Stage 2 - Shiverpeaks

[Erudite]

I figured it was about time to start a new thread, since I think we're both done with Ascalon and have moved on to Shiverpeaks.

We did pretty well on plot mission #5 last night. I think it's the second mission in a row we've initially failed and had to restart, though - that's a disturbing trend.

Also, on the second run through, just before we picked up the bonus mission, we seemed to have a miscommunication that resulted in your untimely demise. I was still under the impression that you were going to try to draw some of the Stone Summit guys away from the priest so we could deal with them without the heals. Sorry about that.

Speaking of the bonus mission - geez, do you think they could have hidden that any better? I was pretty sure where the drake was - I could see a cluster of red dots on my map with no visible way of getting there, and I could walk INTO that snow pile and see the path beyond. Still, having to dump the powder keg off to the side like that seems...unnecessarily silly.

I'm very glad I swapped out the resurrection signet and replaced it with the resurrection spell. Not having to rely on a morale boost to get that off kept us in the mission a few times. I also learned that, in the event of a near-wipe, I should rez the monk first. She'll heal herself immediately and run, and that seemed to give me the time I needed to rez you and let you get clear so you could recover.

I moved some attribute points around prior to the mission - from water magic, which I ultimately intend to focus on, to fire magic and healing. That seemed to help, as the frost-based things we're fighting are more susceptible to fire, and my spot-heals were more effective. In some of the bigger fights, I found myself healing the monk just to keep her up healing the rest of the melees.

I finished three quests last night (the two completed to walking to Borlis Pass, and the elementalist quest we quickly detoured to on the way), and unlocked five new elementalist skills.

[Raveneye]

I agree, we did pretty well considering the levels of the groups we faced were substantially higher than the levels of our henchmen helpers. Our intial failure was due to a twofold error, the first being our overzealous melee henchmen rushing the dwarf scout and aggroing the Priest rider and his pals, the seocond being my misinterpretation of which classes of dwarf were doing what. I had been killing the riders last, thinking them pure melee, when they were actually the clerics of the bunch. The Howlers were almost as tough, being very skilled necros able to heal themselves and cast draining spells on the entire party. Those guys wiped out our henchies fast in several encounters. Basically, the order of targeting for those groups from this point forward should be Riders (healers), then Howlers (necros), then Sages (ele's), then Scouts and Beastmasters. I had been targeting Howlers first, leaving the Riders to heal them and cause havoc on our HP bars... my mistake. :sad:

That miscue on the "pulling to here" came because the scouts in that group landed a "Cripple" (multipe times actually) on me that acts like a snare. Suddenly I could not back up, and I can't turn around when in melee, so I was in effect pinned for a minute in that position. By the time I realized what was happening, I was way low on HP thanks to the Howlers. I figured better to die than kill the whole group.

I was flummoxed by that Bonus Mission as well. Like you, I figured we needed to blow somethign with the barrels, but after we tried the ice pack several times I was ready to look elsewhere. Afterwards I understood the intent, blow the debris and the snow/ice is free to fall away down the slope clearing the path, but man was that totally not intuitive from where we were standing.

My only rez is the Signet, so I tend to use it either on you or the healer. Usually you since it brings you back full strength, and you can then rez the healer. She has an annoying tendency to attempt a suicide rez like she did with me last night that benefits nobody.

I upgraded my equipment some this morning in an effort to maximize damage output and reduce damage taken. It's not a huge boost, but it will help. I don't seem to have a whole lot of useful skills to swap in and out. Most of my weapon skills are Hammer/Axe, the nice Sword stuff comes later. I could probably drop my Healing Signet (I rarely use it in group play now) for another Necro spell that effects multiple targets.

I completed the two Borlis Pass quests, but still have 4 others out of Yak's to complete. I have a staff head upgrade to give you next time I see you, I salvaged it off a purple staff dropped last night. The gold monster armor that I picked up has a Warrior Major Rune of Absorbtion on it that I'm debating applying to my chest armor. It's a fairly uncommon drop (worth 2.5 plat) and it seems a waste to stick it on class armor that I'll be upgrading soon instead of saving it for some nicer armor down the road.

[Erudite]

It's a fairly uncommon drop (worth 2.5 plat) and it seems a waste to stick it on class armor that I'll be upgrading soon instead of saving it for some nicer armor down the road.

Can it be salvaged with an expert kit for reuse?

--

I played for a while today. With a full group of six (five henchmen), my gang hung in pretty well against the mobs in Traveler's Vale. Some of the bigger groups (more than 6) gave me problems, but all in all the henchmen weren't boneheaded enough to screw it up.

I finished every quest available to me in Yak's Bend. I have one quest from Traveler's Vale that sends me back to Iron Horse Mines, so eventually I'll get to that. There's a big group of snow ettins there - they DO rip through the henchmen pretty handily.

