Help Me!!!! Whats the best weapon to level??????

[Hanarg]

Well after several discussion on the world chat I thought I would write this to help explain what weapon to choose to level since there seems to be some confusion on what's good and what isnt.

Lets Start with some basic facts

Crafted Weapons get 297 points when you put a level deed on them upon reaching level 100 (3pts/level)
Dropped Weapons and Artifacts w/out Artifact tags get 495 upon reaching level 100 (5pts/level)
However Artifacts w/levels such as the ones from doom cost double points to level unless you remove the artifact tag from them with ED. So they get 495 pts but abilities cost double so you effectively get half as many points)


I will work with bows since there are really only two artifact bows that are easy to obtain and good to level: Hanzo's and
Horselord.

Counting Points that it would cost to get these abilities with a level deed.

Horselord
125 Luck 375 pts
50 Dmg Inc 200 pts
5 Dexterity 20 pts
1 Mana Regen 6 pts
---
601 pts + 495 pts from a level deed = 1096total

Hanzo's Bow
+10 Ninjitsu 000 pts cant get them with a level deed
50 Dmg Inc 200 pts
40 Life Leech 120 pts
Self Repair 3 36 pts
---
356 pts +495 pts from a level deed = 851total

Now this seems like a big difference but is the 125 luck really necessary thats up to you. I prefer the SR3 saves you lots of
repair bills and you dont need to spend 50ED to get SR5. (On a side note if you are going to relayer one of these bows I would relayer the horselord to a shirt or kilt or whatever and put nothing but passives, regens and stats on it no leeches no dmg
spells etc)

Now lets look at a couple of crafted bows that I have (and thank you Kitty Hawk for donating these bows)

Crafted Rtpg XBow
11 Hit Chance 33 pts
35 Dmg Inc 115 pts
46 Life Leech 138 pts
42 Mana Leech 126 pts
36 Stam Leech 108 pts
---
520 pts +297 pts from a level deed = 817pts total

Crafted Yumi
35 Dmg Inc 115 pts
38 Life Leech 106 pts
34 Lightning 136 pts
50 Mana Leech 150 pts
Spell Channel 150 pts* currently cant get with pts, costs 100ED but the 150pts was proposed by +colibri
--- in global chat one evening

665 pts +297 pts from level deed = 962 total pts
515 pts +297 pts from level deed = 812 total pts
(this is discounting Spell Channel)

Ill toss one more example just so you understand the artifacts what you have to do here is count what the artifact already has
as normal price but count any abilities you want to add as double unless you spend the ED to remove the artifact tag.

Frostbringer
Artifact Rarity 11

Hit Dispel 50% 150 pts
Stamina Regen 10 10 pts
Damage Increase 50% 200 pts
---
360 pts + (495pts/2) 248 = 608pts
since level deeds properties cost double when you add them over normal artifacts

So in conclusion the two normal artifact bows offer more overall points on the average except for the extremely end high crafted bows and offer more versatility to get exactly what you want but if you find the right crafted bow (one with at least 550 pt worth of abilities you want) you can get a better bow that will be easier to level to start wth it will just take more shopping.

Also there are some amazing randomized dropped bows from the peerless bosses but the odds of getting them are very slim and take endless farming. All up to you and what you are looking for.

Pts Costs for Reference *
-----------------------

1 pt
----
Regen Stam

2 pts
-----
Spell Dmg Inc
Enhance Pots
Regen Hits

3 pts
-----
Def Inc
Hit Inc
Reflect Phys Dmg
Additional Hits Mana Stam
All Leeches and Lowers
Luck

4 pts
------
Dmg Inc
SSI Inc
Additional Str Dex Int
All Hit Dmg Spells and Area Dmg spells

5 pts
-----
FCR
LMC
LRC
All Resistances

6pts
----
Rgen Mana

10pts
-----
Night Sight

12pts
-----
Self Repair

50 pts
------
FC
Use Best Weapon Skill

As for the maxes on these Im not quite sure because of crafted items and some dropped weapons seem to not obey any rule that I can figure out.

(edits for clarifications)

[Gwendolyn]

WHat a great post

Ty Hanarg


+ for sticky please

[anarchy]

+1

[Hanarg]

I've had people asking me fairly often... "Hey I read your post on what weapon I should level and I have this really nice bow with blah blah blah, how should I spend my points?" So I decided to write part two on my weapon leveling series after some introspection, experimentation, and deep thought.... ok not really but here are my......

