Your First 250 points, what would you get? Options

[Hulud]

This kind of came up in the suggestions forum as a potential part of a newbie guide.

The idea was to provide examples of what the first 250 points any character might spend on.



What are the "must haves" for each class, what should each classes first 250 points be spent on and why (if not self explanatory)

I'm particularly interested in Warriors but am interested in the generally held view for all main classes.


thanks in advance

For a human warrior, life, AC and a warcry. Get a shield. +1 Str and +2 Weapon mastery are nice to have. Up to 250, most stuff dies to doubles only slightly slower than triples/quads. Concentrate on minimising damage to you.

All IMHO, obviously

Cheers,

Keyth

[MattWest]

If you are a warrior I would personally say it depends in a big way on what guilds you are in.

Suppose you are in Knights of the Land, Frontline and ICOB, an example spend could be:-

6th:- +1 Weapon Mastery in chosen weapon (NB you get Broadsword for free from KOTL at 7th)
7th:- War Cry
8th:- Stamina or Cold Rage or Athletic Training (plus another of these from Frontline)

Let's suppose you are in mastercrafted heavy chainmail armour over leather so PAC 8 on most locations and DAC 1 [from Frontline] = AC 9.

+1 DAC = 35 points
+1 Max AC in Mastercrafted Armour = 15 points
+2 DAC = 40 points
+1 Max AC = 20 points
3rd choice out of Stamine / Cold Rage / Athletic Training = 40 points
+2 Weapon Mastery in chosen weapon = 55 points (don't pick broadsword if you only have +1 WM from KOTL)
Intermediate Tier Social Guild = 50 points (from KOTL, gives you +1 Str, +1 Max AC, don't like WM shield myself)
+3 DAC = 45 points

total = 300 points, puts you in AC 12, 81/27 life, doing Quad (with one-handed weapon, so you can have a shield too), with a War-Cry (gives you 1/day immunity to one stopping effect, such as paralysis or freeze or sleep or catalepsy or I think suspend life, for 5 minutes), Cold Rage (1/day 25% damage reduction for 5 minutes), 2 x Jump. +1 Str is also very useful when your mates hit the deck and you have to lift and carry.

Next 50 points on Intermediate Tier Profesional Guild for Frontline benefits, or possibly choose those earlier (but might mean having to save up points and buy nothing for a while until you are eligible for some abilities).

None of these are ABSOLUTE must-haves, but the AC, Quad and War-Cry are so good that they virtually are, and I've found Jump incredibly useful lately. (Life is very nice but frequently overrated at low points IMHO.)

[MattWest]

If you are a Wizard, something like:-

[Edited] Discern Associated = 20 points [thanks BBB]
+10 mana = 40 points
+9 mana = 40 points
Magical Focus = 45 points [alternatively +1 casting level apparently 35 points or +8 mana for 40 points]
Get a teaching scroll of an Advanced Glyph for grulls / scrounge one = no points
(Make sure double casting damage without magical focus benefits doesn't kill you - so 8 mana or below...)
2nd colour = 100 points

Personally I would think very hard about Natural Athlete (1 jump for 30 points) which would take you to 275 points, and Rebirth (10 points).

[BBB]

If you are a Wizard, something like:-

+10 mana = 40 points
+9 mana = 40 points
+8 mana = 40 points
Magical Focus = 45 points [alternatively +1 casting level for some points]
Get a teaching scroll of an Advanced Glyph for grulls / scrounge one = no points
(Make sure double casting damage without magical focus benefits doesn't kill you - so 8 mana or below...)
2nd colour = 100 points

Personally I would think very hard about Natural Athlete (1 jump for 30 points) which would take you to 295 points, and Rebirth (10 points).

I'd drop 2nd Colour and far more importantly get

20 - Discern Associated
35 - 6pts of Casting Stamina (means random spell casting doesn't eat into your own life
35 - +1 Casting Level (getting 10th level casting quickly is useful, although admitteldy I tend not to bother its a very good buy)

BBB

[MattWest]

Oh yes, I forgot about Discern Associated.

That may have killed several of my wizards in the past...

I'll edit my post...

