Dexterity - the key stat for any caster
Alasdair Allan
affects their ability in combat.
Just to outline - Dexterity aids Channelling. As a Shaman I see this all
the time, thanks to the Dex buffs we get. Adding 40 to my base 70 dex
increased my effectiveness to Channel by about 40%. Now I've added a Cloak
of Shadows and a plus 7 dex necklace to replace my plus 3 wisdom BlackIron
Medallion and a couple of other things I've hit 130 Dex when buffed.
Its great being able to cast with barely 25% interrupts even under heavy mob
melee (the record so far is three hits for well over 200 damage and the
Poison still cast). Obviously this is most important to a Shaman who is
usually involved in melee and taking hits but its annoying when you see high
level wizards or clerics unable to cast because of their pitiful Dex if a
mob turns on them.
Its strange that so many casters think I should forgo the 7 dex for 3 wisdom
in the neck and the 13 dexterity for 4 wisdom in the cloak. Perhaps they
don't understand that all the mana in the world won't help if you can't cast
the spell because you are being hit!
Final thought - casters which are being twinked - roll the new character
with *Dex* as the main boosted stats. If you choose Int/Wisdom and use
items to boost Dexterity these items seldom have a Mana boost. On the other
hand Items that add Int or Wisdom also often add raw Mana in addition to the
Mana you get from the Int or Wisdom boost.
That way your character would have more mana and dexterity overall than one
which has a higher base Int/Wisdom but needs to use items to boost Dex.
--
Alasdair Allan, Ibrox, Glasgow |England - Country where Marx developed
x-st...@null.net | the basis of Communism
X-Static's Rangers Webzine |Scotland - Country where Smith developed
http://www.x-static.demon.co.uk/ | the basis of Capitalism
Ed Ludwig
*never* melee. If I am at the point where I am in melee with a mob, then my
pet is probably toast and I am almost oom anyway. Having more mana is more
important for me at least. I may fight for 3 hours and spend about 1 or 2
minutes engaged in melee. Granted, there have been a *couple* of times that
I wish I could get off a cast when the mob breaks my pet's taunts (the
magician's pet taunts are almost *magically* effective!), but that is a rare
situation. I actually sometimes stop fighting and casting *completely* when
a mob breaks my pet's taunts. That will allow my pet to re-engage the mob
and allow me to step back and cast.
Just my 2 cents.
Buhrjezz, lvl 18 mage innoruk
Alasdair Allan <posth...@x-static.demon.co.uk> wrote in message
news:01bef937$1d122b00$c70201c0@dell40...
Minister of Propaganda
Ed Ludwig wrote:
> I would say that this may apply to other casters, but not the magician. I
> *never* melee. If I am at the point where I am in melee with a mob, then my
> pet is probably toast and I am almost oom anyway. Having more mana is more
> important for me at least. I may fight for 3 hours and spend about 1 or 2
> minutes engaged in melee.
frankly, you need to rethink your strategy. As a pet owner, you have 3 (4)
resources to draw upon:
1. Mana
2. Health
3. Pet Health
(4. Party Member Heath)
If each of these is not refilling to full at the same time, you are
inefficient. Step in and take some beats! Mage's should be the best melee'rs
of any Int caster (yet another reason to have good Dex.) Betcha spend a lot
more time sitting on yer ass waiting for Fluffy (and party members) to heal than
ya should.
Tank For Fluffy. You'll level faster if you do, and Fluffy will love ya for
it.
minister
Meeke and Fluffy
Level 31
Cazic Thule
<shakes head at wimpy no-combat casters>
p.s. typical strategy with water pet: step in and take one bubble dmg, dish
some of yer own, such that you end up one down, Fluffy ends two-three down, mana
two-three down-- this should give you minimum solo downtime. Of course this
demands a strong feel for hate list management-- another topic entirely.
Ed Ludwig
the "dex is the *most* important" idea. I do tank for my pet, especially at
the *hell* mage levels, which are new spell level -1 or -2, when my pets are
always wimpy. I have all my buffs on for combat, etc, etc... There are some
mobs I will only kill with casting, such as acutely poison mobs, disease
mobs, etc... the recovery down time is too long. I have done my share of
melee -- my bind wound skill is always maxed! ;) With higher level mobs, a
mage does have to be careful about engaging, due to the fact that the pet
cannot always taunt the mob away after you start to engage. But thats what I
get for soloing yellows and low reds!!
