Mariner

Class Difficulty: Advanced

Role: Support/Damage

Available to races: High Elf, Man, River Hobbit, Stout-axe

Gameplay: Mariners are confident melee fighters who wield swords deftly to challenge the forces of evil. Mariners have an innate sense of the flow of combat, and use their balance to adjust their fighting style to best fit the moment. Mariners also know how to use combinations of individual movements to create powerful skill chains. In fellowships, Mariners can use shanties to coordinate and motivate their allies, as well as craft strange concoctions to confound and disrupt foes.

Lore: Mariners are resourceful combatants, capable of using strange devices as well as their surroundings to aid them in battle.

This class is inspired by Eärendil, who alone of men successfully sailed to the Uttermost West to plead for the aid of the Valar

A male High Elf Mariner

Class Navigation Classes Skills Traits Traceries Effects Deeds Guides

Gameplay

The Mariner's combat flow is centered around utilizing Sword-play skill to create combos, enhancing abilities while maintaining their balance between Fore and Aft to maximize the buffs relative to each state without over extending in one direction and taking on detrimental debuffs.

• Blue-line (Damage Support): Mariners specialized in the Shanty-caller trait tree use Shanty skills to buff their fellowship. They provide invaluable buffs like  Guided by the Stars, and powerful debuffs like  The Breaking of Thangorodrim.  Thrust is the most commonly used skill, buffing other swordplay skills' damage.
• Red-line (Damage): Mariners specialized in the Duellist trait tree focus further on swordplay skills, cycling through combos to maximuze the damage of  Sweeping Advance and  Compound Attack. Their main damage cooldown,  Shanty: Fore with Haste, provides a massive damage buff at the expense of quickly moving to foreward balance.
• Yellow-line (Pure Support): Mariners specialized in the Rover trait tree utilize  Jugglery to greatly debuff enemy damage at the expense of also reducing their incoming damage. They use Pot skills like  Caustic Brew and  Pitch Pot to shred enemy mitigations.

This class is recommended for seasoned players of the game who desire a new challenge. While this class is not the most challenging at the highest end, the learning curve can be challenging, and the class is very punishing when Balance isn't played properly.

Balance

Balance Panel of the Mariner (neutral)

The Mariner balance system revolves around balance. They will focus more on the defensive in the Aft-stance or on the offensive in the Fore-stance. Going too far into one of these two will result in negative side effects for the mariner. Being balanced (neutral) gives some beneficial effects.

Balance is measured on a scale of 0 - 50, with 1 being fully Aftward and 50 being fully Foreward. A balance of 25/50 or 0 is neutral and the Mariner is considered Steadied if they are at most 6 (19/50) and at most 6 (31/50).

Some skills will shift the Mariner aftward, moving balance towards the left on the panel, while others will shift the Mariner foreward, moving balance towards the right on the panel. Other skills will balance the Mariner by moving balance towards the center of the panel. Finally some skills will return to neutral balance, automatically moving balance all the way to the middle regardless of current balance.

Additionally, critically hitting a target will move the Mariner's balance foreward while being critically hit will move it aftward.

Balance Effects

The buffs/debuffs relative to the Mariner's balance are as follows:

Effect	Attunes	Effect	Attunes	Effect	Attunes	Effect	Attunes	Effect	Attunes	Effect	Attunes	Effect
Tripping Aftward	◀ 19	Extremely Aftward	◀ 19	Aftward	◀ 7	Steadied	7 ▶	Foreward	19 ▶	Extremely Foreward	19 ▶	Stumbling Foreward
Upon expiration			(6/50)		(18/50)	(25/50)	(32/50)		(44/50)		Upon expiration

Additionally:

• Upon re-entering the  Steadied range, the Mariner gains the effect:  Steady
• Should the Mariner allow  Tripping Aftward or  Stumbling Foreward to expire without re-balancing themselves, they will be  Stunned for 2 seconds and their balance will be reset to 25/50.

Symbols

• 
  Aft
• 
  Balance
• 
  Fore

Swordplay

Many Mariner skills are classified as Swordplay' skills. In addition to their base effects, these skills provide combo bonuses to a subset of skills when they are the next swordplay skill used.

When a Finisher skill is used, a type of Swordplay skill, it enables the use of  Re-centre, setting the Mariner's balance back to center. When a Mariner's balance is near the middle of the bar, they acquire the  Steadied buff, which gives immunity to certain combat states, among other benefits granted by certain traits.

Shanties & Haversack Skills

Some skills are classified as either Shanty Skills or Haversack Skills. Shanty skills are particularly important to Blue-line Mariners, and are impacted by many Blue-line traits. Importantly, traits allow Swordplay finishers to reduce the active cooldown of Shanty skills. Haversack skills are particularly important to Yellow-line Mariners, and are impacted by many Yellow-line traits.  Jugglery impacts Haversack skills specifically, granting them a chance to apply additional debuffs.