1. Use a vortex
2. Suck the mobs into a clump
3. Charge up CIV
4. Walk into the clump of mobs
5. Release the charge
6. ???
7. Profit

The problem is that a lot of players use the same third or so of the gear 100% of the time, and that even fewer even own all of the necessary equipment to try out new strategies. While some of us might have tried out most of the possible ways to play the game, most haven't. This gets even more complicated when we consider that about half of the strategies rely on teamwork which in turn relies on all members of the party having the requisite gear.

I've never seen anyone aside from myself:
-Use shivermist buster constructively outside of FSC with triglav or neutralizer to fight anything.
-Fight kats with shard bombs, by waiting for them to dodge and then dropping it at the right time.
-Use hail driver charges to kill trojans/deadnaughts by refreezing them repeatedly when they lack blitz needle.
-Use big angry bomb with supernova to trap things in the corner and murderize them.
-Switch shoot polaris/supernova.
-Rely on poison to take care of large waves. Well, some people do this, but most of the time I have to tell them to quit killing menders.
-Use rocket puppies as the primary means of dealing damage in the turret filled danger room.
-Use shadow cloak to deliver curse vials to various enemies
-Pepperbox charge enemies that are attacking your friends.
-Pepperbox charge mecha knights as they're about to attack you, so as to push them back and not let them shield.
-Light mecha knights on fire/shock them/drop a shard bomb near them and then shoot nearby to waste their time and make them take damage.
-Use vortex to stall enemies, allowing you room to take care of the rest of the mobs in an area.

I generally only spreaded this technique to fellow Troika users to give them an edge if they so desired.
For me, I suck at double switching to remove sword combo cooldowns, so I just use this technique to get an additional first slash when I need it.
With this, you can get 4 hits with a 3-hit weapon, and 3 hits with a 2-hit weapon.
The sequence of actions for 3-hit weapon: Attack > Shield > Attack > Shield > Attack-hold > Attack-release (does four first weapon strikes)
Alternate sequence of actions for 3-hit: Attack > Attack > Shield > Attack-hold > Attack-release (does first, second, first, first)
Sequence for 2-hit weapon: Attack > Shield > Attack-hold > Attack-release
Notes: While doing the Attack-hold, you can move forward to close in or sidestep. You can shield-cancel after this and run away, but the attack combo cooldown still applies and you can't attack right after. "Attack-hold > Attack-release" can be nearly instantaneous. Oh and for this to work, you have to, at the minimum, charge your sword a bit (after it charges for the barest bit, it's fair game).
Double-Switching is generally superior to this technique, as it completely resets the attack combo, but I really dislike spamming my keys that much, so I do this.

Skip the 2nd attack of 3-hit swords:
Attack > Shield > Attack > Attack
This makes your character do 2 first attacks, then the 3rd attack. Particularly useful with the Hammer if you don't want to fly somewhere, but still use the final hit, or in general if you don't want to use the 2nd strike.

The shield-bumpless continual attack with 3-hit+ swords:
If you have trouble with shieldbumping while shield-cancelling, and just want to keep chipping at an enemy without using full attack combos. You can just attack and hold and move.
I start "charging" my weapon to prep (but I'm not going to let it complete charging and not going to use the charge).
Then you do: Attack-release > Attack-hold. (when you want to hit something). Now you're back to charging and you can repeat it again without shieldbumping the enemy away. Be sure to wait a little to let your attack combo reset every 1 repeat (or 2 if you're using a cutter), else you complete your attack combo and you're going to be vulnerable.

Uhh... stuff... Of these three, probably only the top one have I discovered exclusively, but I generally don't see other people using these sword techniques. Perhaps because nobody was truly a swordie ;[ (don't you tell me brandish users are swordies... they are ranged explosive thingyamadudes). I ran Rigadoon and Nightblade back when I started. My first non-sword weapon was a Plague Needle... after I got a Triglav :P (which was after I got a DA for derpulous twins). Ah... the days of random explosions for the Brandish... you actually had to hit enemies with the sword.
EDIT: only had to edit like asdffdsadf times to get this the way it is... hindsight is somewhat like 20/20... ish.

