Curse

Al Andaluz · Mar 15, 2008, 07:18 AM // 07:18

Hello folks,

Although most necros almost never need a pet (barring a few very specific builds), I decided to attempt leveling a pet to dire for my nec. Because my necro is my main char, and because i already have a black widow, phoenix, and black moa in my HoM, I found the desire for a pet that fit my char a little better; after charming a lvl 5 raven, and after deciding that I wanted a dire raven rather than a hearty--or some other prefixed pet--I began looking at ways to create a dire pet for my necromancer.

I leveled my raven outside Boreal Station (HM). The Snow Wurms in this area are easily killed, and allow for easy management of pet health (no ranged attacks + they burrow). Without any scolls, each HM wurm gives 396 exp; since I had a ton of extra Hero's Insight scrolls (+50% exp. for 10 mins), I used them for lvling my pet... this gave ~594 exp. per kill, with about 11 kills per 10 minutes (6.5k+ exp. per run). After about 2 hours of killing, I leveled my pet from lvl 5 to a lvl 15 dire.

The goal of this build is to take focus away from the pet and center it on you; damage or healing toward the pet gives way for an end result of a "hearty" pet. Vampiric/life stealing skills and spells still allow the pet to become dire (so sayeth the "wise" guildwiki).

After ~2 hours of slowly killing the Snow Wurms outside Boreal Station, my pet leveled from 5 to 15, and died only twice (due to my ignoring of the Mountain Pinesoul patrol at the end of the run).

The build I used:

12 + 3 + 1 blood
12 beast mastery
last pts in curses
(soul reaping doesn't help much since the wurms aren't dying in masses or quickly)

Feral Lunge
Scavenger Strike
Enfeeble
Barbed Sig
Life Siphon
Life Transfer [E]
Charm Animal
8th skill is optional (used great dwarf wep when pet was low lvled and when i had the energy for it)

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Equipment: You need to be taking the damage from the wurms (which isn't much with enfeeble), so use a melee item and preferably a blood offhand. I used a caster sword and Gordac's Hook Blood.

Upon encountering the first Snow Wurm, cast enfeeble (dmg reduction against you), followed by either life siphon or barbed sig. Once the Wurm is attacking you, feel free to start spamming feral and scavenger. Note that both feral and scav. can be activated while you are casting spells. I typically would cast Life Trans. after both siphon and the sig had been cast (usually ensures death of the Wurm even if it's underground). Make sure to recast enfeeble whenever you start taking major dmg (w/out enfeeble, I'd take ~50 dmg per hit; with enfeeble = ~15 dmg).

This build isn't perfect, and it's not incredibly fast. If you are aiming for a dire pet for your necro, this works, and it works relatively well. For each 10 min scroll, I was killing 10-12 Wurms per run (5940-7128 exp every 10 mins.) If you have any suggestions on quickening such a run, please let me know. If you already know this stuff or have a better run, either post it or please decline from flaming.

One final note: each run typically has 1 locked chest on it. Out of 15 runs, I found about 17 locked chests. Drops were pretty bad for the most part, but I managed to get a r9 insc. tactics shield of the wing on one run (not much, but it helps the hero's out).

The Luz

the kurzick eater · Mar 15, 2008, 07:50 AM // 07:50

ty, il try this out

King Manolo · Mar 15, 2008, 10:19 AM // 10:19

Keep in mind that pets are unaffected by experience scrolls

Marverick · Mar 15, 2008, 02:27 PM // 14:27

Try the Snow Wurms in Verdant Cascades; they don't burrow, making it much, much faster. Took me 30 minutes to get my pet from level 5 to 11 (aggressive).

Bowstring Badass · Mar 15, 2008, 02:33 PM // 14:33

Why not just do the death lvling? Quicker then this imo...

Trvth Jvstice · Mar 15, 2008, 04:11 PM // 16:11

I leveled a Dune Lizard outside Elona Reach to lvl 15 Dire in about 30-40 minutes w my lvl 19 ranger. I took Olias and deselected all of his skills except for resurrect. I took off all of my armor, and began to charm the lizard, when he became aggressive, I stopped the charm and just stood there, letting him kill me over and over. The lizard gained experience and leveled slowly. When he reached level 15 I put my armor on and charmed it. It was dire because it gained all of it's experience from it's attacks. Be careful where you start the process, because if a Sand Drake or other enemy gets aggro'd, you'll probably both get killed and you'll have to start over.

