I'm doing a blade build at the moment. Do you have any tips? It seems like I just run around swinging hoping I kill everything before I take too much damage.
I'm use a
mod to uncap XY ground/air velocity , which restores movement to its pre patch 1.3 state. This enables you to move very fast with Maneuvering System:
Attributes:
16 Body
18 Reflexes
16 Intelligence
18 Cool
3 Technical Ability
Perks and Cyberware:
https://nukesdragons.com/cyberpunk-2077/character?v=1&a=gig3i&s=gggiiigg33ii&p=ab1aa1a91ak1ai2a42ag3ah1al3a62a31c22c93c62c72cg2c32cf2c42ca2c82c51c01cc1sk1sf1s12r91q93q23q41q01qb3q12qd2qe1qf3q71pd2pe2b03ba3b13b23b83bc1be2b72b32bf2b51p11p21s81&i=oc4oz2l34l14l72f74f24f14n04n52c94c73c01i14i24g04g54g43s02s24&n=Digital Spellsword
Concept:
Use Maneuvering System to Kerensikov in the air as well as on the ground. While Kerensikov is active, Jinchu-Maru doubles your crit rate to about 80%. Legendary Short Circuit has a passive effect that triggers its damage on every blade crit and it has no internal cooldown. This crit proc is no joke - it makes up well over half your strong attack burst damage (and 5 or 6 times your normal attack damage). The burst will reliably kill, which will proc Heal on Kill cyberware, which is how you survive in patch 1.5 post armour nerf.
Kerensikov mechanics:
Kerensikov disables dodging and jumping for its active duration. However, if you have Maneuvering System, you can activate Kerensikov in the air. If you do this you can jump and dodge immediately upon touching the ground. Use this to move safely between enemies and chain short circuit procs. You can get in 3 procs per Kerensikov (more if you have an opportunity to cleave).
See
0:14 and
2:39. You will see this a lot throughout the video. This is how you do it:
Sprint and jump towards your target. Do not double jump. While in the air, activate Kerensikov by blocking + dodging towards your target. You will be dive bombing them (kinda). You can block + dodge while holding a strong attack. When you get in melee range, let go of left click to release your defensive/strong attack. As soon as you touch the ground, jump then dodge towards the next target and use defensive attack or strong + normal/normal + normal if you can cleave.
If you do it right you can jump and dodge twice while Kerensikov is active (3 times if you count the initial jump + block + dodge).
Defensive attack has a narrow hithox and very short range so you will whiff unless you are point blank. Use it always while moving or dodging forwards. Air normals have a pretty wide hitbox. If doing normal + normal, try to do it in the air.
Kerensikov is the only way to change or reverse direction in mid air. To do this you block + dodge in any direction other than your velocity vector. See
8:13 and
11:52.
Bugs:
These are new in patch 1.5:
If you enter a melee finisher or death/revive animation (via Second Heart) at the same time that Kerensikov's duration starts or ends, the time dilation will immediately end and the finisher/death/revive animation will playback at 10% speed. See
20:04. You cannot move or do anything until the animation cycle completes. This is guaranteed to get you killed. The only way to survive this is to die and revive with Second Heart (see
9:00) or get lucky and not have lots of enemies shooting at you when you get animation locked (see
16:23). This also occurs with Sandevistan, which I don't recommend using because it doubles the chance you run into this bug and you lose over half your burst damage anyway.
Until it gets fixed, you just have to avoid doing strong attacks right as Kerensikov is about to end.
Leveling guide:
Since gig order is different now, I have to do another playthrough to get the new leveling order down. Until then this is tentative/provisional.
I recommend playing on Very Hard from the beginning because you get more exp and level up faster, but the early game will be quite unforgiving.
Start with 6 Reflexes, 6 Intelligence and 4 Cool.
Act 1 goals:
1) Take Blades -> Flight of the Sparrow 2/2
2) Level up Engineering/Breach Protocol/Quickhacking to 2 and Street Brawler/Athletics/Ninjutsu to 3 for a total of +6 perk points
3) Take Breach Protocol -> Advanced Datamining 2/2
4) Get Reflexes to 8 and take Blades -> Shifting Sands 3/3
5) Get Intelligence to 7 and take Quickhacking -> Daisy Chain 3/3
6) Get 12 Street Cred and about 12k eddies then grab Stephenson Tech MK2 from Dr Chrome, or Dynalar Sandevistan MK2 from Cassius Ryder and go to Instant Implants in Kabuki to pick up some Sandevistan Heatsinks. (Depends on whether you want to go stealth or rushdown blades early. Rushdown is harder and you don't have Cyberdeck buffers so you can't farm as much cash from access points.)
7) Farm access points and save for Reinforced Tendons and Memory Boost (uncommon), both from Cassius Ryder.
By the end of Act 1 you want to be around level 10ish and have 12 Reflexes and 9 Intelligence, or thereabouts.
Act 2 goals:
1) Get Reflexes to 15 and get Maneuvering System and Kerensikov (epic) from Octavio's Clinic in Arroyo. Take Blades -> Judge, Jury, Executioner and Fiery Blast. After this you won't level reflexes up for a while (getting it to 18 is more of an Act 3 goal).
2) Get Intelligence to 12 and take Quickhacking -> Mnemonic and Diffusion. You need at least 10 Intelligence to hack Gig: Serial Suicide access points but I don't know how early you can do this gig now. You want this ASAP since you need Legendary Short Circuit, Legendary Contagion, Legendary Cripple Movement and Legendary Weapon Glitch. The next power spike level is 16 for Critical Error (allows Legendary Short Circuit to crit).
3) Get Body to 12 for Athletics -> Like a Butterfy and Tenacious V. The next power spike is 16 Body for Bioconductor (epic), Second Heart and Dog of War.
4) Get Cool to 9 for Cold Blood -> Predator, Rapid Bloodflow and Defensive Clotting. The next power spike levels are 11 for Coolagulent, 16 for Coldest Blood and 18 for Cheat Death.
5) Get Street Cred to 40 for Tetratronic Rippler MK4.
6) Get Jinchu-Maru. For this to replace your Katana full time, you need Maneuvering System, Kerensikov and Legendary Short Circuit.
Goals can be done in any order and are basically listing the big power spike breakpoints while levelling up. So just feel it out and work towards the next closest breakpoint..
In Act 2, Legendary Cripple Movement with spread/radius perks is a hard carry and lets you take on big groups of enemies when you are squishy. It turns them into statues that can't move or shoot back.
Legendary Short Circuit + Critical Error + Jinchu Maru will more than double your blade strong attack damage. Getting Legendary Short Circuit and 16 Intelligence is a big power spike.
Until you get Jinchu-Maru, your crit reliability for Short Circuit will not be great, although I don't recommend rushing this as it makes the story rather unsatisfying. I would aim to get this around level 32 to 40. Until then I would use Byakko for its mobility. If not on PC there is a compelling case to use Byakko for the entire game. You trade crit reliability but without mods, you need the gap closing.
Maneuvering System and Kerensikov are mobility game changers. Until you get these, you will not have very good freedom of movement in combat. Until you get Like a Butterfly, you will not be able to infinite dodge in combat.
Until you get Rapid Bloodflow, Coldest Blood and Dog of War, your in combat health regen will not be insane.
