Many new TLP Guides

Discussion in 'Time Locked Progression Servers' started by AlmarsGuides, Jan 3, 2018.

  1. AlmarsGuides Augur

    Hey everyone, me again!

    So I have been putting together a bunch of new guides recently and I am excited to show you all what I have been working on! I've been trying to do a healthy mix of TLP guides and guides for Live servers so that everyone gets some love but I have been working more on TLP guides than live ones (shh don't tell them).

    Here are some of the guides I have been working my butt off on!

    Thurgadin Velious Group Armor: http://www.almarsguides.com/eq/quests/Velious/ThurgadinArmor/

    OoW Spells Guide: http://www.almarsguides.com/eq/quests/OoW/SpellRunes/

    PoP Spells Guide: http://almarsguides.com/eq/quests/PoP/SpellRunes/

    Heroic Stats Guide (What they do, which ones are useful etc; Phinny players are coming up on SoF and Heroic Stats soon so I wanted to finish this guide before then): http://www.almarsguides.com/eq/gettingstarted/HeroicStats/

    As well as TONS of updates to my Leveling Guides which have been massively lacking for end game TLPs which I am sure many of you know...

    Bastion of Thunder Zone Guide: http://www.almarsguides.com/eq/leveling/PoP/Locations/BastionofThunder.cfm

    Acrylia Caverns Zone Guide: http://www.almarsguides.com/eq/leveling/luclin/Locations/acryliacaverns.cfm

    I'm going to be putting out more Armor Guides for Velious and I will continue rolling out updates to the leveling guides over the next few weeks. If you have a specific guide request go ahead and post it here to let me know!
  2. qweasy Augur


    Tinkering!
  3. Guzzle Augur


    We have had heroic stats since Luclin, technically (Was there any before? I can't remember at this point).. AHR Neck (http://everquest.allakhazam.com/db/item.html?item=13340) is the only item I remember in-era, with +6 hstr.

    Planes of Power is when you start to see a decent amount on gear, I think starting with Plane of Time P2+ loot (I don't think any elemental planes have it any heroic stats?).

    Gates of Discord / Omens you can cap all of them (probably at the same time in GoD, but definitely all at the same time in Omens, well.. all that CAN be capped.)

    Heroic Strength should also be important for melee DPS, though I guess you could argue it isn't "top 3" depending on how you feel about the bonuses, and how accurate Allakhazam actually is. For the people that use shields, it should also be marked as important for +AC with shield.
  4. Darchon_Xegony Augur

    50-68 - Flameless Lantern
    68-102 - Stalking Probe
    102-122 - Powered Gloves
    122-135 - Tinkered Catapult (needs Fletching)
    135-215 - Geerlok Automated Hammer (farm Acrylia)
    215-282 - Molten Metal Bow Cams (farm PoFire and forage PoInnovation)
    282-288 - Crab Cracker
    288-300 - Wok

    That's for an Agnarr type server with PoP eventually. Really no reason to raise beyond 270 or so especially if you get a Shei Robe or Geerlok/GM trophy.
    snailish and Chatoyan like this.
  5. Baldur Augur

    Also on heroic stats you say the soft cap is 1000, it's not even close to that if you're talking about heroic mods.

    It's 35 for most of the mods, but not always. It's 38 hdex for accuracy, but 34 hagi for avoidance. It's around 35 for everything though.

    If you're talking about the non mod stuff, then maybe you're right, I don't know, but it's going to be quite a long time before we're anywhere near those levels for it to even be a concern on TLPs. Right now in DoN on Phinny if you have over 50 of an hstat you've focused on getting gear with that stat on it or have auged it as much as you can.
  6. AlmarsGuides Augur

    These are random heroics they added to gear in turn for taking off the Mod 2s; more info about this below. Also you're completely wrong about Heroic Strength being important for melee DPS. It's not - maybe TLPers are misconstrued about this but no one on live focuses on Heroic Strength and if they do they're correctly so told by all their guildies to change their focus. Allakhazam is completely inaccurate for most of their Heroic stat knowledge which is why I made a guide for it. (Note: I am saying Heroic Strength isn't important to FOCUS on - the version of Heroic stats you see now on Phinny is NOTHING like what happens when Heroic Stats are actually added into the game during SoF; the two can't really accurately be compared... That's why in my original post I said "when" heroics are added, implying what you guys have now aren't Heroic Stats they're mod 2s.)

