I've been back to the land after a long sleep for about a month. During that time I've started a baby empath that I'm having a blast playing. The one thing I really miss from the old days is using Voln Fu. I was curious if a brawling Voln rogue would be similar. I've never played a rogue and I'd love to also learn about lock picking. So am I asking for trouble?
OOLONGLONG
RATHBONER
Re: Brawling rogue?
02/26/2015 07:03 PM CST
The big difference is that fu worked from the open and a brawling rogue works from ambush. Its quite like fu when used to ambush zombie type undead, but for wraith and golem types its far less satisfying.
OOLONGLONG
Re: Brawling rogue?
02/26/2015 07:51 PM CST
My little one is only level 5 at the moment and so killing from the open at present. That is good to know for later on. Is it they are harder to kill brawling or not easy to ambush?
I've been reading what I can on disarming and lockpicking on the wiki, is there a locksmith for dummies anywhere?
I've been reading what I can on disarming and lockpicking on the wiki, is there a locksmith for dummies anywhere?
THROGG
Re: Brawling rogue?
02/26/2015 10:32 PM CST
Brawling rogues do well in general, and Voln rogues fare well vs corporeal undead. You don't even need blessed hand/foot wraps to hit undead now. The symbols were reviewed a while back; best to acquaint yourself with their new uses. There is one caveat ... non-corporeal undead don't crit, but that's true when using weapons against them also. The worst thing about these guys is that they are far more perceptive than corporeal undead; makes it rather hard to hide on them. Best to avoid this type of undead unless in a group, where you can get in a punch or two from the open and get a share of the favor. (It is possible to use the new UAC combat from the open, ala monks, but this is far less effective than ambushing).
Note that training in brawling also lets you use brawling weapons for traditional weapon ambush attacks; you end up getting two attack modes for the price of one. Many brawling weapons have feeble damage factors, but I find that sais are pretty effective. Almost as accurate as a dagger for aiming purposes, and far better DF vs any significant armor. I have 3 in my collection so far; plain/blessable for undead, cold flares for fire critters on Teras, and vibration flares for anything else living. Brawling weapons, however, unlike hand/foot wraps, do need to be blessed to hit undead since you aren't using the UAC combat system.
Losksmithing: 2x in both skills will usually suffice to open your own boxes; I would recommend saving up as many mental TPs per level as possible, in order to get 403 and 404 ASAP. Being able to pick significantly over your level usually requires skimping a bit on combat related skills, since you will want to get closer to 3x than 2x in disarm and picklock.
"So, what does that green line on the graph represent?"
"Oh, that's the projection of a hypothetical offspring from a union between Sauron and Cruella de Ville; we use that as a baseline for determining character alignment."
Note that training in brawling also lets you use brawling weapons for traditional weapon ambush attacks; you end up getting two attack modes for the price of one. Many brawling weapons have feeble damage factors, but I find that sais are pretty effective. Almost as accurate as a dagger for aiming purposes, and far better DF vs any significant armor. I have 3 in my collection so far; plain/blessable for undead, cold flares for fire critters on Teras, and vibration flares for anything else living. Brawling weapons, however, unlike hand/foot wraps, do need to be blessed to hit undead since you aren't using the UAC combat system.
Losksmithing: 2x in both skills will usually suffice to open your own boxes; I would recommend saving up as many mental TPs per level as possible, in order to get 403 and 404 ASAP. Being able to pick significantly over your level usually requires skimping a bit on combat related skills, since you will want to get closer to 3x than 2x in disarm and picklock.
"So, what does that green line on the graph represent?"
"Oh, that's the projection of a hypothetical offspring from a union between Sauron and Cruella de Ville; we use that as a baseline for determining character alignment."
KEITHOBAD
Re: Brawling rogue?
02/26/2015 11:59 PM CST
>>I've been reading what I can on disarming and lockpicking on the wiki, is there a locksmith for dummies anywhere?
Guen covered the training aspects, if you're looking for the basics of actually DOING it it's pretty simple.
Disarm the box. If there's a trap, disarm again. Once you've successfully disarmed or determined there's no trap: pull out a lockpick and pick it.
The couple exceptions are sphere traps, scarabs, scales and plates.
Plated boxes: Requires either bashing, wedging or magic to open. At the beginning you won't be able to handle these.
Scarabs: Once the trap is disarmed you have to DISARM SCARAB. It's a good idea to get a few ranks of Arcane Symbols (8 ranks is conventional wisdom).
