Hybrid Scout's (mostly) Untapped Potential

[winter widget]

Little bit of a different post from me. This time, i'd like to discuss some unpolished gems in scout's playstyle, mostly relating to the class' hybrid aspect. But VoidBlast! Ranger exists and it's the hybrid spec! No, it's not! Hunter, too, can become a hybrid spec (and benefit Ranger's playstyle as well) with some skill changes, item additions, and general forethought i'll go over here shortly.

i used the wrong fucking skill for the image

Scout's Hybrid Skill(s)

• Scout's skills are all over the place for a true hybrid scout, i'm afraid. The passive encourages it, but skills like Wind Bomb (without the enhancement), Swiftness (level 2, although it can be switched off) and Sharpshooter (because it is incredibly painful to spend FOUR skill points to enable stacking damage to both sides of a "true hybrid scout") are actively detrimental to the melee side of things.

-# Note, I am referring to a "true hybrid scout" as in both melee and projectile damage are somewhat equal in being output from the player's side of things.

• Scout also has some very powerful active skills that are often brought up, but have gone untouched for a while because scout... really doesn't have anything else to use. A lot of its skills are either fully passive, or are not controlled by them (Hunting Companion). Hunters have the same, or less, actives than some Guardian setups. Sharpshooter and Swift Cuts should be consolidated into a single skill. This encourages SP flexibility, and opens up another skill slot to give Scout another active, and possibly allows the budget of the rest of its skills to be brought down a little.

• But what about ranger, the aforementioned ""hybrid"" spec of scout? Well, it never works out to be a true hybrid. Most of the time, "hybrid" ranger setups are effectively just a Melee Scout using Norvigut Skewer and using the projectile aspect to rip off volleys every once in a while. The weapon is simply too slow in throwing to really achieve a proper hybrid setup, not to mention the lack of ranged skills Ranger has. No, I think the real potential lies in Hunter. Look at Swift Cuts' enhancement;

Tactical Maneuver: -30% Cooldown.
Whirling Blade: +30% Damage and radius.
Predator Strike: -20% Cooldown
Split Arrow: +1 Bounce

Were the proper items to support it in place, a true hybrid scout running Hunter would likely be very potent.

So what about these items then?

Hybrid Scout Items

• A scout running a "true hybrid" build would really need a very peculiar type of weapon. One not overly budgeted to either projectile nor melee, but also have enough on both sides to be worth investing into both. It would also need a firing delay such that it would not be disruptive to your melee combat to mix it between hits. This results in (most likely) a Crossbow, with melee stats, with somewhere around QC2-3. You can store the charge for a reaction shot at the start of your next encounter, and charging up another one to use is not too malignant to what you're already doing while fighting mobs with melee crits. Here's an example I came up with, to replace Shadowstone Ballista (since quickdraw seems to be in decline);

It has everything required for success in a hybrid setup.

• We'd likely also need some charm support. Possibly a Predator Strike charm with huge negative range but a much larger radius, Hypercharged Blade changing the duration of both stacks, etc.

Miscellaneous Closing Statements

• I think a "true hybrid scout" could truly be brought into the light some day, with at least some of the changes mentioned here. Scout will always be the hybrid class, no matter how much people insist on just playing either melee or projectile exclusively. On the topic of skills, I think Pinning Shot could get some melee stuff in it, like applying it's % health damage on the next shot, on the next melee crit as well.

Thanks for reading!

i used the wrong fucking skill for the image

[pulsar dagger]

I think having an actual mixed combat passive skill would be nice; dealing bonus projectile/melee damage on your next attack/ability for previously doing the opposite

[hallow lodge]

I feel like a true hybrid class swapping between melee/projectile weapons within a single encounter is always going to be clunky. You either only use cooldown weapons (snowballs/tridents) or play ranger and put your bows and crossbows onto a cooldown. However no matter what swapping away from a melee weapon and back to it is going to incur an melee cooldown, unless both stats are on the same item, in which (afaik) you have to wait out the projectile cooldown before being able to attack.

