I'm just curious if there are any casting empaths in GoS or if the status quo is still COL?

The utility of GoS is so amazing but I'm curious about how great sigil of power is for empaths with lots of stamina and maybe enough lores for 1107 to refill stamina?

As a hunting, CS casting empath, I don't find much use for COL anymore. The only thing I use it for is the defense. The changes to spell durations and new mana abilities (spellup and pulse), combined with the regenerate ability, mean I rarely use its mana ability anymore. I really need it if I'm in an area where I need to bolt, because I run out of mana quicker, but as the previous poster wrote, that's when it's totally useless.

In the mid-levels, both GoS and the new Voln are much more attractive alternatives. COL may still be good in lower levels for the quick and easy AS boost if you swing for a while before becoming a pure caster.

>>In the mid-levels, both GoS and the new Voln are much more attractive alternatives.

I am curious as to what you consider mid-levels. My empath at 37 still wracks during hunts and can take more then one hunt to finish creature tasks that involve uphunting. To me the mid-levels are 50-70ish or so, and while I do expect to see some improvement in hunting I doubt it will be enough to where my empath doesn't use wracking any more. Not my main though so I mostly just play him through his gift and it will take a while to get him up to 50 even.

>>Me personally, I dislike having to rely on such things and carrying them around, even my wizard rarely used them.<<

Ah; well that's a personal idiosyncrasy for your characters then. You are of course entitled to play your folks as you choose. However, I suspect most players of empaths would have no problem using wizard wands to help them finish out a hunt. I mean, if you are going to train in spell aiming anyway, toss in some MIU skill and grab some wands at the pawn shop. Maybe there won't be anything in the shop that you want, and you will end up relying on your own spells anyway; ok, then there's nothing lost. But if there are some good wands there, taking advantage of that option can't hurt.

The bells of Hell
go ting-a-ling-a-ling
for you but not for me

>>I bet we likely have different definitions of this. To me, this means using a wand, maybe two, to kill those last couple of creatures. From what I've seen of most people who use wands, this is far from the case with them.<<

I used whatever was most effective. As mentioned, I found that shamans and mystics in the Stronghold were very susceptible to acid. The initial attack from empathic assault is plasma based; you do NOT want to use that in the bowels. Crystal and blue wands were my preferred modes of attack there. Yes, you can boneshatter the Iloke and krynches, (and I did so), but the earth elementals there are totally immune to that.

The bells of Hell
go ting-a-ling-a-ling
for you but not for me

Well I use bolt spells/wands/CS spells while hunting. I'm level 50 and just now starting to train higher in Empath spell ranks so my CS is only 241 to most of the critters having a 186 TD. So sometimes it's better to web-bolt and fire spirit and other times its better to boneshatter until I can wrack. Obviously I cannot do that if I'm using bolts. That is the main reason I was asking about GOS. Regenerating almost 30% of my 100 stamina every 40sec to a minute seems like it COULD out perform wracking while in the field. Especially since I don't use any CM's and my stamina doesn't drop ever.

An example of where I run out of mana AND wands insanely fast is when I get tasked to hunt seekers. I believe they are only 53 but their TD makes it unfeasible to hunt with CS spells and their bolt DS is around 300. That means I need to 117 myself then either 111 or wand to get past that. Most times it doesn't kill them on the first shot so that's atleast 17 and at most 39 mana on one critter. Very frustrating when I only have 153 mana.

>>Regenerating almost 30% of my 100 stamina every 40sec to a minute seems like it COULD out perform wracking while in the field.

That 100 stamina will net you 50 mana and you'd be able to regenerate your stamina fully in roughly 4 minutes. You regenerate 20-30% per pulse, so on average 25%. However, you also have to take into consideration that the sigils use up stamina and mana.

>>Well I use bolt spells/wands/CS spells while hunting. I'm level 50 and just now starting to train higher in Empath spell ranks

By this statement, I am guessing you train heavily in lores and tie up a lot of your points that way. If you were trained for just CS, you'd likely tear through seekers, they are soft and squishy when you connect.

>>60 or so. My empath is 69 now and rarely wracks while hunting, although she is 21 empath spells over level.

My empath is currently 31 spells above level with a CS of 195 at 37, most levels he gains 5 CS. His stats are set for growth so he is a bit lacking there compared to most people but I don't mind his steady climb in power either. Once he is a higher level and mana isn't an issue I may consider switching societies, but that is a good way down the road too.

>>An example of where I run out of mana AND wands insanely fast is when I get tasked to hunt seekers. I believe they are only 53 but their TD makes it unfeasible to hunt with CS spells and their bolt DS is around 300. That means I need to 117 myself then either 111 or wand to get past that. Most times it doesn't kill them on the first shot so that's atleast 17 and at most 39 mana on one critter. Very frustrating when I only have 153 mana.

In my experience, you don't have to be 3x PF with 65 ranks in SL:Blessings for the GoS build to work out. My empath is 2x in PF with 30 ranks in SL:Blessings and she's never hurting for mana unless she's trying to finish the 30-creature task assigned by the AdG (she's also only 1x in HP).

