Whoops this article is unedited – give us some time to clean it up!
Hey guys, I’m putting together a skill guide for Aurelia. People have been asking for it and it’s needed so here’s an attempt to get the ball rolling. This guide is (still) very much a work in progress – I’m calling on all baronesses to contribute. It’s based on a beginning attempt by @DankRafft, which is based in turn on @Derch’s Athena skill guide.
I’ve put together a skeleton and basically copied comments from this previous thread with some observations of my own (as well as the occasional minor spelling edit). Once we get some consensus we can decide how to rate the skills and I’ll do a more cohesive write up.
I’m tentatively rating skills based on various members’ opinions, including my own. These will obviously change as they get some discussion; regard every rating as a big question mark. I’ve also rated the skills differently based on different playstyles – sniper, cryo, or coop – as they obviously vary in usefulness depending on your build.
As I said, this is a work in progress; there may be errors, especially math errors. Any help on that or any other front would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks!
[color=white]The scale[/color]
:star:
Sub-par: These are terrible skills that don’t work, harm you, or are just are difficult to make worthwhile.
:star::star:
Below Average: These are skills that can be useful but require you to build around them a bit; just throwing them in to move down a tree is a bad idea because there are usually better options.
:star::star::star:
Average: These are really good skills that are solid choices to get you to the ones you really want.
:star::star::star::star:
Great: These skills will make the game much easier and should always be taken if you find yourself near them.
:star::star::star::star::star:
Outstanding: Skills of this rating will be gamechangers that you base your build and playstyle around; they should be taken with every set up if you are in that tree.
Ratings may have stars removed for particular builds, even if they’re useful for that build, if you have to waste points to get to them or they’re too far down a different tree to get to easily. But if you happen upon an awesome mod that boosts one of those skills add that star right back.
The Huntress Tree
Markswoman
Sniper: :star: :star: :star: :star:
Cryo: :star: :star: :star: :star:
Coop: :star: :star: :star:
Increases critical hit damage and aim speed with all gun types.
• 5/5 Critical hit damage +30%, Aim speed +100%
• 10/5 Critical hit damage +60%, Aim speed +200%
4 stars for Cryo due to 200% buffs critical shots get with frozen targets.
Only the Best
Sniper: :star: :star: :star: :star:
Cryo & Coop: :star: :star: or :star: :star: :star: if using snipers
Increases bullet speed with all gun types, as well as magazine size for sniper rifles.
• 5/5 Bullet speed +100%, Magazine size +5
• 10/5 Bullet speed +200%, Magazine size +10
This skill is good for snipers since it helps with hitting distant moving targets.
Culling the Herd
Sniper: :star: :star: :star: :star:
Cryo: :star: :star: :star:
Coop: :star: :star: :star:
Scoring a critical hit increases gun damage for a few seconds.
• 5/5 Gun damage +30%
• 9/5 Gun damage +54%
A weaker, but more forgiving, version of I Never Miss.
Long-Range Killer
Sniper: :star: :star: :star: :star:
Cryo & Coop: :star: :star: or :star: :star: :star: :star: if using snipers
Your shots deal bonus damage based on your distance to the target. The further away you are from the target, the greater the bonus damage.
• 1/1 Bonus damage up to +60%, depending on how far away you are
Would be extremely useful for snipers except for the fact that enemies never stay distant for long. More useful in cooperative play where you can get others to draw aggro for you while you hang back and take pot shots.
Warning Shot
Sniper: :star: :star: :star:
Cryo & Coop: :star: or :star: :star: :star: if using snipers
After missing a shot with a sniper rifle, you gain increased fire rate, accuracy, critical hit damage, and weapon swap speed for a few seconds.
