@@sjkdsfsdf52 yeah, even against the DLC final boss you can reapply it atleast once (when he does the giant pillar of light). My first victory was just like that. I think on the others you can do the same during the phase transitions. But i'll always think Bloodflame Blade is best with weapons that already have bleed or else you run too much with this issue. Imo weapon buffs should all be as fast as Blackflame blade, that thing is like using string grease.
i love that you optimze the same way i do. stats/weapons/infuisons/talismans/spells optimized for the best numbers, but armor HAS to be optimized for the drip
The alternate version of the banished knights armor keeps the cloak and the bear claws. The fashion works really well too since there's fur on the armor aswell.
Patch 1.13 has buffed Red Bear Hunt's Damage by around 10% and also grants it 400 Hyper Armor (refreshing per stage)! This really helps on the bosses that you can't spam savage claws well on!
This helped me optimise my light roll beast claw build. I was running 60 arcane and 27 faith with Beast Claws set to occult, and whilst I was doing okay, the damage output was lacking. Swapping to heavy infusion and respecing to 80 strength with 10 faith and 12 arcane for Bloodflame Blade and Beastial Vitality helped a lot! It's a shame I am not using my incantations anymore, but that's hardly an issue and can correct that when I go into NG+. And as for the buffs, there are now a golden vow consumables and well pickled turtle necks to get the buffs I need. Thank you again!
I really like this build. I made a new character, and got through to the DLC using a Spiked Club and shield. I took faith to 15 for Flame Grant Me Strength, and Arcane to 12 so I could cast Rotten Breath. It also gave me access to all the bestial incantations for role play value. I mostly kept Wild Strikes on the Spiked Club, because it is fantastic, but if I needed to, Cragblade Fire Infused helped a lot vs high poise targets. If the target was bleed immune, but other element vulnerable, the greases usually helped me out. Same stats as your first option, except only 20 mind and 24 End. A fantastic guide, thanks very much!
I LOVED this type of video!! Finally someone talking about builds outside of incredibly arbitrary ways!!! I fell in love with the death knights longhaft axe, could you do a build analysis on that? Im very on the fence on how to build it and suck at numbers
That one is really dope bro! Not sure if you figured out the build but I’d have 25 faith for golden vow plus FGMS, then pump str as much as possible, since that’s the main dmg driver. Shard of Alexander and axe talisman, and lighting tear are some things I’d add in aswell.
I just finished the DLC with a consecutive attack build (Str/Arc Dual twin-blades), and it really helps to flinch larger enemies. I can't wait to get more time with claws. Thanks for another great video!
You sir, are a blessing. Thank you for you constant treasures of information that you are giving us! This was very informative!!!! Any chance you can give us some delicious math for a level 150 int faith hybrid build in the near future???
I'm planning to make a Bear themed character using the bear roar and the beast incantations so this comes really handy, thanks for it! Still making way with my great shield build through the DLC, and I'm loving the Messmer soldiers spear, hope to see more of your build for when I make it to the end of this journey.
This made me want to pick back up the STR character I abandoned in Liurnia. Any chance for a video on Poleblade of the Bud? It seems to be a very polarizing weapon with people wanting desperately to make such a cool weapon work, but struggling to work around its flaws and fit it into a build that lets it shine.
If I may make a request: Could you do an info dive on Velvet Sword of St. Trina and optimizing sleep with/without weapons? I'm trying to make a St. Trina build but it feels lack luster and I feel lost in the execution/scaling. Especially since the Eternal Sleep pots scale with Arcane but both St. Trina swords scale with INT and Dex. I want to be the deep purple baddy like I've dreamed of. 😔
Im running a heavier faith investment to do a str/bloodflame+madness hybrid build. Using black dumpling,madness exult,madding hand,howl+ golden vow for 77%+15% dmg and a buff cycle that isnt completely absurd. Rotten sword,lord of blood, shard of alex for the other talis. Most bosses fall within 3 casts of savage claws. If i wanted to get really loopy i could run commanders standard/jellyfish but by that point im not having fun anymore lol. I also have frenzied burst and unendurable frenzy for such situations as call for them,im really enjoying this playthrough. If i could get gud enough I think this could be strong status centric pvp build that nonetheless has potential for very high dps.
wonder if the bear claws are worth still using at higher levels where the beast claws can go quality, sicne they cant get infused dont the beast claws beat the bear ones for raw damage as well? also for fashion, if not using the bear claws the Blaidd set works really well (though tend to use fire prelate gauntlets for the extra defenses and poise, they go so well with the set that they look like they are part of it), you just are a werewolf instead of a bear-man (and goes well with Blaiss, he is fairly acrobatic as well after all)
did you test/double check the 2% damage taken increase from rakshasa set? from my testing it doesnt actually increase damage taken, i think the flavour text is just talking about the low damage resitances.