Al Andaluz · Mar 28, 2008, 04:06 AM // 04:06

Alright...

To King Manolo: good call... I didn't know that scrolls had no effect on pets, so I guess the scrolls are not necessary.

To Marverick: good call with the verdant cascades wurms... I completely forgot about them; however, they do some massive dmg to pets, so I'd recommend them for higher level pets. At lvl 15, and with all the supportive crap I could use for my pet, my raven was still getting destroyed badly. If you can work a build around them (possibly enfeeble + a pve skill of some sort), this could easily/quickly level a pet, so again good call.

To Bowstring and Trvth: the problem with the raven is that you cannot d-level it (only one spawns per entry into the area, and it's nowhere near a rez shrine). With charmable pets close to rez shrines, I highly support and suggest the death-leveling method. With other semi-rare pets--those that are nowhere near rez-points--wurm farming is a great and easy way to lvl them toward dire-hood.

For pets like the raven or regular phoenix, easy and guaranteed farming spots are very helpful, thus the dumb wurms outside of boreal. For any pets that are close to rez shrines, death-leveling is the easiest way to go. If you're someone that wants a hardcore dire pet that actually earned its dire-hood, all I can say is good luck, and happy beast-mastery focus for however long it takes you. Either way, a fow/uw spider, a "people know me" rainbow phoenix, or a black moa are the easiest ways to go.

shru · Mar 28, 2008, 06:19 PM // 18:19

Quote:

Originally Posted by Al Andaluz

Alright...

To King Manolo: good call... I didn't know that scrolls had no effect on pets, so I guess the scrolls are not necessary.

To Marverick: good call with the verdant cascades wurms... I completely forgot about them; however, they do some massive dmg to pets, so I'd recommend them for higher level pets. At lvl 15, and with all the supportive crap I could use for my pet, my raven was still getting destroyed badly. If you can work a build around them (possibly enfeeble + a pve skill of some sort), this could easily/quickly level a pet, so again good call.

To Bowstring and Trvth: the problem with the raven is that you cannot d-level it (only one spawns per entry into the area, and it's nowhere near a rez shrine). With charmable pets close to rez shrines, I highly support and suggest the death-leveling method. With other semi-rare pets--those that are nowhere near rez-points--wurm farming is a great and easy way to lvl them toward dire-hood.

For pets like the raven or regular phoenix, easy and guaranteed farming spots are very helpful, thus the dumb wurms outside of boreal. For any pets that are close to rez shrines, death-leveling is the easiest way to go. If you're someone that wants a hardcore dire pet that actually earned its dire-hood, all I can say is good luck, and happy beast-mastery focus for however long it takes you. Either way, a fow/uw spider, a "people know me" rainbow phoenix, or a black moa are the easiest ways to go.

Sorry, but the only pet you can't death level is the HoM Rainbow pheonix. You have heros, USE THEM! Bring along 3 Heros that can help run you to the pet's spawn point, and have them all go /p for sig of return (I used war heros so the pet would take even less of a prirority to their high armor) flag the hero in a large circle,put them on passive with everything but self heal (must be target self only) and res disabled, take off your armor, and aggro the pet. You might have to wand him a few times to keep him on you unti'll you build up some DP.

cgruber · Apr 02, 2008, 03:18 PM // 15:18

Death leveling super easy.. Take 2 monk heroes , both with resurrect and 1 with mending. Disable all their skills besides resurrect.

Monks should have mending casted on themselves for a passive heal. Take all your armor off and let the pet keep killing you. You'll be rezed at 25% health after pet is lvl 15 you can charm and he will be dire.

cgruber · Apr 02, 2008, 03:19 PM // 15:19

Quote:

Originally Posted by shru

Sorry, but the only pet you can't death level is the HoM Rainbow pheonix. You have heros, USE THEM! Bring along 3 Heros that can help run you to the pet's spawn point, and have them all go /p for sig of return (I used war heros so the pet would take even less of a prirority to their high armor) flag the hero in a large circle,put them on passive with everything but self heal (must be target self only) and res disabled, take off your armor, and aggro the pet. You might have to wand him a few times to keep him on you unti'll you build up some DP.

Can't death level white moa either