This guide is for the Shadow stalker of time (SSOT) class and it's variants like SWOT. This is the first chrono I'm making a guide for here, it is a great versatile class that has some average farming capabilities, alongside high DPS derived from an infinitely scaling dot nuke. It is also incredibly safe, providing a great "dodge" support for your team, with the right rotation and timing your team would basically be invincible.

There are some mechanics to understand when using this class, and the skills have different abilities during the time the 5 skill is active. To note some of this information comes from mole and shuga.

Shuga’s amazing SWOT/SSOT guide here for another resource.

If you're buying this class, get it from /curio, you get 2 classes SSOT and SWOT, their cosmetics, for the price of 6k ACs

Skills Overview

• Rift of Shadows
  • 50% Physical Damage / 0.5 AP2
  • Short Range Attack
  • 1.2 second cooldown, 0.6 seconds at max haste
  • Single Target
  • Applies chaos rift
    • Stacks to 5 and lowers their hit chance by 3% per stack
    • Used as the nuke's (5 - 3) inherent multiplier
      • 1 Stack = 0.5
      • 2 Stack = 0.7
      • 3 Stack = 1.0
      • 4 Stack and above = 1.5
    • The first chaos rift is used to start the damage recording over the most recent 10 seconds.
  • If Temporal Eclipse (5) is active, you gain Grant focus and Grant sight
    • Lowers their dodge by 3% per stack, stacks to 5
    • Increases your dodge by 3% per stack, stacks to 5

This is your auto attack which automatically stacks rifts for you, and increases your survivability through dodge. It is recommended to stack upto 4 rifts before letting off a nuke so that you gain damage onto the next rotation.

• Exude/Devour
  • 150% Physical Damage/Magical Damage / 1 AP2
  • Long Range Attack
  • 6 second cooldown, 3 seconds at max haste
  • Uses 15 mana
  • Hits 2 targets (AOE)
  • A moderate/light dot is applied if not in temporal eclipse (5) and some moderate physical damage
  • A moderate/light hot is applied if in temporal eclipse (5), classed as magical here

Some basic damage/healing capability through DoTs and HoTs. Used to rack up more damage.

• Vendetta/Umbral Stigma
  • 100% Physical Damage/Magical Damage / 1 AP2 / 0.2 Chrono2
  • Long Range Attack
  • 6 second cooldown, 3 seconds at max haste
  • Uses 30 mana
  • Single Target
  • If 5 is not active, increases all out to enemy by 20%
    • Considered Physical Damage
  • If 5 is active, consumes all chaos rifts and does a delayed heavy DoT (nuke) based on how much damage was dealt in past 10 seconds
    • Considered Magical Damage

This skill before entering 5 is used to increase your all out damage on the enemy. Pretty much necessary to build higher nukes. When in 5, it deals a delayed nuke. The delay is integral to the class as it helps build more greater nukes during the next rotation, as atleast 1 auto attack will land before the nuke fully processes, meaning the nuke damage from this rotation is carried into the next.

Refer to this amazing animation made by SLGMA for an example of how the damage changes if you exceed 10 seconds.

• Silhouette/Shadow Warp
  • 380% Attack power as damage to self after 2 seconds / 1.2 AP2
  • 180% Physical Damage/Magical Damage
  • 12 second cooldown, 6 seconds at max haste
  • Uses 0 mana
  • Hits 2 targets (AOE)
  • With 5 not active, you get the silhouette buff
    • Increases dodge by 300% for 4 seconds
    • Applies Focus on the enemy for 4 seconds, taunted
    • Considered Physical Damage
  • With 5 active go into shadow warp
    • Applies focus for 4 seconds, enemy is taunted
    • Large DoT on the enemy
    • Regain 30 mana
    • Considered Magical Damage

Skill used mainly for survivability, most combos start with this. Due to the fact it applies focus, it also protects your party in this state, especially when fighting bosses that 1 shot, for example icewing.

Usually you shouldn't use this skill with 5 active as it will lower your survivability, since you won't be able to dodge on the next rotation. This is fine if the enemy just doesn't hit hard.

