[X] My Assistant

he's not that hard if you have spirit shield. but prior to spirit shield he's a pain. with spirit shield you can tear him apart easily with almost anything.

I remember doing him without spiritshield, was a pain having to recharge spirit with soul reaper so my spark of life could stay up. Atleast ET on FSM is really really high

Hey, I was going through the calculations for avoidance and I was wondering if shadow veil was really worth it? I use one handed with light armor and I was going through the wiki to see if all my parry/block/evade was worth it.

I know all the stuff is multiplicative, but I was wondering if its like that for each piece of equipment also. If not, then it seems shadow veil does give me an extra 10 percent to not get hit, So its like one in 10 attacks, I think its active for 24 turns, so if I round it out, casting it will save me from 2 and a half attacks. But if I have haste on, I won't get attacked as much anyway.

I am trying to switch to mage though, and I know it slows my action speed with the stronger spells, but I'm basically just wondering if it was worth the mp. If anything, I'm thinking probably not worth it now, but when I get the higher level magic it will be.

edit: also wondering how protection works. I'm pretty sure its still worth the 1 ability point, but I've been looking over the wiki extensively to see whats worth what. It doesn't exactly explain everything. Like should I add the 25 percent to each equipment? Is it for both absorption and mitigation? I know without it, I shave off about 40 percent of the damage. (only did calculations for crushing type damage).

Thanks everyone.

This post has been edited by smilejb: Nov 1 2011, 08:48

@coykili yeah when i first fought FSM it was without spirit shield. too me a *long* time since i constantly had to ripen him up to keep spark active.

@smilejb as a mage that can't nuke everything in 1 round, i rely heavily on my evade+shadow veil+spirit shield otherwise there's nothing stopping the monsters from tearing me a new one

e: *can't nuke everything on nintendo in 1 round. on normal i can more or less nuke everything 1 shot. can't say the same about hard (IMG:[invalid] style_emoticons/default/sad.gif)

This post has been edited by dcherry: Nov 1 2011, 09:01

I can nuke everything in 2 rounds on normal. Still working on my proficiencies. Honestly, not really sure if a staff is really worth it. I know the proficiency gains are pretty good, but I'll do the calculations for that later. (kind of like being able to block/parry). Probably will use a dagger of the nimble to go with this set up later. For now, my ethereal will have to do because my interference is so high.

What are your stats compared to your level? I try to keep endurance at 1 higher than my level. Strength has to cost about a quarter of endurance (just for the health. Dexterity and agility are at 50 for the bonus, so I'm pretty much dumping them now. Whats left of my experience I spend on wisdom and try to keep intelligence a quarter of the cost.

Unfortunately, intelligence is still kind of low compared to my level, so I'm thinking about keeping it the same as endurance.

quick edit, just compared my one hander outfit to my mage outfit. As far as avoidance goes, the one hander is better. But that may be because I have spent some good credits on some of my one hander equipment where as my mage outfit is everything I found.

This post has been edited by smilejb: Nov 1 2011, 09:29

my stats don't go by level. i go by exp ratio...

currently trying out (amount = exp cost)

DEX = base amount
STR = dex * 1.5
AGI = dex * 4
END = dex * 3
WIS = agi * 2 (so it'd be dex * 8...)
INT = WIS * 1.5 (so it'd be dex * 12...)

in the end it's not like there's a magic formula that everyone should be going. just go with what you want, assuming you go with the general rule that Int + Wis is king for a mage and dex does almost jackshit

This post has been edited by dcherry: Nov 1 2011, 09:37

well I wasn't sure what to base endurance on so thats why thats to my level. And yea, dexterity hardly does anything for mages. I left agility and dexterity at 50 (equipment and artifact gains already included there), just for the extra 2 percent to evade and parry. Thinking about it now, its probably not really worth it.

I am a little surprised that your agility is higher than your endurance though. But as you said, there is no general rule except for int and wis.

Thanks, I think I have an idea of what I want to do. I mostly do the ratios too btw, but I mostly kept magic and physical ratios separate.

Oh, and as much as I want to be a mage, I think for the ring of blood I'll just switch back to melee. Extra health, save mana for cures, etc.

the agi is important if you value action speed. the +evade is a nice bonus as well. i'm currently sitting on 30%+ evade before SV which helps a lot in my nintendo arenas - especially since i'm a pin cushion (it's better for me to avoid things than to rely on my flimsy phase gear to protect me)

once you clear each RoB once for the clear bonus and establish some decent mage gear you can roast FSM daily with ease. schoolgirls/lower will only take a few shots from a mage with the right spells. mages benefit most from 1v1 against bosses since they have ET to "recharge" their mana

For FSM I just bring lots of good mana potions and keep it Silenced and poisoned. It takes a while but as long as you make certain silence is always on it's not much of a threat. Keeping it stunned a lot helps too.

My highest clear is only on Heroic, but I haven't had much trouble once I figured out Silence worked better than Spark of Life. Haste, Protection, Silence, Poison, and Cure are pretty much all I use on it.

Actually getting some good light armor would be nice, but that's not going to happen for a while. So I'm stuck with plate for now.

Though I'd like to get a good rapier/estoc of the banshee to see how good spamming Spirit Attack works.

This post has been edited by Drawde: Nov 2 2011, 00:25

(IMG:[invalid] style_emoticons/default/huh.gif)

Am I missing something here: Why would you want to keep Silence and Poison on FSM? Just for the reduction to its evade chance? I don't remember Poison's DoT being all that great, and halving its MP and SP regeneration rates is moot since Silence is on.