I really appreciate how in-depth you go into these guides. I do have a somewhat specific request for whenever you get around to analyzing the Great Katana; When Cold infused, it appears to favor DEX/INT for scaling instead of STR. I often hear you mention that Cold infusions can work in place of Magic infusions when taking into account the frostbite, but I'm wondering if that would still be the case at 70 INT/40 STR/20 DEX, or would I be better off just going for max damage on Magic infusion?
Damnit i just made an arcane set up with it too lol. I was also making a build using the new anceint ore greatsword, probably gonna slap it on there. From what i remember bloodflame has no scaling for the bleed build up and the scaling for the fire damage is pretty negligible, so i shouldnt have to invest faith much. Also for a talisman i would still reccomend the communion seal purely for low investment and 0 weight
I do agree---bloodflame blade will end up with a lot more bleed buildup than occult infusion. However, outside of boss fights or major encounters, it can get very expensive to maintain.
Using the blessed blue dew talisman makes stuff like weapon buffs or bestial vitality practically free while exploring. It's well worth the talisman slot outside of boss fights imo.
I went with occult because I don't want to keep spamming buffs on trash mobs, and always having good bleed build up is nice.This way I just bust few buffs before the boss fight and never rebuff them because most bosses die fast enough or I am too lazy :D
If you hit someone twice with bloodflame at the same time would that result in 40 or 80 build up? I was under the impression that multiple hits would refresh the duration of the effect rather than adding additional instances of the effect to the target.
@@ChrighttI just notice something while using this build, if attacking with the charge attack you press the run button also he does a jump backwards that evade attacks that hit on the ground
Curious how this setup works using the vampire crystal tear + Malenia’s GR. Throw in some Bestial Vitality and see how far you can push the unrelenting beast motif.
I loved all the beast claws stuff. Dryleaf arts next maybe? I’d love to see your take on the new poison stuff and the poison flower blooms twice. I imagine venomous fangs is the best pick for it but I really dig the idea of poison dryleaf.
Poison Flower is absolutely bonkers on the Antspur Rapier more than anything else I've seen, but Dane's Footwork is the way if you want Poison Flower Dryleaf. At the point in the game where you're playing the DLC, you don't really care about the poison damage over time and just want to proc and detonate as much as you can before resistance curves go too high. So. Poison Dane's with Dryleaf Whirlwind (this is important; multihit status buildup is insane on Dryleaf Whirlwind, and... Not, on Palm Blast), Kindred Exultation, Shattered Stone (this is why you pick Dane over base Dryleaf Arts; every kick move passively gains the talisman buff, and Poison Flower's main strike is also a kick), and your choice from Dragoncrest Greatshield, Rotten Winged Sword/Prosthesis, Godskin Cloth, Alexander... The usual stuff for fast, rapid-hitting weapons. I'd suggest keeping the Poison Hand in your offhand while using this. The bonus stacks with Kindred and applies even when you're powerstancing Dane. You can also just toss on Dryleaf Arts in your second right-hand slot as a backup weapon with Bleed or Cold if you want to use the defense debuff on cold or have a backup in case you run out of poison procs. And a weightless seal in the second offhand slot to cast usual stuff like Bestial Vitality or Golden Vow if you have enough stats. Dragon Communion should work fine since you'd be running Arcane for status.
@@FelisImpurrator that all sounds awesome I can’t wait to get to it in the dlc. I forgot the rot poker because I really dislike rapiers but yeah I don’t doubt it’d be incredible for this setup. I’ll stick to martial arts or venomous fangs for it. We drop kicking god this time around.
Any thoughts on the Thrusting Shields? I actually did a build for the Carian one with a Standard affinity for once just to keep the Guard Boost from tanking.
Syrobe mentioned it in his latest video and I tried it on his advice. Unbelievably busted weapon. It has guard points on most of its attacks, it can shield poke and guard counter natively, and more importantly it has some nutty interactions with buffs and greases. Scholar's Armament and Spinning Weapon can make it a blender of death. Blood Tax can give it infinite sustain. Scholar's Shield works and significantly improves its guard boost by such an enormous margin (and it's a flat value, anyway) that throwing it on literally any staff is worth doing even on a min-Int build if you just want unbreakable shield poke tanking. Who needs guard boost from Standard when you can just buff your shield way past that and use it as an infused status machine anyway?
Thrusting shields are quite OP as shields are extremely good. It's basically like doing shieldpokes with one weapon. The Carian thrusting shield is better and you definitely want to buff your shield.
I went with the buffable version. With 30 Faith and 13 Intelligence you get Golden Vow, Bloodflame Blade, Electrify Armament, Order's Blade and greater resistance buffs against all damage types. The idea is to have a build that can specialize against specific opponents. Counter its strenght and exploit its weakness. I've been usually buffing only against tougher enemies or bosses and using Old Lord's Talisman for buffs to last longer. I could still offer to spend 56 points into Strenght. It's not as good against prolonged boss fights but overall it performed quite well. I also tried to experiment with the counter block tear, since beast claw does nice 4-hit counter attack, but I wasn't very good with the timing. Still I thought it's worth mentioning.