• 5/5 Fire rate +35%, Accuracy +45%, Critical hit damage +35%, Weapon swap speed +50%
• 9/5 Fire rate +63%, Accuracy +81%, Critical hit damage +63%, Weapon swap speed +90%
@Ha_Na: “The extra crit damage is pretty nice, and the swap speed allows you to react quickly to incoming close range attacks, 1 star if not using snipers at all”
Silver Lining
Sniper: :star: :star: :star:
Cryo & Coop: :star: or :star: :star: :star: if using snipers
Killing an enemy with a critical hit adds a bullet to your magazine. Does not work with rocket launchers.
@Ha_Na: “[F]or sniping, it saves us reload time and thus increases DPS.”
I Never Miss
Sniper: :star: :star: :star: :star:
Cryo & Coop: :star: or :star: :star: :star: if using snipers
Shooting an enemy with a sniper rifle grants you a stack of I Never Miss. Increases sniper rifle critical hit damage for each stack of I Never Miss. Max stacks: 999 (good luck getting to that.)
• 5/5 Critical hit damage +3.5% per stack
• [color=lime]At 25 stacks +87.5% critical hit damage[/color]
• [color=lime]At 100 stacks +350% critical hit damage[/color]
• [color=lime]At 999 stacks +3496.5% critical hit damage[/color]
• 9/5 Critical hit damage +6.3% per stack
Sounds great on paper. Doesn’t work so well in actuality, especially if you’re playing with others; you’ll constantly be losing all your stacks due to lag / kill steals / etc.
Magic Bullet
Sniper: :star: :star: :star: :star:
Cryo: :star: :star: :star:
Coop: :star: :star: :star: :star:
Scoring a critical hit with a sniper rifle causes you to regenerate health for a few seconds and causes a healing nova around the target that heals anyone in its radius. Players (including yourself) within the radius are instantly revived from FFYL.
• Health regeneration: Up to 7.5% of max health per second
• Healing nova: Up to 25% of max health
Mediocre at long range but useful for getting second winds when close.
@Ha_Na: “It’s really handy to have, and you can always shoot crit spots on frozen enemies from close range to maximize healing. The second winds are highly useful with melee badass foes like Gargaunts in the dome, that can not always be killed quickly enough when in ffyl.”
Wait For It…
Sniper: :star: :star: :star:
Cryo & Coop: :star: or :star: :star: :star: if using snipers
Missing a shot with a sniper rifle grants you a stack of Wait For It. Increases sniper rifle damage for every stack of Wait For It. Max stacks: 10.
• 5/5 Sniper rifle damage +7.5% per stack
• At 10 stacks +75% sniper rifle damage
• 9/5 Sniper rifle damage +13.5% per stack
Can be useful when preparing for a boss fight… if you use snipers.
Large Caliber
Sniper: :star: :star: :star: :star:
Cryo: :star: :star:
Coop: :star: :star:
Increases gun damage and reload speed, but decreases magazine size.
• 5/5 Gun damage +50%, Reload speed + 25%, Magazine size -43%
• 9/5 Gun damage +90%, Reload speed + 45%, Magazine size -117%
A star removed for non-sniping builds as it’s so far down the tree. But if you’re going down the Huntress tree anyway then this is a good place to spend points.
Prudent Prudence
Sniper: :star: :star: :star: or :star: :star: :star: :star: with a fast shield
Cryo: :star: :star:
Coop: :star: :star:
After suffering melee damage or having your shield depleted after fully recharging, you gain increased movement speed, reload speed.
• 5/5 Movement speed +30%, Reload speed +40%, Gun damage +30%
One star removed from Cryo and Coop for same reason as Large Caliber.
Custom Loads
Sniper: :star: :star: :star: :star: :star:
Cryo: :star: :star: :star: :star:
Coop: :star: :star: :star:
When zoomed in with a sniper rifle, a wheel scrolls by with icons featuring each of the elemental damage types. Scoring a critical hit in this manner creates a small nova.