Sphere: You need a lockpick in hand to disarm these, otherwise handle as normal.
Scales: This is an easy one to mess up. You need to disarm once to see it. Then pick it. Then pull out a dagger. Then disarm it.
THROGG
Re: Brawling rogue?
02/27/2015 01:16 AM CST
Also note that you can get 403 and 404 imbeds, or have someone else cast the spells on you, and your skills will improve accordingly. Self-cast lores, however, provide approximately twice the bonus that spells from an outside source do. My ability limits rose significantly after I learned the spells myself. Needless to say, you will also want a few ranks of harness power to accompany the spells.
"So, what does that green line on the graph represent?"
"Oh, that's the projection of a hypothetical offspring from a union between Sauron and Cruella de Ville; we use that as a baseline for determining character alignment."
"So, what does that green line on the graph represent?"
"Oh, that's the projection of a hypothetical offspring from a union between Sauron and Cruella de Ville; we use that as a baseline for determining character alignment."
RATHBONER
Re: Brawling rogue?
02/27/2015 06:12 AM CST
>My little one is only level 5 at the moment and so killing from the open at present. That is good to know for later on. Is it they are harder to kill brawling or not easy to ambush?
Golems can only be one shotted by magic. The nearest feel to fu would be 302 with its instakill. They are generally easy to hide on and render helpless by ambushing left leg and right arm, but you've then got 30s of punch, punch, punch, punch, punch, punch, punch, punch, punch, punch, punch, punch before you have a chance they die and punch, punch, punch, punch, punch, punch, punch, punch, punch, punch, punch, punch gets pretty boring when you know its going to be punch, punch, punch, punch, punch, punch, punch, punch, punch, punch, punch, punch every time. Fu might have taken 25s of kicks to bleed a golem out, but each kick might also be the last one, which keeps the game interesting. Overall my kill rate on soul golems only dropped by about 20% going from fu to UAC, but fu was a far more engaging system to use.
Wraiths are hard to hide on and stay hidden from. If they are slow, you can just keep punching their leg for knockdowns and treat them like a low hit point golem, but from wind wraiths on that stops working because they are too fast. You have to have enough defense to stop any of their attacks hurting you before you can take them on. Easy for wind wraiths, less so for the wraiths in Rift and Nelemar. I am not sure how well a pure combat rogue would manage against them, but with 3x picking, brawling and Voln I've been unable to hunt like level undead since the early 60s (soul golems). 2,3 maybe 4 million post cap experience and some of them will become huntable, but up to and just after cap, I'm living off favor from soul golems and temporary hunting grounds (the only place you'll find high level zombie style undead).
The ideal way of killing a wraith is a smite ambush followed up by a punch to crit kill or disable, but wraiths are good at spotting and stopping hiding and smite has a rubbish duration so it is quite likely to have worn off before you make your second attack. I've gone smite, vanish, spammed punch and still had it wear off before the punch happened. In theory that should work (4s smite RT, 5s minimum effect duration) but the game engine cheats on player vs. critter RT so you have to have a 2s margin to guarantee being able to get your action in.
...
From the open at low level you can just flail away and bleed the critter out at decent position. Get a few more levels and you'll be wanting to crit kill, and that requires gaining good position for a head shot, or excellent position for a body shot. From the open you need to see a message telling you the critter is vulnerable to a grapple (or kick/jab/punch) and then get a successful grapple (or kick/jab/punch) on it. The opening remains if you miss any attack, but a successful attack of the wrong type will lose the opening and fail to get position. You shouldn't need to get into the details of how best to do this, since by the time you are able to aim well enough to target body locations, you should be able to hide well enough to ambush and ambush gets you the tier most of the time anyway.
Its not always the case, you can get lucky position on an open attack get get unlucky and no tier on an ambush, but the normal result of an ambush is one tier higher than you were before and the normal result of an open attack isn't.
...
>locksmith for dummies anywhere?
30 ranks in everything is baseline. Either ignore picking till you have them, or train 3x in everything till you get them, or suffer quite a lot by way of breakage and getting eaten by traps. Once you have got to 30, 2x is fine for your own boxes until high level (somewhere around level 75 you'll start finding critters that have the occasional box beyond 2x+lore and the higher you level beyond that the more frequent it gets.
The best picks in addition to disposable copper/steel for a low level smith are glaes and invar once you have the ranks to be able to use them properly. I've got through a few glaes over the years, but I still have my original invar and even though its a bit battered its actually more useful to me now than a fresh one is.
