How Good is Mark? - Darkest Dungeon Discussion

[@ShuffleFM]

Thumbnail came from this reddit thread with permission: www.reddit.com/r/darkestdungeon/comments/h7q375/pov_you_are_marked_for_death/

[@Thatoneguy-uw6fv]

POV: you’re about to be crit for 68 damage

[@doomfishmain5154]

*dodge*

[@londonfog6654]

miss

[@keirbird5900]

I had a leper get buffed by 4 Holy statues and start hitting like 80 damage. Good thing I had a jester or else all I would have seen was the leper *missing* for 80 damage

[@Big__C]

91 dmg. Take it, you can't leave it

[@Inquisitor_Redacted]

Man at Arms really should have a mark. He's supposed to be like the team captain. I can't think what would be more appropriate then for an officer character then shouting "Hit that one!"

[@hyteclowlife]

MAA so Chad he just says to hit all of them

[@somebodyalive6131]

He even has a move that interacts with mark (I believe Bellow causes Marked people to get critted more)

[@ZenKrio]

@@somebodyalive6131 yah but I don't think that would be enough, maybe is bellow marked two mobs in the front or back, but it only lasts for one round? Either way, he really should have a mark. Question is what would his mark do? One does -prot, one does -dodge.

[@madmaxiemartialartsnerd485]

Tbh though if u did that and gave him a good one with a stat debuf hed quickly go to S tier His stun+Protect+mark+any of his supportive abilities God tier character

[@Marcy4607]

Fun fact, he does! On his reposte. of course

[@SeismicHammer]

I often found the Dodge or Prot debuffs from Mark Skills more useful than the Marks themselves

[@SiegeBallista]

Sending this to my friend Mark.

[@hosh3335]

same

[@pestilentsleeper9152]

I hope you have Mark synergy

[@paulberry5750]

“I'm A Bounty Hunter. Marks are a part of my religion.”

[@aimbotarrow5981]

“Then why the fuck are you not getting 15 percent Prot when you Pray?”

[@paulberry5750]

@@aimbotarrow5981 Who needs Prot when your foes die in One Massive Crit?

[@aimbotarrow5981]

@@paulberry5750 Touche

[@woaiwodepiku]

“This is the way”

[@eclecticspaghetti]

I was honestly expecting this video to just be “It’s okay.” and then thirty-nine minutes of complete silence.

[@QuestionableObject]

Pretty much was a very longwinded way of saying "It's okay."

[@sazger]

I didn’t realize Mark’s duration is number of actions. It should be 4 turns at least

[@gasparperalta3725]

I'd like to see you cover the fabled quad-crusader comp for ruins

[@jacobhoover1654]

There's nothing to cover, it's OP, the only way to mess it up is to not run holy lance

[@OmnipotentGoggles]

Jerusalem?!

[@NostalgicPerson11]

Try 4 houndmasters at warrens

[@speenta4879]

@@NostalgicPerson11 also know as blood for the blood god

[@firestarr5812]

@@speenta4879 Skulls for the Skull Throne!

[@Jeremy-dk8tz]

He is just pointing me, menacingly!

[@posajnejkwahb]

Really really like the idea of mark having charges that are used up when you hit them with an attack, this would be so sweet.

[@ad480p]

I like that this is basically combo tokens in Darkest Dungeon 2

[@johncopenhaver4311]

That would take away from the whole "my team is gonna get wiped at any moment vibe" the game likes to jam up the player's rectum. It would be awesome if it worked like that FR.

[@DanielMartinez-pg8zo]

appreciate you uploading more frequently!!

[@jackcristo1628]

I agree with the big the picture, though as someone who has tried to make the most of a mediocre situation (Arbalest) many times, I do want to hone in on one point: the logic that Arbalest needs to act last is flawed. Speed determines turn order, but it also grants up to +1 turns per battle. For instance, if Arbalest acts first, then her second turn occurs at the same time as when her first turn would have occurred if she had acted last, despite occurring in different rounds. So in the acting first scenario, she gets the same mark damage exploitation as when acting last, and an extra no-mark turn as a bonus. If she acts in the middle, it's more of a mixed bag, but you're still getting +0.5 turns per battle to help offset the cost of potentially missing out on a first turn mark, and you could also use this turn to boost her speed with Blindfire and once again potentially get her 2nd turn at the same time as she would have gotten her first turn if she had been acting last.