• Bonus elemental damage: 30% of damage dealt
• Critical nova damage: 15% of damage dealt
Free damage when ADSing. With elemental snipers can be used to trigger synergies such as explosive + cryo, which makes it particularly beneficial for cryo builds… if you can get this far down the tree.
[color=deepskyblue]Cold Money Tree[/color]
Avalanche
Sniper: :star: :star: :star: :star:
Cryo: :star: :star: :star: :star: :star:
Coop: :star: :star: :star: :star:
Dealing cryo damage to an enemy grants you a stack of Avalanche. Each stack of Avalanche grants a bonus to cryo damage and freeze chance. Max stacks 100.
• [color=lime]5/5 Cryo damage +0.75% per stack, Freeze chance +0.4% per stack[/color]
• [color=lime]At 25 stacks (which is very easy to get) +18.75% cryo damage, +10% freeze chance[/color]
• [color=lime]At 100 stacks (good luck) +75% cryo damage, +40% freeze chance[/color]
• [color=cyan]10/5 Cryo damage +1.35% per stack, Freeze chance +0.72% per stack[/color]
With fewer points the bonus is underwhelming, but at five points this becomes quite a respectable skill. Stacks also decay very slowly, around one stack every 13 seconds. Also helpful for coop due to the crowd control and extra damage potential for teammates. This seems like it would be good for all builds, unless you like using fire weapons.
Bitter Riposte
Sniper, Cryo, & Coop: :star: :star: :star: or :star: :star: :star: :star: :star: with a fast shield
Taking damage from an enemy while your shield is fully charged fires and ice dart at that enemy, dealing cryo damage.
• 5/5 Rank 5 ice dart damage
• 10/5 Rank 10 ice dart damage
One of Aurelia’s One Point Wonder skills. Every build should have this – any shot, melee strike, or any other faux pas – and the offender gets zapped by ice dart. The only problem is that the dart has a tendency to wander around at a rather leisurely pace before landing; by that time, you may have already taken them out (or they may already have taken you out). Drop a couple of stars if you’re using a slow shield.
@CitizenJayne: “Free Antagonist shield? Yes please! I love this skill, love it sooooooo much. Bitter Riposte + Winter’s Veil + a purple Tediore shield = SO MUCH AWESOME‼ And when you add her other ice shard skills (Winter’s Fury, Fragment Rain, Polar Vortex, and Whiteout) say hello to Winter Storm Aurelia! These make her easily one of the best mobbers in the game. Maybe the best; Nisha, you’d better watch out!”
Short Summer
Sniper: :star:
Cryo: :star: :star: :star: :star:
Coop: :star: :star:
Dealing cryo damage to an enemy while Cold As Ice is active grants you a stack of Short Summer. Improves action skill cooldown rate and shield recharge delay for each stack of Short Summer. Max stacks: 200.
• 5/5 Cool down rate +0.75%, Shield recharge delay -1% per stack
• [color=lime]At 25 stacks 18.75% cool down rate, -25% shield recharge delay[/color]
• [color=lime]At 200 stacks 150% cool down rate, -200% shield recharge delay [/color]
• 10/5 Cool down rate +1.5%, Shield recharge delay -2% per stack
This skill is great for the cool down rate buff – more Cold As Ice = more awesome – and the more often you have Cold As Ice active the more often Frostbite will be proccing. If you use a fast shield then the recharge delay bonus may be less important. On the other hand, maxing out this skill might mean you could use another kind of shield and get your recharge delay bonus here instead, but it seems like it would be pretty hard to get anywhere near 200 stacks.
Winter’s Fury
Sniper: :star: :star:
Cryo: :star:
Coop: :star:
Activating Cold As Ice causes you to knock back all nearby enemies. Forcing your shard to switch targets causes you to knock back all enemies again.
Like Claptrap’s Repulsive skill, Winter’s Fury only really serves to make it harder to hit enemies by moving them around. It might be marginally useful for players who rely on keeping enemies out of melee range… or it might not.
