The following describes Assur's vision of a hybrid warrior that relies on riposte to win. Hybrids are the hardest warriors to master, but great hybrids are tough to beat. From here on out, when I say hybrids, I am specifically talking about Hybrids designed to win with riposte.
Riposte messages in the fight are the message you often see right after a warrior parries or dodges that reads something like:
Hybrid steps back, and then rushes forward in a counterstrike!There are a number of such messages that all mean you are using your riposte skill.
1) Design
Hybrids need a balance of physicals and skills. More is always better, but your hybrid cannot start with 21s in all stats, so...
Encumbrance is one of the most important attributes. You do not want to over- encumber your hybrid for most all fights. Your armor will be chosen according to your ability to carry weight. A guideline: APL - 9 Str/Con. ASM - 11 Str/Con. APA 14 Str/Con. Realize that with those minimum str/con values, you need to be careful with helms and weapons or you will be over-encumbered. Sometimes it is fine to carry too much, but if you aren't sure who you are fighting, stay under your limit!
Hit Points are wonderful. Hybrids love hit points. The more the better because there are nasty pure offensives that will try to take you down and they are good at it.
Damage and Endurance are not as important, but you want some. Little damage is tough to work with. Endurance depends on your style (Suggested Minimums: Poor for PR/AB, Good for LU).
The most important skills are your parry/defense and attack skills. You'll want some riposte skills and initiative skills don't hurt. Decise is almost useless for Hybrids.
I would recommend at least one of your encumbrance, hit points, or defensive skills to be on the high side, preferably two of them.
With all that in mind, here is what your stats should look like:
Str: 9+ Con: medium+ Siz: any Wit: 11+ Will: 7-21 Spd: 3-9 Dft: 11+ *** 13 speed is a big breakpoint for riposte skills. 10-12 is a bad starting place *** While an 11 wit PR can learn enough skills to compete as a hybrid, that same 11 wit total parry or lunger might have more difficulty as they learn too many of their primary skills and not enough of their secondary skills.2) Style Choice
Only two styles naturally learn riposte. However, because initiative is underpowered, you can live with a non-riposte learning style.
Parry Ripostes are the king of this type of hybrid. They naturally learn att/par/rip, though they often learn too much riposte and not enough of the other two. They learn init and decise last.
Aimed Blows learn attack and riposte naturally, but do not learn their defensive skills as fast. Still, they can make excellent hybrids, but when you put 21 points on deftness, it is difficult to find a balance with the rest of your stats.
Lungers are the king of all the hybrids (as you'll see in my follow ups the next couple of turns). They have high attack and defense bases. They have the highest total skills of all styles (tied with WOSs). They learn defense and init skills first, but attack and riposte are their secondary skills, so they will learn some riposte. They burn endurance fast, so it is recommended to start with high will.
Total Parries can be run very similar to Parry Ripostes. They have better natural defenses, but worse attack and riposte. As mentioned before, they learn defense and parry first, but attack and riposte are their secondary learns, so they can still make good hybrids, especially with high wit.
Wall of Steels, Parry Lungers, do not learn riposte much at all. It can be their favorite learn, but usually it is not. That said, because of their attack/init/defenses, these styles can be run as a riposting hybrid. Riposte is one of the easiest skills to 'fake'. Again, these are high skill/high endurance burn styles, so make sure they have more endurance than I suggest as minimum.
3) Weapon Selection
I am not a fan of shields on Riposting Hybrids. You are trying to attack and nothing is worse than attacking with a shield (which tends to do no damage). It is recommended to use the best weapons in the game that you qualify for. I tend to use off-hand daggers for PRs and PLs and a single weapon with the other styles.
For main hand, I usually pick (style dependent) in order of preference: BA, SC (poor against scale), BS, LO (poor against plate)
Feel free to experiment with other weapons. Most of the time, weapon selection will not be the deciding factor in the fight. Different weapons have different strengths and weaknesses. Until you start to learn those strengths, the safe choice are the top overall weapons in the game.
4) Strategy and tactics
This is where things get difficult. You really need to experiment to find where your hybrid wants to fight. Different warriors like different rhythms and typically your favorite rhythms are a good place to start for most of these hybrids. For ABs, I tend to ignore their favorite activity level and run 7-10 in early minutes. What works on one hybrid may not work on another. When your hybrid starts to act like a monster at a certain set of numbers, you may be hitting his favorites. For reference, the 'most common' set of favorites for the styles mentioned in this article:
PR: 5-6 AL/3-4 OE TP: 3-4 AL/1-2 OE AB: 3-4 AL/3-4 OE PL: 5-6 AL/5-6 OE L: 7-8 AL/7-8 OE WOS: 3-4 AL/5-6 OEOnce again, this is only a place to start. These numbers may work well or not at all for your warrior. But, it is not a bad place to start. And if you're going to err, I'd recommend erring on the higher side. But one of my favorite hybrids was a Total Parry that went crazy running 2 OE. He always wanted to attack.
If you refuse to attack after a riposte messages, consider lowering armor or raising your activity level and offensive effort AND drop any tactics you are using.
As I mentioned, riposte is easy to fake. The Riposte tactic is a wonderful tool for warriors that need help in the riposte department. Very rarely will ABs or Prs need to use this tactic (and I almost never use it for those two styles). The hardest styles to riposte are typically Slashers and Lungers (and sometimes Wall of Steels and Parry Lungers, depending how they are running). These two styles tend to be running fast and have lots of initiative and though it is underpowered, if you have enough, it is tough to riposte you.
Parry and Dodge are also useful when you need to augment your defenses.
5) Armor
I talked a lot about armor in the design section. Wear some, but watch your weight.