Nisha – Skill Guide

Hi everyone and welcome to my skill guide for Nisha
In this guide, I will try to provide general guideline in choosing skills to help you kick as much ass as possible.

Note that this is a simplified guide meant to give, at a glance, a rough idea of what our favorite cowgirl is all about, and to help bring the best out of her.
Which means that if I say a skill sucks, it’s because it sucks in general and might be a very good choice in some specialized builds. Likewise, some great skills will be bad choices in other builds. Please use common sense.

It goes without saying that this guide should be used alongside the Top gear for Nisha thread, and the Nisha skill builder 2.3k

Sometimes I will give a skill two different ratings. this is because it’s performance will change depending on the gear you use or the other skills around.

I will use the simple color coded rating system I used when making my previous guides:
Poor : These skill are sub-par, only spec in it to get further down the tree, and only if there are no better options for you.
Average : Can help, not bad choices for going down trees.
Good : Good skills are worth specing into, they will help without necessarily being the focus of your playstyle. Definitively worth taking.
Outstanding : Skills of this rating will be gamechangers and should be taken by almost everyone.

##Law Average
Shield Capacity: +4% per rank
Melee Damage: +4% per rank
Not much to say really, it’s mandatory if you want to go down that tree anyway

##Order Outstanding
Stack added upon taking 15% of health as damage
Heal Chance: +1.2% per stack to heal double damage taken
Maximum Stacks: 10
The one-point wonder. This skill taken alone is ok, but once you get the other one-pointers that increase your maximum number of stacks, you can truly begin to take the hits. Nisha’s main survival tool.
This is also the fuel for many L&O skills like Rarin’ to go or Discipline. A must have.

##The Third Degree Good
stacks added on showdown ending and Kills
Melee Damage: +20% per stack per rank
Max stacks: 5
Once you have 5 stacks, there isn’t much that will survive, especially if the target is frozen. Not exactly a good base for a melee build, but for a hybrid build, it’s awesome.

##Rough Rider Good
slam damage: +25%
+2 Order stacks per enemy damaged by slam
+5 max Order stacks
Adds 5 additional stacks to your max, you should take this even if you don’t slam much.

##Wanted Poor
Stacks added when enemy damages you
Damage Level based on rank
Max wanted stacks per enemy: 5
The damage from this is static, and anything will trigger it: bullets grenades, slams, Dots…
The equation is: (3.2*1.1^Level) * (# of Stars) * (Rank) = Total Damage.
Not terribly efficient, but you can’t do better if you don’t have melee elements in your build. Produces decent numbers if boosted with a class mod… If you are using guns exclusively, you will want this instead of third degree, but don’t expect anything out of it.

##Discipline Outstanding
Upon getting 10 order stacks: full shield
When Order stacks = 10+:
Melee Damage: +1.5% per stack
Gun Damage: +1.0% per stack
Shield Recharge Delay: -1.5% per stack
Max Order stacks: +5
Yet another +5 to your order stack cap, which should be reason enough to take this, but it also refills your shield once per engagement, boosts your melee damage, boosts your gun damage and quickens your shield…all for ONE point. Melee-exclusive builds should avoid this if they use Roid shields though.

##Due Process Poor
After melee attack:
Gun Damage: +5% per rank
Hybrid builds will like this, others will not. the damage boost isn’t sizable enough to deserve a better rating.

##Blood of the Guilty Good
Health restored on kill: 5%
Max order stacks: +5
More order stack, and health on kills? what’s not to like ?

##Jurisdiction Good
during showdown:
Regenerates 0.8% of your Max Health / sec per rank
Movement Speed: +4% per rank
The movement speed is nice, the regen is ok. This has it’s place in tank builds, or to go down the tree to reach rarin’ to go, and it’s better than it’s neighbor.

##No Pain, No Gain Poor
Gun Damage: Up to 10% per rank (depending on how low your health is)
Keeping your health high should be a priority, so this is counterproductive. Helps you get out of FFYL though, so it’s not completely useless.

##Rarin’ To Go Good
Kill skill
Reload Speed: +2% per Order stack
Gun Damage: +2% per Order stack
Rarin’ to go is a potent kill skill that boosts both reload speed and gun damage based on how many order stacks the player currently has. At 30 stacks, 5/5 of this skill equals a hefty +60% bonus to both reload speed and gun damage. This gun damage comes in addition to the gun damage per stack already provided by discipline for a total of +90% gun damage with max order. This skill turns order stacks into a powerful offensive asset on top of their already powerful defensive adds, and is a must have for any L&O build. It does require substantial investment in the L&O tree though, so you might be missing out on other goodies for it.