[@Josh---]

You are Swine Prince; Two arbalests and two houndmasters just walked into your boss room. Your good friend wilbur tells you who to kill. Then, you are blinded by flares, whistled at, and bum-fucked by crit arrows until you die.

[@SeismicHammer]

The funny thing is, without Wilbur, Swine Prince just goes, “Fuck it, HIT ALL OF THEM!”

[@jacksonholder2987]

Wait, how the fuck do flares work, isn't the Swine blind? Hence why he has wilbur call out targets for him?

[@Josh---]

@@jacksonholder2987 Flares get rid of mark, which is his main gimmick

[@jacksonholder2987]

@@Josh--- Man, I know that. But the Swine doesn't have eyes, so how da fuq do bright lights make him lose track of his target.

[@SeismicHammer]

@@jacksonholder2987 Wilbur uses flags though, that wouldn’t do anything for a blind person. Maybe his vision is poor but not blind

[@TheValiantBob]

Thinking about this a bit more, and I thought of a few things. The first is that, Come Hither on the Bounty Hunter is what I think is the best example of how a mark move should have worked in the game. Because it does something OTHER than just mark and debuff. It does a little bit of damage, and it has an extra utility effect. And that got me thinking that you could slap mark on some other moves that other heroes use, as like a bonus effect. For example, imagine Crusader's Zealous Accusation. By itself, rather lackluster. But imagine if it also had the ability to inflict mark? Or Vestal's Illuminate? I'm sure there are other examples of lackluster moves on various heroes that could thematically mark a target. It would open up the mark playstyle to a lot more different party comps and make it more fun. My next thought was that mark should have some general universal effect that all characters benefit from. That way even if they don't have a move that gains bonus damage or crit from a marked target, it is still beneficial and helps the team overall. I think the best example would be making it so attacks against a marked target are guaranteed to hit. Help out the party by making fights more consistent. Although then the mark that decreases dodge should probably be changed, since that'd be redundant. But still, that would certainly make an interesting change, as for example it could make Leper fit into a mark team, which is neat.

[@SecureBirch410]

I mean to be fair, every team can benefit somewhat from mark, since applying mark will debut either protection or dodge, which is helpful to everyone.

[@bonogiamboni4830]

@@SecureBirch410 yeah but that's not a bonus caused by the enemy being "marked". That is caused by a debuff applied by the move that also marks. Debuffs can get resisted. Having something that helps everyone just for the fact you marked an enemy would be nice, then if the debuff lands that's great, or if the marking move also has some other effect that gets triggered like come hither that's great. As it stands you don't really use marking skills specifically for the mark unless you're running one of those three mark characters or maybe the ones with the slight synergy.

[@superceilingfan9741]

"Zealous accusation should mark" And now we have dd2 zealous, wish granted

[@namenotloading]

Turns out it's preeeeeeeetty good, unless...

[@siennas254]

bounty hunter is actually my favorite character. Been a while since I played so I don't remember what it's called, but I had some trinket that pretty greatly increased mark damage from a boss. I would have the bounty hunter set up his own marks. Guess it's not optimal but it got me through the darkest dungeon. Vestal?-Hound-Bounty-Crusader iirc

[@ShuffleFM]

Sounds like vvulf's tassel

[@siennas254]

@@ShuffleFM that would be it. I remember my set up made it so I did more than double damage to marked enemies so even though my bounty hunter spent 2 turns hitting someone he still just put out enough damage

[@WhiteNegative]

Its fun to watch your videos and hear about teams and synergies I accidentally found with little game knowledge lol

[@TheBordener]

I think Highwayman is just a better Arbalest. He can shoot with the 50% damage buff with his pistol on a marked target on the back line if he needs to but he’s just fine if that doesn’t happen. You mentioned how Arbalest gets screwed if she’s out of order and highwayman only having that mark value on one damage ability fixes that. If the speed roles correctly and the situation calls for it he can snipe a bone noble but if there’s something better to do he can just wicked slice instead and nothing is lost.

