Hitting teh Big Mobs

[jezer]

Ok, all you _experts_... I’d like advice on how to solo some bigger/thicker/harder hitting mobs… for instance Pheonix in Arbo and Mayor Galio. Yes, I know how to use a nightmare… but more specifically to the point… I’m wondering how to get better effective use of my mana.

Last night I spent probably the greater part of 30-40mins killing Galio. At first I tried to run him like I do Solarian and Morrigan. I create slime molds, give them potions, stone them, aegis them, and cast demonic aura. I then shift into a mean tarantula and we do the deal in two runs.

However when a mob like Galio dispatches my pets in the first few rounds, I wondered about the real benefit of wasting 200 mana and 2k coins on them.

I then tried to employ a few different strategies…
• Stay in as long as possible breathing fire (2 Run Regen)
• Stay in as long as shield of thorns was up, NO BLAST, recall, cast shield, shift and repeat (3-4 Run Regen)

So, which do you think did the most damage for the cheapest amount of mana… and what is the best way to solo these mobs?

For the record… I am NOT a cleric, I am NOT a mage, I am a 4x Caster, Druid Prime, with -8ac, and with no way of improving that ac without copious amount of drachma eq, and iron skin. (You’ll have a hard time convincing me running unshifted is the way to go) I got 650 mana to play with in a run.

I don’t know the answers, but I do suspect that there needs to be a shift in strategy for me when a mob is more than two runs with pets. Don’t tell me play a necro or whatever either. Stryx is mean, and you all know it! I just want to be the best that a druid my level can be.

* Should I bother with debuffs... baring in mind at -8, gonna have to heal self a lot before they land.
* What spells should I have up? Is wraith a waste of time for big mobs? etc

Ok, Fire at will! (no Aaron… I’m not inviting you to abuse Leaf, more than what you already do.)

[Rynquald]

The best way start a shifted kill primarily depends on whether the mob in question actually has any chance of missing. Assuming it does, it's normally most efficient to fog the room (taking advantage of the fact that forms have high enough hit that you're not likely to miss most mobs even with fog up) and toss a damn/curse.

Staying in to land more debuffs seems like a good idea at first glance, but only damn both lasts long enough to be useful for a shifted kill, and lands easy enough to make it worthwhile. Fog is of course a free debuff since mobs don't get angry when you cast it. If you have to use 200 mana worth of heals in order to land a blind or weaken or whatever, anything you gain from the -hit is lost with your mana.

Slime molds are only really useful on mobs that either do very little damage but have a ton of hp, or mobs that hit insanely hard(I'm not talking 4-500 dam a round when I say hard btw). In the first case they'll last a while and help you chop a mob down, and in the second case they'll save you some hp, at the cost of efficiency. I don't generally use them on the latter example anymore though.

As for blasting, my rule of thumb is that it's a waste of mana for any mob that you can stay with for 3+ rounds, you'd get better mileage saving the mana for heals when you flee. In the case of mobs you can't last that long with, the expense of the frequent flee/heal will likely overtake the expense of blasting.

I'm not entirely clear on how shield of thorns works, but assuming it's a -ac spell with a chance to break on each hit, I doubt it works out as useful as stone/iron when you can't recast without fleeing and unshifting.

Wraith is useful on a mob-by-mob basis, if the mob in question whiffs through wraith, go for it, if not, waste of mana.

Hopefully that long ramble has at least some useful information.

Edit:As you fight bigger and bigger mobs, and get more mana, you will start running up against problems with your own spells dropping near the end of combat. The best advice I can give for that(and to solve several other problems) is to keep a stopwatch with you, and keep track of your timing. I realise there a plenty of ways you can script around such problems, but in my experience you can't do much better than a good stopwatch.

[jezer]

Thanks Ryn, it's nice to get specific information on the questions.

>Debuffs
I'll try fog and damn tonight and see how they go. Shield of Thorns is practically the "only" redeeming feature of being prime druid, besides the nice regen. If a mob is hitting me less, it has less chance to break, and this means I could possibly stay in 3-5 rounds more per round, if it's up. Will give this a shot tonight. I rate Shield of Thorns one of the best spells in game... Pity it breaks so easy.

I remember trying to dispel Solarian before runs... It landed but seem to have little to no consequence on how long the fight took. I didn't bother after then... Maybe nothing good came off him.

>Drop The Pets
Nod, thought this might be the case for these mobs.

>Blast/No Blast balance
So there is a balance, and it's best gauged by how long you stay in battle. Good to know. I'm in for about 6-8 rounds on galio. I'm still really unsure at what ratio I should be blasting him. It probably changes per mob, but gauging that will come with experience that will come with time...

>What spells to have up
I dropped the wraith, good move on gailo... Greater Fluid... pointless when shield is up. Haste... for the win. Aegis and Stone... givens.

>Keep a stopwatch with you
Swatch or Casio?

Hmm, be nice to hear from king strides or stryx...

[brady]

[quote="jezer":3nw6d53v]
I remember trying to dispel Solarian before runs... It landed but seem to have little to no consequence on how long the fight took. I didn't bother after then... Maybe nothing good came off him. [/quote:3nw6d53v]

The Solarian has a spellshield that won't dispel fully with a single casting. Use something like {e;disp solarian;w;e;disp solarion, etc} until there is a list of dispelled spells (whether you can tell what they are or not). You have a better shot of keeping mobs friendly that way.

