Tips on Soloing High Level Missions with Excalibur

[ecaliburprime]

Hey guys, I am struggling with going on solo high level missions with my Excalibur. I feel like they just shred through my shields too quickly. Any tips on how I can do better and not waste revives?

[(PSN)HSomDevil]

Radial Blind.

Put on a decent range, don't kill your duration and you have one of the most abusive abilities in the game in your hands.

[Xaero]

1. Forget about the shields.

2. Many would advice you to use Naramon, but I'd recommend not getting used to it as it's broken and likely to be reworked.

3. Use this build, don't forget to blind your enemies, channel, refill your HP with Life Strike.

[THeMooN85]

33 minutes ago, ecaliburprime said:

solo high level missions with my Excalibur

What do you mean "high level"? Like Sortie level or above?

If you thinking about mission below Sortie, than those should do the trick.

http://warframe-builder.com/Warframes/Builder/Excalibur/t_30_3400222020_2-3-10-3-8-5-5-7-5-57-1-5-59-2-3-411-6-10-479-4-10-481-0-10-615-9-5-726-5-5_481-7-57-8-59-9-2-12-479-7-726-8-411-8-5-9-3-18-615-9_0/en/1-0-5/121455/0

http://warframe-builder.com/Warframes/Builder/Excalibur/t_30_0400220330_2-2-10-5-3-4-19-1-10-34-8-5-55-7-4-59-6-3-479-4-10-615-9-5-726-5-5-830-0-3_830-9-19-7-2-12-5-8-479-7-726-8-59-9-55-5-34-14-615-9_15/en/1-0-5/131753/0

[Epsik-kun]

41 minutes ago, ecaliburprime said:

Hey guys, I am struggling with going on solo high level missions with my Excalibur. I feel like they just shred through my shields too quickly. Any tips on how I can do better and not waste revives?

Movement, positioning, proper utilization of Life Strike. Spin Blind when you are cutting through the crowd, RB when you realize you're in open area filled with enemies and you don't want them to shoot you down simultaneously.

Your panic button is Slash Dash - not Radial Blind.

Generally speaking, Vitality should be enough to carry you through augmented damage level 100 sorties given you are moving properly, CC on the go, and don't eat bullets with your back. Steel Fiber provides 47% EHP increase, so it's a viable option to have if you are feeling just Vitality is not enough for you. There is 5-mod survivability combo (Vitality, Fiber, Rage, PFlow, Quick Thinking) but I, personally, advise against using it.

Rage is amazing at helping you sustain your energy and life (via Life Strike) and it allows you to drop Flow out of your build.

Maxed efficiency (full Fleeting and Streamline) paired with Primed Continuity allows you to run Transient Fortitude as your sole Power Strength mod putting you at 155% Strength, which is all you'll need for the regular content while providing minimal skill and toggle costs while still having enough Duration for Blinds to be effective.

For Exilus, Hand Spring is the best-in-slot option by a huge margin.

Chromatic Blade provides insane damage dealing potential when it's used with a Corrosive+Blast weapon that utilizes Condition Overload. If you're running 155% Power Strength build, make one of your elemental mods a dual-stat while having others to be 90%. The same build will also provide you decent CC potential free of charge with Blast constantly knocking enemies down.

Having Stretch in your build will make Slash Dash a very fast mobility tool, will make Spin Blind more reliable and will give RB more range than it'll ever need. It's a decent last mod choice for your build.

 

All of that being said, in some sorties with particularly nasty spawns, you'll find yourself getting bursted down from full health instantly under some unlucky circumstances. Excal isn't durable enough to be completely safe against damage spikes and lag. You can avoid that completely by falling behind your group, using the cover, and blinding like mad. But, again, I would not advise doing that because there are better frames for the purpose. Excal is supposed to cut the enemy down - you will be more useful if you learn how to move in the actual close-combat despite getting down from time to time than if you stay alive 100% of the time but will be useless to the team. Not to mention, as you'll get better you'll be downed less and less.

Edited July 28, 2017 by Epsik-kun

[Tizodd]

1 hour ago, (PS4)HSomDevil said:

Radial Blind.

Put on a decent range, don't kill your duration and you have one of the most abusive abilities in the game in your hands.

I second this.  Radial Blind is one of the best CC abilities in the game as long as you have line-of-sight.  Exalted Blade is cool and all, but for soloing I prefer the survivability of Radial Blind.  Not only are enemies blinded, but they are also open for stealth finishers and stealth melee damage bonuses.

Also, focus on health instead of shields.  Shields don't benefit from armor, health does.

My main Excalibur build is primarily focused on efficiency and range for Radial Blind spamming (duration and strength are both in the positive, but not particularly high).  I also run him with a [Rage]/[Quick Thinking]/[Primed Flow] combo for more survivability.

[kyori]

1 hour ago, ecaliburprime said:

...

Use their suggestions and go to today's eximus sortie 3 and see how you fare.... solo.