Use detect rather than disarm unless you are actually trying to disarm the box. Mechanically its not required, but you'll have fewer accidents if you get into the habit of using DETECT.
DETECT MY BOX
DISARM MY BOX
DISARM SCARAB (don't use MY or you'll be disarming the dead scarab in your pocket rather than the live one on the ground)
If in doubt, DISARM. There's enough information in the messages about why you can't disarm spheres or scales to work out how to do it and if the box has been cleaned of a trap, you won't get RT for checking it.
If you feel it necessary to detect again after the box looks clean, you should be training more. Doing lots of detects to test your skills is a good way of finding out where your limits are though.
50 ranks perception is plenty if you just want perception for detecting traps on your own boxes. Get it as early as possible though.
Light/dark/fog affect traps quite a lot. If you have a way of making sure you are in a brightly lit area when detecting and disarming, use it.
If you are really into picking, do Lock mastery. It makes for a much deeper system to explore as well as the mechanical benefits you get from it.
Golems can only be one shotted by magic. The nearest feel to fu would be 302 with its instakill. They are generally easy to hide on and render helpless by ambushing left leg and right arm, but you've then got 30s of punch, punch, punch, punch, punch, punch, punch, punch, punch, punch, punch, punch before you have a chance they die and punch, punch, punch, punch, punch, punch, punch, punch, punch, punch, punch, punch gets pretty boring when you know its going to be punch, punch, punch, punch, punch, punch, punch, punch, punch, punch, punch, punch every time. Fu might have taken 25s of kicks to bleed a golem out, but each kick might also be the last one, which keeps the game interesting. Overall my kill rate on soul golems only dropped by about 20% going from fu to UAC, but fu was a far more engaging system to use.
Wraiths are hard to hide on and stay hidden from. If they are slow, you can just keep punching their leg for knockdowns and treat them like a low hit point golem, but from wind wraiths on that stops working because they are too fast. You have to have enough defense to stop any of their attacks hurting you before you can take them on. Easy for wind wraiths, less so for the wraiths in Rift and Nelemar. I am not sure how well a pure combat rogue would manage against them, but with 3x picking, brawling and Voln I've been unable to hunt like level undead since the early 60s (soul golems). 2,3 maybe 4 million post cap experience and some of them will become huntable, but up to and just after cap, I'm living off favor from soul golems and temporary hunting grounds (the only place you'll find high level zombie style undead).
The ideal way of killing a wraith is a smite ambush followed up by a punch to crit kill or disable, but wraiths are good at spotting and stopping hiding and smite has a rubbish duration so it is quite likely to have worn off before you make your second attack. I've gone smite, vanish, spammed punch and still had it wear off before the punch happened. In theory that should work (4s smite RT, 5s minimum effect duration) but the game engine cheats on player vs. critter RT so you have to have a 2s margin to guarantee being able to get your action in.
...
From the open at low level you can just flail away and bleed the critter out at decent position. Get a few more levels and you'll be wanting to crit kill, and that requires gaining good position for a head shot, or excellent position for a body shot. From the open you need to see a message telling you the critter is vulnerable to a grapple (or kick/jab/punch) and then get a successful grapple (or kick/jab/punch) on it. The opening remains if you miss any attack, but a successful attack of the wrong type will lose the opening and fail to get position. You shouldn't need to get into the details of how best to do this, since by the time you are able to aim well enough to target body locations, you should be able to hide well enough to ambush and ambush gets you the tier most of the time anyway.
Its not always the case, you can get lucky position on an open attack get get unlucky and no tier on an ambush, but the normal result of an ambush is one tier higher than you were before and the normal result of an open attack isn't.
...
>locksmith for dummies anywhere?
30 ranks in everything is baseline. Either ignore picking till you have them, or train 3x in everything till you get them, or suffer quite a lot by way of breakage and getting eaten by traps. Once you have got to 30, 2x is fine for your own boxes until high level (somewhere around level 75 you'll start finding critters that have the occasional box beyond 2x+lore and the higher you level beyond that the more frequent it gets.
The best picks in addition to disposable copper/steel for a low level smith are glaes and invar once you have the ranks to be able to use them properly. I've got through a few glaes over the years, but I still have my original invar and even though its a bit battered its actually more useful to me now than a fresh one is.
Use detect rather than disarm unless you are actually trying to disarm the box. Mechanically its not required, but you'll have fewer accidents if you get into the habit of using DETECT.