[@Denizu]

The thing that is so interesting about team compositions and using specific strategies is that the nature of Darkest Dungeon (especially on styigian/bloodmoon with the timer) is that especially in the early to mid game, you can't reliably get the heroes you want for these compositions. Sometimes a bounty hunter doesn't come up, or you can't afford to destress core members of the planned composition (or even dismiss them to save costs and free up your rooster). You *will* have weeks where you just have to make some sort of rag tag team of whatever is available and make it work. Sometimes your Plague doctor will be your Weald bleeder, just because of circumstances. That is what makes the late game so interesting. You start having this control and can now make planned teams and utilize these strategies to face the difficulties of late game, champion bosses, crimson court missions and the Darkest Dungeon itself.

[@dismasthepenitent569]

imo mark is a tool you can incorporate into a party but not something you should base your party around. Like you can have a party with stuns and DoTs but you shouldn't expect to be able to base your entire strategy around stuns and DoTs because there's enemies that have resistances to both. Mark is good versus big bodies that you want to die quick and not as good against most other enemies because a well-constructed team can one or two shot trash mobs. The term "mark-based party" doesn't make as much sense to me as "party that can take advantage of mark," because you can build a party that can use marks without being forced to use mark in situations where you wouldn't want to.

[@glowcloudwheatproducts495]

I agree. I don't think its an accident that most of the mark characters have access to support in the form of bleeds, stuns, etc.

[@michaelw6277]

I’ve had success with mark focused teams. Use a sped up Occultist to apply the mark on the first turn and then destroy one enemy on the with some combination of Bounty Hunter/Houndmaster/Arbalest (choose 2). Use the fourth slot as a purely dedicated support… Plague Doctor is a great add for the stuns, but the Crusader brings stuns, healing, and decent supplemental damage. So on the first turn you’ve stunned two and killed one. It’s still not my first choice for an A team but it works well if it’s what’s available in your roster and your A team is on a down week.

[@jonathanrussell8998]

The idea of marks having a limited number of charges has a great design space for attacks that do decent non mark stuff but only give one or two mark charges, or marks that hit multiple enemies but again have fewer charges.

[@hollowbagoogiesboy8740]

Your easily becoming my favorite DD streamer and youtuber.

[@montsaint-michel9443]

Because of the cons you've mentioned, especially that 'takes too many actions' and 'quite an overkill', I think men-at-arms at the position of bounty hunter is more reliable. He is a better tank and stunner(Rampart shield) than bounty hunter, and his incapability of stunning the back line is not too bad since the teamwork of other three heroes can deal with the back line quite easily. Not that it is easy to do so, but equip him as a debuffer, you can lower your opponent's speed as well as dodge and it might overcome their weakness of taking too many actions. Especially at the wealds, because the fungals or a giant can be deadly to two frontal heroes, him defending the second liner would be quite handy, making him obviously better than bounty hunter at least for that dungeon.

[@liammcguinness139]

Ohh riiight, the comment, the comment for the algorithm, the comment chosen especially for the algorithm, the algorithm's comment. That comment ? Gotcha covered.

[@fuzzythoughts8020]

I really like "Come Hither", and the thing you aren't mentioning when you say "Back line enemies have moves to get back to the back line" is that those moves aren't their high damage, dangerous attacks, those moves usually are a weak bop, it's always better to take a bop than to get critted by an arbalest.

[@ShuffleFM]

I more meant the weakness of come hither being you don't get to hit them afterwards, but you're right many retreating moves are gentle. Except escape cloud lol

[@fuzzythoughts8020]

@@ShuffleFM true. Sometimes if you combine Come Hither with Occultists pull move, you can bring the backline up front, and in a perfect scenario their escape moves just have the trade positions without actually going back. If only you could plan for that, would be a hilarious strategy. However my issue currently seems to be just surviving passed week 10 in a run without having some ridiculously unlucky thing happen. Had a run get shafted by Necromancer right after I got a focus ring all because of him resisting a stun on what was a 65% chance to stun, then getting missed by 4 attacks in a row. He killed the whole squad because of RNG which is something I just can't escape lately, when I tried a run on radiant I had so many misses and took so many crits in the 2nd week dungeon that I just deleted the save lmao.

