Beautiful design and concept, loving the idea of building up a setup for the strong finale. Still, I feel like she's really strong even with no setup, most skills are a bit too good on their own. This would be my feedback:

Mutilate is a pretty comfortable skill already, even if you don't build up it has a nice crit and acc. I think it should have negative dmg (maybe 30 or 40?) and lower crit, so it's pretty much the 'finisher' skill, strong when conditions are meet, weak otherwise.

Backstab is pretty good. Maybe make it OOXX so isn't avalible so easily.

Fast roll is nice but a bit dull. It could have another effect, maybe lowering the acc of the frontline or rising the dodge of the party.

Silver and Golden debuffing both dots feels a bit too much, also the debuff is pretty strong, you can start a lot of stacking with other classes with little effort. Maybe each one could debuff the other one, so there's a synergy there. I would lower those turns a bit too, 8 turns of marks and dots is a lot! Most marks last for 3-4 turns, because there are a lot of classes who get huge bonuses vs. marked.

Estus is kinda OP too even for a single use, a skill with only the heal would be pretty good already, but this also cleans dots and adds two turns. I would sugest to nerf or to add a strong drawback. Maybe it could heal less +1 turn, or just clean dots and add 2 turns but it slows you for some turns, or even a stun at the end of your turn?

Great feedback.

The base damage is pretty low on Lord's Blade. I can make mutilate -20%, but buff the damage on poisoned/bled targets. Should emphasize the combo nature.

Fast Roll is staying the way it is. Any benefits it shares will come from trinkets.

Backstab is quite good, but it's meant as a viable alternative to selecting Mutilate. Since it moves forward 2, it can't be repeated in a non-shuffle comp unless done from rank 4. I think it's good as-is for utility, though I could nerf the base damage increase some.

I'll grant Silver Strike and Golden Strike the opposite type debuff only. This way, they compliment each other. I'll bring the mark down from 6 to 4.

The blight/bleed duration is mostly for boss fights in which they have 2-3 actions per turn. That removes the ability to combo for Mutilate pretty quickly. I can bring it to a 6 turn duration. The blight/bleed damage is super low already for respective levels.

I'll nerf the heal on Estus, remove the cleanse, and add a speed debuff.

Nerfs implemented. I'll add the speed debuff in a bit.

Speed debuff added. Resub for the changes.

It feels like the damage isn't scaling properly on this character. A level 4 mutilate against a bleeding opponent (with +50% damage from two +25% trinkets) shouldn't be hitting for 7.

Originally posted by Extra Solid Snek:

It feels like the damage isn't scaling properly on this character. A level 4 mutilate against a bleeding opponent (with +50% damage from two +25% trinkets) shouldn't be hitting for 7.

Is an expectation for this character to become virtuous with the use of the Abysswalkers 'humanity' item and the relevant camp skill?

Originally posted by Extra Solid Snek:

It feels like the damage isn't scaling properly on this character. A level 4 mutilate against a bleeding opponent (with +50% damage from two +25% trinkets) shouldn't be hitting for 7.

It's possible to hit low with her, but not quite that low. I don't know enough details about your situation, though, because debuffs and/or protection limit damage modifiers quite a lot. I need some screenshots of her doing the damage, and the turn before and after showing buffs/debuffs. A picture of the enemy's stats would also be great.

Concerning her virtuous state, it's certainly an option. Check the Abysswalker's guard as well. More virtue!

I don't understand the class desing here at all. She doesn't fullfill any role really, she is not a healer, not a stress healer and not a stunner. Her only role in the party is dmg dealer and she is a bad one too. Backstab is a good opener, +10% dmg and +10% crit and moves forward 2, nothing to complain here, idk about the marked dmg since marks are bad for 90% of the game except few boss battles. Armor piercing is whatever since not a lot of enemies in the back rank are armored anyway and you have to apply bligth before the skill anyway so I can only see it as an opener. Golden strike is straight up a bad skill, very small bleed, marks a target which I already said is not great and gives bligth resist debuff, meh. With -90% dmg this skill is next to useless. Idk what the intention here was? To use this on enemies that are not bleed resistant to make them more blight resistant? So then you can follow up with silver strike which is actually better than the golden strike thanks to the -3 speed debuff. And again the -10% bleed resist is a head scrath. Fast roll is ok I guess, it is a dull ability for "oh ♥♥♥♥ moments" so you can go back to rank 3 or 4. Thrown tracer is her probably only skill I like. It is -20% dmg that can hit ranks 2,3,4 with nice +10% crit. Again marked dmg and armor piercing is w/e. It is also nice that this skill doesn't move her. Estus brew is pretty bad, it is a low heal early on for a -3spd debuff and only usable once per battle, what? I assume it scales to 10 heal on max lvl but still it is not realiable if you can only use it once per battle with such a negative spd debuff. There is also another big issue here but I'll touch it later after the skills. And lastly probably the ability everyone thinks is broken, mutilate. Well is it? No, not really. The buildup is nice with +% on bleed and blight and also acc and crit%. Ability itself has -20% dmg and low crit but I understand that the reason is so you build up the statuses first to deal tons of dmg with later hit. There is a problem with it though. For majority of figths you don't want to be building up for such a long time especially with enemies usually resistant to at least one of the dots. It is rare you will have both dots for that sweet big dmg. But even if we opt for one dot dmg there still is a problem, ranks. The ability hits rank 1,2 and that is probably the biggest drawback on this skill. Usually you don't want to kill rank 1 and 2 fast since you are trying to recover so this skill already is useless for majority of the fights. The only reason you would have to use the ability is on boss and only of few of them which you can hit rank 1 or 2. Alternative is to not use the skill and play with marks but again that only is usefull for few bosses and not for normal mobs which take 90% of the game. So yeah most of her abilities are bad since this character is only a dmg dealer, has really nothing else to offer but her dmg projection on the ranks you care about, which are 3,4 is not great. Now her stats, another big problem, her max hp is 14 on lvl 0, what? She is literally the lowest health class in the entire game with ok dodge. Dodge is unreliable stat and hp is always better. On top of that she is a fast character, and that is good, however with her super low hp that makes her a dangerous character to use since if she gets crited once at the end of the turn and gets a dot applied on her then there is a big chance she acts first and dies to the dot before the healer could do anything. Her hp is probably biggest problem especially with her abilities that like to put her in the front ranks, it is like asking for enemies to one shot kill her. So overall a rather weak character, cool are and visual design but her abilities, stats and role makes her really weak. The only area she excells at is few boss fights where you can stack marks, dots to make the big numbers appear but I'm not a fan of characters you cannot really use in normal dungeons on normal enemies. This class might be fun to play with but I would say it's only use is for casual play on low difficulty. And don't get me wrong I'm not trying to ♥♥♥♥ on the work you did, it's just her whole character base idea which is stacking on one enemy so she can hit hard is not what majority of the game is about which makes her weak and nich character. Now that I look at it, it is a grave robber copy but worse, you made her skills stack a little more for the loss of the upfront dmg which is the opposite of what you want. Grave robber was very squishy but you made her even more squishy. Really don't understand the design here. I would probably use grave robber over this almost every single time.

