Epic Challenge Farmer (21 drow pure wizard) [Archive]

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EllisDee37

01-09-2014, 07:00 PM

This is a first life drow pure wizard who stays level 21 forever. If you want an iconic version, morninglord is the way to go. You'll be stuck with a cleric level unless you burn an LR+1 heart, which doesn't amount to much except a loss of +2 int from the wizard capstone. You'll be fine without the capstone, so feel free to roll this up quickly as a sun elf and call it good enough.

Epic cannith challenges require level 21 to enter, so level 21 is the lowest level you can be. The lower the better, since you can then get a higher bonus for running underlevel. Unlike my heroic-level monk challenge farmer, this one is also used for eveningstar mats. The one key feature of eveningstar challenges is that you really want a good dancing ball caster, which made wizard the natural choice.

This wizard is pretty evenly specced for instakills, enchantment, and dps via acid, cold, fire and electricity. The primary dps is from acid, specifically from energy burst. The idea is to run around in draconic, nuking everything and their brother with energy burst and dragon breath, plus the insta-kill ability of pale masters. Three dots for bosses, plus firewall for pretty much everything in the disruptor.

My regular wizard doesn't bother with the skeletal knight line because pets are generally pretty poor in high level quests. Challenges, however, are easier than quests in terms of mob strength and the pet acquits itself quite well. It's also nice to leave the pet guarding the foreman while you do other things, giving you more leeway on how quickly you have to respond to incomings.

True Neutral is ideal to use superior stability items for saves while leveling. Gender doesn't matter.

The only tomes I used are a +2 con from 1750 favor and +5 int from Mabar. After farming out 7.5 million xp I realized that I'd been running around with medium encumberance the whole time, so I might grab a strength tome for this guy. At very least I'm going to start casting Bull's Strength as one of my standard buffs until I slot a strength augment.

Epic Challenge Farmer
Wizard 20, Epic 1
True Neutral Drow

Stats
. . . . . . . .28pt. . .Level Up
. . . . . . . .----. . .--------
Strength. . . . 10 . . . 4: INT
Dexterity . . . 10 . . . 8: INT
Constitution. . 14 . . .12: INT
Intelligence. . 20 . . .16: INT
Wisdom. . . . . .8 . . .20: INT
Charisma. . . . 10 . . .

Skills
. . . . . 1 .2. 3 .4. 5 .6. 7 .8. 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20
. . . . .------------------------------------------------------------
Concent . 4 .1. 1 .1. 1 .1. 1 .1. 1 .1. 1 .1. 1 .1. 1 .1. 1 .1. 1 .1. 23
Spellcr . 4 .1. 1 .1. 1 .1. 1 .1. 1 .1. 1 .1. 1 .1. 1 .1. 1 .1. 1 .1. 23
Repair. . 4 .1. 1 .1. 1 .1. 1 . . . . . . . . . . . . .3. 1 .3. 1 .3. 21
Heal. . . 1 .1. . .1. . .1. . .1. . .1. . .1. . .1. . .1. . .1. . .1. 11
Balance . 2 . . 1 . . 1 . . 1 . . 1 . . 1 . . 1 . . 1 . . 1 . . 1 . . 11
Jump. . . 1 . . . . . . . . . .1. 1 .1. 1 .1. 1 .1. 1 . . 1 . . 1 . . 11
Haggle. . 2 . . 1 . . 1 . . 1 . . 1 . . 1 . . 1 . . 1 . . 1 . . 1 . . 11
UMD . . . 1 .1. . .1. . .1. . .1. . .1. . .1. . .1. . .1. . .1. . .1. 11
Tumble. . 1 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .1
. . . . .------------------------------------------------------------
. . . . .28 .7. 7 .7. 7 .7. 7 .8. 8 .8. 8 .8. 8 .8. 8 .9. 9 .9. 9 .9

Feats

.1. . . . : Insightful Reflexes
.1 Wizard : Spell Focus: Enchantment
.3. . . . : Empower Spell
.5 Wizard : Extend Spell
.6. . . . : Heighten Spell
.9. . . . : Maximize Spell
10 Wizard : Spell Focus: Necromancy
12. . . . : Spell Penetration
15. . . . : Greater Spell Focus: Necromancy
15 Wizard : Quicken Spell
18. . . . : Greater Spell Penetration
20 Wizard : Mental Toughness
21 Epic . : Epic Spell Penetration

Spells

Nightshield, Jump, Sonic Blast, <Any>, <Any>
Knock, Resist Energy, Invisibility, Blur, Web
Displacement, Haste, Rage, Fireball, Lightning Bolt
Death Aura, Negative Energy Burst, Dimension Door, Acid Rain, Ice Storm
Niac's Biting Cold, Eladar's Electric Surge, Teleport, Cone of Cold, Hold Monster
Necrotic Ray, Greater Heroism, True Seeing, Undeath to Death, Disintegrate
Finger of Death, Otto's Sphere of Dancing, Banishment, <Any>, <Any>
Black Dragon Bolt, Polar Ray, <Any>, <Any>, <Any>
Wail of the Banshee, Mass Hold Monster, Dominate Monster, <Any>, <Any>

Enhancements (80 AP)

Pale Master (41 AP)
Dark Reaping, Zombie Form, Vampire Form, Wraith Form, Lich Form, Master of Death
Spell Critical, Skeletal Knight III, Negative Energy Conduit II
Efficient Maximize III, Spell Critical, Corpsecrafter III
Eternal Servitude III, Intelligence
Dark Furor III, Intelligence
Necromantic Focus, Improved Shrouding

Archmage (30 AP)
Chill Touch, Command Undead, Halt Undead, Enervation
Energy of the Scholar II, Spell Critical
Efficient Empower III, Spell Critical
Spell Critical, Intelligence
Efficient Heighten II, School Mastery: Necromancy, Intelligence

Drow (9 AP)
Spell Resistance, Intelligence, Spell Resistance II, Intelligence
<none>
Enchantment Lore III

Destiny (24 AP)

Draconic Incarnation
Energy Sheath: Fire III, Intelligence
Out with bang: Acid III, Intelligence
Dragon Heritage: Black I, Piercing Spellcraft II, Intelligence
Energy Burst: Acid III, Secondary Specialty: White I, Spell Knowledge I
Flyby Attack, Dragon Breath
Energy Vortex: Acid

Twists of Fate (8 fate points)
School Specialist: Necromancy (Tier 2 Magister)
Boulder Toss (Tier 1 Fury)
Endless Faith (Tier 1 Exalted)

One thing I can confidently say without reservation: drow wizards are super squishy. I was under 300 HP at level 17! The build ends up with low/mid-400s at 21, which is still a bit squishy but acceptable for challenges.

The archmage school is conjuration for the early levels to take advantage of free heighten on webs. As soon as you get dancing ball and finger of death you switch the school to necromancy for the cheap enervation sla and extra +1 necromancy DC.

