58th level, figuring out where to hunt and getting killed doing it

[Xzean]

Hi all, just came back to the game after a long time and have been trying to figure out where to hunt. I had been hunting in Bonespear previously, but my level is now pretty high for there. I have tried RR Citadel and Red Forest creatures, but both seem to kill me pretty easily. Dying even with Dreavening in Red Forest. I am thinking Blighted Forest maybe. I'm afraid of the maneuvers in Illoke/stone mastiffs. I don't know if it is my skills or i'm not disabled enough, or what. So if people could fill me in on just how to hunt on a sorcerer of this level, maybe that is what my problem is. Here are my stats and skills for those curious.

Strength (STR): 78 (14) ... 78 (14)
Constitution (CON): 65 (2) ... 65 (2)
Dexterity (DEX): 91 (30) ... 91 (30)
Agility (AGI): 65 (12) ... 65 (12)
Discipline (DIS): 97 (13) ... 97 (13)
Aura (AUR): 100 (35) ... 100 (35)
Logic (LOG): 98 (24) ... 98 (24)
Intuition (INT): 92 (26) ... 92 (26)
Wisdom (WIS): 94 (27) ... 94 (27)
Influence (INF): 72 (6) ... 72 (6)

Armor Use..........................| 20 4
Physical Fitness...................| 160 60
Arcane Symbols.....................| 160 60
Magic Item Use.....................| 160 60
Spell Aiming.......................| 220 120
Harness Power......................| 160 60
Elemental Mana Control.............| 160 60
Spirit Mana Control................| 160 60
Sorcerous Lore - Demonology........| 160 60
Perception.........................| 136 38
Climbing...........................| 90 20

Spell Lists
Minor Elemental....................| 31

Spell Lists
Minor Spiritual....................| 31

Spell Lists
Sorcerer...........................| 85

[Allereli]

Constitution (CON): 65 (2) ... 65 (2)

I had that CON before fixstat-ing, I died a lot to maneuvers.


Perception.........................| 136 38

This will also contribute to your problem


Armor Use..........................| 20 4

Have you tried 8 ranks and doubles? Padding and armor fittings are highly recommended either way.

I recommend the Blighted Forest for hunting. I hunted there with Mind Jolt, aimed Limb Disruption, Energy Maelstrom, Dark Catalyst, Mana Disruption, and Disintegrate.

[Maerit]

What's getting you killed in the citadel? I hunted there from 55 to right around 65 with my sorcerer, and as long as you disable the arbalesters it seemed to work fine.

I also enjoyed hunting Pyrothags out on Teras. They're pretty rich...

Similar to Allereli's suggestion, I recommend getting 8pts in AU, and some padded stuff. For me, all I needed was a temp padded greathelm since the only thing that was messing me up was crits to the head and neck.

Alternatively, is there a reason for the demon lore training? Necro lore has been massively improved, and you may want to invest in that over demon lore due to the significant advantages to using 711 and 730 (and more). Though if you're getting crit a lot I suppose the 712 benefits from demon lore can be useful!

[Xzean]

I'm 61 now and still having problems hunting. I under hunted Eidolons after blighted forest vipers and red forest vipers kept killing me with their spit. Haven't been back to try the citadel yet. Skills are here in case anyone is curious (tried doubles and hated it, so back to fulls). Am I just not supposed to ever hunt things with maneuver attacks? Hit, stun and killed every time.

Armor Use..........................| 20 4
Physical Fitness...................| 163 63
Arcane Symbols.....................| 163 63
Magic Item Use.....................| 163 63
Spell Aiming.......................| 226 126
Harness Power......................| 163 63
Elemental Mana Control.............| 163 63
Spirit Mana Control................| 163 63
Sorcerous Lore - Necromancy........| 163 63
Perception.........................| 163 63
Climbing...........................| 90 20

Spell Lists
Minor Elemental....................| 34

Spell Lists
Minor Spiritual....................| 32

Spell Lists
Sorcerer...........................| 85

[Maerit]

I'm trying to understand what you're struggling with regarding hunting. You went from 58 to 61 in less than 2 weeks, which isn't incredibly fast, but also faster than a lot of people level in this game, so you're not really getting XP slowly.

Are you just struggling with maneuvers? Because if that's the case, prepare yourself - it's the primary thing that will get you killed for the rest of the game. Every hunting area you go to from now on is going to be filled with combat maneuvers like spit, shield bash, headbutt, charge, disarm, boil earth, spike thorn... the list goes on and on. All you need to do is learn how to disable things before they use a maneuver. It's not guaranteed to work, but it will work most of the time.

Once again, I highly recommend training out of demon lore and putting those points into necro lore. Why? Take those vipers for example. If you were killing them with 711 - they would never even have had a chance. 711 puts targets into hard RT, which is a form of disable. With sufficient lore training (I believe it's 66% of your level) you will consistently put targets into 6-7 seconds of RT.

730 is another excellent reason to train Necro lore. When you go out and kill something using 711 (say a black forest ogre) and you're 1x into Necro Lore, you can then animate that creature to fight alongside you for the next 10 minutes. Give the critter a weapon (claid, ebladed greatsword... whatever) and it will destroy things. Believe me, a strong animate is one of the best allies and you don't have to micro manage it at all. Just "tell animate follow", "tell animate attack". When your hunt it over, "tell animate die" - loot it, get your weapon back and have a great day! If you hunt the citadel, animate an arbalester and let it keep the crossbow. It can hit undead, never runs out of ammo, and shoots the thing super fast - great animate!

