The Forum

[quote="SHRO"]First of all, a bit of background... For those of you who don't know me, Hi, I'm Shro and like many of you, I love Soma... The game and it's strange culture is deep rooted within me as I'm sure it is with most of you. Now, I didn't get to play much DSoma on euro, I remember it's release and I instantly preferred it but due to the fact that I was so young, and family issues and such, my official Soma career ended there. - I played a lot since, when I was a little older, many many different nameless private servers, even one of my own. - Still I preferred the Devil race. Which brings me here, when I found this server, I instantly jumped at the chance to relive my childhood - Creating the character of my dreams, a powerful devil wizard. While I've only been here for some 20 days or so, I've enjoyed every minute of it and invested well over 180 hours into my character already. However I have run into a few problems which I will now discuss. Initially, I was met with the same problems, any mage, on any game faces... Lack of HP and being forced to hit and run mobs to ensure your survival. This was to be expected and wasn't much of a problem, if a little tedious. I was however frustrated that literally every quest I had was for a melee based mob that I was unable to defeat effectively without endless hitting and running, or a tank. - Necronis only takes you so far... When I found out I had the INT to take on cyclope, my life changed for the better slightly, finally, an INT mob that I can hit.... My guild helped out and provided me with some Barrs to help me along the way for Hellfire-X which sped this section of my journey up, quite a bit... I was here for quite a while, leveling fairly steadily, as long as i was careful not to step into melee range and get kicked in the face.... [Sarcasm]Great mechanic by the way, LOVE IT[/Sarcasm] however i got to a point where, suddenly I stopped getting %. Once I learned I'd capped these, it was time to figure out what to hunt next. Checking the Recommended Monsters list, I found Elite Gargoyle Fighter and noted that they were in the Devil Dungeon, so off I went. Struggle at first, after dying atleast 10 times to melee fighters, running around aimlessly trying to figure out what I'm doing wrong, a guild mate showed me the EGF spawn at the end of the dungeon, close to the Shionim boss spawn. MY LIFE WAS CHANGED (Little did I know, I'd be here for the next 35 levels) - A little perilous to get to, but worth it, at first I was only able to tank a few but my % per trip was amazing, 60-75% every 40 mins or so with the limited number of potions I could carry... This slowly decreased, as expected as I leveled up however, I should mention that I did have to keep my INT at 124 in order to kill these and still gain %... by the time I left i had over 25 points available to spend into INT. At this point, i was getting really bored and it was time to spend my INT and try to move on. Drazil Druids then.... Instantly i noticed... this is slower. Much slower.... the drops are atleast more interesting but the speed at which I was gaining % was nowhere near as fast as before, I figured I must be doing something wrong and.... nope, general consenus is that INT mobs are just terrible % so I decided to do some testing.,. First - I bought and used a respec scroll and lowered my INT to 124 to go back to EGF All testing was done un-rested so that I could gather the most accurate data possible. I didn't wanna get halfway through a test and have my rested run out, ruining the sample. At level 73 - One hour EGF (Relaxed) - 18% p/h Approx kills: 320 Spell used: Chain Lightning For this first hour I went and was chill about it, i wasn't vigiliant about making sure I'm always hitting 4+ mobs, sometimes only 2-3 depending on the kills/spawns etc At level 73 - One hour EGF (TRYHARD) - 22% p/h Approx kills: 370 Spell used: Chain Lightning For this second hour, I tried super hard, never hit less than 4 mobs, mostly always 6-8 - this took a lot more concentration, but clearly it was worth it. Next I dumped my points back into int and moved on to the Drazil Druid part of the testing At level 73 - One Hour Drazil Druid: 14% p/h Approx kills: 210 Spells Used: Weaken,EXP-X,Chain Lightning The numbers speak for themselves really, noticeably slower % it's difficult to get anywhere near as many kills in the hour, mostly due to the range of these things, it's insane. They can hit you from off the screen, you never know how many you're in combat with and you can't walk the mob or group them up, if by some lucky miracle you do manage to spot 2-3 in the same spot, jump on them with AoE FAST - these would be such good % if you could AoE them more effectively. Lastly we have Fallen Trolls At level 73 - One hour Fallen Troll: 12% p/h Approx Kills: 150 Spells used: Weaken, EXP-X Seriously, 4th axe aura? Who the fuck thought that was balanced?? Just don't even bother with these.... Lastly, I'd like to note that I didn't try Gargoyle Shaman, because their range was so insane that I thought it'd be far more tedious than the EGF method I was using, even if it is ridiculous that I should have to gimp myself in order to get good % - Which is a point I'd like to link back to something said on the podcast the day I joined and that is "players want to compete" - I want to compete and participate in all the events, all the wars. It's unfair that I and other DSoma mages have to effectively nerf ourselves in order to level. This takes us out of the competition. TL;DR - Mages aren't that broken, the mobs are... Please fix :) [/quote]

