User talk:68.209.145.136/Phase Smack

march

Overview
Gasp! There's no Radiance here! No Phoenix! Imagine that. This build is designed, primarily and above all, to let you run rampant in Phase Walk while still maintaining some gun usability. The basic layout is this - beat your enemies up in PW with the aid of Phase Strike, and keep them under control via Striking and Mind Games when you're outside of it. Also, notice that there's no points in Diva, or Resilience. That's because this isn't a "commando" build like many other melee types. You're going to need to employ guerilla tactics here; a lot of hit-and-running. For those times where it's just not plausible to avoid taking a hit, we have Silent Resolve to potentially save you from a crushing blow. Inner Glow makes an appearance as a nice tech skill - you're going spend a great deal of time in Phase Walk, it's nice to regenerate health while doing so. Hard to Get, Hit & Run and Blackout are in for obvious reasons. We want to stay phased out as long as possible, and then have downtime in-between as limited as possible. But wait! You may be asking - if the point is to stay Phase Walked, why no Radiance? A great deal of the game's enemies are humans, which Shock elemental damage does very little against. Sure, it WOULD add a smidge of extra DPS while phased, but not enough to warrant putting any points into it in favor of something more important. As before-stated, this build is aided by improved gun usability outside of Phase Walk, so High Velocity is a great roster choice. The following layout shows why, exactly, the skills that were chosen were, to clear up any "What in the world?" questions.

Layout
Striking - We'll be doing a lot of melee damage and getting real close to our enemies, so we want to keep them under control as effectively as possible.

Inner Glow - A fairly staple skill in any phase-heavy build, it adds some much-needed regen and survivability in-phase.

Hard to Get - The faster we can get back into Phase Walk, the better. This was an obvious choice.

Mind Games - While Striking may have seemed like enough, we want to make absolutely sure our foes stay dazed. Put that high fire-rate SMG to use.

Silent Resolve - There's no way for even the most apt Siren to dodge every attack out-of-phase. This is here to take some of the edge off of the hits you DO take.

Hit & Run - In addition to the nice melee damage bonus, 4 extra seconds in Phase Walk, while not an eternity, is invaluable to get the full effect from Inner Glow.

Blackout - I know, it's an on-kill skill. But imagine this - if you kill even one enemy with a Phase Blast, combined with Hard to Get, your cooldown is about 14 seconds (or less). Which is a good thing.

High Velocity - Huh? Why is this here? I chose this over something like Quicksilver for the simple fact that, in the end, bullet velocity and extra damage are more of a help than fire rate is here.

Phase Strike - This will one-shot most humans without shields if you can hit them in the head. Anywhere (and anyone) else hurts pretty bad as well.

Conclusion
Overall, this is a good up-close build, and average at gun combat. You'll want a fairly good shield (at least 1200+) to make up for the lack of Diva. I reccommend guns with a very high elemental effect chance, as per Spark being absent from the line-up. HellFires, Volcanoes and Defilers all work great. If you don't want to go the elemental route, I'd suggest guns with a moderate (not too high) fire rate and average-to-high damage, like a Hyperion Bitch for instance. For raw power, just about any Dahl shotgun will serve you well, especially the Bulldog line. If possible, a Desert Bulldog will be your best friend against those tough Badass enemies. For sniper rifles, there's a different story. If you're far enough away from an enemy that you need to be sniping, you want to hit hard and fast. Liquid snipers, particularly a Liquid Penetrator, are priceless in these situations. The fourth weapon slot is really up to your own discretion - use whatever you feel comfortable with. As far as class mods and grenade mods go, it's also really up to you. A good suggestion for this build, however, is a high-level Catalyst mod. The cooldown reduction helps immensely with your Phase Walk downtime, and you'll likely be out-of-phase fewer than 8 or 9 seconds often. For grenade mods (though a lot of people dislike them), I generally go with rain grenades of the Incendiary or Corrosive variety, depending on the enemy.