Dizz's Diary - OMG he got 50!

This could be a really big diary so bare with me on this one.  As always this and all the other diaries can be found at http://dizzarian.com/acmages.

Prelude - Written by that excellent Teller of Tales, Fahrenheit

The air fractures with energy as a large magical blade issues forth from his outstretched wand. It careens into the last Executor, transforming it from a powerful Virindi into a lifeless tattered cloak. Its just another of the many cloaks and cooked meat pile, reeking of charred flesh and hair, corpses of what used to be Tuskers and their masters. Dizz had again proven himself supreme.

Battleworn, he refuses the impulse to relax and catch his breath. The ritual of regaining his vital energies commences; health, stamina and mana are restored. Only then does he relax from the fighting stance. Through the next doorway should be the prize. What prize is it? Who knows, but that’s the entire point, isn’t it? Finding the unknown. Reveling in the discovery.

The Greater shadow armor rightly glows. Its formidable construction again protected itself and him from harm. Nary a scratch on it, what fine skills the Isparian armorers have.

Ah, the last doorway beckons. As the cycle of buffing his considerable skills begins, Dizz's mind becomes honed to the battle that must take place next. The unknown. He must be prepared for all known spells and attacks. He chooses to use eviscerate, which does the slashing damage that seems the most universal. A vuln will follow, maybe a ring spell or two with a drain here and there for good measure.

With confidence, he pushes the final doorway open and steps into luminosity unmanageable. His arms try to block the light that permeates the room. Gods, if he can't see he, can't target. He moves instinctively to avoid any attack. If only he could catch a glimpse of what's inside here! Suddenly, a form seems to appear mid chamber, floating high. At last, the break he needed! With a mental command the mana housed within him coalesces into stark physical form. As it releases, the creature spreads its arms outward, its wings slowly beating its decent to the floor, “I am a Seraphim of the Lord” It states in somber booming tone, “I bring you ARRGGKKK!” the blade cleaves it in twain, banishing the light and sending the two parts of its now limp, winged body to the floor with a wet, sick smack.

Ah, victory! Dizz moves in and quickly finds it was only carrying cheese. So much for that grand reward that will save all of Dereth. Stupid vague prophet must have lied to him!

-F (Gahru'n BM) 

When last we left Dizz

He was ripping up the Center of the crater.  I love this area and still hunt there regularly.  Until you really try to live there you have no idea how easy it can be.  And fun, I've had some really interesting battles there and more monkeys on me that I thought was possible.

The Long Hard Road

I'm not going to lie to you about this.  These last 10 levels are hard, long, and painful.   There were times I wanted to give up and just play another character but I pushed on through.  There were 2 primary places I hunted the Tusker Camps and the Crater.  I only hunted the camps when I was left alone and had 2 camps to myself.  This is a rare occurrence on MT and I would say that only 35% of the last 10 levels was gained there.  So I just ran my routes through the plains and into the crater and stuck it out.  For some reason I had the song from Smokey and Bandit in my head "We got a long ways to and short time to get, We're going to do what they say can't be done"

My only advice for these last levels is get a stack of Good cd's or mp3's and just plow through. It's boring, it sucks and is mind numbing.  Also play in full screen i.e. hit F9 twice.  There's no need to sit there and watch every bit of xp tick by.  You'll drive yourself nuts.  Plus it was a little more rewarding to just look at my xp at the end of every buff cycle and then see how much I got that round.

My new Best Friend

I'm actually morally opposed to a lot of the programs used for Decal but Mage Minder has become my new best friend.  If you do not have this utility, get it!  I especially suggest you get it for these last levels because I found I could kill more tuskers per buff cycle because I knew exactly how much time I had left.  Plus knowing how much time a debuff has left is very handy in deciding on wither to dispell it or not.  After Mage minder I got Arcane Knowledge.  This one is not needed that much pre-50 but after 50 it's very nice to learn all your new critter spells in game with out having to tab out and look up splitpea or other program.  

My Spell bars

This question gets asked very often so I took these shots of my spellbars before 50 so that you'll have an idea on how I set mine up.  There's a million and 1 different ways of setting these up and everyone has their own preferences.

