[Slayer] Armor Advice

[Tamarlan]

Hi Slayers,
Have full ruin, merc and anni. Any advice on what to equip?

[Darosh]

Mix and match of ruin, merc and preferably domi to softcap strength.
If you have conq swap out stuff for 3/3(/3) - conq belt, boots, shoulders (crit+melee power+haste) and rest dominator (aswell as BL; cloak, ring, pocketitem, if you have it) for the wounds and other shinies.
You can go 3 or 4 pc BL too (helm/chest, cloak, ring, pocketitem) + conq/any mix and match if you have it, for some wounds, ws, strength and a talislot, otherwise go genesis.
If you wanna be really fancy, mix and match to optimize haste (one of your only ways to up ST dps once you are at str softcap/max crit - every other increase in punch comes with group composition) - conq shoulders, eight peaks tomeset and overlord head, you can run 4 BL (above) whilst sporting 3 conq and some odd piece, or two conq and two merc/domi/ruin pieces if you value str more than wounds, which you imho you should not.
Weapons: epic quest (keep the on-being-hit AP proc one in your offhand for ORvR sessions) -> gutslime/influence weapons/SC (first tier, 400embs/1h) -> SC (second tier, 1200embs/1h)/subjugator.

If you wanna roam, well, things get alot more tricky.

Abbd.: As to the gear available to you: 2/2/x for low tier setboni (softcap str without investing too much into talis/RR [never pick plain-stats with your RR, the returns are garbage, pick the fancy stuff] yet), or 4/2 for the mastery point if you are participating in ORvR and need it to grab shinies for your bomb spec.

[Grock]

its like you didnt even read OP until posting your reply

also you can't 4/2 with ruin/merc/anni, those are 5-piece sets

Hi Slayers,
Have full ruin, merc and anni. Any advice on what to equip?

it really depends on what you want to do, whats your build and playstyle
if you are just rolling with PUGs and doing solo SCs i'd say just get as much defence as you can - 2 anni 2 merc + anything, maybe winds impervious accessory set, armor tactic, armor/tough pots and enjoy STAYING ALIVE and spamming Deep Wound and Shatter Limbs

Damage benefit from softcapped STR isn't that high - all skills have base damage which scales with mastery(and equipped weapon) and its quite high (also dont forget Reckless Gamble, even tho it doesnt't get bonuses from rage, crits or tactics)
at 1051 str my Spine Crusher shows 617 damage, when i remove STR tactics and all gear except for weapons i end up at 295 str and 390 damage on the tooltip
so i'd say unless you have best-in-slot gear don't bother about about STR too much, especially about softcapping it, get some initiative and crit reduction from RR, get some wounds and toughness so that you can survive without pocket guard&heal

[Darosh]

Spoiler:

First things first, no offense intended - its didactive grumpyness at play:

its like you didnt even read OP until posting your reply

also you can't 4/2 with ruin/merc/anni, those are 5-piece sets
(4 anni or 4 merc for the respective mastery point, 2 pieces of whatever set you have - domi/BL as they offer cloak/belt that can be combined with jeweleries or, in case of the domi belt, with a set of gloves (for 2pc setbonus) [gloves carry meh stats throughout; carry no important stuff, i.e.: crit etc], and allow for fast-swaps on the fly for more wounds/str and other shinies ~ but generally speaking: every gear does the trick in the very end.)

Hi Slayers,
Have full ruin, merc and anni. Any advice on what to equip?

it really depends on what you want to do, whats your build and playstyle (Yes-ish.)
if you are just rolling with PUGs and doing solo SCs i'd say just get as much defence as you can - 2 anni 2 merc + anything, maybe winds impervious accessory set (Apparently you don't know how the career mechanic works, especially how it works on RoR - resis are a waste for Slayers/Choppas.), armor tactic (<Maybe> in solo/duo roam, but certainly not in anything above that, the bonus the tactic grants is neglible, if not outright worthless [debuffs&career mechanic, dmg sources, yada yada].), armor/tough pots (Nope. Why would you want to force your KotBS to run the garbage str aura [toughness aura > str aura, as it accounts for all members of a group; rdps,mdps,healer,tanks - not just mdps and tanks -, freeing them up to use mainstat pots] or another member of your group to waste a gcd buffing up your strength? Then, let alone how few toughness you can reach on a Slayer without heavily dedicating yourself to it... Most of that toughness is gone anyways once you are debuffed or is simply outlasted tenfold due to your lack of pewpew.) and enjoy STAYING ALIVE and spamming Deep Wound and Shatter Limbs (Yes, please spam your best utilities mindlessly - at best you don't cover them up with Onslaught or anything, really. Just spam it. And while we are at it, pop EB on deftard tanks and NS on casters to cover all your other [note: most impactful in small scale - e.g.: NS + guardbot = implosion, EB + dps = zero pressure/no on-crit nasty stuff {HDs, strikethroughs, ... yada yada}, EB + healer = medicore heals/no on-crit nasty stuff {+25%heal, bubbles, AP, ... yada yada}] utility in the same fasion.)

