51 Riftblade Specs

[50 percent grey]

Hi,

Since I find pure joy in experimenting with builds I tried around with 51 riftblade (click here for fluff/rp-background). Note: this wont ever be the "most DPS in a raid!!11" builds and they are not supposed to be. This post is for those who want to play a 51 riftblade or who want to experiment with riftbladespecs and need a starting point.


Riftblade 51 only (not a spec, just the basics)

What ALL 51 riftblade-builds here have in common is:
- CC via Silence (Windspear), Root (Stonespear), Interrupt (Finisher, Earth Burst), Slow (Finisher, Earth Burst), Gap Closer (Riftwalk)
- either minor selfheal (Blade of Elemental Affinity) or power regeneration (Planar Blade) which can be switched on the run
- solid DPS in melee
- some DPS ranged
- ok AE abilities (Storm Burst, Earth Burst, Fork + Spears, Thunder Strike

the vanilla (= riftblade only skills) single target macro is like this:
#show Flamespear
suppressmacrofailures
cast Rift Strike
cast Frost Strike
cast Freeze Armor (because it gives +20% riftblade fire dmg on target because of improved freeze armor)
(cast flamespear) (switch this in if you dont have power issues because the dmg is nice)
cast Searing Strike
cast Freeze Armor (this will only trigger if the target is not in melee range)
cast Flamespear (this will only trigger if the target is not in melee range)

the vanilla single target finisher is Fiery Burst, Earth Burst if you want to interrupt/slow the target

the vanilla (= riftblade only skills) AE target macro is like this:

the vanilla AE finisher is like this:
#show Storm Burst
suppressmacrofailures
cast Storm Burst
cast Fiery Burst

#show Earth Burst
suppressmacrofailures
cast Earth Burst
cast Storm Burst
cast Fiery Burst

two of those because I like to have Earth Burst when I need it not to spam it. In PvE the second one (with earth burst) is ok, in PvP you want to have Earth Burst available when you need it.

Throw in Rift Storm whenever you feel like it and its up.

You dont need a ranged-spam button (the single target dmg button will fire ranged anyway) but you will need the Windspear and Stonespear on separate buttons for when you need them.

Standard buffs are Avatar of the Rift (switch in Water if you are getting too much dmg or Air if you want some extra speed and no bard or beastmaster can help you out) + Planar Blade (switch in Blade of Elemental Affinity when not in PvP and soloing).

Now some specs


Riftblade/Paladin

1h+shield
I got this from Taugrim, who experimented a lot with riftblades (click here for taugrims site) - thanks for that!

http://rift.incgamers.com/soulbuilder/Build/2082

The Riftblade 51/Paladin 15 is excellent for low rank PvP and "ok" for soloing rifts/elite mobs. The survivability is surprisingly good, the (burst) dmg is, too. You can 1v1 a lot that doesnt get healed too much, AE like crazy and you got the oh Sh** panic button fullheal every 10 minutes.

If you do not like the Cooldown on Light's Hammer put the point in Small Arms Spec.

Remember to use Face Slam for interrupt (in addition to earth burst)

The 3rd class is either the Vindicator (for Break Free) or the Void Knight (for Void, the 5% magic dmg reduce buff)

the single target macro is like this:
#show Flamespear
suppressmacrofailures
cast Retaliation
cast Rift Strike
cast Aggressive Block
cast Frost Strike
cast Searing Strike
cast Flamespear
cast Freeze Armor
cast Shield Throw

You can put in Sweeping Strike, too. The dmg is nice on that one but it crapped up CC too often and draines power so I am currently not using it.

The AE macro is like this:

#show Thunder Strike
suppressmacrofailures
cast Rift Strike
cast Sweeping Strike
cast Thunder Strike
cast Searing Strike
cast Flamespear

Finishers just as in the vanilla riftblade (see above).


Riftblade/Paragon

http://rift.incgamers.com/soulbuilder/Build/2087

dual wielding
This one is for PvE (instances and soloing). Soloing rifts and elite mobs works well if you use the rift crystals and/or have decent equipment.