##Thunder Crackdown Good
Melee override
Cooldown: 15 seconds
Melee Damage: +25% per Order stack as Shock Damage
Max Order stacks: +5
Coupled with Third degree, this has the potential to kill bosses in one strike. Can kill multiple mobs in one hit… this along with third degree makes hybrid melee builds not only viable, but devastating.

##Saddle Up Average
Kill skill
Movement Speed: +4% per rank
Gun Damage: +5% per rank
Perhaps this skill is doomed to live under the shadow of its neighbor ruthless, but that doesn’t mean the skill is bad. Both the attributes it boosts can come in handy after a kill, giving you more movement speed to overrun the next target, and a gun damage boost to play with along the way. Ironically, the skill also compliments ruthless if the player finds they need to re-position in order to get another kill in the middle of showdown.

##Ruthless Good
Showdown Duration: +0.1 second per kill per rank
Showdown is awesome, so more showdown is more awesome. Works especially well with High Noon.

##Magnificent Six Poor or Good depending on weapon
on the last 6 bullets of a magazine:
Gun Damage: +6% per rank (only works on non-elemental weapons)
with guns like lasers or SMGs, this is completely useless. But with Jakobs shotguns and pistols, this is simply free damage on almost every shot. Nota that if you have 2 pistols, you’ll get the damage boost on 12 bullets instead of 6.

##Bottled Courage Average
Showdown restores 10% of Shields per rank
during cooldown:
Shield Recharge Rate: +7% per rank
Shield Recharge Delay: -7% per rank
A bit of survival in a tree mainly concerned with unloading ammo. The instant shield can save you from a burn DoT in a pinch. And when boosted to 10/5, it completely fills your shield, resetting novas and Amp.

##Short Fused Average
Up to +35% Weapon Damage as Explosive Damage
depending on how close target is.
Ugh… this skill doesn’t really do what’s advertised. you’ll never get 35% unless you’re literally INSIDE your target, and the numbers drop off quickly from there. Not very good from farther than shotgun range. Still, it’s just one point. Note that frozen targets take triple damage from explosive,

##Faster ‘n You Good
Kill skill
Reload Speed: +7% per rank
Weapon Swap Speed: +7% per rank
Fire Rate: +7% per rank
This can transform Nisha into Salvador when fire rate is concerned. and the reload speed is also most welcome.

##Pickpocket Poor
Cooldown: (unknown)
Melee attack steals up to 6 bullets and loads them in your gun
If you are within melee range…and 6 bullets is a good number when compared to your mag size…and your gun reloads slower than the melee animation…this MIGHT have some use. Otherwise it’s just bad. If you have a hybrid build where you were gonna melee anyway and you are also down the FTH tree for some reason, you might spend a point there… otherwise, it’s a waste.

##Gunslinger Poor
When showdown begins or ends:
Up to 1 ammo added per rank
Skip this. 5 points for a partial reload that doesn’t trigger reload-related skills ? no thanks.

##Hell’s Comin’ With Me! Good
Extra Shot Chance: +9% per rank
Two fangs’s little brother. This is the only way to increase Jakobs guns’ fire rate without getting cybernetic finger implants. a must have for all those Maggie builds

##High Noon Good
During showdown:
Gun Damage: +3% per sec per rank
Looks like the holy grail on paper, but if you have a showdown that has lasted long enough for the bonus to start to matter, it means you have already killed a lot of things… so you didn’t need it… and everything is probably dead already anyway. Still, it’s a very easy bonus to activate, it’s not dependent on kills (by itself I mean) and it can get very powerful when boosted by a COM and/or after a few kills.

##One For Each of Ya Outstanding
Dual wield Pistols
On automatic pistols: twice the mag size and twice the fire rate
On Jakobs pistols: twice the mag size and almost erases reload time completely
for a single point …’nuf said.

##Snap Shot Poor
When hip-firing:
Accuracy: +7%
Recoil Reduction: +5%
Nisha hip shooters are usually relying on Trick shot and Tombstone, so an increased accuracy or a reduction of recoil is not necessary. For the others, the bonus is rather small.

