Philosophy of Burst Damage

Most opponents are 1-2, sometimes 3 hits away from dying if they make bad defensive decisions. Simple as that. The question is, can you capitalize on their bad defensive decisions and convert them into a kill? Well good news is, most people make bad defensive decisions habitually. The bad news is, most people can NOT finish the duel in 1-2, maybe 3 hits when the opportunity arises. Hell, most of the time, they don't even know the opportunity DID arise. That'll be my goal in this guide, make kill opportunities clear so you can identify when to go for the KILL during your duels, and teach you how to execute those kill combos. That is the entire point of the duel, right? Kill the opponent as fast as possible. This aspect of dueling has a name: BURST DAMAGE

The Antithesis of Burst Damage (What NOT to do)

Before I get into the guide I just want to drive home what burst damage philosophy is all about. I feel that a great way to do that is to show what the opposite of burst damage looks like The truth is, the majority of duelers out there are passive & predictable. They just swing and cycle and hope weapon streaks of 5+ hits finish the duel for them. Either through overwhelming, unreturned hit streaks which lead to the enemy dying outright, or running them out of mana. Either way, they don't decide when the duel ends, RNG does. The epitome of this strategy is spamming the following interrupt cycle: Harm, Magic Arrow, Fireball, Lightning, Halberd. Most of the time, they lead into that loop by starting the duel off with Energy Bolt pre-casted. They run in for a big hally, send the EB, then go right into the Harm, Magic Arrow, Fireball, Lightning, hally cycle. That's it, that's the whole gameplay loop. Spam that interrupt cycle, over and over, hoping the hallys land and the enemy doesn't return much damage. There is no fluidity or creativity in that loop. This is just robot dueling and it is not effective. You will NOT become an elite dueler with this style of dueling. It's the absolute worst to watch 2 of these types of duelers face each other. Those duels go to sudden death more often than not and the winner is purely decided by who lands the critical, unreturned hits. Essentially, RNG decides. But honestly I don't blame anyone for playing this way. This is the way many people were taught to duel - lead with Hally EB, then get straight to interrupt cycling. It's time to change that