I'm very close to 15 now. If I don't make it before Thursday, completing a plot mission will definitely bump me over. I picked up three monk skills as well. Down to one steel key, though. I have to remember to buy some more.

[Raveneye]

Can it be salvaged with an expert kit for reuse?



I tried this today by placing a lesser rune on a pair of gauntlets I was wearing. When I then attmepted to salvage the gauntlets using an expert kit, I did not get the rune back, only several iron. Thus it appears that once placed, runes are permanant fixtures. Since that is the case, I will not be using the major absorbtion rune until my next round of armor upgrades.

The good news is I found a minor absorbtion rune today, and placed that on my armor. Between the 1 absorbtion I get from the Asclalon boots and the 1 from the minor rune I placed on my chest armor, I now get the equivalent of a major rune.

I too have finished all Yak's Quests and have only the entry quest for the Iron Horse Mines left on my list. There are several quests to get within the mines, so that will be my next stop. I dinged 15th upon successful completetion of the 2nd to last Yak's quest. :lowsmile:

[Erudite]

I crossed over into 15 this morning. The dwarf rescue mission in Iron Horse Mines leads to another mission to Iron Horse Mines to recover some battle plans, which leads to another quest to blow some things up (haven't finished that one yet).

Also, rescuing some Ascalon refugees in Traveler's Vale (harder than I thought it would be) leads to a quest that starts just inside TV and takes you into Ascalon foothills.

So, two more quests in my log at the moment. :p

I saw Gravenstone on this morning as well. Assuming he's planning on joining the Thursday evening plot advancement sessions, we'll have to decide how best to catch him up (logging some time on some alts, going back to missions we've already done, or just waiting).

--

*Edit - One more quest, as I finished blowing things up. Also, I crossed through Iron Horse Mines into Anvil Rock and putzed around there for a bit with the minotaurs (very tough). While doing so, I managed to stumble upon Ice Tooth Cave, a dive of an outpost. A merchant, a banker, and the henchmen, with a collector standing just outside.

Still, it's a nice quick jump right to Anvil Rock and some decent hunting.

I now have two Monk Major Runes of Divine Favor (+2 to divine favor, -50 to health) and 2 Ranger Rune of Minor Expertise (+1 to Expertise), neither of which are useful to me. Divine Favor is the monk attribute only available to monk mains. If they are of use to somebody, hollar.

[GravenStone]

I saw Gravenstone on this morning as well. Assuming he's planning on joining the Thursday evening plot advancement sessions, we'll have to decide how best to catch him up (logging some time on some alts, going back to missions we've already done, or just waiting).

Not to derail you guys here, but as I told Erudite in game, I may ditch (or reroll) Elbereth since I now learn that I missed one of her Ranger trainers and all her additional Mesmer ones pre-Searing. In her stead I have been working on Zyll Tsch (7 necro/undecided). He needs to choose a second class (with attendant added trainer quests) and finish Over the Wall, then it's off to the Searing with him. I'll have a character of some sort ready for storylines by Thursday.

[Raveneye]

You're ahead of me now Erudite, as I have yet to complete any quests within the Iron Horse Mines or put Ice Tooth Cave on my map. I'll probably only get one evening to play this week before the Thursday night mission night.

I think we could probably go back to Ascalon and run through the missions and bonuses with GravenStone's character. Since we've been there done that, it shouldn't take as long, and we're high enough level now to blow through them easily. It won't be much of a challenge for GS with us along, but it will open up the map and let him see all the cinematics and storyline that we've seen (which is apparently less than 20% of the content so far).

I wonder if he'll even get xp off the stuff we kill as a group? I assume he'd get mission and bonus rewards (1000xp) since he doesn't have them completed, but it would be nice if he got kill xp as well since it would help catch him up faster.

Considering the henchmen we use are still only Level 8, getting GS to 10th or so should be enough to allow him to survive on the missons we're currently undertaking. I'd imagine he'd earn more xp on those as well, so eventually he'd catch up level-wise.

I'm also completely willing to set aside a time to "power-level" GS by helping him zip through a few of the more difficult Ascalon quests worth 1,000-2,000 xp each.

[Erudite]

I think we could probably go back to Ascalon and run through the missions and bonuses with GravenStone's character. Since we've been there done that, it shouldn't take as long, and we're high enough level now to blow through them easily. It won't be much of a challenge for GS with us along, but it will open up the map and let him see all the cinematics and storyline that we've seen (which is apparently less than 20% of the content so far).

I guess that's up to him. I mean, I'm willing - but I don't want to cheat him out of fully experiencing the first few missions just so he can catch up with us.