    You're slightly right about Heroic strength for shields; it works differently than how you state it though.


    The caps probably work differently on TLPs than it does on Live which is why I haven't put in values for them (because I havent experimented that much). As you can see in the screen shot I used for Heroic Stats I have well over 200 of each Heroic Stat on the character I took the picture on. He's a level 100 in non prestige TBM gear. He's no where near capping out most of the mod 2s. Unless we have different definitions of what capping it out is.

    I'd welcome a discussion on Heroic Stats though if I am wrong about certain aspects of them - most of the online information about Heroic Stats is dead wrong so I am trying to make a guide with the most up to date correct information on all of them.
  7. AlmarsGuides Augur


    You rock! I'll have to bookmark this thread and keep your list on hand when I do tradeskills. They're getting a complete rehaul next after I finish leveling information. Ring of Scale introduced new caps on Tradeskills which needs some attention & while i do that I plan to fill in the blanks for older expansions as I go.

    On that same note I will probably be putting out Alchemy and Posioncrafting Guides as well as updating Research all around the same time
  8. Baldur Augur

    Not sure what you mean by "when" heroics are added. Heroic stats work exactly the same on TLPs as they do on live servers.

    The soft cap for each Heroic Mod (or mod2 as you're calling them) is 35 for almost everything. Once you hit 35 then you need like 400 to get the next benefit from that mod.

    I think what you're missing is that heroic stats also increase your stat cap. So heroic strength will increase your melee dps, because it increases your strength. It might not be by much, but it does increase it.
  9. Guzzle Augur

    Heroic stats are still heroic stats. Are they not "real" heroic stats because we can't get hundreds of the stats right now? Mod2's don't exist anymore, everything is just a heroic stat whether you think it's a "real" heroic stat or not.

    Per your note:
    Heroic Strength: Increases Endurance, Endurance Regen & Endurance Regen Cap. Improves the percentage of AC that gets tranfered from your shield to be used for damage mitigation. It also improves melee attack damage (minimally... very minimally)

    So, you change it to say "Minimally... very minimally", but you don't address anything about it. Why should we take YOUR word for it, over Allakhazam? Do you have any data, parses, tests, etc to dispute that it is actually important for melee? From the formula's I have seen, 10 pts = 1 pt of damage. Is that damage added to your weapon(s)? Is that incorrect altogether? I haven't parsed it myself, but if you're focusing on DPS... Agility isn't going to do anything to help you DPS more, except for possibly avoiding damage... that you should be avoiding anyways by not pulling agro. Dex and Str are the only two things that will help your DPS when it comes to heroics. Minimally? Again, I'd like to see the data on that - as of now you're asking us to blindly trust your guide(s) with no supporting information as to why we should trust that. I'm not saying you're wrong, just that I'm skeptical in general.

    Perhaps that's true, that right now is nothing like in the future when heroics aren't just translated mod 2's... but does that really matter? If you want it to be relevant for a TLP, you should maybe put some era-based differences in there? Is +10 (or more, obviously) hstr GOOD in our era right now? Does it become less good later? Why? Again, I'd be interested to see the data behind it - not just "trust me, it isn't". This is data that would be relevant for the entire lifespan of Agnarr, and for multiple years on future TLP's.

    Okay, can you expand upon this, then? Per your description, it says the "percentage of AC from shield for mitigation" etc... I was under the impression that, from game mechanics standpoints, shield AC was the only actual piece of equipment that gives you a 1:1 display AC -> actual AC transfer (and have seen it on the character sheet displayed as such). Can you explain how it actually works, with data to back it up?