In a long fight the poison damage adds up. I don't have the equipment to do fast kills on FSM, even in normal difficulty. Poison's mana cost isn't that great so it's an easy extra 6k-ish damage. That's 4-5 hits in melee, but I have to cast it 10+ times. I might have to try without it to compare.

Does Poison's damage go up based on the monster's original hp on normal, or it's difficulty-adjusted hp?

In a long fight the poison damage adds up. I don't have the equipment to do fast kills on FSM, even in normal difficulty. Poison's mana cost isn't that great so it's an easy extra 6k-ish damage. That's 4-5 hits in melee, but I have to cast it 10+ times.

Why don't you just focus first and then cast? It will surely hit then. It doesn't seem to make sense to cast it 10 times just to get 4-5 hits when you could have been swinging away 10 times anyway.

I meant that 6k is about the same as 4-5 melee hits. But during a single fight with FSM I cast Poison more than ten times. So the damage adds up, and rather cheaply too. Anything that finishes the fight sooner is good.

I usually don't have a problem landing it. Though I always focus when casting Silence.

Poison isn't too good if you have Silence, since you've basically counted out the fear from the monster charging up its powerful shots.


The following is if you do not care about the extra effects of Poison (halved MP/SP gain):

The better your depreciating proficiencies are, the more the damage will feel "worth it". Especially with a spell like Poison, where the base duration is extremely long, some increased points of proficiency would make a really noticeable difference in duration.

For example, with at least 100 depreciation proficiency, with the formula

duration = base_duration * (1 + [additional_AP / 4]) * (1 + [proficiency / 50])

Poison's base duration being 15, 5 points in poison would be

15 * (1+1) * (1+2) = 90 turns

I'm not sure what the true base HP of FSM is, but let's assume it does 400 a turn - that's a grand total of 36k damage, for the cost of 15 base mana. Assuming you are not killing him faster than 90 turns in this situation, it's a great cheap damage tool. I also don't think Smite (13 base mana) at level 100 would match up to 36k damage, even with full Heimdall gear.

Is Poison really good for damage for 5 AP? No. You may as well spend those 5 AP on better skills instead.

I tried FSM just now, with my light armor. Normal difficulty.

The increase in the duration of the spells was quite noticable over my plate duration. Twenty mp a cast. I hit 88 rounds with Poison, at 279 damage a round. 24,552 damage over it's duration. And the fight lasted over 500 rounds, which made it well over 100,000 damage the entire fight.

Not the best spell, but I'd have been fighting for over 100 more rounds with the weapon I was using, an ethereal club.

This post has been edited by Drawde: Nov 2 2011, 10:01

[troll]

People discuss about how to kill FSM, ...today? (IMG:[invalid] style_emoticons/default/huh.gif)

RoB is so ridiculously easy now its not even worth talking about it; just use whatever gear you want, no need for special armor set, let alone any holy/dark mit gear, and you will win.

[/troll]

[troll]

People discuss about how to kill FSM, ...today? (IMG:[invalid] style_emoticons/default/huh.gif)

RoB is so ridiculously easy now its not even worth talking about it; just use whatever gear you want, no need for special armor set, let alone any holy/dark mit gear, and you will win.

[/troll]

Level 252 (Godslayer)

k.

Level has nothing to do with it. (IMG:[invalid] style_emoticons/default/ph34r.gif)

The reason is much simpler than that: Player got buffed + RoB monster got nerfed... It took me about a thousand turns to kill FSM on normal at 122 using specialize equipment, and this was after he got nerfed (resist bug was introduced when Tenb upgraded HV a few weeks before this fight) ... I didn't even try to fight him before this nerfed, since my chance of winning is so slim... (IMG:[invalid] style_emoticons/default/sleep.gif)

1) Get underleveled and crappy gear to make up for the higher stats and proficiencies
2) Go fight FSM
3) Make sure you don't use Spirit Shield, Heartseeker, Arcane Focus, Nerf, MagNet or Regen II
4) Report back results

(IMG:[invalid] style_emoticons/default/huh.gif)

Am I missing something here: Why would you want to keep Silence and Poison on FSM? Just for the reduction to its evade chance? I don't remember Poison's DoT being all that great, and halving its MP and SP regeneration rates is moot since Silence is on.

Poison is great damage for melees. FSM lasts a long time so the poison gets to do it's full damage, which is pretty considerable, since it lasts so long.
And it becomes even greater when you get spirit shield, and can put weaken on FSM instead, so that the halved MP/SP will get some use.

And the reduction in evade chance is nothing to scoff at. Considering how cheap poison is, and how long it lasts, even giving a 5% increase in chance to hit, is quite noteworthy just by itself.

But all of these things rolled into one, makes poison pretty good.

[troll]

People discuss about how to kill FSM, ...today? (IMG:[invalid] style_emoticons/default/huh.gif)

RoB is so ridiculously easy now its not even worth talking about it; just use whatever gear you want, no need for special armor set, let alone any holy/dark mit gear, and you will win.

[/troll]

FSM is not all that hard, once you start getting the necessary spells. But he is long and boring, and ways to make it faster is always appreciated.

Otherwise, you could take him on with nothing but magic missile (assuming you are a mage), sure you will win, especially with access to all the spells and ET and stuff at your level. But it will be long and boring, even if it isn't very hard.



Also, I really am considering switching from melee to mage....just seems like there will be such a huge change to make, needing to train up new proficiencies (staff, cloth, forbidden/divine/elemental*), resetting my ability tree and deciding what spells to get and getting a decent set of phase armor....

*Which of these is best for a lvl 200+ mage? Should one go for elemental for the cheaper spells, or go straight to holy/dark/soul spells? Or is it almost a must to get all, and vary your gear depending on the type of battle?

This post has been edited by Randommember: Nov 2 2011, 18:18