I'm not too worried about powerlevelling him. With the level cap at 20, we're gonna hit it long before we finish the plot missions anyway. We've only done five of them and we're already at 15. We're not even to Kryta yet.

I finished the last mission I had in/around Yak's Bend. I couldn't find any more missions to run, so I think I'm done with Destrid until Thursday. If I play before then, it'll likely be my necromancer/ranger. That, or I'm thinking of trying a warrior/monk (paladin) focused on hammer and smiting prayers. :lowrazz:

[GravenStone]

Well, I sorted out my secondary for this clown - ranger. Now trying desperately to find the other class trainers so he can have access to all his spell types before Searing.

Still not sure what I want to focus on in terms of abilities yet. Halfway to 8th level and he has yet to assign any ability points. :evileye:

With luck, I'll be 8 or maybe even 9 by the time Thursday rolls around, so I might actually be semi-survivable wherever you two are.

[Erudite]

Still not sure what I want to focus on in terms of abilities yet. Halfway to 8th level and he has yet to assign any ability points. :evileye:

These are totally customizable. If you buy levels in something and decide you don't like it, you can sell the levels back for the same amount of points that you spent to get them. You can re-spec your character at any time, so just play with it a bit.

[Raveneye]

With luck, I'll be 8 or maybe even 9 by the time Thursday rolls around, so I might actually be semi-survivable wherever you two are.

You won't be able to travel where we are, as the game won't let you travel to map locations you haven't already uncovered on you own, even if you're grouped with someone who has been there. That's the oddball thing about Guild Wars, rather then traditional "powerleveling" where we'd run around gaining you XP to level you up, instead here we would be running around protecting you from death while escorting you to all the various outposts and towns to uncover your map. Then we'd be escorting you through the missions to uncover plot and open up the next section of gameworld.

You'd need to progress through all 4 Ascalon missions and the first Shiverpeaks mission to catch up to where we are currently. That's not difficult to do, especially if you're already level 9 or 10. It might be less frustrating and more social if we came back and assisted, but you can also do them on your own with henchmen. It's up to you, I'd be happy to help out any way I can to get you up to us and add a third live person to our Thursday night group. :lowsmile:

[Raveneye]

Finished the first two Iron Horse Mine quests last night, and found the entrance to Anvil Rock. Couldn't find the Ice Tooth Cave in the limited time I had left though, so ported back to Yak's instead.

If I have time to play tonight or tomorrow I'll continue with the Iron Horse quests (I think there is at least one more) and try to uncover Ice Tooth Cave. Then Thursday we should be in good shape for the mission or to assist GS, whichever we decide on.

[Erudite]

Couldn't find the Ice Tooth Cave in the limited time I had left though, so ported back to Yak's instead.

If you skirt along the northern edge of Anvil Rock, you'll only have to fight the group of minotaurs right near the zone line along the path north (big group, by the way), and maybe one or two other groups of four before you get there. The entrance is near the northwest corner - look for the green dot that indicates the collector - he's right outside.

After the initial group, I only had one other group to fight. I hugged the northern wall and skirted a few others because I just wanted to look around. I probably could have avoided the one group I did fight if I'd been patient and waited for them to path out of my way.

[Raveneye]

Cool, thanks. I think I went more south, into the meat of the zone.

One funny thing that happened : I encountered a group of several minotaurs shortly after zoning in. They killed my healer pretty fast, and it looked like we might lose a couple more people, so I zoned back to the mines to regroup with the minos on my tail. Amazingly, one of them actually ZONED WITH US and appeared on the Iron Horse Mine side of the zone line! Since he was solo, we defeated him easily, but I'd never seen a mob chase me through a zoneline before.

[Erudite]

Played for a while tonight. I jumped to Anvil Rock and headed south, which lead me to Deldrimor Bowl. Continuing south lead me to Griffon's Mouth, which was filled with snow ettins. Smaller groups, though - usually only three at a time - and a quest to get through it with some soldiers to help, which I accomplished without too much trouble. A named healer gave me a bit of a struggle, but surprisingly not too bad.

The other side was Scoundrel's Rise in Kryta, and a quest to deliver a note detailing the news of (you'll LOVE this, Raveneye!) Price Rurik's demise. Best I can figure, I'm a zone or two (or more) ahead of the plot.

Scoundrel's Rise had gargoylish mobs, level 12 near the zone line.

[Raveneye]

deliver a note detailing the news of (you'll LOVE this, Raveneye!) Price Rurik's demise.

YAY!!! DING DONG THE PRINCE IS DEAD!!! :goodie!: :biggrin:

Something tells me we'll have to endure one last mission with Prince Manic before we're rid of him though...