DETECT MY BOX
DISARM MY BOX
DISARM SCARAB (don't use MY or you'll be disarming the dead scarab in your pocket rather than the live one on the ground)
If in doubt, DISARM. There's enough information in the messages about why you can't disarm spheres or scales to work out how to do it and if the box has been cleaned of a trap, you won't get RT for checking it.
If you feel it necessary to detect again after the box looks clean, you should be training more. Doing lots of detects to test your skills is a good way of finding out where your limits are though.
50 ranks perception is plenty if you just want perception for detecting traps on your own boxes. Get it as early as possible though.
Light/dark/fog affect traps quite a lot. If you have a way of making sure you are in a brightly lit area when detecting and disarming, use it.
If you are really into picking, do Lock mastery. It makes for a much deeper system to explore as well as the mechanical benefits you get from it.
OM1E5GA
Re: Brawling rogue?
02/27/2015 11:33 AM CST
<30 ranks in everything is baseline. Either ignore picking till you have them, or train 3x in everything till you get them, or suffer quite a lot by way of breakage and getting eaten by traps. Once you have got to 30, 2x is fine for your own boxes until high level (somewhere around level 75 you'll start finding critters that have the occasional box beyond 2x+lore and the higher you level beyond that the more frequent it gets.>
Just a couple things I wanted to add:
-Don't get discouraged when (not if) you miss seeing an occasional trap early on and go boom. With 3x in picking skills I was in the habit of DISARMing (DETECT wasn't an option at the time) boxes three times before PICKing them until I was about level 20 and it wasn't until I was almost level 30 that I stopped tensing up every time I typed DISARM MY BOX. The early teens are a good time to start picking to get a feel for it, but do it away from others until you're spotting traps on the first attempt every time (eventually you'll even be seeing traps well above what you can possibly disarm).
-getting ten ranks in Arcane Symbols will allow you to cast both 403 and 404 off scrolls and will make disarming scarabs much easier (though eventually your picking skills will make the AS training unnecessary for scarabs)
-never let your bank account run dry JUST IN CASE you need to pay a fine. Everyone has an off day and every picker has at least one story about how they forgot to disarm a scales trap or sphere and ended up taking out the entire commons/tower/etc accidentally. Heck, I can't even remember the number of times I've set off spheres after seeing them because I'm so used to PICK MY BOX coming after GET MY PICK (luckily million+ silver fines are a thing of the past)
-speaking of traps, the wiki has them all listed here: https://gswiki.play.net/mediawiki/index.php/Traps Most of them are pretty straight forward to disarm, it's the scales and sphere traps that trip folk up the most and scarabs require an extra step to disarm
Starchitin
A severed gnomish hand crawls in on its fingertips and makes a rude gesture before quickly decaying and rotting into dust. A gust of wind quickly scatters the dust.
Just a couple things I wanted to add:
-Don't get discouraged when (not if) you miss seeing an occasional trap early on and go boom. With 3x in picking skills I was in the habit of DISARMing (DETECT wasn't an option at the time) boxes three times before PICKing them until I was about level 20 and it wasn't until I was almost level 30 that I stopped tensing up every time I typed DISARM MY BOX. The early teens are a good time to start picking to get a feel for it, but do it away from others until you're spotting traps on the first attempt every time (eventually you'll even be seeing traps well above what you can possibly disarm).
-getting ten ranks in Arcane Symbols will allow you to cast both 403 and 404 off scrolls and will make disarming scarabs much easier (though eventually your picking skills will make the AS training unnecessary for scarabs)
-never let your bank account run dry JUST IN CASE you need to pay a fine. Everyone has an off day and every picker has at least one story about how they forgot to disarm a scales trap or sphere and ended up taking out the entire commons/tower/etc accidentally. Heck, I can't even remember the number of times I've set off spheres after seeing them because I'm so used to PICK MY BOX coming after GET MY PICK (luckily million+ silver fines are a thing of the past)
-speaking of traps, the wiki has them all listed here: https://gswiki.play.net/mediawiki/index.php/Traps Most of them are pretty straight forward to disarm, it's the scales and sphere traps that trip folk up the most and scarabs require an extra step to disarm
Starchitin
A severed gnomish hand crawls in on its fingertips and makes a rude gesture before quickly decaying and rotting into dust. A gust of wind quickly scatters the dust.
THROGG
Re: Brawling rogue?