Frigid Touch
Sniper: :star: :star: :star:
Cryo: :star: :star: :star: :star:
Coop: :star: :star: :star:
Killing an enemy causes a portion of cryo damage dealt to enemies to be converted into healing for a short time.
• [color=lime]5/5 steals 10% of cryo damage[/color]
• [color=cyan]10/5 steals 20% of cryo damage[/color]
• Kill skill
One of Aurelia’s 3 health regen skills, and the only one even close to the beginning of the tree. The other two – Keep Your Chin Up and Magic Bullet – are both tier 4 skills. And Magic Bullet only regenerates your own health if you’re standing right next to the victim. And manage to get off a critical hit. So maybe it’s more accurate to say this is one of Aurelia’s 2 and 1/2 healing skills. As such, I imagine this is a pretty necessary skill if you’re going to be doing a lot of cryo damage. Putting 4 or 5 points in this has certainly improved my survivability when running a cryo build.
I’m not sure how much good Frigid Touch will do if you’re running a sniper or coop build as it requires five points in Avalanche and/or Bitter Riposte… although if you use Cold As Ice regularly a 5 point investment probably has some utility, especially since you end up with two great skills – Avalanche and Bitter Riposte – as your consolation prize. And Aurelia is squishy as hell so it’s nice to have some extra health regen in there.
@Ha_Na: “3 Points are usually enough to keep me alive with my Sniper/Cryo and Cryo/Coop build. Either do large crits or fast crits (or both) to maximize the health regain.”
Fragment Rain
Sniper: :star: :star: :star:
Cryo: :star: :star: :star: :star: :star:
Coop: :star: :star: :star:
When your frost shard attaches to an enemy, it has a chance to spawn ice fragments, which fly towards nearby enemies and deal cryo damage.
• [color=lime]1/1 35% fragment chance[/color]
Chaining ice darts at the cost of only 1 point? Yes please!
Frostbite
Cryo: :star: :star: :star: :star: :star:
Sniper & Coop: :star: :star: :star: or :star: :star: :star: :star: depending on gun
Enemies damaged by your frost shard or ice fragments are Frostbitten, causing them to take increased cryo damage for a few seconds. Additionally, enemy shields are disrupted while Frostbitten, increases cryo damage dealt to shielded enemies even further.
• [color=lime]5/5 Cryo damage bonus +35%, shielded cryo damage bonus +55%[/color]
• [color=cyan]9/5 Cryo damage bonus +63%, shielded cryo damage bonus +99%[/color]
This appears to be a key skill in successfully using a cryo build at higher levels; Frostbite makes your cryo damage much more effective against shields.
@Ha_Na: “With 10/5 Avalanche and 5/5 Frostbite or 5/5 Avalanche and 9+/5 Frostbite, the total Cryo damage multiplier can match and outperform regular element matching bonuses.”
@Ha_Na: “For a cryo build it should be maxed out, for sniping with a cryo sniper, spec at least 3 points.”
Polar Vortex
Sniper: :star: :star: :star:
Cryo: :star: :star: :star: :star:
Coop: :star: :star: :star:
Your ice shard has a chance to create a singularity.
• 1/1 Singularity chance 100% the first time, 35% each time after
Turning your ice shard into a homing singularity grenade? Oh hell yeah!
Cold Advance
Sniper: :star: :star: :star: :star:
Cryo: :star: :star: :star: :star: :star:
Coop: :star: :star: :star:
Increases critical hit damage. Additionally, scoring a critical hit while Cold As Ice is active extends its duration. This skill has diminishing returns.
• [color=lime]5/5 Critical hit damage +30%, Shard duration +2.5 seconds[/color]
• [color=cyan]9/5 Critical hit damage +57%, Shard duration +4.5 seconds[/color]
@Ha_Na: “Sniping profits from even more crit damage. Cryo profits from the extended duration, especially if the bar is still almost full when the last foe dies, since that will shorten the recharge delay of the action skill. The extended duration also allows you to collect more Short Summer stacks to further accelerate the cooldown.”
