Quick Combat Questions

Lyr

I'll start.

During a priest vs. monk match up, I see no possible way to win against an even somewhat competent monk. A priest's only fairly reliable kill method is absolve, but with an interesting setup, we can pull off a judge.

ABSOLVE FAILURE:

In dragon stance, a monk can mind drain away double what a sap takes.

JUDGMENT FAILURE:

A monk can give paralysis, so barring a lucky angel care, healing, or stupidity tick, even with every exit walled off, judgment is always stoppable.

Any tips?

Zeon

Try to drain their mana using things besides just sap. Perform force, focus afflictions via hellsight, insomnia. Then throw in some saps. Also use their attacks against them, watch out for attacks of theirs that take a lot of mana like blackout (iirc).

That being said priest has a pitiful offense in exchange for its godly defense. Every class has its counters and a straight up tekura monk could probably kill a priest pretty easily, since there isn't much you can do prone, since your shield nerf.

Zeon

Highly highly recommend force. There is just so much you can do with it. Talk to some monks in game and ask them what they find most annoying/effective when fighting priests.

Lyr

Thanks @Zeon!

Do you think I should get proficiency in rapiers, get a really fast rapier, prep with mace, break with envenomed rapier?

Jacen

Talk to Darroth IG. I can't tell you what priests do, but I know as a monk, I can't kill one, and I have to manage my defense very carefully to avoid absolve. Most classes I fight against, I can just throw a well timed cripple or batter or disrupt to dig myself out of a sticky situation. Fighting priests, my mana becomes much more valuable, and I really have to focus on managing it.

Hhaos

I'd say axes or daggers if you really wanted to do that, though the artie maces that I have seen are just *drool*, I'd say work in weaponry personally but then again most priests I've fought have just owned me with sap spam so take it with a grain of salt

Mizik

Keep your mana around 500 when fighting Monks. Does wonders.

Tanris

say I command you, servant of oblivion.

Tanris

Lol, copy paste fail.

 

Its very important to remember monk is extremely untanky in and of itself. The one thing which let's them become one of the tankiest classes on game is burning their mana.
Step 1. Do as Mizik said and deprive them of mind drain.
Step 2. Make them hurt.
Step 3. Remember you can force them to burn 1000 mana at will.

Tanris

Not exactly. Shield is the one thing which will save you from sylvan if:

Prep torso (3 rends)

After that the general theory is you need to heartseed when someone applies restoration, then set off the torso break before the heartseed gets cured. Break restoration = 4s heartseed cure = 4s torso cure (gets cured before heartseed = 4s.
If done correctly you'll heartseed on the apply, meaning 8 seconds until heartseed cures. Unless you have some sort of god mode strategy I'm unaware of,  they should shield, so you'll need to erode and break torso before that 8 second window, which adds another 4 seconds on to the needed time to cure the heartseed. Heartseed = 12 seconds, so if done correctly they'll die.

The hard part is getting that heartseed off right as they apply restoration, as you'll need to break multiple limbs and stop them shielding somehow.

Pre breaking torso is unadvisable, as tracking torso damage vs sylvan/dragon/druid is a simple matter of counting to 4 system side, which is about as easy as it gets.

Mizik

Artefact bow + meteors is a fair option.

Tanris

Bow is definitely what I'd advise. Its 350 cr, whereas arguably the more precision option (thoths fang) is 1500.

Xith

Erode, break torso, erode, heartseed. I don't know if that would work, but erode chews through shield pretty fast. But prep extra limbs to be sure (not that I know exactly how long limb prep lasts, if not indefinitely).

 

Zeon

Meteors are a viable option, but it's far easier to just erode or double erode considering how quickly it outpaces shield. You might have some trouble without a diadem vs anyone who spams shield, but best thing is if it doesn't work you've only lost about 12 seconds of prep time.

Heartseed combos are about the most easily predictable things to forsee in Achaea, meteors make it more predictable, and you're working on a limited time frame.

Tldr: bow works, but diadem works better (more expensive by far). Diadem is pretty much a staple for sylvans. there probably aren't any people you can't kill without a bow that suddenly die with one. Diadem on the other hand will bring you up a tier almost surely.

Zeon

Daeir said:

I'd like to ask a quick one as well - Sylvan combo basics revolves around prepping torso with venomed thornrend (presumably aconite or epteth/epseth) and then breaking before heartseeding, from what I know. I have two questions - is this general idea for an offense correct, and if so, how do you mitigate a person shielding to prevent you from rending further? Also, what does lacerate actually do?

Was on my phone before, realized that I didn't really address your question.

When prepping limbs no venom works fine, you really only want those specific epteth/epseth venoms for the actual breaks. I also like using the loki sylvans are given since it forces diagnose on occasion. For the breaking Tanris described it well enough. There aren't many things you can do to stop shield, though it is possible to get a resto break application on a prone opponent with eq up due to SWING STAFF, it just takes a ridiculous amount of prep and isn't worth it imo. Prepping for a sylvan is fast, so when it doesn't work out because you got interrupted by a shield you don't lose much time. Lacerate is cured by epidermal to head and gives stuttering, if you lacerate a lacerated person it gives them a level 2 laceration which does the same thing more or less, but requires a resto application to head to cure. It's mainly something to use in group fights to kill salve bal/stop duanathar. Though it can be useful in 1v1 to force a resto break with limited prep, especially using eclipse which is ridiculously easy to pull off on certain classes.