[@aidanchutkan8662]

I’ve really loved using the team “hounds of war”, which is Arb-Occ-HM-Hellion. Having Hellion in there helps a ton because she can completely lock down the front two ranks which is what Arbalest struggles with. Arbalest’s heal works really well with Wyrd Reconstruction to just bring someone up to full from nothing. Houndmaster can stun in the front and dish out ridiculous damage. This team destroys the prophet too if you want something easy against that boss. It’s also a party that doesn’t need to always mark, you still have good damage even without marking, but if you want to nuke a big enemy it can do that with mark. I also want to say I think you’re heavily underrating Arbalest’s non-mark abilities. Bola is quite good for pushing enemies around, battlefield bandage is a solid heal that has synergy with other healers, especially Occultist who works in mark teams. And rallying flare is of course there to bully the swine king. She has enough utility besides sniper shot that even when you don’t have a mark down or a good target in the back she can still benefit the team.

[@lukeyilonen]

Maybe gaining stress heal after using a mark

[@imchipjames]

Cool video. It's interesting to hear someone well versed in the game discuss pros and cons of different builds as I'm nearing the darkest dungeon for my first time.

[@nikitakempf5065]

Very nice video, good explanation about the pros and cons of Mark teams!

[@Fjuron]

Bounty Hunter's Mark and Hound Master's mark are pretty equal in power level imo. Target Whistle is great against really tough enemies with its higher debuff stats, but Mark for Death's speed bonus is really strong, especially at max rank almost guaranteeing the bounty hunter to go first before the target to kill it next turn.

[@moobo3944]

You should make a video about changes and improvements you would like to see in darkest dungeon 2. It would be a fun discussion.

[@ShuffleFM]

It's a good idea for a vid. Just need to sit down and script it out

[@vttsu]

give arbalest an attack that marks, at say 90% dmg

[@lustejon]

My personal best mark party: From 1-4 MAA,OCC,HM, and ARB. MAA guards OCC who then stuns/heals. HM sets and ARB delivers. Pretty fun imo since I feel like this team has a pretty good balance between support and mark synergy.

[@annurissimo1082]

One of the best intros to date kek

[@gregorlangemeier4116]

Great video and in depth analysis! But not mentioning vvulfs tassel?

[@Khrene]

I think I was making suggestions to balance out the power diff between Arb and HM? - Blindfire: Always hit the correct target if that target is marked. - Sniper's Mark: Get's Target Whistle's amazing Prot Debuff, and can mark any rank. However it can only be used in ranks 3 and 4. Stealth weird I also would flip the formula on its head a little more. Have more slow tanky backlines like the mushroom crab-men in the weald.

[@ZenKrio]

I was playing last night and BHs Come Hither mark was great in a team with two BHs, where one would grab the back liner and the other would one shot them after the fact. Especially those guys with doomsay (I'm barely past apprentice). Your vids have helpede get a lot better at the game though, thanks a lot.

[@defaultv.7959]

Id give Arbalest the Highwayman's 'Tracking Shot', maybe have it Mark too or give Bola/Buckshot the ability to Mark instead of Move. To allow her to utilize speed more and set other people up if she happens to go first or is cleaning up fights.

[@nunyabusiness8000]

I’ve actually had some great success with hybrid mark, arbalest with her healing trinkets and snipers ring hits hard, and stacks healing very well with her buff, it all falls apart if you get shuffled tho lol

[@3Bitjoke]

nah dude you go THE podcast voice

[@ChefGuevara267]

I don’t consider future updates for the game impossible; I don’t think anybody thought the game was gonna get a total overhaul to the characters for a completely new PvP mode, that is apparently still going to be updated in the future with things like bot support. With regards to Mark though, the easiest fix to me would be making it scale off enemy size, with size 1 being 2 turns, size 2 being 4, and so on; hell, maybe even 3 and 6 wouldn’t be too busted. As for arbalest specifically, she really does feel spread too thin. Blind fire doesn’t really have synergy with her other abilities, flare does a bunch of stuff but you’ll almost never be able to take advantage of every aspect of it, bola is set up to fail when front line enemies tend to have better move resist, and suppressing fire suffers because it’s one of the only debuffs to only last 2 turns instead of 3. I think I’d like it if she just had better crit, like just a flat +5 base on her weapon, at least that way her low range would feel more justified...

