- "Senkei, Senbonzakura Kageyoshi."
- ―Byakuya Kuchiki
Swordmancer, along with Illusionist, is one of the two Master Burst-typed classes that cost 800 points in CRITICAL STRIKE.
Appearance[]
Swordmancer wears the standard Critical Backpack, armbands, boots, and a combat skirt. They are surrounded by 6 glowing swords, which they use to attack. In their idle and movement animations, they hover menacingly.
Overview[]
Summary: Hybrid ranged / melee class with extreme damage, but fragile and requires good aim.
Swordmancer is a high-execution class that initially plays zoning and keepaway with its high mobility until it lands a clean hit with enough swords, after which it shifts gears into a hyper-offensive rushdown class with incredible DPS against single targets. Swordmancer also has high AOE damage with moderate range, allowing it to perform well in team modes.
However, Swordmancer requires pinpoint precision to achieve its highest potential, as stray swords that get stuck in walls do not return unless manually picked up or after a lengthy duration, and may mess up Swordmancer's teleport. Due to this, Swordmancer struggles against classes with high mobility. Additionally, Swordmancer suffers against tanks who can shrug off its initial offense, requiring players to win multiple more interactions to get the kill.
Overall, Swordmancer is a difficult class to learn, but a very rewarding one to master.
Strengths[]
- Amazing AOE
- High mobility
- Long Range
Weaknesses[]
- Fragile
- Difficult to achieve maximum damage
- Easily rushed
Moveset[]
| Attack | Name / Icon | Description | Damage | Status Effect | Cooldown |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| ATK | Steel Notes
  |
Launch one of your swords forwards, sticking to walls and players and each dealing 5 damage and lasts for 5s. Cannot be cast without swords. Running into a sword will return the sword to you and cause it to spin around you once, dealing 5 damage. Swords will automatically return to you after 5 seconds if not picked up. Swords that travel the maximum range without sticking to anything will also be returned to you. |
5 | N/A | 0.4s |
| AB1 | Blade Dance
  |
Dash forwards, dealing 5 damage, inflicting Sword Mark for 8s and resetting this ability's cooldown. Hitting a player with Sword Mark inflicted will not reset the cooldown. |
5 | Sword Mark (Target) | 4s |
| AB2 | Steel Edge
  |
Launch two of your swords while dashing backwards. On hit, recast within 2.5 second to teleport to your closest sword, returning it and dealing 10 damage in an AoE. |
6x2 / 10 | N/A | 7s |
| CRT | Blade Crescendo
  |
Unleash an AOE of autolocking magical swords, striking opponents who are caught in the AOE 9 times and each dealing 1 true damage. Damage is increased by 1 against players with Sword Mark. 3 second windup period. Picking up a sword will reduce this ability's cooldown by 1 second. |
1x9 / 2x9 | N/A | 10s |
Notes[]
- Steel Edge's teleport will teleport Swordmancer to the closest sword. As a result, stray swords stuck into walls near you will be prioritised over swords stuck into enemies further away.
- Blade Crescendo only targets enemies who were in the circle after its full expansion. Additionally, enemies too high up will not be detected.
- It is possible to pick up swords immediately after Steel Edge's backdash if you are close enough.
Tips & Tricks[]
- By staying close to an enemy and spamming ATK, you can infinitely collect and throw your swords to deal incredible amounts of damage. This is decently risky, however.
- If you get knocked back or accidently jump into a dangerous spot (such as the void), use AB2 to quickly escape your predicament, it's an excellent recovery tool.
Combos[]
ATK X2 > AB2 > AB2 (recast) > CRT
- Use ATK two times for a quick 12 damage before using AB2 and the recast for 12 damage plus 25 damage from sword pickup, then finish it off with a fast
Ikkka SenjikaBlade Crescendo.
ATK > AB1 > ATK > AB1 > AB2 > AB2 (recast) > CRT
- Use ATK at close range for 11 damage, then activate AB1 to deal 5 damage, repeat the first two moves before using AB2 and CRT to finish the combo.
Gallery[]
Trivia[]
- Swordmancer is the first class that has been added to CRITICAL STRIKE since September of 2020, missing the two-year anniversary mark by only two days.
- Swordmancer's codename before it was added was "CONTROL THE BLADES".
- Swordmancer's inclusion in CRITICAL STRIKE marks the Burst role as the first in the game to receive ten non-Special, non-Unique classes.
- Blade Crescendo is directly inspired by Terraria's Terraprisma, a weapon for the Summoner class which summons flying, rainbow-sparkling blades to independently slash at enemies for the user.
- Alongside that, Steel Notes uses one of Terraria's numerous casting sound effects, picking up swords plays the Death Sickle swing noise, and Blade Crescendo uses the Razorblade Typhoon's casting sound.
- There is an admin-exclusive version of Swordmancer called Prisma, which actually has Terraprisma physically follow the user and attack on command.
- Prisma was actually created as a joke by Corrupt_Planet, but other developers insisted on it being used in the game as it was just that well-made, and so it was used for Swordmancer's moveset.
- Prisma was used in Critical Strike's April Fool's update.
- Steel Notes and Steel Edge may be inspired by Byakuya Kuchiki from Bleach, specifically his senbonzakura kageyoshi ability known as Senkei. (Confirmation Needed, delete this if it actually wasn't inspired by Byakuya.)
- Swordmancer is the first class that was not created by former CRITICAL STRIKE developer team. Instead, it was modeled by Minigus101 and coded by director EpicExplosivesGuy2, with Corrupt_Planet having created Blade Crescendo as mentioned previously.
- In mid CS3, Swordmancer's 2nd ability used to have a big, but slow sword mark scanner, later changed to a small but fast one.
Update History[]
- v5.8.0:
- Added to the game.
- v5.8.1:
ATK's projectile now starts at half max speed instead of 0, and reaches max speed 0.1s faster.- AB2's recast briefly causes the next spin from picking up a sword to deal 5 additional damage.
- CRT's tool-disable is reduced.
- Visual effects toned down, particles heavily reduced across all abilities.
- Ability icons remade.
- v5.8.5:
- ATK's blades are now affected by physics.
- Picking up the swords no longer reduced AB1's cooldown.
- AB1's hitbox is reduced.
- ATK and AB2's ranges are reduced.
- Swords thrown by AB2 are now prioritized when recasting AB2 to teleport.
- v5.9.1:
- AB2 can only be recast on hit.
- AB1's hitbox is put in front of the dash to improve hit detection.
- CRT's startlag is reduced by 25%.
- v5.9.3:
- ATK: Cooldown fixed to be properly 0.4s.
- ATK: Added VFX on cast.
- ATK: Damage reduced. (6 -> 5)
- AB1: Hit detection improved. (Bugfix)
- CRT: Startlag increased by 10%.