Remember to use flinching strike for interrupt (in addition to earth burst)

#show Flamespear
suppressmacrofailures
cast Rift Strike
cast Rising Waterfall
cast Frost Strike
cast Freeze Armor
cast Path of the Wind (this to trigger the +%crit for rising waterfall every now and then)
cast Searing Strike
cast Freeze Armor
cast Path of the Wind
cast Flamespear
cast Path of the Raptor

I experimented with Searing Strike <-> Dual Strike for this one but Searing Strike is too much dmg (and gets boosted a lot through the riftblade-tree). My problem was that the synergies didnt work out right. less riftblade and more paragon would be the solution, I guess. But thats kinda off-thread
the macro started getting too long, too.

The AE one like this:

#show Thunder Strike
suppressmacrofailures
cast Thunder Strike
cast Rift Strike
cast Searing Strike

This AE one is kinda gimped, the 15 points paragon just doesnt have an AE spammer. Paragon's advantage would be more ranged (path of the wind, path of the raptor


Riftblade/Champion

http://rift.incgamers.com/soulbuilder/Build/2082

dual wielding or 2hand
The same purpose as the Riftblade/Paragon. I tried this one out because of the next patch (2hand weapons might be better than dual wielding then). But you can dual wield this one, too.

Thunderous Kick, Battlefield Intimidation and Blitz are no must-haves. I like them but you can put those points elsewhere. Just keep in mind that your main dmg is not physical but elemental (riftblade).
Grim Satisfaction is REALLY nice if you have power issues.

Remember to use Bash for interrupt (in addition to earth burst).

Between the paragon and the champ alternatives I like the champ one more. The AE macro actually works and the single target macro isnt crowded. Power issues are quite solved. For now it is better with dual wielding.

the single target macro goes like this:

#show Flamespear
suppressmacrofailures
cast Rift Strike
cast Frost Strike
cast Freeze Armor
cast Inescapable Fury
cast Debilitating Strike
cast Searing Strike
cast Freeze Armor
cast Mark of Inevitability
cast Flamespear


The AE one like this:

#show Thunder Strike
suppressmacrofailures
cast Thunder Strike
cast Rift Strike
cast Mighty Blow


So...
Im working on a spec riftblade+VK and riftblade+reaver now. Im still optimizing the macros but Id like to hear your ideas. If there are enough ppl out here who are interested in riftblade specs, this might lead to the riftblade+vk synergie-build (planar blade + rift summon synergie) for very flexible, cc-heavy PvP, an optimized moreparagon-lessriftblade-build and a revival of the old massfarming reaver+riftblade-builds.

[jargonchipmunk]

I'd like to see heavy riftblade be competitive in pve dps situations. Maybe only because I'm a fan of underdogs. (and I like to see tons of tiny numbers rather than big chunk crits when I DW) I wonder if spotter's (WL) would be a good addition to 51 RB, since you have so darned many tiny hit procs, etc.

[50 percent grey]

the paragon/champion variants are just better at the moment. Dont get me wrong: riftblade dps in 5mans or raid really isnt bad. The riftblade can compete with most rogue- and magebuild, provided the equipment is ~equal.

the class shines because of the additional CC and flexibility. This come to use in randomgroup-instances (when they find out they need someone with silence/interrupts) and pvp, especially open world pvp on pvp-servers.

[MacrosTheBlack]

try removing Freeze Armor from your rotation. Its a no damage/ no attack point skill. I am thinking that the time it would take to cast 5 searing strike(to get your casts worth out of it), Freeze armor would have been recast, and clipped your previous FA. It needs a bit of tweeking, I actually found I lose DPS with this in the rotation by about 5%. Not to mention it does no damage, so no spec procs will happen(another bad effect)

Also. Rift Blade surpasses the Cookie cutter spec in multi mob pulls(trash), on T2s, and certain 10man groups. In my opinion

IT DOES NOT however do near the damage as the Cookie Cutter in boss fights, and most 20man raid groups due to buffs helping para way more than Riftblade.

I was thinking of creating a Thread called "Making it work: 51 Rift Blade", but it would just seem redundant now.

Great Thread, and thanks for posting it.

[50 percent grey]

hrrm. the +20% are on fiery burst as well as searing strike. my thought was that it adds up. that will need some parsing, i guess :.-)

[jargonchipmunk]

hrrm. the +20% are on fiery burst as well as searing strike. my thought was that it adds up. that will need some parsing, i guess :.-)

and flame spear /shrug

[Alxandr]

Our guild has only just started raiding, cleared GP this week in our first real week of guild runs. (so I dunno too much about top teir gear)

I run a 51 RP / 15 champ / 0 Vind. build http://rift.zam.com/en/stc.html?t=0c...0V.EGstdsrGdsR

gearing AP focused in T2 gear with an epic filled source machine, I pull 1k+ dps in raids (900ish self buffed on the dummy) I contend with our para/champ war and sabdancer for first on the parser.