I use the keyboard for combat (as can be seen in the linked videos downthread) so I have a limited amount of hotkeys I can fit within easy reach. Here's the main functions I have at my fingertips:

Shrine Buffs: Jump, Nightshield, True Seeing, Greater Heroism
Short-term Buffs: Displacement, Haste, Rage, Death Aura
Rays: Necrotic Ray, Polar Ray, Boulder Toss, Lightning Bolt
DoTs: Niac's Biting Cold, Eladar's Electric Surge, Black Dragon Bolt
AoEs: Energy Burst, Energy Vortex, Dragon Breath, Acid Rain, either Firewall or Ice Storm
Debuffs: Enervation SLA
Instakill: Finger of Death, Wail of the Banshee, Undeath to Death, Banishment
Crowd Control: Mass Hold Monster, Otto's Sphere of Dancing, Dominate Monster
Healing: Negative Energy Burst

I only use dominate monster for sunset ritual, specifically to dominate the wolves. (Not the werewolves.) While I do keep disintegrate hotkeyed, I only use it in shroud for crystal duty. Fireball is only for questing, unmeta'd, for breaking down doors. I never use delayed blast fireball or meteor swarm, instead preferring to stack firewall and acid rain on top of each other.

Mainly I just instakill, boulder toss and energy burst, plus a healthy dose of necrotic ray. Everything else is gravy.

I generally don't use quicken except for dancing ball. Or in the rare boss fight where concentration checks fail. Because my spells aren't quickened, during boss fights I have gravitated to a pretty basic rotation:

Niac's, Eladar's, BDB, Necrotic Ray, Boulder Toss, Necrotic Ray
Niac's, Eladar's, BDB, Necrotic Ray, Polar Ray, Necrotic Ray
...repeat as necessary...

This sequence is pretty well sync'ed up in terms of animation speed and cooldown timers. A decent example of this sequence can be seen here (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LGJne7hv8Ec&t=6m26s). Substitute polar ray for boulder toss if you don't twist it in.

EllisDee37

01-09-2014, 07:11 PM

My primary goal for gear was ease of acquisition. As it turns out, the easiest to acquire gear is amazingly powerful when you limit yourself to gear that's ML21 and under. Mainly it's named items from the expansion packs. Here's the breakdown:

Head: Darkstorm Helm
Eyes: Sage's Spectacles
Neck: War Wizard's Amulet
Back: Guardian's Cloak
Wrist: War Wizard's Bracers
Hand: Guardian's Gauntlets
Waist: Guardian's Girdle
Feet: Epic Rock Boots (Tier 3) (Necro Focus I, open)
Ring1: Crafted: Feather Falling of Good Luck +2 (Striding 30%, Vitality +20)
Ring2: Crafted: Enchantment Focus II of Moderate Fortification (Enchant Focus I, Excpt Int +1)
Trinket: Crafted: Efficient Maximize II of Kinetic Lore V
Body: War Wizard's Robe
Mainhand: Staff of the Necromancer

The rings are essentially open spots. I finally settled on the pair of crafted rings listed above, but for a while I was really targeting:

Ring1: Epic Elemental Essence (Enchant Focus I)
Ring2: ToD ring with Excpt Int +1 (Insightful Int +2)

I set up the crafted rings to be easy swaps for them if I ever happen to get either or both. Also note that if you epic the darkstorm helm you get another green slot to work with. As for the unused colorless on the boots, I've been using Master's Gift while farming up destiny xp. Once that's all finished I'm swapping it to Strength +6.

It's worth pointing out that enchantment is rarely used in any challenges outside of sunset ritual, so it's easy to drop enchantment focus items altogether and just swap in Sage's Mantle for that one challenge. I spent a ring on enchantment for destiny farming, which is where my guy is now.

Also, as you may have guessed, feather falling, striding and good luck are basically throw-away effects, easily discarded if you get a better ring or don't have the crafting levels. (Putting a flexible lore on the rings is an idea I toyed with for a while.)

Swaps

+5 Heavy Spiritcraft Shield of Hammerblock III (Spell Agility 15)
ML21 Glaciation of Ice Lore scepter (Impulse 90)
Pale Rod

Epic Cloak of Flames (for disruptor only)
Sage's Mantle (for sunset ritual only)

Cunning Trinket (shrine swap)
Charismatic +6 Boots of Haggling +13 w/guild augment: SP (shrine swap)

The guild augment boots are the perfect place to slot FF if you go another direction with the rings, especially if you don't have the crafting levels to make flexible charisma shards.

The shield is for boss fights. I settled for an ML20 version of the ice lore staff and called it good enough.

Weaponsets

MH: Staff of the Necromancer

For trash. Pretty much equipped at all times.

MH: Glaciation of Ice Lore (Impulse +90)
OH: +5 Heavy Spiritcraft Shield of Hammerblock III (Spell Agility 15)

For bosses. You get your full dot spell power with the glaciation, max force for boulder toss, and a 0% asf shield (thanks to the augment) for shield blocking. This is especially effective for Devashta, but really any boss that melees you. The crafted hammerblock complements the axeblock and spearblock on the Guardian's Cloak, all of which stack with the DR you get from active blocking. You can stand toe to toe with Devashta on CR25 challenges with this.

The scepter can either have glaciation or impulse; simply slot the one it doesn't have in the red slot. The ice lore is key, though, because if/when you get boulder toss you'll want kinetic lore "always equipped" on your trinket. I find that I don't cast polar ray enough to warrant putting ice lore on my trinket, and whenever I dot something I switch to the shield weaponset for increased cold spell power from the scepter anyway.

MH: Pale Rod
OH: +5 Heavy Spiritcraft Shield of Hammerblock III (Spell Agility 15)

For priestesses, who just love casting divine punishment. May occasionally be useful in lava caves if the clerics get their DW up before you can finger them.

EllisDee37

01-09-2014, 07:11 PM

Here are the stats assuming the above listed gear, followed by the detailed breakdowns:

56 Intelligence
53 Necromancy DC
49 Enchantment DC
39 Spell Penetration

435 Hit Points
3184 Spell Points

20 base
5 levelups
8 enhancements (2 drow, 2 AM, 2 PM, 2 capstone)
4 lich
8 item
1 exceptional
3 destiny
5 tome (mabar)
2 ship
---
56 intelligence (23 mod)

10 base
9 heighten
23 int
---
42 base DC for all schools (43 when you factor in Spell Mastery from the War Wizard set)

42 base
2 feats
1 lich
1 archmage
3 item
1 augment
3 twist
---
53 necro DC

42 base
1 feat
1 ship
3 item
1 augment
1 drow
---
49 enchant DC (when wearing Sage's Mantle)

20 base
8 feats
5 destiny autogrants
2 destiny
4 staff of the necromancer
---
39 spell penetration

1205 wizard
805 int (caster level + 9) * int mod = (20 +5 destiny +1 staff + 9) * 23 = 35 * 23 = 805
105 Mental Toughness
200 archmagi
150 elemental
300 destiny
50 cunning trinket
80 large guild augment
----
2895
289 endless faith
----
3184 spell points

14 base
8 item
4 lich
2 tome (1750 favor)
2 ship
---
30 con (10 mod)

45 heroic durability
80 wizard
210 con
10 epic
10 draconic vitality
40 false life
20 vitality
20 elemental
---
435 hit points

EllisDee37

01-09-2014, 08:18 PM

Grinding out the twists I wanted on this was brutal. For the first few days I played around trying to identify the easiest, most reliable xp I could get doing any given quest only once. Once I came up with a list I spent the next week fine-tuning the order and all the little tricks and tips to speed things along. The last few days were a brutal slog as I limped to the finish line, 7.5 million xp later. And while I do now (finally) have all my twists done, I still need another 700k or so to max out draconic and officially call it finished. Oofa.

The daily run ended up being ~2.5 hours and ~530k xp. This included a 4% ship buff, 5% pots you can buy from cannith challenges, and no epic tome at all. Better shrine/pots/tome will increase the total.