EDIT: Wait.. .Waititids.fad.f..... what? I thought this was about actual techniques, and not weapon usage situations shtuff...... errr... whatever

I have fun with kats, I pummel them with my Silversix (because Argent peacemaker never shows up except when I don't have the CR) while dodging bullets. When they dash at long range I shield bump them and they continue flying elsewhere (allowing for more shots) at closer range I do the same thing but switch to my FOV to snag a single sword hit (since FOV gets fire change on every hit it works great) and then continue blasting them.

Rocket Hammer works best without autotarget, actually. You rarely want to hit enemies head on with the dash, because you'll often eat a retaliation attack. Instead, dash into them at an angle, so you wind up to their side. The only time I personally use autotarget with the hammer is while attacking a turret where a full dash would send me flying into a floor trap.

You can make the dash damage enemies more reliably by holding attack for a split second and taking a step toward your target after the first swing. This also works with heavy swords to reposition for the second swing, or with faster swords to prevent whiffed combos due to knockback.

WMRH may say it is a slow sword on the wiki but if you quick shield after your first swing and then attack you can do a swing pattern like a DA. This is similar to quick shielding after a Calibur, brandish, or FOV to do all three swings while only taking one step.

Attack, shield, attack, attack.

I don't use a lot of clever control techniques. Insofar as I have tricks, they mostly center on not using weapons directly on the monsters, because that is a meta-game that I enjoy:

* Shield-bump or kite monsters into exploding blocks, and blow up the blocks. Auto-target should be off. And I hate to say it, but this is one area in which Antiguas shine.

* Shield-bump monsters into obstacles, so that the AI gets stuck on a corner. Everybody knows to do this in the boss fight of Ghosts in the Machine. But you can do it in many more places --- for example, battle arenas. When you eventually decide to kill the monster, use something insulting, like a haze bomb.

* Shield-bump monsters into my teammates' bombs, etc.

* Trick lumbers into hurting other monsters.

Also, at the risk of self-aggrandization, I use the Final Flourish charge attack more than any other player I've seen.

"-Fight kats with shard bombs"

>:[

dash canceling out of the pill recovery animation. Of course, I'll say that I'm the only one I've seen doing this but I'm sure you've all seen/done this, just like I'd say to the stuff you guys post.

I tend to quick charge with the pill animation. Eat a pill, hold the attack button, voila, you're charging once the pill animation ends! It's not as practical as shield charging as you can't use it at all times unless you want to waste pills but as a gamepad player, I can't do that because I have attack/defend on the triggers.

Uh...

A lot of techniques and tricks have been thought up and/or individually-discovered. But here are a few that I either experimented with on my own or rarely see others do:

Techniques:
- I self-taught (and once in a while, teach others) scroll-wheel-based doubleswitching, if that counts for anything.
- I figured out how to control Drakon's shield barrier skill to walk over active hazards.

Weapon usages:
- Shield bump --> instant Magnus shot (so it's essentially a push-shot).
- Maskeraith Needle --> shoot quickly to explode early needles so there's space for newer needle sticks for more damage.
- Heavy sword Slash1 --> charge step backwards --> slash2
- Vortex --> VT
- Vortex --> Catalyzer single-charge frenzy (aimed to the right side, for most effective explosions).
- Vortex --> hold Troika charge --> Release charge so it hits JUST as the bomb explodes so shock animation cancels out knockback. Also leads to double-hit charge in PVP
- Heavy sword triple slash: Slash-shield-Slash(hold)-Release. I had written this in a guide at some point years ago lol. Also of note, Qwez seems to have found this independently as well.
- Alternating Mist bombs with 2-3 shots of any gun (Totally helped when soloing Grinchlin Assault). Ex: Stun aura with Stagger Storm combined with hate from Storm Driver.