Dizz's Diary - Home on the Plains

Wow has it been a month? I know many of you have probably given up on me but I'm still around. Lot's a RL stuff going on that has made it very difficult to play thus this diary has lagged behind. I'm getting close to being settled again so hopefully these will get back to a somewhat regular basis. On a side note if anyone lives in the Wilkes-Barre/Scranton area in Pennsylvania drop me a line, I'm moving there this month. As always you can find the online version of this diary at http://www16.brinkster.com/dizzarian also all the old ones are archived there. Now on with the diary. This one will cover levels 34-38

When we last left Dizz

He had moved out to the Obsidian Plains (OP) to start his life of leveling on tuskers. This is the first time that I've seriously explored the Plains let alone try to live there. It's a fascinating area to me. When you look at it on the map it just looks like a huge black area with no definition but it's definitely interesting and there are many defining areas so that you don't get lost. This is where all the major badies of dereth live. Here's the run down of what you'll find

• Tuskers Guards/Slave(Non-Training Camp) - They are here in huge abundance, hell that's why mages go here. On the plains they are almost always accompanied by at least 1 virindi and as many as 6 so always alert them from a distance. Most of these spawns are on about a 10 minute spawn.
• Virindi (All) - Nasty buggers who always have their pets with them. Although at this level I can take out Virindi, it's not a wise thing to do on the plains. The first or 2nd spell that they are going to cast on you will be bludgeoning Vuln so their pet just runs over and smashes you into next MorningThaw so it best to NOT wake the virindi.. please.
• Shadows (All) - Lots of melee guys come here for them, they are very abundant out here and almost always in huge packs. These being spell heavy creatures I suggest you not bother these either they are just more trouble than they are worth at this level. Just consider them a meal for when you reach 50.
• Golems (Obs/Diamond) - You can definitely take an Obs Golem at these levels. And most of the time you're armor is buffed to do so but don't do it on purpose. It's hard to regain mana off of these dudes and the xp isn't worth it. Now if you accidentally wake one of these dudes up then you might as well kill it because he's going to follow you till the ends of the earth if you don't. Diamonds??? Run Away.. far away, these bastards like to cast mage inepts on you like they are going out of style and that's a fast way to end your hunting trip so just stay away. Luckily they are pretty easy to see and easy to avoid.
• Altered Drudges - These are fairly common in the plains and easy to see from a distance because of their lightning weapons they carry. I've not actually tried to see if I could take one down or not just because they are so spell heavy. I would say to avoid them unless you are just feeling frisky.
• Frags (Single/duals) - Woot! I can take a frag now, it's been a long time coming but I can do it. Plus their magicD is all very close together so once you can take a broken you probably can take a dual. Unfortunately, on the plains, these guys are in a pack of some other bady and drawing them out is a tedious task but they don't usually cast any real debilitating spells so if you're feeling frisky go ahead and take one out. Also remember were you see 1 there's almost always another near by.
• Grievers (Banes/Destroyers/Harrowers) - Yup not only does the plains have grievers but they have the bad ones, hella bad. Move along now.
• Wisps (Shadow/Dark) - Seems to be an overpopulation of these things here and they are very very bad. They like casting all forms of drains on you and when you're running through the plains this is very bad to loose stats like this. Also these things have a large wake-up ranges which is even worse. Unfortunately most of the time you don't know when you wake one up and they follow you forever continually casting drains on you. Not nice at all.
• Training Camps - Tuskers, virindi, hollows etc on a 2 minute timer. These things are actually pretty rare and when you find one they are usually camped (at least when I play) This is the honey pot we are looking for though so if you find one uncamped park yourself there for a while and enjoy the xp.

The route

So the route I use to get into the plains is pretty much the ones outlined in Zarya's journals (Available on my site) I start at the small black hill and run toward the WaiJhou lifestone. Do not take the vally into the plains, the devs know this is an easy way into them and they packed it full of baddies to make it difficult. Instead run south to the next valley. There are no spawns in this vally giving easy access. Don't bother with any spawns you see for a while, the plains don't really get interesting till the land starts getting flat then you can start establishing a hunting route. Always use the valleys for easy reference. If you get lost on a black top just hit your number pad to get an overhead view and head toward a valley from there. And above anything else if you can't find a descent spawning area move on, this is a huge area and lots of xp available.