Whiteout
Sniper: :star:
Cryo & Coop: :star: or :star: :star: :star: if using snipers
While Cold As Ice is active, enemies near you deal decreased damage. The percentage of damage reduced decreases with each additional point.
• 1/5 Nearby enemy damage -17%
• 2/5 -29%
• 3/5 -37%
• 4/5 -44%
• 5/5 -50%
• 6/5 -55%
• 7/5 -58%
• 8/5 -62%
• 9/5 -64%
• 10/5 -67%
• 11/5 -69%
Great if you like to get up close and personal. Not so great if you’re a long range killer – Whiteout creates a bubble of whirling snow that can make it difficult to see, and it doesn’t protect you from damage coming from anyone outside the fairly small area of effect.
Note: These numbers are based on Gearbox’s official skill calculator. Since it doesn’t include numbers for coms, the boosted numbers are extrapolations. Some testing is needed.
Winter’s Veil
Sniper: :star: :star: :star:
Cryo: :star: :star: :star: :star:
Coop: :star: :star: :star:
When struck by a melee attack, or when your shield becomes depleted, you emit a cryo nova with a high chance of freezing enemies.
• [color=lime]5/5 Rank 5 cryo nova damage [/color]
• [color=cyan]9/5 Rank 9 cryo nova damage [/color]
This gives you an ice nova shield for one point… the problem is getting this far down. For a cryo build taking this skill is a no brainer. For other builds it depends on how many points you want to invest in Cold Money, but if you’re this far down the tree there’s no reason why you should not take this skill.
Wintertide
Sniper: :star: :star: :star: :star:
Cryo: :star: :star: :star: :star: :star:
Coop: :star: :star: :star: :star:
Killing an enemy causes all of your non-cryo guns to deal cryo damage along with their usual type, and causes cryo guns to deal even more cryo damage.
• [color=lime]Additional cryo damage +25%[/color]
• Kill skill
@Ha_Na: “If this skill is multiplicative, then Holy ■■■■. Huge DPS increase either way. Be it to add cryo to non-elemental snipers to get stuff frozen and multiply the crit damage, or to raise the cryo damage even higher, or just to increase freeze chances for more crowd control, here you have it all.”
@Adabiviak: “I didn’t want to make a new post about this, but Wintertide is insane. At first I wasn’t sold on it (if I wanted cryo damage, I would switch to a cryo weapon). Combined with a beam laser, once the skill is triggered by a kill, things freeze fast. I’m using it with Moxxi’s Vibra Pulse now, but I imagine any good beam laser would do well with this (due to the high ‘fire’ rate). I’ll be getting her a Rosie soon, and I expect that it’ll also do quite well. It changes my mobbing tactics from ‘prioritize and take them out one at a time’ to ‘snipe the weakest link to get that skill active and start steamrolling’.”
Contractual Aristocracy Tree
Duchess
Sniper: :star: :star: :star: :star: :star:
Cryo: :star: :star: :star: :star:
Coop: :star: :star: :star: :star:
Killing an enemy grants you a stack of Duchess. You gain increased accuracy for each stack of Duchess. Necessary for coop builds because that’s the only way you’re going get any further down the CA tree. Max stacks: 100.
• 2/2 Accuracy +1.6% per stack
• [color=lime]At 25 stacks +40% accuracy[/color]
• [color=lime]At 100 stacks +160% accuracy[/color]
• 7/2 Accuracy +5.6% per stack
• Good for solo players
A good skill even with only one point. It’s fairly easy to gain stacks, and if you get to max stacks with 2/2 points (which, unlike Aurelia’s other stacking skills, is actually quite doable) Duchess can narrow the spread of shot guns and guns like the Skullmasher so they act like single bullet guns.
