Max range Breach Surge stuns enemies over huge range, and also synergizes with Seeking [Talons] as surge sparks have a positive feedback loop with Seeking [Talons], creating self propagating sparks that deal infinitely increasing slash procs over time (although this is now pseudo capped at 5 million before [Garuda]'s Passive and external buffs). [Garuda]'s passive also double dips on Breach Surge sparks (i.e. 4x damage to spark).

PLAYSTYLE

General Ability Rotation
1. Cast Bloodletting (tap 3) twice at beginning of a mission to hit near max energy (240 energy per 50% health consumed), and recast whenever needed e.g. energy drops below 300
2. Cast Breach Surge (tap 2) to stun enemies and prime them for making sparks
3. Keep [Dread] Mirror (aim at enemy and tap 1) active at all times and face direction of enemies to block frontal damage, while absorbing damage into dread heart. Dread Mirror also prevents knockdown/stagger. Leap onto additional enemies (trying to target heaviest units) to build up more [Dread] heart damage.
4. Charge [Dread] Heart (hold 1) and release to nuke, ideally keep at least 100 energy so you can still cast 4 on demand. If you built up sufficient damage via leaping and absorbing prior to charging, you can just charge for a very short time and release it immediately so you don't stay in a vulnerable charging state for too long.
5. Cast Seeking [Talons] ([Double Tap] 4 for narrow cone, tap 4 and allow it to expand for maximum cone) to cause slash procs and mark enemies to take slash procs from damage from any source, including [Dread] Heart. If you're running [Blending Talons] augment, you can just simply tap 4 once for full shield gate.

Survivability
We rely on a combination of shield gating, crowd control and invulnerability frames (i-frames) to survive.

• Shield gating: Whenever you deplete shields you gain a certain number of i-frames based on how much shield you had. Brief Respite and two augur mods allows a single cast of seeking talons generate 230 shield, which is approximately 1s of i-frames. Having even more Augur mods on your pistol allows you to generate 310 shield, giving almost 1.3s of iframes.
• Crowd control: Breach Surge stuns enemies
• I-frames: Both dread mirror and seeking talons now have inbuilt i-frames, meaning Rolling Guard's i-frames are no longer necessary when you can simply cast seeking [Talons] once to get full shield [Regen], rather than rolling followed by either [Dread] mirror or seeking [Talons]. Status cleanse from bloodletting also lets you quickly get rid of damaging status procs or annoying cold procs.

Combos and Aerial Combat
[Garuda]'s abilities can be linked together in certain 'combos'. [Garuda]'s 3 and 4 abilities also launch her into the air particularly when cast while already airborne. The combination of the two can cause you to [Reach] very high altitude without even bullet jumping. There are many benefits for aerial combat. You become a harder target to hit while airborne and moving, melee units cannot hit you, ground based damage sources cannot hit you e.g. mines, toxic sludge, grenades, you have a better overview of enemies allowing for easier targeting of dread mirror, dread heart and seeking talons.

• Heart to Heart (Aerial Chain Nuke Combo): With [Dread] mirror active, while in air, tap 4, aim glide, hold 1 to hover and release dread heart to nuke, aim glide, tap 1 on enemy before they die to refresh dread mirror for new dread heart.
• Clean Energy (Status Cleanse): When you are afflicted with a damaging status, cast 4 and immediately start tapping 3 to fit a cast of Bloodletting within the last few i-frames of 4 to get a safe status cleanse as well as regenerate energy safely. You get 1.75s of i-frames from the beginning of casting 4 and become free to move/cast new abilities for the last 0.5s. Bloodletting takes 0.8s to finish casting.
• The Ascension: With [Dread] mirror active, while aiming down sights, tap 3 to ascend into sky. This means you don't need to bullet jump to achieve air time and can keep dread mirror facing enemies the whole time
• Honing Altar: Attack a blood altar enemy with melee to build up melee combo to x12 without killing the enemy, great for x12 heavy attacks.

BUILD SPECIFICS:

BUILD SPECIFICS

Duration
Positive duration helps maintain uptime of [Dread] mirror and seeking [Talons] mark.

Efficiency
Neutral efficiency is suggested because the amount of energy returned from bloodletting scales positively with efficiency, meaning you get 364 energy per 50% health at 100% efficiency (2.5 casts to refill whole energy bar from 0), compared to only 228 energy per cast at 45% efficiency (4 casts required to refill whole energy bar from 0). This means you need to spam bloodletting much less often (less vulnerable periods) and one cast provides enough energy to perform multiple combos of Seeking Talons and Dread Mirror/Blood Altar. Neutral efficiency also means you can channel [Dread] Heart more efficiently and get more damage for less drain. [Primed Flow] is essential to hold more energy for chaining combos.

Range
Range is maximised for Breach Surge (50m), [Blending Talons] (25m) and [Dread] Mirror nuke (28m).

Strength
We only need to hit the 134% strength breakpoint to give Seeking [Talons] a 100% chance to cause slash procs. Any bonus strength helps boost breach surge and dread mirror.

Aura
Brief Respite - Helps with shield gating
Swift Momentum - Good for melee/talons focused build for maintaining combo and heavy attacks
Combat Discipline - Only for activating arcane avenger

Exilus
Cunning Drift - maximises range
Primed Sure Footed/Handspring - not needed for most weapons as Dread Mirror blocks knockdown, but still has inconsistent stagger resist for certain AOE weapons
Kavat's Grace - prevents hard landings which is very common when using Garuda, as all her abilities cause you to launch into the air
Vigilante Pursuit - if no enemy radar

Augments
Blending Talons is essential - Tapping 4 gives a radial area of seeking [Talons] and also provides quick shield gate in one tap rather than [Double Tap] of 4, as well as being able to target enemies behind you with no animation lock. You can still hold to charge 4 to cover the original 60m range.

Other augments are optional:
Blood Forge - Allows you to reload your weapon by casting bloodletting. Great with certain weapons hampered by insanely long reloads e.g. [Strun], [Kuva Zarr], [Trumna], Sepulcrum, Tenet Envoy, Quellor, Gorgon, Komorex, Kuva Chakkhurr, Tenet Arca Plasmor, Akarius. Note: this does NOT work with Hata-Satya on Soma Prime as it counts as a proper reload.

Dread Ward - gives a long duration of invulnerability if you either kill directly with [Dread] mirror (requires health < 40% threshold) or kill with a slash proc just as the [Dread] mirror leap animation occurs even if they die before you land. Pairs well with Reave which harvests a set % of health per cast, but the micromanaging of the invulnerability period and enemy health values can become tiresome and is overall inconsistent compared to just shield gating. The other issue is if you run [Panzer Vulpaphyla], matryr symbiosis will trigger BEFORE [Dread Ward] prevents your death and your Panzer will [Sacrifice] itself for no reason. In my opinion, it is safer and more fluid gameplay wise to rely purely on shield gating and crowd control.

Archon Shards
TWO Amber Cast Speed shards (Tauforged preferred)
THREE Crimson Strength Shards