ka243

Does EP help with legendary finding? I didn't realise they were so hard to find. Just been hearing everyone say "EP is not very good, just do griffon/boar runs and you will get everything you need" - mostly true concerning sets except for that darn pyro set that I have never found a single piece of even after like days of griffion/boar killing... just noticed I'm still using a level 50 nlovae's mystery. It'd be nice to get a better version by now . Really like to find another excalibran too. Only found one of those with my level 35 seraphim with EP. HMMM.....

Thanks. That's reassuring that there's no permanent penalty. I still don't understand this though unless there's a tooltip display bug: "I have 96 soft points in delphic arcania focus (and 43 hard points). According to the tooltip, my maximum CA level without penalty should be level 46. But I had Grand Invigoration at level 43 and just ate another rune and the CA level went to 43.8 instead of 44." Do only "hard points" count to increas max ca level without penalty (I had 43 hard points in the example).

Thanks antitrust. I find I get enough set items from doing griffon and boar runs that ep is not necessary. But, I never find any legendaries (ever) and it would be nice to find more good shields and stuff. Added some sepculation about ice stuff to previous post. Also added concrete numbers for what DA lore and CD added if picked. Thanks for input everyone.

I wonder... Is Ice skin a better option for fighting the guardians than fire skin and the great machine area in general? I.e. will glacial mirror help versus the temple guardian fire traps and fenn fire spells? Will it help versus the nameless guardian CA attacks? Is my fire skin "close combat reflect" doing anything to reflect the nameless attacks? ... this might be a good reason to take ice focus as last skill. Mods would be: Ice skin - glacial mirror, , Cascading shroud: Mist, Inconspicuous, Steam Pure caster build does fine vs everything except the guardians at gold which gave me trouble and the plat guardians probably will too. I'll let you know when I get there. Currently level 75 CAS: Mods: Incendiary shower lv 17 (1 rune): Stun, Continuity, Crit: Damage 1176, 13 meteors Tempest level 18 (2 runes): Initial Damage, Burning Damage, Crit : Damage 764 + 1368 / Sec Fire skin level 44: Burn Arrow, Reflect melee, Fiery Ardor Shadow Step: Lower regen Expell Magic level 9 (1 rune): Strength, Pentagram, Protection - spell banishing effectiveness : 149 Grand Invigoration level 45: Pyro regen, CA regen, less Detrimental effects Current skills (before bonus to all skills): Pyro Lore: 75 Pyro Focus: 43 Armor Lore: 8 Ancient Magic: 2 Bargaining: 75 Delphic focus: 43 Concentration: 13 Constitution: 25 Shield lore: 1 ? Can't decide between EP, Delphic lore and Combat discipline. CD would be for damage only as combo speed is bugged on console. After a test: After a test delphic lore level 52 added about 400 spell banishing effectiveness to my Em and 150 extra hp regen. CD level 52 added about 100 to my initial BT damage and 300 to my IS damage (per meteor I think) All skills bonus: 52 now HP: 9Kish - HP Regen: About 300 / second, Armor : About 4000 Stats: Half into Vitality, Half into Stamina

THAT Explains it!! I thought they were fire damage. I had quite low magic resistance. Bugger temple guardians. If you get hit with 2 fire traps at once you're pretty much out. By the way, the wiki says spell resistance is partly broken: "WARNING: in the current patch (2.34) the skill-based Spell Resistance bonus is not displayed. Currently the bonus to spell resistance (stat) is not working, though the mastery & spell-crit reduction is working. " Is this still true that the bonus to spell resistance (stat) does not work? That makes it less interesting.

I have 96 soft points in delphic arcania focus (and 43 hard points). According to the tooltip, my maximum CA level without penalty should be level 46. But I had Grand Invigoration at level 43 and just ate another rune and the CA level went to 43.8 instead of 44. By the way, is there a "permanent" penalty for eating more runes than the maximum level without penalty? Say for example, I start a new game and eat 10 runes, then pump da focus up to a level where my maximum CA level without penalty is 10. Will I now have less than level 10 because I got a "penalty" for eating more runes than I should have earlier? Asked another way, is there any reason to wait on eating more runes than the "penalty" level until you have as many points in the CA focus as you want to have? This is confusing. Thanks for your help.

Finally beat them on gold. I leveled up to level 74 and bought a bunch of HP jewelry and was able to do it after getting my poision amror above 1200 and my HP above 10 000. The last guardian was level 86 when I beat him by the way. Antitrust, are those the minimum and maximum levels for the guardians? Bronze: (26) - (40-41) Silver: (26) - (75-76) Gold: (66) - (120-121) Platinum: (96) - (160-161) Niobium: (136) - (215-216) Meaning in platinum, they will not go below level 96? Thats very helpful if so.