@Derch: “Works in solo. I think this is going to be one of those skills every build should get, great to outstanding. At first glance a skill that boosts accuracy isn’t much but tier one and it only takes 2 points is a pretty big deal. At 100 stacks (and it doesn’t take long to get there) 80% accuracy is a game changer with many guns, I was using a Tediore splitter and it almost looked like a single beam. Now the fact you can boost it 7/2 is another big deal. 5/5 skills you can get to 11 which is just over double the base skill. This skill you over triple what it can do. At full stacks and 7/2 thats 280% accuracy and that can bring almost any gun to max accuracy. If you are using anything with multi pellets this is huge if you are not it’s still worth the 2 points. “
Contractual Obligations
Sniper: :star:
Cryo: :star:
Coop: :star: :star: :star: :star:
If an ally signs the contract by melee attacking you then they become your servant and you become their master. You deal increased gun damage and your servant gains increased shield capacity.
• [color=lime]1/1 Master gun damage +15%, Servant shield capacity +10%[/color]
Not a useful skill in solo but you need to take this to go down the tree any further. Forms the base of the coop skills so necessary for coop play; it also gives you and your partner some nice little buffs. Other players may take it to get to Quality Not Quantity.
Valet
Sniper: :star:
Cryo: :star:
Coop: :star: :star: :star:
When your servant kills an enemy, you gain a stack of valet. You and your servant gain increased reload speed for each stack of valet. Max stacks: 100.
• [color=lime] 2/2 Master reload speed +0.4%, Servant reload speed +0.3% per stack[/color]
• [color=lime]At 25 stacks +10% master reload speed, +7.5% servant reload speed[/color]
• [color=lime]At 100 stacks +40% master reload speed, +30% servant reload speed[/color]
• [color=cyan] 6/2 Master reload speed +2.4%, Servant reload speed +1.8% per stack[/color]
Like Contractual Obligations only works in coop, but necessary if you want to get any further down the tree for other stuff. Also, Valet stacks are necessary if using All Glory To the Master as Valet stacks are converted into Glory stacks.
@Derch: “This is like the above skill but this time it only works in co-op and the buff again is great. at 2/2 and max stacks you get 40% for you and 30% for your servant. I don’t think this is nearly as good as Duchess but boosting both of you is really solid and who doesn’t like reload speed. Now at 7/2 it gets pretty impressive, 140%/105% is really impressive.”
Protect Your Assets
Sniper: :star:
Cryo: :star:
Coop: :star: :star:
Increases shield capacity and max health for you and your servant.
• [color=lime]5/5 Master shield capacity +20%, Master max health +15%[/color]
• [color=lime]Servant shield capacity +15%, Servant max health +5%[/color]
• [color=cyan]9/5 Master shield capacity +36%, Master max health +27%[/color]
• [color=cyan]Servant shield capacity +27%, Servant max health +9%[/color]
@Derch: “I have yet to spec into this, while Boosting both of your shield and health capacity for Master and Servant is nice, it might not be needed or ideal for your partner, and the other skill in this tier might be a better bet. If you are leveling up and you are not finding blue or better guns get this, otherwise skip it. I wouldn’t rate it bad, just very average.”
You First
Sniper: :star:
Cryo: :star:
Coop: :star: :star: :star: :star:
Killing an enemy restores part of your servant’s shield.
• 1/1 Restores 55% of servant’s shield
• Kill skill
Another one point wonder… if you’re playing coop.
@Derch: “I think this is a pretty amazing yet quiet skill. 1 point and on kill you restore over half of your partners shield. Unless they are playing roid melee this is outstanding.”
@CitizenJayne: “Your coop partner will love you.”
Quality Not Quantity
Sniper & Cryo – Do you like rare guns?: :star: if no or :star: :star: :star: if yes
Coop: :star: :star: :star: :star: :star:
Increases gun damage and fire rate when using guns of blue rarity or greater. Decreases gun damage and fire rate when using guns of green rarity or lesser.
