Storming the City

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Dranwin
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Storming the City

#1 Post by Dranwin »

At what point ...is it safe to attempt the final section of the quest? I've seen a lot of dumps of characters that were fairly high level and they have never entered the portal to face the mage.... I want to go through it...but...I don't want to needlessly die in a deathtrap.

overtrix
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Re: Storming the City

#2 Post by overtrix »

Whenever you think you're hard enough :)

It's not like the Crypt of Diverse Diseases and Messy Death but with a mage, I usually leave it until it's on the verge of being lost - else whenever the trip to meet the purple dragon doesn't feel too daunting that'll be about right for sparky too perhaps. Before the sandworms and Tol Doodah, because they're a bit of a pain to climb back out of.

Sirrocco
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Re: Storming the City

#3 Post by Sirrocco »

I'd definitely run sandworms first. They're a lot less dangerous once you know how to run them. I agree that once you can consistently survive the giants and the other giants and the dragons in the one mountain all the way up and all the way down, you've got a decent shot of surviving the giants and the other giants and the dragons at the top of the other.

It is worth noting that characters who have stuns, thorough detects, and high damage outputs can scum for him - if you can play the "stun him, then burn him down while he's stunned" game, it's a lot easier to kill him than it is to survive going through the level looking for him. On the flip side, if you *can't* stun him and burn him down before he recovers, it can be pretty important to pack enough stun resistance for yourself.

greycat
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Re: Storming the City

#4 Post by greycat »

You absolutely, positively want 100% stun resistance for ANY spell-casting boss in this game(*), because that is your ONLY defense against the Freeze spell, or being frozen by other icy spells. Of which Urkis has more than one.

A ring of lightning resistance sure wouldn't hurt either.

With those things, and other good equipment and appropriate skills, most characters can probably take him fairly safely at level 16 or so. Maybe level 20 if you want to be extra cautious.

(*) Even Wrathroot.

Dranwin
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Re: Storming the City

#5 Post by Dranwin »

Yea I charged in with my summoner with huge success!!

After the initial excitement of the rod of recall i promptly died in a random crypt.

Sirrocco
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Re: Storming the City

#6 Post by Sirrocco »

Actually, some classes can handle stunning in certain situations reasonably well (with wrathroot as a specific example). Heavy-defense ice wyrmics sometimes wind up doing more damage to their attackers in melee than the attackers do to them, and alchemists with their golem out put the caster in the position of only being able to stun/freeze one of his attackers at a time.

Still, in general, you are correct.

Frumple
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Re: Storming the City

#7 Post by Frumple »

Whoo! Completed the quest with an 18th level tempest. Having better than half of my offensive lineup chopped in two due to 100% resist was dicey, but I managed to go paranoid with vision and arcane eye and opened combat just at the end of range and with some walls and such in between me and U-whatever to help break up line of fire. That shock dazed the bugger helped, but in any case, I took the guy down. The 33% bonus to lightning damage (So what, he had an effective 27% lightning resist?) didn't hurt.

Having that 30% stun resistance hymn and stabilizing armor probably helped, heh. Nice to be able to deal with stun/freeze with a single piece of equipment and a free, effectively costless, talent.

Was kind of disappointed nothing else seemed to happen after dropping the wizard, though. I was expecting some sort of reward from either the wizard leader critter or someone in derth, but all I got was a completed quest. Wizard itself didn't drop anything better than base egos, nor did the fragmented whatsit I took down in a vault exploring 'is cave. Was a sad thing, I guess.

Sirrocco
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Re: Storming the City

#8 Post by Sirrocco »

Is "on the verge of being lost" some reference to character level, or are you just talking about going into the portal?

greycat
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Re: Storming the City

#9 Post by greycat »

Frumple wrote: I was expecting some sort of reward from either the wizard leader critter or someone in derth, but all I got was a completed quest. Wizard itself didn't drop anything better than base egos
Sounds like a bug... or, wait. Are you in svn instead of 15b? If so, then maybe it's just a lack-of-feature.

If you're in 15b, he should've dropped the rod of recall.
nor did the fragmented whatsit I took down in a vault exploring 'is cave. Was a sad thing, I guess.
If you've already unlocked Geomancers, then he's just another random boss. Should've dropped an artifact, though.

Frumple
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Re: Storming the City

#10 Post by Frumple »

Recall, recall... maybe. I probably promptly forgot about that, since I was/am, yanno', playing a Tempest, who comes with something similar built in (at least for the west, I guess). Coulda' almost sworn I got that from somewhere else, though. Anyway, be a bit more fulfilling if the mage lady gave it to you instead of it being dropped by the dude, I'd say. Give room for 'im to drop a decent artifact or somethin', too.

As for the essence dude, not only did 'e not drop an artifact, all he dropped was two piles of gold. I got less cash off of 'im than a decently egoed steel weapon. I guess I got gypped.

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