Forge Pathfinder Guide

Forge Pathfinder Guide by roosta

Pathfinders are sentinels of the forest. They’ve mastered the bow and laying of traps, and use both to keep their enemies from ever getting close. Their deadly accuracy and knowledge of nature allows them to use arrows to control the flow of battle. Pathfinders wear medium armor, but are light on their feet. The best defense a Pathfinder has is their ability to keep the enemy at a distance through the clever use of traps and specialized shots.

History

Long ago, some within the Vaklndr rebelled against the idea of living inside of cities made of brick and stone. They believed this separated them from nature, and thus from the gods themselves. So they set off to live in the forests, mountains and plains. Through the centuries, they became known as elite guides throughout the otherwise unknown wilds, and so became known as Pathfinders.

Abilities


Bow Shot
Fires a single arrow at their opponent. 15 energy GAINED for a succesful shot, used to regenerate energy faster.
85dmg


Poisoned Arrow
The Pathfinder poisons the tip of their arrow before releasing, causing the enemy to continue to take injury even after the arrow strikes. The target will also take increased damage if they move while affected. Duration: 5 seconds. Cost: 20 energy.
150dmg (20×5 + max movement penalty 10×5)


Volley
Releases several arrows at once, hitting multiple enemies within an area in an instant. Cost: 15 energy.
80dmg (per target)


Blinding Shot
Fires an arrow towards an enemy that blinds them on contact for a short period of time. Cost: 20 energy, 20sec Cooldown.


Caltrops
Lays down a trap of caltrops, that when triggered causes all pursuers in range to bleed and move more slowly. Cost: 20 energy, 15sec Cooldown.
80dmg (16×5)


Explosive Trap
Lays a trap that when triggered explodes, damaging and knocking down any pursuers within range. Cost: 30 energy, 15 sec Cooldown.
160dmg


(low-res image. updated icon coming soon)
Pin Foot
Fires an arrow into the foot of their enemy, trapping them in place. Cost: 20 energy, 20sec Cooldown.


Camouflage
The Pathfinder blends into their surroundings, becoming undetectable until they move. While in Camouflage, the Pathfinder is able to use unseen pathways beneath the ground floor to kidnap an enemy, dragging them under the ground floor then trading places with them. Doing this ends Camouflage. Cost: 30 energy, 20sec Cooldown.

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NOTE: Armor Values
All Pathfinder damage is NATURE damage. With customization, players have the ability of increasing (or decreasing) their resistance to nature damage. This in turn will effect the final damage that your abilities do to each individual player. Below is the base resistances to Nature damage for each class, and the formula used to work it out.Damage Reduction % = Armor Value / (1000 + Armor Value)Base Resistance to NATURE damage (pre-customization)
Assassin – 24.52%
Pathfinder – 37.83%
Pyromancer – 16.67%
Shaman –  24.52%
Warden – 34.43%
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Tips For Playing The Pathfinder

As a Sentinel of the Forest, you are a master of crowd-control and you will have to master them all to be of most benefit to your team. Pin Foot, Blinding Arrow, Caltrops, Explosive Trap and Camo-Swap make you a giant Pain-In-The-Butt for the opposing team, and getting them to hit your targets at the right times is an extremely satisfying part of pathfinder play.

Camouflage

You are semi-stealthed while Camouflage is active, gaining a kind of ‘Predator’ shimmer. You can shoot without breaking camo, but taking damage or moving will cancel the effect. While in camouflage, press the button again while targeting somebody – friend OR foe –  to trade places with them.
Drop a trap before swapping to leave the enemy a nice surprise – or swap with your relic-carrier to give them a boost across the map!
Swap the enemy shaman into the middle of your team, just be ready for whatever lies waiting for you at the other end.
Pyro sitting on a nice little perch, picking people off? well thanks for finding that spot with your Flame Burst, but i might just steal it!!

Blinding Arrow and Pin Foot

These are your two ranged crowd-controllers.

Blinding arrow makes the recipient see a 90-95% black screen (UI still visible) for 5 seconds, though assassins have a unique passive ‘ability’ while blinded. They can still see outlines of things close to them, working in the sense of a short-range sonar. All classes still have full control of their character despite being blinded and can run, attack, block etc.
In a 1v1, use it to zip around a corner and hit camo+trap for an ambush. Or catch them in the open with it and give yourself some time to stack some Poison Arrows.
In group settings the uses are endless: Blind Healers heal pillars, nuff said; Excellent at peeling melee off your healer/teammates; And use to help reduce damage from the enemy as they are (hopefully) unable to target.

Pin Foot locks the person in place for 5 seconds. While they cannot move, they can still attack in the direction they were facing when ‘pinned’. In other words if they were successfully attacking you as you pinned them – strafe a reasonable distance left or right while attacking them to avoid wearing their return fire. Pin Foot will also raise the Determination status on the enemy, meaning they are immune to further stuns for a short period. This will affect Explosive trap, although any stuns used on a ‘Determined’ target will still cause a slow effect.

Traps

These 2 abilities have a lot of strategic uses, and are effective both defensively and offensively. If you are being chased, drop the Caltrops in a bottleneck area to slow the pursuer down – like shooting fish in a barrel. Both traps are an AoE, meaning they will hit multiple targets in the ‘blast-zone’ when triggered. Camo swap yourself into the enemy group and drop and Explosive trap for a group knockdown effect. Or is the enemy Warden speed-buffing the team across the bridge in Ymil’s Throne? Pillar jump to the upper level of the bridge and drop down into the middle with your Caltrops to slow ’em down a notch.

In a 1v1 you can run in on a stunned opponent and drop the Explosive trap for additional damage. But if you know there are melee enemies around then you’ll need to time those abilities well. Caltrops will help to gain a little distance and maybe  give enough time to get a Pin Foot for more clearance. If you used Pin Foot then the Explosive trap wont stun that target now, but WILL still do damage so keep that for when they get close again. Watch for people blocking your traps too. They make a noticeable audio effect to let them know that you dropped it.

Poisoned Arrow

This ability has a 5 second duration and you can apply multiple stacks. It also has a second effect in which the target will take additional damage if they move while poisoned.Not accounting for armor, the movement damage bonus is 10 per second for 5 seconds (max 50 damage).
Using Pin Foot on an opponent that is not facing directly at you (they can still fire in the direction they were targeting while “Pinned”) gives you enough time to stack the poison a few times plus use Bow Shot for some energy regeneration and damage, or maybe Blind them for an easy getaway.

Volley

An efficient way of punishing the enemy team for standing close to one another in open Line-Of-Sight

Also if you suspect that there is an assassin close to your target, Volley will hit them and remove them from stealth. (Only works if you have a valid target when cast, AND if an assassin is within the usual range for volley to hit. Thanks Corsair)

Thanks for having a look at my guide. I actually enjoy playing all the classes so far; Shaman and Warden have interesting and unique mechanics and are fun to play, and the Assassin and Pyromancer have great toolkits and interesting strategies to work with. After playing them all to death in the first Alpha release of the game, I found i kept getting drawn back to the Pathfinder in the end. I think the personal deal-breaker is that i like to see the arrows shoot across the map and the sense of satisfaction when they hit a target. Kinda like a little visual ego-boost every time. You have a bag of crowd-control abilities, and with Determination meaning you cant just chain CC a single target until death (a GOOD thing) you have to learn how and when to best use them for maximum benefit. In saying that, i thought I’d put together a few of the tips that i found useful.

Please post your Pathfinder tips/combos for all to see!

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