Well when i start play soul hound i don't even know what dyes i can use..
It's really op class but really hard to play :P
So i make this guide for players that don't know how to play soul hound i hope help!
1. INTRODUCTION
Okey before I start with the guide i want to be clear, I do not care how you play what you do etc. this is how i play it, and believe me you it does work properly.
Before i continue with the guide i would like to explain some words that i am going to use:
Miracle - a movie...
Over Powered (OP) - Thats what you are being called, when you own your oppoenent really hard.
Noob - That is what you are called by the dead guy who you just killed that cannot admit defeat.
One-Button-Character - Characters that use around 4 skills during their play.
Runner - That is what you get called when your opponent is angry that you have escaped to avoid your death, and usually when you come back and kill him you are called a Noob
Now before you even think of creating a kamael you must chose your server. Avoid playing on servers that the max encahnt is more than +16, this makes your class and some other classes useless, because the land rate of the debuffs would be quite low, those servers are designed for nukers/tanks, not for kamaels.
So why Soul Hounds ?
It is pretty clear that in Lineage every class has an anti class (assume that both players can play well in their classes), Soul Hounds however got, okey not none but very few anti-classes. During my experience with some private servers i have seen statements from pathetic players which look like this "I play my Soul Hound as a mage." , "How do you play your Soul Hound as a fighter or as a Mage?", this just makes you laugh. Soul Hound is hybrid class, what it means is that it has both mele and magic skills. You do NOT play that class as only one - for example use only mage skills(this is such a waste of skills), just the opposite, you use different skills in different situations. Soul Hounds, and not only them but all the kamael characters are quite flexible, what i mean is that you need a bit of brain to use them (to be clear i definately state that for Tricksters and Soul Hounds, after this guide i will look deeply into Doombringers).
But still, why soul hound?
It doesn't metter the game you play, Aion/Tantra Online/ZX Online all possible MMORPG games that you can think of right now, if your character doesn't have one of the following: stun/immobilization (hold/sleep/paralyze) your character is useless (silence does help but in different occasions). Soul Hounds however have them all, except for the sleep.
2. Character specification
2.1 Male or Female
Once you reach the character creation screen, and presumably you would like to make a kamael soul hound, you should be careful which one you pick - Male or Female. Unlike the other races, the two genders have different skills:
Female:
1. Warp - teleports you in some distance (forward)
2. Ultimate Escape - increases your moving speed/evasion
Male
1. Rush - Rushes into your target
2. Sword Shield - Greatly increases your P.Def.
Now this is quite tricky, both are good BUT personally i would suggest male one, because I would rather be sure that i ll take less damage than hoping to avoid a hit. Warp, however, is good vs mele characters like daggers/tanks/warlords, but having in mind that both genders have Hard March which increase the moving speed, the escape of them is quite easy. Anyways I still go for female one because of the good looking.
2.2 Dyes
As many of you know, kamaels got low Con, which means they are vulnarable to stun attacks. Also non of the S grade Light Armor give stun resistance, which makes it even worse. So what dyes i suggest:
+4 Con -4Str - This will not only boost your HP but resistance to stun and mental attacks as well (Check my Trickster guide at the beginning how to avoid stun attacks). Str is not that needed because you mainly use skills just like daggers do.
+4 Wit -4Int - Now something that i missed to mention before, for all classes the more M.att you have the bigger chance you have for debuff land(hex, death mark you just name it). Having -4Int does decrease your M.att but from the other hand having +4wit increase your casting speed, which is a MUST when we are talkinga bout Soul Hounds.
What dyes you must NOT put:
+4 Dex -4 Con
+4 Dex -4 Str
+4 Con -4 Dex
+4 Str - 4 Con
Decreasing Con means decreasing your chances of survival. Increasing Dex, well yes you ll have a bit more critical rate that you do not really need, about +2-4 Speed, which is unnecessery as well and a bit more evasion that you do not really need because Soul Hound's evasion is not that big.