02/27/2015 10:10 PM CST
>>Wraiths are hard to hide on and stay hidden from<<
As mentioned before, non-corporeal undead are hard to hide from; this is also true for animal type foes. I was on Teras recently, hunting wind wraiths. I found that the best way to get an initial ambush tier-up effect on the beggars is to hide in an empty room, then hit them as they enter, before they get a chance to search. Alternatively, you can run to the next room and hide after your first attack, then sneak back and attack again; potentially you can get up to excellent position in this manner. The good thing about the UAC is that once you have achieved a tier-up against a specific target, you keep it even if it wanders off to another room (or you do). If you encounter it again, you keep the same tier for your subsequent attacks.
I use the same technique against stone mastiffs (perceptive animal types)in the Stronghold. Against wind wraiths, if you are decently spelled up, you can then hit them from the open, having achieved good rather than decent positioning. They do have an annoying shriek attack which can stun you; stun maneuver training is useful here. Again, hunting with a partner is useful in such situations. Faster kills, less risk, faster favor accumulation.
"For the female of the species
is more deadly than the male."
As mentioned before, non-corporeal undead are hard to hide from; this is also true for animal type foes. I was on Teras recently, hunting wind wraiths. I found that the best way to get an initial ambush tier-up effect on the beggars is to hide in an empty room, then hit them as they enter, before they get a chance to search. Alternatively, you can run to the next room and hide after your first attack, then sneak back and attack again; potentially you can get up to excellent position in this manner. The good thing about the UAC is that once you have achieved a tier-up against a specific target, you keep it even if it wanders off to another room (or you do). If you encounter it again, you keep the same tier for your subsequent attacks.
I use the same technique against stone mastiffs (perceptive animal types)in the Stronghold. Against wind wraiths, if you are decently spelled up, you can then hit them from the open, having achieved good rather than decent positioning. They do have an annoying shriek attack which can stun you; stun maneuver training is useful here. Again, hunting with a partner is useful in such situations. Faster kills, less risk, faster favor accumulation.
"For the female of the species
is more deadly than the male."
THROGG
Re: Brawling rogue?
02/27/2015 10:25 PM CST
There are also little tricks you can use as far aiding your hiding. For example, if you have some magic item use skill, you can have a cleric with the appropriate training bless the unpresence spell into a gem for you (or just get a high level cleric to cast it on you before you go on a hunt). Now, you need to understand that unpresence does NOT help your initial hiding attempt, but it does give you a better chance to stay hidden from a searcher. Darkness and/or spirit fog scrolls or imbeds also can be helpful, as is training in Shadow Mastery. And the more S&H ranks the better, obviously.
"For the female of the species
is more deadly than the male".
"For the female of the species
is more deadly than the male".
OOLONGLONG
Re: Brawling rogue?
02/27/2015 10:58 PM CST
I really appreciate everyone's response! Thank you for the in depth information on Golems and Wraiths.Right now my little one is having no trouble killing in the graveyard but I can easily see where later on it will be harder.
On picking, I have tried it at my low level and to say I feel like a complete and utter klutz is an understatement. I'll definitely wait until I have the 30 ranks and hopefully it will be better. It's good to know to detect first. I did find a few traps (one fire and one gas from level 1 creatures?!?) that made me blanch. Right now I'm getting 3 ranks of perception each level, both disarming and picking it is harder to get above 2 in those. Plus I haven't even started with hiding and ambush training, much less CM, spells and arcane symbols. So much to learn.
On picking, I have tried it at my low level and to say I feel like a complete and utter klutz is an understatement. I'll definitely wait until I have the 30 ranks and hopefully it will be better. It's good to know to detect first. I did find a few traps (one fire and one gas from level 1 creatures?!?) that made me blanch. Right now I'm getting 3 ranks of perception each level, both disarming and picking it is harder to get above 2 in those. Plus I haven't even started with hiding and ambush training, much less CM, spells and arcane symbols. So much to learn.
THROGG
Re: Brawling rogue?
02/28/2015 12:00 AM CST
3x perception is probably overkill right now. Tripling anything is pretty expensive in TPs actually, which are going to be in short supply for you at this point. I think I started tripling in S&H around level 40; at 64 I'm still only 2.5x in this skill. I've never seen the need to go over 2x in perception. If you want it at this point for detecting traps ... don't! You shouldn't be picking just yet, if you want to survive. Levels blow by at your stage of development; be patient. By level 10 you will be semi competent to pick low level boxes and not get arrested for setting off traps in town.
"So, what does that green line on the graph represent?"
