Friday, November 6, 2015

Getting Straightened Out

Getting Straightened Out

Note: This entry covers a bunch of stuff I wanted to get out before the weekend goes into full swing.

Fist is tired of being told she's done everything wrong since she was summarily directed to become active again. Most of those errors were more the fault of bad guidance, which she is beginning to learn to ignore, since it generally gets her into trouble.

No one has been mishandled worse than young Thor, however. When Tiphaine pulled her version of Tormmok, Mock, from Gorgrond and brought him to her garrison, the first thing she did was send him out on mission after mission until he reached level 100. That's the way it was done. No one even considered the idea that you could take your bodyguard into the field at less than level 100.

No one told Fist this. When Fist proudly brought home her version of Tormmok, Thor, she, quite accidentally, discovered that Thor was ready and able to go into the field with Fist at the tender age of 93. Off they went, and over the course of several days Thor racked up almost 3,000 points toward earning his way to the second level.

Then came the downside of that approach. Thor stayed at level 93. That was a sobering lesson which no one had ever mentioned to Fist. Followers level in two different ways. First, they must level to 100 through missions. When taken into the field as a bodyguard, they earn points to gain levels, but that is a separate process from missions. The bottom line is that what is best for Thor right now is to spend his time doing missions until he reaches level 100. Only then is he truly ready to be a full time bodyguard. While he's doing that, Fire Mage Vivianne offered to return to bodyguard duty. She's well equipped with i675 weapon and i660 armor.

It is quite remarkable how well Thor did as a level 93 bodyguard. Though new to the job, he did fine. Well, there was that time Thor tangled with two demons out of range of Fist while she was in a bit of desperate business herself. This was in Sha'naar, a zone she immediately destested.

They'd just entered the Temple of Sha'naar tunnel and lit into the first Demon they found. But there were also dogs, and warlock casters and they swarmed over Fist and Thor. Young Thor, unused to such ferocity, got separated from her. Fist fought wildly, killing everything around her while her health dropped below half. Desperate, she slew the last one and charged up to engage the demon Thor still fought. She made a fatal rookie mistake by trying to pull off and kill the demon on Thor instead of healing Thor first. The mountainous Thor groaned and toppled, dead at her feet. Fist slit the demons throat.

Fist learned more than one lesson. Thor should never have left Fist's side, but since it happened, Fist should have closed in so Thor could reconnect. They are much better as a team. Lesson #2 is DON'T FORGET YOUR SAVE ME SPELLS. She had two she could have used on Thor. Lesson #3 drew a crazed grin from Fist. Her DPS rang up close to 16k even against some lethal (though still not elite) enemies. Lesson #4 - Her health bar swung pretty far toward death more than once. The dance Fist has to play as a Brewmaster is a deadly one.

During the period Fist and Thor were working, she did some experimenting with the Brewmaster's primary taunt ability, the Black Ox Statue. It's like a totem. You set it down and it immediately begins taunting everything within a thirty yard circle around the statue.

Fist first tried it on a family of boars just outside the walls of Vol'mar. The effect was amazing. Not only did every boar in range immediately stampede to the statue, birds flying through the zone also zeroed in on it. If left in place the full fifteen minutes, I suspect that worms under the soil would come wriggling out as well.

Of course, unless there are healers supporting you, summoning the statue needs a few rules. First, don't be standing next to it when you set it down, because you then become ground zero for every mob in range. When soloing, Fist learned that the best approach is to set the statue down a good distance away. Then move in and pull mobs in smaller groups, kill them, lure in some more, rinse and repeat. With the statue active, Fist gets additional defensive spells such as Guard and Elusive Brew to help keep Fist alive. It's all still pretty strange, and she needs a lot more practice. Even more strange is that there are cases where the statue itself moves on it's own, depending on what is going on. Fist has not experienced that yet.

Fist picked up a new weapon as additional protection (not to diss Vivianne, but she can't do the things Thor can). Fist dropped her dual blades (i630 and i609) and added a two-hand staff (i675). Overall, her gear is now i643.

Also, here is some early data on the breakdown of spells being used:

Iron Harbor - the two of them (Thor is still with her here, no statue) reached 18k dps and managed to stay alive. However, they did take on one of the big Gronns, and though it was non-elite it probably would have killed them if another player hadn't helped out on the kill.
So far her damage is spread out pretty evenly, though that may be because I'm just going with whatever attack is available to me.

#1 Touch of Death, 23.7% (this is the kill spell when a mob is under 35% health)
#2 Keg Smash, 21.7% (this is the AOE spell)
#3 Melee, 19.2% (she seems to know how to use those dual blades)
#4 Tiger Palm, 11.0% (my usual starting attack after pulling with Crackling Jade Lightning)
I like using Breath of Fire (its a DoT), but it barely made the list with only 1.2%  and it consumers two chi. I need to retire that one.

I'll put out another report next go around.

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