I read [edit: on the wiki] that spell resistance does not work (does not do anything). "WARNING: in the current patch (2.34) the skill-based Spell Resistance bonus is not displayed. Currently the bonus to spell resistance (stat) is not working, though the mastery & spell-crit reduction is working. " Is this true? If yes, is it true for Console only, for PC only or not true at all. I die a lot versus the temple guardian fire traps that they throw and these frustrate me lots - yes, I do put the fire relics on before going into this area but I die anyway. Will spell resistance help against these? I'm using a pyro elf considering it as the final skill versus delphic lore or combat discipline. Thanks.

Hi, Do the nameless guardians have a minimum level on certain difficulties? Ex: minimum level on gold, platinum, niobium. I have a level 65 pyro high elf and I die every time to the guardians on gold (I have died at the first or the second guardian so far - haven't even gotten to the last which I'm sure is even harder). I make sure to kill the traps before attacking the guardians so the TGs are not a problem. The boss is just doing so much damage to me.

Does damage conversion work only on weapon damage (ex: I can't use it to convert some of the physical damage of meteor shower to ice for example)?

I made one of each character type (mostly melee builds) but did not take any past level 20. Now I have a pyro high elf and am really enjoying it, currently level 45. Great for killing without having to get within melee range of the enemies. The world is sooo big that if you have to get within melee range to kill everything, you will lose time closing with the enemies. I always play with the special pyro mount unless in dungeons, cast a blazing tempest, keep going towards my destination and cast another tempest when ready accumulating hordes of enemies following me, and dying while burning :-D. A lot of the fun of the game is trying out different builds, so look at some guides to get an idea of what sounds like the most fun to you, try different classes and see what you like best.

Some people argue for taking extra damage on initial hit versus faster expansion. Here's some reasons faster expansion may be better: - Having lots of tempests on the screen (3 or more) can slow your game down (especially on X360). If they expand faster, they will hit the enemies faster and also disapear faster enabling you to cast more tempests without the lag.... This is unless of course the expaning speed of the tempest means that the tempest will stay on screen for the same amount of time but expand at a faster rate which would effectively extend its range, which would be even better I think, but I'm not sure whether it would work this way. - The burning damage from tempest does more than the initial hit anyway - You can get damage from other sources but nothing else will make your tempest go faster My current character has it modded this way: Damage, Conflagration, Crit... but I think Faster Expansion, Conflagration, Crit would be better. Has anyone ever picked the faster expansion bronze mods and what do you think about it?

Hey Gogo, did you contact the community manager about doing an interview on DM? would like to see that. I agree, still the game is immensely fun even with the bugs. I would like to see blacksmithing get fixed on the console anyways, hopefully they will get their 'external developer' to fix the console bugs.

I beleive the answer is that your US Key can be used to unlock an EU version of the game which is necessary to play on EU servers. Quote from the SIF: "No, you still need the main client region to match the add-on region in order to install. It just means you can use your purchased key to install any region of the main client. So you still need a UK version of the main client in order to install a UK version of the add-on. I am just saying you don't have to re-purchase a key. Your US key will work to install a UK client, then purchase a UK Ice & Blood when it's release. You will obviously be playing online on EU servers though. Until the add-on gets release in the US all US servers will remain version 2.43." Source: http://forum.sacredeng.ascaron-net.com/sho...5910&page=2

With just one rune in skin, regen time bonus for AP is always higher than the penalty from using the buff, always. As you eat runes in skin, 2 things happen: Your bonus to AP regen time increases, Your Penalty from using the buff increases. As you eat runes, depending other parameters like your stamina, whether you are using a special mount or not, the special mount's level, grand invigoration level and mods, etc... either the penalty from using the IS buff or your bonus to AP regen time will increase faster than the other. What has happened is that in your case, for now, penalty from using the buff has been increasing faster than the bonus to AP regen time. As your character changes by getting more stamina and other factors, you may reach a threshhold where adding runes will add more to the bonus to AP regen than to the penalty from using the buff. Next time you think about eating a rune in IS, save before doing it and check the effect. If it is desirable, continue, if not, reset.

Are you activating other buffs at the same time and are you on a mount or changing any other variable? Pyro mount will reduce regen time as will Grand Invigoration and some equipment can also do it as will blacksmith runes....

See antitrust's posts on this. The higher your character level, the harder it is to get top tier items. Ex: tier 12 is relatively easy to get at level 5. It is impossible at level 200. The general consensus is that it is best to aim for tier 10 items whatever your character level. Shooting for more than that is probably unresonable. Note that lightsabers are in tier 12. Here's the thread: http://forum.sacredeng.ascaron-net.com/sho...ead.php?t=56777 For example, to get tier 12 at character level 15 you only need 17 points in bargaining. To get tier 10 at character level 200, you need 394 points in bargaining. See also schot's posts on "bargaining networks".

If you do like kat did and get delphic lore, you don't need spell resistance because you will have a very strong expel magic. I'm not sure spell resistance even works. Also remember that a light character cannot party with a dark character.

