Ability rotations: adrenaline, cooldowns and the order you press

A rotation is the order in which you use your abilities. It matters because abilities share one resource, adrenaline, and each one waits on its own cooldown before you can use it again.

Three kinds of ability

Basic abilities build adrenaline. Smash and Havoc each give 8%, Fury and Backhand 9%.

Enhanced abilities spend some of it for a larger hit. Assault costs 25% adrenaline and deals 560% of your ability damage, and more under some effects.

Ultimate abilities spend a lot of adrenaline at once. Overpower costs 60% for a 620% hit, and Berserk costs all 100% to raise your damage for a time instead of hitting.

A rotation alternates between building and spending. Using an enhanced ability as soon as you can afford it keeps adrenaline from piling up unused; saving up for an ultimate trades a few smaller hits for one large one.

Cooldowns count in game ticks

A game tick is 0.6 seconds, and each cooldown is a whole number of ticks. Smash and Havoc are ready again after 17 ticks (10.2 seconds), Fury and Backhand after 25 (15 seconds), Assault after 10 (6 seconds). A rotation that uses an ability before its cooldown ends will not work in the game, so the order has to leave room for each one.

Write it down and share it

Open a five-ability melee rotation in the ability rotation tool. It uses Smash, Havoc, Fury and Backhand to build 34% adrenaline from those abilities alone, then spends 25% on Assault. Each step shows the game's icon with its cooldown and adrenaline, and the share link carries the whole order, so someone else opens exactly the same rotation.

Add abilities from the picker, move them up or down, and give the rotation a name. The tool keeps the rotation in your browser and, after you sign in, in your account.

What the tool does not do yet

The tool lists each ability's own numbers. It does not yet add up adrenaline along the rotation, find gaps where nothing is off cooldown, or turn damage percentages into damage per hit; those need the combat formulas, which are not in it yet. Your equipment's damage bonuses are in the equipment comparison.