[Raveneye]

Played some this weekend adding Ice Tooth Cave and Beacons's Perch to the "towns" on my map. I'm halfway through 15th now, but XP is slow in coming as most of the stuff level 9-13 gives me no xp or so little as to be of negligable consequence. There seems to be a marked lack of quests between the bunch available at Yak's Bend and the next stage at Kryta.

I started an alt as well. Cade Keeneye is a Mesmer/Ranger still in Pre-Searing collecting skills. I'm basically using him to kill time and unlock skills for new classes.

[Erudite]

Where is Beacon's Perch? I haven't added that one yet.

[Raveneye]

Beacon's Perch is straight south from the zoneline between Anvil Rock and Deldrimor Bowl. Basically, zone into DB and hug the East wall heading straight south. You'll pass a couple of water areas to the West of you, and then come to a path that rises up East into the mountains. That path leads to Beacon's Perch, a dwarven settlement that contains the usual merchant, bank and henchies. Henchmen there are Level 10 though, so they are a nice upgrade.

[Erudite]

I added Beacon's Perch yesterday, and Gates of Kryta today. I finished the letter delivery quest I had previously received, and the three quests in Beacon's Perch (unlocking two skills each for monk and elementalist).

I'm just over 5000xp short of level 16 still, but the experience in Scoundrel's Rise is decent. So far as I can tell, no quests in Gates of Kryta. :(

[Raveneye]

I am in exactly the same position. All quests out of Beacon's Perch done, letter delivered and about 4-5K shy of 16th. I now have both Frost Gate and Gates of Kryta as "blinkie" mission points on the map, so we've got some work to do when we've got GS caught up. :smile:

[GravenStone]

Looks like I've cleared the Yak's Bend and Traveler's Vale related quests. Not quite halfway through 14. Need the Borlis Pass storyline mission next.

Also, picked up a Lightning Sword Hilt today if you can make use of it, Raveneye. Supposed to add electrical damage. Also got a Poisonous Bowstring, although I've moved away from the bow currently in favor of a casting Cesta (7% chance to halve spell cast time) and an off hand item that boosts Power and AC.

[Raveneye]

Heck yeah, I'll take that sword hilt, thanks! Seems I find tons of hammer hafts, axe heads, staff wrappings and bow strings, but never an actual sword upgrade. I wonder if they program it to intentionally NOT drop the thing you need most? :smile:

[Erudite]

With nothing really catching my attention in EQ, I turned to Guild Wars this evening and ended up having an extremely productive night.

Setting out to explore from Gates of Kryta, I moved through Scoundrel's Rise and into North Kryta Province. I found the Ascalon Settlement in NKP (not a seperate zone, just a collection of huts, some material traders, and a few quest givers). I ran a pickup-and-delivery quest from there into Nebo Terrace, and another that took me back to Scoundrel's Rise to kill some undead - and let me say, by the way, OUCH. Two groups of 3 17th level necromancers to get to the boss, plus three 18th level warriors (with some necromancer abilities). Then the boss guy, Lord Timot - 21st level in all his glory, and I thankfully got his necromantic butt alone because he kept popping bone fiends on me. Ultimately, though, down he went.

Back to NKP, where I meandered south and found another quest giver in the middle of the zone. He just needed me to protect him from some 15th level Nightmares while he transcribed some runes - they spawned in four waves of 2, 2, 3, and 4 - and he rewarded me with some skill unlocks.

Continuing on, I happened upon Lion's Arch, the capital of Kryta and a rather extensive outpost. More quests here, including a couple that took me a short jaunt west to D'Alessio Seaboard - another outpost and another plot mission zone. Oh, and one of the quests here gives a whopping 4000xp reward. I haven't done that one yet.

Somewhere in there, I crossed over into 16th level.

I didn't pick anything up that looks useful for Raveneye, but I do have a few things that might interest GravenStone.

Deadly Cesta
cold damage 9-14 (requires 5 death magic)
halves spell recharge of curse spells (chance: 12%)

Truncheon
dark damage 10-18 (requires 9 blood magic)
halves casting time of blood magic spells (chance: 14%)

Poisonous Longbow of Fortitude
piercing damage 12-21 (requires 7 marksmanship)
damage +11% (while in a stance)
lengthens poison duration on foes by 33%
health +22
(This unlocked a poisonous bowsting and a bow grip of fortitude when I identified it.)

Longbow
piercing damage 13-25 (requires 6 marksmanship)
damage +10% (while in a stance)
received damage -2 (while in a stance)

[Raveneye]

Holy crap man, just when I think I'm caught up with you... :smile:

[Erudite]

Yeah, I either gotta go pay some attention to my N/R pre-searing, or start an alt that keeps my attention better. It's fun to explore and find new things, but it does spoil a few things being ahead of the plot like this.