As you can see on every single tab I have almost exactly the same first 6 spells.  I'm a creature of habit and when I hit 4 it better drain what ever i have targeted and not portal me back to the lifestone or some silly nonsense.  Of particular note I have my first 2 spellbars dedicated to war and vuln spells.  I actually set this up specifically for tuskers.  Fire and Pierce are pretty even for killing monkeys and depending on the economy for that day I might need a different one.  Also I generally switch spells between packs i.e. I group of 5 I'll use pierce the next group I'll use fire.  This helps keep my charges up on each spell group also.  Another added benifit is the ability to easily find spells.  I rely heavily on my keyboard and rarely use my mouse in battle so my spell bars are designed for this.  My 3 tab contains all my other spells. 4th is just basically my stam 2 mana stuff to get best returns.  5th is my buff tab.

Stats Pre-50

I've got 2 pictures here since I really missed a diary.  At 45 I was really just getting my core stats where I wanted.  And by 48 I worked on get all my others up to comfortable levels to carry me through to 50.  Specifically I wanted a lot of mana.  

Arrgg! I wrote this at a different time and since then I accidentally overwrote my pictures for 48.  I'm really upset about this and apologize to you for this.   Instead I've provided you with my buff stats at 48 that way you know what you will have to work with

The Home Stretch and the Marathon

At 48 I really got a second wind with the goal in site I actually got kind of excited.  Made 49 in a couple of days.  In fact I got 49 on the Monday before patch.  I was surfing the news sites and saw that the patch was indeed that week and on Wednesday.  Well I made a vow to be 50 by patch day so the next day was laid out for me.  I needed 4.8 million xp to do it.  A daunting task for me to be sure.  I hate powerleveling and have never got that much xp in a day.  To make it worse I still had work and other stuff to do but I was determined.  I know if everything is right I can make about 1 million per hour so that was about 5 hours.  Which means I should have been done about 10pm that night.  Well things never go according to plan, the spell economy was bad and the assholes were out that night.  So at 12am I'm less than 1 million away, I'm in the center of the crater killing away trying to keep my eyes open, I was so very tired.  I had several people online rooting me on or else I probably would have quite right then and  there.  So big thanks to them.  So I get down to 60k and what happens?  Well of course I run out of comps, ARGG! and not just any comps ones like gold and plat scarabs where I have to run to Mayoi for.   Luckily I made it back to town and my buddies were there to supply me.  My good friend followed me back and I finally made it at 1 a.m.   I answered all my congrats cast focus 6 on myself and promptly went to bed.

A New Day Dawns

I awoke the next day, wiped out!  Luckily it was patch day so I could take it easy and get some work done that I had neglected the previous day.  After the patch was up I immediately got in and went to work learning all the important self buff needed.  I saved up all my xp from 48 on and had just enough to get my critter to 230.  Well actually 229 I had to spend some the previous week to bump my jump up for a frost stone run.  So what's the first thing a newly graduated BM does? Well he goes and kills a Diamond golem of course. Ok that was too easy a vuln 6 and 2 Spikes and he was down.  That had to be a fluke right? umm no I had to kill 5 of those buggers in 1 buff cycle!  I was amazed, next quarry? Umbris, still too easy.  I didn't really meat my match till I started looking for my acid.  Short of that story is finally found it on a virulenant griever not a Harrower.  

The Stats

I have to end somewhere, I could go on about how I got my mage armor but I think I'll save that for another diary maybe.  Needless to say 51 came very easily and there's very little I can't do.  I've been to Aerlinthe island and had no problems and I got my mage armor quite easily.  I've had to bump my focus to use the focusing stone so keep that in mind if you're below 50. This shot shows me getting my golden level and my stats at 51.  These buffed stats are fully buffed with 6's, wearing my exarch plate, and with the focusing stone equipped. 

Well I do plan to continue doing these every now and then so this isn't the end.  It's just the beginning of a Powerful mage story ;)

Till Next time, Have fun and Blow stuff up!

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