[jezer]

I've never really figured this one out... the whole... Darkness... Fog... Dark Cloak... Wearing Light... Mobs fighting blind etc.

How do I use these spells to make a seeing mob fight blind in a lighted room?
Do I cast darkness on myself or the mob? (Conflicting info on this one)
What effect does a mob's darksight or infravision have on this?

Discuss...

[Evergreen]

galio has damn good saves, sometimes you need 10x to land a damnation on him

[jezer]

Evergreen is right, saves on this mob are incredible, debuffs are a waste of time for solo.

So I've been running some tests... Here are results... For mayor galio...

B = Brutal
M = Massacre
E = Extremely
V = Very Hard
I = Miss

Mayor Galio (With Haste - 5 Attacks - Tarantula - -10 - No Wraith)

B M E V I
0 22 4 0 4
0 19 6 0 0
0 21 9 0 0
0 15 8 0 2 Small Wounds (Regen #1)
0 22 5 0 3
0 19 9 0 2
0 20 5 0 0
0 16 6 0 3 Quite Few Wounds (Regen #2)
0 19 10 0 1
0 18 5 0 2
0 21 4 0 0
0 24 4 0 2 Pretty Hurt (Regen #3)
0 21 3 1 5
0 25 6 0 0
0 17 8 0 1
1 16 1 0 1 R.I.P.

During this test, I had aegis and haste up. Each run I shift returned to recast shield of thorns. I got 4 runs per regen and 3 regens, to kill mayor.

Here is the surprising part... next run I just breathed fire at mayor. It took me 2 runs per regen to waste my mana. It took me 3 regens to kill mayor. So that's NO DIFFERENCE just attacking, or blasting hard. If anything blasting is actually quicker in REAL TIME.

[Leaf]

Jezer did I read right ... You do not user Greater Fluid if u have shield of thorns?

Unless something have changed, I was informed that thorns and fluid stack
with each other. If it did not, then thorns would be one of the biggest waste
as a prime spell only. Since anyone that has druid in 2-4 can cast fluid.

[jezer]

I use greater fluid almost perm... but sometimes I'm scratching my head why. I don't see much difference. It would be the first thing I'd want to know about, if sloth was a bit more free with information.

[Autolycos]

[quote="jezer":1nnfmhmr]if sloth was a bit more free with information.[/quote:1nnfmhmr]

The main reason sloth is not free with information is due to that most players now days are more familiar with calculations and variables then the past coders were. If they made info available, everyone would pick out the inconsistencies and bad coding.

[Vixn]

[quote="Autolycos":1a99s50u]If they made info available, everyone would pick out the inconsistencies and bad coding.[/quote:1a99s50u]

ROGL!

[*juggleblood*]

[quote="Evergreen":639ag09n]galio has damn good saves, sometimes you need 10x to land a damnation on him[/quote:639ag09n]

Heh, try dispelling him first. He's prolly just got prot from evil up, like the lammasus and semielves in elemental school. I always get the damn on one try after a dispel.

Galio is a pretty weak chop mob. You should be able to debuff him easily after u dispel and damn him. Then shift and chop him down with a rabbit healing u. Might be 1 run.

[jezer]

It could be quite a laugh, to run some tests on some spells to gauge there effectiveness... A bit like "myth busters" on sloth. Yeah, people been doing it for ages I guess... but would be cool to start like a journal or newspaper on the crier about them.

Need to find like a practice dummy type mob, cast faerie fly on it like 50 times and then see there is any effect, and write a satirical post back with the results. Sounds right up my alley!

I swear some of the lesser used spells are probably completely broke. Things do get broken through obscurity.

But then again, some players have tried to warn me off my little "activist" type tendency in case things get nerfed or broken or changed. Yeap, some people are serious... but I've never been much of a "people pleaser"

I might try faerie fly tonight and write a post, it caught my eye last night... cause I had to cast it 20 times to get 2 to stick on galio last night. (I bet he was a goal keeper in another life.)

I also tried that fog spell and it disappeared in like two ticks, and that's about how long it takes to shift tarantula when rapid shift doesn't work! and I'm thinking... debuffs are such a group thing... be cool if some were a little more for solo. Two spells to test straight up I guess.

[jezer]

[quote="juggleblood":1r800w9p]Heh, try dispelling him first. He's prolly just got prot from evil up, like the lammasus and semielves in elemental school. I always get the damn on one try after a dispel.

Galio is a pretty weak chop mob. You should be able to debuff him easily after u dispel and damn him. Then shift and chop him down with a rabbit healing u. Might be 1 run.[/quote:1r800w9p]

Hmm, thanks, I'll give this a shot too... is his sanct perm? Cause if I could have dispelled it, I really have been a doofus haven't I

[Zukt]

[quote="jezer":2sqc7cf5]I use greater fluid almost perm... but sometimes I'm scratching my head why. I don't see much difference. It would be the first thing I'd want to know about, if sloth was a bit more free with information.[/quote:2sqc7cf5]
Greater fluidity is 20% reduced damage from hits. Its a pretty major difference.