Talk about how overpowered your build is.

[Xilren's Twin]

With a bit of running around it's possible to split the medusa's. I went up the right side, then ran back when I had agro from the nearest and the other 2 went back to their spots leaving me  able to kill the rightmost one solo. However, when you get to crete, you are in for a world of pain. The automata in front of the labrinth is basically unkillable by my war/storm hybrid. He has two stun attacks and basically keeps my guy chain stunned. He also hits for half my life often. At that point I packed in my melee guy and went back to my caster. Supposedly you can just run around him and into the labrinth but that sucks.

I just did the medesua's yesterday with my 31 War/Stm and they kicked my ass 4 times.  I had to split them off 1 by 1 and while that worked fine, this does not give me good feeling for the harder stuff to come.

BTW, anyone going to running some trading MP games this weekend?

Xilren

[Miasma]

I really can't bring myself to play through this again, I got disinterested after beating the gorgons on legendary as well.  Maybe it's my slayer build.  All I do is click and hold on enemies, I should have rolled a pet class.  If they let me keep my portals so that I could go to Asia and farm the jade set maybe I would keep playing.

[Alkiera]

Just started playing yesterday as a Pyromancer (haven't hit level 8 yet to get a 2nd mastery). I have heavily invested in Ring of Flame, since it seems to make all the week swarming mobs go away quickly. I am starting to wonder how viable it is going to be later in the game though, since I am not going to want to be in melee range of things too often. Is that the case? How gimped am I?

I started a Pyro recently, and picked up this skill eventually.  You want the child skill to it tho, which increases the range to 3.0m, and adds a 3s burn component... gets rid of annoying birds quite readily.  And with Earth Enchantement running, it ups the damage of the ring notably...  For undead areas, I've been known to summon my Core, then just run all over the place, not even casting, just gathering stuff up and then running circles around it while the core beats on it.  I'm pretty confident I'm doing more damage than he is, tho.  Stuff dies before he even gets to it, unless it's a special type undead, like the yellow 'rogue', 'captain', etc.

Then again, I've got +15% fire damage on my staff, and a bracer set with +20% elemental dmg.  With Earth Enchantment up, my lil fire ring has got to be doing some silly damage.  Currently working on gathering essences of Promethius' Flame, to make things really silly.

I'm an Avenger, Earth/Hunting.  Currently all I have from hunting is the herbal lore.

--
Alkiera

[WayAbvPar]

I have 6/8 points in it at level 14 (I think), and I consider it points well spent. Like you mentioned- I can just run laps around my Core Dweller and do tons of damage.

Also- I  Volcanic Orb. There is no end to the amusement I get from lobbing one of them into a tightly packed group of skeletons and watching them go into orbit in mutiple pieces.

[Alkiera]

Also- I  Volcanic Orb. There is no end to the amusement I get from lobbing one of them into a tightly packed group of skeletons and watching them go into orbit in mutiple pieces.

YES.  Or even living things, who fly into the air in wild poses before hitting the ground with a solid 'thunk'.

I like to use it at close range primarily... gather up a big mob, and throw the orb at the leader... ideally, everything goes up at once... and then comes down dead.   

--
Alkiera

[Fabricated]

I just picked up the game about 3 days ago. I get to play it for like 2 more days and then I'm off to cali to visit my brother.

Got a level 14 Warfare/Defense guy and I'm enjoying it a lot. I'm wondering if I've gimped myself since I haven't put a single point into health or energy, just strength and dexterity. I got the defense skill that lowers armor requirements maxed out, which is really helpful.

[Tebonas]

I've never put a single point into health and energy up until the 30s with my Warfare/Defense guy, and then I only did so because I had so many of them that I wanted to use up some of them. Don't worry.

[Fabricated]

This game needs a Diablo II item stash big time. My friends are picking up the game and it's getting annoying holding the blues I find. I managed to luck out and find the Thebian Bracers and just now a Brimstone ring (Fire resists, like 4 different effects that add more fire damage in some way, awesomeness), but I have some cloth/hunterish blues clogging my bag.

Can you even get online with your offline characters? I haven't bothered with the net portion of the game yet.