[RobWasHere]

I prefer to use Surging Dash instead of Chromatic Blade. I dash few times while having Exalted Blade active, then throw very powerful waves while multiplier is active. If power is not enough to one shot enemies, bleed will. Remember you are invincible during dashing. 

[DatDarkOne]

2 hours ago, Ksaero said:

1. Forget about the shields.

2. Many would advice you to use Naramon, but I'd recommend not getting used to it as it's broken and likely to be reworked.

3. Use this build, don't forget to blind your enemies, channel, refill your HP with Life Strike.

I like this method a lot.  I would just add one more suggestion.  Try it with the Healing Return mod and it might work even better.  I say this because it should allow healing even while using Exalted Blade.  I know it still works for Titania's RazorWing and don't see why it wouldn't also with EB.  HR also has the nice convenience of working with Quick Melee and doen'st require channeling.  It does require enemies to have some type of status on them, which shouldn't be a problem. 

Please be advised that I don't play Excal so I don't know the finer details of how he works.  Just wanted to offer another possible option to help a fellow Tenno.  :D 

[Xaero]

2 hours ago, DatDarkOne said:

I like this method a lot.  I would just add one more suggestion.  Try it with the Healing Return mod and it might work even better.  I say this because it should allow healing even while using Exalted Blade.  I know it still works for Titania's RazorWing and don't see why it wouldn't also with EB.  HR also has the nice convenience of working with Quick Melee and doen'st require channeling.  It does require enemies to have some type of status on them, which shouldn't be a problem. 

Please be advised that I don't play Excal so I don't know the finer details of how he works.  Just wanted to offer another possible option to help a fellow Tenno.  :D 

I tried Healing Return, the gain is too slow compared to Life Strike, which is instant full heal on hit.

[rudman88]

6 hours ago, ecaliburprime said:

Hey guys, I am struggling with going on solo high level missions with my Excalibur. I feel like they just shred through my shields too quickly. Any tips on how I can do better and not waste revives?

why not we see your set up the only can advice you what to do.

but excalibur is not shield type more like armor.

with the new mod for exalted blade, if you go corrosive and blast the enemies technically cant even stand up.

[DatDarkOne]

59 minutes ago, Ksaero said:

I tried Healing Return, the gain is too slow compared to Life Strike, which is instant full heal on hit.

It's a personal preference thing.  For me it's the extra convenience that it provides that I really like.  :D

[Desperado14]

Radial blind and exalted blade work really well together, since the cc is there, as well as damage.  Any enemy taking too long to kill, blind them and do a stealth attack with exalted blade.  At 3200% damage on stealth finishers, there's not much that can stop you.  

Steel charge (or CP if you are in a party) vitality, rage, stretch, prime flow, prime continuity, and fill in the blanks with maybe an augment or something, and some more duration (constitution is a good mod) and efficiency.  Maybe top the exilus slot off with a cunning drift.  

Pair it with a melee with prime pressure point, prime fury, berserker, true steel, a couple 60/60 mods, life strike, and condition overload.   

If you get into trouble, you can use slash dash to get away before using blind, since slash dash casts a lot faster and you are invulnerable during movement.  

[ecaliburprime]

On 7/28/2017 at 0:14 PM, rudman88 said:

why not we see your set up the only can advice you what to do.

but excalibur is not shield type more like armor.

with the new mod for exalted blade, if you go corrosive and blast the enemies technically cant even stand up.

Vitality, Blind Rage,Primed Flow, Primed Constitution, Chromatic blade,  Constitution, stretch, fleeting 

[ecaliburprime]

23 hours ago, Desperado14 said:

Radial blind and exalted blade work really well together, since the cc is there, as well as damage.  Any enemy taking too long to kill, blind them and do a stealth attack with exalted blade.  At 3200% damage on stealth finishers, there's not much that can stop you.  

Steel charge (or CP if you are in a party) vitality, rage, stretch, prime flow, prime continuity, and fill in the blanks with maybe an augment or something, and some more duration (constitution is a good mod) and efficiency.  Maybe top the exilus slot off with a cunning drift.  

Pair it with a melee with prime pressure point, prime fury, berserker, true steel, a couple 60/60 mods, life strike, and condition overload.   

If you get into trouble, you can use slash dash to get away before using blind, since slash dash casts a lot faster and you are invulnerable during movement.  

can that melee build be used with the Nikana prime? I wanted to use NIkana prime late game

Edited July 29, 2017 by ecaliburprime

[Desperado14]

19 minutes ago, ecaliburprime said:

can that melee build be used with the Nikana prime? I wanted to use NIkana prime late game

Yes, but this is a general build to get more out of exalted blade.  It can be used on any melee and exalted blade will have the same stats.  

If you don't want to use exalted blade and you want to use the nikana prime, the build I suggested for both excal and melee is probably not the most ideal.  There are some in here that would work much better for that purpose.  Even then, you are limiting yourself further depending on the objective of the mission.  In other words, survival might be easier with a weapon-melee build (especially with naramon), but defense, mobile defense, excavation, etc. Becomes a lot harder.