It depends. Obviously, on a Trapper or Kicker, Claw Mastery isn't going to be of much use, as Claw Mastery doesn't add damage to Traps or Kicks. However, if you're playing a build that's heavy on chargeups or relies on claw damage, then max Claw Mastery is probably worth the points.
=Trap FAQ=
==What exactly does +x/y weapon damage on the various Blade skills mean?==
It means that x/y of your total damage is in effect on the Blade skill, in addition to its own natural damage. This includes elemental damage, poison, etc., bonuses from CM/STR/DEX in terms of claw damage despite what it says. If you're C/C, it uses damage from whichever claw you equip first (or have still equipped, if you unequipped one) + external elemental damage.
It should be noted that this property reduces Venom's duration in proportion to its damage, and not its damage alone. For example: At level one, Venom does 60-80 damage over 0.4 seconds(150-200 over one second), and can be expressed in the following equation):
:(150-200 damage / sec) times (0.4 seconds) = 60-80 total damage
The Blade skills' property (in this case, BSentinel's +3/8 damage) changes the above equation:
:60-80 (over 0.4 secs) reduced to 60-80 * 3/8 (over 0.4 sec * 3/8) =
:60-80 (over 0.4 secs) reduced to 22.5-30 (over 0.15 sec.)
So while the damage/frame is still unaffected, in practice, you have to be able to hit once every 0.15 seconds(3.75 frames) to keep up your Venom damage rate, which is near impossible except with Blade Shield and BFury.
Note: It isn't a good idea to use Two-Handed weapons with the Blade skills, if your aim is to improve Physical damage with them, as the Physical damage of Two-Handed weapons takes an additional 50% damage penalty (on top of the fraction of damage that is applied on the Blade Skills). So, when using Two-Handed weapons, only 3/8 on BFury, 3/16 on BSentinel, and 1/8 on Blade Shield of Physical damage is transferred over to the Blade skills (despite what it shows for BFury and BSentinel on the Character Screen). However, the elemental damage transferred remains unaffected.
==Q: What is Blade Shield's range?==
Blade Shield's range is locked at 6(or 4 yards). Weapon range does not affect it.
==What determines the speed of Blade Shield (how often it does damage)?==
Blade Shield's speed is locked at 25 frames (i.e. it damages every second).
==Do Blade Fury, Blade Sentinel and Blade Shield need AR, or do they have a 100% chance to hit?==
No, they do require AR (use Normal Attack AR), despite them not having an AR listed on the Character Screen.
==How do I increase the rate my Traps fire their shots?==
Unfortunately, this isn't possible. The speed at which Traps fire is locked.
==How do you calculate Blade Fury's speed?==
The speed an Assassin throws out each star is locked at 6 frames.
==Since the Blade skills make use of weapon damage, do Claw Mastery/+%ED Auras (such as Might) increase the damage you do with the Blade skills?==
Yes to both. However, Claw Mastery only increases the Blade skills' damage if you're using claw(s).
==SWeb and BSentinel have a 25 frame(1 second) NextDelay. How does this affect the skills?==
The NextDelay property, in this case, renders these two skills mostly useless (even detrimental), as they do little damage, in addition to preventing the above attacks from doing any damage for the 1 second duration (including attacks in the NextDelay list, from other characters). However, they both have some redeeming factors. SWeb is still useful as a Lightning trap synergy, and BSentinel remains the only AoE duration-based Blade skill (and hence is a good method of distributing poison/elemental damage), in addition to looking very cool.
==WoF has a 4 frame NextDelay. How does this affect the skill?==
Given that WoF fires its shots so fast, there may be a chance of WoF shots hitting a target may overlap and cause one another not to do any damage (especially with multiple WoF traps). To remedy this somewhat, try not to cast WoFs from the same distance to a crowd (or boss) or bunch all your WoFs together, so there will be a short time between each WoF hitting a crowd, to allow NextDelay to expire (having a tank, like an SM or Act 2/5 mercenary to keep the crowd/boss as still as possible, helps greatly).
==What determines the speed you throw FBs and lay Traps?==
A: Your "Normal Attack" speed (use the heading "%IAS required for 7 frame attack with Claw/Shield Non-Elemental Chargeup Attack" on this for finding out the speed of your Normal attack. If you're C/C, use the WSM of the claw you equip first, or the claw that remains, if you unequip one) is used for calculating the speed at which you lay Traps and throw FBs. Since the speed of your "Normal Attack" is subject to IAS on your equipment and slvl of BoS (if any), so is your FB throwing & Trap-laying speed.
==Why is my WoI barely hitting anything?==
It's been discovered that the actual missile that causes the damage of WoI is extremely thin, which makes it useless on moving targets. WoI still has hope with completely stationary targets, though.
==How many traps {sentries} can the Assassin place?==
She can place a maximum of five Sentries at any one time. These can be mixed (2 Wake of Fire, 3 Lightning) or all the same kind. The five cap only applies to Sentries (Charged Bolt Sentry, Wake of Fire, Lightning Sentry, Wake of Inferno and Death Sentry). Do note that the Traps that your Shadow casts also counts towards this limit. For example, if you had five WoI traps active, and your Shadow casts an LS, one of your WoI traps would be destroyed and replaced with your Shadows's LS.
While BFury, Blade Shield, SWeb and FB don't count as Traps in terms of the trap limit, BSentinel does (when you have 5 WoI traps active, and cast a BSentinel, one of your WoIs will disappear). Theoretically, an Assassin is not able to have more than 5 BSentinels active at the same time, due to limitations from its casting delay and duration (there is also a hard limitation that prevents more than 5 BSentinels from being cast, as the first BSentinel will wink out before the sixth is cast).
==So the best traps to use are WoF, WoI, LS, and DS?==
Some combination out of those four, yes. Don't bother putting more than one point into DS, as the lightning damage is not as good as LS. The only thing that increases per slvl is the corpse explosion radius. But remember, a maxed trap is better than several low level traps.
Also, remember to put natural points in the relevant Trap synergies to ensure your Traps' effectiveness in Hell.
==Can monsters/players destroy traps?==
No.
=Credits=
jrichard, Frenzied Bovine, Sebol, Fenriz, LGT_Freak, RogueMage (from the Amazon Basin forums), LeserXYZ, Cironir, Brainles, Skythe, BT-LightDash, Loschnorg, eclipsedk, Tommi Gustafsson, The_Great_Apple, Mr Bones, StealthStalker, BIGeyedBUG, Polaris, *Cyrus*, Zath (from the Lurker Lounge forums), Shade, zen_bc, The_Great_Apple, Noni_Ryder, weylun, archpsi, Forksup31, dydx, adeyke (from the Amazon Basin Forums), several users of the Diabloii.net Assassin forum and the Lurker Lounge
[[Category:Assassin]]
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