That being said, my take on 51RB dps is that while effective in low teir raids, as you start to push higher dps you'll eventually have to switch spec or fall behind better scaling builds. At lower gear the AP scaling on 51RB is amazing (0.6 dps per ap from my math) but as you get closer to 1500+ dps the weak crit scaling will start to trip you up (firey burst only crits for 50% and elemental touch can not crit)

here's what advice I can give: if you're gonna go 51RB 2h is the best bet DW isn't terrible, but you're losing damage on storm blade, all your special attacks save spear and burst, and needlessly increasing the amount of people you've gotta contend with for gear.

NOTE: all crit numbers are buffed if you can maintain that through bard/archon buffs and Rift Strike

Flame Spear: in a 2h spec this is a ranged only ability, in DW it does about the same as searing (last I checked) so meh.

Freeze Armor: I don't have the crit at present to truely test this with my crit RB spec, but that's the only time I can see it being worth the GDC (and it's not worth anything if you can't keep your energy u).. with the exception of a phase where you have to sit at range, dropping a Freeze Armor on your way back in can be benifical.

ex. Freeze Armor only affects your fire abilities, with a 51 RB spec you're only getting 7 searing strikes, and 8.5 firey burst hits during the 15sec up time(frost and rift strike, + the GCD you're not getting a power point) with a cost of 30 energy, 1 searing strike and 1.5 burst ticks. In theory you'll do more damage as long as you can maintain the energy, but that's not taking into account the possibility of the missed SS and FB being crits. if they both crit you would need to crit on virtually every attack during it's up time to actually gain a damage increase. even if they don't crit you're only getting 2 hits worth of dmg increase on SS and 1 hit worth on FB, and refreshing freeze armor early hurts even more. I've run Freeze Armor a few times and at present I have yet to see it actually increase my dps, I do however believe it could in higher gear and the crit spec below.

StoneShield: probably the most underrated ability in the RB soul, StoneShield works on the majority of boss mechanics. I wouldn't recommend standing through an AoE with it up just to up your dps but it has saved me more times than I can count during midnight xAP runs and such where I'm just not paying attention or standing too far from safety.

Blade spells:

Rift Blade: For all AoE, 5mans or raids if you don't have 30%+ crit and a cheap ability buff (also for boss fights where having endless charges is important), the most important thing for RB dps is maintaining your energy if you ever have to wait on energy your losing more dps than you'd gain from storm blade.

Storm Blade: Single target dps, only when you've got the 30%+ crit to maintain your energy

Blade of Elemental Affinity: Questing etc, any time when you're too impatient to drink or need self heals.

Specs:

I linked my 51 RB / 15 Champ /0 Vind.
build above, that is the dps build I'm using atm however I'll link the other dps builds I've used here and explain a little.

51 RB / 15 VK / o Vind: http://rift.zam.com/en/stc.html?t=0c...0a.EGstdsrGdsR
I used this build prior to 1.3 when Champion's weapon specialization only affected physical, This build will never stand up to a champ build for raw dps, however having the purge did add some nice utility.

29 RB / 27 Champ / 10 Para http://rift.zam.com/en/stc.html?t=0c....Ero0bcbMzs.xx
I believe this to be the best scaling of the RB focused specs, as you're basicly trading crit reduced dps (firey burst and elemental touch) for higher searing strike and crit damage. even in my AP heavy build the dps difference is +-100.

there is some room to play with the talents, for example if you can't maintain energy there's no need for the freeze armor points they can be moved elsewhere, and if you're hitcapped for what you intend to run you can move the cruel effeciency points around.

Macros:
I only use the one main attack macro. (adjusting for the procced attacks depending on spec, add them at the top as they're off the GCD) this is the 51 RB 15 champ macro. For the 29/27/10 build you just remove Rift Strike and add the procced attacks.

#show Searing Strike
suppressmacrofailures
cast Inescapable Fury
cast Rift Strike
cast Frost Strike
cast Searing Strike

well that's my 2cents, any questions or comments lemme know.
~Alx

[Corebot]

What great timing for this thread. I was thinking earlier that I'd try a 2h build that was not a pet class and see if I could hang with the other DPSers

Currently, as a paragon/champ/RB cookiecutter i can pull 1k dps on a dummy with spikes of 1100 with good crit streaks. My main gear is a tank set so dps is offspec for me.