Things to keep in mind: This build caps at 21, meaning it can't enter the higher level epics (ie: can't complete any epic sagas) and it can't pick up level 23/24 rogue hires to hit 80 open lock. That means no Death Undone and no hidden chest in Trial By Fury. Also, as an insta-kill build EN is much faster than EH since you can finger/wail orange-names on EN as you sprint past them.

All quests are done on Epic Normal, and aside from VON3 and DA every single quest is 8 minutes or less for a completion. Regardless of which destiny I had active and what twists I did or did not have, apart from VON3 and Devil Assault I never used a single shrine in any quest.

Ship Buff #1 (~45 minutes, ~200k xp)
Put up LFM for "EN VON3 then EN DA" as you buff, then hop in VON3. Usually you'll fill before you make it to the end of the prequest, but starting the quest proper solo and letting it fill as IP works fine.
VON3
...DDoor out, collect end reward and teleport to portable hole to sell/repair and drop down into market. You only need 1 person from the VON3 group to stick around for Devil Assault, and you only need that one person so you're not dealing with Baktor all by yourself. When soloing, his teleporting makes him untargetable apart from acid rain and ice storm, which take forever.
Devil Assault
...drop group on exit, turn left and run to searing heights, which is right there. I went solo for all remaining quests in all three lists except for sometimes duoing with a competent guildie. The next list of quests is greatly slowed down by people getting lost in Trial By Fury.
Bargain of Blood (Video (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gBTK6FrL1yo))
...Teleport to House D, turn in and re-acquire BoB, run to airship to sell/repair and rebuff.

Ship Buff #2 (~60 minutes, ~200k xp)
Lords of Dust
...worth using Pendant of Time on exit, collect end reward and run to MotU cavern. Note that Undeath to Death is very handy to have slotted for this quest.
House of Rusted Blades
...grab end chest then teleport to Harbor, run back to MotU cavern
Trial By Fury (Video (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oOXnENDxP3g))
...DDoor to exit, haste then run to...
Deal and the Demon
...ransack is worth getting. On completion, use Key to Eveningstar, run NE to tavern to sell/repair, then continue further NE to Druid's Deep area.
The Druid's Curse (Video (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tBrrKvgoADk))
...this is essentially a 7-minute full sprint. Slot Merfolk's just for this. Finish out (DDoor doesn't help), collect end reward for this and acquire Outbreak.
Outbreak (Video (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3d5FdpyTN2M))
...only like 15k but with DDoor and instakills this is like a 2 minute quest. DDoor out and head to King's Forest.
Impossible Demands
...I've never been able to bug her out to prevent her from going through the first door, so I just run in right after her, catch her attention, kill the drow in the room and release the 3 prisoners. After she eats all 3 I then DPS her down. Probably like 2 minutes all told. Run to exit and head south. So very far south...
Unquiet Graves
...this is the end of the slog, and it usually completes with 1-3 minutes left of the ship buffs. Typically I'll DDoor to exit and recall to Eveningstar, turn in and re-acquire Impossible Demands and Unquiet Graves for the next day's runs, turn in Outbreak, then teleport to House P and hop on the ship and go for a smoke.

Ship Buff #3 (~40 minutes, ~130k xp)
Have ship navigator send you to Menechtauran.
Offering of Blood (Video (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D640ouNx4Eo))
...after completion, Greater Teleport back to Zawabi's Refuge, turn in and re-acquire OOB then teleport to House Phiarlan.
Snitch (Video (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LGJne7hv8Ec))
...I don't invis this, but I also don't engage or kill a single mob after that first room until after I turn the valve that lets you up to the box-monster construct. After that valve I run back a few steps to gather the rats and gargoyles into a group and acid rain them all. After completion, turn in, use Pendant of Time and run NE.
Under the Big Top (Video (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HuqPGQy_M-I))
...this is a weird quest. Invisible keeps you from aggroing anything, and turning the wheels does NOT break invisible. You literally go invis, run to the 5 required wheels, then run straight to the end fight without engaging a single trash mob. After completion DDoor to exit, collect end reward and use the House P teleporter to go to House K, drop down and head to Red Fens.
Fathom the Depths (Video (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2zNRg97R-3c))
...old-school invisozerg, where you re-invisible after pulling each lever/valve. If you're quick enough you don't have to engage a single mob until right before the end fight. Be sure to cast DDoor before pulling the lever that floods the area. After DDooring, turn directly around in mid-air, cast invis and head east to end fight. Kill all trash mobs at the last lever after opening the last gate. Finish out (DDoor doesn't help), cast jump on yourself, then jump off the SW corner of the pyramid, the topmost level next to the shrine. Float all the way down to the SW corner of the map.
Claw of Vulkoor (Video (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3gyzZAhpX2E))
...I had great success using a single enervation SLA followed by a quick FoD on all the guardians. Seems to work pretty reliably. On completion, DDoor to exit, recall to House K and reenter to collect both end rewards. Teleport to House Phiarlan and go back to ship; you're all done until tomorrow.

Being epic normal runs, don't expect much valor. All told I ended up with around 1500 valor and a million plat from vendor trash farming out my 7.5 million destiny xp. I also pulled three planar focus and a handful of AH-worthy trash.

Here are my Big Top notes:

UNDER THE BIG TOP
Gate 1:
...Straight: Blue = Yellow X
Gate 2:
...First left: Green = White Triangle
...Back to first right: Yellow = Red Diamond
Gate 3:
...Through arch, right twice: Orange = Green Circle
...Back to arch, left twice: Purple = Yellow Square

For the third gate, the wheel locations are randomized. The orange wheel will be on the right side, either right there just past the arch (though that one is usually red) or along the right path. The purple wheel will be on the left side, where the gate to continue forward is. When you go "back to arch, left twice" the second left is right before an arch. Don't go through that arch. After taking that left, the purple wheel will either be straight ahead at the gate or on a side path that fades a little to the right.

Stoner81

01-20-2014, 12:20 PM

Nice one buddy you finally got it sorted out, I am going to have to TR one of my toons in to this or something since I have no character slots left.

Stoner81.

LiquidZombie

01-23-2014, 05:27 AM

Excuse the n00b questions, but my main character is a first life human PM who has just reached level 20 so I am interested in this build and the strategies it might use even though I don't plan to be farming challenges specifically.

Three dots for bosses, plus firewall for pretty much everything in the disruptor.

What are the three DoTs? Niacs, Eladars and ???? Are you counting the Energy Vortex ability from Draconic?

Challenges, however, are easier than quests in terms of mob strength and the pet acquits itself quite well.

Really? I tried a couple of the arena-based challenges at level and found them much more difficult than regular quests, as I quickly became overwhelmed with spawning mobs including multiple orange-named. Admittedly I suck, but I can't imagine being able to do this while significantly under-level.

Dragon Heritage I (acid)
Dragon Spell Knowledge I (acid)

Are you only taking one rank in those because of insufficient EDP points? They seem like abilities that are worth maxing out otherwise.

Vellrad

01-23-2014, 05:53 AM

E

What are the three DoTs? Niacs, Eladars and ???? Are you counting the Energy Vortex ability from Draconic?

Black dragon bolt.

EllisDee37

01-23-2014, 06:43 AM

Really? I tried a couple of the arena-based challenges at level and found them much more difficult than regular quests, as I quickly became overwhelmed with spawning mobs including multiple orange-named. Admittedly I suck, but I can't imagine being able to do this while significantly under-level.Being overwhelmed by mobs is where this build shines. Lay down an ice storm and acid rain and then shield block, or just do an energy burst to clear it all out in one shot. I expect to be able to easily handle arena challenges at CR25 but haven't verified so. If I have problems with it I'll post back to let you know.

