Build:Dragon Age Reaver

Dragon Age Reaver is a Character Build in Outward, created by AstinusTheChronicler.

Summary

Dragon Age Reaver
This build is a claymore magic build inspired by the Reaver specialization from the Dragon Age games, using vampiric attacks and blood magic to kill enemies while healing yourself.
Breakthroughs			Required Faction

Equipment
Weapon	Off-Hand	Head	Body	Boots	Backpack
Molepig Sigh	Enkindle	Order of Discipline	Economy	Speed and Efficiency

Quickslots
1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8

Full Build Details

The Reaver uses vampiric weapons combined with the Infuse Blood ability provided through the Blue Chamber, to get a decay damage, extreme poison and extreme bleeding-inflicting blade, that restores a Whopping 20% of its damage as health to the wielder. Bloodlust also grants the reaver the ability to restore burnt health, mana and stamina upon slaying foes.

This build allows you to take an aggressive stance with most encounters as your healing will far surpass the damage being dealt by enemies in most cases.

You will also complete the game with a wellspring of health and mana to draw on thanks to Well of Mana, and Blood of Giants and Ancestors Memories Acquired from the Blue Chamber Questline.

Take Breakthough Points in:

RuneSage (internalized Lexicon)
Cabal Hermit (Sigil of Wind)
Hexmage (Blood Sigil)

When at a ley line, invest 3 points in mana for a total 60 + 40 + 25 + 20 = 145 mana. Be sure to get Efficiency and Fitness from the speedster and spellblade trainers respectively. Complete the Ash giants quest as best possible to receive the blood of Giants passive for +40 health Be kind and have faith in Roland Argenson throughout your questing to receive the Ancestors' memories passive for +25 Mana.

Finally Acquire the Peacemaker elixir from the final blue chamber quest.

This should give you:

170 Health
130 Stamina
145 Mana

Early on in the game, you can construct scourge cocoons and sleep in them to increase you corruption level, then use Cleanse to acquire Dark stones. Make sure you have bandages on hand and use runic heal to restore health if you use this method. You can also use Mana Ward immediately before using Cleanse to avoid cleanse's damage.

Prepare for fights by buffing with Bless, Possessed, Mist, Rage and discipline(optional)

cast Runic Protection, Infuse Blood on your Vampiric Greatsword, then cast runic heal, and reapply Runic Protection. If available keep and eye out for human corpse graves and skeletal remains to use reveal soul to restore mana (spark) or conjure a ghost (conjure).

Get to max lock-on range of an enemy.
Place a rune trap on the ground.
Cast runic lightning twice,
Draw you weapon you can start a combo once they trip the rune trap, and keep the enemy staggered until knocked down.
Use pommel counter to block their next attack an apply confusion.
Continue chaining combos that start with a sweep kick, push kick or mana push.
Between the extreme poison, extreme bleeding and healing you receive, you should make short work of your enemies.

Realistically this will be enough to deal with most enemies, but for tougher opponents use Sigil of blood and Conjure in the onset of the battle to summon up a blood turret. it will target enemies every second with consistent damage AND impact, and with the right timing you can capitalize on your enemies low stability to chain combos without using other openers.

A few tips when using Blood sigil:

Try to fight over the sigil as much as possible, to benefit from Blood tendrils effect when using Mana push

Use Conjure immediately after using Sigil of blood to get the most out of the turrets 30second duration, using it again will resummon/reset the turret.

The sigil lasts 60 seconds but the turret will endure after the sigil is gone, thus it is a good idea to recast conjure often, especially when the sigil is about to run out. the stagger provided by the sigil will provide cover for placing another blood sigil if necessary.

Use the Stagger provided by the Blood Turret to switch weapons, take potions, or close in and maul bosses and more dangerous foes.
After a fight, if time persist on the sigil and you are tainted, Use mana push, conjure and mana ward on the sigil to increase your corruption level to corrupted, then use cleanse to conserve/acquire Dark stones.

Archer Hybrid Variant

This build also has an archer variant using the Vampiric Bow. (see Below)

Prepare for a fight with runic protection, runic lantern, Discipline, Rage, Bless, mist, and Possessed Boons.

Place a runic trap on the ground.
Use the first word of runic lightning.
Start with sniper shot, then evasion shot.
Cast the second word of runic lightning and Srafing run (if available)
Cast shim
Continue firing arrows until the enemy is over the runic trap,
When they snag the trap cast shim again to trigger the runic detonator.
Continue firing and using rune magic until the enemies are down. or cast runic blade or great runic blade to finish them off.

Once strafing run is available, you can swap out the egoth rune.

Again, for heavier enemies use the blood turret. The combined ranged arsenal of blood turret runic lightning and the enchanted bow can be very powerful and allow you to whittle down powerful enemies with ease.

You can also use all available sigils (fire, wind and blood) with archery to deal devastating ranged damage with a vampiric bow, a ghost for tanking, a blood turret, etereal bolt and lightning spark (close range) from a wind sigil, and fireball from a fire sigil. This is done by replacing the arrow/reload with spark and placing a fire sigil over the wind sigil; a loadout I call the Firing Squad(see below).

you will need to cast the sigils from the menu, either at the onset of the fight or while the enemy is stagger-stunned by the blood turret.

To get the most out of this build ...

You will need to take heed of the fact that this claymore is one of the slowest weapons in the game, so you will need to be able to start chain combos with Sweep kick, Push kick or mana Push to keep the enemy staggered for best results. Also use runic trap, runic detonator, runic lightning and blood turret to keep the enemies stability low before starting stagger combos.

Also the Vampiric Claymore has (slightly) reduce range/swing radius compared to other claymores, so try to start combos right up close to the target.

And don't forget; you are a runesage, and can summon a Great Runic Blade to make short work of enemies with high physical resistance, like gargoyles and scarlet emissaries, and infuse it with blood for the vampiric effects.

Some of the important items you need are ...

For Boss fights:

Cannon Pistol
Chimaera Pistol
Shatter Bullet
Steel Sabre or Cerulean sabre with Rainbow Hex enchant

Start the fight with a canon pistol loaded with shatter bullet and the cerulean/steel sabre equipped. fire the gun then use blood sigil and conjure.

As a general rule, at the start of the fight, it is always a good idea to apply confusion with the cannon pistol/Shatter bullet, elemental vulnerability with the chimaera Pistol, stack hits with the Sabre to apply each hex to the boss, then use torment. This will deal 120- 200 damage and apply weakened, sapped, burning, poison, slow and bleeding.

This will reduce the bosses elemental damage by 65%, physical damage by 40%, and increase your magic damage by 50% and physical damage by 25%. Remember to use the stagger window from Blood Turret to switch weapons to your claymore. Keep using torment whenever it is available throughout the fight for free damage and to reapply negative effects.