"Oh, that's the projection of a hypothetical offspring from a union between Sauron and Cruella de Ville; we use that as a baseline for determining character alignment."
"So, what does that green line on the graph represent?"
"Oh, that's the projection of a hypothetical offspring from a union between Sauron and Cruella de Ville; we use that as a baseline for determining character alignment."
RATHBONER
Re: Brawling rogue?
02/28/2015 07:16 AM CST
>You shouldn't be picking just yet, if you want to survive.
Depends on your priority. Smith trained you can actually pick better at level 5 than you can ambush if combat trained.
>I've never seen the need to go over 2x in perception.
If you want to play with boxes at level 5 you should have 21 ranks. Staying over 2x doesn't pay, but putting points into extra perception at low level does. At level 64 you don't even need to be 1x if all you want it for is spotting traps on boxes.
>I think I started tripling in S&H around level 40; at 64 I'm still only 2.5x in this skill.
I think I started doubling S&H around level 75, and tripling post-cap. I just couldn't bring myself to drop the ability to pick my record boxes, though you'll have a lot easier time of it hunting that range with just 2x box training.
...
Depends on your priority. Smith trained you can actually pick better at level 5 than you can ambush if combat trained.
>I've never seen the need to go over 2x in perception.
If you want to play with boxes at level 5 you should have 21 ranks. Staying over 2x doesn't pay, but putting points into extra perception at low level does. At level 64 you don't even need to be 1x if all you want it for is spotting traps on boxes.
>I think I started tripling in S&H around level 40; at 64 I'm still only 2.5x in this skill.
I think I started doubling S&H around level 75, and tripling post-cap. I just couldn't bring myself to drop the ability to pick my record boxes, though you'll have a lot easier time of it hunting that range with just 2x box training.
...
TROUBLE13
Re: Brawling rogue?
02/28/2015 10:23 AM CST
Unless the idea of dying appeals to someone I tend to suggest holding off the picking until you can get 30 ranks pick/disarm/perception and 10 ranks of AS. Might not need quite that much pick/disarm for your own boxes but without the 10 ranks of AS a low level rogue is going to have a hard time with scarabs. 30 ranks of picking is also when you start getting full exp for it.
OM1E5GA
Re: Brawling rogue?
02/28/2015 11:22 AM CST
<Depends on your priority. Smith trained you can actually pick better at level 5 than you can ambush if combat trained.>
While this is probably true, I wouldn't recommend anyone do serious picking at that level since they'll miss seeing as many traps as they spot. If they wanted to stick to only boxes they can actually spot traps on (and are sure they can disarm) or are willing to take the risk outside of town on their own boxes I don't see any serious harm in it. Not a whole lot of boxes you could successfully pick with just critter found picks though.
<Plus I haven't even started with hiding and ambush training, much less CM, spells and arcane symbols.>
This has me curious about what you're actually training in. You might want to copy/paste what it says when you type SKILLS in game and let folk here comment on it. Even with a locksmith build there's no reason you shouldn't be able to afford CM, ambush, and S&H (though, there are those that advocate holding off on Ambush and S&H until you can get enough ranks for them to be useful so you can train more in skills that are of more immediate use).
AS you can just get ranks in as you have spare TPs and spells you can hold off on until much later (I didn't even get my first spell until level 69 or 70)
Starchitin
A severed gnomish hand crawls in on its fingertips and makes a rude gesture before quickly decaying and rotting into dust. A gust of wind quickly scatters the dust.
While this is probably true, I wouldn't recommend anyone do serious picking at that level since they'll miss seeing as many traps as they spot. If they wanted to stick to only boxes they can actually spot traps on (and are sure they can disarm) or are willing to take the risk outside of town on their own boxes I don't see any serious harm in it. Not a whole lot of boxes you could successfully pick with just critter found picks though.
<Plus I haven't even started with hiding and ambush training, much less CM, spells and arcane symbols.>
This has me curious about what you're actually training in. You might want to copy/paste what it says when you type SKILLS in game and let folk here comment on it. Even with a locksmith build there's no reason you shouldn't be able to afford CM, ambush, and S&H (though, there are those that advocate holding off on Ambush and S&H until you can get enough ranks for them to be useful so you can train more in skills that are of more immediate use).
AS you can just get ranks in as you have spare TPs and spells you can hold off on until much later (I didn't even get my first spell until level 69 or 70)
Starchitin
A severed gnomish hand crawls in on its fingertips and makes a rude gesture before quickly decaying and rotting into dust. A gust of wind quickly scatters the dust.