Having lived the situation you describe above, I'd recommend you turn down tasks on seekers, golems, and elementals until you're 52. It's just extremely mana intensive and it pretty much requires bolting. I stuck with tigers and mammoths and by 52, I could nick seekers, which sometimes ended up with a crit kill because of the double strike with fire spells. Also, if you just stick to killing whichever creature you're sent for, you'll never lack for mana because you'll be regenerating mana and stamina while you're waiting for your next creature to generate.

>My empath is currently 31 spells above level...

Empath spells? I'm wondering what the rationale is for this. The return for the 21 is far better than spiritual by over double, but not after that. That nets an additional 5 CS, while training in minor or major spirit would net 4, along with nifty utilities. 10 spells for 1 CS?

I think you would have exactly the same empath CS if you switched spells to having 26 in each of the others and if you trained one more spell, you would actually be 1 CS ahead if you had 26 in MnS and MjS.

There is definitely an empath CS point gained at 22 and 25 in the other circles, and I think the way the 2/3 level rounding works would give you one at 26 too.

Well, I just trained my empath so I figured I'd check on the CS rounding and see where this happens exactly.

At 70 empath ranks, 20 MnS, and 21 MjS, a CS of 199, increasing MjS by 1 rank raised it by 1.

I went and dropped my MnS by 2, lost 1 CS, raised it by 1, gained 1, brought it back up to 120 for obvious reasons.

Well from what I've seen it just rounds up your CS if it is above a solid point. Has anyone even pinned down the exact bonus of the ranks above 2/3 yet? I recall there being some discussion about it a while back. It is listed as .1 per rank but someone said it was more like .11 or maybe .1111 where they were getting +1 CS every 9 ranks and not 10.

I'm trying to put in the excel formulas for you to figure it out yourself, but the boards aren't cooperating. E me and I'll just send it.

Your wisdom bonus seems to be 12. Ouch. At level 39, if you train 2 more empath spells your CS will be 199. If you train zero empath and 2 major spirit, it will be 199, zero difference and additional MjS CS, which is not insignificant. You're not at the 2/3 threshhold for spiritual spells yet, and I just think it's wise to be there and get the additional benefits from them. You'd benefit a lot more by getting a wisdom bonus enhancer from the adventurer's guild!

>I'll likely do this at the start of the year when I can use silvers to charge up the badge.

It takes trivial amounts of points to keep a badge charged at your level and its silly to put more than one charge in at a time, because you can likely get a better enhancive by the time that charge is used up. Maybe wait till level 40 to allow 4 rather than 3 point enhancive but the points involved are trivial. (e.g. my monk has used 4k on 3 charges which kept his badge charged from mid 20s to level 39)

>Suppose you are level 27 and 2/3rds level is 18. You gain +1 CS at secondary circle ranks 1/4/7/10/13/16 and I believe 19. At what secondary rank do you get the next +1 CS? It is 1 per 10 ranks above 2/3rds level up to level. In this case there aren't 10 levels between 2/3rds level (18) and level (27). If you get one at 19 do you get the next one at 28 (the first rank above level), 29 (10 ranks above the last CS bonus) or some other higher rank? These are the instances that we still don't have enough data.

The way I think this one works is you get 1/4/7/10/13/16 on the basis of 1 per 3 at less than 2/3 level. At 19 you are into the 1 per 10 region and you get the first (and only) one of those at 19. I would then expect that at 28 you are into the 1 per 20 region and you get the first of those at 28 and the next at 48. I don't have the data to prove it though.

>>I've done a lot of misspending and will still easily have enough for a fixstat by the time I cap. I also don't understand placing stats for growth anymore, especially for empaths, unless one doesn't want to do bounties.

My empath gets most of his exp healing right now. I focus more on my main then anyone else, followed by my wizard, my bard, my empath, then any others when I'm in the mood. And while it is easy enough to earn the bps for a fixstat, to me it is a waste of points when I can use those to sell fixskills or fixstats to other people.

To me it also makes more sense that my character gets steadily stronger as he levels instead of being a powerhouse from 0 to cap. And it isn't like I have difficulty hunting him when I do or anything either.

Yes, the badge cost right now would be quite minimal but then so would the gains from it as well.

Just remember that to advance, you don't need to kill Grimswarm exclusively. You can progress in Sunfist by hunting hated enemies, such as trolls and giants. Only one advancement task actually requires you to help raze 5 camps by the time you're ready for rank 15, 1 of which must be razed while you have that task. Even to get credit for the raze, you just need to have injured 5 Grimswarm in that camp and be present when it's set on fire. Beyond that, you can turn in your Sunfist tasks that involve camps and just focus on hated enemies.

GSGuide.net has a fantastic guide to Sunfist, complete with advice in many topics to help you through. http://www.gsguide.net/index.php?title=The_Guardians_of_Sunfist_Guide

Gretchen

Meeting Nilandia: http://www.gsguide.net/index.php?title=Nilandia
Nilandia's GS4 Info Repository: http://www.nilandia.com
AIM: Lady Nilandia