Back

Hi guys, I'm back after a holiday in CZ and after a few months over the course of which I mostly played single player games, I'm eager to spend more time in DDO, especially now it seems Khyr and some of the Danes are back. I want to get on with Reckluse and Kreea and get some raiding done on Micron and Vs. I'm also thinking about TRing someone to get rid of the XP gems I've accumulated over the last few months.
See you in game!
M.

Computer kaputt

Hiya, it seems that my computer won't let me log into it. A weird error I've never seen before, I'm working on it but until I figure out what's wrong, I probably won't get to play. To be honest I haven't been playing a whole lot anyway the last few weeks so you might not really notice any difference :p but it's slightly annoying that it's happened now because I was actually planning to run some Crystal Cove while it's on. I have a lappy but DDO doesn't run very well on it so I'll be trying to fix the desktop as soon as I can. Until then, have fun!
M.

In CZ for two weeks

Hi dudes, I'm in the Czech Republic for two weeks and will probably be fairly busy (the week between April 21 and 27 anyway) so you might not see much of me. See you soon!
M.

Balance of Land and Sky

While mucking about on Kreea last night I noticed that my saves go up when I put on my Balance of Land and Sky (+3 saves, +3 deflection AC and +11 competence Balance) Greensteel cloak even though I already have a +4 resistance item on. A closer look at the rather convenient Effects log in the chat revealed that the save bonus is the Enhancement type. Now, I'm pretty sure that this item didn't stack with Resistance in the past. I don't know if this change has been announced by the devs (or if it's even WAI!) but I'm not complaining.
If you're after saves on your toon then I believe this is a stacking +3 that wasn't available before. I might make a few of these to replace my MinII shroud items that are slightly obsolete these days. I still want the +45 hit point on my squishies but the other two enchantments on it (100% fort and +5 deflection AC) aren't that great now - both can be slotted as augments and the AC is meh anyway if you're not going for at least a semi-usable AC (which I don't on any of my characters except Ganthra). And while the Balance of Land and Sky comes with a +3 deflection as well, the +3 stacking saves is rather handy and the balance skill bonus is useful on almost any toon. And what's more, a +45 hp Balance of Land and Sky (with some exceptional skill bonuses to boot) is a single-shard item that only costs 2 large scales and stones.

December

Hi people,
Busy month for me, moving house next week, then going to the Czech Republic to visit family in the second half of the month and lots of work inbetween. I'm still planning to show up occassionally for Festivult and some questing but I'll probably be on much less than usual.
Mic

Reckluse ver 11.2013, versatile centered scimitar kensei with repeaters

I've changed my multiclass gimpling again so I thought I'd put the current build on here, mostly for me to ponder it further when I can't log the character but also for guildies if any of them are interested in checking it out. The concept for this character has always been a bit of a jack of all trades, he can do several things but doesn't excel at any of them. Regardless of the build I use, I always want to be a decent melee, be fairly self-sufficient (UMD, self-heals, acceptable saves), have a ranged option (ideally repeaters because they're cool) and be able to do traps. In this incarnation I also want to see if I can get my Hide and Move Silently high enough to be sneaky. The level split and abilities were partially inspired by the U19 Centered Kensei Cleaver but I modified the build a fair bit to suit my gimpy needs and playstyle.


Level 28 Lawful Neutral Halfling Male 
(8 Fighter / 6 Monk / 6 Artificer / 8 Epic) 

Fighter 8 = Bonus feats, Kensei damage, centered with scimitars and longswords (One with the Blade).
Monk 6 = Earth Stance for extra damage on 19-20 crits, some other monky abilities that I always wanted to try but didn't because I couldn't face playing a proper monk.
Artificer 6 = Free repeater prof, trap skills, UMD, Fussilade! And a few other useful goodies.

Leveling and feats
1 Artificer, Point Blank Shot
2 Monk, monk bonus: Power Attack
3 Monk, Cleave, monk bonus: TWF
4 Monk
5 Monk
6 Monk, Precise Shot
7 Monk, monk bonus: Toughness
8 Artificer
9 Artificer, Great Cleave
10 Fighter, fighter bonus: Improved TWF
11 Artificer, arty bonus: Imp Crit Ranged
12 Fighter, Master of Forms, fighter bonus: Imp Crit Slahsing
13 Fighter
14 Fighter, fighter bonus: Greater TWF
15 Fighter, Weapon Focus Slashing
16 Fighter, Weapon Specialisation Slashing
17 Fighter
18 Fighter, Improved Precise Shot, fighter bonus: Greater Weapon Focus Slashing
19 Artificer
20 Artificer
21 Epic feat: Overwhelming Critical
22
23
24 Grandmaster of Forms
25
26 Destiny feat: Perfect TWF
27 Epic feat: Blinding Speed
28 Destiny feat: Elusive Target