I just had this thought and I don't think it really fits on scout without a total rework, but imagine a class that functioned similar to some monster hunter weapons, where between encounters themselves you swap between weapon types:

For example you beat one area with melee attacks which throughout charges a bar, and when full you swap to a projectile playstyle, consuming the bar to deal extra damage/cooler skills. This would allow a mostly 50/50 hybrid playstyle without dealing with the troubles of constant cooldowns hindering the gameplay by vastly spreading out when you swap weapon types.

[winter widget]

this is why i put emphasis on requiring a very peculiar type of weapon

crossbows are the perfect fit

they arent as clunky as melee bows, and they have more enchantments than tridents and can hold their charge

by design a hybrid scout weapon must be one weapon and not swapping between two

because it'd fuck up melee cooldown, fuck up charging for the projectile half and disable reactionary attacks for both sides

thats why theyre so hard to design

that, and TM is probably scared of making Titan Spear 2 lol

[hallow lodge]

I think trying to force scout into a hybrid playstyle isn't viable, and as an explanation to my downvote on 11896, think that it's best if ranger is just kept as "the spec you can play melee on".

I do however agree that it is currently (and always has been) moreso of a parasite taking away a portion of the base skills and 1/3 of the spec skills in order to keep alive a playstyle that the rest of the class is allergic to.

It's obviously absurdly more work, which is why I don't expect it to change, but removing the melee part of melee scout and making scout a purely projectile class, then taking those melee aspects and turning it into a true, from the roots melee/projectile hybrid class (such as the one I thought up above, or otherwise) with mobility involved as well

[winter widget]

i don't think turning scout into a purely projectile class is a good idea

it already has budget sapping away with melee and it's already this strong

[acoustic flame]

hybrid melee/proj doesn't work in the structure of Minecraft and requires a significant amount of overwriting Minecraft's combat system to make into an enjoyable experience. Monumenta doesn't do enough of this so a hybrid would fall flat.

[winter widget]

imagine if it was all projectile skills

[hallow lodge]

Are you arguing for adding melee stats to certain crossbows then? So it's a single weapon? I still think having to manually reload them would be clunky in the current paradigm and you cannot melee while reloading and you must reload to shoot it again

[winter widget]

mostly, yes

nor do i think auto-reloading crossbows should be a thing

[hallow lodge]

I mean that's another issue entirely, it IS this powerful with a parasite leeching half it's skills

[winter widget]

turning it into a projectile purist would make the problem worse

[tulip gust]

i mean a simple gunslinger with slashes and strikes would be cool

[acoustic flame]

I imagine a hybrid working really well if bow charegup/crossbow loading was discarded entirely (quickdraw with varying cooldowns) and melee was given tools to use constantly in melee instead of single use actives that have charges

[tulip gust]

quickdraw but now its a short range melee swipe 🤔

idk

[acoustic flame]

because of how Ranger's skills are set up, you have very little flexibility in application as well

[tulip gust]

hybrid isnt that hard to make imo its just idk how you would make builds work

would u be expected to run full proj % or melee %? or a mix?

[winter widget]

hybrid without new items is just not happening

norvigut barely works and using 2 different weapons is going to pilot like complete ass

[acoustic flame]

for example back during Wynncraft's Silent Expanse update, Assassin and Warrior were not limited by overarching cooldowns which enabled players to define their own playstyle with the abilities.
In Monumenta, your resources are very limited on Ranger and it puts a chokehold on expression through gameplay

[tulip gust]

my vision would be something where u use proj as ur main attack and have a "Slice" bmb style ability that procs off bow melees or something to take down elites

[hallow lodge]

Not if scout's core issues were put into balance and extra skills existed to spread out the power, creating more skill diversity. You could nerf volleys damage if you could also do triple shot burst attack and then rain arrows from the sky

[acoustic flame]

sure you could pop off use a double tact whirling blade on an aerial mob to be cool as fuck but now you are down 2/3 tacts and 1 whirling on a single mob

[winter widget]

why are you continuing to refer to ranger, i was putting emphasis on hunter

well actually under ideal circumstances both would be hybrid but either spec would focus slightly more on either side

[acoustic flame]

I'm bringing it up because that is the current existing melee proj hybrid in the game to compare other mediums to

I use Ranger to describe flaws with the current perspective of the design

[winter widget]

the main problem with hybrid currently, most often is the projectile half always turns out weaker

ranger has zero projectile skills to work off of

so help me god if you say quickdraw

[acoustic flame]

