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Lodestar vs Swordmaster


SaviorSword
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The better PvP male sword user class  

36 members have voted

  1. 1. Lodestar or Swordmaster



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First thin's first. This is my very first topic in Serenes Forest! Glad to be here!

Anywho, I have been tryin' to pick a male sword user on my PvP team. Of all the possible sword male sword user classes, only Lodestar and Swordmaster has really stuck out for me.

The two classes are really similar and I don't understand if Lodestar is truly suppose'd to be superior in nearly every possible way compare'd to Swordmaster with rather minimal drawbacks of bein' a Lodestar instead. Here's the list of pros and cons and ties that each class that I have came up with. I'm lookin' for an endgame sword user, so all my comparisons have been just base'd off the class's max stats.

Swordmaster Pros:

  • +1 Strength, +2 Magic. SLIGHTLY hits harder than Lodestar for any kind of sword.
  • +2 Speed. Unless the foe has a negative max speed mod on a Lodestar/Master Ninja/Fast Class or uses a Steel/Heavy Speed Penalty weapon, then the 2 extra points won't matter much.
  • Higher Critical Rate
  • +2 Resist. That's nice to have but...

Swordmaster Cons:

  • -5 HP. Really puts Swordmaster's physical survivability far below average than other sword users. It's low HP also spoils the +2 Resist Swordmaster has over Lodestar in taking magical hits too.
  • -3 Defense. As if -5 HP wasn't bad enough for physical hits.
  • -3 Skill. 32 Skill is pretty good for a high proc chance for skills, but if another class has a better Skill, then the said other class would have a better chance of procs.
  • -7 Luck. Which causes the followin' statements...
  • Lower Hit Rate. 18% can be quite big in some situations, but with already high Hit Rate, would that matter much if at all?
  • Lower Avoid. It's by 0.5%, but it rounds up to 1%. 1% is nothin' worth cryin' over, but it's still a "con" in a comparison.
  • Lower Dodge. It's by 3.5%, and it rounds up to 4%. It's a bigger difference than the Avoid, but 4% is still nigh negleable.

Neutral:

  • S-Rank sword rank
  • Movement
  • Swords only
  • Non-mount'd
  • No extra unit type (e.g. Dragon/Beast/Flyer/etc.)

Unless I'm missin' anythin' else, I can safely say that Lodestar is a bulkier Swordmaster that might hit negligibly weaker. With such advantages, there shouldn't be much of a reason to choose Swordmaster over Lodestar, right? Any other thoughts would be much appreciate'd!

Edit #1:

Here's some interestin' numbers in regards to defense and such...

http://serenesforest.net/forums/index.php?showtopic=64579&p=4428960

Edit #2:

Here's some more number crunch, but most importantly to take from this is the difference +1 or +2 in damage can make.

http://serenesforest.net/forums/index.php?showtopic=64579&p=4429784

Edited by SaviorSword
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Gotta go with Lodestar. Bulkier, but I'd say the class depends on your strategy. Like Hinata will have a higher defense cap than Ryoma if they were Lodestars. Do you want a tank that will absorb hits so everyone else can attack afterwards or simply like a unit that picks off enemies behind the front lines?

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Nice to meet'cha, but to the topic...

For Pvp, I believe swordmaster is better because the extra strength/magic/speed may help you defeat if needed; whereas the extra dodge is not that great.

Lodestar having more hit can be useful, but quixotic(?) is something and makes both players likely to hit each other. Lodestar also has 5 less crit than swordmaster, in exchange for hit. So more reliable in hitting but less reliable in critting. Sword also has the best hit rate of the first triangle so I find the extra hit not that great sometimes.

PVP is all about killing them b4 they kill you, so I would say Swordmaster wins there and it's not gender lock so it has more options.

Of course it really depends on your build and what character you're using. Heavy skill builds require high skill, so yeah it should be better to go lodestar; yet having more speed means more attack chances which means more chances to proc skills. Due to maximizing characters, people often use those with +7 or +11 base speed or something like that. So if you having a character in swordmaster may push certain units enough to not get doubled or to be able to double.

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Do you want a tank that will absorb hits so everyone else can attack afterwards or simply like a unit that picks off enemies behind the front lines?

So this is the main question that I should ask myself before I pick the class?

Can I assume that the first choice points toward Lodestar? If that's the case, then Lodestar might be my choice.