Thoughts:
First thing first.... PLAN OUT YOUR WEAPON!!!!!!! there is no going back once you spend your points and if you mess up you have wasted lots of time and effort leveling the thing so sit down with pen and paper and maybe a calculator and figure out how you want to spend your points. Also someone supposedly made a weapon planner for EUOX but I havent messed with it.

Now where should I spend the points from leveling my weapon?

The 3 leeches, Mana, Stam, Life,
Lower Attack and Defense
Hit Spell (Magic Arrow, Harm, Fireball, Lightning) I leave dispel off this list cause it's pretty useless IMO
Hit area Spell (Cold Fire Energy Poison Physical)

You can only get those items on your weapons so they should be of the higher priority than any passive stat. You can get str, dex, int, hps, mana, stam, all 3 regens, resistances, hit chance, defense chance, reflect dmg, luck, DI, SDI, SSI, LRC, SCing and SR ( Luck, SCing and SR can be added w/EDs instead of spending points and DI can be added with sharpening stones from BS bods though they are a rarity) all from the 17 other pieces of gear you wear. Once again these are just my thoughts and opinions and Im sure there are people who will disagree with me, especially over the str dex hps stam.

If in Melee (with bow or melee weapon), IMHO, you should have all 3 leeches, with Vampiric Embrace and a high dex/high heal skill for bandies I dont think you need Life Leech over ~30%. Some people say with Divine Fury refilling your stamina you shouldnt need stam leech... eh Ive tried that and TBH that puts another spell in my rotation that delays me from using the weapons special moves and lowering my damage output. I rarely run out of Stam or mana with ~ 50% ML and SL and if I do, it takes me stopping my Consecrate Arms/Weapon Move combo for only 1-2 cycles to be back at full mana & stamina. Lightning, Fireball and Harm in that order for Hit Spells are my second tier because they help you kill the mobs faster. IMO if you cant get them to >40% preferably 50% then dont spend the points there. For my third tier I like lower attack for being in close because it reduces their chance of hitting you therefore reducing the amount of damage you take.

If using pets,and standing back and plinking away with a bow then Mana leech is #1 priority (IMHO). This allow you to keep your mana full for healing your pets and using your weapons specials moves and other needed spells, Life and Stam leech not so much, I consider them third tier. Here I prefer to put Hit Lightning and Hit Fireball (Harm loses dmg the farther away you are and magic arrow doesnt do much dmg at all) to increase your dmg output to kill the mob faster. On the same tier but slightly below are lower defense and lower attack to lower your pets chances of gett?ing hit and increase thier chance to hit the boss since pets usually dont have more than 100 in their melee skills and no HCI DCI.*

This brings me to the subject of hit area spells, due to recent testing while leveling a weapons with hit area spells I found that they dont affect the mob that you are attacking. Only the ones around it. Now this is still pretty awesome if you are surrounded by a bunch of low level mobs and using whirlwind or at a champ spawn with lots of stuff around, but if you fighting just one mob like a boss then they are useless IMO.

*You can raise a pets wrestling ability with Pet Power Scrolls and you can also raise a bios HCI and DCI with gear.

Once again these are just my opinions/views and they work for me, I hope this helps you make a better weapon.

[Brotherwolf]

Just wanted to add that Tokens not hard to get and so many areas you might want to have a diverse selection of weapons. Currently my char has a lvl 87 Axe and I am carrying two lvlable bows at lvl 30 each and depending on the environment I can switch to a specific weapon and take more time deciding where I need to spend the points Hope this helps a little.

Wolf

[Hanarg]

Yeah I carry two axes and a bow on me normally. i wasnt saying that the AOE's are bad just be aware that they dont affect the mob that you are currently attacking which can greatly reduce damage output in a single target fight

[fingers]

Imo, the best weapon to have is a yumi. Armor peirce deals incridible damage and because its a range weapon, you can hit without getting hit. The stats you want on your bow depends largely of the rest of your suit. For an example, hit chance increase is capped at 45% if your suit already covers that, then there is no need to add it on your weapon. Then comes lower mana cost. It's capped at 40. it's really important to have max, so add whatever your suit doesn't cover.

