All I have tried to say: you have too much state defenses vs dizzy, wasted points in FS melee speed, too low KD/posture change and medium melee defense. Please tell me if I'm wrong!
Pikeman bad? Then I'm bad too! And Michael also!
Question: lets assume there is a contest 'who kills more elders in a buff session'. Would you use your template or
Melee and Ranged defense are useless against ALL high level mobs, I've never noticed a difference between when I was a stacker and when I went doc in the DWB or the corvette. It's all the in the counterattack.
ARIAS TE'THAI
Master Swordsman|Elevator Wh0re
ECHUU|ECHUU-SHEN
Jedi Knight |Mandalorian Enforcer
Day One player/Pre-9 Jedi/PvP God. All gone. Canceled.
I know the abstract toons we are constructing have endless money and access to tapes. But for the masses, 4 skill points spent in melee speed, especially for the pike/swords builds, are probably better than anywhere else you would spend them. I know for the abstract excercise a shirt with +25 2h speed/+25 polearm speed/+25 2h accuracy/+25 polearm accuracy is all you need, but for most of us, getting +16 into a suit of armor that is going to get beaten to shreds by all the mobs we fight (elders=replace 3-5 pieces every week, replace the other every two). This is especially true if they pull out AP2 weapons. With how hard and fast elders hit, having a couple of +speed, 0/0 condition pieces is not a winning option.
IMHO, the ultimate guide should factor in longevity, not just uber power until you need to hunt for new armor. My friend has a 30+ million suit of armor she uses for pvp. I think it has about +23 sword speed, as well as amazing state defence tapes. Another friend and I were out hunting Elders when a jedi and a swordsman decided it was time to jack our spawn. So she got a mission for the jedi and came out, in case words weren't enough to convince them that it was our spawn. They left without hostilities, and when we started to fight the Elders again. After tanking for about 2 minutes, she said she was defenently out of there, because even she, with seemingly endless access to money, was not willing to risk her armor on the battering of an elder. On our server's trade forums right now, there are 3 posts that say LTB: 2h weapon speed SEA's. They are not as easy to access as we would wish, especially with all the new folks going swords. I think for this to be the "ultimate PvE guide" you need to consider 4 points spent in melee speed as more than worth their value.
I'm With-Stupid n I-am With-I'm
The Jedi Jeweler - Outside Theed at -3990 4485
I go Bakersfield Chimp on Krayts and Nightsisters. You Savvy?
- I support keeping & balancing the current combat system You can too
The following its not intended to evaluate/harm real persons but to evaluate/discuss abstract/virtual toons and their abilities.
cwhooks,
you're right, in your situation I would do the same. I am curious if your +10 accuracy and the defense vs blind (as far as I remember +15 or so) really do something in the game. Anyway, a rodian with a hammer its a great view. Can you tell us, if you would have 900/1000/1100 on mind like I have, would you keep 14 spts in medic 0040?
If I could ahve your mind pool stats, I think I would at the most only have 2000 medic... Fixing the bleeds is pretty powerful with first aid... Of course a TKA splash could so that too...
Battleaxe - Bloodfin galaxy. Surveyor of Lok and 12 point Master FS Weaponsmith. _____ Resources, Sliced Weapons, Skill tapes, Loot... Mall.....800m from Theed starport at -5139 3399. _____ Deliveries use any vendor named 'BA's ...'.
give me a 250 mind strength dot fire NS lance and I would do the same. If they don't nerf the DoTs this whole thread is useless because the best template in the game will be Master Pikeman/Master Doc or something around that. Anyway enjoy your pikes man!
AriasImmortal,
many low level mobs from corvette (Sergeant, Lieutenants, Captain, Major etc) miss me. In DWB its pretty hard to feel the difference but let me tell you something, if you get template 2) you will notice it. I will modify the guide to reflect your observations (ranged defense good only for low level mobs on vette).
Milgram,
I'm with you man, I have a pair of composite gloves with 56% kinetic, cond is now down to 14000/39900 and I'm terrified to repair them. Ive put a +5 2h speed +5 counterattack and some states there. Don't tell me about belt or shirt because I already have them.
I also included from the start a template for poor people, vnicula's standard template.
Tip(important):
Buy +1 2h speed around 300k or less from vendors. Search the bazaar, sometime you can buy them with 5k or 6k. Buy as many as you can. Start to put them on bracers, biceps, gloves. The trick is to have at least a +8 on the shirt and belt (best on shirt) and with these additional +5 you're almost capped with 6.0 hammer. Don't tell me you don't have 1.5mil (as I said I often bought +1 2h speed with 5k) to buy the tapes. The shirt with +10 2h speed its a different story, you buy it once, pay the price and use it forever (hopefully).