Question though, what do ya mean by pickin' off foes from behind? Like a class with high Movement that can circle around easy or someone which high enough damage and range to "snipe" a foe? (Kinda sounds like the Sniper class lol.)

Nice to meet'cha, but to the topic...

For Pvp, I believe swordmaster is better because the extra strength/magic/speed may help you defeat if needed; whereas the extra dodge is not that great.

Lodestar having more hit can be useful, but quixotic(?) is something and makes both players likely to hit each other. Lodestar also has 5 less crit than swordmaster, in exchange for hit. So more reliable in hitting but less reliable in critting. Sword also has the best hit rate of the first triangle so I find the extra hit not that great sometimes.

PVP is all about killing them b4 they kill you, so I would say Swordmaster wins there and it's not gender lock so it has more options.

Of course it really depends on your build and what character you're using. Heavy skill builds require high skill, so yeah it should be better to go lodestar; yet having more speed means more attack chances which means more chances to proc skills. Due to maximizing characters, people often use those with +7 or +11 base speed or something like that. So if you having a character in swordmaster may push certain units enough to not get doubled or to be able to double.

So basically, Swordmasters are better offense and Lodestars are better defensive? While at the same time they both play the fast-weak-sword-user goodness trope that we all love?

Edited by SaviorSword
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I'm going to go with Jason on the fact that it rather depends on who you're changing to Lodestar in the first place. Hinata has enough bulk to survive most hits so he'll be fine defending against blows even if he's hit which with this RNG will most likely happen to any unit. You have anyone in mind to give it to since you pretty much only get one Seal for it?

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I have my Corrin to consider to change to. He's Strength Boon and Luck Bane.

He may not be the best, but I'm gonna use him against friends with their Corrins as well.

Since my Corrin's not really made defensively, I might as well go all out on Swordmaster then?

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I have my Corrin to consider to change to. He's Strength Boon and Luck Bane.

He may not be the best, but I'm gonna use him against friends with their Corrins as well.

Since my Corrin's not really made defensively, I might as well go all out on Swordmaster then?

Well you get only one Lodestar class, so it depends if you want Corrin to have it.

If you have another character that can make use of it more than Corrin, then it might be better on them than Corrin.

Battles tend to be quick, base on the ones I see, so bulk might not be the best. Thus go SwordMaster.

If you have rules to regulate what you can and cannot have, then bulk might be good and thus then you go Lodestar.

With Warp+Galeforce, Pvp ain't that fun sometimes.

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Master Ninja

I'd say they're about equal. The rocket-tag nature of PVP means that the extra bulk on the Lodestar is pretty much meaningless while the Swordmaster's higher avoid doesn't have much effect outside of WTA due to Quixotic and Duel weapons

Generally speaking, Lodestar's are more likely to hit (+10 to hit and a higher skill and luck cap) while Swordmaster's hit harder (more strength, more likely to double and higher crit).

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So unless yar name is General, a bit of an overkill statement, fragile bulk around this level is near moot to take into consideration and ya might as well max out any offensive capability?

Anywho, I went ahead and crunch's a few numbers and got these interestin' numbers.

One Punch Physical Kill

Lodestar: 90

Swordmaster: 82

One Magical Kill

Lodestar: 89

Swordmaster: 86

Two Physical Kill

Lodestar: 60

Swordmaster: 55

Two Magical Kill

Lodestar: 59

Swordmaster: 59

A One Punch Kill is the minimal require'd total damage to kill a unit in a single hit. If the foe's total attack (Strength + Weapon Might + Weapon Rank Bonus + etc...) is equal to total defenses (HP + Defense + Weapon Bonus + Skill + etc...), then it will result in a one hit kill if the attack connects.

Since we are just talkin' about just base stats, then it's simply figurin' out what Defense plus HP is.

Now let's be honest here. Even for an unarm'd Swordmaster to be OHKO'd by a physical attack would require MORE THAN a +11 Strength mod with a +7 Silver Axe Berserker to achieve (assume no skills)! That's not a practical scenario at all!

A more practical number would be the Two Hit Kill numbers. Half of 60 is easy to get, but half of 55 is 27.5. Since we can't use decimals, we have to round up. Lastly, ya plug in the now half HP with the defensive-stat-in-question.

I knew Lodestar would come out on top on the physical side nicely, but I wasn't expectin' Swordmaster to tie Lodestar on the magical side!