I didn't bring up Hunter because Hunter's only melee skill is a base class ability that only provides a 30% damage buff to your melee hits and nothing else, it is vanilla gameplay that is hardly supported by the spec

sure the enhancement exists but it doesn't do anything with your melee gameplay (or lack thereof)

[winter widget]

i see you also forgot about swift cuts enhancements hunter buffs

much like everyone else did

and me

[acoustic flame]

Pinning Shot AND Split Arrow are required picks which will usually set you back 2-3 spec points at minimum and the value you get for them is impossible to pass up

why would you wet noodle the mobs when you can shoot them with fucking GUN

[hallow lodge]

I'm pretty sure it was said like a week ago that sc(u) only has hunter "buffs" on it so that it isn't explicitly designed for one spec. But if you could name me a single person who takes SC and SC(u) on hunter I would eat a hat, it's nonsensical

[acoustic flame]

this also takes value away from Cuts (U) inherently because it makes one of its buffs trivial as you likely don't even pick the ability that it buffs

[winter widget]

but you're never gonna take pstrike 2 on hybrid, you'll never be far enough away to get a large* benefit out of it

at least you shouldn't be

if you're that far away regularly you should be playing proj scout lol

[acoustic flame]

also with lack of mobility on Hunter, there's no mobility to changeup your engagement besides 20% walkspeed and Jump Boost if you decide to try toggling it

[tulip gust]

i mean a charm that reduces swift cut stacks to 1 and makes them decay slower or something could make sc(u) a viable pick

[acoustic flame]

you walk in as melee OR proj, not both

and since melee is supported WAY less, just drop it

Paladin at its height unironically pulled hybrid off better

most of its tools accomodated melee and range and they all did it equally with very little dropoff in value for deciding to engage in one or the other way

[winter widget]

paladin worked because cleric at its core was sort a hybrid / all in one class

[tulip gust]

hybrid wouldnt even be bad at this very moment if you could just build 1 dmg type and scale off it ngl

[acoustic flame]

Javelin can be an AoE melee nuke or a Projectile beam bonus and marking tool

[winter widget]

illu, dj working on projectiles etc

[acoustic flame]

LI works on any attack (rip)

[winter widget]

i say was due to... certain incidents

[acoustic flame]

you could do HoL for melee focus and/or Illuminate U for projectile/hybrid focus

[hallow lodge]

If there wasn't a damage buff you'd be correct that it'd be terrible on ranger (as the SC damage is your only skill buffing melee directly). But all that would do on hunter is just make you play projectile only hunter, but you can melee once every x seconds to get a long duration cooldown/bounce buff

[acoustic flame]

Paladin's abilities played nicely with melee and proj instead of focusing on one or the other

usually it was indirect too which enabled expression

[winter widget]

we also are missing where i said combine SC and SS into 1 skill

[acoustic flame]

(I AM MALDING WHY DID THEY FUCK THE SHIT OUT OF CLERIC)

anyway

[winter widget]

because even outside of making a hybrid class theres no fucking point to have 2 skills like that lol

[acoustic flame]

if you wanted Hybrid Scout to work, Swift Cuts and Sharpshooter should go together, additionally Quickdraw should try to have a projectile AND melee interaction

imagine melee Quickdraw being a quick sword swipe to cover your attack speed chargeup

[hallow lodge]

That would help, but not because you'd play hybrid with it, but because the new skill would probably be useful and you'd just pick the combo skill and then play either melee or projectile with it

[winter widget]

no shit it'd be useful

no matter what you're playing you still have your stacking dmg bonus lol

[hallow lodge]

Combine swift cuts and sharpshooter then make quickdraw a base class skill and then replace quickdraw with a melee skill :5Head:

[acoustic flame]

if DJ is allowed to buff both melee and projectile equally without conditions then why does Scout pay twice the skill points for conditional buffs

Cleric at its peak went unfathomably hard holy shit

such a good class

[winter widget]

i think Versatile could be changed to add much more of the melee damage % to projectile damage %

it would also help a lot

[acoustic flame]

SC and SS should become one skill AND rework the stack system to function as an interactable resource with the class

imagine the damage bonuses being passive, instead melee/proj grants stacks and your spec skills cost stacks

[winter widget]