• [color=lime]5/5 Rare gun damage +25%, Rare gun fire rate +15%[/color]
• [color=lime]Peasant gun damage -5%, Peasant gun fire rate -5%[/color]
• [color=cyan]10/5 Rare gun damage +50%, Rare gun fire rate +30%[/color]
• [color=cyan]Peasant gun damage -10%, Peasant gun fire rate -10%[/color]
@Derch: “I really think this is a great skill, its half of wreck but always on if your gun is blue or better and between mission rewards, item of the day, golden chest, etc… It’s not hard to have blue or better guns. Both damage and fire rate on one skill is always amazing and there are many coms that boost this as well. With all of the crit and cryo buffs skills like this are really important to build those multiplicative skills. I just checked and all 3 legendary coms boost this skill.”
Excellent Shot, Madam
Sniper: :star:
Cryo: :star:
Coop: :star: :star: :star: :star:
Enemies damaged by your servant become set up. Damaging an enemy who is set up deals cryo damage to that enemy, consuming Set Up in the process.
@Derch: “This is outstanding. So your servant damages enemies in anyway, including grenades, ice shard, anything that I have seen so far and enemies are set up. If you shoot a set up enemy you add cryo to your shot. The cryo damage so far that I have seen is usually higher than my bullet unless I hit a crit. So it’s like adding over 100% splash damage to a lot of shots. Even on snipers its more than a body shot. Also this helps you with the next tier’s single point skill because adding that damage to enemies your servant shot first helps you beat them to the kill.”
Next To Cleanliness
Sniper: :star: :star:
Cryo: :star: :star: :star:
Coop: :star: :star: :star: or :star: :star: :star: :star: depending on gun preference
Increases gun damage and reload speed with all guns that are not incendiary, corrosive, or explosive.
• [color=lime]5/5 Gun damage +20%, Reload speed +20%[/color]
• [color=cyan]9/5 Gun damage +36%, Reload speed +36%[/color]
@Derch: “This is another really solid skill, gun damage and reload speed in one. 20% for both and only for you at 5/5. If you are taking all the DPS skills by this point you have buffed your base damage 3 times for 60%, Accuracy 80%, Reload speed 60%, Fire rate 15%, Critical hit damage (100 stacks to be realistic) 40%. Now with this one you are limited to NE, shock, cryo damage but the way she works that’s not that big of a deal. The explosive kinda sucks and maybe holds this back but I really like this skill and the balance you are seeing for DPS in this skill tree.”
All Glory to the Master
Sniper: :star:
Cryo: :star:
Coop: :star: :star: :star: :star:
Killing an enemy who was first damaged by your servant converts one stack of Valet into one stack of Glory. You and your servant gain increased critical hit damage for each stack of Glory you have. Max stacks: 250.
• [color=lime]1/1 Master critical hit damage +0.4%, Servant critical hit damage +0.2% per stack[/color]
• [color=lime]At 25 stacks +10% Master critical hit damage, +5% Servant critical hit damage[/color]
• [color=lime]At 250 stacks +100% Master critical hit damage, +50% Servant critical hit damage[/color]
@Derch: “This is either great or outstanding. When your servant shoots an enemy first and you kill them you convert a valet stack to one of these and these boost crits. At 250 stacks its 100% crit damage for you and 50% for your servant. This can take a bit to stack so its not often I get past 150 stacks of this before we call it a session but even 100 stacks gives you 40%/20% and for one point thats amazing. Look at your 5/5 skills and just take one point and you get around 6% crit damage for only you. “
@Ha_Na: “This really depends on whether your servant keep up with collecting valet stacks. If the servant is heavily underleveled or mal-equipped, you won’t be getting too much of these. As such, this skill too situational to be considered generally good, although it’s very promising on paper.”