THROGG
Re: Brawling rogue?
02/28/2015 11:16 PM CST
Rogues actually have three basic options available to them. Heavily trained picker, middle of the road, and pure combat. I experimented with all three, before finally deciding on the middle of the road skill set. Here is my wee locksmithing rogue; as you can see, she is fairly well trained in combat skills also. She has gotten to be close to 3x in picking skills, but at the expense of less shield and CMan training than my middle of the road build. This build has some serious S&H though.
>skill
Gwindolyn (at level 16), your current skill bonuses and ranks (including all modifiers) are:
Skill Name | Current Current
| Bonus Ranks
Armor Use..........................| 82 18
Shield Use.........................| 82 18
Combat Maneuvers...................| 82 18
Brawling...........................| 132 36
Ambush.............................| 128 34
Physical Fitness...................| 82 18
Dodging............................| 130 35
Arcane Symbols.....................| 50 10
Magic Item Use.....................| 20 4
Disarming Traps....................| 145 45
Picking Locks......................| 145 45
Stalking and Hiding................| 146 46
Perception.........................| 130 35
Climbing...........................| 58 12
Swimming...........................| 30 6
Training Points: 5 Phy 2 Mnt
"So, what does that green line on the graph represent?"
"Oh, that's the projection of a hypothetical offspring from a union between Sauron and Cruella de Ville; we use that as a baseline for determining character alignment."
>skill
Gwindolyn (at level 16), your current skill bonuses and ranks (including all modifiers) are:
Skill Name | Current Current
| Bonus Ranks
Armor Use..........................| 82 18
Shield Use.........................| 82 18
Combat Maneuvers...................| 82 18
Brawling...........................| 132 36
Ambush.............................| 128 34
Physical Fitness...................| 82 18
Dodging............................| 130 35
Arcane Symbols.....................| 50 10
Magic Item Use.....................| 20 4
Disarming Traps....................| 145 45
Picking Locks......................| 145 45
Stalking and Hiding................| 146 46
Perception.........................| 130 35
Climbing...........................| 58 12
Swimming...........................| 30 6
Training Points: 5 Phy 2 Mnt
"So, what does that green line on the graph represent?"
"Oh, that's the projection of a hypothetical offspring from a union between Sauron and Cruella de Ville; we use that as a baseline for determining character alignment."
THROGG
Re: Brawling rogue?
02/28/2015 11:24 PM CST
Just for comparison, here's my combat build. Can't pick a kobold box, but a mean ambusher. Brawling plus TWC lets her ambush with twin sais, which have a better DF than daggers vs many armors. She's also competent with UAC combat, although TWC training doesn't give you a second attack with this combat mode. (It really should!)
>skill
Aldoril (at level 34), your current skill bonuses and ranks (including all modifiers) are:
Skill Name | Current Current
| Bonus Ranks
Two Weapon Combat..................| 178 78
Armor Use..........................| 130 35
Combat Maneuvers...................| 141 41
Brawling...........................| 172 72
Ambush.............................| 172 72
Physical Fitness...................| 141 41
Dodging............................| 205 105
Arcane Symbols.....................| 74 16
Magic Item Use.....................| 58 12
Stalking and Hiding................| 201 101
Perception.........................| 140 40
Climbing...........................| 82 18
Swimming...........................| 50 10
Training Points: 0 Phy 2 Mnt
"So, what does that green line on the graph represent?"
"Oh, that's the projection of a hypothetical offspring from a union between Sauron and Cruella de Ville; we use that as a baseline for determining character alignment."
>skill
Aldoril (at level 34), your current skill bonuses and ranks (including all modifiers) are:
Skill Name | Current Current
| Bonus Ranks
Two Weapon Combat..................| 178 78
Armor Use..........................| 130 35
Combat Maneuvers...................| 141 41
Brawling...........................| 172 72
Ambush.............................| 172 72
Physical Fitness...................| 141 41
Dodging............................| 205 105
Arcane Symbols.....................| 74 16
Magic Item Use.....................| 58 12
Stalking and Hiding................| 201 101
Perception.........................| 140 40
Climbing...........................| 82 18
Swimming...........................| 50 10
Training Points: 0 Phy 2 Mnt
"So, what does that green line on the graph represent?"
"Oh, that's the projection of a hypothetical offspring from a union between Sauron and Cruella de Ville; we use that as a baseline for determining character alignment."