There are some stats that are not capped, therefore very important to add to your levelable weapon: dexterity, hit points, strenght, intelligence and mana should all be at +8 (granted that some high end suit offers so much mana and mana regen that you dont really need the int and mana bonus).

The first weapon "hit" attribute should be mana leech. with 50%-60% mana leech, you can chain the weapon primary ability (armor peirce) again and again.

For the stamina leech, it comes handy if you get hit alot, but you can do without it if you have enough chivalry for divine fury.

For the life leech, the way it's processed is that it takes the % you have (lets say 60% life leech) and generates a random number between 1 and that number (60). So the average number should be around 30. Then it gives back 40% of that number (12%). So if you hit a foe for 100 damage, you get back 12 hit points when the life leech hits (60% of the time). So a weapon with 60% life leech should give you, on average, 8 hit point per 100 damage if your weapon has 60% life leech.

It's not that impressive if you take for account that in vampire form, you leech 20% of the damage you do each time, and if you use the spell curse weapon, it leeches 50% of all damage you do. So life leech is not a bad thing, because it stacks with vamp and curse weapon, but it's not the best bang for your buck.

Then the hit lower defence is pretty handy to have, especially when fighting high end monsters. It lowers the defence of the foe by 25% for 8 seconds. I beleive the swing cap here is around 1 shot every 1.25 seconds (from my experience), so in that 8 second gap, you will have shot 6 times. If in the worst case, you have hit the foe 3/6 times, then imo, 33 hit lower defence is enough to keep that monster under the effect of it constantly. Then again, more doesn't hurt.

Hit lower attack is only good if you plan to fight stuff toe to toe.

For the damage increase, you want your total number to be at 100% (cap). So count what you have on your suit and add what is missing on your weapon.

Hit spell (lightning, harm, fireball and magic arrow). Lightning and fireball do good damage. For a bow, hit harm is pretty useless as the damage takes in count the distance between you and the target. Further you are, less it does damage. Magic arrow does little damage. Magic arrow and fireball has a delay for the damage, wich is good to make a caster fizzle, but it's not really important here as the shard is not pvp oriented.

Well I hope it helped. I am not to much for a formula that says: this weapon has attributes that gives you X points when starting and you can add this many points; because I couldn't care less about the 125 luck that would cost 375 spending points that the horselord has. I think you want attributes that helps your template according to the suit you wear.

That's all I can think of now

[Posseidon]

Woaw!! Really thank you Hanarg and Fingers for that guide! Its helped me to understande more what is useful on a weap ^^ Now i dont need to ask friends for help and tips LOL!!
Anyway, this guide rocks!
Thank you!

[Ruewyn]

I'll agree that Yumi's are the better weapon...but man i just wanna melee!
So here's a just some basic data on some melee weapons I had laying around. Sorry it's not more complete.
The Axe of the Heavens is the only doom artifact, so it gets the 1/2 xp penalty. The rest get the full 500 from level deed.

Axe of the Heavens (doom artifact)
Damage 4sp 50pts 200
DCI 3sp 15pts 45
HCI 3sp 15pts 45
hit lightning 4sp 50pts 200
490

Sword of the Stampede
Damage 4sp 60pts 240
HCI 3sp 10pts 30
Hit Harm 4sp 100pts 400
670
Darkened Sky
Damage 4sp 50pts 200
Hit Lightning 4sp 60pts 240
SSI 4sp 25pts 100
540
The Destroyer
Damage 4sp 50pts 200
Hit chance 3sp 10pts 30
stamina leach 3sp 40pts 120
str bonus 4sp 6pts 24
374

Wind's Edge
Hit mana leech 3sp 40pts 120
DCI 3sp 10pts 30
SSI 4sp 50pts 200
Damage 4sp 50pts 200
550

Blaze of Death
Resist Fire 5sp 10pts 50
Damage + 4sp 35pts 140
Fire Area 4sp 50pts 200
Fireball 4sp 50pts 200
SSI 4sp 25pts 100
690

[Hanarg]

Yeah my initial posting was more about the points on a weapon and the abilities on the weapon to help you figure out which weapon has the best stats for the gold when you do level it. (ie Artifacts w/levels, versus normal artifacts, versus dropped gear versus crafted) Especially if you plan on relayering a weapon to a different type.

My second posting was more about my opinions on which abilities are the best for your play style and provide the most bang for the points spent. My opinion on stats on weapons versus active abilities is probably very contentious to a lot of people but like i said it's just my point of view.

