Are melee FVS a thing of the past?

[Xeno5k]

Interestingly enough, the curve of melee FvS play is one reason why builds like the Juggernaut are so popular - they wind up with the survivability (and then some), the damage (slightly higher melee damage + manyshot ability winds up eclipsing FvS damage with EDs), and none of the drawbacks of the FvS symbol - this is a direct reason for why the melee FvS population has dwindled.

Yeah I totally agree, it took me forever to learn how to properly use my melee FVS. When I first stated I thought getting 60 damage per swing on a falchion was amazing dps (yes I know that sounds bad), now months later I'm finally able to pull off 3k crits. I imagine a Jugg would be much easier to play since its more focused.

[scoobmx]

Interestingly enough, the curve of melee FvS play is one reason why builds like the Juggernaut are so popular - they wind up with the survivability (and then some), the damage (slightly higher melee damage + manyshot ability winds up eclipsing FvS damage with EDs), and none of the drawbacks of the FvS symbol - this is a direct reason for why the melee FvS population has dwindled.

I'm not sure precisely what you think gives the juggernaut more survivability and melee damage? If anything the benefit of the Juggernaut is in the ranged damage and unique buffs an Arty brings to the party. You can gear and ED a melee FVS in the same way as a Juggernaut, get deadly from your friendly party Arty, and the difference comes down to battle engineer vs beloved of the Lord of Blades and Greatsword Specialization, which give you way more damage than battle engineer. Similarly for survivability, you not only have more heals available to cycle for yourself but also wings. This is just my perspective, but I see WF FVS as sacrificing the ranged physical capability of Juggernaut to gain ranged spell damage (energy drain which is thousands of hit points effectively on the first cast, and of course divine punishment) party heals, divine buffs, and slightly better melee damage and survivability. The FVS build is probably a bit more button-mashy of course.

[TheLegendOfAra]

I'm not sure precisely what you think gives the juggernaut more survivability and melee damage? If anything the benefit of the Juggernaut is in the ranged damage and unique buffs an Arty brings to the party. You can gear and ED a melee FVS in the same way as a Juggernaut, get deadly from your friendly party Arty, and the difference comes down to battle engineer vs beloved of the Lord of Blades and Greatsword Specialization, which give you way more damage than battle engineer. Similarly for survivability, you not only have more heals available to cycle for yourself but also wings. This is just my perspective, but I see WF FVS as sacrificing the ranged physical capability of Juggernaut to gain ranged spell damage (energy drain which is thousands of hit points effectively on the first cast, and of course divine punishment) party heals, divine buffs, and slightly better melee damage and survivability. The FVS build is probably a bit more button-mashy of course.

If I can derail for a moment:

What he's saying here is that both his jugg and his melee fvs are gimp, and really he should just reroll them into a ranger.
Poor Scoob just doesn't know it.

[WruntJunior]

I'm not sure precisely what you think gives the juggernaut more survivability and melee damage? If anything the benefit of the Juggernaut is in the ranged damage and unique buffs an Arty brings to the party. You can gear and ED a melee FVS in the same way as a Juggernaut, get deadly from your friendly party Arty, and the difference comes down to battle engineer vs beloved of the Lord of Blades and Greatsword Specialization, which give you way more damage than battle engineer. Similarly for survivability, you not only have more heals available to cycle for yourself but also wings. This is just my perspective, but I see WF FVS as sacrificing the ranged physical capability of Juggernaut to gain ranged spell damage (energy drain which is thousands of hit points effectively on the first cast, and of course divine punishment) party heals, divine buffs, and slightly better melee damage and survivability. The FVS build is probably a bit more button-mashy of course.

Juggernaut loses spell damage for the most part, but gains higher melee damage (from buffs) and ranged damage from manyshot. With EDs, this gives favor to Juggernaut, especially in EE content where running out of spellpoints is a realistic concern for maintaining spell damage.

Juggernaut has very similar survivability, due to at least as easy access to saves (if you play the paladin version, even easier, though your DPS suffers slightly) and generally more HP, along with typically having more PRR - Reconstruct and Heal are really in about the same category for instant self-heal, so being able to take more hits makes up for not having wings to avoid a few hits, while also gaining damage from not winging away (which causes reduced melee damage).

Trust me, this comes from playing the same character with a roughly equivalent level of well-geared as both a Juggernaut and a melee FvS (as well as a Paladin, but that's a different kettle entirely - it gains more in survivability while being only at best a little better melee damage than the Juggernaut).

[jalont]

Juggernaut loses spell damage for the most part, but gains higher melee damage (from buffs) and ranged damage from manyshot. With EDs, this gives favor to Juggernaut, especially in EE content where running out of spellpoints is a realistic concern for maintaining spell damage.

Juggernaut has very similar survivability, due to at least as easy access to saves (if you play the paladin version, even easier, though your DPS suffers slightly) and generally more HP, along with typically having more PRR - Reconstruct and Heal are really in about the same category for instant self-heal, so being able to take more hits makes up for not having wings to avoid a few hits, while also gaining damage from not winging away (which causes reduced melee damage).

Trust me, this comes from playing the same character with a roughly equivalent level of well-geared as both a Juggernaut and a melee FvS (as well as a Paladin, but that's a different kettle entirely - it gains more in survivability while being only at best a little better melee damage than the Juggernaut).

Mathematically, with an artie in the party, a horc soul has better melee dps than a jugg. I've found that sometimes things that work on paper don't actually transfer to game though. So, any idea why a jugg comes out on top?

[WruntJunior]

Mathematically, with an artie in the party, a horc soul has better melee dps than a jugg. I've found that sometimes things that work on paper don't actually transfer to game though. So, any idea why a jugg comes out on top?

Battle Engineer 1 (+2 enhancement bonus and +2 seeker) + Tensers (I've almost never seen a melee FvS keep this up, while almost every Jugg keeps it going, so that's +4 Str) put a Juggernaut behind by only a couple damage. Add in ranged capabilities and things start looking better for Juggernaut.

Also worth noting a Juggernaut can make a displacement scroll approach the usefulness of a displacement clickie - it's a 1 minute buff.

Almost missing having a Juggernaut from all this Jugg talk. >_>

[zwiebelring]

Yeah I totally agree, it took me forever to learn how to properly use my melee FVS. When I first stated I thought getting 60 damage per swing on a falchion was amazing dps (yes I know that sounds bad), now months later I'm finally able to pull off 3k crits. I imagine a Jugg would be much easier to play since its more focused.

The effort to keep up Tenser's on a FvS is higher than just ignoring it. Artificer's got a wonderful synergy for solo playerstyle and independant gameplay: longer duration on consumables.

High UMD on a FvS still needs some work, e.g., gear swapping which is annoying incombat. Every minute using a scroll vs. every 1,5 to 2 min. is a big difference.

Then the playstlye from offensive twitching melee into occasional melee and inbetween turtling-up.

edit: just found a better way to describe, why I changed and what is killing fun for me regarding melee FvS:

All I can say is that before ED's came out, based on my own experience, a well built and well played melee FvS could survive better than any toon while doing 60 to 70% of the damage a good melee toon puts out to a single mob in elite quests AND all the while fully capable of healing the group through any quest/raid. Now it is more like 20 to 25% because to get the same survivability I had before in epic quests I have to be in destinies that focus on defense. My melee FvS is simply not as fun or as effective as he once was, relatively speaking. And I have tried all sorts of ways to get him back on par. It is kinda sad for me as my melee FvS was my favorite for a long while.

Mellkor summed it up very well. I didn't build an esos (or any endgame melee weapon on that matter) for occasional meleeing!