Hey guys! I've been ejoying the quests of the expansion and have leveled nicely along the way (currently 86). I've been harvesting my little heart out and only came upon one rare.(where the heck are peeps getting all the rares!). My bank account can't handle the cost of buying the rares for all spells of each level. All my T8 are mastered. I'm a sage also so can make my own spells but then again should I buy the T9 Journeyman ones that I can find then work on the Expert level? From Xalmat's post about what spells to master: Fiery Magician (unless you can get your mythical) Earthen Avatar (if you spend most of your time solo that is) Crystal Blast Blazing Manifestation Elemental Unity Plane Shift Earthquake Shattered Tectonics Solidify Torrent Winds of Velious Vampire Bats Less important ones, but still needed, are: Conjuror's Pact Antagonize (unless you have your Mythical) Defensive Haven Geoticism Sediment Master's Intervention Reconstruct Servant Lowest priority: Expire Communion Pyro Aqueous Serpents Elemental Aspect Magma Seed Infernoshield Wind Sensei Vehement Skin Should I use this list to attack my Journeyman then Expert order? All suggestions are appreciated! *edited to remove a duh question*
Personally if you are t8 mastered I wouldnt bother with the experts at this time unless you need to research them into a master. There is only a teeny tiny difference between the two, so if you can hold out I would. I might be wrong tho...so if someone has a good reason on upgrading would love to hear it I am just holding out for masters and researching them as I go since I am all t8 specced atm. The only ones I did expert on were the mage pet and the tank pet, since they will be researched first and the myth is outleveled.
Lady Shai wrote: Agreed. The one exception is pets: Get them expert ASAP. My Research Assistant order is as follows, which is a little different than the above (Crystal Blast is your Grandmaster choice): Top Priority: * Fiery Magician * Earthen Avatar * Blazing Avatar * Elemental Unity * Plane Shift * Fiery Annihilation * Shattered Earth * Earthquake * Ice Storm * Winds of Velious * Vampire Bats * Petrify Second Priority: * Conjuror's Pact * Geotic Rune * Heal Servant * Sacrifice Bottom Priority: * Everything else * Aery Hunter (very last spell)
Thanks for the quick responses! I feel less pressured to get all them rares. PHEW! Question tho I solo 99% of the time. so would the order still be to get the Fiery Magician then the Earthen Avatar ? Or do I move that down to the last of the top priorities?
Which pet do you use more? Mage pet now with the buffs to survivability is a perfectly viable (and imo fun) solo option so if you solo with mage pet then that should be priority one. If you solo with tank pet exclusively and dont use mage pet at all though then tank pet should be your main priority. Just focus on whatever pets you get the most use out of. But you know even if you solo 99% with only the tank pet, I'd still get mage pet somewhere in there so that if you do group with someone that 1% of the time you'll still have a decent dps option available to you. My two cents anyways.
Day-to-day soloing of non-heroic mobs is easily accomplished with the Mage pet if you ask me. Only when I'm soloing heroics do I use the Tank pet anymore.
Xalmat wrote: My bad...I did mention that I was doing that and should have made that a bit more clear to the OP that they should do same. Personally I don't bother with the air pet...only the mage and the godawful fugly tank pet. I solo mostly with the mage and use the tank on heroics as well. Thanks for the catch! Remember tho, no. 3 on Xalmat's list is Crystal Blast...that is also a GM choice so you don't really have to worry bout Mastering that one if you chose it.
The other downside to "upgrading" to T9 Expert is that they use more power than their T8 counterpart.
Katryna@Lucan DLere wrote: Actually they don't use more power, at least not significantly. They just have a smaller power pool. However it's not really a major issue.
