|
|
The High Council has come up with some hunting strategy tips, guidelines if you will, for GoS. This area pertains to hunting with a guild or group of players, although some advice may be helpful alone as well. This page is a compilation of advice from the High Council along with tips from all the guild. Feel free to email with comments or new suggestions. New strategies are always welcome. These are not rules of hunting for guild, just guidelines of things we have learned from hunting with each other that make hunts go smoother and help keep us from visiting "The Land of Black & White" so often.
I. General Strategy
Know your hunting partners, their strengths and weaknesses. Know the strengths and drawbacks of the various types of characters (ie. provoker gets targeted when provoke fails, mage cant cast when under attack). Know who can res and who can heal, who can cast invisibilty. Who is unable to teleport or who has low resist, or low or no magery. This of course is part of getting used to your mates and comes with time, part of the reason for hunting with your guild mates.
Know the lay of the land. Know where you are going and what creatures you are likely to encounter. If no one has been there send in a ghost to run thru the dungeon earlier in the day or week and see for yourself what is there and where. Also a good way to see other players fighting successfully and what they are using spell wise, and pet wise on various creatures, also a good way to find safe spots.
Stay together, warriors can't heal unless you are next to them. Mages cant heal or cure or invis you if you are off the screen. If you get too far ahead and run into trouble and run back, you draw that "trouble" with you back onto your guildmates. There are times when you may encounter trouble so bad that the wisest thing to do is to run further in away from your mates and take the death, then come back and be ressed and let the group fight together towards your corpse. You will be able to tell them what they will be encountering.
We will often encounter ppl in need of help. Keep in mind that we have chosen our hunting site based on how many we have in our party. If we divide to help a citizen in need. Those left behind or those going on to help are likely to perile. We can help that person, but need to go as a group.
When we do need to send in "bait" to draw out spawn, know where bait is headed (part of knowing lay of the land). Bait should move slowly in so as not to get targeted by too many at once, endangering himself or mates.
Dungeon Crawls are called "Crawls" because you need to do just that. Move slowly thru the dungeon. Often the spawn changes dramatically around the corner or in the next hallway or room. Moving slowly allows you time to see as spawn hits the screen and take them on a few at time, knowing what you are heading into.
I know Myst has said this but: STAY TOGETHER!! FOR THE LOVE OF GOD STAY TOGETHER!! If your gonna run ahead or go off on your own, do us a favor and just start meteor striking or attacking the party instead. That will save us alot of time and our corpses will be right there.
Pay attention to party messages. Often trouble can occur if you miss something important. Such as a warning of what is ahead or that we are gating out now. If you have trouble seeing party messages or get distracted and dont notice them, try changing the party color on your options to red or something you cant miss.
As a courtesy to your guidemates, arrive 15 min prior to hunt so we can see what skills we have as a group and can decide where to go. Arrive ready to hunt, you know you will be needing regs and bandages etc. Have your armor repaired at the end of hunts so you are ready to go for next one. We are all in different time zones and many can not stay indefinately on hunt nights.
Know what you are attacking. If you have never heard of that creature and we are moving at a slow pace as we should be, back off, ask other mates. There are some creatures that can take us all down. This also brings up that it is to your advantage to know your emeny and your weapon..what works best on what creature; poisoned weapons is of little use on ogre lords etc.
If you have to run because your 2 seconds from death, run past the party and stop, then when the monster works its way past the group, do it again...of course this wont work well with spellcasting monsters but usually someone is trying to heal you. Knowing monster psycology is one thing that seperates a newbie and a veteran. A monster likes killing people :]. Monsters will take a few seconds to notice someone unless the someone attacks. Monsters notice people who are off screen too. They seem to prefer to attack someone running away from them, but it could be my imagination. If you are the first to attack them, they will come for you and very few things will switch their targets. If a friend is being attacked by a monster, dont be afraid of it because it will not hit you unless it cannot strike the target when its ready to bite (i.e. the target runs), and even then it will still want to go after the origional target. If you decide that you dont want to be attacked and you are being attacked, dont damage it! It wants to kill you but it will change its mind if someone else is hurting it alot more than you. Monsters that radiate heat or other damage are wildly unpredictible. They will frequently switch to targets that they damage and they are hard to control. If you need to lose them, run through a group of people that you know wouldn't mind fighting it. If any monster has no targets, it will rummage through corpses if its next to one or it will walk in a random dirction after a minute or so. Most monsters dont care about what they can't see. If you can't invis, keep this in mind: monsters lose interest about half a screen after their health box drops off your screen. If you can hide, be aware of how quickly you can hide while running from a monster...It varies with skill.
