Advice / Planning

[Bimble]

Posting this here, as a non-guild member with hopes that someone responds. Not sure that the Torilmud forums would give me the same type of answers I could find here as I am basing some of my assumptions on Gormal/Kaelas convos in GCC. Super long - have been over thinking.

First - thanks for the access. I have spent hours reading the quest info. Amazing!

I started before the split. Well before the split. As large group online games were relatively new I was more interested in the social aspect. Never spent a lot of time zoning, or attempting things to today's "end game" standards. Not very skilled. The game seems new again.

In 2003 (maybe) I left. Have been gaming every since (now I am 61 years old). Bored and came back to Toril for the last month or so. I have characters of every class to 40+, a Lich, etc. When I came back I had zero gear. Nothing in storage etc.

I started over. Not asking for handouts. I rerolled and started from scratch with Scardale gear until I could get a feel of the new game, and start the gear progression. I'm not very far! Mostly because I didn't listen to the GCC advice and got sidetracked leveling an Illusionist. My start now is to gather plats / quest for gear progression.

I'm at the point where I need to focus on one class/character. As I hear news that new zoning groups might be opening. I would like advice on what might be good to focus on? I would want to be able to solo, explore and be effective and needed in a group.

What's needed if two zone groups sprout up? More interested in learning new experiences than being uber geared by tomorrow.

Here's my opinion from observations of the public discussion:

Most players have several class so they can cover many roles. I won't be able to do that.

No one plays a cleric other than for the functional need in groups. Not noted as a solo class. Would allow me as a mediocre player to get a jump start, but limited to zoning.

Any of the new melee power classes with a passive heal are popular. They are way more powerful than casters prior to Sorc. This group seems crowded with experience and highly geared players. I avoided this as I wanted to be different... recently rolled and leveled to 50 a warrior and can say it was fricken easy compared to a caster. Plats come easy.

Shaman has a role, can solo to some degree as it has both heals and damage. Zones don't always require multiples.

Rogues - my historical primary class, is still competitive with gear. I can continue my restart here as I gather more plat and gear in my reroll class. As they are not as popular as once was the gear for sale is not thief/rogue gear.

Sorc seems like a good fit. Haven't played on yet. Crowded at the moment.

Lich fun to play, not sure it has a role in zoning anymore. It's limitations seem to overshadow its utility.

Illusionist - really want to play, but there is no need for corpse recovers anymore and they lack group utility.

[Gormal]

Thanks for being the first person to come here for discussion! We absolutely want people to come here and talk about the game. As Toril itself continues to grow, and the knowledge pool within the playerbase succumbs to life and time, it takes all hands.

If you're looking for advice on what the different classes offer, there aren't too many bad options, I've been overthinking this like you and guess that the best way to answer is just to talk about each class briefly and where they stand for various roles.

Fighters:

Warrior - DPS: 5 Tank: 5 Solo: 4 Group: 5
- more gear-dependant than pal/blk/ranger/hex due to low self-healing and fewer defensives, but what they have is potent and the 2h damage is probably the best in the game.

Ranger - DPS 5 Tank: 4 Solo: 5 Group: 5
- sneak/hide, track, archery bypassing shield, a host of good elven weapons... it's hard to argue with ranger as probably the best all-around melee class

Paladin - DPS 4 Tank 5, Solo 4 Group: 5
- Good defensives, puts out solid damage and has tons of self-healing.

Blackguard - DPS: 4 Tank: 5 Solo: 5 Group: 5
- Blackguards are like paladins on steroids. Poisons, aoe stun, aoe slow, tons of vampiric healing, and better weapons than paladins with Deathknell, Pestilence, and the evil Bahamut sword.

Hexblade - DPS: 4 Tank: 3 Solo: 4 Group: 4
- Decent enough but hex are in a weird place right now needing some tweaks to really shine. their defensives require them getting hit to work, which kinda sucks. 2h is solid unresistable damage, but building combo points is boring when you only have a few abilities.


Mages: Less gear-dependant than melee, usually have a lot of utility.

Sorcerer - DPS: 5 Tank: 4 Solo: 5 Group: 5
- Only buffed magic class. Super powerful unresistable damage, super fun to play.

Invoker - DPS: 5 Tank: 1 Solo: 2
- No defensives at all, still the best big aoe magic damage.

Elementalist DPS: 3 Tanks 3: Solo: 4 Group: 3
- Good all around, straightforward mage with oodles of tools and pets to use. Decent self healing, can ward/embody in groups, but not desirable in zones really. Good for small groups

Enchanter: DPS: 1 Tank: 4 Solo: 2 Group: 5
- Pure support. Almost necessary in high level zones, but can't do much on their own.

