Enemy gains 1-4 Stacks of Soulblaze on Critical Hit.
2.5-4% Bonus Critical Chance on Chained Hit. Stacks 5 times.
2 Shots on Critical Hit. 2-5% Ranged Crit Chance.
This written section is still a work in progress, and I will get around to finishing the guide in the coming days, but the setup shown above is ready to use.
2-Handed Force Sword Disclaimer!
A lot of this might be common knowledge based on game testers' info, which I honestly don't know much about, but after spending an hour in the meatgrinder checking both weapon marks and blessing/talent interactions for them, here's some quick info I could gather.
When aiming for weakspots with the special attack (especially larger enemies), it might be required to aim a bit further down towards the torso as the special attack otherwise has a high chance of going through enemies' heads without registering a hit. The special attack does NOT grant stacks of shred, nor does it refresh the timer of it. Despite this, the special attack seems to benefit from shred if the melee attack shooting the wave hits an enemy before the buff falls off.
The special slice attack does NOT count for true aim consumption on either sword, regardless of level of charge used on the attack. Furthermore, the blazing spirit blessing does NOT trigger on the special attack crits either, also regardless of charge.
This might seem like it would invalidate the entire build and especially the soulblaze angle, but the damage of a 3-charge attack that crits can go to numbers above 2000. On top of that the attack seems to have infinite cleave and a large enough hitbox to clip enemies around corners, making it a strong tool to catch fleeing or hiding specialists. Using the special attack while in melee does require some foresight as getting hit at any time between pressing the special action keybind and sending the attack will result in the special attack being cancelled and all charges dropping, as with other force swords. In general, the special attack is best used to clear/stagger an incoming horde mixed with elites, or to stagger a group of shooters allowing you to close the distance safely for your melee onslaught.
Soulblaze and Crits
The reason for all the soulblaze is to create a crit-burn feedback loop, not unlike the zealot crit-bleed loop. Usage of scrier's gaze will be more detailed in the gameplay section, but hypothetically using the ability for its critical chance and opening with the sword on a horde you will eventually crit (or kill an elite for PC) and apply soulblaze. Hitting this or any other enemy suffering from soulblaze will trigger souldrinker, giving us extra 5% crit. At this point shred should also be stacked sufficiently for the maximum crit bonus of 20%. Counting everything will on paper have you comfortably sitting on 65% critical strike chance or higher. With all the finesse bonuses from the sword itself, as well as scrier's gaze and disrupt destiny maxed out, all enemies in the game except monstrosities can theoretically be one-shot with the stabbing heavy attack as long as it lands a critical weakspot hit. Maulers, Crushers, and Bulwarks will most likely require 2 hits as those one-shots only happen under perfect circumstances (max stacks of malefic momentum, max peril for warp rider, SG and DD stacks maxed, and pulling a crit for every enemy).
Weapon and Curio Setup
Sword blessings are optional to a certain point here. Crit chance on dodge is a strong alternative for shred, ultimately coming down to playstyle. Finesse on dodge is also good, trading some crit chance for increased damage potential. Personal preference is king in this game, however I found in my testing of aurics that soulblaze/crit downtime was significantly shorter at the start of battle when I could generate crit chance without relying on enemies' actions. Dump stat is mobility as no significant benefits are gained by speccing into the last 20%. As you might have noticed, for this build I opted not to take deflector on the force sword. This can be changed instead of say shred, and is the proper choice if you want to be sure of your own survival through defensive gameplay. The talent kinetic deflection in itself provides an extreme increase to durability, and coupling this with either deflector or some block efficiency on curios will not only make you stupidly tanky, it also increases your chances of rescuing allies (whenever you are reviving or rescuing someone you are technically in a "blocking" state).
Talking about ranged weapons there is some room for variation, again depending on preference. The voidblast (Trauma) staff has the biggest aoe for applying soulblaze through crits. The cc provided by the secondary attack and penetration against armored enemies with rending shockwaves is also extremely valuable in those clown car carapace moments, or when the director decides to introduce you to 40-fucking-ragers. Dump stat for trauma staff is quell speed, the sword will handle all quelling through the talent by crack of bone. Alternatively you can choose warp-resistance as dump stat if your goal is to reach high peril fast. For perks, carapace and flak to make sure 1-2 attacks bring enemies into sword lethal range.
The elektrokinetic staff offers solid cc for dual targets and synergizes extremely well with the crit nature of the build due to its own crit multipliers. On this staff you can use surge, warp nexus, and warp flurry, the choice here being whether you want warp flurry for more focus on the secondary attack or surge for insane target picking potential at infinite range with the fast fire bolts. Dump stats here follow the same principle as the trauma staff. For perks it is viable to go +5% crit and either unyielding or carapace, but this is not strictly required.
Voidstrike staff in this build needs to have surge and blazing spirit. Coupling this with true aim and the Mk VI's strikedown attacks, every single missile you fire with the staff will fire twice and apply soulblaze to all targets provided you swap back and forth between your weapons. Going for this staff gives us a very strong and much needed long-range option. It is extremely fun, but will require more careful positioning to achieve the same utility that the trauma staff brings in close-quarter situations. For perks this staff is the most flexible, allowing you to go for bonus damage on enemies, more crit to secure machine-gun tap fire, or even stamina. Personally I like to go flak and carapace to handle the before-mentioned clown cars. As with the other staffs, dump stats are either quell speed or warp resistance.
Personally, I wouldn't go with the inferno staff in this build as we are already operating with semi limited ranged options. It does completely bypass the waiting time of getting soulblaze procs which is also nice with the stagger the primary attack brings, but as stated it severely harms ranged damage output.
For curios, +3 stamina, and double 17% toughness. Extra toughness gives us good defense in melee, block efficiency helps with preserving stamina and making kinetic deflection even better. Gunner resistance and ability cooldown reduction help round the curios out, but can be changed depending on preference. Psykinetic's aura does wonders for your ability uptime when in the middle of a fight and can fill the gap if you opt for something other than 4% cdr on curios.
Talents
For this build Soulstealer and Quietude both perform well.
