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**Kastel** · 06-02-2004, 06:57 AM

generally people say about 3sec when you see their WS go off. Since i have to use SA+TA then WS, I usually go about 1s after I see their WS. It's really just a feel for it, wait until his animation. One... Two... Hit Macro and Go.

**Theiry** · 06-02-2004, 07:40 AM

So I wait until every last bit of the animation is over, then could to 2 and trigger my Sneak Attack + Weapon Skill macro? Make that 3 seconds without sneak attack, and 1 with sneak and trick?

I'll be sure to try this next time we play =)

**SurrealRogue** · 06-02-2004, 08:49 AM

If you don't have damage filter'd off, a tip I tell my LS mates to try when skillchaining...

Jess readies <Weaponskill>
Jess does xxx damage.
---Hit sata+WS macro now
Surreal uses Sneak Attack.
Surreal readies Dancing Edge.
Surreal uses Trick Attack.
Surreal does xxx damage
Skillchain: xxx

This timing works with a plain WS macro or a Sata + WS macro. With the Sata macro though, this will place the WS at the very end of the timer for skillchaining.

I got used to using this timing for SC's because I generally play in first person and can't see shit round the back of a Galka :sweat:

First person play is a carry over from EverQuest unfortunately =p Someday I'll give it up and play in 3rd person.. mebbe :sweat:

**Rykielz** · 06-02-2004, 09:09 AM

Re: Skill Chain help

Originally posted by Theiry
I love being a Thief, and they are extremely powerful if played right

yeah thiefs are pretty powerful IMHO. i was just in Gustav Tunnel yesterday and i did a SATA+Viper for about 588 dmg and distortion did about 400 give or take a few. and this was on an IT mob at level 41. I'd recomend you join a party because in parties you can get great xp with low downtime.
As for skillchaining i just time it about 1.5 secs after the 1st WS's animation ends.

**Mithrankittycat** · 06-02-2004, 10:32 AM

I start sneak attack + trick attack + ws macro when first person's ws animation ends.

**Balgas** · 06-02-2004, 11:08 AM

Last night I was in a PT in Garlaige Citadel the SC was Double Thrust -> Viper Bite most of the time the SC itself would only do between 30-70 damage. One time though I pulled off a self record high 466 damage with viper bite and the SC did 216.

So why is it that most of the time the SC was doing crappy damage?:confused:

Are the monsters resisting it or do you have to pull it off at just the right time to get good damage? I'd really like to figure this out.:sweat:

**Theiry** · 06-02-2004, 12:50 PM

Thanks =) I'll try all of these. I'd love to get my skill chaining abilities down well enough to hit them 100% of the time when I start getting in full parties. I don't mind (too much) if my brother and I die from my bad timing, but I'd feel bad if someone else did.

When you said
'Surreal uses Sneak Attack.
Surreal readies Dancing Edge.
Surreal uses Trick Attack.
Surreal does xxx damage'
You readied Dancing Edge before you did trick attack, is this how your macro is built, or does it just happen that way? How many wait's are in there? I always had my macro's doing Trick then Sneak then WS, with wait 2's. But if it works to put the weapon skill between sneak and trick, I'd love that =) It's funny how many times my battle log reads:
"Theiry scores a critical hit! 100 damage to the ___
Theiry uses Sneak Attack!
Theiry uses Fast Blade. ____ Takes 20 damage"

Oh, and about getting in parties, yeah, I know I should. But right now my brother and I are having fun just exploring around and working on our trade skills. We're leveling fast enough to be happy, and we're getting our trade skills up. The only bad thing is we don't cap our weapons =l Other than that, we're almost leveling too fast for what we want to do =)

**Kastel** · 06-02-2004, 01:01 PM

Haha, I set PT with Surreal. Sometimes the log will say that, but she uses trick before her Dancing goes off.

