Braver Skill Tree

[Mizumi323]

Well, average stance is best to always have enabled. Weak stance is best when you're hitting weak points - which is frequently with ranged due to the headshots and ability to be precise and such, but melee doesn't have those advantages as often.

So for striking you'd only enable it when you know weak points are ready to be hit. A few of those situations off the top of my head:
1. elder falz (lol)
2. any time virtually any boss is downed
3. a good number of darkers, due to their cores (hnnf killing waves of fish with katanas is way too satisfying)
4. a good number of bosses have weak points that melee can benefit from, although may not be super easy to focus on

I agree pretty much completely. Since I hardly ever go into the first-person mode for the Bow (and I'm generally lazy when it comes to aiming for weak points with melee), I opted to go with the simple DPS increase that Average offers lol. Plus, things with their weak points exposed tend to die fast enough for me not to care about an extra 20% damage anyway.

[gigawuts]

Yeah, I'm torn. 20% damage does add up, and I'd rather be killing trash mobs more easily than boss weak points since I rarely solo and the plain convenience of not having to use twice as many PA's because something survived by 1 hp is an attractive prospect. But, then, for damage where it counts weak stance hits things harder.

I guess for bosses it comes down to:
Break parts faster
Hit weak points harder

[Zipzo]

So I've done some tinkering...

If you would prefer to run a Striking Mag instead of a full ability mag (which rarely anyone has and there's probably only a minority of people who are going to take advantage of the opportunity to raise one)...you can get a tree looking like this.

http://ryuhiroshi.funpic.de/pso2/ski...4NdncKsNJ20000

This gets you both stances maxed and KC maxed.

This is probably the way to go for anyone who can't afford to start a new pure ability mag, or CBA'd. I think J.recovery is a much better point spent than snatch. It's a good "I fucked up trying to get K-Gear running" cover-up skill.

Barring all of this, I want to strongly recommend against "hybrid" builds...I think your potential can only go down splitting points between all the stances and all the weapon trees. Pick your poison, Katana or Bow. If you want both, get another tree.

[Limbo_lag]

^ Yeah, pretty much what I ended up with too. Wondering whether I should go rare mastery or reversal cover....

[gigawuts]

This is what I'm considering right now: http://ryuhiroshi.funpic.de/pso2/ski...dncKsNpFib0006
(Any tree I think I like winds up changing within the day, so yeah)

I love JR Cover 5. It is fantastic. That extra 10% really, really pulls through. I already have snatch step, and I do like the little flinch it inflicts when you step through an enemy. Weak Stance is only 35%, but that's more than the 21% on average stance.

What I'm waiting for is the next wave of skills to bring this all together. Right now we're very clearly looking at a barebones framework for a more refined tree layout with unique abilities. I know there's something about recovering PP when dealing crits, so that average crit skill may wind up being a must-have for katana users. Weird, right?

[Alisha]

heres what i'm looking at for a pure bow braver build. be aware there's some point dump in both tree's
http://ryuhiroshi.funpic.de/pso2/ski...NcnmxIkjGK0006

[Limbo_lag]

I know there's something about recovering PP when dealing crits, so that average crit skill may wind up being a must-have for katana users. Weird, right?

If that happened, we'd probably only be able to max out one stance. Might be a good time to pick one you like.

[Zipzo]

This is what I'm considering right now: http://ryuhiroshi.funpic.de/pso2/ski...dncKsNpFib0006
(Any tree I think I like winds up changing within the day, so yeah)

I love JR Cover 5. It is fantastic. That extra 10% really, really pulls through. I already have snatch step, and I do like the little flinch it inflicts when you step through an enemy. Weak Stance is only 35%, but that's more than the 21% on average stance.

What I'm waiting for is the next wave of skills to bring this all together. Right now we're very clearly looking at a barebones framework for a more refined tree layout with unique abilities. I know there's something about recovering PP when dealing crits, so that average crit skill may wind up being a must-have for katana users. Weird, right?

I understand what you've done but I question a point expenditure that is based on being knocked down accidentally as opposed to maximizing your potential weak point damage. Maybe pull from Katana combat instead? Five points in KC still nets you a decently shorter CD, if you must have snatch.

[gigawuts]

I'm always getting knocked down, turns out I'm programmed to act like a human

edit: This is what I'm leaning towards now, but may not necessarily keep. I'd like to see how maxed KC flows in regular gameplay, so I'm heading straight for it right now. If it doesn't work out I'll use a reset and change it up again.

[layn2321]

I understand what you've done but I question a point expenditure that is based on being knocked down accidentally as opposed to maximizing your potential weak point damage. Maybe pull from Katana combat instead? Five points in KC still nets you a decently shorter CD, if you must have snatch.

Considering all the multipliers in effect through the hunter tree as well, that additional 5% is likely closer to 2% total damage, if that. I don't think it's unreasonable for some to prefer a bit of added cushion for losing an extremely negligible amount of damage. This isn't chess, personal playstyle will always play a factor.