Wall of text. Wow. Could use formatting.

I actually read that, though.

You don't like set-up damage and low HP characters.

Got it.

You don't understand the class design, and it seems like you completely missed the point of Estus Brew.

Got it.

Stick with something which makes you content. If it's not a set-up burst assassin, try elsewhere.

The only part of your rant which is useable is perhaps changing mutilate to allow rank 3 attacks, and perhaps buffing her base dodge by 5 or so.

People have been telling me this character's good, and they've made it to higher levels of CoM with her, as well as handle Champion Dungeons just fine. I certainly don't see the class as weak.

Format your next post better.

Yeah I probably could have formatted there a bit my bad.

I completely understand if what you were going for was a set up assassin, I'm ok with it, not the optimal playstyle but hey, I will not tell you or others how to play the game. Some people want to have fun with class.

Since now I get what you were going for I will not try to persuade to change skills or anything like that and I'm glad you might consider making her hit back rank a little more :)

Maybe you could try giving her a little hp so she wouldn't get one shot? Just a suggestion. Gl with your mods! Oh and sorry if my post came off as being a jerk or something, wasn't my intention at all.

Great class caedwyn! really loved it. The way she is viable in so many types of comps is so satisfying, although i dont see really viable to use her with an abysswalker because u want her to be with some bleeding dude in the frontline to get most of the damage and not waste your lords blades turns on bleeding enemies. I was a little bit dissapointed about their sinergy, but i still loved her.

My only critical oppinion and i would love to see your response to this is, how about buffing the estus heal and maybe add the cleansing back ( not sure about the cleansing tho ) but just add her 1 turn instead of 2. I really got high in the harvest with her thanks to her being able to use 2 turns straight, which felt really kind of op.

Whats your oppinion on why should it remain with 2 turns instead of 1 or what possible changes could she received. Love your work.

P.S Idk why i get so freaking hyped with her virtue animation, that art was so freaking well done

Heya, JD.

Thank you!

Abysswalker now bleeds enemies on his Hurricane ability. BOOM! MORE SYNERGY! The duration scales in the same way Lord's Blade's does.

The Estus Brew is supposed to be a steroid ability, but in a different form. Whereas others have direct buffs in their steroid abilities (revenge, PD's vapors, etc), which result in a huge hit, implementing such buffs is a key part of Lord's Blade's base kit. This ability lets you:

1) remove the burden of setting up on 1 target.
2) add set-up, then attack (in the case of an ally helping with debuffs)
3) attack twice-- which is STRONG AF when you have set-up applied.

Meanwhile, this thing gets you off Death's Door, guaranteeing good damage potential. Combine this with an Abysswalker for a virtue, and you've got a nasty amount of set-up if you have the patience/skill/some luck for it.

I think this approach is more interesting than the fire-and-forget Revenge.

Option 3 is where the difficulty in balancing comes in. Each following turn which is granted has a new initiative roll. If it's lower than the enemy's initative, then they get to go, despite you having another turn. This is less of a pain against enemies with super low speed, but more of a drawback against enemies with higher speed.

Is it an elegant solution? Not in my estimation, though it's something I'm experimenting with.

In the next patch (coming in a few minutes), I'm going to make Mutilate's buffs in more traditional code (using .skill_instant). This should resolve some problems it has with gaining its buffs.

I'm also going to add a dodge debuff to Estus Brew. Should mix well with the whole "I bursted, now I'm tired" tactic.

A few more changes will accompany it.

Glad to have your response so quick!

To be honest maybe its my fault that i dont really use correctly the estus, maybe its smarter to safe it for later to get out of deaths door as you said, i need to continue experimenting. My tactic has always been insta-use estus on first round apply a blight then go for mutilate or if im in a boss and want to play it safe just throw the blight and roll my ass out for damaging next turn and to get a guard on her from my hm or my MaA before she gets out of stealth. Thats been my tactic almost always.

Glad to hear you are planning some nice changes on her, the dodge debuff i think its a completely good idea to make it more fair.
Keep up the good work!

P.S thank you for the Abyss bleed add, that will finally make it viable to bring the 2 souls bois on the same dungeon.

Bring Dragonslayer! He benefits a lot from Lord's Blade's mark. :D

Dodge debuff uploaded.