Stats with current gear
Str = 15 base + 7 levels + 8 item + 3 enh + 3 tome + 2  ship = 38 atm, need to work on items and twisted Primal Scream will add another 5 for 15 mins per rest, so ultimately I'll mostly run about with 45 or so
Dex = 16 base + 4 tome + 6 item + 2 ship - 2 Earth Stance = 28, not sure I'll have gear slots to improve this
Con = 16 base + 3 tome + 9 item + 2 ship + 4 Earth Stance = 34, planning to slot more augments
Int = 14 base + 3 tome + 6 item = 23, want to improve this a bit to increase repeater dmg
Wis = 9 base + 2 tome + 6 item + 2 ship = 19
Cha = 8 base + 2 tome + 6 item + 2 ship = 18

HP = currently 770 in Grandmaster and 815 in Dreadnaught in Earth Stance
SP = currently 665 with Shroud cloak, mana is exclusively used for Cocoon so I'd get away with less if I wanted to make a different cloak.
PRR = 62 (30% damage off) in Grandmaster or 47 (24% damage off) in Dreadnaught in Earth Stance
Dodge = should be between 15 and 20% once I get decent Dodge 9% boots
Heal amp = 80% incl. ship buff
UMD = 44 unbuffed (with drow mask)

Saves
Fort 50
Reflex 44
Will 45
This is in Grandmaster in Earth Stance with current gear and with full ship buffs and GH, ie. the general values I have when questing. These saves are not great and if I switch from Grandmaster to something else they drop considerably, especially Will and the Reflex, considering I want to be able to do EE traps which might involve getting through some. I can switch to Water Stance for +6 to all saves but then I lose a lot of hitpoints and some DPS and Ki regain so I'd probably only use that to get through traps or extra tricky situations. In general I want to work on the saves some more to stand more chance on EE - replace Res 7 augment with 8, slot a Good Luck +2 somewhere and perhaps some +2 ins Dex or Wis augments.

Skills
UMD and Search full ranks, Disable Device 19 ranks
Balance 10 ranks, Concentration 11 ranks, Hide and Move Silently 10 ranks, Open Lock 5 ranks, Tumble 1 rank

Full UMD and Search are a must. Only 19 ranks in Disable Device by mistake (I added 1 Int point in planner I didn't have) - could fix this via LR at the expense of other skills but can't be bothered, I'm just 4 off the maximum and I can always get extra items to boost it. Currently have a +15 item but can get a +20 one, +5 enhanced from Tinker's Goggles and +6 Int skills from Shroud.

Enhancements
Halfling 1 AP = +1 saves
Battle Engineer 24 AP = First 3 core abilities, 2x Field Engineer, 4 tiers of Crossbow Training, Endless Fussilade, 3x Melee Wrack Construct, 1x Damage Boost, 1x Extra Action Boost, 1x Str
Arcanotechnician 3 AP = First core ability and 2x Scroll Mastery
Ninja Spy 7 AP = First core ability, 1x Sneak Attack Training, 1x Faster Sneak, Fists of Iron
Shintao 11 AP = First core ability, 2x Deft Strikes, 3x Iron Skin
Kensei 34 AP = First 3 core abilities, 3x Extra Action Boost, 1x Haste Boost, 1 one of the two lines that are prerequisities for One with the Blade; One with the Blade, 2x Contemplation, 2x Str

This might still change since I'm testing the character for now, but some of the ones above are a must: the Kensei Spec and One with the Blade, Iron Skin, Fists of Iron, Fussilade and a few others.

Gear - current + desired
Head = EH Black Dragon +3 Ins Con and something or +8 Con and slot +2 Ins Con
Goggles = Deadly of Accuracy (the best I can get, preferably with two slots)
Trinket = Epic Gem of Many Facets (Claw set) or Planar Focus for extra PRR when using Needle
Necklace = kept free for swap-ins like immunites, deathblock, True Seeing etc.
Armour = Flawless Black Scale Robe, probably slot +14 PRR
Cloak = Shroud Conc Opp +6 Wisdom +4 Cha skills +6 con skills +30 HP
Bracers = Convalescent (20% heal amp) of Parrying VIII (+4 stacking saves... and AC)
Belt = Epic Spare Belt (+5 tactical DC, slotted Con 7 and Resistance 7)
Ring 1 = Epic Stalker (Seeker 6, Manslayer, 2 slots, currently +6 Dex and other not filled)
Ring 2 = crafted +6 Int of Greater False life, 2 slots, unfilled for now
Gloves = Epic Gloves of the Claw (Claw Set, +6 Str and 30% heal amp)
Boots = Fortified of Dodge, ideally with a slot or slots

This is gear setup is a mixture of what I already have and what I need to get.


