Tier 4 Surge Deathblade Build Guide

Last Updated:November 12, 2024|Changelog

Welcome to the Tier 4 Surge Deathblade Build Guide! This build revolves around generating Surge Stacks with multi-hit skills during Death Trance (Z) state to release an insane burst of damage with your Surge skill. After using Surge, your Death Orbs are refunded so you can repeat the stacking cycle instantly.

Surge Deathblade struggles to inflict reliable amounts of Stagger and Destruction, but compensates by bringing incredible amounts of potential damage to the table.

Pros

Good defense
Good mobility
Stylish Gameplay

Cons

Positional gameplay
Melee
High APM
Reliant on Party

Tips

If you're unsure when to transition, our Ark Passive Breakpoints guide could help you decide whether you should return to the Tier 3 Guide or continue.
Want a different twist on the playstyle around the Surge skill? Check out our Remaining Energy guide.
For more information on some of the systems that make up your build, check out the guides below:
- Ark Passive Guide
- Gem Guide
- Engraving Guide
- Bracelet Guide
- Elixir Guide
- Transcendence Guide

Builds

Raids

Kurzan Front

Skills Setup

Surge (Z) is your main damage skill. It's used after reaching 60 Surge Stacks to deal massive damage with a front slash.
Blade Dance, Turning Slash and Blitz Rush are your secondary damage skills as well as Surge stackers.
Earth Cleaver is your Counter as well as your only Destruction point.
Maelstrom is used as passive stack generation as well as Maelstrom party-buff provider.
Wind Cut and Surprise Attack are your main Surge stackers. Surprise Attack also applies Synergy.
Spincutter is a flexible mobility skill that also serves as a secondary Synergy and Surge stacker.
Deathly Slash is often used every other cycle, either to generate or recover Surge Stacks.

Skills Setup

Soul Absorber and Blitz Rush are your main Elite killers.
Death Sentence, Twin Shadows, Moonlight Sonic and Turning Slash all have decent AoE and damage to kill lesser monsters.
Maelstrom buffs your move and attack speed for faster skills, and generate Death Orbs faster to utilize Surge.
Spincutter serves as a mobility skill and to break Floor 3 crystals quickly.

Recommended Engravings

Preemptive Strike
Contender
Raid Captain
Cursed Doll
Magick Stream

Warning

This build is optimized and meant to be used only in Kurzan Front. For Ebony Cube please use a Raid build.

Identity & Gameplay

This build focuses on dealing massive amounts of burst damage repeatedly by quickly gathering 60 Surge Stacks during the Death Trance state and then using Surge. To achieve this, you cycle between low-cooldown, multi-hit skills that generate many stacks.

Limit Break doubles the damage of the skill if you cast Surge at 60 stacks.

Activating Death Trance (Z) grants you the following effects, based on the amount of orbs:

10/15/20% Attack Speed
10% Move Speed
8/16/24% Attack Power
50% Cooldown Reduction on activation

All attacks with a Back Attack affix receive +10% Crit Rate and +5% Damage when they land on the target's back-side indicator. It is important to position yourself accordingly as much as possible to take advantage of this.

Deathblade Identity

Rotation

Bear in mind that the rotations shown here aren't always achievable. You can and will need to improvise when you fail skills or in other scenarios when you aren't able to reach the proper amount of stacks in time.

Example #1 - Wind Cut pre-cast

Example #2 - No Wind Cut pre-cast

Example #3 - Blade Assault burst

Example #4 - Death Slash

Example Rotation #1

For this rotation, you need to quickly enter Death Trance (Z) mode after casting Wind Cut. This will allow you to get ~4 stacks and also the cooldown reduction on Wind Cut for faster stack generation.
In this rotation, you don't need to use Spincutter for stacks, so you can treat it as a mobility/recovery skill.
- Your only Synergy in this case comes from Surprise Attack so avoid missing it.
Earth Cleaver can be skipped if Blade Dance and Blitz Rush are off cooldown, since the stacks aren't required (unless you missed some hits).
You can use Surge just as you finish casting Surprise Attack, since the stacks will reach 60 before the skill hits.

Example Rotation #2

This rotation is generally used if you had to cast Wind Cut late in your previous cycle, as it won't be available for the pre-cast rotation.
Your Spincutter and Surprise Attack apply your Synergy, remember to keep it up at all times.
You can use Surge just as you finish casting Surprise Attack since the stacks will reach 60 before the skill hits.

Example Rotation #3

This rotation is ideal for burst scenarios as it does a bit more damage than your regular rotation. You want to use Atropine Potion right before your first Surge lands.
Your Spincutter and Surprise Attack apply your Synergy, remember to keep it up at all times.
You can use Surge just as you finish casting Surprise Attack since the stacks will reach 60 before the skill hits.

Example Rotation #4

This rotation is ideal for burst scenarios as it does a bit more damage than your regular rotation. You want to use Atropine Potion right before your first Surge lands.
You can alternatively use Blitz Rush instead of Blade Dance and skip Earth Cleaver, but this has the potential to Surge at 59 stacks if you don't wait for Maelstrom's last tick.
You can use Surge just as you finish casting Surprise Attack since the stacks will reach 60 before the skill hits.

Gems

Gems are another significant aspect of your build, as they directly impact the damage and cooldowns of your skills. You can equip up to 11 gems at a time. Here are the ones you should focus on in order to maximize this build's potential, listed according to their priority.

Damage Gems

Surge
Blitz Rush
Blade Dance
Turning Slash
Earth Cleaver

Cooldown Gems

Wind Cut
Surprise Attack
Blade Dance
Blitz Rush
Earth Cleaver
Spincutter*

*Note: Spincutter Cooldown gem is technically useless, since you shouldn't be using this skill more than once per cycle. You can replace it with a Wind Cut Damage gem for a very small dmg gain.

Engravings

Engravings are a core part of your build. You can equip up to five at a time, freely swapping between them.

Recommended Setup

Grudge
Keen Blunt Weapon
Adrenaline
Ambush Master
Cursed Doll

Alternative Setup

Grudge
Keen Blunt Weapon
Adrenaline
Ambush Master
Raid Captain

Engravings Information

Raid Captain has the potential to be stronger than Cursed Doll, but it requires a mix of external sources of Move Speed as well as considerate use of your Maelstrom skill.
- You need both Vernese Wine (3%) and Stronghold Feast (5%), as well as landing at least 63% of your damage inside the Dark Order window, which only lasts 6 seconds.
- You can utilize a Rage rune to further boost the efficiency, but the trigger chance is very low.

Bracelet

Bracelets provide beneficial effects to yourself or to your party members depending on the rolls they have.

The primary goal is to get the main stats used by this build - Specialization and Crit. After that, you should be aiming for Special Rolls to get more damage. Please note that this system is heavily reliant on RNG, and you should not expect to get much more beyond your main stats early on.

Optimal Bonus Rolls

Specialization
Crit
Ambush
Circulate
Fervor
Precise
Hammer + Wedge

Alternative Bonus Rolls

Superiority
Hammer (without Wedge)
Wedge (without Hammer)
Assail
Weapon Power
Dexterity

Elixir

The recommended Elixir Set for this build is Master.

Credits

Written by Sekwah
Reviewed by Perciculum