Tag Archives: Wizard

My Undead Monster?

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This is my current take on the Melee Wizard. Right now most of my gear is laughable, this is another guy that got to 20/22 and just stopped getting played much. I knocked out his third life as a rogue/figher to make soloing to cap fast and easy and for the most part it was.

How much of this do i really need to explain? 17 wiz is for Power Werd Killz, if you can live with out it then you might only need between 12 and 15 wizard levels. For me i want Otto’s and Power Werd Stun so 15 is my personal minimum for a melee caster.

Main defenses are miss chances, Wrath form, Blur/Displacement and Hps. I think i can work in a 30 -40 PRR with the right items and what not and i want to max out my dodge. Think right now it is like 8% with only feats to add to dodge.  It is also worth saying i took all the ways to get Radiant Forcefield effect. I didn’t love the idea of a triggered cast based on my live total but then i tried it and i dig it. Sure it cuts down on incoming damage so you can heal up but it is also a HUGE VISUAL CLUE! And that is huge when you are playing a super busy character, it is easy to lose track of your HPs in the thick of things.

Things that might be confusing. That one point in Int on the EKnight tree, that was an messup. I was trying to spend the 30 points for the top tear when i realized that i just didn’t have the points for it and the dwarf/Pm lines i wanted, went to hit cancel and hit Cool Cool instead…. I was too cheep at that moment to bother fixing it. I will clean it up later.  Why didn’t i nab that last level in the dragon mark? Think i will when i fix that Int point, but really the thing i thought was most important in the dwarf tree was Con to damage then the forcefield after that i wanted to get into the Class PREs and i just didn’t have extra points to take the ranged grapnel.  Lastly i really like how just those few points really sang in the Assassin tree. That is a lot of dps for not a lot of points, a really great return.

Well i hope to get some time on this character soon. But i feel that he will always feel behind until i gear him out really well and i am not sure how motivated  i am to do that right now.

 

<3s

 

 

Elf Samius?

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Okay before you all revolt with a title like Elf Samius I just want you to know while I am debating on a race change… spoiler I don’t think I will. I do want to talk about my reasons and my logic behind it.

I said reasons but really there is just one for a race change on my wiz, PRR. I have gotten lucky enough to be in on some good groups for a lot of the EE Giant Hold quests and I have noticed a personal weakness by my lack of PRR. Now I use a shield so I get like 10 PRR. Weeeee! Oh boy, I take like 5% less damage. When something hits me for 300+ after my 10 DR and 5% PRR meaning I still need to heal real fast. Even twisting in Cocoon and slotting in the 114 devotion on my shield I am still running super low and having to hope to not get hit again while firing off a heal scroll. I can’t make 300+ dc checks to keep the spell if I get hit.

To add PRR I could swap into armor like the E Blue dragon hide or Scale. The scale would be a little more PRR over the hide and has a skin I like over the hide but brings with it an ASF of 25%. So if we slot -15% ASF augment gem I would still have to deal with 10%…. Enter the Elf/Helf as options as they can reduce ASF with enchantments points.

But I would lose the Evasion that makes the 18/2 rogue splash so good, even if right now my Reflex save is only in the mid 40s which Tobril says is crap in EEs atm…

Also looking at the DDowiki’s Enhancement Alpha Page  run down, I don’t want to loose all the HPs from the fat Halfling race post changes…  Wonder if I can splash in a bard level and take warchanter for some ASF reduction…

No at least until the enchantment pass I think I will just stay Fat Halfling, use the hide armor and pick an armor skin that doesn’t suck. 🙂

Oh one last thing assuming I did the math right… with my bab being like 10 the non bab buffed PRR for Hide is 7 and the Scale is 11… Buff that with a Tenser’s or Divine Power (clickies) and the difference is a little wider 12 vs 18 but still not worth loosing evasion.

Scale 10 + 14 + 11 = or about 82% damage taken – evasion

(DP) 10 + 14 + 18 = 42 = about 77%

Hide 10 + 14 + 7 = or about 83% damage taken keep evasion

(DP) 10+ 14+11 = 82%

Now if I can just get one of those +3 Int items so I can free up my body slot…

<3s

Some Follow Up Anwers

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I posted a projected build for myself this morning of a 18/2 wiz/rog mostlikely as a Pale Master. This spawned a few comments and questions. So let me see if I can hash a few of them out for you all.