Damage benefit from softcapped STR isn't that high (So math isn't your strong suit, gotcha.) - all skills have base damage which scales with mastery(and equipped weapon) and its quite high (also dont forget Reckless Gamble, even tho it doesnt't get bonuses from rage, crits or tactics) (Unless you are using it for some very fancy* FM play, it is - next to Fierceness - one of the worst abilties you could possibly use, especially whilst bombing or pugging; why would you opt for taking up to +450 [depending how much your armor is debuffed and your mastery points in the respective tree; nine targets hit with a direct ability] damage per gcd [and by extension timestamp; e.g.: Wild Swing**/tactic'd flurry + ID tick = ~900dmg from RG. With a HP Pool of 5-8k {post wounds debuff and depending on your wounds stack}, thats 11%(8k HP)-18%(5k HP) of your HP gone in one timestamp without any enemy burst. For ST derping: SC + ID tick = +500dmg from RG, 5-8k HP, 6.25%(8k HP)-10%(5k HP) gone in one timestamp, yada, yada] - and significantly more than +450 damage per gcd, or in this case much rather timestamp, if you have multiple IDs up - to deal at most ~80ish additional damage post-mitigation per gcd on your ST target, or otherwise fluff dmg that gets back at you by adding to your opponents bursts/chews through your healers AP? You might aswell save your healer the AP he'd need to heal through the fluff/spike damage this ability creates and spare him the frustration of seeing your HP drop in terrifying manners. You can and are supposed to run it in 2h, but if you run 2h you are with a proper 6man anyways ~ as halfarsing the 2h spec makes no sense whatsoever.... ~ and you will most certainly not waste gcds for lackluster flurry spam, unless you need the range on it; you won't have ID to accidently blow yourself up with.)
at 1051 str my Spine Crusher shows 617 damage, when i remove STR tactics and all gear except for weapons i end up at 295 str and 390 damage on the tooltip (Well, if there is no 'clicky'-moment for you upon seeing those numbers, ...factor in the loss of strikethrough, debuffs and the toughness overhaul.)
so i'd say unless you have best-in-slot gear don't bother about about STR too much, especially about softcapping it (It is the other way around.), get some initiative and crit reduction from RR (Yes, please waste your RR on underperforming stats - completly ignore that you are playing one of the classes with the lowest base initiative levels, close-to-worst access to initiative on gear; that'd have to invest literally everything into initiative/ctbc to make it remotely worth it - i.e.: enable actual returns that turn the major losses of dps/sustain, that you'd get with other stuff, into a "reasonable" [= on paper, not effectively] tradeoff. Note: Never burn RR on plain base stats, unless its wounds or you are extremely high RR and otherwise decked out, the returns are abysmal compared to avoidance/crit/actives.), get some wounds (This actually is a good idea. The synergy with FM is hilarious, and the wounds will help you to survive semi-static bursts you can't reduce to neglible levels either way.) and toughness so that you can survive without pocket guard&heal (That simply doesn't happen, the current implementation of the class mechanic [by extension combat forumlas] doesn't allow for that, rather heavily punishs roaming/pugging on Slayer/Choppa more than it ever was the case on live. Now let alone that no coordinated opposition/players with a brain will let an unguarded Slayer/Choppa freely roam around, and that no pug healer will be able to heal an unguarded Slayer, especially against coordinated opposition - thats utopian thinking. Moreso, you don't have burst on a Slayer but [high, very high] sustained damage [i.e.: enough to easily chip away at focus healed targets {arguably needs alot of gear, you are better off joining large ORvR events until you are geared or run proper premades into scenarios with something burtsy tagging along} - plenty enough to make for a good assisttrain-anchor {consider yourself a living, walking and bearded healdebuff that can kill, if you will}]. If you go full deftard you might aswell reroll tank and actually bring stuff to the table for your group, whilst facetanking derps. Just to account for everything a little: Given single-zone campaign its more often than not burst-or-bust as it comes to [solo]roam ~ Slayer have so little sustain, that actually playing for it is counterproductive - especially in this very environment. You are most certainly better off roaming on a WH/WE than you are with a SL/CH - those classes are also alot more bursty and require alot less gear, moreso alot less dedication to grouping [i.e.: coordination, composition, ... yadayada] to be fully functional. Protip: Get a group, amaze them with your deeps - or your awareness and all the fancy stuff - and get them to funnel gear into you.)

+100 cat points for cat video.
*Note: There is more than just FM-related fancy plays with RG. Go test mechanics to get a grasp of them.

Note: As to the implied super-squishyness, if you feel squishy in bombing situations - if you use alot of flurry and ID and all the goodness - and if you run Reckless Gamble all the while... well, there is your answer. Parse your combatlog for 2hrs whilst bombing, be amazed at how much of the incoming damage is dealt to you ~ by yourself.