(But I would still go for 2nd colour every time. 1st colour probably a handbook one, 2nd colour probably a new colour, Ebony, Gold or Bronze.)

[Onasuma]

Priests:

Rebirth - 10pts
Discern Assossiated -20pts
1st level of spirits - 40pts
2nd level of spirits - 45pts
Spheres - 40pts
3rd level of spirits - 50pts

That seems to be what I always buy first, regardless of what type of priest it is.

Peter Long

[Harrumph]

Priests:

Rebirth - 10pts
Discern Assossiated -20pts
1st level of spirits - 40pts
2nd level of spirits - 45pts
Spheres - 40pts
3rd level of spirits - 50pts

That seems to be what I always buy first, regardless of what type of priest it is.

Peter Long

as someone new to priests this is a genuine question, sorry if i've missed something obvious but is there a point of getting spheres without getting the advanced miracles at the same time?

and as for wizards i'd agree with BBB have a look at your colour first and before multicolouring look to the advanced grimoire for your first colour and see what spells are there, dependent on the levels of the spells (and the levels of the basic spells that you plan to cast) work out what casting level you need and work it into your priorities

warriors very first spend is all about AC, 1 point off every blow over a day is much better than +6/2. If you have chain mail phys rep then you won't need quite as much DAC, but if you don't then max out on DAC and max out on Max AC but work out how much armour you are in and only buy extra max AC if you can use it (e.g. if you are only in armour AC 3 with say a point of DAC from a specialist skill there is no point increasing your max AC until you get close to the 9 max AC you start in as a warrior).

Rich

[Rob]

Spheres and second colours are no way top 250 stuff unless you have a very specific "plan"

Rob

My wizard max 250 spend - which is broadly "more power and less damage casting spells".

Discern Associated - 20pts
+10 mana - 40pts
+9 mana - 40pts
6 casting stamina - 35pts
+1 casting level - 35pts
+2 casting levels - 40pts
+8 mana - 40pts (T2)

That's 250 points

You then have a couple of options to look at:
1) Do you intend to be bracket pure? If so the no-brainer option is:
Draconic Advocate - 125 pts

2) Do you intent to specialise in one colour
If so look at the Elemental Apprentice series of abilities.
If not, I strongly recommend:
+5 specialist slots - 50pts (and teaching scrolls opr a relatively small number of points to fill them)

I wouldn't bother with second colour (yet), particularly if you are playing a wizard for the first time, as it's a lot of points spent on "things you can spend your mana on" rather than "mana to spend on things", and you may find you have more mana than spells. It may also take a while to figure out which other colour best fills any gaps in your current selection of spells.

I wouldn't buy rebirth at first, unless you are excessively paranoid or an evil elf with no one likely to try and get you ressed.

Lucy

[Onasuma]

Many things priests get later on are based off what spheres they have - many abilities, all the "spiritual X" multiclasses, even the level they res at is effected. I would also assume more new priests would have make minor scriptures as their pre 8th crafting ability so having spheres early on is now amazingly helpful for a priest who wants to tool up on their "essential" miracles.

Peter Long

[BBB]

as someone new to priests this is a genuine question, sorry if i've missed something obvious but is there a point of getting spheres without getting the advanced miracles at the same time?

Rich

Yes, there is now with Scriptures!

BBB

For my Budoka I took:

35 - +1 DAC
40 - +6/2 stamina
20 - immunity to bruising using DAC

Which makes 95 points

You're doing triple in E, you've got Forearm Parry, You're in 8 DAC if you make a monster points item of +1 DAC and blag a bless off someone, you're completely immune to singles and you're in a respectable amount of life (for a max 250 anyway)

[Chaz]

anyone got any suggestions for scouts, my current character is my first and only scout class and i have no idea where to take it after 8th....

as someone new to priests this is a genuine question, sorry if i've missed something obvious but is there a point of getting spheres without getting the advanced miracles at the same time?

I reckon not in your first 250 points. Getting more power points to do things with is better at low levels than getting more things to spend your power on.
You can buy minor sphere miracles without paying for the spheres, so if you know which ones you intend to take eventually you can buy a fair few advanced miracles without spending the 40 points.