Are you only taking one rank in those because of insufficient EDP points? They seem like abilities that are worth maxing out otherwise.I'll likely switch those around. I just put a theory-crafted ED breakdown in there because I've never used draconic before. Now that I finally got my twists all set (Necro specialization, boulder toss, endless faith) I can finish maxing out draconic. Once I do I'll figure out what I like best and update the ED section of the build accordingly.

EDIT: And yes, black dragon bolt is the third dot.

EllisDee37

01-23-2014, 07:56 AM

I added my destiny farming notes.

LiquidZombie

01-23-2014, 09:37 AM

Being overwhelmed by mobs is where this build shines. Lay down an ice storm and acid rain and then shield block, or just do an energy burst to clear it all out in one shot.

I'll try this. With my PM aura going I think it is unlikely I (or my skeleton) would actually die in this situation, it's just a question of whether the SP pool will hold out for long enough.

EDIT: And yes, black dragon bolt is the third dot.

That makes sense. I wasn't sure if BDB was considered a DoT for bosses since it lacks the long-term stacking behaviour of the other two, but it certainly does a good amount of damage for its cost if you chain-cast it.

I added my destiny farming notes.

Thanks, that perfectly answers my next question which was going to be "How the hell do you manage to get enough XP to obtain all those different abilities in more than one tree". It looks like I will need to buy some more content and learn the quests, but at least I now know where to start.

Ancient

01-23-2014, 10:51 AM

I added my destiny farming notes.

Those farming notes are nice enough to deserve a post devoted to that topic. Thank you!

Just one curious question, how would you rate this against a shiradi pew pew build? You tend to min/max, (as do I), so I don't expect it to be a flavor thing... You generally have reasons for why you take the approach you do. I would love to hear it.

EllisDee37

01-23-2014, 03:33 PM

Those farming notes are nice enough to deserve a post devoted to that topic. Thank you!I might post one for general purposes, but I'm not entirely sure yet. Maybe next month when I finally get back to my real characters. (I've been working on both challenge farmers since the beginning of December.)

The guide posted upthread is more specific to this particular build than you might think. Any normal character would include Death Undone as soon as you hit 23 and could use a rogue hire, which means that whole second shrine quest sequence would have to change because you'd lose your ship buffs before you even got to Unquiet Graves.

Also, once you take 26 you can no longer run BoB, Snitch or Big top on EN for full xp. Thinking about them I doubt it matters; I can't think of any orange names in any of them. (Compared to, say, Druid's Curse which is chock full of them.) Running them on EH lets you get full xp through level 27. Also, the EN/EH distinction only matters for insta-kill casters (due to orange names being immune to insta-kill on EH) so the next character I plan to TR (my paladin, who needs 3 million karma) will likely run everything on EH for better valor.

Just one curious question, how would you rate this against a shiradi pew pew build? You tend to min/max, (as do I), so I don't expect it to be a flavor thing... You generally have reasons for why you take the approach you do. I would love to hear it.To be honest it never occured to me to do a shirardi challenge farmer. That probably would have been a better choice for me personally because I already have a DC caster and I do not have a shirardi caster. So it would have added some variety. And it certainly wouldn't need to worry about running out of mana in 20-minute no-shrine challenges. (This build won't either; energy burst does most of the killing.)

The only real downside to a shirardi caster is that you kind of really want energy burst for challenges, and it's expensive to twist in. All three of my twists combined cost 8 fate points, compared to 10 for energy burst alone. In CR25 challenges energy burst is old-school wail with no-fail DC that also works on constructs and undead. You really can't beat it.

EDIT: I will say this, though: That competent guildie who joined me in the full circuit maybe a half dozen times was a shirardi caster, and he was great, but for some reason he had to shrine a lot. Especially in something like OOB. I think it was because he spammed meteor swarm a lot.

EllisDee37

01-23-2014, 03:46 PM

Squeak just posted Lama release notes (link (https://www.ddo.com/forums/showthread.php/376774)) which include quest xp changes. Here's the relevant ones in terms of the destiny farming guide posted upthread:

The Jungle of Khyber
* Previous Base XP on Epic Normal: 42,693
* New Base XP on Epic Normal: 23,299

Ouch!

Trial By Fury
* Previous Base XP on Epic Normal: 16,336
* New Base XP on Epic Normal: 25,692

Outbreak
* Previous Base XP on Epic Normal: 10,151
* New Base XP on Epic Normal: 13,085

The Druid's Curse
* Previous Base XP on Epic Normal: 17,005
* New Base XP on Epic Normal: 21,206

The House of Death Undone
* Previous Base XP on Epic Normal: 13,243
* New Base XP on Epic Normal: 14,500

Nice!

Death Undone isn't part of it but would be if I went past level 21.

EDIT: Moving the crafting hall teleport destination from house K to house C hurts, though.

Ancient

01-23-2014, 06:56 PM

The only real downside to a shirardi caster is that you kind of really want energy burst for challenges, and it's expensive to twist in. All three of my twists combined cost 8 fate points, compared to 10 for energy burst alone. In CR25 challenges energy burst is old-school wail with no-fail DC that also works on constructs and undead. You really can't beat it.
I agree 100% on energy burst. My shiradi has settled on the twists of energy burst, boulder toss and unearthly reactions. Combined with arcane supremacy, that is some crazy good spike dps.

I don't know what to tell you about the guy running out of mana.

Thanks for the insight!

EllisDee37

01-24-2014, 02:36 AM

I agree 100% on energy burst. My shiradi has settled on the twists of energy burst, boulder toss and unearthly reactions. Combined with arcane supremacy, that is some crazy good spike dps.Yep. I remember now my original train of thought when first designing this build, before rolling it up at all:

"Want dball for Sunset Ritual, so has to be wizard."
"Simple to acquire gear; commendation set a given, should check out the shadowfell auto-drop loot."
"Energy Burst a must. Super annoying to twist in, so...hello, Draconic!"

heh.

Regarding twists specifically my goal was to have the build work pretty much fine with no twists at all, then an easy magister twist for +3 dc as a nice perk for little effort. Then the crazies could go nuts twisting in boulder toss and endless faith if they really wanted to perfect it. (I turned out to be one of those crazies.) Twisting in energy burst was never even a consideration due to the excessive grind.

nibel

01-24-2014, 06:39 PM

Just thinking with myself, if all you need to finish twists are 8 fate points, it might be possible to reduce the grind by buying two Keys of Destiny to skip LD and GMOF, and still end with with enough fate points to get your twists.

8 fate points = requires 24 ED levels.

Mandatory:

5 Draconic
3 Magister (7 AP required for <school> specialist, grind up to next level)
4 Fatesinger (Alternativelly, can key off Fatesinger, and use this for LD/GMoF)
3 Shadowdancer
3 Sentinel
3 Shiradi
2 Exalted (9 AP required for Endless Faith)
1 Fury (3 AP for Boulder, grind up to next level)
===
24

Stoner81

01-27-2014, 01:12 PM

Hey m8 could you do a complete spell breakdown too please? By this I mean what spells you have slotted once you reach level 20.

Thanks!

Stoner81.