    I appreciate your guides, and I think they're very helpful, but in this particular instance in reference to heroic stats... I want to see more of what validates what you say. I am not saying you are wrong, by any means, because most of it is pretty spot on from my knowledge and experience - but I think it would be great to rely on the hard data to support your reasoning instead of your reputation.

    Thank you for your contributions, and taking the time to discuss!
  10. Baldur Augur

    I think the big problem for most people is the "hidden" stats that heroics give. Like hdex increases crit chance or hint/hwis increases mana regen.

    For the mana regen you can actually see it on your character sheet, but for crit chance, it's not visible at all. So when someone says, "hdex increases crit chance", we just have to take your word for it because there is nothing visible in the game that tells us that. I'm sure there's a post by a dev somewhere at some time in the past about it, otherwise how would the players know that it does that?

    I'm with Guzzle on this, the only thing as a melee dps that you can do heroic stat wise to increase your dps is hdex and hstr. And right now on TLPs you are limited in what you can get to increase those stats. You shouldn't be pulling aggro during raids anyways, so to me hdex and hstr are more important than any other heroic stat for a melee dps. It's not like there's enough augs to have to choose anyways, you could have all the hdex and hstr augs in the game up to DoN and still not have much to choose from, you'll just aug them all.
  11. AlmarsGuides Augur

    I dont consider them real heroic stats on the TLPs because they added those heroics to replace what used to be the Mod 2s. I'm not using my opinion on this, I am using the facts. Heroic stats were added in SoF if there are Heroic stats prior to that expansion the gear was obviously changed at a later date - which it was.


    Last I checked allakhazam doesn't have any parses either to back up what they say. Why are you blindly trusting allakhazam but demanding evidence from me?

    I've heard the same formula as you, 10 Heroic STR = 1 point of damage but that's 1 point of damage. That's not even very minimally... That's just garbage. People are burning for over 1 million now - 1 damage isn't going to make anyone focus on Heroic Strength when they could instead get more dex and improve their chances to crit which would multiple their damage 1000x more than 1dmg. The reason Heroic Strength isn't focused is because everything else is better. People argued about this same point for YEARS after Heroic Stats were introduced, if you're so eager to walk down the same road they all did and focus heroic STR for the minimal gains I am sure there are dozens of old arguments you can google and pull parses from. Maybe I will add a few to my website, I didn't expect TLPers to be this confused about what Heroics did =X .. I totally expected people would be mad at me for saying Heroic Dexterity isn't what melee should focus on (which a lot of raiders would throw feces at me for saying such nonsense) ... I totally didn't expect to have a long winded argument about a Heroic Stat as useless as HSTR =P

    Heroic AGI would be better because bosses ramp, raid events summon adds and there are always going to be instances where you take a solid punch to the face. I still prefer Heroic stam over Heroic AGI though as Heroic Stam helps with ALL damage *not* just melee damage.


    The guide is meant to start when SoF starts. Prior to that I am very ignorant on Heroic Stats because they obviously are being used differently than when they were originally introduced into the game. They were added originally because everyone hit stat caps and they wanted a way to increase your stats beyond the cap without raising the cap. Also my guide kind of addresses what you asked, I point out that all Heroic Stats are worth focusing on enough to get the Mod2s/Heroic Mods. That's about the extent of Heroic Strengths usefulness as far as most people are concerned on live.

    My guide links to Dzarn's posts where he explains AC in detail and how it works. I'm fuzzy on this one aspect of Heroic Strength too and I was actual told to add it to my guide by a close friend who reviewed it. See, on live Heroic Strength is the redheaded step child of all heroics. If you ask people half of them will say Heroic Strength's AC component is broken and the other half of them will tell you it gives you more AC... I haven't met anyone who argues that Heroic Strength improves DPS though..

