Lunar Madness: A level 15 assessmentFollow

Mystro dinged 15 last night. First time I have been in Paludal Caverns since 2003/4 I think. This morning I loaded up a couple of chars from back in that era that I no longer play, one of which wasn't even played back then. After having looked at my Level 45 Vah Shir Rogue and my level 21 Vah Shir Bard created right after Luclin was released, something occurs to me. My Rogue was actually played, whereas the Bard was P/L'd to 21 to make it relatively safer to loot the various class required drops for the many Vah Shir quests, notably the sonic Wolf Bane weapons. These older chars were played during their "correct" era vs what we are trying to do today. They are MUCH better geared than the current chars are. My Bard at 21 has completed all of the Vah Shir quests. He has his Officer's cape etc. He was never played, just looted the drops. The difference is that then, these zones were filled with people exploring a new expansion. The Hollowshade war was almost always on and the drops readily available. Good drops for the time, drops that I still use on new chars. Grimling Forest was also relatively busy. All of this made drops readily available, or if not, because everyone was killing mobs, your mob would eventually spawn and calls for assistance were quickly answered.

Fast forward to today. These zones are empty. At least two of the armor quests no longer seem to be available. The tradeskill progression quests are extremely difficult to do as now you alone, have to kill everything to spawn the required mobs. Kill with weapons far below the quality that most people used back when this expansion was fresh. These weapons were plentiful in the EC tunnel or GFay or wherever your selling zone was on various servers. today, these weapons have either been destroyed, tributed or are gathering cobwebs deep in the vaults of older chars. I know on my main server, I have a collection ready to lend out to my newbie chars.

To make what could be a long story short, what we are doing is likely much more difficult than it would have been back in the day. Still, though, I'm having a great time! I'll stop the rambling here.

Kunark didn't have cutthroat insignia rings or anything like that, that I recall. But even those rings were often replace by a Jewelcrafters ring, which most of the recipes no longer work, other than the engagement and wedding rings, iirc. At least Luclin brought back similar rings in PC bandit camps: Recondite Insignia Ring .

Weapon ratios seemed to improve for lower levels then too, but had been during Kunark and Velious also. Just seemed alot more abundant during Luclin.

Yther Ore.

My experience has been different because I'm not a vah shir. I'm more of a "visitor". If i wasnt crafting my own armor, i'd be wearing a full suit of padded or something like that.
I don't face any of the weapons issues because as a Wizard, i've got so much nuking power that weaps are nearly useless to me. However, sometimes soloing took forever because i'd have to wait for mana. Plus, if i run out of mana and the monster has too much health left im toast and i have to run .
The nice thing is, with everyone else in the guild around theres lots of opportunity for groups. The higher level we get the more important it is to be able to have a group in this expansion. I remember, when luclin was current, there was always people running around the zones, ect. there was almost always a few groups in the bandit camps in paludal, Groups in dawnshround, groups in other places on the moon. Its hard as a solo character, progress is much slower.

I've looked around at some of the available gear, for casters there are some pieces that drop off the big boss shroom in paludal, yelloweyes.
Theres lots of great drops in the hollowshade war. I'm looking forward to getting to a level where we could be doing the hollowshade war for gearing people up. Theres so many nice pieces of mid level gear that drop from the bosses there. Some of them are powerful, i dont see it being too possible until around lvl 30 at least.

I do love the nuky power tho... I was able to kill Phlerg fiends without letting them touch me and give me crud .

Fiend crud is the worst thing SOE ever added to the game. This is, without hyperbole, the honest and solid inarguable truth... until the next thing that annoys me.

Seriously though, why would you add a 1hr DoT proc to a lowbie mob?

^from my experience wizard is brutal hard at low levels if you're soloing. you're just so weak and dependent upon that mana pool being at 60%+ which it almost never is and when something connects with you in melee fight is over- run or die, or get really lucky. oh and if you're not addicted to peridots yet- you will be (for the skin spells that keep you from getting THWACKED!). And it's brutal. But just like in D&D the wizard starts as a very weak character able to do one or two big things then sitting duck for a while, to become at higher levels just a juggernaut of destruction. When it takes 2% of your mana to do 1500 damage in 1.3 seconds- the brutality of the low levels pays off. Last time I actually used a weapon in some type of melee combat was in Gloomingdeep; after about 5th level the only reason to have a weapon in hand was for the mana boost it gives.

But for my Luclin experience now at the 15th level of magnitude, it's been a good time and I definitely feel like an outsider among all the brawlers (though digging the necromancer pet)- items for casters are almost non-existent outside of scrounging them up on your own from the natives. Still looking for the elusive boots and gloves temp armor to tailor up some decent looking items. I don't know if it's the class, or the zone, or a litle of both but necromancer is much much easier than wizard at this level. I can count my deaths on one hand so far.

As a complete alien here I have no idea what's out there, or where the roads may take me, so I'm hovering around homebase for now until I can do some proper recon without being chased back to the city by all-too-easily-angered natives; though the Paludul(sp?) caverns I note I can move through freely without being attacked but I get to a place where all con white and red so know I need a little more seasons under my belt to venture onward to whatever lies that way.

The planet is cool-looking in the sky. If I squint hard enough I can see my wizard.

Part of the reason I picked a druid (I can cast spirit of wolf as of level 10)
Also, I get ports... a few of which apply in Luclin.

At level 51 all of us will be happily purchasing runspeed


Necro is the most forgiving true solo class once you know how to kite, especially in bad gear. Other classes can solo certain things better... but naked at level 49 I don't think anything would compare to a necro for scrub mobs.

Primary stuff before trio recipes are here at http://eqtraders.com/recipes/recipe_page.php?article=369&rsa=Jewelcraft&sub=por&sb=item&menustr=080070080080

EDIT: Yeah! Yay! Finally excellent by default!

EDIT 2: If you want all the trio stuff comparison, use this link: http://nathrach.republicofnewhome.org/gizmotron/ It's his most upto date one, but the one Bijou linked is probably better. Don't think underfoot diamonds drop till 70+ zones.

Yther Ore.

Edited, Oct 11th 2013 6:40pm by Yther