That's all as far as soloing goes. Group strategy, for me at least, involves
staying out of melee as completely as possible. I usually stand back and
survey the scene, casting and watching out for the unexpected, like a caster
mob healing the mob your party is fighting, or an approaching sand giant,
etc... In a group I try to use as little mana as possible, so my mana
downtime will be in synch with the hp downtime for the tanks. It's a subtle
art, to use your mana to speed up combat enough to save the tanks health,
but not too much to slow down your medding time. I always like to have a
little extra mana for that panic burn when things go all to pieces!! :) The
best thing about the mage in groups is that due to the pet's amazing
taunting skills, I almost never have to worry about getting rushed by mobs
that hate my casting mega damage at them. Wizards have to worry about this
alot more. At least, this has been my experience up til now.
Buhrjezz level 18 mage innoruk
Minister of Propaganda <ministerSP...@adelphia.net> wrote in message
news:37D60342...@adelphia.net...
Sentry
'tanking for Fluffy' but that 'strategy' is just so fundamentally wrong that
it will waste an enormous amount of cleric mana.
First of all, this 'tanking for Fluffy' idea is based on the assumption that
if you get hit for 200 damage, you just 'saved' Fluffy from 200 damage.
Well that is completely false, you probably saved Fluffy from 50 damage...
Because you get hit for double 60 to 70 every round, and Fluffy gets hit
only once every 5 rounds and when he does it's for 1 to 40 damage.
Also, cleric heals are more mana efficient if they heal greater amounts of
hit points. If the cleric needs to throw a mix of 600 and 300 hp heals on 4
people that's very inefficient compared to throwing a complete on one
person.
Also, meditating during battle is infinitely better than negligible melee,
so standing up while not casting a spell is a waste of time to begin with.
Sood
Minister, but I believe what was meant was the following (and this can
apply to soloing or grouping):
You've three resources directly at your disposal. Health, mana, and
pet health. Obviously, if all three of these are regenerating at the
same time, that's maximum efficiency. Just as you don't want to have
your mana be the last thing you wait for to regen, you don't want your
health to be behind in the "regeneration race". I find that (at my
level) a 2:1 ratio is ideal. If I spend 2 bubbles of mana, then I
melee until I'm hit for 1 bubble of damage. I do this because my mana
regenerates at approx. twice the rate of my health, and they'll both
max out at about the same time. Not to mention that your pet will
finish healing itself at the same time too.
So, the idea is not to take so much damage that you need a cleric. On
the contrary, if a cleric were to heal me at that point, I'd say,
"Hey, thanks, but save your mana. I've got to sit to meditate
anyways, and my health will be full when my mana is."
During the fight, if I've spent 2 bubbles of mana and 1 bubble of
health, then usually the pet can finish it off while I start
meditating. Depends on how sure I am that my pet will survive with
minimal damage. Just to be safe, though, I do a /pet report health
every 5 seconds or so, while keeping the monster targeted, so I can
compare their progress.
Anyways, bottom line is, clerics "don't enter into it" for us casters,
with this strategy.
But what do I know? *grin* I'm only level 10, with 200 more miles of
rain, asphalt, and light before I sleep, but I wouldn't trade all your
golden tomorrows for one minute of this night.
On Wed, 8 Sep 1999 08:16:55 -0400, "Sentry" <mi...@frontiernet.net>
wrote:
Sood
High Elf Enchanter
Innoruuk
Mark Rafn
>> I would say that this may apply to other casters, but not the magician. I
>> *never* melee.
Minister of Propaganda <ministerSP...@adelphia.net> wrote:
>frankly, you need to rethink your strategy.
[...]
>Tank For Fluffy. You'll level faster if you do, and Fluffy will love ya for
>it.
This is going to vary widely by level and group. At lower levels (under 20,
say), and solo or in a small group, then you're going to want to fight a
bit. After that, or in a group with real tanks, you might wade in and dish
out a few whacks, but try to do it after the MOB hates your pet/tank enough
to leave you alone.
It's simply the case that you have no armor to speak of, and can't take the
punishment like your pet or a real tank. It's not just that you have fewer
hit points, it that you take twice or three times the damage from each hit
that a well-armored fighter does, and get hit more often to boot.
--
Mark Rafn da...@dagon.net <http://www.dagon.net/> !G
sne...@my-deja.com
Minister of Propaganda <ministerSP...@adelphia.net> wrote:
>
>
> Ed Ludwig wrote:
>
> > I would say that this may apply to other casters, but not the
magician. I
then my
> > pet is probably toast and I am almost oom anyway. Having more mana
is more
> > important for me at least. I may fight for 3 hours and spend about 1
or 2
> > minutes engaged in melee.
>
> frankly, you need to rethink your strategy. As a pet owner, you have
3 (4)
> resources to draw upon:
>
> 1. Mana
> 2. Health
> 3. Pet Health
> (4. Party Member Heath)
>
> If each of these is not refilling to full at the same time, you are
> inefficient. Step in and take some beats! Mage's should be the best
melee'rs
> of any Int caster (yet another reason to have good Dex.) Betcha spend
a lot
> more time sitting on yer ass waiting for Fluffy (and party members) to
heal than
> ya should.