I'd probably not look at getting spheres before T:6, where you get the sphere specific abilites, unless there was a very particular major advanced miracle I was interested in - and as most of those are quite expensive you probably want the power points to fuel them first.

Lucy

[Carlo]

anyone got any suggestions for scouts, my current character is my first and only scout class and i have no idea where to take it after 8th....

The first thing would be your tendancy. Brilliant bang for your buck! for 50 - 100 points you get a good few hundred points of abilities.

If it were a 250, I'd buy your grade of backstab, and bulk up on your scout skills which are all useful at lower levels, including things like bandaging, trap wary and so on.

Carlo

[Chaz]

The first thing would be your tendancy. Brilliant bang for your buck! for 50 - 100 points you get a good few hundred points of abilities.

If it were a 250, I'd buy your grade of backstab, and bulk up on your scout skills which are all useful at lower levels, including things like bandaging, trap wary and so on.

Carlo

Cheers mate i will have a read up on tendancies at the weekend and make a decision on where its going based on that i guess!

Scouts: buy a tendency, +1 and +2 levels combat wary.

[MattWest]

For scouts:- obviously Tendency; Backstab is what gives you your DPS/Striker role; as for combat wary, surely +1 DAC and +1 Max AC in MC Armour is far better value for 35+15 points than +1 Combat Wary, +2 Combat Wary for 45 points, so you can be in:-

PAC 3 + MC 2 + class DAC 2 + Tables DAC 1 = AC 8

(Assuming you wisely didn't pick +1 DAC as a specialist skill.)

So that's 90 points plus the cost of your Tendency. I think Loner Tendency gives you +1 innate PAC which would make it almost pointless buying the +1 DAC at this stage though you would still want +1 Max AC in MC Armour.

(Edited to add:- obviously once you've got the best AC you can, it's worth thinking about combat wary, but I think AC has to come first.)

Look at the numbers very carefully on your standard skills, based on how many skill levels it takes for you to get an extra jump / stealth / whatever - some of them could be very good value by raising your skill levels, others less so. For instance if you have Skill Level 5 in jump, you would need to buy +2 Skill Levels = 45 points for a 3rd jump (Skill Level 7 divided by 3 round up = 3), but for 30 points on Table 1 you could buy Natural Athlete (1 jump). Obviously if you want to major on jumping (and it seems to me it's always good to have a few jumps), you might want to spend the 75 points on getting +2 Skill Levels in Athletics AND Natural Athlete.

Oh and I really like a lot of the scout specialist skills which at 40 points can be quite good value so it's worth thinking about buying an extra 1 or 2 of those.

As for mages I understand the point about how annoying it is having more things to spend your mana on than mana to spend, but quite often having the right spell for the right situation means you can deal with an encounter with a lot less mana, or you can deal with an encounter which you simply couldn't otherwise. And you get a hell of a lot of extra spells for the price of going 2nd colour. It's easy to burn through 100 mana so I wouldn't put 2nd colour ahead of +10, +9 mana, and +8 it's questionable, but you can deal with the casting damage with healing potions etc. especially if you are in Companions or Children of the Dawn or similar, so I just don't see how it's worth foregoing a 2nd colour for the sake of some limited reduction in casting damage which will only affect a minority of your spells (e.g. Casting Level II) or is only equivalent to 1 healing potion (e.g. +6 casting life) - those two abilities together add up to 75 points and are nowhere near as good as 2nd colour which is 100 points. Also compare 2nd colour for 100 points to learning one 8-mana advanced glyph, one 4-mana advanced glyph and one 2-mana advanced glyph for the same points - there's no comparison, 2nd colour is simply better, you get twice as many [useful] spells and you don't end up feeling ripped off because you could have learnt them from teaching scrolls just for grulls (notwithstanding the new teaching scrolls battleboard limits).

PS also, 2nd colour is just more fun!! makes you feel big and important, you are the wizard with 2 colours, doing the job of 2 wizards at once :-)

anyone got any suggestions for scouts, my current character is my first and only scout class and i have no idea where to take it after 8th....

What are your pre 8th skills? That's the first thing I would ask - because those can make a really big difference as to the sort of scout you are.
I agree with Carlo in principle on the tendency and skills thing, but which skills and which tendency will very much depend on what you started with.

Lucy