Avto

Mizik said:

Keep your mana around 500 when fighting Monks. Does wonders.

I was new to combat when I first saw that move, was pretty excited. Dyzanru was fighting Cain I think. Sap, Sap, Sap - Mind drain, Sap Sap #loop focus X10 Sap Absolve. I think Cain raged that mind drain was bugged after that.

Trey

Cain raging about a not-bug? Nahhhh

Chord

This is kinda a quick combat question. If I have ~850 credits lying around, should I go for:
Ceylonese Bracelet
Lvl 2 Health Sip Ring
Eagle's Wings
Upgrading a Lvl2 Rapier to Lvl3
Upgrading Lvl1 Bow to Lupine
Anything else I am forgetting?

My stats, for reference, adding in my two level 2 rapiers. I mostly roleplay and raid/raid defend, don't do MUCH 1v1, due to the current PvP climate, but I'd be interesting in hearing different opinions.

Garao

Lyr said:

I'll start.

During a priest vs. monk match up, I see no possible way to win against an even somewhat competent monk. A priest's only fairly reliable kill method is absolve, but with an interesting setup, we can pull off a judge.

ABSOLVE FAILURE:

In dragon stance, a monk can mind drain away double what a sap takes.

JUDGMENT FAILURE:

A monk can give paralysis, so barring a lucky angel care, healing, or stupidity tick, even with every exit walled off, judgment is always stoppable.

Any tips?

(1)

As has been said, mind drain depends on your current mana. Let your mana drop, don't sip it back up. You can force transmute (Up to 1000, or 1500. I can't remember, checked a while ago. Even if you force transmute 3000, it should force them to transmute max amount, it's pretty high though, but its usefulness depends on your opponents sip/max mana mainly, because it's a 4 second eq ability on a 4.5s sip bal not including moss.)

Priest is greatly augmented by artefacts, and at a lower credit card bal, you're going to mainly be skimping on offence for a solid defence. Level 3's for consistent dps, shatter, damage through shield, faster eq, shield breaking/damage meteors. Adds a lot more viability to strategies. Things like shatter arm, break leg, heal insomnia/hourglass, start shatters with meteors going off. Idk. 

-----------------------------------------

(2)

Heartseed is weird in that if you manage to escape your heartseeder, even if you're behind on salve balance/broken torso/heartseeded, you'll still survive it because heartseed gets cleared. I don't know if it's a bug or not, kind of sounds like it. It's already been said what you need to do - Throw heartseed on either a prepped torso or a broken torso at the fractions of a second they apply restoration to a limb. It used to be a lot easier when illusions were viable, but Vadi/Svo makes that more of an exercise in futility. I don't know what the eq on swing staff is, but provided it is at 2 seconds or quicker it suddenly makes heartseed quite a bit easier as they cannot run/shield.

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(3)

Honestly a personal taste choice. Eagle's wings will fare you pretty well. I would personally go for weapon upgrade. Greater defence is always nice, but as a level 91 Paladin(?) with sip ring and bracelet, I doubt it's really an issue.

Iocun

Heartseed illusions still work well ob Svo.

Garao

Do you mean heartseed illusions or restoration illusions not at torso? I suppose as long as any restoration illusion hits it's pretty easy to take advantage of as a sylvan with breaks off salve balance or heartseed off torso salve balance.

Sohl

Wings @Chord.

Triak

Chord said:

This is kinda a quick combat question. If I have ~850 credits lying around, should I go for:
Ceylonese Bracelet
Lvl 2 Health Sip Ring
Eagle's Wings
Upgrading a Lvl2 Rapier to Lvl3
Upgrading Lvl1 Bow to Lupine
Anything else I am forgetting?

My stats, for reference, adding in my two level 2 rapiers. I mostly roleplay and raid/raid defend, don't do MUCH 1v1, due to the current PvP climate, but I'd be interesting in hearing different opinions.

First, do you bash? If so level 1 crit pendant pronto.

Second, the answer is always sip ring level 2.  Most bang for your buck across the board.

Achilles

@Triak - He has a fire pendant already.

@Chord

For raid defense focus

upgrade to level 3 bow (750 cr)

For a good mix

upgrade to level 2 bow (300 cr)

upgrade to level 2 sip ring (500 cr)

For hunting to dragon (whenever that's back)

Level 2 bracelet (700)

For PvP

Will they let you use 1 soulpiercer and 1 eaglescream?  

Tanris

I'd do bow and sip ring.

Tanris

Na, that's a lie, just realised when I posted. You should do bow and sip ring, but you'll do wings.

Garao

Why would they not let you use a spiercer and an eagle's scream? @Achilles

Achilles

Garao said:

Why would they not let you use a spiercer and an eagle's scream? @Achilles

Isn't it they won't let you use one artefact rapier and one forged one?  I only heard a rumor of it, too cheap to shell out $1k for text rapiers myself

Tanris

No.

Garao

Aren't they both artie rapiers O.o

Achilles

Garao said:

Aren't they both artie rapiers O.o

Yes, so in this case it won't apply.  Also, since Chord is a runie I don't think having average rapier speed of 229 and 234 will make a huge difference.  Paladin's would need the soulpiercers a lot more.