The Abyssal Stalker

Builds
Utopian Organ
February 4, 2024
1
149

First published in Season 4. | Return to the Build Hub.

A. Bacon's Abyssal Stalker

By embracing the ultimate taboo of combining melee with magic, become the Apex Predator, the King of Assassins, the Grim Reaper, or Death itself. The Abyssal Stalker seamlessly utilises quick melee movements with the dark arts of the void to finesse and blindside enemy lines, leaving only a trail of blood to prove their existence. This build is primarily made to punish ranged players (both archers and mages) in the outskirts of a battle who indulge in the illusion that they are away from danger. Be the bane of their existence and make them tremble in fear every time they catch a glimpse of the Stalker’s abyssal glow.

Build Summary

Weapons:

Great Axe
Sword & Shield

Best for:

PVP
Assassin

Main Attributes:

Strength
Constitution

Prevention:

This includes things that prevent damage such as blocks, stuns, roots, staggers.

Support:

This includes things that strengthen the team and mitigate damage, such as healing, buffing and debuffing.

Damage:

This is pretty self-explanatory and covers raw damage output, including damage over time.

Difficulty: Hard

Weapon Ability Trees

For your Sword and Shield, the Abyssal Stalker would use Leaping Strike as a tool for engagement to apply a stagger and slow. Similarly, they would also run Shield Rush for an additional stagger and slow (the grit that it comes with may be of use as well in some instances). Finally, you would use Whirling Blade to apply a rend on to your enemies to magnify your own damage on to them. Alternatively, you can switch out Whirling Blade with Shield Bash to run the old-school holy trinity of a SNS assassin.

As for the Great Axe, this is your main damage-dealing weapon. The bread and butter of this playstyle is utilising Reap to drag foes to you while applying a devastating slow on targets due to the Crippling Reap weapon perk. Charge will be used as either a gap closer with a punishing point of contact (Unpredictable Strike as the final upgrade) or an escape tool to run from danger. For the third ability you have a choice between running Maelstrom, Gravity Well or Execute. I personally enjoy using Maelstrom to do extensive AOE damage on multiple targets if you get surrounded but it works well on single targets too. It is important that you pick up Blood Lust on the Reaper side of the GA skill tree (left side) as your final passive. This skill will earn you the title of Master Hunter due to the haste you obtain when looking at a foe making it the ultimate tool for chasing runners.

As for the choice of heart rune, I recommend either the Cunning Vines to trap your prey or the Stalwart Stoneform for a backup self heal and fortify. You could also run Brutal Detonate if you are itching to do more damage.

View my full gearset on nw-buddy.de

Attribute distribution

The ideal attribute distribution for this build would be 350 Strength, 50 Dexterity, and 200 Constitution (with the use of a 40 attribute food buff). You could also use the higher tier 48 attribute food to truly maximise damage, but it isn’t really necessary to make your mark on the battlefield.

However, if you plan to play with a pocket healer, I do recommend dropping your Constitution to 150 and assigning 50 points into either Strength (to do more GA damage) or Dexterity (to do more SNS damage). This will allow you to hit high damage numbers but would make your sustainability be impacted by the skill of your healer. If you truly trust your healer, you can potentially drop your Constitution to 100 to assign even more points into damage but it isn’t always recommended (depends on the skill of both the healer and you).

Important perks

Weapons

The Abyssal Stalker is all about Void damage. They are the reapers assigned by the Gods of the Abyss to punish those who look down upon the power of the Void.

Therefore, Abyssal Attunement is a must have on your sword paired with an Abyssal runeglass with an Amethyst slotted in for more void damage. Other perks you could have on your sword would include things such as Vicious, Penetrating Backstab, Rogue, Keenly Jagged, Keenly Empowered, or even Empowering Leaping Strike. As for your shield, any damage-enhancing perks would suffice and you would also benefit from having Fortifying Shield Rush as a perk as well.

For the Great Axe, this build will use the Abyss artifact which drops when closing high-level Major Breaches. Crippling Reap should be added as the final upgrade to this artifact.

Armor

As this build is all about maximizing your Void damage it is important to have Void Harnessing in all your armour pieces in addition to the use of Abyssal Runeglass gems to once again further the void damage even more. Using the Featherweight artifact will help you obtain more armour by equipping 3 medium pieces of gear and still remaining within the light equip load. For the second armour perk, I recommend running something defensive such as Elemental Aversion or Enchanted Ward as you will be taking a fair bit of hits. The final perk choice is up to your preference or could be used as an excuse to help feed your subconscious gambling addiction with scarab crafts. Ideally, you would want either weapon ability perks or Shirking Heals. As long as you have two strong perks, the third doesn’t matter as much.

Jewelry

In terms of jewelry, it is recommended that you use a protection amulet of some sort. Ideally, Flame Protection or Thrust Protection as archers and mages are the main type of foes you will encounter.

As for the ring, it is imperative that you have Void Damage, to again maximise damage output. Hearty is also a must-have on the ring as it would aid in stamina management (most important factor in any PVP instance).

The earring is very much up to personal taste. I enjoy running Healthy Toast for an ok additional heal and Healing Heart for even more healing.

Build in action

My advice

The playstyle revolves around spending a lot of time stalking your prey and waiting for the perfect opportunity to strike. Never run in headfirst into a fight unless it’s absolutely necessary for the kill or you need the cover from your allies, The Stalker doesn’t degrade themselves by acting like a barbarian. They use the elite arts of assassination where the darkness and enemy blind spots are their friend in battle. Sneak up on enemies with your arsenal of staggers and decimate players who dare to turn tail and run.

The Abyssal Stalker is a fairly complex build and may need a decent level of game sense and mechanics mastery. However, if you don’t mind the steep learning curve, this build would make you a force to be reckoned with. Hence why I 100% recommend this build to anyone who doesn’t mind the potentially painful start and wants to do pure glass canon DPS. Become the very meaning of damage.

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