Do you have a shopper already? Are you looking to make a build that depends on a shopper, is a shopper or does not need to shop? If the third case, maybe look at this build? 2 types of area damage: Magic Coup (Magic) and blazing tempest (fire): http://darkmatters.org/forums/index.php?showtopic=12524 High elves are very powerful Area of Effect damage dealers and have good defense and survivability especially at low levels thanks to in combat regeneration with Grand invigoration! If you want a shopper and Area of Effect build, Dobri's self-sufficient high elf seems very good.

When thinking about what choices were the best for some high elf mods where you could either choose between more regen or something else: ex - More HP regen, close combat reflect, more damage.... http://darkmatters.org/forums/index.php?showtopic=12401 The popular response here seems to be that you should take the regen mods because its less easy to get them elsewhere. It occurred to me that a great source of regen is blacksmith runes which give -regen and +crit. I was thinking about a new dual aspect build where bargaining would be dropped and instead of socetting +skills or other things we can buy with bargaining, we would socket the smith art that gives regen and crit hits. So, we can take conflagration on BT, HP regen on GI, Close combat reflect and fiery ardor on IS since we will have so much regen from gear... Instead of bargaining, we will take DA Lore. To manage the weaknesses of blazing tempest which is an uber mob killer (namely that it doesn't work well in water and crowded areas and that it works less well on fire resistants, we take advantage of DA Lore to boost magic coup. Other advantages include that we would not have to waste time/money shopping. Skills: AP Lore AP Focus Concentration DA Focus DA Lore Armor Lore Constitution Shield Lore Ancient Magic Combat Discipline The delphic skills will help lots in low levels by boosting hp regen in combat. Main SKills: IS: Burn Ranged, Reflect CC, Fiery Ardor GI: AP Focus, Life Regen (boosted by delphic lore), Run Speed Tempest: Expand faster, Conflagration, Crit Magic Coup (Crowds in Water areas or fire resistant crowds): Target Focus, Life Leech (boosted by delphic lore), Stray Damage Shower - boss killer: Stun, More Damage, Crit (we will already have a lot of crit from smith arts) EM for protection vs spells and CAs: Expansion, Pentagram, Protection Teleport: Phase Shift, Vanish, Explosion Cobalt Strike: Damage, Electrify, Crit (For debuffing bosses) Fire Demon (After 75 Conc): Higher Level, Less detrimental Effects, Less regen penalty Stats: Mostly Stamina Mount: Pyro Mount for most areas except areas with lots of water What do you think about this?

Happy birthday and thanks for all your contributions!

So... That means that if you have a high close combat reflect chance (from inc skin for example) shield lore is not very useful, is that right? I'm thinking about not taking shield lore on a high elf and putting in delphic lore instead to get more hp regen from GI.

When I said it takes more time to kill if you maneuver I mean you can't spam your cas while you are moving, so if you have to move a lot to avoid, maybe you won't be able to shoot as fast. If you are stunned, it seems to me that you cannot move and can't manuver. In this case, it could be helpful to have close combat reflected. If you get GI and fire demon high enough with the mods to reduce detrimental effects would this stop you from ever getting stunned? In this case maybe the close combat reflect mod would be less good. The wiki says this about the frosty breeze mod which it seems to me is just like the fiery ardor mod but for ice: * The "Mystic Stormite Expertise" gold mod provides a scaling regeneration bonus that will improve with additional runes. This is most useful early in a character's life when regeneration time balancing is difficult. This mod becomes less useful over time however, as the Crystal Skin CA has a built-in reduction of Mystic Stormite regeneration times already, and the natural progression of a character in higher levels means drastically decreased regeneration times in general. * The "Frosty Breeze" gold mod provides a scaling damage bonus that will improve with additional runes. This is most useful late in a character's life when a percentage based increase in damage means tens to hundreds of points in additional ice damage. Who wrote this I wonder and is it sure that this analysis also applies correctly to fiery ardor and can we make the generalization that regen mods are best in character early life and damage/defense/life regen mods are better in later life? The fire skin and GI buffs give bonuses to regen as a basis. Other places to get extra regen late in character life are numerous like extra stamina, concentration, aspect focus, + skills boosting both focus and concentration, pyro mount, fire elf set, rings and amulets. Of course there are lots of places to get more damage too. The screnshots of the character in the topic seem quite powerful with the mods he chose. I would like to see some screenshots of the CA mods chosen by other characters also to compare.

I've got a Fire HE (mainly fireball, 'cause it's fun at ~0.6s regen & some chance for 1/2 regen) & I'm pondering on my last mod for GI (I've taken pyro regen & HP regen). I feel like I "should" take the detrimental effects reduction mod, but that seems like a waste of a run speed mod... The silver mod is the hardest to choose for me. The gold one seems easy as I spend so much time on the pyro mount, run speed = not very useful. My analysis of the silver mod and others on which I would welcome commentary/input: http://darkmatters.org/forums/index.php?showtopic=12401

More discussion of regen times and which mods to pick for high elves in this thread: would welcome your input: http://darkmatters.org/forums/index.php?showtopic=12401