When a modded piece is over, buy another +1 2h speed, put it in the new piece etc.
Youll notice that is not so hard to find them and the prices are decent (its like a loan, you dont pay 15mil at once but in time...)
Don't be greedy, when you'll sell that looted LVA with 670 max dam unsliced youll get your reward.
you keep saying give me this give me that, you asked what would you rather use, and i answered. you didnt ask, "if i had" what would you use... 'shrug'
I say stick with it. In time you'll find speed tapes so you could migrate to Prowess 0040 and put the rest on medic.
I am curious how are you doing alone in geo->mercenary room before server reset. I use to make my FS xp once a day there before I log out (don't like to grind, i) and I usually cap 300k combat in 1h (only if I'm alone there). Did you tried that?
Sometimes they spawn like 25+25 maybe more and they put some ugly bleeds. My current template has +122 melee def and with tapes and backpack goes to +140. Those mercenary sentry seems to have problems hitting me and yes with CoB things are better. If you have time, please post your experience about this. You have low melee def in your template, I'm really curious if you can manage them.
How to test:
within 2 hrs before server reset go to geonosian caves. If there is someone in mercenary go to the right room ('geonosian room' or 'jedi room'). Start to kill the spawns with Area3 and try to dizzy them with 2hHit3 before killing them on the floor. If you kill them while dizzied on the floor the spawn goes crazy. Anyway there is a good chance that someone have already done that for you. I'm more interested in mercenary room, the 'geo room' is much easier, I think you'll be doing fine there but I'm curious if you can continuously handle a crazy spawn in mercenary with your template.
Best for you is 2). And its a great template by the way.
If you want things to go smoothly you need this:
a)Full mind buffs.
b)Good 85% or more kinetic armor and a macro to /warcry2 change helm/chest/pants/boots and add PSG with those with 40% stun you also have in your inventory
c)3x every heal state pack: dizzy, stun, blind (you can skip intimidate)
d)10-15 melee PUPS per fight
e)CoB macro with /firstaid
f)read the posts about hunting NS
g)synthsteak (one per fight, consume it immediately after you kill one, 4 min before the other will spawn), canape, muon, pixie, vercupti (shall I say brandy also
h) mind attack macro (after killing 5 in a row without this you'll understand why is this required);
My goal here is high level pve (kryat & ns). I would have all stats buffed (including mind ones) if that matters.
Vnicula is right, this is a pretty good template, and it keeps your artisan.
Here is another alternative i came up with you might want to consider:
Artisan 0030
M Brawler
Medic 2030 that goes to 2040 when you get the SEA's
Fencer 0440
TKM 0300
Parowess 0014 that gets migrated down to nothing when you get the SEA's.
KD +95 PD +90 Dizzy +65 Blind +60 Ranged and Melee Def suck at 35 and 45
Should do pretty well against Krayts and Elders.
Vnicula, I will try the geo cave, and see how i do. I know that the cave is heavily camped on my server, and I HATE trying to fight other people for spawns, especialy Jedi, with their manifest destiny type attitudes (if it is big, and drops good loots, it is mine, because i do more damage, and i need to keep myself in crystals. Oh, by the way, thanks for tanking while i steal your elder/krayt).
I appreciate the critique of my template. You are right, i have too much KD defence. Here is what I am going to try to migrate to:
Medic 2030
M Brawler
M Swords
Pistoleer 0040
Combat Prowess 0003 that will go to 0030 as i get SEA's.
KD +95 Dizzy +100 Blind +90 Pos Dn +50 Stun +90 Ranged and Melee defence still basically non-existant.
So I got medic 2000 and was all excited to try soloing an elder. I zoom around dath and finally find one. Sweeeeeet, i am thinking as i pull her on my bike. I completely forgot to /ex her while she was chasing me to see what she was carying. ugg, she had a stun bat. I ran like a little hoe, and put on my stun armor and pulled about 6 psgs out of the crate. I go back to the spawn, and poof, it is gone. I have killed a lot of Elders, but never on my own. I always needed at least the friendly stormies at the prison to help.
Question about first aid. Is there a way to make it more effective? I get hit with a 500 point bleed, and first aid only seems to knock off 100 points at the very most, and i think that is an optomistic figure. I have also tried a combat bleed defence +18 shirt (the BE ones, not the SEA version) and Rancors still do bleeds for 150 whether i am wearing it or not. Does the mod work, does it decrease the duration or what.