At higher levels, this couldn't possibly be more wrong. As a Level 43
Magician, if I step anywhere near Melee range, I'm deader than shit
faster than you can count to 2. You can't imagine how hard things begin
to hit you, and how quickly they can kill you. If I only lose 1 bubble
of HP in a single round of combat, I got off lucky, and the mob probably
missed at least once. At higher levels, you *CANNOT* tank for your pet,
*ever*. You want as much distance between you, and the mob as the
terrain allows, *period*. The level 39(actual level about 32ish) pet is
an absolute Monster. It has 1700hp for a reason. It has a higher AC
for a reason. It has two purposes in life. Those purposes are to
sponge damage, and to dish damage. If I'm in there taking the beats for
it, it's only doing half it's job, and I'm doing none of mine.
>
> Tank For Fluffy. You'll level faster if you do, and Fluffy will love
ya for
> it.
You'll spend more time recovering lost exp from dying than anything
else. Like I said, I can go from 5 bubbles to 3 in *one* round easy.
How much "tanking time" does that buy me? Wouldn't I be better served
using that round to launch a DD spell? If I launch that DD spell from
melee range, that mob is on me like flies on shit, and it ain't gettin'
off. Melee = death, pure and simple. What if the mob smells blood, and
sees that I'm weak now, and won't get offa me? I only have about 2
rounds left before death. That's not a lot of maneuvering time.
>
> minister
> Meeke and Fluffy
> Level 31
> Cazic Thule
> <shakes head at wimpy no-combat casters>
>
> p.s. typical strategy with water pet: step in and take one bubble
dmg, dish
> some of yer own, such that you end up one down, Fluffy ends two-three
down, mana
> two-three down-- this should give you minimum solo downtime. Of
course this
> demands a strong feel for hate list management-- another topic
entirely.
>
This is a fine strategy at lower levels, but trust me, you'll change
your tune mighty fast when mobs start hitting you for for 180 damage in
a round, and stunning you just so they can squeeze in another 180 damage
round before you limp away bleeding, screaming "Mommy!" Your pet is
useless when you're dead. It's supposed to die protecting you, not the
other way around.
At level 31, you should have learned this by now, to be honest. How
effective do you think that <poke> <poke> "Eat Sacrificial Dagger,
baddie!" is? :) How long can you stand in melee range acting as a
damage sponge before you have to limp away? One round? Two mebbe?
As I recall, Aviak Avocets hit for about 70/70/30 right?
For me, tactics are essentially:
1.) Launch pet into mob
2.) If pet wasn't already damage shielded, do it. (It should already
have been though)
3.) Malise mob to soften it up.(If situation permits, I'll use Malise
to pull the mob, then sic the pet on it before it gets to me)
4.) Put as much distance between me, and the mob as possible.
5a.) If terrain is open, and flat, burn mob into the ground.
5b.) If quarters are cramped, burn it once, wait 10 seconds or so, burn
it again, rinse, repeat.
6.) If mob gets aggro at me and I'm solo, run to the other side of my
pet, and let it pick it back up. Don't DD for a little while. If I'm
not solo, stand very very still, and wait for the tank to pick it back
up. Apologize for over-nuking, and mellow for a few.
I don't even carry a melee weapon. I can't even remember the last time
I cared about whether I carried a melee weapon, other than when I was
caught without a pet, got picked on by a stupid suicidal skeleton and
had to waste mana blowing it to smithereens. As a high level caster,
melee weapons are worthless. Melee equals death. Voluntary Melee
equals suicide. Don't be a corpse waiting to happen.
P.S. The level 39,and up pets regen at an absolutely phenomenal rate
(really, you can't even imagine how fast until you see it. It's
disgustingly fast). My pets will heal from near dead to full health
faster than I can recover 2 bubbles of mana. It's pretty amazing. I
don't mind one ending the fight near death at all.
Sent via Deja.com http://www.deja.com/
Share what you know. Learn what you don't.
Alasdair Allan
> Well, you're probably right there. I guess I was overreacting a little to
> the "dex is the *most* important" idea.
Key, not most important. The most important stat will remain whatever gives
you mana. But you need to unlock your mana and at times you will be taking
hits. Thats when Dex saves you.
You may be right about Magicians needing it the least. Shamans cant cast
about anything under attack, Druids have a range of spells too, Clerics need
to heal while being beat, Enchanters to mesmerise and Wizards/Necros to root
and back out.
Magicians would only need the opening to nuke a near dead beast so their
requirement is much much lower.