[GSM]

I should probably just cut it all short here:

Kensei is flat-out just better than Ghost at the moment.
Ghost’s roster is half useless, part situational, and part necessary to even get the class working.
Kensei is entirely better, sans Wraithguard, where it can do everything infinitely better.

Kensei’s cardinal sin is more than likely the Raijin: even though it got nerfed, its tiny 30% STR scaling is so negligible that without building STR, one can Two-Hand a Raijin for over 110+ SWA.
Ghost has to either go into Fitting Form in order to keep up with the rapidly expanding Evasion meta or go into Two-Handing to completely fall behind and never be able to hit.

There are several suggestions I have:
-Hit Raijin where it hurts, make it in line with the other elemental katanas. (scaling goes from 30% STR 30% SKI 40% LUC to 60% STR 40% LUC)
-Buff Ghost’s arsenal as a whole, because it entirely falls short.
-Hit Kensei directly, somehow, without rendering it obsolete.
-Buff STR, so melee builds that have to build STR to compete with similar SWA can actually catch up.

The amount of Kenseis that build a no-STR Raijin Bloody Palms turns the entire meta into ‘don’t fight Kenseis, they instantly win from stat advantages’.

[Autumn]

-Most of the elemental katana are 50/50 scaling, that should probably be fine for Raijin as a whole, its main offender is the crit effect on hidden cut imo, that thing can hurt a lot while also opening defensive options with Quick Draw.

-Ghost needs a couple of buffs in areas where it falls off, as brought up in another thread though, I think it should be addressed there

-Kensei's innates are really only the most broken when paired with 2hand as a talent, I think 2hand's needed a much deserved toning down for quite a while:

2hand should likely be toned down to a SR*2% Scaled weapon attack boost, being doubled if using a weapon with 20 weight(10%), and further doubled if using an axe or greatsword class weapon. (20%)

Abolish Well Fed lv2 from Fugu Katsu please.

[Fern]

The people that build Raijin, generally do so because they dislike STR, finding it to be quite unappealing in comparison to other stats. There has been a few threads about buffing STR, thankfully.

A lot of people prefer two-handing for damage stacking with Bloody Palms, so making it not so obligatory to run might be good.

Removing Well Fed and making someone lose -1 or 2 scaled in stats feels like a waste of time, to be honest. Even if someone forgets to eat their Fugu, it doesn't really change the outcome of the fight they go against - it helps achieve more precise numbers at most. I feel that food regen should be looked at instead, for reasons that aren't dungeoning, but that's for another thread.

[Inconspicuous Kitty]

I can't help but notice that not a single thing that has been mentioned thus far has anything to do with Kensei itself, or it's skillset, which leads me to believe Kensei isn't at fault one bit here. What's more of been brought up is Ghost's comparatively lackluster skill set when -compared- to Kensei, and the Raijin, which is, at my own opinion, a sword despite being a katana. Thus, it simply works best with Kensei but is at fault on it's own level even outside of Kensei, due to the scalings - which once more brings up the issue of Strength being not a very saught-after stat, yet again, as well as twohand factoring into that.

But in other words, rather than touching on Kensei, and what it can do worse - I'd once more prefer to shift the spotlight primarily to Ghost, and what it can do better - and there were suggestions regarding it's balance that I believe are worth a look at in this thread.

My thoughts are summed up in three points.
- STR needs yet another look.
- Twohand needs to have some viable alternatives - as it stands, it's up to a 20-30 SWA boost, which can add up to quite a lot.
- Ghost needs buffs to catch up to Kensei - I'm not sure Kensei needs the drop.

[Chaos]

The people that build Raijin, generally do so because they dislike STR, finding it to be quite unappealing in comparison to other stats. There has been a few threads about buffing STR, thankfully.

Except that after all those threads, we have yet to come to any solid conclusion towards helping STR. Honestly, if we want to see STR buffed, it'll likely have to be forced, rather than obtained through support.

Also, you can argue that basic attackers require too many stats and leave too little room for variance, especially under a system with 210 stat points + APT. That will not solve STR's dilemma, but a separate topic touching upon this is a good idea.

As for the OP, upping Raijin's STR scaling while throwing out its SKI scaling is a decent band-aid, but at that point, why not just do the same for every other melee/bow weapon (beyond daggers) that doesn't put STR first?

[Autumn]

I can't help but notice that not a single thing that has been mentioned thus far has anything to do with Kensei itself.

Veering slightly off topic, but Kensei's power spike mostly lies in how well it can abuse Duelist as a class compared to Ghost.

Duelist is such a good base class that its promotions are dwarfed in comparison to it, Kensei can 2hand a 20 weight weapon and get hit/crit passives, and make use of the better swords in the game, katana.

That is why it is chosen over Ghost most of the time.

[Lolzytripd]

what spoops said, also kensei spend so much of their points on passives and kensei support skills that they cant afford to get kensei offensive skills (other than basic attack steroid wazebane if they can fit airborne into their build) and instead opt for the BETTER SCALING duelist skills.

[Kiranis]

Can someone explain to the slow one here why we are comparing the two classes ? they are well DIFFERENT classes even if they share some similarities


All in favor of ghost being more op tho.

[Grandpa]

Can someone explain to the slow one here why we are comparing the two classes ? they are well DIFFERENT classes even if they share some similarities

They're both duelist promoted classes. Kensei is chosen infinitely more times than Ghost, as Ghost has very little to offer that trumps over Kensei.

They are very different classes, yes. But they're both branching off the same base class. One promoted class shouldn't be obviously infinitely better than the other, it should just be different. Kensei can do everything a Ghost can do but just flat out better because of the unmarkable system.

The ability for a Ghost to silence through Death Gaze vs Absolute fear is a nice example. Sure, Death Gaze does damage, but Absolute Fear applies fear, hesitation, and silence. A two turn cooldown doesn't mean much when you can still use all your other class based skills. Claret Call needs to be applied for all Ghost combat skills, excluding Ghostwind, to have their full effect- or even be usable in the case of Ether Invitation.

As is, I don't really think the unmarkable system needs to exist at all anymore. Just give things cooldowns or make them consume the Claret Call instead. This would certainly help Ghost become a bit more comparable to Kensei's obvious power advantage, but I still don't think it would be enough.

[Lolzytripd]

Perhaps we should increase grave stones range and make it so that when cast on an enemy it restrains them, and that when and enemy walks around one there is a chance they will be restrained.

also when knocked back into and hitting a gravestone they could take damage and be restrained.