2.3 Weapons
Now I have seen the majority of Soul Hounds playing with +Focus weapons. Now let me be clear, you are not playing on low rate server(if you do you must have Focus weapon for easy pve play), so +Focus will not get you anywhere on a High rate server, what you need is +Health, you can easily get 12k HP, a little bit less/more (depends) than Elf Tank which makes you a BEAST. Having a mage weapon... well honestly if you are not that good player you do not need one, but if you are a proper good player you ll need one. I ll explain later why and when.
3. Skills
I ll present you "NEXT TARGET" button(lol). I suggest every mele class(warlord/doombringer/tanks/daggers/soul hound/dwarfs/destroyers/tyrants, did i miss any ?) MUST have next target on their skill bar. In pvp every millisecond counts, losing time on targeting someone is pathetic so here comes "NEXT TARGET". Have you ever had that problem, when you are running away from a Doombringer and you cannot just target him ? Well yeah you just one click "NEXT TARGET" and t here you go.
IF YOU DO NOT USE "ENTER CHAT" Option stop reading now, what it means is that you are one of those One-Button-Character lovers. This class is not for you. There are a lot of skills to be used, and from my previous guide i had several pms asking me how the hell do i manage to use that many skills... well it is quite simple. I personally can use from 1-7 from F1-F7, others to 12 i leave for self buffs or skills that i use just in one particular situation. But still 14 buttons are not enough + losing time to move ur hand on the NumPad is unnecessery. What i do is I open my option menu for Enter Chat keys, and i change all my NumPad Keys. For example:
NumPad (Keyboard 1) - Q
NumPad (Keyboard 2) - W etc...
So thats how you can use at least 18 keys easily.
Now skills, I ll devide them in 3 groups( I will not list the skills and description like the previous guide, its too much time consuming) so like 1st ones must be at the most convinient buttons, then 2nd then 3rd:
1.Main - Skills that you use all the time no matter the situation
2.Usable - Debuffs
3.Buffs - I think this one is clear
In "Main" i put the following Skills: Death Mark (you just start with this skill all the time), checkmate, Shining Edge, Tripple Thrust/ Soul Of Pain, Soul Cleance (THOSE ARE like ... MAIN MAIN). Following are also main but not that used as the previous ones: Soul Vortex, Soul Vortex Extinction, Soul Strike, Annihiltion Circle, Curse of Divinity (those are mainly the mage skills).
In "Usable" i put the following Skills: Soul Web, Voice bind, Shadow Bind, Blink, Dark Flame, Lightning Strike, Pride of the Kamael (this is buff, but you ll use it quite often), Steal Divinity.
In "Buffs" i put the following Skills: Dark Weapon, Dark Shield, Lightning Barrier, PainKiller,Curse of Life Flow (Only for olympiads)
NB: I might have missed some i ll correct myself whenever i feel like it.
Skills that you must NOT use:
Leopid - Slow Cast
Surrender to the Unholy - It is effective I have to admit but not as much as you think.I would rather strike another hit than losing time casting it unless the target is away and is a mele character.
4. PvP Hints
As I mentioned before every class has an anti-class. If you are good Soul Hound player, you must not have difficulties at all vs ANY and i mean it ANY class. Also when you make a pvp you must always have a backside thought - "I must NOT die", run / escape / hide use the surrounding (GEODATA), heal up go back, let them call you whatever you like, at the end you are the one who wins not them.