EllisDee37

01-27-2014, 02:11 PM

I added video for a bunch of those destiny farm runs. I'm not much of a zerger but they should give an idea of how to get fast completions. (To clarify, the videos are definitely of me zerging, which I don't normally do.)

I was originally only going to do one for Trial By Fury to show the fast no-killing path, but they're all so short I figured what the heck. With the videos done it appears that Snitch isn't worth it in terms of xp/minute, which is unfortunate because I kind of like it. Also, I hear reports that Spies in the House is a good destiny farm, though it's too late for me now since I'm (finally!) all done.

In the last videos I did I was back in Draconic but made a point not to use energy burst. I did use Boulder Toss, albeit sparingly, but since that was my first twist I ended up doing the last 3 million or so xp with boulder toss.

Hey m8 could you do a complete spell breakdown too please? By this I mean what spells you have slotted once you reach level 20.Sure, no problem. Maybe later today.

EllisDee37

01-27-2014, 05:02 PM

Hey m8 could you do a complete spell breakdown too please? By this I mean what spells you have slotted once you reach level 20.I edited a spell breakdown into the OP. I don't really cast the way most casters do; I see others do a lot more aoe attacks like meteor swarm or delayed blast fireball. I'm more of a ray guy.

whereispowderedsilve

01-27-2014, 06:08 PM

ray guy.

http://l2.yimg.com/bt/api/res/1.2/vwjOJ6XEgXkpXU2FPkkzMQ--/YXBwaWQ9eW5ld3M7cT04NTt3PTQxMA--/http://l.yimg.com/os/388/2012/11/15/Ray-Guy-USPstoryAl-Davis-jpg_021458.jpg

Haha, I couldn't help myself! I'm a HUGE Raiders fan! Hehe!

Keep up the great work Ellis! Looks really awesome! +1!

EllisDee37

01-27-2014, 06:35 PM

http://l2.yimg.com/bt/api/res/1.2/vwjOJ6XEgXkpXU2FPkkzMQ--/YXBwaWQ9eW5ld3M7cT04NTt3PTQxMA--/http://l.yimg.com/os/388/2012/11/15/Ray-Guy-USPstoryAl-Davis-jpg_021458.jpg

Haha, I couldn't help myself! I'm a HUGE Raiders fan! Hehe!

Keep up the great work Ellis! Looks really awesome! +1!I considered capitalizing the "name" but I thought an NFL reference might be too subtle for the D&D crowd. hehheh.

whereispowderedsilve

01-27-2014, 07:06 PM

I considered capitalizing the "name" but I thought an NFL reference might be too subtle for the D&D crowd. hehheh.

LOL! Nice! Heh.

By the way, if/when you have some spare time/energy if you could please consider helping me out, giving me some feed back on 32 pt PDK Iconic 11 bard 2 rogue 2 fighter bard build here:

https://www.ddo.com/forums/showthread.php/434584-Possible-Challenge-Farmer-concept-build-feats-need-fixing-though-help-plox-)?p=5229769&viewfull=1#post5229769

It would be greatly appreciated! Thanks a bunch! :P! :)! :D! Cheers!

LiquidZombie

01-28-2014, 04:13 PM

Saekee

01-28-2014, 04:50 PM

EllisDee does the DDoor work on the Colossal Crystal transporting kobold? Otherwise this is a brilliant idea. I am usually running challenges with melees.
Another option is to use a character with strong ranged sneak attack, like a mechanic, since for many of the challenges you do not have aggro. A mechanic would struggle in Rushmore and Disruptor, though.

EllisDee37

01-28-2014, 07:36 PM

I was going to ask why you didn't usually cast blur but having seen the videos I assume that this is simply because you are in and out so quickly that displacement never wears off anyway.Displacement lasts 5:00 or so; I keep it up 24/7. I keep blur slotted for the colossal carrier.

I am curious about what you use Mordenkainen's Disjunction for however.Spell wards while questing, so I should probably put that in parentheses. After I had finished the off-destinies and went back to draconic, I leveled the last 800k through actual questing instead of zerg farming. For that I used mordenkainen's on the spell wards.

EllisDee does the DDoor work on the Colossal Crystal transporting kobold?Sadly no. Only a teleporter in a circle can port the colossal carrier back.

By the way, if/when you have some spare time/energy if you could please consider helping me out, giving me some feed back on 32 pt PDK Iconic 11 bard 2 rogue 2 fighter bard build here:I don't really know bards so can't offer much feedback on that build. My initial reaction is that I like it.

Stoner81

01-29-2014, 06:26 AM

Thanks for the spell breakdown m8 :) pretty new to Wizards only ever run one and he was awful so hopefully this build will help get to grips with the class more and stuff as well fill 2 or 3 roles I could do with too :)

Stoner81.

Stoner81

03-19-2014, 02:19 PM

Hey buddy been looking over this again since one of my toons is close to 20 and going to be TR'd in to this build so with that said I have a couple of questions:

My ECF will be a 34pt build effectively since it's being TR'd so where would recommend spending the extra points?
In your gear slots you say the rings are pretty flexible and I was wondering if a Greensteel item could help such as a Con-Op one maybe?
Upon reaching 20 would it be worth using the +20 heart I still have to switch to Wizard for the past life to help with the next one since it will be wizard?

Thanks m8 :)

Stoner81.

EllisDee37

03-19-2014, 10:54 PM

In your gear slots you say the rings are pretty flexible and I was wondering if a Greensteel item could help such as a Con-Op one maybe?You can't make greensteel rings, and every other accessory in the listed gearset is a named item that serves a specific function. I specifically designed the gear to be easy to acquire, mainly because a truly optimized version will include multiple scroll/seal/shard epic items. (Possibly a complete 5-piece epic abishai set. Ha!)

Because I went for easy to acquire instead of optimized, there is no greensteel but that loss is mitigated by the War Wizard's set giving most of the HP/SP bonus of greensteel items.

Upon reaching 20 would it be worth using the +20 heart I still have to switch to Wizard for the past life to help with the next one since it will be wizard?If it were me I'd just use the +20 to turn it into an epic challenge farmer and skip TRing altogether.

Unless, of course, you're already past level 21, or aren't a drow or sun elf, in which case I'd tr into a morninglord and use the heart to remove the first cleric level. Then you'll already be level 15 and only a hop, skip and jump away from getting back to 21.

There's no particular need for the wizard past life feat, though it of course would help. Ideally I'd drop Mental Toughness to fit it in, but that would require significant reshuffling in the feat order.

peng

03-20-2014, 12:32 AM

Since you're farming so much epic xp for twists, would it make sense to level up to 28 and etr, then level back up to 21? If so, which epic past life would you go for?

Level 6: Necrotic Ray, Greater Heroism, True Seeing, Undeath to Death, (Disintegrate)

No circle of death?

I used mordenkainen's on the spell wards.

My wizard carries a stack of greater dispel scrolls and alternates casting mord and scrolling greater dispel. Speeds it up a bit and saves some sp.

Stoner81

03-20-2014, 01:07 AM

You can't make greensteel rings, and every other accessory in the listed gearset is a named item that serves a specific function. I specifically designed the gear to be easy to acquire, mainly because a truly optimized version will include multiple scroll/seal/shard epic items. (Possibly a complete 5-piece epic abishai set. Ha!)

Because I went for easy to acquire instead of optimized, there is no greensteel but that loss is mitigated by the War Wizard's set giving most of the HP/SP bonus of greensteel items.

Fair enough I didn't even think of that about not being able to make GS rings *facepalm*.