[fingers]

I'll agree that Yumi's are the better weapon...but man i just wanna melee!
So here's a just some basic data on some melee weapons I had laying around. Sorry it's not more complete.
The Axe of the Heavens is the only doom artifact, so it gets the 1/2 xp penalty. The rest get the full 500 from level deed.

Axe of the Heavens (doom artifact)

Special move: whirlwind and double strike. Really a good weapon, add as much mana leech as you can, and 8 STR,HP,DEX and STAM, amd you are good to go. If you can afford the 200 eds to take off the doom tag, it's even better. you also get a 10% damage bonus if you have GM lumberjacking.

Sword of the Stampede

Special moves: crushing blow and riding swipe. Riding swipe is useless, but crushing blow is amongst the 3 best special move in the game (armor peirce, crushing blow and whirlwind). 100% harm on melee, 10% hci and 60% DI is nice. You also get all the 500 spending points! Again, mana leech (40% for 120 pts) stam leech (40% for 120 pts), lower def (40% for 120 pts) and stats buffs (112 pts)and you will be a happy camper (and 23 sp to put where you want).

Darkened Sky

Copy paste the Stampede comment;-)

The Destroyer

I prefer the two above (60 lightning and some ssi; or 100% harm is better than 40 stam any day!

Wind's Edge

Some of the best stats, but: special moves are feint and block. I say run away. If you fight something strong, with thoses thoses special moves as a buff, all you are going to do is tickle it and make it mad

Blaze of Death

Special moves are whirlwind and concussion. Not too bad, but what i dislike is the 50 fire area. The area damage does very little damage, so all you do is aggravate the spawn that is nearby. Sometimes, in places like labyrinth, near two rends, you dont want that to happen!

Hope it helps!

[Ruewyn]

Thanks for the updates ya'll. Good info on these melee weapons. My favorite is the Blaze of Death, good point about the AoE fire, it can be a headache and you have to switch weapons sometimes, It is really fun to use whirlwind and that AoE damage helps to "attract" more stuff to you to kill! You do need a really good melee suit and skills to use it though, otherwise the dozens of mobs will kill you before you kill them.

[ticketguru]

Always remember that if you can afford the 200 ed, you can change the type of a weapon, ei change a skinning knife to a war hammer. My favorite weapon types are War Hammer, Halberd, Double Axe and Thundering Axe. The war hammer and halberd have the two best specials HtH special moves, whirlwind and crushing blow. The axes give a bonus for gm lumberjacking that is over and above the 300% DI bonus limit. This makes the thundering axe the best base damage weapon available and it has crushing blow as well (Jack Sparrow Cutlass is by far better base damage if you can get one).

The best weapons for leveling are the 58% drop weapons from peerless bosses. I currently have a 4x58% halberd that I am leveling that is wicked in combat. If you can get 5x58% or 6x58% weapon, you can spend the 200ed to change it's type to one of the really good hand weapons or even a yumi.

[fingers]

Always remember that if you can afford the 200 ed, you can change the type of a weapon, ei change a skinning knife to a war hammer. My favorite weapon types are War Hammer, Halberd, Double Axe and Thundering Axe. The war hammer and halberd have the two best specials HtH special moves, whirlwind and crushing blow. The axes give a bonus for gm lumberjacking that is over and above the 300% DI bonus limit. This makes the thundering axe the best base damage weapon available and it has crushing blow as well (Jack Sparrow Cutlass is by far better base damage if you can get one).

The best weapons for leveling are the 58% drop weapons from peerless bosses. I currently have a 4x58% halberd that I am leveling that is wicked in combat. If you can get 5x58% or 6x58% weapon, you can spend the 200ed to change it's type to one of the really good hand weapons or even a yumi.

Very accurate! I am actually leveling a 6X max mod weapon including 58 mana leech, 58 life leech and 58 lower defence (+18 cold resist, 18 energy resist and 18 hit chance). It was a swords that i changed for war hammer for its crushing blow and whirlwind. Whirlwind works marvels for weapon leveling if you know how to use it

[Brotherwolf]

Yeah I have to agree Whirlwind is fantastic for leveling as you can be surrounded by baddies and just hack away and drop 7 or 8 of em at once in some instances. I have a Lvl 87 Axe that has Whirlwind and then Double strike when some baddies run away and you want to put em down fast.


Wolf