Friendly Classes to kill
1. Tanks
2. Daggers
3. Dwarfs? Don't ask me why do i even mention them
4. Tyrants / Gladiators
5. Titans
6. Mages
7. Doombringers
Hard classes to kill
1. Archers
2. Other Soul Hounds
Daggers/Tanks/Duelists/Tyrants/Dwarfs/ Titans: Its quite simple, doesn't metter what class you fight vs you must always start your fight with Death Mark (may be except for one i ll explain later) NOT with Steal Divinity (you will only overbuff). If your Death Mark lands then you have bigger chance to land debuffs. Use mainly your magic skills (Swap wepaon to mage weapon if you are that good but you must bare in mind that you eventually will have to swap again to rappier which will slow you down so I strongly recommand use only rappier if you are not that fast) and Shadow Bind that holds your target. Kamaels are fast characters so vs tanks even without Shadow Bind will be still fine. Against daggers however, they got escape shackles, unfortunately ES has bigger cool-down than Shadow Bind so that shouldn't be a problem to keep them hold during the whole time and just use magic skills to own them. Even if they come close to you use Blink which has a chance to stun them and that teleports you far from your target and again continue using magic skills. Same applies to Duelists and Tyrants, they do have range skills but with 12k hp and that less dmg that they do compared with your magic skills you will be the 1st one to get them dead. Tanks can be annoying using ultimate defence/vengence/bla bla, just use Steal Divinity and get that self buff from them, remove it with alt +left click if necessery and continue. DO NOT FORGET TO USE SOUL CLEANSE WHEN YOU HAVE A DEBUFF ON YOU. When they hit the ground you might see the following words:
Over Powered (OP) orrr Noob. Neither you are overpowered, nor you are a newb, actually you have done your job quite well.
Doombringers - Again use death mark, use shadow bind, if they do not land... you do NOT attack you run... until they are ready to be applied again. If he uses Soul Cleance you use them again. One your opponent is on hold DO NOT RUN far from him, stay in close range so he cannot hit you and he cannot rush to you (thats about ... one character size distance) and use ur magic skills.
Mages - Normally they start with Surrender To Xxxxxx then Vortex, 1st thing you do is use Soul Cleance, after removing those debuffs death mark, try Voice Bind, and use checkmate/shining edge/ and either tripple thrust or Soul of Pain (you will do more dmg with tripple Thrust but you might remove his target with Soul of Pain). I have seen many players just using checkmate and Shining edge, on a normal server, there is about 1 second delay between each skill, so you should not lose that second but instead use a 3rd skill as I mentioned before.
My Death Mark didn't land and my Voice Bind didn't land as well what do i do?
Well you do not RUSH into them and hope for the Miracle it will just not happen. You run away try again with death mark, then run away and try again, if you get slowed or w/e use soul Cleance, once landed rush into them and use them 3 skills I mentioned above. If you see that Blue Ball going around their upper boddies(Enlightment), it means that if you do not escape in the next 1-2 seconds you will be dead, so you use Blink and run until Enlightment is off, and then back to them. They can call Runner, well I normally stick to one phrase "Ignorance is a bliss", if at the end of the fight I am the one who is standing, then i am satisfied.
Archers: Okey, they got high criticals, they got fast moving speed, and they have stun shot. So this is like ... 50/50. Use death mark if it lands ok... if not use painkiller right afterwards and wait for the death mark to land again, do not use any skills because u ll stop the painkiller's effect, instead try to get as close as possible to your target, once close enough use death mark, shadow bind. In this case I do suggest using Soul of Pain instead of Tripple Thrust, because it will remove their target and plus that archers do not have that much m.def. If they are running away... well you have rush/warp so this wouldn't be a problem as well.
How do you kill a Soul Hound?
Well high elemental dmg(from mages) is an option but still it is not a 100 % win. Anchor (Necromancers), yes but still not 100 % win, because Soul Hounds have lightning barrier as well and 12k hp and high m.def so its definately not 100 % win. What is the only thing that can actualy bring you 100 % win against Soul Hound is... silence. Once silenced Soul Hounds cannot use their magic skills - Soul Cleance (to remove their debuffs), Death Mark, so if Death Mark cannot be used they cannot use Checkmate as well, all magic skills are useless, so what they are left with is... SHining Edge and Tripple Thrust.
5. Conclusion
So yeah, overall Soul Hounds are quite good characters but as I said before if you cannot play with that many buttons well then the problem is with you not with the character. I do hope you enjoyed my second guide, and that you learned something new.
