Melee Zer0....You Still 0ut There?

Sun_Tsunami · 2018-12-18T22:11:04.394Z

Kuolemanlaakso · 2018-12-24T17:54:37.318Z

I wish I could become melee master, but I settle for shooty shoot in arse while hiding master instead.

Kuolemanlaakso · 2018-12-29T18:21:42.460Z

I desperately want to learn how to use melee zero. I just feel my reflexes aren’t quick enough for it?

Sun_Tsunami · 2018-12-29T18:29:22.529Z

It definitely takes time to become proficient. Practice on OP0 Peak.

Adabiviak · 2018-12-29T18:48:06.582Z

Kuolemanlaakso:

I just feel my reflexes aren’t quick enough for it?

If that’s based on having watched OP8 raids against Voracidous and the like versus based on your own actual inability to work the controls (which I doubt), give it a spin. I rock a melee Zer0, and you don’t need to do all the crazy things you see in videos unless you want to raid, play at OP8, or otherwise fight at the top tiers of difficulty the game has to offer.

Heck, I only started using a roid shield with any regularity like a week ago when I let my Jakobs Assassin use the Order with his Law (and he doesn’t have Many Must Fall - one-hit kills).

In Normal mode (or wherever you are when you can get Many Must Fall), it’s much easier to string a few melee kills together without stacking all the things. Really, you should give it an honest spin at a level that doesn’t require it. Once you kill something and find yourself back in Decepti0n with a renewed timer and kill skills up, if you’re not hooked, it wasn’t meant to be.

Jefe · 2018-12-29T20:27:12.149Z

My current Bandit Zer0 doesn’t (and probably won’t) spec MMF either - so it’s very much : tesla, stab, shoot, run - fairly straightforward.

A great way to get the feel of MMF without having to think about slag or kunai or shield stripping is to use a Love Thumper in Pete’s Bar - in any mode. You still have to work on backstabbing and for the BAs you need to let the timer run down closer to zero. Just use a bladed Rubi - or even just a Law or Rapier if you spec Resurgence (which a purple Ninja boosts). You can leave the other slots empty (except maybe a FFYL weapon).

Kuolemanlaakso · 2018-12-29T21:01:14.973Z

I think it is that I see all the people doing amazing things and when I try it’s like a geriatric epileptic trying to wire a plug. Maybe I shouldn’t try and emulate those people and instead just try it my own way.

Edit: When I got my Zer0 to 72 I made a copy of him pre-peak and stored melee gear on the copy. This is the build it currently has

Is this logical?

Sun_Tsunami · 2018-12-29T21:27:57.768Z

Kuolemanlaakso:

Maybe I shouldn’t try and emulate those people and instead just try it my own way.

Definitely this^^^

Once you get comfortable with your own play style then you can analyze other’s.
If you scroll to top of this thread you will see I was figuring things out that others have done way before.

Jefe · 2018-12-29T21:32:38.223Z

Kuolemanlaakso:

Is this logical?

What are you using Precision for? Velocity should be more useful - better for slagging.

Rising Shot is great for spamming - you can take some points from Resurgence.

Kuolemanlaakso · 2018-12-29T21:34:16.591Z

Jefe:

What are you using Precision for?

Tbh I don’t even remember making this build, so I have no idea!

Jefe:

Rising Shot is great for spamming

It’s like you know me…

Jefe · 2018-12-29T21:35:06.236Z

Adabiviak · 2018-12-29T21:59:30.639Z

Kuolemanlaakso:

Maybe I shouldn’t try and emulate those people and instead just try it my own way.

I’ll second that… once you get melee down and you start looking at that stuff, you can decide if it’s worth the trouble or if it looks fun enough to try.

nat_zero_six · 2018-12-30T03:02:55.442Z

Welcome to ps4 ninja club @Kuolemanlaakso

Kuolemanlaakso · 2018-12-30T11:09:34.124Z

I wouldn’t go that far but i’ll try it out from time to time to see if I can get the hang of it

Is that better?

Adabiviak · 2018-12-30T16:40:57.885Z

That build looks fine… you could certainly do worse. Are you going to use a Roid shield? If not, I’d highly recommend Grim (I’d transfer the points from Iron Hand).

Jefe · 2018-12-30T18:54:26.301Z

An option is to go 5/5 in Rising Shot and 3/5 in Unforseen. Unforseen is still quite strong at 3/5 and if you’re trying for MMF chains it can mess them up if you kill a guy with Unforseen.

At OP8 it’s not an issue but may be at 72. Besides you can use a shock Bone to bump up the damage.

Adabiviak · 2018-12-31T20:13:33.491Z

On that note: a question for melee gurus: can you effectively maintain a stack of Rising Sh0t for melee with Many Must Fall? The decay rate for melee strikes seems so short that it would be difficult to maintain unless you were super overpowered in a dense mob.

Is the decay rate for melee based on the fire rate of the weapon you’re carrying, or some fixed value for melee? Does anyone try to include Rising Sh0t in their melee routine, and if so, how?

Jefe · 2018-12-31T20:34:45.391Z

From my experience, no, but my eyes rarely fall to the Rising Shot indicator during MMF. Its primary usage is for spamming against a single target. Pete’s Bar might be the only place this will work, or against varkids.

As usual, grain of salt but this from the wiki :

Stack depletion rate seems to depend entirely upon the fire rate of the equipped weapon, regardless of whether you use regular weapon attacks or melee attacks. As a result, weapons with slower rates of fire are more effective for maintaining Rising Sh0t stacks while using melee.

That said, obviously there’s a latent decay rate if you have no guns equipped. This doesn’t help us in any practical sense but I’m curious.

Edit : Science! Rising Sh0t needs a gun to work. And yes, the equipped gun does make a difference to decay and rate :

Adabiviak · 2019-01-01T00:32:13.325Z

Interesting… while my Jakobs Assassin has a Law for most of his work, it can’t hold much of a stack. Would it be, for example, worth switching to a bladed Elephant Gun (that can hold this stack for days) at the cost of 50% melee damage? Probably not, because with that character, I’m almost always using melee for a finishing blow…

…but for an Assassin built around Many Must Fall, would a Bladed Elephant Gun let you maintain a stack through those kills, and would that stack be worth the 50% (in the case of the Law) or 150% (in the case of the Rapier) damage loss for using a “plain” bladed weapon?

Probably not… the enhancements you get from the Legendary Ninja COM (which we’re likely using for serious melee) don’t include Rising Sh0t (and the COMs that do aren’t the sort that I would lean on for extended MMF chains).

There’s damage to be had there, potentially a decent amount, but not at the cost of what it takes to get it. Outside of the scope of MMF chains, I will look into working this into my melee damage attacks.

Jefe · 2019-01-01T01:13:12.074Z

Rising Sh0t is additive damage (max 45%). There are so many ways to get ridiculous mulitplicative damage in MMF - but I don’t see Rising Sh0t as one of them.

Still, knowing how you approach Zer0, I think you’ll make it work and prove me wrong

Regardless, it’s a standard skill for ninja.

If you have any interest in the math :

[PORT] The real and complete melee Zer0 formula Zer0 the Assassin

This is a port of Zer0’s melee damage formula by @Voshy. Not my work!! The archive version is here. I’ve done some minor edits : mostly spelling and formatting, but also updated Deathmark stacking as it changed after the 2015 patch. Hi everyone. If you ever played Zer0, you probably wondered how are bonuses for all of his melee skills, relics and COMs calculated, as did I. Apparently nobody had enough time or will to test it all out so far, so only thing we got on this forum is “passive…