The most common two are: Why is Heighten so late (lvl 17)? Why no Spell Pen feats? Lets look at the Heighten question first.

At level 17 when I will take Heighten that will be my 15th wizard level. Which means before then 7th level was my max level spell any way. Aka Finger of Death is as good as it can get and Circle of Death is only 1 behind it. Making my DCs on removal spells almost or just as good as someone that took Heighten sooner.

Spell Pen: You have to know from reading my stuff for a while to know that I have the max number (for past life gains+) of Wizard lives done already. And as a completionest I have already done a FvS life, so I am +7 over a first lifer already. So I am sure that will get me to 20 with just a few enchantments and an item. If I get to epics and have trouble I can swap out the sorc past life and side in the spell pen feat taking the rest post 20. But I don’t think they will be needed. Tobril was telling me just the other day how a 2nd lifer was getting no fail Spell Pen on eE quests with all the feats and a few twists. I am hoping the extra 5 spell pen I have from past lives will do the work of all those feats and some of the epic twists. If not I can do a few mow FvS lives.

Also real fast something I might have said or should have said is this build is mostly to level with. I don’t know if I will stay 18/2 post level 20 or not. But this is a fairly well rounded build for the first 20 levels.

Lets see some other comments….

On Barb Past life: The sooner you take the Barb past life feat the stronger it is in the over all life of a build. 20 hps and a rage is very strong at level 3. Just looking at the planer level 3 I would have around 60 hp with out items, taking the feat is a third more. Be at -11 to -19 a few times and tell me how you feel about having 20 more hp? Barb past live vs toughness: 20 hp now vs 3+1 per level until level 17 the past life is just plan better and having the clickly is an often over looked perk. Be one point short of pulling a lever and know that if you had this you would have gotten it done.

No Extend?: With the changes to extend I don’t take it on new casters. I just don’t. Why do I need it? Haste and Rage were talked about in one comment, But I offen don’t cast them on my casters, unless I am killing mobs via melee or something.

Empower: This is my spell booster for the low levels. Sometimes I just want to cast a spell once and be done. This is how I help make this happen. Its costs are low enough that paying for it is affordable at low levels, I used to use Max Spell but those lifes often took longer to level up due to having to melee more then I liked.

Sorc past life: I am only taking it for prereqs for like Wrath form and if I go Am to use instead of Mental toughness. If it turns out I can’t use it as a Mental Toughness sub (think it can) I will be taking Mental toughness instead.

The last big comment I see again from Malinza2 (lots of good comments btw) is on why not 2 monk over 2 rog. This is a matter of preference. For starters I have never liked how a 2 monk splash looks on casters. You either make life hard on yourself or run a round uncentered all the time. In my eyes two feats are not as good as Rog skills and a d6 the sneak attack for stunned or held mobs, lest not forget alignment restrictions that monks have to follow meaning you can’t switch to N to take less damage at places and take neg levels to use some items. Also for me it comes down to gear. I have lots of gear that plays well for a caster that plays well with rog levels that doesn’t play nice with monk levels. I mean if I am doing a melee build, monk is easy to fit in I have lots of cool wraps and a fair amount of robes, but as a caster I am just better of using a host of other gear.

Would I say run out and build this for yourself? Not really. This is more of a build for me. But I want to share my thoughts and process in the event that it helps others.

Tomorrow that talk on AM vs PM.

❤

Looks like Fat Halflings are Okay by You

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Step two: build layout. Again looking at using a 18/2 wiz/rog PM mostly because I love me some removal spells here are some basic plans. Starting with Stats.

Keep in mind these are 36 point builds on a Fat Halfling Race (aka Dwarf)

Plan A
14 Strength
10 Dexterity
16 Constitution
18 Intelligence
08 Wisdom
12Charisma

Plan B
14 Strength
08 Dexterity
16 Constitution
18 Intelligence
08 Wisdom
13Charisma

Plan A vs Plan B: A has one less Chr but 2 more Dex meaning that there is no starting dex penalty to skills or AC (wanking motion to show how impressed I am with the new AC system) but Plan B will have +1 to Chr skills at odd tome levels ie +1 and +3 so more UMD and Intim aka both good things. Guess my Open lock and ninja skills will eat a -1.