If it were me I'd just use the +20 to turn it into an epic challenge farmer and skip TRing altogether.

Unless, of course, you're already past level 21, or aren't a drow or sun elf, in which case I'd tr into a morninglord and use the heart to remove the first cleric level. Then you'll already be level 15 and only a hop, skip and jump away from getting back to 21.

There's no particular need for the wizard past life feat, though it of course would help. Ideally I'd drop Mental Toughness to fit it in, but that would require significant reshuffling in the feat order.

Ideally yes this is what I would have done but the problem is that the toon is currently a WF Arti so need to TR to switch to Drow. Doing a TR into a Morninglord could work quite well it will just take forever to get the CoV's together to do the ITR.

Would I really lose that much if it was a WF Pale Master instead of Drow? I know a loss of some INT isn't great but just how bad would it be?

Stoner81.

EllisDee37

03-20-2014, 03:44 AM

Would I really lose that much if it was a WF Pale Master instead of Drow? I know a loss of some INT isn't great but just how bad would it be?When crafting this build I wanted to know what DC I should aim for, so I went into a CR25 lava cave challenge and took off enough DC gear to get down to 50 DC. Then I tossed out around 200 fingers and tracked the saves to determine what necro DC I needed for "fail only on a 1." Here's what I came up with:

<50 Drow Rogue (31 kills, 1 save = 96.88%)
51 Drow Sorcerer (32 kills, 3 saves = 91.43%)
53 Drow Ranger (31 kills, 9 saves = 77.50%)
58 Drow Witch Doctor (20 kills, 16 saves = 55.56%)
58 Wolf (30 kills, 23 saves = 56.60%)

The build as written has a 53 necromancy DC, which seemed acceptable against the above saves. (I probably should have tested the giants, but it was so much quicker to run in, head east, finger that group, recall and reset.)

Going warforged loses you 2 DC, dropping it down from 53 to 51. It's up to you whether 51 is acceptable for the above saves. Much of your killing power comes from draconic anyway, but there is a fair amount of fingering and wailing as well.

Note that a warforged would have to change the gear setup since you can't wear the War Wizard's robe. The primary reason for the war wizard set is the -10% mana cost set bonus. You could substitute the ancient gemstone, but now you're looking at having to slot archmagi and concentration somewhere else, since those are both on the robe but neither are on the docent. (Similar deal with the stone heart, which also requires 375 PDK favor to make it complete the set.)

EDIT: Note that the ranger is perfectly in between two DCs. I rounded their save up when coming up with the total. (77.50% becomes 80%, need 3 more DC to get that to 95%, 50+3=53 DC.)

EllisDee37

03-20-2014, 03:56 AM

Since you're farming so much epic xp for twists, would it make sense to level up to 28 and etr, then level back up to 21? If so, which epic past life would you go for?Would be nice, but all that epic xp is spread out over all four spheres. I don't have anywhere remotely close to 6 million xp in any one sphere. (Closest are the arcane and martial spheres, both of which are a couple hundred thousand shy of 3 million.)

No circle of death?Only because I can't fit it into my hotkey area. I use circle until I get wail, but then ditch it.

My wizard carries a stack of greater dispel scrolls and alternates casting mord and scrolling greater dispel. Speeds it up a bit and saves some sp.That's a good idea. Even ignoring the mana savings, waiting for mord's cooldown is pretty annoyingly slow.

Stoner81

03-20-2014, 09:58 AM

In that case then I will scratch the idea of staying WF and figure out how to sort this out :)

Thanks m8!

Stoner81.

unbongwah

03-20-2014, 12:53 PM

Note that a warforged would have to change the gear setup since you can't wear the War Wizard's robe. The primary reason for the war wizard set is the -10% mana cost set bonus. You could substitute the ancient gemstone, but now you're looking at having to slot archmagi and concentration somewhere else, since those are both on the robe but neither are on the docent.
On a WF caster, I like the Artifice ring (http://ddowiki.com/page/Ring_of_Master_Artifice): SPs, Reconstruction, Repair Lore, Auto-Repair (low proc rate, but hey, free repairs!), Reconstruct clickie for emergencies. Concentration is more of a hassle to replace, though, unless maybe you burn an augment on it; I suppose the Sun Soul belt (http://ddowiki.com/page/Belt_of_the_Sun_Soul) is the easiest swap.

EllisDee37

03-20-2014, 07:08 PM

Stoner81

03-28-2014, 07:02 AM

Just about to TR and was wondering if there is a quick way of going through the lower levels, any bits of gear I should specifically seek (I have a capped toon for farming) that type of thing.

Thanks for all the help :)

Stoner81.

EllisDee37

03-28-2014, 08:27 AM

I mainly used crafted and challenge gear. My monk farmed up frozen tunic, rock boots, cloak of flames and bracers of wind for the epic farmer's leveling. Then I tossed in some basic crafted gear and called it good enough.

Stoner81

03-28-2014, 09:18 AM

Righto then will have a look at the challenge stuff later on then, this is my first time really running a caster so it's pretty new what to find where type of thing:) (just made level 2 :) just another 19 left!)

Stoner81.

Stoner81

04-14-2014, 05:15 AM

Well, ****. Release notes for today's update on lama say that boulder toss is no longer boosted by spell power. That's a significant hit to the fun of this build.

I'll likely switch to the crappy shirardi dagger thing, which is essentially half a boulder toss at multiple targets. Unless that lost spell power too. (Which I doubt.)

Will this affect gear layout at all since having the Kinetic Lore on the trinket would it be worth swapping it to something else instead? I read that the base damage for Boulder Toss was boosted but by how much I have no idea :(

Stoner81.

EllisDee37

04-14-2014, 05:37 AM

I'm withholding judgement until I do some farming first. It appears the next time I will need to farm epic challenges is when I roll up a shuricannon, where cormyrian weapons are attractive.

In the meantime I'm leaving my guy's gear as-is, though I should probably update the thread. (Ice lore goes on the trinket, and the "dot swap" for bosses becomes glaciation and magnetism.)

Stoner81

04-20-2014, 08:58 PM

Woohoo! Finally reached level 20 tonight at long last! :D

Now time to start gearing up and stuff but I'm going to take a look at the gear and see about coming up with a fully optimised gear set (be it hard or easy to acquire) so I best stock up on painkillers because my head is going to hurt again :( oh well part of the fun I guess (fun? I must be mad!).

Stoner81.

Nodoze

08-13-2014, 12:43 PM

EllisDee37

08-13-2014, 06:45 PM

If you we running an all ranged group with no insta-kills, would you avoid any of the above quests?Not really. It's nice in claw to finger the orange-names but by no means required.

Have you decided on any changes to the above list since the XP changes?If you mean the rebalancing a few updates ago, the only changes from that are VON3 went down. All other adjustments were to increase quest xp, and many of the quests that got bumps were on the list. (Trial By Fury in particular was a pleasant surprise.)

I did a slightly modified version for a blitzer that included Don't Drink the Water, but I don't remember all the details. I do remember that I needed to come up with two different quest lists, since the lower level quests stop being blitzable once you get to the level 26+ range.

