1 mordschag with dop 3 to give the best knockdown for use with punish. just remembered that doppel now has a new attribute that gives +10 aoe ratio to all doppel skills (1 per attribute level), meaning mordschag (which already has +6 aoe ratio on the skill) would knock down a vast number of enemies~ perfect for punish which already has 15 aoe ratio (25 with new attribute)
edit: the reason i suggested maybe pelt2>hop2 instead of pelt1>hop3 is because deeds makes you take +19% damage. seems like full uptime on guardian would be more important than ever, as guardian not only doubles your defense, but also makes you take 20% less damage, which would negate the +19% from deeds. sadly you’d be missing out on the stabbing attribute at hoplite c3 though.
Would you default 1h spear and shield with the doppel build or swap between spear and 2h sword? Seems clunky.
@Remiri would just default a spear+shield. due to cyclone getting higher skill factor scaling soon, you’d want to max that anyway (it’s also 30 second cooldown, not 40 seconds as the simulators seem to suggest) and maxing deeds of valor for +33% damage is another 15 skill points used, leaving just 15 anyway. the ‘punish’ skill can also be used with a spear, so that’s where the final points would be. i’ve now tested mordschag and sadly the knockback/down distance is way too far, so no point in taking that unless you want crowd control. i’ve also found that punish will hit all enemies even if only 1 enemy is knocked down (it seems you just have to have 1 knocked down enemy to allow the skill to activate) (it might be just 2 hits if the enemy isn’t knocked down, though - the two additional hits from the attribute) you can just pop the bash skill from swordsman c1 and then hit punish which, with the attribute for it, hits 3 times (1000% factor x3).
hahah - i love it. Might steal this build as a passion project. Would probably use a dagger with it tho and just avoid synchro.
Interesting discussion about adding doppel. Might try pelt3 doppel3 and ret2. Can you summarize which skills in the doppel tree works on a shield and spear only build? Should I be full str or dex to maximize the effects of DOV? Never tried doppel before but I want to try improving my trident finish further with DOV and seeing cyclone from the instance dungeon looks good as a filler skill.
@NetDUO skills that work with spear+shield are cyclone, deeds of valor, punish, mordschlag, and double pay earn. the build seems good so far (i went with pelt2>hop2, but pelt1>hop3 would be higher damage thanks to +20% damage vs medium enemies attribute and better stabbing - but i value having full uptime on guardian too much to drop pelt to c1). as for stats, i’ve gone full dex for a compromise between damage and defense. if you land a crit, then dex gives you a slightly larger damage boost than going full strength would, but your damage when you don’t crit is lower than if you did full strength. but being full dex means you have evasion to go alongside your block rate - think of it like 2 dice rolls (block and evasion) to avoid damage - if you can hit even a 40% chance to evade damage, that’s incredible when you pair it alongside a 70-to-80% chance to block; when you fail a block you may still evade, and when you fail an evade you may still block. as dex you’d ignore the +3 aoe ratio attribute on finestra, as that wipes out all of your evasion but, as standard, level 10 finestra won’t make you lose any evasion because, while it reduces your evasion by 150, guardian buff from peltasta has an attribute to give you +150 evasion which cancels out the reduction from level 10 finestra. i’m liking the build so far - its burst isn’t quite as strong as pelt3>hop3>ret3 (pelt has umbo thrust to reduce enemies defense by 30% for 2 seconds and blandir at ret c3 basically dishes the same damage as a full-duration cyclone if you use one of the nets first to double its damage) but the doppel3>ret2 is really consistent for general pve. the build handles CM’s extremely well - think of the build as large aoe-focussed swordsman. you have the large area cyclone thanks to the new attribute at doppel c3, and you can pull together 13 enemies with pull rete and wipe them out with spear lunge > trident finish. also for some reason all of the skill simulators have the cooldown of cyclone wrong. it’s actually 30 second cooldown, not 40 seconds. edit: doppel also has a new attribute that boosts all doppel skills by +10 aoe ratio (+1 per attribute level). with this attribute at 10/10 and using 3x centaurus cards and +2 aoe on another piece of gear, my cyclone’s aoe ratio is now at 30.
2nd edit: you mentioned going peltast3 with it? that might be interesting as you could then fit barbarian 1 into the build for cleave debuff to make cyclone do +50% damage (i guess this build would be sword1>pelt3>barb1>doppel3>ret2). you’d use umbo thrust to boost your trident finish, instead of spear lunge with hop2 build, and you’d use cleave to boost cyclone damage. you’d be losing finestra though so you’d probably then be better off as full str instead of dex for damage - losing crit rate would tip the scales. i’ll be sticking with pelt2>hop2, but other variations on dop3>ret2 could certainly work.
Thanks for the detailed reply. I’ll consider adding barbarian to the build. Will the duration of cleave debuff last the whole duration of cyclone? So going for sword 2 doesn’t really give much benefit is there?
Can you comment on which skill would be better to use for knockdown to punish? Bash or umbo blow attribute level1?
cleave debuff is 5 seconds, and cyclone is being changed soon from 5.5 second duration to 3.5 seconds, but having its skill factor drastically increased. so yeah it’ll last full duration. edit: umbo blow with level 1 attribute is better. it has an extra 2 aoe ratio on it, and its area is larger (tested with forecast scrolls). i do believe that pelt2>hop3>?>ret3 build is better. but doppel build holds its own and is fun. (doppel version is strictly pve btw)
I’m kinda in the same boat except considering murm2-ret1. Currently a sw1-pelt1-hop2-squire3-murm2 and no idea how ret1 is like. I love Sprint, but my murm2 feels so weak with not enough aoe skills. Will ret1 be the missing piece? Or should I switch to goon3 or dopp3 or even fencer3?
can’t comment on dragoon, but i’d steer clear of murm2>ret1. murm 2 simply doesn’t add enough over murm 1, and by not going ret c2 you’re missing out on the attribute to let you apply throw rete to bosses. and only 8 targets with pull rete at retiarius c1 is also pretty lackluster compared to 13 targets at c2. you say your build is squire though - squire really is only for a utility/shop character. it adds pretty much nothing to a serious build. were you planning to keep or to get rid of squire 3?
I agree with going high DEX for a non-Hop2-3 build. Builds like this makes DEX even more valuable since your evasion bonus is not penalized by Finestra anymore. It will require you to be more dependent on crit rate from gear and other sources though compared to having them through Finestra.
Sw3 Pel3 Rod1 Ret3 vs Sw3 Pel2 Rod1 NakMuay Ret3 - ughhh, so hard to decide between the two when I only have 2 rank resets left and don’t want to end up with a build I don’t like. 
How long does Umbo Thrust debuff last by the way?
I’m keeping Squire3. Don’t know much about swordies, only had a catagoon3 before. I’m now thinking about going sw1-pelt2-barb1-squire3-dopp3. What are your thoughts about this build?