Leveling layout, again this is with the plan of leveling to 20 as a PM.

Level 1 (Rogue)
Feat: (Selected) Insightful Reflexes

Level 2 (Wizard)
Feat: (Wizard Bonus) Empower Spell

Level 3 (Wizard)
Feat: (Selected) Past Life: Berserker’s Fury

Level 4 (Wizard)
Level 5 (Wizard)
Level 6 (Wizard)
Feat: (Selected) Past Life: Arcane Prodigy
Feat: (Wizard Bonus) Spell Focus: Necromancy

Level 7 (Wizard)
Level 8 (Wizard)
Level 9 (Rogue)
Feat: (Selected) Completionist

Level 10 (Wizard)
Level 11 (Wizard)
Level 12 (Wizard)
Feat: (Selected) Greater Spell Focus: Necromancy
Feat: (Wizard Bonus) Maximize Spell

Level 13 (Wizard)
Level 14 (Wizard)
Level 15 (Wizard)
Feat: (Selected) Past Life: Arcane Initiate

Level 16 (Wizard)
Level 17 (Wizard)
Feat: (Wizard Bonus) Heighten Spell

Level 18 (Wizard)
Feat: (Selected) Quicken Spell
Level 19 (Wizard)
Level 20 (Wizard)

Feat order might look a little out of order but what this layout does is allows us to take PM2 right at 14 and at the same time allows us to skip using Vamp form as the last thing you want to do at level 14 is start using a form that explodes when shot by a laser beam.

Also with just a little tweaking (swapping the Focus Feats) or none at all I could go AM and not PM until 20 when Lich form (aka the good one) kicks in. Tomorrow if I have time I will talk a little about maybe trying out AM for leveling up and why I am leaning that way at least until 20.

Finally the Main stat number, Int. Now this is not all fleshed out. Like I could take the epic +1 stat feats post 20 but for the most part this is everything I have or plan to get easily.

INT:
18base
+6level ups
+3enhcancements
+3tome
+2ship
+2yugo
+1litany once i get one (I like the raid)
+3insight robes
+8int goggles or ring
+2lich (going to assume PM at 20 for now)
+2completionest
+6 wizard destiny
+2 int twisted in from 2 other destinies
+1 int twisted Echoes of the Ancestors: Arcane (Magister)
+1 exp slotted some place easy
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50 int normally running around with just yugo pot

+ 1-3 house D pots as needed (yeah right)
+1 when I find a +4 tome
+2 Store pots
+2 capstone if I go to pure at 20

I could go drow and have +2 more Int or Human and get +1 more. But really until Turbine makes an Int based Gnome I just like the Fat Halfling look. I mean have you seen their beards?

Well those are my thoughts atm, feel free to comment below.

<3s

More on End Game Caster Gear

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Last we talked about As400 I had the goals of getting a Necromancer’s Staff (done) and a seal of the Ring of ER (not done ☹) But hey one out of two tough to farm items in 3 or 4 days is not bad.

Assuming that I do finally get my hands on the Seal I need to get my hands on a Spider Robe (+3 exp Int) and some kind of +7/8 item. Once that is done I have a few other slots to fill.

But before the wiki and I can do our thing and find items to farm for I need to know what slots are open.

So lets see at least one ring slot is open. The cloak slot would open up with a new int item. Getting a spider robe clears out the need for the Bracers of the Glacier now that I have the Necro Staff so it would be open. Gloves are totally open right now and my boots are for FF and a large guild slot that can be moved to any other guild slotted item. I don’t remember 100% and my.ddo doesn’t like old 400, but I think that my belt slot is a simple con belt.

So in summary I am married to my hat, torc, robe (once I get the new one), a ring (once I get that seal) and a staff…. Which means mostly everything. Oh boy….

So what can we get with easy farming/plat?