Another option is to use 709 (also improved by necro lore). 709 isn't super friendly to other players, but it is incredible at disabling rooms. It will also incur hard RT on targets, and most (but not all) critters will use their next "turn" to stand back up instead of attacking. A handful of casters will prioritize casting any spell they have prepared, but most creatures will chose to stand.

My final suggestion is get the hell out of swarms. Don't stay in a room with 2+ creatures. You are a squishy sorcerer, and while you have tools to handle swarms, there is absolutely no reason to risk it on daily hunting trips. Just abandon the room and move.


If you want some good hunting areas to try:

#1 Citadel. This is a great place for sorcerers. Disable the arbalesters and if you want to fight the Phatasmal Swordsman you *must* be proficient at 711 (they are immune to 708, 709, stun immune everything, but they are *not* immune to RT lock from 711). RR is not super populated. The citadel is fairly wealthy, but don't expect a rescue unless it's primetime.

#2 Black Forest. Over-hunted, easy creatures, should be easy to fry. You won't get very much loot, but you will have plenty of help.

#3 Eye of V'tull. Focus on Fire Sprites (be sure you 703 them first) and Red Tsarks. I avoided fire elementals and lava golems because they do a lot of annoying things. The fire mages are very dangerous, but easy to avoid if you just move out of the room. Get fire resistance from a ranger if you go here first. If you hunt here you can and probably will die once in a while. The sprites are pretty rich, however, and there's tons of people hunting in Nelemar that live in town who will come rescue you.

-- Major Sorcerer Tip for Eye of V'tull -- Sorcerers are one of the best equipped professions to fight fire mages. Fire mages lash out on death inflicting damage that can stack up very quickly. Sorcerers can bypass this by using an animate. If you animate a pyrothag (which is what I used) give it a claidhmore you can kill fire mages without ever taking their retribution damage on death. Simply use 709 to keep them on the ground, then 417 to dispel their defense and let your animate decimate them for you. For this reason I stayed here until 75, and no one else hunts there because of how annoying those mages can become - so they're pretty rich.


Good luck!

[Xzean]

That is some great advice actually so firstly I just wanted to thank you! If you look at my skills I did swap lores actually. I didn't realize the animate changes were that good, I am going to hop over to RR and try that out for sure. My real question is what can I do as a Sorcerer to try and ensure I live through a creature using a maneuver on me? Or should I just accept that if they get it off before I disable I am dead and that is the cost of hunting? Thanks!

[Gnomad]

Loot in the Black Forest is fine if you can skin; my empath used to pull ~1K each on boars and vipers.

[Maerit]

That is some great advice actually so firstly I just wanted to thank you! If you look at my skills I did swap lores actually. I didn't realize the animate changes were that good, I am going to hop over to RR and try that out for sure. My real question is what can I do as a Sorcerer to try and ensure I live through a creature using a maneuver on me? Or should I just accept that if they get it off before I disable I am dead and that is the cost of hunting? Thanks!

That depends on the maneuver. When you're in the citadel there are a few things you will need to watch out for:

1. The guardsman can use charge and trip.
2. The arbalesters WILL sweep you.
3. The phantasmal swordsman can tackle.

In the case of the above, it's generally just RT and time spent on the ground. Charge it the only "dangerous" CMAN used in the citadel that can outright kill you (and I rarely saw it when hunting there). The easiest thing to help manage this is to just pump up your DS with outside spells from scrolls. Sorcerers + Scroll Infusion is amazing utility. I carry around about 2-dozen scrolls for the sake of using them whenever going somewhere that the AS of my opponents can overcome my DS.

202, 303, and 507 are super easy to find, and worth keeping on hand. Make sure you're using 102 (of course), and small statues help a lot as well. If you're friends with a ranger on RR, getting some 618 casts will be a major improvement to your maneuver defense.

If you get an animate, it will help you by attacking anything in the room. Everything except the mages (only level 54) and the swordsmen can be stunned by regular attacks, and the animate will be wailing away on them likely landing stuns. Otherwise the same advice regarding crit padded gear. I used temp padded leathers for a long time before I picked up some 5x DCP leathers from DR. The temp padding only starts to wear off if you actually take damage from an attack, and works on all forms of attacks. Temp padding can last years for a sorcerer, and is usually pretty inexpensive (if you can find a set of full, reinforced or double leathers).

You may need to push your TD up just a little because the Heralds actually have some strong CS attacks, but they are super easy to shut down as 703 will basically make them useless and they are very susceptible to 719 (can one-shot them often).

Arbalesters - aim left leg or left arm, 708 arbalester, then you can plink them to death with 702 or 705. They stun easily. *note - they wield an arbalest, so you will want to macro your spells to target "arbalester" or you'll end up casting at their weapon if you blow up their left arm

Heralds - 703, 719, 702 if still alive. You *might* have to use 715 (or quartz orbs) if you find their TD is too high, but still open with 703 due to the TD pushdown.

Swordsman - 711 until they die. Might have to 715 these guys if the TD is too high to ensure your 711 hits. Don't bother trying any other disable spells, they are immune to all of them (cannot be knocked down by spells, cannot be limb disrupted, cannot be stunned except by 717).

Guardsman - 706 (actually works great on them) and then 705 them. They'll die in about 3 casts of 705 and likely will not recover from the stun.


Animate targets are Swordsman or Arbalesters. I found that the Arbalesters worked out great against everything except swordsmen, who are easily dispatched with 711. If I remember correctly, the swordsmen can hit undead if you don't give them a different weapon, but if you want to equip them with a weapon it has to be blessed. Been a while...