**fixed

OT: You should refrain from giving advice; either your math is generally incredible wonky or you lack the experience in regards to the mechanics in play - again, no offense intended. Judging by your recent endeavours in the /advice channel and the things you elaborated here, you haven't played the game for more than a few (2?) months, if even.
BTT: OP, your gameplan should revolve around getting a group and softcapping STR with gear (then go about wounds and the other stuff), and getting crit/avoidance/(depending on format: RD/CW).

TLDR: A slayer is only as good as his group (= hold true since live), trying to lonewolf-snowflake around with this class is asinine ~ especially given the implementation [its a general issue] on RoR. Premature ragedump is a pughabit, even moreso on RoR where there is little-to-no difference in staying berserk or ragedumping - outside of (solo)roam that is. The most potent burst/assist hits you precisely when you are in Beserk, stuff continues to tick extremely high even post-ragedump and morales don't care about your mitigation either way = might aswell pull through and only ragedump if it really is necessary and if you can follow it up with LoS/kiting to allow your healers to actually capitalize on it and stabilize you properly.
Last but not least: No amount of stats/gear can help you survive proper assisttrains. WoP *cough*

Positioning + awareness > gear, as it comes to sustain on every class - but especially SL/CH.

Hi Slayers,
Have full ruin, merc and anni. Any advice on what to equip?

Go by crit>str/melpw>strikethrough*>avoidance==wounds>ini>ws, pick two pieces of ruin and two pieces of merc, rest whatever you have access to - if anni is all you have access to, grab whatever anni piece has the shinies on it (note: the toughness setbonus is neglible however, so are the resis boni). Note: Anni is a rather lackluster set all things considered, and is only really useful for the mastery point; to enable high RR specs at RR50/60.

Abbd.:

Spoiler:

*Yes. Even though you have Rampage, strikethrough is your friend; look at what levels of true avoidance enemy mdps can reach (and how they do it) and at what levels of strikethrough you can reach - if it comes for free, with little to no tradeoff, pick it up.
Preventing mdps to get returns from their avoidance is pretty crucial in terms of dps, but also utility. You really, really don't want your utility (HD,SL,EB,NS,KD,...) to be parried! If you can manage to get 7%ish parry strikethrough you basically negate ~10RRs(?) spent on parry stack. Furthermore, preventing enemies from reaching the magic 20% and 30% avoidance tresholds (pre-buff) is always a good thing (it is a bit trickier for destro, given IB parrybuff <3).
Having reasonable levels of stickiness without Rampage is key to properly building momentum (Rampage means ragedump, outside of PT specs - ragedumps kill your dps), it'll average out and grant you more pewpew than the strength would, that you at times lose if you pick the strikethrough.
TLDR: Strikethrough is a tool you use to bash mdps, not tanks - tanks you let implode via NS.

[Grock]

I could do the same and write some text for every line of yours but honestly thats a waste of time.

Not everything you say is true, many things we both say are up to discussion.
What i suggest i tried myself, playing solo/pug all the way through T3 and T4 without guards/healers, without good talismans and potions, all while the opponents i faced were rr60+ with full officer/lair/influence gear (and after i returned - conqueror/beastlord/genesis/purple weapons) believe me i know what im talking about.

Once again - pay more attention to what people say in their posts.
I didn't say anything about solo roaming, i didn't say anything about coordinated play, i didn't say anything about "proper" build and role of a slayer.
I gave a suggestion on how to survive in current T4 PUG environment, nothing more.

You are talking to yourself

p.s. do you play slayer? can i ask the name?
p.p.s. my math is fine

[Toshutkidup]

You can do what I did at the start, Wear what you have, mix match for Str cap bonuses when available. Then do alot of ORvR, save conq medals for better gear or do SC's ( I didnt ), Get Genesis Pieces when you win and equip. You can also do the Haste jewels quest ( as I did ) and just keep at it.

Not much help, but grinding is best advice I can give..

[Tamarlan]

Thanks for your support, highly appreciated.

Decided to mix 2 merc items, 2 ruin items and the inf +2 crit boots. Results in capped strength and +5 crit.

[Aehnur]

Hello guys, i'm currently leveling my slayer (cr37). I'm full Ruin and doing epic quests. Wich of those weapons would you recommand ?
I was also checking jewelery : would you consider The Blood-soaked Sigils and Great Oathstones good options ? Or is aa haste garbage when dual-wielding ?

[TenTonHammer]

Is wild gambit ever worth running in y'all's eyes?

[nebelwerfer]

I reckon Wild gambit is a great tradeoff but you need good rage management since toughness is the only defence you got when red.

And for the epic weapons and token unlocks i remember i used red carnage(emp quest 2h mace with crit proc) with the two rings that give a lot of wounds+oathstones.
Tactics were push for more(haste) and +fierce might(more crit dmg, works best with more wounds).
Idk if the weapon procc stacks with fierce might but it should afaik. I had some good times with that. Just my 2c, i am no Expert