Hi, thank you for reading my post in advance. I made this tier list as a way for newer players coming into the role of berserker/warlord/warlock. This is primarily my opinion, but do note, I have a lot of experience with 2/3 of those roles. A lot of my time is spent optimizing my builds for PvP and I enjoy being technical with my strategies in PvP. This tier list ranks success that I have seen with players using different fighting styles.
Introduction aside, here is what all rankings mean:
All rankings are relative to each other. It is a zero sum game as when you pick one fighting style over the other, you are accepting all the disadvantages that this might bring. Basic fighting style (not that it won’t be discussed further later) is ranked so low for example because it is fundamentally inferior to almost all other fighting styles; It lacks DOT, exceptional damage, speed, and survivability.
THIS TIER LIST IS NOT COMPARING ANY OF PRESENT RANKINGS TO ANY NON-STRENGTH STAT BUILDS, SUCH AS MAGE OR WARRIOR.
A: Meta Defining. Fighting styles here are apart of the most effective tactic available across the board. You can run these on almost on any fighting style build, and it will be extremely hard to go wrong.
B: Sub-Meta Defining. You are still putting yourself at an advantage, but items in this category are not nearly as effective as the first tier. There is still almost an order of magnitude separating them.
C: Average. Items ranked here are either unremarkable or in a perfect spot. As the game irons out and furthers its balance changes, expect items here to become much more common.
D: Disadvantage. You are actively putting yourself at a disadvantage by primarily using items in this tier. Expect items in this tier to be gimmicky or poorly designed, but that is not always the case.
F: Extreme Disadvantage. Using an item in this tier is the effective arcane odyssey equivalent of blowing off your leg from the knee with a shotgun. You are playing with such a large handicap that you might as well be playing the game on a veritable hard mode. Most people either do not realize the extent of this disadvantage or are using it themselves. These fighting styles need total overhauls or completely new additions to make them viable.
Now onto my ranking explanations. These are still fighting styles, no matter how much I talk them up they won’t be
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A Tier:
- Thermofist has extremely good interactions across the board, it is the highest DPS and fastest fighting style currently attainable. It scales extremely well with attack speed and has led to a sort of sub-culture of fighting style users who rely on airtime and well-aimed shots/uses of axe slash.
- This fighting style is exceptionally good as a primary fighting style and functions well with imbuements due to its added damage over time effect, which is around 7% of the damage dealt on the initial hit. Just 40 intensity is enough to increase the status effect duration by 50%, meaning a single well placed shot on an optimized build can deal over 500 damage over a long range with minimal startup.
- Iron Leg is a high AoE high damage fighting style. It has the highest area of effect out of all fighting styles, and if built properly can effectively make its moves almost as braindead and easy to spam as pulsar, albeit with less damage. It also has high survivability and incredible interactions with warlock/warlord builds, one of the proper meta builds for it being crystal warlock. This fighting style is also notorious for its tankiness, as a resilience focus can easily net you over 1k health when you build into defense.
- Overall, amazing fighting style, equal to or better than thermofist. This fighting style grants the user a lot of options but lacks in approach, which can be made up for by getting attack size armor such as sunken gear.
- Thermofist has extremely good interactions across the board, it is the highest DPS and fastest fighting style currently attainable. It scales extremely well with attack speed and has led to a sort of sub-culture of fighting style users who rely on airtime and well-aimed shots/uses of axe slash.
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B Tier:
- Sailor Style or as some people call it Sailor Fist can be strong on some magics but people will often find it lacking compared to the first two. It deals similar damage for the added seawater mechanic, meaning you will often have to drop what you are doing in a fight just to drink a bottle of seawater. This can range from menial to making you lose a fight depending on how low you are. You are discouraged from using M1’s with this fighting style since they cost almost equal seawater energy to moves for much less DPS output.
- Sailor style gets a B instead of a C ranking for its interactions with warlock specifically. Lightning warlock is able to easily incapacitate most rushdown playstyles and even scale up to iron leg or thermofist in terms of effectiveness. This is only one interaction though and most magics are not nearly as useful as ice, lightning, or snow.
- Sailor Style or as some people call it Sailor Fist can be strong on some magics but people will often find it lacking compared to the first two. It deals similar damage for the added seawater mechanic, meaning you will often have to drop what you are doing in a fight just to drink a bottle of seawater. This can range from menial to making you lose a fight depending on how low you are. You are discouraged from using M1’s with this fighting style since they cost almost equal seawater energy to moves for much less DPS output.
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D Tier:
- Cannonfist has its use as a secondary fighting style, but its ammo mechanic, lack of airstall on the only fighting style it’d be useful on (lol), and poor DPS overall makes it an easy D tier.
- Basic Combat is fine primarily, just is it objectively outclassed by almost every other fighting style in its tier and above it. It deals almost equal damage to thermofist by itself, and far less DPS. It has unremarkable speed, survivability, and attack size as well. If it had its own niche or was more effective as a ‘one-size-fits-all’ fighting style, I would be a lot more forgiving. Its primary use is that it is extremely helpful for getting to max level, since you don’t have to farm mastery to unlock its skills. After that, it falls off harshly.
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F Tier:
- Boxing. This is in my personal opinion almost indisputable. There is absolutely no reason to use this fighting style as is. It is an early game fighting style most players make the mistake of getting and is extremely deceptive in its description as to what it actually does. Its knockback is relative to the TARGET’S level compared to the USER’S level. Fighting an equal level opponent like you might while progressing makes this passive completely worthless. It is a contradiction of rushdown playstyles as well, since you are dealing less damage for more knockback. This is literally the inverse of the tradeoff you make in your technique customization.
- I don’t think that there is more of a disadvantage you can put yourself at in terms of fighting style than boxing. You deal almost 20% less damage than iron leg, almost 30% less than thermofist, have less speed than the latter, and the smallest possible size out of all fighting styles. It is almost impossible to land boxing moves that aren’t overtuned to the point of absurdity, and then they just deal no damage. I mean it when I say this, under no circumstances, ever pick this fighting style. It will make your progression much more tedious and much more difficult for absolutely no reward.
- You lose most of your combo potential on lower level targets, making what is normally fly swatting for other fighting styles into a game of cat and mouse. Your moves become consistently impossible to land in PvP. You have wind’s passive with none of the special magic interactions that make wind good. There is no self synergy for building wind boxing and the passive does not stack. I wish it were not so, but boxing is the heavyweight champ of being garbage.
- I don’t think that there is more of a disadvantage you can put yourself at in terms of fighting style than boxing. You deal almost 20% less damage than iron leg, almost 30% less than thermofist, have less speed than the latter, and the smallest possible size out of all fighting styles. It is almost impossible to land boxing moves that aren’t overtuned to the point of absurdity, and then they just deal no damage. I mean it when I say this, under no circumstances, ever pick this fighting style. It will make your progression much more tedious and much more difficult for absolutely no reward.
- Boxing. This is in my personal opinion almost indisputable. There is absolutely no reason to use this fighting style as is. It is an early game fighting style most players make the mistake of getting and is extremely deceptive in its description as to what it actually does. Its knockback is relative to the TARGET’S level compared to the USER’S level. Fighting an equal level opponent like you might while progressing makes this passive completely worthless. It is a contradiction of rushdown playstyles as well, since you are dealing less damage for more knockback. This is literally the inverse of the tradeoff you make in your technique customization.
Thank you for reading this far, if you have any questions let me know. I don’t think I did the bottom 3 dirty, but maybe someone might be able to change my perspective on that.