Illusionist: DPS: 3 Tank: 4 Solo: 4 Group: 3
- Tons of cool tools, but tendrils are kinda useless in big rooms and nightmare is basically just something BLK get for free now. Fun though and the best sneaky mage.

Psionicist: DPS: 3 Tanks: 2 Solo: 2 Group: 3
- Psi is neat, but most of their toolkit feels like it's trying to make up for their innately terrible tanking, while making them more vulnerable to dying because everything lags them. Good challenge class, has some great group buffs. You need good gear to really play squid.

Necromancer: DPS: 3 Tank: 3 Solo: 3 Group: 2
- Just go lich, these lost their value.

Lich: DPS: 5 Tank:3 Solo: 3 Group: 4
- Very high potential on a lich if you can manage pets on top of spamming rot/siphon undead. Very powerful but challenging to play.


Priests - Heals are kinda important I guess.

Cleric: DPS: 1 Tank: 2 Solo: 1 Group: 5
- Dedicated Healer. Not much needed saying here I think.

Shaman DPS: 2 Tank: 3 Solo: 3 Group: 5
- Gheal spam is really boring and pretty much all you'll do in zones other than some silencing and maybe throw a few stones/rescues out with pet. Ashield kinda sucks, but gheal is critical to many zones.

Druid: DPS: 4 Tank: 3 Solo: 5 Group: 4
- Druids are awesome. You've got tons of tools like shapechange which is useful as just a full heal or to sneak around, Creeping Doom is great damage, silences... Great class.




Thieves - You got locks to pick? Traps to disarm? Bring a thief.

Rogue: DPS 5 Tank: 3 Solo: 4 Group: 5
- Personal favorite class. Tons of utility, good damage, fun weapons to quest, but gear-dependant to shine solo (healing weapons mostly needed).

Bard/Bchanter DPS: 3 Tank: 2 Solo: 2 Group: 3
- Bard is the AFK class because once you sing you can't do anything else really other than use wands/staves. healing song is very helpful in big groups though so there's usually someone playing it.

[Bimble]

Thanks for the in-depth response. Gets to the point of my question. Think I need to try Sorc. If its ranks up there with Blackguard it may have the flexibility I am looking for. I'll be back with more questions!

[Bimble]

Feedback in the recommendations.

Sorc to 50. Love the class. Lots of fun, but it seems there are so many folks playing it's hard to enter the class and compete for a DPS spot if you haven't been around for awhile. Equipment inflations is skyrocketing. Playing from 0-50 with newbie gear you start to max out at around 46-47 and need some upgrades to keep the power arc increasing. Might wait for the rush to fade.

Blackguard to 50. Wow compared to my 50 paladin it's wild. Even with crappy gear you can take out a lot of rares, etc. Lots of healing, lots of control. Spending considerable time on Blk. It is pure fun. Hate not having the travel tools Sorc does. Blk and Sorc can go after the tough fights, but Sorc will make runs, and Blk will just heal through it.

I don't typically favor good align toons, but think I might start a ranger. Cross it off the list. Maybe too close to rogue. Someday I want to go back to Bimble for nostalgia.

[Gormal]

As far as competing for DPS spots, sorcerer is much more skill-dependent than any other class. Especially if there's AOE, because the difference between someone just idly using all of their cooldowns and someone who's not wasting CP, getting abilities in every round, not AOEing <4 mobs, not using DRF outside of DM, etc... it all adds up to a lot.

Paladin is great for main tanking with guard, gold baha blade, layhands, TRS, etc, but yeah BLK mostly beats it. I think you'll enjoy ranger having hide/sneak, vigorize, misty path, and all those useful tools. Rogues still feel like they have their own niche with traps/picks/poisons and their playstyle is different.

[Bimble]

Going to show some ignorance and ask for detailed advice. Most of the classes I have played it's been apparent how to play the core class skills/spells. Some more complex than others. Although I have played Druid (not to 50) I did so with minimal gear and played as caster. I am struggling to find some of the interactions I expected. I get the basics of using AC, Healing, and maybe casting - I can't decide which spells are truly the best for leveling (nature vs harm). I'm guessing there are some combos or tricls I am missing.

Druid: DPS: 4 Tank: 3 Solo: 5 Group: 4
- Druids are awesome. You've got tons of tools like shapechange which is useful as just a full heal or to sneak around, Creeping Doom is great damage, silences... Great class.

Would anyone care to share their Druid Tips and Techniques that make the class such an "all-arounder"?

Thanks!