SWIFT CUTS HAS RECIEVED A REWORK

LEVEL 1

PERFORMING A MELEE CRITICAL STRIKE

[acoustic flame]

nah not critical let me sit on the ground

but my idea actually would work with the class

[winter widget]

that or just make some actual mixed pieces with proj/melee that'd benefit classes other than scout like cleric

[acoustic flame]

fuck was LI trying to do

[winter widget]

pre incident

[acoustic flame]

imagine Tactical Maneuver costing 2 stacks instead of being a fucking 8 second cooldown

or Whirling Blades costing stacks instead of being a burst tool and then you run out of gas enjoy dying lmao

[winter widget]

i think that could work if the buffs started maybe halfway into the max stack limit, with a grace period to regain the stacks before the full buff runs out

[acoustic flame]

Dreadwood is premier MScout option because MScout's abilities are so easy to run out of

then you become current Paladin

[hallow lodge]

I had this exact thought, but it just wouldn't work because the devs wouldn't want a skill to be forced in order for it to function, and especially across spec-class boundaries. It could work if it took stacks first, but if no stacks or no skill it was a cooldown, but that's still probably against the rules. It'd have to be a spec skill or spec passive which is then going 180 from the initial thought

[winter widget]

it could be a fallthrough

it can use the stacks while on cooldown

[acoustic flame]

so fun fact Deadly Ronde

not identical, but it showcases that an idea like this can work

[hallow lodge]

And also yeah as void mentioned, it'd suck if you were using skills and then reducing your melee damage from consuming them, so it'd have to completely rework the stack system to front-load the damage to the early stacks and then the latter stacks either give a tiny buff or no buff. It's just messy

[hallow lodge]

It's not comparable in the slightest lol. Ronde is "any skill on cooldown", not "if BMB is on cooldown"

[acoustic flame]

is why I think the damage buff should just be passive, DJ gets to be passive

[winter widget]

gunblade can work

scarabs is just not happening though

bows by design will never be compatible with hybrid

[hallow lodge]

But then the stacks do nothing unless you're ranger and you're in the same sinking ship

[buoyant breach]

scarabs deals 10 dmg to slayer enemies on 4 atk speed

[acoustic flame]

then make Hunter work with it

[hallow lodge]

That also includes R1 :p

[acoustic flame]

Hunter low key due for a rework it's so one dimensional and so op at the same time

R1 could be a problem true

idk maybe Volley and a new melee skill use the system?

[winter widget]

congratulations, you've literally walked into my example of "melee scout with a projectile weapon to rip off volleys with"

[buoyant breach]

lightbringer

[winter widget]

[acoustic flame]

idk I just hope Scout gets the bone it's been looking for

it's been so long

[sharp forum]

Interesting

[winter widget]

hello frozen

[hallow lodge]

Honestly I disagree. Bows downside of having low movement speed while shooting is made up for hybrid by allowing you to limp fire shots through the cooldown/charge time that other weapons have. If you're playing hybrid being able to stop what you're doing and instantly start doing the other thing is key imo, same as tridents except you can't limp shot tridents, and unlike with bows, if you shoot a snowball you can't melee until the cooldown is up

[winter widget]

the charge time of a bow would be inclined to disagree

one of my main points was to be non disruptive to melee combat

[pulsar dagger]

if sharpshooter and swift cuts are merged there could be a new skill which allows you to basically shoot your projectile weapons on melee kill without charging them and that's quickdraw

[winter widget]

now, if you made an enchantment like Cumbersome for bows that lets arrows always be critical and deal full damage even when limped, you could make an argument

[sharp forum]

Wouldn't it be so much cooler if quickdraw was a grappling hook arrow that could pull you in to deal some melee swiping

[slender oracle]

ehhhh

[lyric jackal]

this looks so cursed, but I love it at the same time

[pulsar dagger]

judgement draw

[hallow lodge]

If they removed the movement speed penalty on bows (which has been brought up repeatedly and afaik devs have agreed it'd be a good thing to toy around with), then the upsides of limp shots exceed the max charge time requirement for full damage

[buoyant breach]

projectile/melee mainhands:
r1: lightbringer and blightbane
r2: titans spear, ghastcallers gunblade, scarabs bane, ichimonji, firecoral lance, soul spear, apotheosis spears, gold cursed polearm
r3: rat trident

[winter widget]

i can agree with this

scout should have this in general tbh

[buoyant breach]

doesn't include tiered r2 tridents

[winter widget]

it'd open up a lot of options

[winter widget]

i have mentioned multiple times why tridents are a horrible idea for true hybrid scout

[slender oracle]

i think i know how to give hybrid scout a viable weapon

[winter widget]

please reread the post

[slender oracle]

anyone here played divinitys end?