##Bona Fide Grit Average
Kill skill
Health Regeneration +0.4% per rank per second
Critical Hit Damage +7% per rank
The health regen is nice, but the crit bonus is what makes this skill good. and as a choice for going down the tree, it’s better than snap shot. Currently bugged: it boosts crit damage by twice the listed amount (so 70% at 5/5)

##Quick Shot Good
After reloading:
Gun Damage: +6% per rank
Fire Rate: +7% per rank
Hip shooters will love this, and it’s pretty easy to trigger.

##Unchained Outstanding
Fire Rate: 1% per stack per rank
Max Stacks: 21
I don’t get why people are not raving about that skill. There is nothing in the whole Borderlands franchise that can give you that much fire rate (210% at 10/5 ? sign me up!) And the best things? 1: Once it’s stacked, it’s constant…not reliant on kills or anything else. and 2: If you are using pure splash weapons (like Torgue-Barreled ARs, Rocket Launchers or things like the Boomacorn) you can bypass the “once per second” limit and stack up to 21 in a few seconds (you can then switch guns of course). Needless to say that it’s one of the best skills you can have when facing a boss.

##Fistful of Bullets Average to Outstanding depending on gear
Mag size +3
The power of this skill straddles two extremes. With the right guns this skill can be completely game-changing. It can as much as quadruple a guns ammo capacity (like on the Luck Canon), however, the bigger the clip, the less significant the skill becomes. Even with guns carrying up to 10 rounds, the skill is providing a 30% bonus to capacity for 1 point. 30 rounds? that’s still 10% more ammo, more then most +capacity skills provide, point-for-point.

##Crack Shot Good
On first shot in a magazine:
Gun Damage: +10%
If this kills the target, releases explosion nova
Boom! headshot! The explosive nova is cool and all, but the real benefit is making Snipers and jakobs shotguns really efficient

##Impatience Good
Stack added on kill
reload speed: +20% per stack
Max stacks: 21
It’s a single point, so even with short mag weapons like Jakobs shotguns it’s still worth it.
On weapons with a larger mag where you could accumulate many kills within a single mag, it’s a no-brainer.
Note that it activates on any kind of kills: grenades, melee, slams… get that RL reloaded pretty quick

##Hot Lead Average, Outstanding With Tombstone
On critical hit:
Adds 5% of Gun Damage as Incendiary damage per second per rank
This skill adds fire damage to non-elemental guns, and that damage is multiplicative (a good thing) with every other gun damage boost you have. It creates an initial “spark” that then creates an incendiary DoT. The extra damage is per second, based on the NON-CRIT damage of your gun. (so crit damage boosts don’t affect it) Additionally, if you have Tombstone active when you get a crit, the spark can also crit, creating another spark…that can also crit…and so on in a chain reaction that can go as long as tombstone procs. An explosion from Short fused that crit can also trigger Hot lead.
A MUST have for Jakobs builds.

##Trick Shot Good
Bullet Ricochet Chance: 8% per rank
Ricocheted Bullet Damage: -20%
Who needs aiming ?
With a few points, this is a useful tool to recuperate a few stray bullets and to kill something behind cover. With full points and a COM boost, it negates the need to even point the gun at enemies altogether. Combos VERY well with it’s neighbor Tombstone. The very definition of “spray and pray”
Currently bugged: The bullet damage is actually not reduced by 20%.

##Tombstone Outstanding
Kill skill
On body shot:
Critical Hit Chance: 6% per rank
This skill… this one skill… makes Nisha a walking apocalypse. Get a COM that boosts it along with trick shot, and you’re looking at a build that can be played with a blindfold.
Important note: Tombstone can make crit things that normally cannot: Rocket launchers, Short fused, Grenades, Hot lead’s spark, butt slams etc…
Hands down Nisha’s best skill.

##The Unforgiven Outstanding
During showdown:
bullets ricochet toward enemies doing 10% gun damage
When showdown ends:
all enemies hit release explosive nova
it clears rooms and has given me more second winds than I can count. if you make it that far down the Riflewoman tree, there are NO REASONS to skip this. When it comes to overlapping hit boxes, the Unforgiven works the same way Bore, chain reaction and Nth degree did in BL2. Derch wrote a terrific guide that explains this interaction in details.