I'm With-Stupid n I-am With-I'm
The Jedi Jeweler - Outside Theed at -3990 4485
I go Bakersfield Chimp on Krayts and Nightsisters. You Savvy?
- I support keeping & balancing the current combat system You can too
Thank you, both of you for your well thought out responses. I will being doing the template vnicula suggested //edit// or maybe not, that other template looks good too..grrrr what to do what to do. I like passive defenses, sometimes it seems to me that instead of healing my states i could just be wacking away and dealing w/it as i have to. With warcry 2 i suppose i could heal my states at that time..hmm Any more thoughts on this>????was best and report back soon (im fairly close now but have heavy work demands so maybe by weekends end. Milgram thanks for your idea too and when and if i do some fs stuff i will reconsider. My main is a jedi so i more than likely will not focus on force stuff except with him.
/hi5
Arguss
Message Edited by GunJacker on 10-14-200412:37 AM
Message Edited by GunJacker on 10-14-200412:40 AM
On the way to EREBUS you will feel
grief & anxiety, along with diseases, GERUS & death xxxx, xxx
The template I have been using for about six months is Master Doc/Master Swordsman and it has worked for me. I have solo'd the high end mobs (tusken observer most recently) and the only real danger is the potential for my mind to bottom out from healing states. I do not get knocked down that often, but when I do I am able to stand immediatley with a macro. The NS Elders are a pain and because I have to heal states and first aid so much my mind can get critical. However, for me at least, it comes down to proper management of the foods I use. As long as I can time the use of canape and brandy (and the emergency muon gold toward the end of the fight) I fair rather well.
A big advantage for me is I have a second account that has a master dancer/muscian for the precious mind buffs. My toon is Rodian and my mind stats are sub-par without the buffs. So the second account helps me out alot. I have grown to love this template as I play a large part in a regular hunting group where the Doc abilities are a bonus.
The defense stacking is very interesting and should I ever decide to drop Doc, I just might have to try it out. But didnt SOE say that defense stacking is going away when (or if) the combat balance comes out?
There is no If, there is no But..., there is no Wait...
I made a pathetic try to use an academic language, my mistake. Here is more directly:
a) Elders/Ancients dont give a sheet on your defences. You can have +100 dizzy/stun/blind/kd/posture, you will be blinded, dizzied, stuned, laying on the floor.
b) Stun state removes all your defences vs states, ALL.
c) There are 3 types of fights with the elders (you have to kill at least 50 to understand and verify this):
easy fight (couple of dizzy, 1-2 KD's, 1-2 bleeds, your health bar is almost full every time = you can watch tv, grab a sandwich)
annoying(6-7 dizzy+KD, 4-5 bleeds, 1-2 bleed stack, blind and stun almost all the fight, frequent dizzy attacks = heal, heal, heal you must watch your toon)
bmf (hehe, frequent bleed stack, dizzy attack all the time, KD only with dizzy(this is the sign), HIGHER damage to you = vercupti and muon + warcry and heal like crazy)
Ancients are like big puppies, they cannot kill you. They are more annoying than elders because they have +95% resist to all (except you know what) and higher HAM. Expect a long fight to take one solo. Also watch your ph, if you start with 250 remaining condition and use PUPS, at some point you'll notice the beast is laughing at you.
Ancients use dizzy attacks so frequently that you can use 5 cure dizzy packs in a fight. Also they tend to move a lot (because they use area attacks and many low level creatures -including jedi here- are trying to attack them back). It's annoying because we cannot afford terrain negotiation.
Before someone wants to post something like 'I'm Master Fencer/Master Swords/Master Brawler/Medic 2040 and I solo elders all the time' I just want to add this:
You can solo many elders with Master Brawler/Master Swords/Medic 2040/Whatever. In time you'll meet a bmf elder. Then at some point you'll run.
About the /firstaid efectiveness: Get the template I recommend, you'll see that /firstaid works much better with Doc 4200
.
Any more thoughts on this>????was best and report back soon (im fairly close now but have heavy work demands so maybe by weekends end. Milgram thanks for your idea too and when and if i do some fs stuff i will reconsider. My main is a jedi so i more than likely will not focus on force stuff except with him. 
annoying(6-7 dizzy+KD, 4-5 bleeds, 1-2 bleed stack, blind and stun almost all the fight, frequent dizzy attacks = heal, heal, heal you must watch your toon)
bmf (hehe, frequent bleed stack, dizzy attack all the time, KD only with dizzy(this is the sign), HIGHER damage to you = vercupti and muon + warcry and heal like crazy)