[buoyant breach]

i read it, ik

[slender oracle]

theres a cool crossbow in it with both melee and proj stats that gains stacks on alternating melee and proj hits and at six stacks becomes a very powerful crossbow for 3 shots

[winter widget]

i would post a gif of doom's super shotgun with the pulling chain but i cant find one

you get the idea

[buoyant breach]

2 non tridents, only 1 real thing

[winter widget]

ah no here we go

just let me do this

[slender oracle]

the hybrid gameplay with it was very fun when i used it but im not 100% sure if it would translate into monumenta well

[sharp forum]

I think the main obstacle to projectiles is how silly pure projectile gameplay is where you just camp X blocks away while never really having to risk anything

[winter widget]

welcome to scout

[hallow lodge]

https://tenor.com/view/correct-plankton-gif-14118231

to both of you

[winter widget]

this is why like, all of the damage on the example crossbow is contained within point blank lol

[sharp forum]

RC4 straight up made elites immune to projectiles so you can't just spam them down from forever away

[hallow lodge]

For 7 long years scout has been plagued with "ok but like what if I just stood an extra block back?"

[winter widget]

old dreads :S

it would be so awesome

[slender oracle]

rc4 also didnt use crossbows at all save the one hidden one and a bugged drop though

[tulip gust]

scout isnt even great right now

like its at a point where as crazy as it sounds i kinda want a buff??

NOT hutner tho

ranger needs a buff maaaan

[sharp forum]

[buoyant breach]

after making x amount of melee and y amount of projectile hits your next z attacks (melee or proj) are charged with explosives and deal aoe damage

[winter widget]

you can buff some aspects but if you ever touch volley i will have you drawn and quartered

[tulip gust]

nerf split arrow and we can talk about buffing hunter 👍

[winter widget]

leave that fucking skill alone

[slender oracle]

amazing skill idea

[sharp forum]

Volley u:

[winter widget]

this is what new LI should be btw

[tulip gust]

volley u: volley ignores iframes

[hallow lodge]

The difference in CTMs is that everyone has a sword and a bow. In monumenta you have classes and it SUCKS if you're playing and then suddenly you're entire class gets turned off. Like imagine the opposite and you find a mob that's immune to melee damage and you've gotta go into your remnant as rogue and find a bow just to keep playing. Instantly terrible

[winter widget]

if it were designed with 2 brain cells

[slender oracle]

volley u can (and probably should) die base volley must live forever though

[tulip gust]

volley u = ignores iframes is growing on me everyday

riskier + u lose out on AOE but you gain elite 1 tap back

[slender oracle]

interesting but that sounds a tad op on bosses

[tulip gust]

idc

[sharp forum]

I've also seen some games make ranged classes take more effort by having you physically need to retrieve arrows after firing them so you actually have to close the distance instead of camping

[buoyant breach]

yeah it feels more like a cleric skill

[tulip gust]

wont ever work in this game

unless we get some boomerang system

throw out a BIG arrow and pick it up

cooldown is ur speed

[hallow lodge]

Thanos snap all arrows and quivers

[sharp forum]

It wouldn't make sense for our regular arrows yeah

More of a special weapon

[hallow lodge]

Projectile weapons now instead have a total arrow count with internal cooldowns

[slender oracle]

pls no

[winter widget]

i think you could make a trident that "sticks" to elites and continues to damage them and you have to either kill the elite or melee it to get it back

[hallow lodge]

https://tenor.com/view/xplosion-uranus101-supernova-asteroids-space-rocks-gif-21637556

[winter widget]

i think that'd be cool

[slender oracle]

OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

do that

[tulip gust]

a skill that is BMB and but proj dmg would be cool

[sharp forum]