[@javorgeorgiev6130]

I think I see the use for mark after taking my poor plague doctor to the Weald. A lot of stuff is both bleed and blight resistant as well as high stun resist. Dismas paid with his life after getting hit hard one turn and then the enemy immediately took the next turn again to finish him.

[@TinySkeleton21]

It’d be nice if mark helped more people, like say if chop had an acc buff against marked and other things like that. It feels like outside of arbalest it’s just better to use the mark heroes as other things like bounty hunter being great at stuns and still having good damage outside of mark and hound master just being good at most things. Great vid btw

[@tiagocosmos]

i for one like using mark synergy, except against bosses with multiple actions per round.

[@Bleuthatup]

I believe that Star Renegades handled marking better than DD. While marking in DD works similarly (emphasis: similarly) to marking in SR, in star renegades they still give a minor bonus to every character's damage, regardless if they get actual marking bonus or not. Also, you can get many items that make your regular attacks also apply marks. Imagine trinkets that made, for example, the Helion's Iron Swan also apply marked! And if you haven't tried Star Renegades, do it. Timeline-based, deterministic and roguelite Darkest Dungeon in space

[@redbeardthepink4809]

Running occultist up front for the stun is pretty choice, but I really like to run him further back and use his pull move. The mark from bounty hunter's pull is practically useless, and occultist's pull clears corpses. Plus bounty hunter's stuns are pretty good, so it's not like you're losing it.

[@KissatenYoba]

marks are insane with mods which allow to somehow put marks on hit. It makes arbalest the biggest damage dealer in farmstead+, for example. Absolutely bonkers damage output.

[@cdgonepotatoes4219]

Unless your party has 2 solid hitters additionally to the one marking or some abilities with mark-specific bonuses, for most situations I can't but draw parallels with Decisive Strike in D&D (sacrifice 1 turn for double damage the next)

[@dungeonguy88]

Huh...That actually put into words a lot of the issues I felt cropping up with Mark teams. Some of them just aren't as effective at it as you would think and it's kind of labor intensive creating teams that will work well. And the action economy, it just doesn't always pay off. Arbalest in particular is quite situational, I think I've mentioned before. When she's exactly what you need, when you need it...that's great. When she's not, you find yourself wishing you'd gone with someone else. She unintuitive in some ways, and in others she's kind of undermined the logic of the gameplay.

[@S_Black]

I agree that it's often too much work to set up in regular fights and not worth the effort considering how short many of the fights are. But I'm currently playing with some modded classes and I'm having a lot of fun. The Thorn has low base ACC, but gets more ACC and/or stun chance against marked targets. And she has a riposte that auto marks enemies. Mechanics like that would be fun in vanilla. They offer something more than the usual straight up damage. Then there is the Sisters who get a garantueed crit against marked, which is great for them as they struggle with stress build up otherwise. The Falconer combines a mark with a de-stealth. And the Serpaph always consumed the mark, but gets a massive 150-200% damage. Which makes it worth it for another character to mark for her as it as much of more damage in that two regular attacks and debuffs the target before

[@GatesOfAvalon1]

Bringing flag to the ruins, the secret pro strat

Mark should have a duration based on cycles, not actions.

[@burrito4332]

I found the Arbalest's Mark to be exceptionally useful only with the horrid shrieker because of its ridiculous dodge. But it also has 3 actions so, it's a huge time gamble. Other than that especially, I opt out of marking or using Arbalest, tho imo she's perfect for decimating a boss like the swine god due to having Flare. Arbalest does get a bit better when equipped with the prophets eye and the matchstick. I do love all the marking animations though.

[@goldenthing8865]

How good is mark? - Big numbers go *brrr*

[@dorcasmutton6335]

Marks aren't very good but God damn they are so much fun! I love running mark teams

[@inkoursor2942]

what if every character could mark by as an extra built-in move (like move is), but to make marks more potent on dedicated characters, their debuffs would be guaranteed with their dedicated mark move?

[@TheValiantBob]

I always felt like Mark as a status should have given at least some benefit to all attacks done against that enemy. Like a minor buff to damage or crit. Skills that have Mark Synergy would obviously still be ideal, but then that way it would still be somewhat useful to all team comps.

