Advice on Farming Tome Pages (drop rate, etc.)

[stille_nacht]

So after 4 runs of cinnis i am feeling quite hopeful, as a tome page VII dropped, which means that the rate might be as high as 25%! however, the AH prices (1mil each) seem to point away from this conclusion.

Exactly what is the drop rate?

Would it be more efficient to farm all of them, or just one side and then try trading the tome pages away?

(capped AM ench. wizard using hireling.)

[Jaid314]

personally, i prefer to find something that reliably sells for a good amount of money and drops reliably. then i farm that, and *buy* tome pages. oh, you may have to wait a while to pick up the pages you want, watch the AH like a hawk, advertise constantly, etc... but it beats farming litany repeatedly imo :P

[stille_nacht]

thats the problem, i dont really know what the drop rate is :{, is it 1% and i was really lucky? or is it 25% and i only have to do a couple runs to get em?

[shagath]

but it beats farming litany repeatedly imo :P

Farming litany is fun when compared to elite eye of the titan(didnt have choice back then, took 52 runs to get it), over 200 prey on the hunters and weapons shipments(took over 80 runs).

I took count back in the days when I farmed for my skiver. 47 runs gave me 6 different pages and 2 extra. I traded for the missing ones. Had to pay a bit because the ones I had as an extra were a bit easier ones(cinnis or vol).

In this life I've done all bosses once and vol twice. Got 3 different pages(II, III and VIII). We had bard doing greater dragonmark of finding for chests. Anyhow rate seems higher now or I just had seriously good luck.... or dragonmark of finding really makes you find.

[stille_nacht]

ah i see, with these sorts of drop rates id be more than willing to farm it :], litany is pretty fun.

[sirgog]

No actual data, but the drop rate feels to me to be about 10%.

[stille_nacht]

as a caster what is the best way to handle the mentau section? the flesh golems are really irritating, yet i dont really want to disintegrate them all (too much sp possibly), but firewalls tick sloowly...

[sirgog]

as a caster what is the best way to handle the mentau section? the flesh golems are really irritating, yet i dont really want to disintegrate them all (too much sp possibly), but firewalls tick sloowly...

Don't solo that one. If you must solo, bring a hireling with bladebarrier.

[stille_nacht]

oh yeah... hirelings, would heal work on them? /start cackling.

Current plan of action:
Solo Cinnis <- easy-ish, flamebounds are annoying but i can use a hireling to heal them
Solo Vol <- really easy, fw everything
Farm mentau with a party/ trade for the pages <- fun fun :]
Trade for Chotulzz's page (i already have VII from cinnis) <- i hate this thing with a passion.

[sirgog]

oh yeah... hirelings, would heal work on them? /start cackling.

Trade for Chotulzz's page (i already have VII from cinnis) <- i hate this thing with a passion.

Archmage, Evocation spells + Beholder antimagic = fun times.

[stille_nacht]

update, got tome page IV with a single run of high priest 8D

[Irinis]

You're lucky on that character then. Flagged 5 characters and helped flag a few more people without seeing more than a single page drop... for someone else.

[Cartheron]

as a caster what is the best way to handle the mentau section? the flesh golems are really irritating, yet i dont really want to disintegrate them all (too much sp possibly), but firewalls tick sloowly...

Ice storm. Clear rooms in seconds

And beholder - summon hezrou, distract beholder, curse him, symbol of pain him, disintegrate the thing.

[shagath]

Web flesh golems and just use cold fire(from table after talking with dragon, you can have it after defeating Cinnis) to disable fire barrier guarding Mentau. It's easy from there.

[Unreliable]

So after 4 runs of cinnis i am feeling quite hopeful, as a tome page VII dropped, which means that the rate might be as high as 25%! however, the AH prices (1mil each) seem to point away from this conclusion.

Exactly what is the drop rate?

Would it be more efficient to farm all of them, or just one side and then try trading the tome pages away?

(capped AM ench. wizard using hireling.)

The drop rate seems to be about 5% per page.

I ransack litany (all 4 sides) fairly frequently, seems to be about 1/20 chest pulls i get a tome page. Sometimes more, sometimes less, but on average... 1/20 seems to be it.

[brucelee82]

I have run this quest about 20 times and seen one tomb page drop. I did get another named item. The person actually passed the page to me for free which was nice especially because it was the beholder page. So about 1/20 is right on from my personal experience.

[Cardtrick]

We had bard doing greater dragonmark of finding for chests. Anyhow rate seems higher now or I just had seriously good luck.... or dragonmark of finding really makes you find.

How on earth did a bard of all characters manage to fit the 3 feats for a greater dragonmark? (Although, I have to hand it to him/her -- a bard with greater dragonmark of finding is truly the ultimate piking character.)

[shagath]

How on earth did a bard of all characters manage to fit the 3 feats for a greater dragonmark? (Although, I have to hand it to him/her -- a bard with greater dragonmark of finding is truly the ultimate piking character.)

Haha, true. No idea as I was just pugging it for abbot flag at lvl16.

[Jaid314]

How on earth did a bard of all characters manage to fit the 3 feats for a greater dragonmark? (Although, I have to hand it to him/her -- a bard with greater dragonmark of finding is truly the ultimate piking character.)

yeah, i agree... it's presumably done by not contributing much in the other traditional bard areas.

for example, if you ignore melee (or at least, ignore having particularly effective melee), and don't bother with spell focus feats... you could be a group healer.

toughness
maximise
extend
quicken
least DM
lesser DM
greater DM

if human, you could add in empower healing. between scrolls/wands and your SP, you could probably even be a decent healer/buffer. if you're a spellsinger, that would help with SP even more.

of course, in any group that doesn't need a full-time healer, you'll likely not be all that impressive... but let's face it, there's more than enough characters that need babysitters that such a bard would likely be useful more often than not :P