Well Belt of the Sun Soul is a quick farm. And is a +7 con belt not bad for a generic Con incress if it would grant HPs . The Sun Bracers have exp con and a save bonus, also not bad.

Speaking of easy to farm bracers that are not bad, the War Wizard’s bracers are more Sp and HP even if the rest is not uber… But I can see wearing the bracers all the time once I get enough favor and make the Spider robe part of the War wizards set and swapping into the Amulet in non-torcing fights to push the Sp a little more.

I am not in love with the rest of the turn in items on my Wiz and that leaves us with a lot of open slots so lets look at epic items. Under Boots we have Epic Firestorms, Dustless and Golden Greaves. I would put Delving boots but I will never get a pair. Oh and lets not rule out Rock boots, they are real good for my wiz in fact. Think I will plan on them.

Gloves? The Cannith challenge system doesn’t have any gloves so we can’t just run with them so lets look at the epics. Bramble caster and not a lot else, might have use this slot for some Green steel…

Cloak the Epic Phiarian Cloak is a clear stand out for a PM. But the two epic slots from a Cloak of Flames might be better.
But mainly I need to decide do I bother trying for a Tod Ring/set? The thing is all the Tod Rings are +6 stat and would be a waist I get my hands on a +7 or better Int item. And are any of the ring+belt sets worth it? Maybe the Archmage set??? Kinda…

Idk might use one of my Large Guild rings for like a Great school Focus of Fort so I don’t have to slot extra fort anyplace and keep that guild Hps….

As always if you have any ideas use the comments.

❤

Wizbot to MaxDC Guy

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So I decided how to best use my stone of skip 8 levels for me. I was back and forth a lot but think I will be happy at once capped again. Anyway I took one of my 18/2 WF wizard/rogue (As400) and TRed him into a pure drow build. I don’t like the numbers on a lot of the stats. 14 con is low for a 2nd life guy to me. Which means I will need to work extra hard on finding Hps and getting that Con as high as it can go. To make up the short fall of that Con penalty. But I do love having a starting 20 INT so there are some trade offs.

Why? I spent more then an hour last night running down the list of possible quick second life builds I could do and was willing to skip some of the key play levels.

I have a junk Clr, that I designed the original Bowonk for him. I even picked up a first and last name change tokens when they were on sale a few weeks back with the plan to TR him some day. But he had some cons, he had a cleaned Shroud item, as well as I really want to have a monk life on my bowonk builds. And I didn’t really want to invest in a monk life and then the Bowonk live right now. I thought about using him as another Fleshy Artificer. I could skip taking the Essence feat and take the Clr past life instead. Do Helf with the monk dilly, and have a rocking Amp score and make my umd do the healing work. The nice thing would be his CorOp GS would be a boon, as well as him sitting on the shards to make a dual shard GS repeater. Take the Dragon marks and focus on electric damage and go to town. But I wasn’t ready or comfortable trying to make an artificer carry a party of 2 or more pikers to 8. Not yet anyway.

So I looked some more, Samius Jr could use a second Monk life but he is just starting to get his gear sorted. Samiusbot could use a go around but I didn’t want to be with out a scroll farmer while he was leveling back up. I even threw around the idea of taking one of the FvSs and making him into a Sorc.

But I decided that having another real DC caster for the guild would be for the best. Samiusbot’s Dcs are not horrible. And for the amount of work I put into him they are great but it is time for me to have a Big DC guy at least until Samius is done.

As for the Race decision it was fairly simple to rule out WF or any race that didn’t have a way to boost Int and starting with 20 Int is better then any other race although the +1 humans/helf have are close. But if you want the max then drow is the max. I looked at Elf for a long time however because of the Elven Arcanum line and I might regret not having that as an option. Max Dcs don’t do a lot if you can’t beat the SR of the mob.. But past live Wiz, the wiz pen line, pen feats and an item and I should be okay.

Would I have done Drow if I couldn’t skip the hard to solo as a PM levels? Nope. I never liked the Drow as a race. But I hope that skipping the hard levels will make leveling one a ton easier and will give me the big Dcs that the guild needs in epics.

Wait…. Open beta notes…. WTF? Well maybe it wont be soooooo bad?

❤