[@hariman7727]

Play to the team's strengths. Use mark teams against common enemies in preparatory runs and single action bosses, and save your other teams for the multi action bosses. That being said... yeah. Marking suffers against certain types of enemy. It's still usable, especially with the trinket that boosts anybody's damage against Mark. Leper, Hellion, or Flagellent + mark = BOOM.

[@antoniorodriguez-manzanequ4617]

I think of marks as someone uses his action to debuff a enemy (occ + arb against dodge and hm + bh for prot) so your damage dealers (arb and bh) don't need that much acc so you can go crazy for raw damage and i use trinkets with speed for hm and occ so they can protect their team.

[@fleshwebber1757]

Come heither is the only mark move I like in this game, not because it move the backline closer but rather push back the frontline. A frontliner in the backline often has to use bad attacks to reposition themselve or just deny dangerous situations like, for exemple bringing a thug to rank 1 so his fat friend can't have the chance to do a critboosted point blank shot. (also if there is a fish shaman or bone courtier at rank 3 you can neutralize them).

[@gerrakarma4944]

I love bounty hunter! His kit is so fun to use)

[@tchortaff1750]

Haven't watched the video yet but this is my take on the mark. It is way too slow. First round of a normal encounter is the most crucial one. And you spend it just to mark an enemy instead of damaging and possibly killing it. It is a setup for your allies, yes, but instead of going for mark+dmg, going for dmg+dmg is more proactive and sure way of doing things. This was for the standart hallway or room encounters. Mark shines a bit brighter when you are dealing with bosses because you can't finish them off within a single turn. So having a lasting buff is good. But the problem is, bosses usualy take more than one action. So this makes mark a lot less effective. It wears of just in one turn. So you have to mark the boss every single turn. But having a dedicated marker just for this is just... not very smart in my opinion. And there is the fact that you may take turns in the wrong order so your marker may go later than your damage dealers, effectively ruining your strategy. And one other thing is, you pretty much have to create your party around the mark. You have to have 3 or maybe even 4 people that can benefit from mark to make the strategy worthwhile. Because of this you have to give up on so many utility by not bringing different people. Overall I think mark comps are just too demanding for what it's worth.

[@saltysalt4537]

The problem with Darkest Dungeon for me is the lack of consistent ( stress ) healers like Jester and Vestal. Other characters are just not even close, so if you want that awesome ( stress ) healing, you are constantly stuck with two occupied positions which never change. That omnipresent limitation makes the game turn into a chore SOOO much quicker...

[@kingofthejungle5338]

other characters can do it but those two are just the best at their job

[@dankgung3783]

He is standing there me... Aaahhhh

[@woaiwodepiku]

Hey shuffle ! Just recently finished stygian. So far in my run double bounty hunter is my staple team. I found that the monster gets too strong and have high resistance to cc’s. I went for strike first, strike hard. Especially against their high Prot mobs. So mark is my preferred rotation

[@jfried6754]

Twitch streamer tells orphan she isn't good for 30 minutes straight.

[@cerebralcloud92]

I will say that Marks, at least in Vanilla, are 100% a “When To Use” kind of mechanic. Personally, the performance by the fabled “Mark For Death” without Marks is already decently satisfactory, regarding damage already present, stuns, and sustainability. However, I find that Marks are most important to use against tanky enemies that will ruin your day, such as Large Carrion Eaters, Swinetaurs, Skivers, Fungal Giants, etc. However, considering both the Occultist and Arbalest are decent at healing once put into such a position, it’s more than fine to chip away at enemies. I will say, Mark For Death works WONDERS against bosses, like the Collector, Shambler, Swine God, and even Siren or Cannon. Even Thing From The Stars can be hit pretty hard after the 80% Prot Buff. Point is, with how this specific team works out, it has the damage and sustainability to kill MOST important targets, even on Bloodmoon. Of course, there’s no kill like overkill, but who needs overkill for hallway battles?