[Lilithelle]

At 50, I use doom if 3 or more mobs, if not I don't use it in zones cause I'm saving them for a big fight or something to happen that I'll need it for. After doom, it's hail/desiccate if there's more than 2. If you're soloing or not expecting to ever fight many than it's doom all the way.

Hail is very nice in group and solo because it can slow mobs, reducing the damage you take. Desiccate is VERY nice vs mages and shaman, the mob AI makes them cast stoneskin if it is down, desiccate automatically kills stoneskin. Timed well it really cuts down on incoming damage.

For single target I tend to use fire seeds, mostly because it works on wraithform and in noground rooms, which spike stones do not. If non-wraithform, and on ground, spiked is better because it mobs often have protection from fire up which drops fire seed damage 10%. Fire seed owns trolls.

Unless you're fighting trolls take cyclone over flame blade, hits multiple targets, it's force damage which mobs have no resists against, they often do against fire.

Firestorm is the worst spell ever! Insect plague isn't bad, but in 6th circle I go all utility, heal, vitality, and suffocate. Suffocate damage isn't bad, but it's main use is as silence, well timed it can help a lot. Don't waste it in a group situation on clerics, save it to use on high damage caster mobs like invokers, and elementalists. Soloing I often suffocate casters.

Harm I never use due to poor damage, sticks to snakes will do more. 5th circle is almost all for sunray, even better than slowing a mob with hail is blinding it to reduce melee damage taken. Solo I blind first, then slow with hail. Sunray works super well vs undead, in group or solo, always sunray undead. Blind mobs basically only hit with a critical hit.

Dust devil is pitiful damage, I save 4th circle for earthquake, earthquake works terribly on high agility mobs like elves and faeries, but owns ogres and giants. I once calculated a 36% drop rate on human mobs with earthquake. So even fighting humans if they have a lot of casters it can be a big help. Dust devil can disarm mobs, used on backstabbing mobs it can be brutally good, though it doesn't land a ton, when it does, it's sweet.

If anyone in the group does not have -100 ac, usually rogues and mages, barkskin them, -50 ac at level 50.

Always faerie fire backstabbing mobs, it's a big help, even mobs that are super tough a faerie fire spell should help the melee hit and land powers, quick to cast, quick to mem back.

Summary:
Due to good damage from doom (it's in the top 3 damaging spells rot, inferno, doom), utility of slow, blind, silence, faerie fire, disarming, druids ROCK in small group and large group situations, I would take one or more anywhere but Tiamat/Bahamut. Only sorcerers can do meaningful damage to dragons.

If undead I sunray first, else I drop all dooms, if there are lots of casters that are not wraithform or high agility races I will quake, doom, quake, doom, ... After dooms I go all hail (usually I have hails for the slow) or all desiccate. If there is a small number of high damaging casters that do not quake well then I will suffocate before going to damage. After that I would go all cyclone, after that you should probably just mem out.

When soloing I find I spend almost as much time healing as I do nuking, druids damage well but have little in the way of damage mitigation other than AC. So solo, sunray blind is super useful, but often hard to land on high level non-undead. Sometimes it's just grind, nuke, flee, heal, repeat. So for druid soling, it is by far best for smaller fights. With pass without trace, shapechange, planeshift, word of recall, moonwell, druids are good for ninja missions, I often use druids for that., like sneaking into Myth Drannor to solo smaller fights. Because druids are not best for everything, not as good in as many situation as ranger or blackguard, it is one good tool to have in the box, but you want others. Druids rock in groups, large and small!
Lilithelle

[Bimble]

Thanks Lili, very generous response - time and knowledge shared is very appreciated!

Never having made it to Tia/Baha it's kind of sad to know that the reworked classes outshine the others to the point of exclusion.

I need a lot of group practice anyway. Gormal has been good as a mentor. I still rack up more errors than win - but that comes with practice. Think I will relevel a Druid and employ your advice! Thanks again.

[Gormal]

Don't forget things like shapechange for multiple full heals each day or sneaking past things. I don't believe weather impacts powers versions of spells like the old ones. Pass Without Trace is incredibly useful, just remember that it only works if you're 2+ rooms away, they can see you from adjacent rooms and will still track.

[Alurissi]

Don't forget, druids are best, when it's continually played, to find your strengths and weaknesses, you can do a lot of the game, as a solo druid.

Best, is showing up Lili, which I've done with 3 different races, Grey still best race for the class.

I believe you should be looking for race to class ratios, as some races make certain classes extremely hard, I had the first Halforc illusionist, compared to other races, it's toward the bottom on how hard the race makes the class