As a general rule kill magic casting creatures first. If a bard has two creatures provoked, kill the rest of spawn fist then kill those two fairly evenly with harder one dieing just before the other.
Use scenery to your advantage: doors for bottlenecking a hoard of critters, teleport into a ring of rocks to seperate yourself from monsters, putting obstacles in between you and the monster if you are trying to cast a particularly long spell...etc..
If you cannot invis yourself, carry invis items. There are times when an invis item can mean the difference between life and death, between retrieving your items from corpse or losing that vanq weapon forever.
When you are hurt, don't run from mages. Instinct may tell you to run but you cannot get healed by warriors on the move and if you run from mages you are on your own.
Have a designated "Gater" for hunts. Know who will be gating, and gate caster always enters last with warriors going first and mages just before the gate caster in case of spawn at gate.
Know the words of key spells such as chant for invisiblity. If you are in trouble and see a mage casting this realize it may very well be to help you and remain still.
Keep party health bars up and make sure they stay working. Sometimes going thru gates and at random times they will stop functioning (we love you OSI), when you see someone has been poisoned it's a great time to double check your health bars to see that they are functioning right. Also if you dont see anyone taking damage or mages not using mana. Use the red and green buttons on party bars to heal and cure with magery.
Loot whenever possible and loot can be distributed to someone who is lighter later. No one likes to be the one stuck as "clean up man" while the rest of group are hunting just ahead of him. Drag Health bars off of creatures to use to attack and loot with "all names" command, clicking on highlighted name. You can loot creatures deep in piles this way and will keep from accidently attacking guild mate.
When the need arises to loot a guildmate go for his weapons armor and regs first, then the rest. Loot all of his items into one pouch or bag. Using one of your trap pouches if need be. It is much faster to hand back to him when you dont have to search your pack and saves time in handing to him all at once. Keep in mind if he is trying to loot his corpse and you open a trade window, you prevent him from looting, What you have is safe now, and you may be able to hold while he finishes and protect him. Keep track of which creature has killed guildmates, it may need to be killed to recover a valuable item.
Put all your non-newbiefied stuff in you pack into just a few pouches or inner packs so that when you or someone else loots the looter doesn't have to sit there for 5 minutes grabbing goofy stuff like potions and bandages and such. The only downside to this is that monsters like looting packs, but its easy to kill the monster once you grap your basic equipment. All in all, it's a tradeoff, but its better to have all your stuff in one pack. For mages I would advise putting splitting your regs in 2 packs, perhaps with your potions and other items or in your trap pouches, so you wont be looted of all your regs by a creature. Don't use extra junk! Everything you bring is something that will sit on top of your bandages when a lich is walking your way. Make all your bandages white, Try not to use jewlry, scrolls, and piddely crap (unless you have a good reason). Always keep a charged runebook in your main pack. Runebooks are newbiefied. If you want, you can even reduce the amount of clothing you wear to help reduce looting time. If your in fel, seperate your ammo into multiple stacks so that if someone steals them, you can still peg them with a spell, arrow, or bolt. Use less reagents in Fel.
I. General Strategy
Know your hunting partners, their strengths and weaknesses. Know the strengths and drawbacks of the various types of characters (ie. provoker gets targeted when provoke fails, mage cant cast when under attack). Know who can res and who can heal, who can cast invisibilty. Who is unable to teleport or who has low resist, or low or no magery. This of course is part of getting used to your mates and comes with time, part of the reason for hunting with your guild mates.
Know the lay of the land. Know where you are going and what creatures you are likely to encounter. If no one has been there send in a ghost to run thru the dungeon earlier in the day or week and see for yourself what is there and where. Also a good way to see other players fighting successfully and what they are using spell wise, and pet wise on various creatures, also a good way to find safe spots.
Stay together, warriors can't heal unless you are next to them. Mages cant heal or cure or invis you if you are off the screen. If you get too far ahead and run into trouble and run back, you draw that "trouble" with you back onto your guildmates. There are times when you may encounter trouble so bad that the wisest thing to do is to run further in away from your mates and take the death, then come back and be ressed and let the group fight together towards your corpse. You will be able to tell them what they will be encountering.