EDIT: Ah, found the low level version in my notes:

Circuit 1
---------
- Captain to Harbor
- Rusted Blades
- Death Undone
- DDoor, recall twice, head in to demonweb
- Trial By Fury
- Deal and the Demon
- Closing the Portal
- Recall twice, teleport to House P, rebuff/smoke
Time: 44 minutes
XP: 173,462 (1953048 to 2126510)
Valor: 109 (1857 to 1966)
Plat: 15k

Circuit 2
---------
- Key to Eveningstar
- Turn-in & re-acquire quests from Circuit 1
- Impossible Demands
- Unquiet Graves
- DDoor, recall
- Outbreak
- Turn in & re-acquire two king's forest quests
- Overgrowth
- Thorn and Paw
- Druid's Curse
- Turn in all 4 druid's deep, re-acquire first two only
- Teleport to House P, rebuff/smoke
Time: 51 minutes
XP: 162,442 (2126510 to 2288952)
Valor: 126 (1966 to 2092)
Plat: 19k

Circuit 1 & 2
-------------
Time: 1:45
XP: 330k
Valor: 235
Plat: 34k

The higher level version was mostly druid's deep, high road and gianthold.

Caprice

11-10-2014, 06:05 PM

This is a bit of a thread necro (of a necro thread!), but I have a couple of questions. The Challenges are fresh in my mind since I spent a chunk of the weekend farming the Epic Challenges on a non-ideal character build so I am considering how to rectify that in the future. At the moment I'm thinking through the Morninglord version since I may be too lazy to level from scratch, plus my queue of alts to level is fairly long already, but I am probably too cheap to buy into a LR+1 just at the moment.

1) Have you stuck with Boulder Toss or switched to a different twist? E.g. Wild Shots in Shiradi as mentioned previously?

2. How critical are:
A) ... the +1 enchantment DC from Enchantment Lore 3?
B) ... the 10% SP cost reduction from the War Wizard set?
With the recent armor changes I am wondering about taking advantage of the armor proficiencies the 19/1 gets from that Cleric level. By dropping Enchantment Lore I could go 2-3 into Arcane Fluidity and switch to Light armor for a little PRR , or with a Spell Agility augment I could even go for Medium Armor , although then the Heavy Shield swap has to deal with ASF which isn't ideal. Examples I have on hand already I would consider:

Epic Duelists's Leathers: Light armor, 10% ASF, 22 PRR/15 MRR (=18%/12% reductions, respectively), +10% Dodge (w/Mobility), +15 Balance, Blue slot (Resistance +6, perhaps)
Epic Cavalry Plate: Medium armor, 25% ASF, 40 PRR/30 MRR (=28%/21% reductions, resp.), +30-40 False Life HP, Resistance+5, DR3-5/Chaotic (I think I only have tier 1 of this one)

However on a Morninglord with no LR+1 taken, with all else being equal my Enchantment DC would be lower already thanks to missing out on the PM capstone. I probably won't invest into all the augments unless/until I get it kitted out and decide that I like it (or at least I may wait for the next big augment sale) and thus I'd be more like -4 DC to start. You cover Necro DCs, but Enchantment will be targeting Will rather than Fortitude so I'd expect some difference in effectiveness. Did you do any testing on those DCs?

On top of the Enchantment DC drop I'd also be looking at higher SP costs on everything since I wouldn't have the War Wizard set bonus. You mention not ever needing to shrine while questing. Does that carry over into Challenges?

I am also vaguely considering going Chaotic Neutral on the off chance that I decide that I want to go farm up a Torc someday. Chaotic takes takes slightly less damage from Lailat, and DDO doesn't seem to do much (non-player) Lawful damage - a few divines cast Order's Wrath and it would allows some damage from Druid's Word of Balance, but both seem fairly rare. However that's definitely a minor point.

EllisDee37

11-10-2014, 11:49 PM

Alignment is totally irrelevant, as far as I'm aware. Chaotic Neutral (for torc farming) could conceivably also help against Devashta, though I doubt it. In any case, Chaotic Neutral is totally fine.

I still like and use boulder toss. It's particularly nice for taking out the occasional animated armor missed by energy burst, but really it amounts to a single-target insta-kill that costs no mana.

Being -2 int due to loss of capstone from a 19/1 morninglord should work fine.

I only ever use the enchantment school in Sunset Ritual. Outside of that one challenge I wouldn't even notice my enchantment DC. I did use enchantment enough to notice while farming fate points, though.

The 10% reduction in spell point cost is huge in longer challenges. I wouldn't sacrifice that. Besides which, the War Wizard's Robes fits the build perfectly. (Archmagi, Concentration +15, Resistance +6)

PRR is great in questing, but based on my experience it's pointless in challenges. You'll be facerolling all comers with 0 PRR and 0 MRR. I suppose it could help if you're in a full group (full scaling) and you decide to tank devashta, but while solo or with one other person it's trivially easy to tank her on this build with a heavy shield and no other sources of PRR.

Consider this CR25 Buying Time run, particularly the devashta fight that starts at 3:31 and lasts for 15 seconds:

http://youtu.be/ZwtWg5OpcxY

I have no PRR at all, and this is the most dangerous fight presented by challenges in terms of needing PRR. At least in cannith challenges. You can see me shield blocking between casts, but for the most part it's just a mana-dump.

EDIT: To clarify, in the video I'm using the exact character detailed in this thread, both in terms of build and gear. I bought a cosmetic for the robe because I find the war wizard's kind of ugly.

EDIT 2: The video is a demo of averaging 300 parts per 5:00 run during a 50% bonus weekend without buying barrels or teleporters. Just 5 workers and 5 torches.

Caprice

11-11-2014, 10:44 AM

Okay, that is all good to know and hopefully I will get started on mine soon. I definitely feel like PRR helps my SB heroic farmers a lot but Cures are less SP cost efficient and consume more time than Death Aura. My main remaining point of debate is whether I want to level to 28 while working on EDs and ER at the end. It seems like a shame to let all that XP go to waste, although the gains from a single EPL are really marginal too. I'll figure it out.

I agree that Devashta is the riskiest fight among all the Challenges as she has the highest DPS of any boss, but she has quite low HP compared to most of the other red names (I think Sam is probably the only one with less) and is positively anemic compared to the Eveningstar bosses. You definitely make her look easy there. I often duo these and IMO there is a noticeable difference in how difficult the fights are even with that small amount of scaling, but we'll see how I hold up. FWIW I tested being Chaotic some time ago and it does not help with Devashta. Her damage is typed differently than Lailat's, although I forget as what at this point.

I have already adopted your 5 minute run pattern in Buying Time. It's very straightforward, has good & consistent rewards, and the short run time lets me be aggressive with SP use. For an epic arcane it also means that Extended Haste will last the kobolds the entire time, although I have been running it mainly in heroics and thus I have to recast it a bit. Minor quibble: I think you should have put down a DDoor near the end of the line in the last 30 seconds - it looked like you'd have gotten at least one more purple out of it. ;-)

EllisDee37

11-11-2014, 02:04 PM

I have already adopted your 5 minute run pattern in Buying Time. It's very straightforward, has good & consistent rewards, and the short run time lets me be aggressive with SP use. For an epic arcane it also means that Extended Haste will last the kobolds the entire time, although I have been running it mainly in heroics and thus I have to recast it a bit. Minor quibble: I think you should have put down a DDoor near the end of the line in the last 30 seconds - it looked like you'd have gotten at least one more purple out of it. ;-)Yeah, agreed on all of that. Particularly the points about haste lasting for the whole challenge, letting me use quicken without worrying about mana, and the final DDoor would have been nice. I tried to cast DDoor when you say but it was on cooldown, which is the only downside to the epic farmer. The heroic farmer with the dragonmark can spam DDoor one after the other.