    The way it was explained to me is it: "cause people think it actually gives you ac
    it improves the percentage of AC on your shield that gets transferred into actual damage mitigation"
  12. AlmarsGuides Augur

    I'm going to assume the reason people on the TLPs are focusing more on HSTR is because they can't get any other Heroic, as you guys are stating. I've seen a few HSTR augs while playing on Lockjaw but I generally avoid them like the plague like I do on live... Maybe I should actually buy them and do some testing. Also for people on the TLPs 1 damage actually does do something while on live 1 damage does virtually nothing; probably another reason you guys think HSTR has so much value.

    As for the "hidden" stats - the majority of bonuses that Heroics give are "hidden". I agree with you it's a real pain in the butt which is why there is so much confusing surrounding Heroic Stats, what ones are useful and which ones aren't.

    The last thing I'll say is it seems you guys are all forgetting about adds on raids as well as AoE spells and other things that cause your character's to take damage... If you pull agro from a raid boss you're gonna die anyway most likely regardless of how much Heroic AGI you got on your characters. You *should* be focusing more on Heroic Stam/keeping your character alive from things on raids that *actually* happen. Like AoEs, attacks from adds, you getting put on the Rampage list... yadda yadda.
  13. taliefer Augur

    once mod2s are maxed, all heroics are kinda meh. you need chunks of either 10 or 25 to see any improvement.

    hdex does increase your crit chance, kinda. it increases it because it increases your standard dex cap, and dex has a minuscule effect on your crit chance. dex has absolutely 0 effect on your accuracy (not the accuracy mod, your atk accuracy. hdex gives you mod2 accuracy) which you can actually see in game by raising and lowering your dex. your accuracy atk will never change.

    EQ tooltips are inaccurate in many ways, they arent really a trustworthy source. i have no idea why the tooltip for dex says it increases your chance to land an attack. dex also does not raise your offense atk, which determines how much damage you do, despite the tooltip saying it does. ive also never seen my endurance regen go up no matter how many heroic stats i have, on any server. either on the character sheet, or by watching endurance tick up.
  14. Guzzle Augur

    I'm not blindly trusting Allakhazam, at all, because I have found them to be inaccurate as well on some things - but there are no other sources.

    Is that 1 point of damage to your WEAPON DAMAGE, or say you would have hit for 1097, but with 10 hstr you hit for 1098? That is a HUGE difference. 2 damage augs with anguish gear make a 60+ DPS difference on just an off-hand weapon itself. Especially if you can stack up to 50 hstr, that's a 5 damage aug, if it affects weapon damage. On live that is insignificant, sure, but this is a TLP...

    That makes sense... on live, which isn't a TLP. Are people burning for 1 million in SoF, when this guide is supposed to start?

    Is crit chance from dex ALWAYS additive? Or does it cap?


    No one is necessarily confused about what heroics do, they just are very different - NOW - than live. You're talking about content a year+ out from now.

    I'm not mad about saying heroic dex isn't what a melee should focus on, but you definitely should cap it for accuracy purposes.

    I don't think HSTR is useless to people this guide is supposedly made for - TLPers. TLP's have heroics before "heroics are put in"... and should not be ignored because they are just making up for mod2 removal. I think if you're making this **FOR TLP's**, that you should make it for TLP's and discount current live content. Just my opinion, but as I said, I certainly appreciate it.
  15. taliefer Augur

    hSTR borderline useless. its 1 point of damage per 10, not 1 weapon damage
  16. AlmarsGuides Augur


    Me either, I was a bit perplexed when I seen basically every information site on Heroic Stats say it increased endurance and endurance regen. One of them even said that one of the heroic stats increased the distance you can fall before suffering a fatal fall ... Which was total news to me and makes no sense at all cause I have jumped off the Evantil tree dozens of times and the only factor in me dying or not was FPS/server lag =P



    You should know this already if you're advocating so much for Hstr! Obviously if it was 1 weapon damage that would be a huge difference. Also 5 weapon damage is hugely significant on live.