With a 2h (not as good as my 1h's) I was only able to get like ~700 dps. if i had a 44 dps 2h rather than a crappy t2 38dps, maybe that would look better.

I tested 51 rb/para and rb champ, champ won on all counts.

One difference though, I took 5pt take no prisoners for +10% non cp consuming attacks over 10% str. Wonder if that was unwise?

[Seaven]

Slight variation,

I use 51 rift, 13 paragon, and 2 pally.
Aggressive block & 4% in block in paladin (net +14% block) & have ~22% increased weapon dmg from paragon as well as 30% chance to build 2 attack points.

Run this build in tanking essence / sword&board / & high endurance gear. Pretty tough to take down.

[mire`]

been preaching about 51rb since i dinged 50, now p6 with close to full p6 gear, nearly exclusively running 51rb. the flexibility with RB is amazing. any encounter you have ways of putting yourself in a better position than your opponent, even vs a MM.

I choose to run 51rb 15vk, with my high physical crit and points in Ravenous Strength, damage is wonderful plus you have the purge (which can be used in many different ways ;) play around with it, you might figure out how its broken ), mana drain capabilities, anti caster skills (disrupt, etc)

personally after thoroughly playing 51rb, it nearly feels like rb and vk go hand in hand. very fun stuff!

[ChereD]

What great timing for this thread. I was thinking earlier that I'd try a 2h build that was not a pet class and see if I could hang with the other DPSers
...

I tested 51 rb/para and rb champ, champ won on all counts.

One difference though, I took 5pt take no prisoners for +10% non cp consuming attacks over 10% str. Wonder if that was unwise?

They case is that RB has a lot of 1-person CC, with pall combination it also hase lot of CC breaker + vitality. while 2h champ acts like waaaagh with tons of dmg and dies.

[Skullcrush]

been preaching about 51rb since i dinged 50, now p6 with close to full p6 gear, nearly exclusively running 51rb. the flexibility with RB is amazing. any encounter you have ways of putting yourself in a better position than your opponent, even vs a MM.

I choose to run 51rb 15vk, with my high physical crit and points in Ravenous Strength, damage is wonderful plus you have the purge (which can be used in many different ways ;) play around with it, you might figure out how its broken ), mana drain capabilities, anti caster skills (disrupt, etc)

personally after thoroughly playing 51rb, it nearly feels like rb and vk go hand in hand. very fun stuff!

How about a 3x/3x?

http://rift.zam.com/en/stc.html?t=0c...zz.tGc0zsMGzso

[DarkDruidSS]

What great timing for this thread. I was thinking earlier that I'd try a 2h build that was not a pet class and see if I could hang with the other DPSers

Currently, as a paragon/champ/RB cookiecutter i can pull 1k dps on a dummy with spikes of 1100 with good crit streaks. My main gear is a tank set so dps is offspec for me.

With a 2h (not as good as my 1h's) I was only able to get like ~700 dps. if i had a 44 dps 2h rather than a crappy t2 38dps, maybe that would look better.

I tested 51 rb/para and rb champ, champ won on all counts.

One difference though, I took 5pt take no prisoners for +10% non cp consuming attacks over 10% str. Wonder if that was unwise?

This is the build I am running for PvP. Just started it last night after talking to some guildies about it because I was struggling trying to find a 2h build that would take advantage of my Hunter's Pursuit polearm from GSB. It's working amazingly good. I can't wait to try this build out for PvE in a couple days in GSB.

I also took Take No Prisoner's instead of Titan's Strength because while the Str increase is nice you usually pick up strength buffs from others while in a raid. So the 10% more damage on your non-cp consuming attacks is pretty noticable. Avatar of the Rift is a physical dpser's bane in PvP as well.

I will have to see how the VK version performs in PvP as well tonight. Thanks for this thread.

[Corebot]

Managed to pull 1k on world event boss. I actually did more dps with dw than with a 2h most likely because 34+30 dps > 38 dps 2h

Same fight I could prob break 1.2k with paragon dps build

[Delolith]

Managed to pull 1k on world event boss. I actually did more dps with dw than with a 2h most likely because 34+30 dps > 38 dps 2h

Same fight I could prob break 1.2k with paragon dps build

You did more DPS due to autoattack damage of DW compared to 2h with Empowered Strikes.