(( Whilst I agree with most of what is being said here, I must give the opposite advice to to that given by some regarding upgrading spells in a new tier. Firstly, note that getting Expert spells is *very* easy, and can be done solo, so it is possible for every player. You can harvest the rares yourself for a single level for one character in a couple of hours on average, and sell any other rares you find. Yes, it is random, and you may be unlucky one day, but on average your rare-pull rate will make this quite achievable. There is a reason why harvesters make such a huge amount of coin! Alternatively, make the coin yourself in your favourite way, and buy the rares (or even the spells, if you don't have a friendly guild Sage) directly from the broker. Secondly, if you do not have the master for the previous tier, the Expert spell in the new tier will be a significant upgrade. Even if you do have the master from the previous tier, the new tier expert is still often at least a very small upgrade in most regards. This is not 100% true I know, especially not at the level that the spell is first attained, but it is often true. You may think "well, I don't care about being 5% weaker", well, many of us want to make the best of what we have, and 5% is 5%. Since it is so easy to get, well why not? Thirdly, every spell you have at Expert is then "ready" to be researched at Master level (you cannot research a spell master unless you already have the Expert). Over the period of this level cap remaining the level cap, which might be 1 or even 2 years, you will likely get to research many masters. Having the Expert ready and scribed is one step on that path. Add to all this, for those who like me love to be "completionists" on things like this, I know it will feel much better at level 90 when my characters all have all 81-90 abilities/spells at at least Expert! So, personally, when or before any of my characters gets a new level, I make sure I have the Expert quality spell ready for scribing very soon thereafter. It just keeps the characters at the best upgraded state. Anyway, just thought I'd put that out there. ))
Right, usually but not always is the t9 expert a little better than the t8 master. I dinged 85 and noticed that my pet was blue (I don't have the upgraded spell list so it was a surprise). I quickly and excitedly got my t9 expert mage pet (after paying through the nose for a kabotite cluster ~ 18P) and got the stupid looking (imo) fearstalker pet (I think that's what it is) and did a possess minion on it to see the difference. To my horid surprise, he is less than my t8 magician! But, I still needed to get the expert so I can set my research assistant to work on it. So until I get the master i will continue to use the t8 pet--I will cast the t9 after eacg ding and see if he eventually surpasses the t8 one. Also, I am really loving the mage pet to solo since the expansion. He was way too easy to be killed before. Now I am having so much fun having him out soloing.
How so? lvl 85 pet has 3 more int points compared to the 84 pet. In all other stats the 84 is supperior--550 more health, 140 more power, and 41 more max primary/secondary damage, and even more power and health regen. ( I took screen shots while possessed). Oh wait! I did not look at the damage produced by the spells themselves! I will have to check those. Then I will test this out. I will take them somewhere (maybe to the lava beach) and see if there is a noticable difference in the time it takes to kill. I would really like to see the new 85 expert pet be even a little bit better than the 84 master--pretty bogus if it is not the case.
For one thing the pet ignores its own INT and goes off your int. Second, and more importantly, Level is the very first check in resist checks. Higher level = less resists.
So I happened upon a Crystal Blaster master book, do you guys think its worth taking the downgrade to master and GM something else? What do your opinion #2 GM choice is, FA?
Chmod@The Bazaar wrote: While I personally like FA a lot, I think that CB is a better choice now. If you don't have the Master version of FA yet, I'd say get the GM version of FA and scribe the CB Master. Once you get ahold of a FA Master, switch around - go with CB GM (respecs should be cheap for those lines) and scribe the FA Master.
Xalmat wrote: Whoa. Wait a sec. The pet bases his damage of MY INT? I can't believe that. It may be the dumbest thing I've ever heard. If this is true, there is no reason (ever) to use the pet offensive stance. Offensive stance increases pet INT, Haste and probably skills while decreasing defense. Defensive stance gives him a Ward and greater defense while decreasing INT (who cares, right?). Am I missing something?
Banditman wrote: You missed some of the changes from TSO then Pets now base their damage off the caster's Int. THis was done to improve the relationship between gear upgrades and pet upgrades - increasing your own Int now improves the pet's damage. And also since a few GUs before TSO, pets now share our crit mit. And yep, the offensive stance is now useless for the mage pet - only good for melee pets as it increases the attack speed.