    Basically I can summerize this with Phinigel isnt the center of the universe and you're acting like it is. The guide says in the first sentence that "Heroic stats were added in the Secrets of Faydwer expansion pack" that should make it abundantly clear when the guide is supposed to become relevant. Phinigel is coming up on when the guide is meant to be relevant. I didn't write the guide FOR your server I wrote it FOR Secrets of Faydwer because that's the expansion it's relevant for. You're misunderstanding the word TLP; TLP doesn't mean Phinigel TLP means Time Locked Progression server which there are many of. What about Fippy? This guide would be relevant for them!

    And I honestly am not even sure what your argument is aside from the fact that you seem offended that I have said Heroic Strength isn't worth focusing on. The guide already says what you want it to say - that all heroics are worth getting to cap out your Heroic Mods. Which obviously is relevant to people on Phinigel and makes perfect sense. You have Heroic Strength available to you -- so get it!! I'm not arguing with you. In fact you even convinced me to get the Hstr LDoN augs on my Lockjaw tanks for the Heroic Mods. I'ma test it out.

    You're arguing that I should say Heroic Strength is useful cause that's all you can currently get on Phinigel right now... But that doesn't make Heroic Strength useful. In fact they're probably giving you guys Heroic Strength so early on solely because of how *not* useful it is. If they gave you guys more Hdex and Hagi than Hstr it would make a much larger difference.

    This is the reason I wrote the guide though, because of the confusion I have seen on Lockjaw about Heroic Stats. Someone said in general awhile ago that Heroic Dexterity was good because it improved Bow Accuracy and I said oh dear lord I need to write Heroic Stat Guides. Not because he was wrong - but because Heroic Dexterity does so much more useful stuff than improve bow accuracy (which rangers stop using bows real soon and start meleeing as their melee DPS starts to take off around Heroic Stats being introduced).
  17. AlmarsGuides Augur

    Old thread debating Hstr/Hdex and the damage differences between them:


    http://www.thesafehouse.org/forums/...ck-alley/38059-heroic-stats-and-impact-on-dps

    Stat Consolidation Patch Notes talking more about Heroic Stats:

    https://forums.daybreakgames.com/eq...u-may-2016-patch-preview.232498/#post-3430009

    Heroic Stats for Pure Melee Daybreak Thread:

    https://forums.daybreakgames.com/eq/index.php?threads/heroic-stats-for-a-pure-melee.209463/


    And I could link more but I have other guides I would like to write. Basically if you google "Heroic Strength vs Heroic Dexterity Everquest" every poster I've read universally agrees focusing on Heroic Dex over Heroic STR. In fact I don't even see many people saying "get Heroic Strength too" just "get Heroic Dex"

    I also added an addendum to my website that Heroic Strength is worth getting prior to SoF for melee DPS as there are no alternatives for you at that time.
  18. Guzzle Augur

    I don't mean for it to come off that way, at all, in fact heroic stats are already on Ragefire/Lockjaw and coming soon for Agnarr. I'm not acting like Phinny is the center of the universe, but it certainly is the most progressed relevant server as it pertains to heroic stats.

    Again, you keep saying that heroic stats were added in Secrets of Faydwer, which is true. When heroic stats were introduced, did they retroactively change mod2's at the same time, or were those changed at a later date? If they were changed at the same time, I would argue that heroic stats in SoF are simply just mod2's that were instead implemented as heroic stats, and all existing items that used the mod2's were translated into heroic stats. Just because it was introduced in a certain expansion, doesn't make that the only expansion it is relevant for.

    Fippy is officially dead, with the final guild still to be raiding there ceasing operations as of two weeks ago. While you're not wrong, the 0 players that play there will likely not utilize the guide. I would think that (in general) the guides should be more oriented towards people on the earlier TLP's for a base level understanding of heroic stats - many of the players weren't around for heroic stat introduction.