I guess I'm startin' to lean towards the Swordmaster side. This discussion is still rather interestin'. Thank ya folks for takin' the time to post here! I'd like to see this debate to go out longer if folks are still interest'd. :)

Edited by SaviorSword
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Personally I'd go with Swordmaster. As Phillius said, the rocket-tag nature of PvP makes defenses basically irrelevant... as such, you just want to get your AVO as high as possible, so you want your SPD as high as it can get. In addition, you only get one Lodestar, but you can get a LOT more Swordmasters. There's also the fact that I always give Lodestar to Xander to fix his SPD in the main game, which is suboptimal for PvP.

EDIT: Spelling.

Edited by Nihilon
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Personally I'd go with Swordmaster. As Phillius said, the rocket-tag nature of PvP makes defenses basically irrelevant... as such, you just want to get your AVO as high as possible, so you want your SPD as high as it can get. In addition, you only get one Lodestar, but you can get a LOT more Swordmasters. There's also the fact that I always give Lodestar to Xander to fix his SPD in the main game, which is suboptimal for PvP.

EDIT: Spelling.

Well it's not that it's completely irrelevant, but rather that if you want to make defence work than you have to go all in with it and the only two classes that can reliably pull that off are General and Great Knight, and even then General is the only one that stands a chance of competing with the better classes (Great Knight does make for a good pair-up for a General though). You also need Pavise and Aegis to get the most out of your bulk, so that's Quixotic (+ Hoshidan Utility and Nohrian Trust if possible), making it three skill slots (if you can't get Nohrian Trust) + Wary Fighter, leaving you with one additional skill slot if you're running an optimal defence unit, so you're going to be pressed for skills.

But even if you do get you're 50+ Defence and Resistance Nohrian Trust General on the field, all it takes is one Lethality proc (which can have a minimum activation of 25% if the enemy is running Quixotic + Nohrian Trust) for all that work to be wasted.

tl;dr: Defence isn't irrelevant, it's just very inefficient and dodge-tanking is hardly any better with Duel Weapons, Quixotic and Certain Blow around.

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For pvp, swordmaster is better even though I prefer lodestar. As others have explained, the strength and speed of the swordmaster are huge benefits and can change whether you double or not. Because pvp is based on killing the enemy team in one turn with cheese skills such as galeforce, replicate and warp, swordmaster is just better due to offence.

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If I was crunchin' this many potato chips I'd be over obese by now! Thankfully, it was just numbers that I crunch'd on today.

I only had sword wieldin' class max stats to work with, so I figure'd out their 1HKO, 2HKO, and 3HKO marks for both magic and physical attacks. I'll format what numbers I came up to make it a bit nicer to look at.

PK = Physical Kill

MK = Magical Kill

Class

1PK - 1MK // 2PK - 2MK // 3PK - 3MK

And here... we... GO!

Vanguard and Blacksmith

97 - 92 // 65 - 60 // 54 - 49

Great Knight

102 - 93 // 70 - 61 // 59 - 50

Master of Arms

96 - 93 // 64 - 61 // 53 - 50

Hoshido Noble

91 - 88 // 61 - 58 // 51 - 48

Nohr Noble

89 - 92 // 59 - 62 // 49 - 52

Hero

90 - 87 // 60 - 57 // 50 - 47

Paladin

92 - 92 // 62 - 62 // 52 - 52

Lodestar

90 - 89 // 60 - 59 // 50 - 49

Dread Fighter

84 - 89 // 57 - 62 // 48 - 53

Batman Dark Knight

89 - 85 // 62 - 58 // 53 - 49

Grandmaster

83 - 88 // 56 - 61 // 47 - 52

Swordmaster

82 - 86 // 55 - 59 // 46 - 50

Bow Knight

82 - 87 // 55 - 60 // 46 - 51

Master Ninja

81 - 89 // 54 - 62 // 45 - 53

Which comes to the conclusion is that if yar defensive stat is low, yar gonna be more prone to tickle attacks as oppose'd to a strong-arm attack. Of course ya shouldn't be seein' "tickle" attacks in PvP, but that goes to say that even if ya do find an unfavorable match-up a tickle fight might begin. And here's where the real magic of just +1 or +2 Strength/Magic difference comes into play, the difference between some 2HKO and 3HKO are rather small and such lil' numbers can add up for difference of another one of yar units needs to follow-up and kill a target ya attack'd before.

In short, I once thought that +1 Strength and +2 Magic on Swordmaster was not worth mentionin', but the numbers don't lie!

Edited by SaviorSword
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