[Alkiera]

This game needs a Diablo II item stash big time. My friends are picking up the game and it's getting annoying holding the blues I find. I managed to luck out and find the Thebian Bracers and just now a Brimstone ring (Fire resists, like 4 different effects that add more fire damage in some way, awesomeness), but I have some cloth/hunterish blues clogging my bag.

Can you even get online with your offline characters? I haven't bothered with the net portion of the game yet.

I have a brimstone ring on my Avenger(earth/hunting), it is luv.

Characters from offline work just fine in online games, just like d2.

[Yegolev]

I might complain about not having a stash if TQ didn't provide a much-larger inventory.

[Alkiera]

Got the the end of Greece, got whooped by the Minotaur guy.  Ran around a bit, leveled up again, beefed up pet another skill level... and this time, when I went in, he'd wandered off to the left... so I walked right, and my pet agro'd on the fire tower, which we killed.  He then chased down the 2nd right fire trap, and we killed it.  Right around the time it exploded, the Mino got a clue, and attacked.  I tried several tactics, letting my pet tank while I staff'd it to death, some running around, letting pet die and resummoning... running around while letting the summon timer work it's way down after having pet die again...

When I came upon the most stupid tactic ever, which, of course, worked.  I had the Mino's attention, my newly summoned pet was beating on it, but not getting agro.  So, I just run around the pair in tight circles, letting ring of fire/molten metal do it's thing, and distracting the Mino... who has a hard time hitting in melee because I have a bunch of +def gear.  So my pet hit the debuffed Mino easily with earth-enchantment buffed attacks, and I ran around looking like an idiot, thumbing my nose at a giant minotaur.  It took awhile, as the Core doesn't have nearly my levels of dps... but it did die eventually.

If it's stupid, but it works... it's still stupid looking.

--
Alkiera

[Strazos]

Welcome to EQ. A few bards would like to talk to you, over in 1998.

[Alkiera]

Welcome to EQ. A few bards would like to talk to you, over in 1998.

Actually, most of those bard tactics(charm kiting, etc) didn't come around for some time after release, often depending on 50+ level songs... with the exception of Bellow kiting, which I suppose also took forever and looked dumb, but worked(and could be done at level 12).  Eh, maybe that's what you meant.

--
Alkiera

[Dren]

I don't mind having to kite certain enemies.  I do mind when I have to kite ALL enemies.  There will obviously be some builds that cannot stand toe-to-toe with some creatures.  It makes sense to develop a different stategy, although silly looking, to prevail.

[Yegolev]

All the great heroes from Greek myth were cheeseballers.  Clean the stables by running a river through them?  I'm sure that's not what the puzzle designer had in mind, sploiter.

[Alkiera]

I don't mind having to kite certain enemies.  I do mind when I have to kite ALL enemies.  There will obviously be some builds that cannot stand toe-to-toe with some creatures.  It makes sense to develop a different stategy, although silly looking, to prevail.

True.  It's nice that my tactics change based on enemy types.  Some I can ignore, they're so weak they'll die to my ring of fire before doing me much damage.  Others can be one or two shotted with my staff.  Some enemies I really want my pet to engage, 'cause they hurt me too much.  Then I throw AEs on top of them and blow them up.  Big Bosses seem to offer the most variety.  Some require the goofy run-around(need to record performance of that fight and youtube it with Blues Traveller in the background!).  Others I actually just stand toe to toe with depending on my regen and potions to overcome their damage while I nuke them down, like the (Spoiler) Triskene or whatever after the Minotaur at the end of the Greece section.  My -armor, -damage secondary effect on ring of fire helps alot with that.

I like that there's not the point-daught that there seemed to be in D2, where to become useful at high levels you had to carefully focus your character with synergies, and not misplace any points.  I love the ability to try stuff out, and then respec if it sucks or doesn't fit the character, and no re-roll required.

--
Alkiera

[Dren]

Yes, respec being intregal to the game was a very good design choice.  I was amazed it was there from the start and actually sighed with awe when I saw it for the first time.

Yes, an audible sigh.