Try this for macro:

/ja "Sneak Attack" <t>
/wait 1
/ws "Fast Blade" <t>

**Rhayn** · 06-02-2004, 02:10 PM

In my opinion, timing a skillchain by sequencing animations is rather iffy. I believe you have between 2-4 seconds from when the previous member initiates a WS to initiate your own, and since various weaponskills have different animation times it is hard to time your own weaponskill by watching this.

Because of this, I generally time any skillchains by monitoring the log instead. If you don't have the proper chat filters enabled, your log might be too spammy to see the weaponskill text well. A /party announce with a <call> (I personally like call3 for weaponskills) helps immensely with timing. For example, my Vorpel Blade macro looks like this:

/ws "Vorpal Blade" <t>
/p >>> (Vorpal Blade) Â» <t> <<< <call3>

If someone is using a macro with a call like this one, you only need to make sure your own weaponskill starts about 3 seconds after you hear the call from their weaponskill starting. It's a lot easier to time a skillchain by just counting a few seconds than trying to watch a weaponskill animation that is more often than not lagged, imo.

I've also leveled thief some, so my macro for SA+Fast Blade is this:

/ja "Sneak Attack" <me>
/wait 1
/ws "Fast Blade" <t>
/p >>> (Fast Blade) Â» <t> <<< <call3>

I only need to count two seconds after I hear the <call> from the first persons weaponskill, hit the macro, and it skillchains almost every time. The only exception is of course when you're in a very laggy zone and your macro fails to activate or Sneak Attack goes off wrong because of the lag. XP

Hope I've been helpful at all.

EDIT: Forgot to mention, if there are more than one call in close proximity, the second one often won't be heard, so it's a good idea to monitor the log for the /party weaponskill text visually as well. The text is a lot easier to pick out in party chat than in the log also and while sometimes the weaponskill animation and text is delayed, the party announcement is not.

**Tidane** · 06-02-2004, 02:23 PM

I don't do any of this counting, heh. It just came naturally. I've found the easiest way for me is to hit a Sneak Attack + Trick Attack macro when I see the person's weapon skill animation. Right after I hit the SA+TA macro, I hit CTR+W and always have the WS I'm using seleceted, so I can hit CTR+W - Enter - Enter.

SA/TA macro

/ja "Sneak Attack" <me>
/wait 1
/ja "Trick Attack" <me>

This may not work for you if you have a laggy computer, but it works just fine for me. Like I said though, SCing came like I had done it for years when I first started.

**Theiry** · 06-02-2004, 04:17 PM

=) I'll try all of these. I have plenty of time to test these out. My brother and I are going to Ranperre's Tomb (however it's spelled) to level and farm for crystals, so we will have more than enough time (and TP) to test this on goblins.

**Theiry** · 06-02-2004, 04:23 PM

I have one more question for you all, how do I time 3 part skill chains? I tried this in the beta, kinda, and never got one to work. It took me forever to talk a party into helping me try, and that party only lasted about an hour. Plus, I was the only one that knew (or suspected at that point) that you could pull off a 3 or more part chain, so it was up to me to set it up. They gave up after an hour =l

Anyway, how do I time the third (or fourth, ect) skill in a longer skill chain? Do I time it the same way, by waiting for the animation to end on the last skill (or the trigger of that skill) then using my skill, or do I wait for the chain animation to end (or start)? Getting of a three part skill chain was one of my biggest goals in the beta, and I never got it done. So now it's one of my biggest goals in the full version =)

Thanks for all the help everyone =)

**guyincorporated** · 06-02-2004, 05:07 PM

Originally posted by Mithrankittycat
I start sneak attack + trick attack + ws macro when first person's ws animation ends.

**Disturbed** · 06-02-2004, 05:31 PM

you'd have to if you pt with a drk and open with skillchain XDDD

it's also possible to start your macro while the animation of the other ws is still going, but you kinda have to get into the groove where you know if the skillchain will still happen or not =\

altho when i've done this the dmg has ended up being crap, even tho the chain still hits..maybe it's coz the mob is tougher than the others, not really something i pay attention to, but bugs me none-the-less (>_<)/~~

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