[@LeesPizza]

Imo i really like mark (esp for bosses) and it should almost never be used in 1st turn dungeon encounters. Take Arb, hound, occ, bh (that order) into boss dungeon or reg dungeon. They have solid damage, supp and healing. You can even put bh in rank 3 and a tank in rank 1 or mark shieldbreaker in rank 1. Anyways, you take out the back line, classic stun and back line kills, never using mark because it wastes a turn. Clear out those big hitters like usual since your team still deals lots of damage and stuns. Mark comes into play once backline is taken care of and you need to deal with prot heavy front liners. You have 4 heroes to mark with too. Usually you can heal with occ, mark with bh (who will then go first next turn) hit with arb and hound. Especially helpful after they have their stun resist up and your occ doesnt need to heal so he can mark instead. I find theres a lot of options and flexibility with mark, just never ever go into a fight thinking youre going to use it 100p. Use it when the opportunity arises and it pays off really well. Thats my take currently.

[@LeesPizza]

Ooh, disclaimer: havent played stygian or bm yet

[@thepureheartofdark]

I use mark mostly as a way for my low damage spec supports to deal damage by proxy.

[@neglectfulsausage7689]

Complaaining MAA isnt as good as Jester battle ballad is like saying a wagon SUV isnt as good as a truck. one has inferior load and space, but if you want some load and space and benefits over the truck you take the wagon SUV instead. Its an apple an orange comparison. Its like saying that you shouldnt take/use crusader for the melee attack because the higher damage of leper is all around better. If you want the skillset that is only on MAA but also something like battle ballad thats less strong then you take MAA for that reason. If you awnt to be sure to use marked on bosses then modify character speeds.

[@alberthcuayla1587]

I wish that mark last until the end of the second turn after the mark is applied.

[@wesleybrock315]

Honestly mark teams exist for bosses and big mobs. The protection shred makes marks worth it. And the dodge ones pay dividends for the shrieker. Just thinking about marks as a "debuff" helps you with employing them. Yeah you don't need to mark the spiders but the giant fuck off pig centuar? Yeah mark him.

[@evanblack20]

I don’t think I’ll have another arbalest tbh. I’d almost always rather have a another houndmaster or occultist I think.

[@sirknightdude2587]

Mark is comparable to all power up moves. Where a turn of set up can result in more damage and maybe some added accuracy and crit. This can make enemies with large health (Size 2) or high dodge (Madman, Crone, Virago) mobs easier and are wonderful for boss fights which take 1 action a turn. The same outcome comes from a Leper using Revenge, a Hellion using Adrenaline Rush, and Highwayman with Tracking Shot. The advantage with mark is: the debuff to dodge or prot benefits everyone, and party people with bonus vs mark get in on the fun. A team that relies entirely on mark is not as good. Its hard to put all your damage in one place and you end up taking more turns to overkill small fry. A more balanced team can deal with threats that mark was not designed for easier, and has better general abilities for not being a one trick pony. Teams in general can make great use of a mark character or two they're good at what they do best.

[@bakasan0000]

I find marking in normal encounters is often not worth the time. It would be nice if there were options to mark multiple targets at once, even if only for 1-2 rounds.

[@toad23567]

To me, Marks are like stress, disease, and torchlight. A mechanic that mostly/only benefits the enemy and fucks you.

[@mastemathedank4043]

Imo mark teams literally only help the Arbalest, since the other classes that benefit from them and set them up can do other things or work in other comps better (like stun for instance) and the Arbalest's damage output is so low without marks

[@wisemage0]

If they put in a mark skill that also stunned...

[@KILLRAIN42]

Now I'm just starting out and am 90% blind with this game but I had a thought the other day while playing, what about two arbalests/musketeers in 4 and 3 then houndmastwr/bounty hunter/graverobber/crusader in 2 and a hellion in 1? I know I'm probably committing a cardinal sin by suggesting to bring an arbalest at all let alone doubling down given what I understand to be vehement hatred of the class on this channel/in this community but I'm curious as to how effective it could be.

[@ShuffleFM]

It totally is. This vid is a bit dated. I really like arb now so take it with a grain of salt lol

[@KILLRAIN42]

@@ShuffleFM Oh hey that's awesome then! Thanks for responding! I was sitting here listening to this and another video thinking to myself "Aw, damn. Arbalest seems fun and helpful how badly have I misunderstood this game?" Glad to hear I'm at least not 100% off at least.