We will often encounter ppl in need of help. Keep in mind that we have chosen our hunting site based on how many we have in our party. If we divide to help a citizen in need. Those left behind or those going on to help are likely to perile. We can help that person, but need to go as a group.
When we do need to send in "bait" to draw out spawn, know where bait is headed (part of knowing lay of the land). Bait should move slowly in so as not to get targeted by too many at once, endangering himself or mates.
Dungeon Crawls are called "Crawls" because you need to do just that. Move slowly thru the dungeon. Often the spawn changes dramatically around the corner or in the next hallway or room. Moving slowly allows you time to see as spawn hits the screen and take them on a few at time, knowing what you are heading into.
I know Myst has said this but: STAY TOGETHER!! FOR THE LOVE OF GOD STAY TOGETHER!! If your gonna run ahead or go off on your own, do us a favor and just start meteor striking or attacking the party instead. That will save us alot of time and our corpses will be right there.
Pay attention to party messages. Often trouble can occur if you miss something important. Such as a warning of what is ahead or that we are gating out now. If you have trouble seeing party messages or get distracted and dont notice them, try changing the party color on your options to red or something you cant miss.
As a courtesy to your guidemates, arrive 15 min prior to hunt so we can see what skills we have as a group and can decide where to go. Arrive ready to hunt, you know you will be needing regs and bandages etc. Have your armor repaired at the end of hunts so you are ready to go for next one. We are all in different time zones and many can not stay indefinately on hunt nights.
Know what you are attacking. If you have never heard of that creature and we are moving at a slow pace as we should be, back off, ask other mates. There are some creatures that can take us all down. This also brings up that it is to your advantage to know your emeny and your weapon..what works best on what creature; poisoned weapons is of little use on ogre lords etc.
If you have to run because your 2 seconds from death, run past the party and stop, then when the monster works its way past the group, do it again...of course this wont work well with spellcasting monsters but usually someone is trying to heal you. Knowing monster psycology is one thing that seperates a newbie and a veteran. A monster likes killing people :]. Monsters will take a few seconds to notice someone unless the someone attacks. Monsters notice people who are off screen too. They seem to prefer to attack someone running away from them, but it could be my imagination. If you are the first to attack them, they will come for you and very few things will switch their targets. If a friend is being attacked by a monster, dont be afraid of it because it will not hit you unless it cannot strike the target when its ready to bite (i.e. the target runs), and even then it will still want to go after the origional target. If you decide that you dont want to be attacked and you are being attacked, dont damage it! It wants to kill you but it will change its mind if someone else is hurting it alot more than you. Monsters that radiate heat or other damage are wildly unpredictible. They will frequently switch to targets that they damage and they are hard to control. If you need to lose them, run through a group of people that you know wouldn't mind fighting it. If any monster has no targets, it will rummage through corpses if its next to one or it will walk in a random dirction after a minute or so. Most monsters dont care about what they can't see. If you can't invis, keep this in mind: monsters lose interest about half a screen after their health box drops off your screen. If you can hide, be aware of how quickly you can hide while running from a monster...It varies with skill.
As a general rule kill magic casting creatures first. If a bard has two creatures provoked, kill the rest of spawn fist then kill those two fairly evenly with harder one dieing just before the other.
Use scenery to your advantage: doors for bottlenecking a hoard of critters, teleport into a ring of rocks to seperate yourself from monsters, putting obstacles in between you and the monster if you are trying to cast a particularly long spell...etc..
If you cannot invis yourself, carry invis items. There are times when an invis item can mean the difference between life and death, between retrieving your items from corpse or losing that vanq weapon forever.
When you are hurt, don't run from mages. Instinct may tell you to run but you cannot get healed by warriors on the move and if you run from mages you are on your own.
Have a designated "Gater" for hunts. Know who will be gating, and gate caster always enters last with warriors going first and mages just before the gate caster in case of spawn at gate.
Know the words of key spells such as chant for invisiblity. If you are in trouble and see a mage casting this realize it may very well be to help you and remain still.
Keep party health bars up and make sure they stay working. Sometimes going thru gates and at random times they will stop functioning (we love you OSI), when you see someone has been poisoned it's a great time to double check your health bars to see that they are functioning right. Also if you dont see anyone taking damage or mages not using mana. Use the red and green buttons on party bars to heal and cure with magery.