How to kill a Tusker

You may think this is a silly topic but it actually gets asked quite frequently by new mages and I don't think the answer is the same for BMs, let me explain. First the buff, I always cast level 6 armor and bludgeoning protection. Then I cast imp 5 and BBane 5 on my Gloves, Coat, Pants. Also if your still really getting hammered you can buff your underwear, although with GSA this becomes less needed especially if you can cast imp 6. Don't forget these this is the whole reason we take item at 20. Now on with the killing. Find a clear area with a tusker or 2 in view. Move the camera so that you know how many tuskers will be swarming you and know your limit. If your limit is 3 and there are 5 there make sure you have room to run so that you can loose some. Now Cast the highest level vuln on the tusker you want. Don't cast the war spell till he's over half way there or it'll fly of backwards. Now continue to fire on this dude till he's dead, drain only stam if needed. With a Dark flame and Vuln 5 the tuskers should go down in 2 or 3 shots. Then move over to the next tusker, regain your stats with draining, vuln and kill. You see a pattern? That's right as a BM you don't need to do all this drain health till it's almost dead then kill. You can but it's not necessary. With war spec'd, I have found, that a level 5 war spell on average takes less mana than a Drain 1. Experiment with this and see what you come up with, but I say as a BM draining is not your offensive weapon.

Questing Dizz

So for the most part I've been leveling on the plains, which has been mostly uneventful. So I've done a few quest to pass the time every now and again. First up was the Impious Staff, Yes I know this staff is pretty much useless in a mages life but it looks good and it's part of the reason I choose gharu as my race. The quest itself is very nicely done. It basically has 3 parts.

• The towers, this is pretty easy you have to kill an undead in each "tower" and get a key that will let you get the broken staff.
• You go to collier to get some ore. This part of the quest is tedious and you have to have a map or a guide who knows the place to do it. Also you might as well get the Baron's amulet while you're here. Melee Characters are always wanting this amulet to start out their noobs so it's a good trade piece.
• Now comes any easy part of the quest but it does require a lockpicker and an alchemist. So I go to subway and hire a lockpicker for 10k. His name was "Billy bad ass" although he was only level 20 or so he was able to pick the door. Once there you get a pot, so I had billy stay there while I portaled back to my alchemist which I'm pledged to (don't let that spec'd loyalty go to waste) she made the slag easily and and I went back and got my staff.

Not too bad of a quest, it does take a little bit of time though in fact I think I did all of this over 2 or 3 days.
I also took part in the new luggie quest when it opened. Then this last week I did the new spells.

Dark Flame

So there's all the debate on the boards about what this does and its purpose. So I went and got it, My spear buddy and I went there to get it. If you're going to get it the Dark flame spell is straight down the passage to the East (we got lost the first time) You have to fight lots of drudge lurkers and Dolls and at the end a puppet and a special level 68 Virindi. Well my buddy died taking out the virindi, so I thought "hmm what the hell, I got nothing to loose" Well jumping Moses I killed him. I was in total shock. In fact I went back the next day and killed him 2 more time so I know it's not a fluke. Now when you take the scroll to Zak don't do what I did and give it to the wrong translator (Yes I know I'm a dumb ass) Which brings me to a little rant, Why the hell is this scroll on a 24 hour timer? This makes absolutely no sense since the scroll is ungivable and the only reward is the spell itself. Doesn't seem right to me. So my conclusions for what this spell is that it's just for spell economy. It's the same spell comps as flame five so there's no difference in windup time or anything. It's not un-resistible or any other nonsense. There might be a creature later on we’ll have to fight with it but that would be iffy. I use it constantly now though because of the spell econ.

Dizz Finally gets GSA

Oh man I finally feel like a real AC player. Although I only came up with about half of the components the rest of it was all fronted by my very good friend Danwa-lo aka Conflict. I would say that this is essential gear for any battlemage. I don't know how I was fighting tuskers with out it, especially now that we know that they do hit legs quite frequently.

The Stats

I've worked on many things here, first strength. After getting GSA I was short on strength so I bump it up to a point where I could leave the mage shop with just below 100% burden. Next ManaC, this was done almost exclusively for STM. At these levels I no longer lie on my back to regain mana and stamina. I just use the revit and STM till I get refilled. Obliviously after these I bumped focus/self and my primary skills resulting in a 220 war/life. I've actually reached these numbers earlier than expected which is always nice. Lastly I bumped item up to 200, I'll probably work on it some more till I can cast 6's pretty reliably then I'll be a machine.

Next Diary will be at level 40 then after that I hope to put one out at every level I get there after. But I physically move the next 2 weeks so it could be 3 or 4 weeks till my next one. So everyone wish me luck. Also if your a mage visit my site I'm sure you'll find something there you'll be interested in.

Till Next time, Have fun and Blow stuff up!

Original Post :