Project Duck News
Introduction
Hey everyone, I’m Vivid (Sifut). I’ve been playing Project Duck since beta and over time I’ve learned a variety of classes. In this guide, I’ll be doing a deep dive on the gimmicks of Dragoon and how to play the class. I also have other guides such as Blood Phantom and Ripper so feel free to check those out!
Note: If you intend to learn this class, you should get the weak point mod. It makes the class less of a headache. Just ask in the server discord.
Overview
Dragoon is an elemental converted class that relies on a mechanic in their kit called [Vulnerable], or more commonly referred to as “weak point”, to pump out a bunch of damage using their signature skill [Backflip Pierce]. Despite being a converted class, I recommend using light conversion because of Valkyrie’s ultimate which buffs light attack.
Dragoon’s Bubble System
Dragoon’s bubble system is pretty easy to grasp. MOST skills that you will be using will generate bubbles. The amount of bubbles you will generate from skills will either be 1, 5, or 10.
One bubble: [Forceful Bounce], [Stab Tug], [Spinning Takedown], [Twirling Chop], [Twirling Thrust], [Backflip Pierce], [Charging Sweep], [Charging Sweep INS], [Bifrost], [Lingering Swing], [Twirl Trance]
Five bubbles: [Hornet’s Touch] without parry
Ten bubbles: [Hornet’s Touch] with successful parry
The bubbles cap out at 20 and will enhance your [Backflip Pierce] to guarantee a weak point.
Skills
Note: It’s mandatory to use skills from the Valkyrie tree unless you want to sack your DPS potential
Lencea
[Forward Pierce]: This skill is enhanced by CM3 and deals more damage.
[Hornet’s Touch]: This is your parry. Inputting LMB will make the skill go off instantly. This has an i-frame.
Lancer
[Forceful Bounce]: This is your debuff skill.
[Stab Tug]: This skill generates lots of hits onto an enemy. Good for generating weak points.
[Spinning Takedown]: This is in your top three in skill spread. You can either right-click this for a non-charged version or let the skill go off on its own.
[Twirling Chop]: This skill generates lots of hits onto an enemy. Good for generating weak points. Also has a small i-frame at the beginning.
[Twirling Thrust]: This skill generates lots of hits onto an enemy. Good for generating weak points.
[Erratic Power]: Make sure to have this on, this is what gives your other skills the ability to generate one bubble.
[Martial/Stalwart Spirit]: In most cases, you will always want to have [Martial Spirit] active for damage. In case of emergencies, [Stalwart Spirit] provides healing over time and damage reduction.
[Flag Salute]: Good mobility skill and also has an i-frame as well. Pressing tumble into RMB will make you leap.
[Lingering Swing]: Filler skill, good for generating weak points.
[Twirl Trance]: Last resort filler skill. Try your best to not use this.
[Circle of Spears]: Filler skill, good for generating weak points.
[Piercing Spike]: Good for avoiding stomps if you need extra airtime to dodge a stomp.
[Rushing Strike]: This skill is used by tumbling or dashing into a LMB input. Used to activate [Charging Sweep INS].
[Champagne]: Valkyrie ultimate, buffs light attack.
[Leap]: Dragoon ultimate, i-frame throughout the entire animation, guarantees a weak point. There’s almost no situation where you would use this ultimate.
Dragoon
[Backflip Pierce]: This is your main source of damage. It deals the most damage when the boss is inflicted with a weak point. [Backflip Pierce] does not share a cooldown with [Enhanced Backflip Pierce].
[Charging Sweep]: This is a skill that generates a lot of hits and deals a good chunk of damage. You never want to end the skill early since this will reduce the damage of the last two hits. You also get damage reduction while using this skill.
[Charging Sweep INS]: This skill is in your top three. It’s activated by using [Rushing Strike]
Awakening
[Bifrost]: This skill will shoot you up into the air. If you use this while the boss has a weak point inflicted, it deals more damage and will reapply a weak point.
[Over the Rainbow]: This skill is generally used after [Bifrost] and will place you back on the ground. It has a small i-frame.
[Headbutt]: Using this will guarantee a weak point. Try not to use this while there’s another weak point active.
Skill Build
Unified Skills: Final Damage Boost, Max HP Boost
Skill Crests
Damage: [Backflip Pierce], [Charging Sweep]
CDR: [Twirling Chop], [Spinning Takedown], [Hornet’s Touch], [Stab Tug]
AS: [Twirling Thrust]
+1 [Backflip Pierce]
Gameplay
In my opinion, I would say Dragoon is kind of a freestyle class but there are some rules/tips that I recommend following for the gameplay to be smooth like butter.
Tip #1: “Fishing for weak points”
The way the class works is the more hits you inflict on the boss the more possibilities for a weak point to generate which leads to higher dps. However, this doesn’t always work out the way we want it. Skill sequences I like to use to increase my shot at generating weak points:
[Twirling Thrust] -> [Stab Tug] -> [Twirling Chop] (I like to fit [Hornet’s Touch] in after I use [Twirling Thrust])
[Twirling Thrust] -> [Lingering Swing] / [Circle of Spears]
[Twirling Thrust] -> [Bifrost] -> [Over the Rainbow] (This honestly doesn’t have much weak point generating potential but it just feels good when one does spawn midway during [Bifrost])
[Twirling Thrust] -> [Forceful Bounce] -> [Forward Pierce] (Cancel the second hit of [Forceful Bounce] with [Forward Pierce])
Note: ANY attack whether it’s a basic attack or whatever has a chance to inflict weak points. Also, if there are two dragoon’s in the party, they can generate and steal weak points from each other.
Tip #2: Skills to use together
Pairing up certain skills together reduces possible downtime and also reduces the amount of thinking you have to do when playing.
- [Spinning Takedown] -> [Charging Sweep INS] : Using these skills together makes it so you don’t have to memorize any cooldowns since they both line up.
- [Twirling Thrust] -> [Over the Rainbow] : [Bifrost] has a long cooldown compared to [Over the Rainbow] so it would be a waste of damage to not use this skill until [Bifrost] is up.
- [Forceful Bounce] -> [Forward Pierce] : This isn’t a dramatic change but [Forceful Bounce]’s only purpose is to apply a debuff and full-casting would be a waste of time. Let [Forceful Bounce] hit once and then use [Forward Pierce].
Note: Number two and three aren’t a big deal, they’re kind of just a finesse. The main thing I recommend getting down is number one.
Rotation
This class is easy to learn, but it takes practice to play efficiently. Especially because there isn’t necessarily a set rotation and more freestyle. However, this is my goto opener.
[Martial Spirit] -> [Champagne] -> [Enhanced Backflip Pierce] -> [Bifrost] -> [Over the Rainbow] -> [Backflip Pierce] -> [Spinning Takedown] -> [Charging Sweep INS]
Everything else past this is dependent on whether or not weak points are generated and freestyle.
Note: You can actually go “too fast” on this class and will either cancel skills or they start ghosting.
Skill Spread
Note: [Backflip Pierce] is always number one. As long as [Charging Sweep INS] and [Spinning Takedown] are taking up two and three on the skill spread and are within 3% of each other, you’re good. Same case with [Charging Sweep] and [Bifrost], as long as they’re both in five or six on the skill spread, you’re good to go. Everything else is pretty much irrelevant.