[X] My Assistant

I really suggest to upgrade your equipment at least up to 5.

What do you mean "up to 5"?

I am just not sure what you mean by AC spell.

Auto-Cast spell. I was only spending one of my two Auto-Cast slots while playing on Normal and I was spending it on Protection.

There are four support spells 1H should use all the time. Protection, Spirit Shield, Regen and Heartseeker.

Heartseeker? Really? That uses up half my MP for at best an 8% damage boost for critical hits for 80 turns.
I will try out Spirit Shield though. I didn't notice when I unlocked it, so I never really thought about it until now.

What do you mean "up to 5"?

Everything to five. Because the first five upgrades dont cost any bindings so you should be able to afford them quite easy and they are those uprades who gives you the biggest bonus. So they are the most cost-effective one and should allways be done.

Auto-Cast spell.

Well, i guess it was just too obvious. (IMG:[invalid] style_emoticons/default/laugh.gif)

I was only spending one of my two Auto-Cast slots while playing on Normal and I was spending it on Protection.

I would suggest to use the second one on Spirit Shield.

Heartseeker? Really? That uses up half my MP for at best an 8% damage boost for critical hits for 80 turns.

Hm? Heartseeker increase your damage by 25% and crit chance by 10%. So i guess you are talking about the "better heartseeker" ability. Which is just a bonus. But half of your MP? Are you absolute sure? How much interference do you have? (IMG:[invalid] style_emoticons/default/unsure.gif)

I will try out Spirit Shield though. I didn't notice when I unlocked it, so I never really thought about it until now.

You will like it. Even when it will feel like it eats your spirit points away at lower levels. But that will be better after you have upgrade your armor to increase your PM and MM. And by reaching higher level to upgrade it with the abilites.

Because the game has been much easier for low level players over the past year, this means they should play at PFUDOR starting at level 150~200 or maybe even down to level 1. Once you can learn it, I think Spark of Life is essential to survive until you become high level. Even after becoming medium to high level, Spark of Life is still needed if you either don't use Spirit Shield (which some people don't like) or fight in the deepest levels of IW/Grindfest or wear too much Slaughter armor at low level.

I fought the easier arenas at IWBTH and PFUDOR when I was level 1, and this was back in the old hard version. I died a lot.

I fought the easier arenas at IWBTH and PFUDOR when I was level 1, and this was back in the old hard version. I died a lot.

The version i was talking about didnt even had PFUDOR.

And no i would never suggest play everything on PFUDOR just because. When you die a lot and actually need SoL to keep yourself alive all i have say to you is that

Everything to five. Because the first five upgrades dont cost any bindings so you should be able to afford them quite easy and they are those uprades who gives you the biggest bonus. So they are the most cost-effective one and should allways be done.

Oh! You meant upgrade at the Forge! I thought you meant upgrade as in replace the equipment with better equipment.
This makes sense to me now.

Hm? Heartseeker increase your damage by 25% and crit chance by 10%. So i guess you are talking about the "better heartseeker" ability. Which is just a bonus.

I absolutely was only looking at "Better Heartseeker". My bad.

But half of your MP? Are you absolute sure? How much interference do you have? (IMG:[invalid] style_emoticons/default/unsure.gif)

40% actually. 366/916. 120 points of interference means I pay 160% for spells.

so instead of playing on the highest difficulty you can manage with SoL you should lower the difficulty and miss out on income? not using SoL when it's essentially free once you have IA3, even if it's just in case of extremely unlikely circumstances, seems like a silly thing to do to me, speaking as someone who has cleared PFfest with a longsword

Oh! You meant upgrade at the Forge! I thought you meant upgrade as in replace the equipment with better equipment.

Well in the end you should of course also keep your eyes open for better equipment. But forging your equipment is at your level most of the time much easier. And it will give you allready some forge XP you will be happy later on. And i would even say forge your parry and your block as much as you can.

I absolutely was only looking at "Better Heartseeker". My bad.