[quote="TYPH"]Aoe is not a right, its a privilege. Other classes do not gain % as fast without upgraded weopon speed or Aoe auras. Saying that: Drazil mage and NM Spell range does not serve the purpose it may have done in the past. It should be reduced. [/quote]

[quote="KHASAV"]Thing is EGF are a one off and I don't really like how the stat system let's people stay on them. Typh is right, in the past mages didn't have the luxury of lowering the stats and you had to go shaman etc. No other mob in the game for any class has the experience speed egf give mages so if anything we had an advantage over everyone.[/quote]

[quote="ARYA_"]point being from the above, respec and go back to egf, as a knuckler I was getting about 10% an hour with a +5 wep.[/quote]

[quote="SHRO"]Other classes at a comparative level are gaining % much faster from what I can tell, both a knuckler and I think an archer are levelling considerably quicker than me at a very similar level +/- 1-2 levels... On another note, why are there also next to no quests for mages? - Dozens of quests for WBM but nothing really for us? [/quote]

[quote="TYPHIN"]Yeah lesson learned. And I'm clearly slow cause I wouldn't have thought to gimp stats for faster leveling. Knux must have been really decent prior to 3rd being fixed to hit reduced targets again [/quote]

[quote="SHRO"]The fact of the matter is that, it is more efficient to gimp yourself in order to level, which is counter-intuitive to the design of the game.[/quote]

[quote="JAHEIRA"]Enjoy it wilst it lasts, finito was on about adding levels onto mobs to stop ppl gimp themselves to lvl on low mobs I had heard that isylver was going to look into mage mobs, tho not heard of anything since ( 4days ago)[/quote]

[quote="TYPHIN"]I don't know that it's necessarily counter intuitive. You didn't know to do it till told. Like me. So check the definition of intuitive :p It's your choice. Level faster and miss the little drops you get on the way to cap or accept the slower % We have attempted to explain to you that you are at an advantage to other devil's, not to mention if you want to really get into it humans... Who have to go NM at 88 Int to get best gains... Your saying you get to cap doing this.... This ain't a real QQ situation. Consider your current circumstances as the solution may not be to your liking or the colleagues in dsoma leveling behind you may not appreciate this having too large a spotlight. [/quote]

[quote="SHRO"]I think you're misunderstanding me, Typhin. I'm not complaining that's it slow, there is no QQ here, this is Soma, I was ready for a grind. I'm merely pointing out that seemingly the most effective way to level up is to play at a weaker level, which makes no sense at all when looking at the game as a whole (PVP/RVR) - there's more to Soma than just a % race. What I am complaining about however is the overpowered nature of the mobs that follow EGF be it with insane range or a ridiculous aura. Making them CONSIDERABLY slower than the aforementioned method, marginally slower would be okay, i can get on board with XP slowing down but at the moment it'll take me 6-7 hours to get a level at Drazil Druid and I'm only 73.... Pretty sure I heard lads saying it was taking them that long at closer to 100... Frankly, I don't mind the leveling speed, it feels all the more rewarding when I do actually ding but the TL:DR was that mages are pretty much fine, it's the mobs that need looking at....[/quote]

[quote="SLAYER"]Mages do need attending to, but I don't know if this is one of the bigger issues or not (don't level a mage lately), they need weaken improving as it's only level 1 if i'm correct. Any devil is meant to be a superior (vs humans) master of their own discipline and humans have level 4 weaken... They also either need a little more con or as someone in guild suggested 4th staff improving in duration. However the mob situation does seem a little silly though, maybe a higher level mage could go into a bit more detail on what they feel needs changing on int mobs, or are they fine as they are?[/quote]

[quote="TYPHIN"]And I agree in relation to the higher monster issues you have raised. I have a dsoma mage of comparable level. I have also raised similar issues at how long humans have to work at Shanis and their drops. EGF are worse I admit. The answers I've been told is if you don't like it go elite lizard for mine so I'd take it the same goes here. If you don't like it stick with Drazil druids. Following what I've learned here I'll probably aoe EGF and gimp my stats [/quote]

[quote="SHRO"]I'll be doing the same, after I spend another 2 days farming more marks in order to re-gimp myself. Assuming nothing is changed in that time. Hopefully this thread grabs the attention of some higher-ups and something happens. Even if it's something small like reducing certain ranges and possibly changing the 4th axe aura on the trolls, Maybe give it less duration and higher cooldown so they can't spam it for example?[/quote]

[quote="FISTY"]To be fair this method works exactly the same for other classes. I’m currently levelling my Knuckler at 61 str at TP because the xp is twice as fast as hunting KL capped and the mobs have better aggro (6ish range compared to 1 range) It’s counter intuitive, but given that the only other option is removing the bonus xp from gimping myself and going back to KL (which is a depressing thought lol) I’ll be staying gimped.[/quote]