Keep Your Chin Up
Sniper: :star:
Cryo: :star:
Coop: :star: :star: :star: :star:
While bound by a contract wherein you are the Master, kills made by either party by your contract restore health to the second party.
• [color=lime]5/5 Restores 9.5% of other party’s max health[/color]
• [color=cyan]9/5 Restores 17.1% of other party’s max health[/color]
@Derch: “This is yet another really really good skill. At 5/5 anytime you or your servant get a kill you heal the other one for 9.5% of their total health. While thats not a huge number you rack up kills easily in this game and can keep each other quite healthy, your servant more so because at this point you should also be healing their shield for 55% on kill as well. The other 2 nice things about this, there is no range limitation and since its based on max health it work with health stacking. Now if you boost this by a com, then you are looking at around 20% and then it really adds up quickly.”
Podsnappery
Sniper: :star: :star:
Cryo: :star: :star:
Coop: :star: :star:
Improves shield recharge delay and fire rate with all gun types. The lower your health is, the greater your bonuses.
• [color=lime]5/5 Shield recharge delay and Fire rate both max 35%[/color]
• [color=cyan]9/5 Shield recharge delay and Fire rate both max 63%[/color]
@Derch: “I don’t care for this, generally skills that boost depending on how low your health is need some pretty big buffs to make it worth it. The boosts are very good and shield recharge delay -35% at 5/5 is great, even more so for survival but I again just don’t generally like these and the tree is full of really good skills. More fire rate again is great but not at the cost of low health.”
Save the Queen
Sniper: :star:
Cryo: :star:
Coop: :star: :star: :star:
When an enemy melee attacks you, they become marked with Save the Queen. If your servant damages a marked enemy, that enemy suffers cryo damage and the mark is consumed.
• [color=lime]5/5 Rank 5 Save the Queen damage[/color]
• [color=cyan]9/5 Rank 9 Save the Queen damage[/color]
@Derch: “If you get hit by melee then that enemy is marked for your servant and now he/she adds cryo to their shot. I don’t know yet how the damage is because I haven’t used this yet. While a lot of it is like Excellent Shot which I think is outstanding but to set up an enemy you have to be hit with melee. That is my issue, Aurelia isn’t a melee range fighter to start with, next she freezes enemies like crazy so she shouldn’t be hit by melee, and lastly you should be able to avoid getting hit by melee most of the time anyways. If something else triggered this it could be amazing but as it stands I don’t care for it.”
A Backhand to Remember
Sniper: :star:
Cryo: :star: :star: :star: :star:
Coop: :star: :star: :star: :star:
Backhanded enemies are knocked back and suffer cryo damage. Backhanding increases movement speed and reload speed for a short time. This skill is NOT boosted by roid shields.
• [color=lime]Movement speed +20%, Reload speed +20%[/color]
@Derch: “I’m not sure what I think of this yet, at first look it seems like her weakest capstone and since tier 5 is kinda weak this might be a good third tree to just get down halfway on. The cryo and knockback on melee is nice but like I said above she isn’t a melee range character and she has a ton of ways to freeze. If the buffs were more than movement speed and reload speed it would be more tempting but to get into melee range to activate this might not always be worth it.”
@Ha_Na: “Yeah that’s right. Best skill to go with the cryo tree. Why? Cryo boosts melee damage by 350% and crit by 200%. Slapping frozen enemies in the face triggers both boosts, which is huge. At lvl 60 and maxed Avalanche/Frostbite and straight Cryo damage, I’ve been hitting close to 1600k backhands without a bladed gun.
While the slap is not spectacular on its own, it can oneshot most trashmobs when frozen and take huge chunks off Badasses. At boss fights, it’s rather unuseful for its damage, but nice to have for its boosts.”
[color=white]Other[/color]
Official skill calculator 442: Plan your build! (some of the numbers are off in the unofficial skill calculator)
Skill calculator 442: Share your build!
This thread is part of the Dear Doctor Dumbass series.