[@АнтонМан-ч9к]

I mark only fat enemys with high HP to get bonus for damage. Or to decrease evasion. Other time I rather hit 2 times than mark once and hit once.

[@Detector1977]

The reason I hate it is cause of the heavy investment. Why mark when I can kill the enemy instead?

[@mysteriousdonkey4624]

I think it would be better game design if mark was completely redesigned and exclusive to one hero, probably bounty hunter, as opposed to forcing you to have at least two of the four mark heroes to get any reasonable value from the mechanic. I find myself very rarely actually wanting an arbalest or houndmaster because they need so much synergy to perform even close to other heroes. (yes there are a couple of exceptions like swine prince)

[@JT-yl9yt]

Huh? The Houndmaster is arguably the best character in the game lmao he doesn't need synergy really at all. He is the best character in the game at picking off key targets with his targeting.

[@kylemurray3526]

Oh, Hi Mark!

[@doctordice2doctordice210]

What you're describing is what makes mark fun, you have to give something in return for the absurd damage it provides It's just a very well balanced mechanic that forces you to make teams better

[@ragewinninethousand4140]

Usually a team with multiple people who can mark works better and possibly what they devs intended for

[@harmonygarcia333]

pog

[@viniciusc.8735]

I get sad that mark teams are so limited, but i do one comp with a man at arms that only buffs and draw attacks, occultist, bounty hunter and houndmaster. But as much i love the style of musketeer, this class sucks so bad

[@Avabees]

I feel like a lot of modded classes hit the mark a lot better ;)

[@Lorens4444]

Marks are good, but focusing on it is not nessesary, it takes too many turns away. I'm just using Houndmaster and Highwayman, marking one crutial member of the opponent's team to kill it faster, then just focusing on the other things, like bleed and stun.

[@moldycarrot9267]

This, all out mark strategy is not necessarily beneficial. It's a good complement to other comps I'd say. You use it when it's the best move to use (against beefies and against backliners as OCC/BH). If you mark all the time it's bad.

[@liammeharry]

Vvulfs tassel arbalest occultist highwayman bounty hunter

[@sazger]

Gonna try double bounty hunter, hound master and vestal?

[@sazger]

Yeah, it kinda sucked. Like you said, just takes way too long to setup.

[@gwahli9620]

How about allowing marked targets to be hit, even if the skill usually can't target that position.

[@edersonnico]

That would become a meme. Hey look, I'm point blank shooting the last rank enemy.

[@shushupyounaughtyminx4832]

mark's a decent guy yeah

[@ZenKrio]

Arbs damage needs to be 8-16 at the top end, like the leper of the back row maybe. I could see her heal cure bleed as well, with the PD healing blight exclusively, both would have the +healing received.

[@bakasan0000]

I'm working on making a mod to address many of the issues raised in this video. If anyone wants to leave a comment on specific skills or changes (e.g. add mark to Vestal's Illumination), I'd appreciate it.

[@Rudi4rius]

Heck yeah

[@PsychoMonkeyxx]

You're talking mad shit for someone in Come Hither/Collect Bounty Range Mark is a very situational thing, Trying to use it all the time unless you're memeing and Using something like 4 Bounty Hunters ( :3) just doesn't work out that well BUT if me being a filthy memer has taught me anything is that Marks work best when strapped with something that also provides Tempo, its biggest issue is how much investment you put into a very non immediate debuff, but something like come hither Can disrupt the enemy party while also setting up a characters Big damage the fact that 4 of 5 ways to mark involve taking a single turn to just set up a debuff makes them feel very weak action wise, but if they did more immediate active things they would be much better and feel way better to use

[@basilvitamin8878]

Mark goes really hard against Sleeper, which sucks because mark teams aren't the best in endless harvest. they had one niche in the DLC content and it doesn't even really exist on a technicality

[@patrykrys3153]

Mark would be strongest for bosess... but bosses have multiple actions so it is useless... I completed multiple runs and marks are... weak af. No reason to use them at all, vs normal enemies you can most of the time kill them with the same number of actions without a mark, and for bosses the mark dissapear before you can use it effectively. And often marking/champs that can do dps to marked enemies are... weaker at the base/have weak utility (not talking about houndmaster, hes okay).