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Chain Blade Special Upgrade Advice
So I want to special upgrade both my Stinger and my Cutthroat (I keep and use both for different reasons). Stinger has been regular upgraded for high crit, and Cutthroat has been regular upgraded for max damage, playing to their strengths.
Should I continue playing to their strengths and give red upgrade sequence to the Stinger and blue upgrade sequence to the Cutthroat? Or should I switch and give blue to Stinger and red to Cutthroat? Which would be better?
Thank you for the advice!
Comments
Stinger isn't a popular chainblade for a number of reasons, but the most predominant of which is that many players have already broken 200% critical chance, which is enough for most enemies in the games to be critted at the maximum of 30%, whereas Cutthroat is generally used in lieu of the far more expensive options of Celtic Howling and whatnot due to having a fairly high max attack, which is always useful.
I am not quite familiar with the newer contents protection rates, however, and 35% more critical (?) over the cutthroat may be useful.
Instead; what you actually want is a pair of 91 base max signed Cutthroat chain blades, upgrading both for the maximum possible damage and getting good artisan rolls at the end, then you can S type one and R type the other. You'll want to use the R type Cutthroat in anything that you think you might not 1 shot, and the S type Cutthroat for easy lower tier content like elite shadow missions to make extra sure you 1 shot all of the mobs (or to help you 1 shot hardmode earlier on in character development). You'll probably want to put engineer's enchant on the S type as well to save on gold, good max damage enchants will be better suited for the R type Cutthroat and continue to be relevant late into the game, around 15~20k total once you've got pretty much everything ranked you'll probably find you can 1 shot things you've been using the S type Cutthroat on using a simple beginner cardinal chain obtained by making a new character under the chain slash talent and switch to that for it's 1 gold base repair fee (5 gold if you put girg enchant on it).
Celtic Howling chain blade is also kind of a bad meme since it's only 21 more max (excluding luck roll, 23.5 more max if you get a perfect artisan for luck and max dmg) than a Cutthroat but 4.5~ times the repair fee. Although it is an actual improvement in damage over Cutthroat, albeit extremely inefficient, and has a reason to exist unlike the Stinger chain blade which exists only as a newbie trap.
The critical rate stuff Blissfulkill mentioned is worth considering if you're making a chain for a character who hasn't and won't rank any skills however (TRUE mabinogi hardmode), the gag Stinger chain will help you get 33% critical in that case, but in any other situation ranking a few chain skills will give you enough luck to go above that 33% minimum for cap critical rate on a 0 protection monster.
Hello Bliss ;-; I missed coming onto the forums, and I do apologize for being so absent.
If Stinger already pushes me closer to the crit cap, then should I go for max damage (blue upgrade) if I intend to have some use out of my Stinger?
Or does Red upgrade push beyond the max crit, somehow?
I do appreciate your honesty! I'm afraid I do not plan on tossing aside my Stinger, as I have my reasons, but I will also take your other advice and smith myself an additional Cutthroat!
And then I'll have both an S and an R type Cutthroat. And I like your advice about Engineer's on S, too; I already have a couple of Engineer ES ready for that.
And, in your opinion, you think it may not be worth trying to smith a Celtic? I was holding off on it for a long time, mostly because I don't necessarily have the funds to get a lot of the required mats (nor have I had much luck in them dropping for me). And yeah, the Celtic repair fees are always something I kind of cringe at...
At any rate, I really do appreciate all the advice! Thank you all!
The Celtic one is a hefty investment, but is the strongest chain blade stat-wise. As Lute said, unless you can comfortably make a lot of money, a cutthroat will serve you better. One thing to consider is that if you're end game, or close to it, then it would be worthwhile to invest in one, otherwise, the cutthroat is more than enough for most content. The most expensive part of the Celtic CB are the ruptured metals, which are used for various other items (some of them erg upgrade related). On the other hand, if you run siege and counter attack elite often, you may come across one as a drop.
I personally feel the Celtic Howling chain blade is only worth using once you've min maxed every other piece of gear, and is only really worth using in endgame Tech Duinn elites. Aside from that the repair fees will end up costing you more than the benefit it's small damage bonus over a Cutthroat provides. If the materials end up in your hands there's no harm in making one of course but it's more min max than a practical option when compared to Cutthroat. Ultimately it's up to you if you consider the additional damage to be worth the significantly higher repair fee, plenty of people opt for Girgashey enchants over Crocodile after all.