(Though arrows being a limited resource is also a tool games use to limit the amount of ranged cheese you can pull off before needing to reload or retrieve arrows)

[tulip gust]

so u have to get close and melee with any bow to deal a lot of single targt

[hallow lodge]

It's called every single hunter projectile

[tulip gust]

my base dmg aint even feel that good no more

i hit like 130 shots nowadays

scout just aint as much of that guy anymore

alch and bers blow it out the water

[sharp forum]

I think the beginning is good but I think it'd end up going the "throw trident/throw volley/throw everything at elite" route which diminishes the whole "unavailable until retrieved" part

[winter widget]

make it ignore CC immune mobs and pin them to the wall

actual impalement

[slender oracle]

how about a boomerang trident that dmg's things as it comes back then

[hallow lodge]

terraria mentioned

[winter widget]

but it's only temporary, after a little while if you dont go dispatch the elite itll slide off the trident and you have to go pick it up off the wall

[pulsar dagger]

silence should prevent shooting a projectile weapon or swinging a sword

[pulsar dagger]

Yeah I remember dead cells did this quite well
Most projectile weapons had a limited number of shots you could take; they came back to you over time, but were stuck in enemies until then so you couldn't just spam enemies down from range + there were abilities to get more ammo, or make the ammo in enemies give you buffs, or increase ways of restoring it

You could still absolutely play pure projectile but it was more work than "I'm going to sit here and press button until boss dies while dodging every attack from a safe distance"

[wet stag]

i dont mind hybrid but it shouldnt have impact on proj/melee

[winter widget]

literally not a single change here would nerf melee or projectile whatsoever

[wet stag]

ok im not saying it has

[winter widget]

then why mention it

where did this even come from

[wet stag]

idk

i just dont like forcing a playstyle

[narrow coral]

Silence on alchemists:

[wet stag]

so true

[zealous matrix]

Scout being hybrid is a problem that should be fixed and not leaned into. Ranged/Melee hybrid is clunky to play even with dedicated weapon and like, can we just have fucking ONE fully projectile class?

[wet stag]

yep

[zealous hamlet]

I agree, also like guys u talking about Hybrid scout while a bunch of the other melee classes are dying?

[acoustic flame]

R3 balance is shit, this is not new information

people want to talk about the weak shit instead of the strong shit though which makes sense

[buoyant breach]

melee classes dying?

[pulsar dagger]

you can just say reaper it's ok

[winter widget]

if i wanted to make a post about classes dying i'd make a 6 page essay about paladin in about 30 seconds

but im saving that for later

really need to smear it in

[acoustic flame]

writing more about Cleric just feels like beating a dead horse now

[tulip gust]

has tm commented on the paladin changes like anywhere

or are we just left with that vague note in changelogs

[slender oracle]

i think they are probably waiting for the content unfreeze and the rest of the changes to drop

[acoustic flame]

no formal comments but maybe something said during conversation somewhere

[winter widget]

I'll just keep one saved up for content unfreeze and if cleric changes very little or not at all I'll just let it rip

[full swallow]

@winter widget The "abomination" that I think might do decent...
https://ohthemisery.vercel.app/builder/m=Norvigut Skewer-4&o=Overgrown Bodkin-4&h=Fungal Fury-4&c=Thief's Raiment-4&l=Melded Bronzeskin-4&b=Sludge Stompers-4&charm=Nih-o_Core-3-G,San-Tendon-2-S,Dis-hakram-3-S,Gre-terity-2-S,Les-terity-1-S,Les-acious-1-S

[narrow coral]

doesn't hit bhop (sad)

is tendon's 80% damage necessary to make volley kill

because the +1 piercing is useless on tridents

[full swallow]

??? Haste II and Grace V

[narrow coral]

oh with grace sure

[full swallow]

If you really care about BHop speed without grace, then maybe swap Tendon with Mycosis

[narrow coral]

yeah that's what i was thinking

then you could run ex kingslayer but you murder your melee ehp

[full swallow]

At least from what I calculated, volley without it only does like 120-130 damage

Maybe I could try Dichen Resolve, but I really would like to keep Sludge Stompers

[winter widget]

"omg look at this quirky wierd build!"

bis-1

[full swallow]

SHHHHHHHHHHHH

(That's how you roll in contemporary Monumenta)