Loot whenever possible and loot can be distributed to someone who is lighter later. No one likes to be the one stuck as "clean up man" while the rest of group are hunting just ahead of him. Drag Health bars off of creatures to use to attack and loot with "all names" command, clicking on highlighted name. You can loot creatures deep in piles this way and will keep from accidently attacking guild mate.
When the need arises to loot a guildmate go for his weapons armor and regs first, then the rest. Loot all of his items into one pouch or bag. Using one of your trap pouches if need be. It is much faster to hand back to him when you dont have to search your pack and saves time in handing to him all at once. Keep in mind if he is trying to loot his corpse and you open a trade window, you prevent him from looting, What you have is safe now, and you may be able to hold while he finishes and protect him. Keep track of which creature has killed guildmates, it may need to be killed to recover a valuable item.
Put all your non-newbiefied stuff in you pack into just a few pouches or inner packs so that when you or someone else loots the looter doesn't have to sit there for 5 minutes grabbing goofy stuff like potions and bandages and such. The only downside to this is that monsters like looting packs, but its easy to kill the monster once you grap your basic equipment. All in all, it's a tradeoff, but its better to have all your stuff in one pack. For mages I would advise putting splitting your regs in 2 packs, perhaps with your potions and other items or in your trap pouches, so you wont be looted of all your regs by a creature. Don't use extra junk! Everything you bring is something that will sit on top of your bandages when a lich is walking your way. Make all your bandages white, Try not to use jewlry, scrolls, and piddely crap (unless you have a good reason). Always keep a charged runebook in your main pack. Runebooks are newbiefied. If you want, you can even reduce the amount of clothing you wear to help reduce looting time. If your in fel, seperate your ammo into multiple stacks so that if someone steals them, you can still peg them with a spell, arrow, or bolt. Use less reagents in Fel.
III. Mages
Cast gates when all are aware and ready. Gate caster should enter last with other mages just before him in case of spawn on other side of portal.
First and foremost a mages duty is to protect the party. Healing, curing , invising, casting on creature is secondary. Meditate before all mana is gone. Always keep some mana for that unforeseen needed cure or heal. Ressing takes a great deal of mana and should be done after spawn is dealt with or when it is thoroughly in hand.
Watch for mates in trouble and cast invis without them having to ask. They may be too busy to ask if they are in trouble that deep. A few seconds of being hidden may be all they need to releive that panic and heal or get mana back and think clearly again.
..
A GM Nox/Mage can't cast deadly poison if someone has already poisoned the creature, so leave the poisoning to the Nox/Mage if one is in party.
IV. Bards
Use peacemake to get creatures off of mages as quickly as possible.
When provoke fails, bard gets targeted, often even when creature was already engaged in battle elsewhere.
When two creatures are provoked, sometimes warriors can kill them off without taking damage, at other times attacking them will break the provoke. As a general rule kill off other spawn before the ones that have been provoked. When you do get to the ones that are provoked try and kill off evenly with harder creature going down first.
V. Tamers
A tamers primary concern is his pet, healing and curing party is secondary. He is not to be counted as a mage even if he is one, when calculating the mage/warrior ratio prior to a hunt.
Tamers should try and control pet so it allows rest of party to still get a good hunt in. Pets that are not obedient should be better trained outside of guild hunts.
If a pet stills a kill from players outside of party. Creature is to be looted and loot politely given to player originally attacking creatures. GoS does not gank, and this includes our pets ;) This applies on guild hunts as well as at any other time.
Be aware that pets have to train and raise magery skill just like the rest of us. They don't spawn casting circle 7 spells. The more they are worked with the stronger they get. The higher the taming and animal lore of the tamer the more loyal they get.
When a pet of a guilded tamers casts a mass spell; ie. mass curse, chain lightening, meteor swarm., it will attack any guildmate close enough to be effected including the tamer. The attacked player will react just as you do when attacked by a guild mate. With a dragon you may not be able to tab out fast enough.
Also if your words come up on screen as tamer is targeting after saying "all kill" and target falls over your words, you will become the target. The best way to avoid this is to talk in party, and for tamer to pull creature health bars off to black side of play screen and target there.
|
|
|
