ToME: the Tales of Maj'Eyal

Running a Higher Necromancer on Nightmare and seeing as how this Beta is nearly complete, I figure this is a good time to report on how it plays.

1. Skill distribution...

1 point in the first three skills in Nightfall.
1 point in every Animus skill and then 2 more into Torture Souls once you get around level 22.
1 point in the first three Death skills and then 1 in the last skill as soon as you kill Urkis and get rid of the manasurge rune.
3 points right away in Call of the Mausoleum, 1 in Corpse Explosion, and 3 as soon as you can in Putrescent Liquefaction.

1st category point - Master Necromancer (it might have been better to switch with Age of Dusk here but it's unclear). Saved 1 point so that I'd have 3 at level 20.

1 point into Aura of Undeath
3 points in Surge of Undeath - this is the skill you really want.

2nd category point - Age of Dusk

3 points as soon as you can into Dire Plague.
1 or 2 points into Crepuscule.
3 into End of all Hope.

That's basically it by level 25. Generics are pretty straight forward but max Blurred Mortality and Spikes of Decrepitude and make sure you have one point for Highborn's Bloom. I haven't gotten the basic martial skills yet but I should have. It really only needs two points but seeing as how I was two points short (Arena bug), I didn't bother. My goal is only to invest when I have to.

I also ran with a shielding rune, a manasurge (until I got the rune of dispersion), and shattering. I'll get two more cat points and one'll go into the Eradication category and the other will be another rune.


2. Game plan...

I went through all of the tier one's and right around level 14 I was sure to enter Urkis' and Celia's domains in order to ensure that they spawned at the lowest level possible. I took down Urkis around level 21 and that left just enough time to take down the Weirdling Beast. It really, really helped to have the runs of dispersion. I managed him by nixing his defenses and then spawning ghouls and hitting him with my basic combo...

I took down down some of the patrols in order to get enough energy and then at level 24, I took down Celia. She was the toughest enemy by far other than a Runed Bone Giant in a vault in the Halfing Ruin floor 3 (not yet finished) that I tried to tackle around level 18 but just couldn't do any real damage to and so I fled.

3. Attack pattern...

I tend to open with Night Sphere followed Torture Souls or Invoke Darkness, depending on how many enemies are present. It's quick and efficient. Once I had Dire Plague, I generally used that immediately Night Sphere and then used Rigor Mortis and Torture Souls. Crepuscule came next if anything was left alive.

Bosses and tougher mobs required a little more effort and so Highborn's Bloom and a horde of ghouls followed by the Putrescence and maybe Corpse Explosion and then the above attack pattern.

Generally speaking, not much lived through that. If it looked like it might, I'd through in a Surge of Undeath which is just amazing. It increases your Putrescence and Corpse Explosion duration and it reduces the number of turns until your next free ghoul.

4. Current situation...

No deaths, got Lichform at level 25, and I'm in pretty darn good shape. I saved three escorts and one was a warrior so I picked up Vitality (a GREAT skill on this class) but nothing else of note. My equipment is mediocre across the board and a bug prevented me from getting the two generics from the arena but all in all, I'm rock solid. Now that I have Lichform and Highborn's Bloom, I should be rollin' through the end of the game...

The hard part is that as soon as you hit 25 comes the cult random dungeon. Consequently, I suspect it's up next.

5. Weaknesses...

Mobility and anti-magic. Holy heck, anti-magic enemies are brutal... I'm not sure how the updated anti-magic works but I'm doing basically zero damage for a long time. They are stout. Luckily, the ghouls keep them busy for long enough to weaken them and once they're antimagic shield is down, they die quickly (like two attacks, maybe three). I didn't even attempt any anti-magic enemies (patrols) until I had Highborn's Bloom at level 24.

Mobility is a consistent problem with this class so positioning matters. It plays more like a melee class without a movement infusion... so it pays to be careful. Luckily, you're remarkably resilient so you don't have to be THAT careful. I found that not much lived long enough to really threaten me but I know that's about to change.

I'll update this when I make further progress.

Nope, second half of the game is easier than the first by a significant margin. I barely even have to pay attention.

Once I picked up Adept (and the lack of xp penalty means that I picked it up before the prides), I was unstoppable. There were lots of combos that worked but the big-money combo was:

1. Highborn's Bloom

2. Call of the Mausoleum

3. Pustrescent Liquefaction

4. Bone Yard

5. To the Grave

6. Corpse Explosion

7. Surge of Undeath

Basically, you'll have a putrescence that now last 16-20 turns and it cost you very few or no souls. Plus, the corpse explosions did a TON of damage and odds are very little is alive BUT if it is alive, follow it up with:

8. Torture Souls

You'll pick up some more free ghouls and if you happen to take any damage and get into negative life then there will be a good chance that one of your core skills came off of cool-down or is close and you can extend the onslaught. It's pretty brutal.

The Lichform skill "Daunting Presence" or whatever, is brutal. It just weakens everything and makes it hard to land status effects, especially from mobs. You're just a murder-machine. I'll finish up the game and post a conclusion.

The two sorcerers went down quick.

I loaded up the Putrescence combo (Highborn's Bloom + CotM + Bone Yard + To the Grave + Putrescent Liquefaction + Corpse Explosion + Surge of Undeath) and then unloaded Dire Plague and Night Sphere and Crepuscule and then whatever I had left. Didn't shut down any portals and they died in about 12 turns. Areyn lived effortlessly.

I actually had 5 unspent talent points that I was saving but forgot to spend before entering the battle. Didn't need them.

As much as I like skeletons, the ghouls are beastly. You can keep a Putrescence up for 20+ turns, dishing out 175 damage a turn while Corpse Explosion does added damage and status effects. Plus, the ghouls keep coming and so with a little planning or luck, you can keep up that combo for a long time. It's not unusual to approach 10k cumulative damage from that and it's effectively passive as you're dishing damage from other means constantly.

I'm not actually sure what my damage per turn is when maxed out but it's a lot.

The only things that slowed me down were anti-magic. I ran into a unique anti-magic at the same time as a floor guardian in high peak who was also anti-magic and that was difficult. Silence is the killer because if your mana is drained and you're silenced, you're in real trouble. The melee guys still weren't a problem as my defense was so high and that just left ranged anti-magic and so... the toughest enemy I came across was an anti-magic unique summoner in the High Peak. Ultimately though, he went down like everything else.

Now it's on to Atamathon so I'll update when I do that.

So .. nerfs ?

Yeah, probably. I didn't do Atamathon but... nerfs are probably necessary.