I don't think the other damage buffs are worth running for the build cause they're greatly nerfed on savage claws. Even with more faith they won't outperform bloodflame blade or red bear's.
@@Chrightt At least Order's Blade makes a huge difference against undead, but I suppose you can use holy grease instead. Newly introduced greases actually adds an extra 120 damage of respective damage type which is almost as much as magic buffs with 25 faith with 2 finger seal. So the motion value applies to damage of buffs as well or where the nerf is coming from? Either way I'm definitely going to give a shot to more comfortable version you've suggested. I'm not entirely sure, but 60 damage negation magic buffs could probably be replaced with consumables as well or I just end up with lesser versions. Anyway playing with the beast claw is great fun. :) Thanks for clarifying all the hidden mechanics!
I’m loving cold beast claws rn with various ashes. Seems to hit very hard with 54st, 20int, 20dex. Of course I’m not optimizing only for that weapon but, very nice either way.
Playing at level 502 to brute force build variety, I figure I can just toss on Quality or something with the normal beast claws if I try this. It should be fun running with the whole beast incantation set, and at this level I figure I can force the bear head to be viable. Red Bear drip is immaculate though. Praise the comments (hah, now that's a rare sentence on RU-vid) for listing off armor sets that are great with the bear head.
A guide explaining euphoria and how its aow works whether it powers up with hits or damage and how it works when in you off hand. The buildup feels random to me and I don’t have your patience and numbers mindedness to test it
I would do a blood infusion with rwst lord of blood Millicent's prosthesis and shard of Alexander but for bosses immune to bleed use a poison set with kindred of rot exultation instead
Hey, do you know where I can find information on NG+ status resistances? I'm on NG+7 and finished up the DLC, wondering what the final boss' bleed resistance is at that NG+ cycle. I don't think it's on the Fextralife Wiki.
Thank you very much for the build! My only question: I know seals aren't a big part of this, but why not Clawmark seal if the build is already heavy strength with low faith? It'd be on theme as well anyway.
only faith scaling affects the faith buff of bloodflame blade (the amount of attack you're getting). Since I'm not casting any offensive incantations, clawmark is pretty irrelevant. Also, you end up with mediocre spell power even with clawmark (as it is already a lower spell power seal that isn't even optimized for here) so I would not suggest tagging on offensive incantations.
Question: does the new crystal tear that restores HP on hit stack with the swaddling cloth and/or Malenia's rune? Haven't had the chance of trying it out, but it looks like it'd be a good pairing with an aggressive build such as this 0_0
@@Chrightt oof that's rough, I hoped it was gonna last a bit longer. Might workout well for some bosses, or critical situations where you have to deal with lots of enemies without resources on your end, but it still doesn't sound great. Maybe could be of use against some bosses, but I doubt it'll be useful without a tiny buff 0_0'
I wonder, just to fit the theme... Would bestial incantations and the claw seal pair well with the build for Ranged options? I never know if the seal is worth running even at low faith.
Can't infuse that either. You get the same blood buildup for less AR versus bloodflame blade because the entire blood infusion gets reduced by 40% thanks to status MV.
How far behind would a Lightning Beast Claws build be? I'm guessing it's slightly better than Keen/Heavy before weapon buffs, but can't use Bloodflame Blade.
Chrightt gets it. The fashion is equally as important as effectiveness. I can't stand that white mask, don't care if I'm running elenora pole blade right now. Il never use it!
so does that mean occult infusion is better on higher motion values weapons aka unga-bunga weapons? so overall str-arcane build is actually better than dex-arcane?
Chrightt, does Rakshasa armor really gives you damage increase taken debuff? I tested attacks with exact same damage negation numbers and damage taken was the same wearing full set vs not wearing any of Rakshasa pieces. I think it just has way less damage negation than other equipment of its class.
Honestly, I think 89 looks plenty fine right now. But some DLC weapons are bugged atm as they forgot the PVP poise multiplier. I'm basically waiting for them to (hopefully) update it next patch before doing poise breakpoints.
Weapon Buffs and Heals only benefit from the Faith portion of your Incant scaling. In this case it's not really relevant since Bloodflame Blade's Fire damage buff is fairly weak and the Bleed DOT doesn't scale at all while regen spells like Bestial Vitality don't scale at all, but the Clawmark Seal would be even lower scaling unless you're using other, offensive Incantations as well.
If I can’t get my hands on rotten wing sword(gave milicent’s prosthesis to a friend) will the regular wing sword be worth using or should I just use a complete different talisman