In the video, you can see me check* the DDoor cooldown at 4:44; there were 21 seconds to go. So at that point it was too late. (I cast DDoor when I first ran out there after the devashta fight at 4:05, though I did it on the run so you don't actually see the door in the video until I run around the circle at 4:27.)

EDIT: Regarding a potential EPL, I wouldn't bother. They don't do much for a wizard, but even if they did, farming out all the twists you need and maxing draconic still leaves you with only 3 million xp in the arcane sphere and much less in the other three spheres. An extra 3 million xp for a marginal benefit, and then needing another 300k to get back to 21 was way too much work for too little return for me.

*I map hotbars 8, 9 and 10 to the Alt alphabet: Alt+A, Alt+B, ..., Alt+Z. DDoor is my standard Alt+D key for all characters, so it's the 4th button on hotbar 8. I moved the handful of Alt keys in the standard keymapping over to Ctrl to make room for using the complete Alt alphabet. Fortunately there were no conflicts with existing Ctrl keys. IIRC, two of the existing Alt keys I moved to Ctrl are (for me) Ctrl+Z to hide the UI, and Ctrl+X to check the quest xp log.

EllisDee37

11-11-2014, 02:11 PM

I agree that Devashta is the riskiest fight among all the Challenges as she has the highest DPS of any boss, but she has quite low HP compared to most of the other red names (I think Sam is probably the only one with less) and is positively anemic compared to the Eveningstar bosses.Is there any particular boss you're thinking of in terms of PRR being useful? I'd be happy to go test it with my zero PRR/MRR if you like and report back what I find, probably with video. I'm always game for short tests.

Caprice

11-11-2014, 03:19 PM

Is there any particular boss you're thinking of in terms of PRR being useful? I'd be happy to go test it with my zero PRR/MRR if you like and report back what I find, probably with video. I'm always game for short tests.
I don't think there's any need. If you can stay alive facing Devashta then your self-healing output is good enough to survive the rest, and with Endless Faith twisted you literally cannot run out of the SP you need to keep up Death Aura healing & NEBing (although you can't meta them on Echo fumes). I suppose that there might potentially be more incoming DPS at times during some of the Estar arena boss fights depending on trash spawn timing, but that's with a bunch of mobs in addition to the boss and you can just kill some of the trash to fix that.

I was watching your video on the default size while on a call and mostly I was keeping an eye on your HP bar and SP use, other than paying closer attention during the Devashta fight, so I missed some details like the DDoor CD mouseover. I had forgotten that the DDoor CD for Wizards is a full minute. Ouch. Clearly I've gotten spoiled by the DM and mostly playing Sorceror in recent questing. The Bard CD is a minute too but for some reason it never seems to be an issue for my current heroic farmer model; I suppose that between stacking Bard & Barbarian Fast Movement, Haste or Speed items, and Sprint Boost it's often just as convenient to run back to the center and peel off any mobs on the line on the way as it is to DDoor.

EllisDee37

11-12-2014, 12:40 AM

I had forgotten that the DDoor CD for Wizards is a full minute. Ouch. Clearly I've gotten spoiled by the DM and mostly playing Sorceror in recent questing.No joke. I ran a ton of challenges on my heroic farmer this past weekend to stockpile xp pots, and then when I switched to the epic farmer to farm up a quick dozen epic tokens the DDoor cooldown was a shock.

In the linked video you can also see me try to cast DDoor but fail due to cooldown at 2:29. I don't bother checking the cooldown because I knew that was the problem. I only checked at the end to show it for the video because the run was over anyway, so there was nothing to do instead.

EllisDee37

04-07-2015, 05:33 AM

Updated the OP to the new output format. Nothing changed; just new formatting.

Heathir

12-14-2015, 01:48 PM

Updated the OP to the new output format. Nothing changed; just new formatting.

Ellis, have you considered a warlock challenge get farmer or swashbuckler? They both have the dps and healing to complete easily.

The warlock has haste, ddo and wings plus amazing aoe dps.

The swash wold have better runspeed, haste ddo and good aoe, better boss dps.

EllisDee37

12-14-2015, 02:16 PM

Both would be solid, for sure.

I personally haven't considered it because I already leveled and geared up the wizard, and he does fine.

unbongwah

12-14-2015, 03:09 PM

Do you plan to swap epic Spell Pen for either of the new lvl 21 caster feats (https://www.ddo.com/forums/showthread.php/467842-Update-29-Feats-Other-Feats)?

EllisDee37

12-14-2015, 06:09 PM

Do you plan to swap epic Spell Pen for either of the new lvl 21 caster feats (https://www.ddo.com/forums/showthread.php/467842-Update-29-Feats-Other-Feats)?Wellspring of Power is the only one worth considering. +20% spell crits for boss fights never hurt anybody, for sure. I'll probably stick with epic spell pen, though. Mainly for Lava Caves, which are thick with drow.

EDIT: Though I suppose it's worth hopping into a CR25 lava caves just to verify what the drow CR is. If it's 25 or lower, epic spell pen isn't needed.

EDIT 2: They are indeed CR25, which means we can drop from 39 to 35 spell pen and still be no-fail against the drow. Wellspring of Power it is!

GhostDargon

04-03-2016, 09:55 AM

I was wondering why do you put points into repair?

EllisDee37

05-08-2016, 12:15 AM

I was wondering why do you put points into repair?For reconstructing the extractors on kobold island challenges in a pinch.

Stoner81

09-15-2016, 05:22 PM

Any thoughts on new gear for this m8 now that the new CC update is out?

Stoner81.

EllisDee37

09-15-2016, 06:10 PM

New goggles would be an upgrade, for sure. Since he's level 21, any crafted stat item will be +10.

I kind of like the war wizard set for cheaper spells, but other than that, just about everything he's wearing could be improved with crafting. Even the staff, though that's not actually terrible. (The fact that it takes up both hand slots is bad, though.)

I haven't sat down to hammer out a good caster gearset yet, though.

Stoner81

09-16-2016, 08:07 AM

Good to know :) I might have a nosy at it later on tonight if I get the time.

Stoner81.

Saekee

09-16-2016, 08:12 AM

Stoner81

09-29-2016, 08:05 PM

EDIT: Regarding a potential EPL, I wouldn't bother. They don't do much for a wizard, but even if they did, farming out all the twists you need and maxing draconic still leaves you with only 3 million xp in the arcane sphere and much less in the other three spheres. An extra 3 million xp for a marginal benefit, and then needing another 300k to get back to 21 was way too much work for too little return for me.

For somebody just starting out (like me :D, well more of a continuation) it's actually probably not a bad idea...

Starting in the Arcane sphere you just level them all up to level 5 which will max them all and leave you at about level 28 ish then move to the next sphere, hit 30 and eTR down and continue on. Some of the past lives are very very good (Colours of the Queen) and it stops all the XP you earn from going to waste so to speak.

Stoner81.

Garorg

02-13-2019, 12:49 PM

Been playing this build and having a lot of fun with it, thanks! So much so, in fact, that I'm wanting to level up to 30 with it. Do you have recommendations for feats and spells?

Whitering

02-15-2019, 07:18 PM

Been playing this build and having a lot of fun with it, thanks! So much so, in fact, that I'm wanting to level up to 30 with it. Do you have recommendations for feats and spells?

At 29 there are two pieces of gear that will rocket you into Reaper god mode from the House J chain, a trinket and an orb.

Take the Master of Death at 24 and you should be good.