These things happen. (IMG:[invalid] style_emoticons/default/happy.gif)

40% actually. 366/916. 120 points of interference means I pay 160% for spells.

Hm, that is less interference as i have. (IMG:[invalid] style_emoticons/default/wink.gif) Well i suggest to use heartseeker at least when you have a channeling waiting for you and if there is none channeling just cast it with Spirit Stance active. That should reduce the overall mana cost.

so instead of playing on the highest difficulty you can manage with SoL you should lower the difficulty and miss out on income? not using SoL when it's essentially free once you have IA3, even if it's just in case of extremely unlikely circumstances, seems like a silly thing to do to me, speaking as someone who has cleared PFfest with a longsword

Manage? When you actually need it to survive it will trigger more than once and it will be also slow. Yeah, sounds like a lot of fun feeling weak, fragile and slow for just getting a few credits more. I mean for me it would not make any sense. But hey, all the mage players would swear blindly that using SoL is the way to do it. I mean what does uncle stu actually know? He dont even use it. He also dont have a full Slaughter set. So better he should keep his mouth shut because we are right and he is WRONG. Fine. I allready regret that i was stupid enough to return into this topic. I am so so sorry. It wont happen again. (IMG:[invalid] style_emoticons/default/mad.gif)

This post has been edited by Uncle Stu: Sep 24 2018, 04:32

So better he should keep his mouth shut because we are right and he is WRONG.

i wouldn't put it quite so harshly. nothing wrong with different people having different points of view

Because the game has been much easier for low level players over the past year, this means they should play at PFUDOR starting at level 150~200 or maybe even down to level 1.

No, they shouldn't.

The version i was talking about didnt even had PFUDOR.

And no i would never suggest play everything on PFUDOR just because. When you die a lot and actually need SoL to keep yourself alive all i have say to you is that

I completely agree with you about that.

This post has been edited by PersonaFan08: Sep 24 2018, 05:25

With no offfense, it seems like more people agree using sol.
Since low level don't have spirit shield max out, why not get an insurance when mana draught is really cheap?

Did any players tried elemental mage with non imperil in GF x20? I know Kyouri has Elec 3+2 build to clear GF x20 but I couldn't find more info about that.

sssss2 also has his records on his GF runs.

And forgot to ask, where do you find his battle record?

Because i KNOW a 1H player dont need it.

Hey, I need! (IMG:[invalid] style_emoticons/default/tongue.gif) (IMG:[invalid] style_emoticons/default/laugh.gif)

This is something important to distracted people like me, and that sometimes is not very lucky. (IMG:[invalid] style_emoticons/default/heh.gif)

Yeah I feel like if you have IA5 or even IA3 Spark of Life is never a bad thing to have. The upkeep cost is so minimal and mana draughts are so cheap and plentiful that there's no real reason not to have SoL on your autocast.

Just remind that spirit shield need lv 285 to max, and before that it's pretty useless. Another thing is spirit shield just trigger if 1 monster crit above 20% HP, not if 10 monsters attack 10% per turn, sometimes I dead from 10 monsters RE if I accident buff "heart seeker" on PFUDOR difficult. On top of that, monster on PFUDOR has 25% speed bonus, that mean they can attack twice on the same turn.
My conclusion is that you will need SoL if you want to try higher difficult, and if you just strong enough to farm, then don't use it.

SoL is necessary to play 1H even at Lvl500. Nothing to discuss.
1H's tankiness comes purely from the luck of not being devastated thanks to your block and your parry.
It only takes a very brief moment of very bad luck, to eat 2-3 spirit attacks in the same turn, to be defeated all of sudden.
Some players learned it the hard way.

So frankly, saving a ridiculously small amount of MP per turn is certainly not worth the gamble of playing with the risk of having high repair costs.

PS:
The only thing that doesn't "lie" about tankiness, is PMit+MMit+HP pool+spirit pool.