    I am not offended by anything you have put out, I am simply arguing for expansion upon the "why" or "why not". In my opinion, guides should provide as much information as possible to not only give players referencing them a nudge in the right direction, but something to chew on and perhaps take further through their own curiosity. I am, by my nature, a very curious person. I am not arguing against the accuracy of anything you have said (except that heroic stats aren't on Phinny, or other early timeline TLP's), I am simply asking for more information that you used to draw your conclusions for my own personal knowledge, as well as the knowledge of others. I am only trying to open the discussion!

    Perfect! I'd be interested to see what you come up with.

    I think that is kind of a silly stance to take, though, and not at all what I'm really arguing for. I'm saying that "every little bit helps" if you're trying to min/max. You can argue how much it really adds, which is fine, but it depends what your goals are. We actually do have more hDex and hAgi right now, I believe, than hStr. However, is there any benefit of being over the 35ish cap on hAgi before you can hit 400? Like, is there a difference between 35 and 399 hAgi? I know hStr / hSta / hDex will continue to benefit you for every single point, as a melee DPS. I think that would be interesting to look at. I would assume hAgi continues to be beneficial by way of increasing your AC from the natural Agi cap increase - is that accurate? Any other benefits, hidden or in plain view? I would contest that this is important information for the guide - but it also depends on how in depth you really want to go with it.


    I absolutely get it, and I think you're right - a lot of people (even on Phinny, which is my TLP experience and what I'm speaking from, obviously) don't understand the full benefits of heroic stats and how important each individual one is - especially the more survival oriented stats for casters. The inspiration for your guide - to address heroic stats due to the confusion you've seen on Lockjaw - seems to counter the idea that the guide is for SoF+.. simply because the availability of stats is vastly different, and through the era's things will change to a degree. Suddenly, it's not about pushing as much of one particular stat as you can, but about getting your caps on everything and then pushing particular stats - is that correct? I'm legitimately asking because I haven't played far enough into the timeline to really know if 400 hAgi adding another point of something makes a huge difference, or if those stats are better focused from elsewhere.

    A vast amount of what I'm discussing (not even necessarily arguing!) comes from my desire to obtain more knowledge, not to question the information you have provided as if I have some superior level of understanding - I am simply a curious person and as someone who DOESN'T know everything there is to know, and also thinks the guide could be slightly modified to explain the difference between current TLP's (future ones as well) and later in the game would be invaluable. These are mainly questions I've come up with after reading the guide, and having my (potentially incorrect) existing knowledge of heroic stats not match up 1:1 - and that is OKAY, I have no problem being wrong at all, I am just curious and want to know more.
  19. Baldur Augur

    Every 20 points of agility is 1 avoidance AC, so yes, from 35 to 399 hagi will benefit you, but very little.

    The mod2s were combined into heroic stats in the May 2016 patch, so almost 2 years ago is all.
    https://www.everquest.com/news/may-2016-patch-preview

    I think the reason Guzzle and I are arguing against what's in the guide is because we feel it isn't accurate for TLPs, and not just Phinny. I understand heroic stats were added in SoF, but with the May 2016 heroic stat change they are now very abundant from PoP onwards. I feel like the guide should take that into consideration.

    It's also about min/maxing and the raid scene at least through DoN. For melee dps you just don't take that much AE damage or get hit by adds much at all, so if you're min/maxing you'd want hdex and hstr. Sure you should prefer hdex over hstr, but at this point in any open TLP that has players actually playing on it you really don't have that luxury. You can however choose to aug hstr over hagi or hsta, which if you're min/maxing I feel you should.

    What would be great is if a dev went through and told us exactly what each heroic stat did and how much X points of it affected what it did, but that's just a pipe dream I suppose. If we knew exactly what hstr did to damage and how many points it took to do it, and the same with hdex and crit chance, we could make a more informed decision. I think though to know for sure we'd also need to know everything the same non-heroic stat does as well. Like how much does strength actually affect damage and in what way?
    Guzzle likes this.
  20. jeskola pheerie