RATHBONER
Re: Brawling rogue?
03/01/2015 07:32 AM CST
Not much CM? I thought combat rogues reckoned on 1.5x as a minimum. (My combat "rogue" is a ranger so I've never explored how much CM to train as a combat rogue.)
TROUBLE13
Re: Brawling rogue?
03/01/2015 09:58 AM CST
Combat rogue just refers to the way they spend their tps, all on combat, not their exact placement. I think the majority of combat rogues are 1.5 or better in combat maneuvers but it isn't true for all of them.
THROGG
Re: Brawling rogue?
03/01/2015 11:45 AM CST
I could indeed have gotten 1.5x or more in CM for my combat rogue, but I put a lot of her TPs into TWC; enough so that, combined with her excellent dexterity, she gets equal AS with both right hand and off-hand weapons. She's also heavily trained in dodge and S&H. I have been debating using a fixskill to drop the TWC, grab some shield training instead, and pump the resultant TP excess into more CM ranks. However, this is a tertiary character, who is unlikely to progress any further, so it's not worth the bother.
I have rolled up a number of low level characters of all professions, and trained them up to anywhere from 25 to 40 levels. This gives me an idea of how different training paths function; I can use that data, combined with my experience with my high level folks, to extrapolate how these alternate builds might fare at higher levels.
So, I have a 24 train pure caster mage, as a comparison with my capped warmage, a 26 train pure casting cleric as opposed to my heavily physical capped cleric, 3 different rogue builds, 2 different paladin builds, 2 sorcerer builds (one pure caster, one THW type), etc. There are two professions I have only one of. As far as empaths go, mine has been around long enough that I have fixskilled her four times between a pure caster and a warpath, before finally settling on the latter build as her final post cap style. So, I know how both pure caster empaths and warpaths function.
The last profession is monk. I just got seriously bored with this one; she's in a holding pattern at level 13. Maybe I've been spoiled by my rogues, all of whom brawl and ambush, but open UAC seems feeble by comparison (sorry, Rowmi). Next fixskills, maybe I'll stick her in full leather and train her in archery or something, and see if that helps.
"So, what does that green line on the graph represent?"
"Oh, that's the projection of a hypothetical offspring from a union between Sauron and Cruella de Ville; we use that as a baseline for determining character alignment."
I have rolled up a number of low level characters of all professions, and trained them up to anywhere from 25 to 40 levels. This gives me an idea of how different training paths function; I can use that data, combined with my experience with my high level folks, to extrapolate how these alternate builds might fare at higher levels.
So, I have a 24 train pure caster mage, as a comparison with my capped warmage, a 26 train pure casting cleric as opposed to my heavily physical capped cleric, 3 different rogue builds, 2 different paladin builds, 2 sorcerer builds (one pure caster, one THW type), etc. There are two professions I have only one of. As far as empaths go, mine has been around long enough that I have fixskilled her four times between a pure caster and a warpath, before finally settling on the latter build as her final post cap style. So, I know how both pure caster empaths and warpaths function.
The last profession is monk. I just got seriously bored with this one; she's in a holding pattern at level 13. Maybe I've been spoiled by my rogues, all of whom brawl and ambush, but open UAC seems feeble by comparison (sorry, Rowmi). Next fixskills, maybe I'll stick her in full leather and train her in archery or something, and see if that helps.
"So, what does that green line on the graph represent?"
"Oh, that's the projection of a hypothetical offspring from a union between Sauron and Cruella de Ville; we use that as a baseline for determining character alignment."
RATHBONER
Re: Brawling rogue?
03/01/2015 02:04 PM CST
>open UAC seems feeble by comparison
It is feeble by comparison. Its also more interesting, but you haven't got enough of the basic abilities at level 13 to be able to use it properly so you'll just see its feeble.
Ambush UAC isn't all that different from ambush with a sai. Open UAC is a completely different game from weapon use.
It is feeble by comparison. Its also more interesting, but you haven't got enough of the basic abilities at level 13 to be able to use it properly so you'll just see its feeble.
Ambush UAC isn't all that different from ambush with a sai. Open UAC is a completely different game from weapon use.
NIGHTVET
Re: Brawling rogue?
03/02/2015 03:58 PM CST
A few days late, but one correction to the post about how to disarm various traps - plated boxes can also be dealt with by using an acid vial on the plate and then picking the lock. The acid vials are trap components which can be pulled using lock mastery skill - or obtained from someone else with the skill.