This post has been edited by decondelite: Sep 24 2018, 08:09

Nicely put. It's also the reason why I still use a (neer Peerless in all stats 368/374 PXP0) Mithril Buckler of Protection that I don't even bother to upgrade, and before that I used a crappy old version Legendary Mithril Buckler of Protection with only 25% actual block.

It's best to aim for high block and upgrade it, but I wanted to train myself to feel what is the true tankiness of my armor set that doesn't rely on luck. This way I will have a better appreciation to know when I'm in danger (from exceptionally bad luck) and when I do need Spark of Life and/or Spirit Shield, and when I don't.

I'm hoping to get a new shield soon, I won't stay this way forever. It's just my body training.

If you have a mostly Peerless Power of Protection/Warding set and are high level with enough juggernauts, Spirit Shield alone is probably safe enough. I still play the low level way myself, with only Spark of Life and no Spirit Shield, but with 1~2 poor plate parts, Haste, and Shadow Veil.

Careful. I never said that one shouldn't use a good, upgraded shield. Even less that it shouldn't be your priority.
Forging mitigations to be able to tank attacks head-on is way, way more difficult than just relying on a shield to do more than half of the job. Even dodging with DW's evade is harder than that aswell.

When you actually need it to survive it will trigger more than once and it will be also slow.

oh and this is painting it a bit too black and white. if spark triggers once during a whole grindfest it has done its job

Spirit Damage = Base_SP * SS_AP_Damage * MIN( (Damage - Max_HP * SS_AP_Damage) / (Max_HP * SS_AP_Damage * 3) , 1)

(SS_AP_Damage = percentage of damage required for Spirit shield to kick in)

Note: This formula works in such way that an increase of base spirit points (e.g. by increasing STR primary attribute) leads to the spirit damage increasing with the same percentage. More base SP does not improve Spirit Shield.

Me and others analyzed various aspects of the Spirit Shield formula last year, but I have a couple more things to point out. (And I recommend that the changes in bold be added. Improving max SP really helps Spirit Shield).

In the typical case the formula reduces to: Spirit Damage = Base_SP * absorbed HP damage / (Max_HP * 3)

Note in particular that the more Max HP you have, the less spirit damage you take. Since HP increases linearly with your level, Spirit Shield is somewhat more functional and uses much less spirit on high level players. It's also important to get lots of juggernaut to make Spirit Shield better.

Last year quite a few of us new players surprisingly disagreed with the traditional endorsement of Spirit Shield. It should be used from low levels when needed, but it's up to each individual when to transition to full Spirit Shield reliance. Some 1H players already love it from level 250, other 1H players dislike it even at level 400. By level 500 where Uncle Stu is at, probably all 1H players should love it.

Just remind that spirit shield need lv 285 to max, and before that it's pretty useless.

Last year I decided this was a misconception. It's not the training of Spirit Shield that helps it. Training only changes how soon Spirit Shield kicks in, but just 1 or 2 levels of training is enough. Spirit Shield might even be most effective when left at level 3 until you are past level 300.

The real problem with Spirit Shield on low level players is that it uses too much SP. You can still get beat down and even when you don't, the SP drain is painful. Training does not reduce the SP damage, it is only SP_AP_Damage in the usual formula, which cancels away.

Last year I decided this was a misconception. It's not the training of Spirit Shield that helps it. Training only changes how soon Spirit Shield kicks in, but just 1 or 2 levels of training is enough. Spirit Shield might even be most effective when left at level 3 until you are past level 300.

The real problem with Spirit Shield on low level players is that it uses too much SP. You can still get beat down and even when you don't, the SP drain is painful. Training does not reduce the SP damage, it is only SP_AP_Damage in the usual formula, which cancels away.

Been at ~250 lv about 6 weeks ago, can confirm that spirit shield is an absolute waste of mana until at least 4/5 upgrade. Spirit management is not hard, you just have to use draughts, sometimes potions too.