Shuga sent some very niche weird bug thingy where nuke damage grows in double nuke when throwing this out after 5. I wasn't really able to replicate this, but just know it exists.

• Temporal Eclipse
  • Long Range debuff
  • 15 second cooldown, 7.5 at max haste
  • Uses 30 mana
  • Hits 3 targets (AOE)
  • Basically increases haste to max in 99% of scenarios, if you do not have a chaos rift stack only 30%
  • Increases crit chance by 80%
  • Reduces enemy hit chance by 30%
  • Changes other skills effects

Used usually to execute your nuke straight after, and apply a HoT. Changes your skill effects, read the previous skills for their differences.

Enhancements

Gameplay/Combos

I'm just going to plug Shuga's Guide as it has combos for a variety of situations.

Generally the idea of the class in 99% of scenarios, is go into dodge, apply 2-3 for damage. Then go into 5 and use 2-3 again for Nuke + Hot.

4-2-3-5-2-3 (Wait for 5 to expire)

For a more DPS oriented playstyle without the need for dodge follow this:
3-2-5-4-3-2

For ultras this requires you to adapt your playstyle for the type of boss, you will need to manage your 4 usage (due to the fact it taunts) and it reduces your HP. Generally not recommended in pubs.

Chainkilling using SSOT utilises the below knowledge in extra information, and it's required to have atleast a bare minimum Phonor or VG in order to actually have enough all out that your nuke damage doesn't drop by too much from the next kill. Make sure you kill the boss with a DoT, because if it dies without it going off you may risk your damage resetting by the next kill. You also may need to drop some skills in order to make sure you’re still within the 10s threshold between nukes.

432523 (dies) 3s to respawn
43532 (skipped initial 2 to compensate for respawn timer)

Extra information

This section is pretty much for those who want to maximise damage and have a bit more understanding on how the class works. This will go over stuff like chainkilling and infinitely increasing damage.

In 99% of scenarios, where the bosses are low to medium hp, you can get away with just having a LOO/LR as support, since the damage you do will be high enough. But for much difficult bosses like Azalith, read onwards.

Refer to DoT/HoT mechanics section for understanding on the mechanics, the base is 1x. Basically it utilises these things:

• All Out - All in
• Mag Out - Mag in
• DoT out - DoT in

Rifts multiplier stacks like this:

• 1 Stack = 0.5
• 2 Stack = 0.7
• 3 Stack = 1.0
• 4 Stack and above = 1.5

SSOT/SWOT has an all out passive of 112%
According to Mole, the class has a base DoT coefficient of 0.2

Refer to the chrono section for more specific information

With this information we can use this to calculate the modifier used to calculate the modifier for nuke damage.

This is usually equal to this without any extra buffs:
1.5 (4 rifts) x 0.2 (coefficient) x 2.12 (all out passives) x 1 (dot out) = 0.636

Meaning an extra 122% of buffs is required to reach the 1x threshold for an infinitely growing DoT. You can reach this threshold relatively easily with enough support and pots. Here are a few classes you can use to reach said threshold.

• Potent Honor Potion - 75%
• LOO - 30%
• LR - 30%
• LC - 15%
• LH - 25%
• Bard - 20%
• Vainglory - 15%

Damage cap is 100m but having 122%+ worth of buffs will allow you to reach it relatively quickly. Having more than 122% means you just reach the cap faster.

You can use this to 1 shot ultras with a boss shield, may take like a few mins to get that sort of damage though

Classes like arachno, vdk, and other classes that debuff defense will not necessarily be calculated into the recorded damage modifier. But they will still increase the overall nuke damage.

The reason we can’t reach infinite scaling solo is because the 0.636 multiplier essentially means that the damage we record essentially caps out at a certain point. Because our nuke is divided by outgoing modifiers in the explained in this section and then multiplied out again by the function. If the nuke multiplier is stuck at 0.636 we can never get infinite scaling, it will never grow. Hence we need 1.0 or above for atleast a net positive gain.