And that's that on Samurai. Overall, it was an OK job to level. Not my favorite, but not bad. I'll definitely keep it in rotation as I work on level 90 duties.
What I liked:
- The flexibility of the third rotation step. If I am not using it to complete three rotations and perform my strongest cast (Midare Setsugekka), it's a good option for doing one and getting that DoT (Higanbana) on the enemy.
- Frequent procs that do not need to be put on cooldown immediately (Hissatsu: Shinten and Kyuten). I like the ability to get in just a little bit of damage during global cooldown.
- Really pretty hot bar icons.
- Lots of staggered AOE sounds. I'm rather obsessed with skills that generate staggered sound effects when used on mobs, and I cannot explain why. But all of Samurai's AOEs do this. (The king of the staggered sounds is Holy Circle from Paladin.)
What I disliked:
- The charging sound of Iaijutsu is just too fucking much for how often you cast it. I've quit the game and kept hearing it like a song stuck in my head. I'd give something more subtle to Iaijutsu and instead give the "impressive sword slash charge" sound to Ogi Namikiri, which you can only cast every two minutes.
- Meditate takes too long to charge any Kenki, and it doesn't give you a Meditation stack until you do. It's obviously great for bosses doing their ultimate attacks, but most don't have any, and the opportunities to use it effectively, even for 10 Kenki, are seldom.
- Until you get Hagakure at 68, it can be a bit awkward to have the "wrong" amount of Sen activated for the next challenge.
- A second charge of Meikyo Shisui is very meh.
- The skills are generally not as interesting as their hot bar icons. I know this seems nitpicky, but even Ninja and Monk's less flashy skills are full of creative animation that's great for gpose. I really struggled to take worthwhile pics of Samurai, so I only have a few.