Weapons
Scimitars - because I already have a decent collection from previous lives and because they look cool! Also, as a halfling I'll never have high Strength and high raw damage and this build doesn't have much sneak attack damage, instead it relies on things that proc on crits (Radiance, Life Stealing etc.) and scimitars crit often. I use an assortment of Radiances, Lightning Strikes, Frostbites, Brigand's Cutlasses and others.
Longswords - hooray, now that they changed Kensei from a single weapon to groups of weapons, I can also use longswords now. This mostly means dual Oathblades which are excellent for all those drow and Khyber quests.
Repeaters - because they look cool and because you can use Fussilade with them! I use Needle, Holy Burst of Radiance and a few others. Planning to get Epic Doublecross Bow and Silver Slinger.
Handwraps - mostly Wraps of Endless Night at the moment, very good for undead. Need to get Grave Wrappings. Now that I'm thinking about it, they have Soul Eating so they might do nicely until I grind myself a pair of Life Stealing Cormyrian scimitars.

Playstyle
Most of the time I run about centered with dual scimitars and longswords. I start every fight with a healing curse, then bascially rotate healing curse, Fists of Iron, both cleaves and 3 other elemental strikes. Probably quite close to how people play monks, however to me pushing all the buttons is entirely new! Well, not entirely to be honest, I'm already used to rotating things from pew pewing on Micron so I set up my shortcuts in a similar way.

I switch to repeaters (and therefore lose centered stance) for burst damage using Fussilade, either on bosses or to make use of Improved Precise Shot for bunches of mobs, when there are a few archers in a line or when meleeing gets tricky and I want to kite mobs with Radiance or something like that.

Apart from lower difficulties and easier quests I have Displacement on almost constantly. I have a Shroud displacement clicky and might make another one or two later on for longer fights but I mostly use scrolls. They're cheap and with my arty scroll knowledge they are 42 seconds so they last through most fights a stack of 100 gets you 70 minutes of Displacement.

Strengths and weaknesses

Strengths
Okay melee damage. In the pugs I've done on this build so far I was either on par with other rmelees or ahead of them (incl. some powergamer dudes) and there's still more damage to get from a few abilities and from the +4 artifact bonus on Claw set. But mostly, versatility - UMD (raising and healing people, removing neg levels, basically unlimited Displacement, True Seeing scrolls, high level Prot from Evil wands etc.); traps; most locks except the most difficult ones. Ranged option for casters in situations where you benefit from IPS.

Weaknesses

• Saves arencould be better. Need to work on them but they might never be good enough for, say, soloing really hard EE quests with caster or stunning mobs.
• No FoM, the only reliable defense against Hold and some other nasty spells. One option is to farm VoN for Kundarak Boots, which might be rather tiring and I'm already farming them on Micron - not sure I can have another char running that raid considering the LFMs are few and far between these days. An easier but more gimpy option is the make an epic Timeblade and stick it in off-hand in situations where the risk of getting held. It would mean a drop in DPS but it might just work. Another option is to try and get a Sireth - unfortunately I stupidly took Antipode for the second raider's box (first was Needle) which turns out to be not very useful on this build, and getting the Sireth from the raid might prove even harder than getting Kundarak boots.
• Can't think of a reliable CC option. Could do with a way to neutralise a mob and ideally make it helpless as well. I could swap out Toughness for Stunning Blow or Fist, but the lowish Strength doesn't really support a workable Stunning Blow and the lowish Wis doesn't really support a workable Stunning Fist. I've done the maths and I could reach roughly mid 50s on the DC on both (slightly higher on Fist), which is okay for most EH and possibly some older EE but not for newer EE content. And the thing is, on EH stunning mobs is just convenient but not necessary whereas in harder EE content stunning a mob can sometimes be the only sensible way of killing it before it kills me, unless one wants to kite it for ages with a repeater. I can think of two options. One is to switch to Fury when I really need to and use Overwhelming Force. But that's a compromise because Fury isn't an ideal destiny for this build. Another, rather gimpy option is to farm a Mornh or Phosphor, swap out Toughness for Imp Crit Bludgeoning and use the Anvil of Thunder from LD for about a 35% chance to stun every 12 seconds. But that means losing centered stance and a considerable chunk of DPS so it's probably a no no. I'll have to think about it and see if I can figure out a way to neutralise mobs using another ability or item enhancement.

That's it. Comments are welcome.

Update 20 today

As downtime has been extended by an hour (surprise surprise!), I thought I'd throw a link to the release notes on here as Jerry traditionally didn't include it in the OP in the downtime thread:
https://www.ddo.com/en/update-20-release-notes

Highlights:

• Two new free quests, one in Forgotten Realms, other in Eberron (Mournlands - exciting!), both high level it seems
• VIPs get extra 15% XP until December 12 instead of the usual 10%
• New enhancement tree, Eldritch Knight
• Iconic and Epic Reincarnation
• Heroic TR XP changes - less XP now needed (as Epic TR will now be the main grind :p)
• A +5 stat tome for 5000 favour, yay! Finally a reason to farm favour again.