Curse

aspi · Jun 06, 2011, 02:43 PM // 14:43

Hmm it's almost time for me to start Luxon again now that my Kurz is done.

Since I do vq with a friend I might try the SF part. Now I am not familiar with the SF part of my sin besides some simple farming. Does anyone have a good build for the SF sin in silent surf? Thanks. And sorry for the hijack :/

untitled2005 · Jun 06, 2011, 05:31 PM // 17:31

Quote:

Originally Posted by aspi

Hmm it's almost time for me to start Luxon again now that my Kurz is done.

Since I do vq with a friend I might try the SF part. Now I am not familiar with the SF part of my sin besides some simple farming. Does anyone have a good build for the SF sin in silent surf? Thanks. And sorry for the hijack :/

Since I usually do the vq myself, I haven't tried have a SF runner. But I guess a standard A/R runner should do.

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The role of the runner is to aggro outcasts, afflicted and wildlife creatures (dragon, fish, kirin) to one another. Due to heavy disenchant skills/spirits that can strip SF, the runner should have some cheap cover enchants and/or quick self-heal.

Bright Star Shine · Jun 06, 2011, 05:49 PM // 17:49

Quote:

Originally Posted by untitled2005

Yes. I noticed that. If you have a friend with you and let him run clockwise to aggro all groups and you start vanq counter-clockwise, you can save a lot of time finish the vanq. I think outcasts, jellyfishs and afflicted fight each other whenever they are in each others' aggro bubble.

Actually, it's the other way around, the runner should go counter clockwise, following the Ele boss group. Then going to the huge battlefield, pulling literally EVERY group into each other, the battle with last a couple minutes and almost everything will be wiped, out of 2 tries, once there were only 2 Outcasts left and the other time there were like 5 or something..

Then go south, pulling the Outcasts into the Afflicted and the Rockhides, go up to the assassin boss, pull that group in as well, go get the mesmer boss and pull them up there, not sure how that outcome will be, didn't try it myself. Ignore the next outcast group, it WILL get wiped by the necro boss. Go south more, get the next afflicted group and pull it into the Saltsprays closest to Unwaking Waters. Once you're done there, go pull the OTHER saltspray group next to the boat and pull them in as well. There will either be 1 saltspray or 1 afflicted left. Once you're done there, go to your main team and help them ball groups and spike better. Your main team should by this time be around the rit boss or the monk boss, not sure.

untitled2005 · Jun 06, 2011, 06:13 PM // 18:13

Quote:

Originally Posted by Bright Star Shine

Actually, it's the other way around, the runner should go counter clockwise, following the Ele boss group. Then going to the huge battlefield, pulling literally EVERY group into each other, the battle with last a couple minutes and almost everything will be wiped, out of 2 tries, once there were only 2 Outcasts left and the other time there were like 5 or something..

Then go south, pulling the Outcasts into the Afflicted and the Rockhides, go up to the assassin boss, pull that group in as well, go get the mesmer boss and pull them up there, not sure how that outcome will be, didn't try it myself. Ignore the next outcast group, it WILL get wiped by the necro boss. Go south more, get the next afflicted group and pull it into the Saltsprays closest to Unwaking Waters. Once you're done there, go pull the OTHER saltspray group next to the boat and pull them in as well. There will either be 1 saltspray or 1 afflicted left. Once you're done there, go to your main team and help them ball groups and spike better. Your main team should by this time be around the rit boss or the monk boss, not sure.

Thanks for the tips! This is very interesting. I'll try that tonight. I want to see without any fighting, what's the vq counter is going to be like when I am done pulling. Maybe it'll be close to 150.

I dont' know if the monk boss/wallow group fight outcasts. There are usually 2 outcasts group next to the monk boss group.

The only foes that do not fight each other are in the SE corner. I guess even with 7hero set up, you can set up as a runner to aggro and flag your heroes one step a time around the SE area. This may involve some micro-managing, but definitely doable. Of coz, the best way is to have a friend to run for you.

Morte66 · Jun 06, 2011, 07:49 PM // 19:49

Not having mesmer heroes, I had a go with a fake version of your team:

The paragon secondaries had to go so no FB/SYG, which meant the time couldn't be any good, but it was enough to get an idea of what it would be like.

The damage that dagger warrior does with dual splinters is certainly a sight to see.

It was borderline survivable, I definitely missed a third res/rignet, but I can see that with some para shouts and the extra damage/edenial from runed up mesmers it would be pretty doable.

I find the Ritualist's Construct is quite brutal without any spirits/minions to draw his attention. How do you go about approaching his group, especially when he has an RoJ monk in attendance?

Bright Star Shine · Jun 06, 2011, 07:54 PM // 19:54

Quote:

Originally Posted by untitled2005

Thanks for the tips! This is very interesting. I'll try that tonight. I want to see without any fighting, what's the vq counter is going to be like when I am done pulling. Maybe it'll be close to 150.

I dont' know if the monk boss/wallow group fight outcasts. There are usually 2 outcasts group next to the monk boss group.

I don't know howmuch the counter will be, it's at least over 120 I seem to recall, but not sure...

Outcasts fight everything, so pulling them into the wallow group would work.

Once you pass under the bridge, behind the outcast boss group, there is also an Oni pop to your right which you can pop, it will fight the Outcast as well. The ele boss is pretty strong, but the others are rather squishy, it's possible for the ele boss to wipe everything there, but remain the sole survivor. That spot is a place to check afterwards though..

I think you can actually make a farm out of this if you take 2 teams that have 2 rits with spirits and a couple damagers, like mesmers that split up. 1 team goes south and 1 team goes north. I think that if done correctly you could do this in ~15 minutes, but haven't had a team to test it with yet.. And it's probably never gonna be a farm, because it requires actually thinking and that's beyond the average PUGs capabilities... Even MQSC is too much to handle for most of them..

untitled2005 · Jun 07, 2011, 01:28 AM // 01:28

Quote:

Originally Posted by Morte66

Not having mesmer heroes, I had a go with a fake version of your team:

The paragon secondaries had to go so no FB/SYG, which meant the time couldn't be any good, but it was enough to get an idea of what it would be like.

The damage that dagger warrior does with dual splinters is certainly a sight to see.

It was borderline survivable, I definitely missed a third res/rignet, but I can see that with some para shouts and the extra damage/edenial from runed up mesmers it would be pretty doable.

I find the Ritualist's Construct is quite brutal without any spirits/minions to draw his attention. How do you go about approaching his group, especially when he has an RoJ monk in attendance?

Primary mes definitely helps a lot. Not only with more powerful ES, but with faster casting speed/rez speed. My original build wasn't the safest way to vq this area. It's rather "i kill you before you kill me". I found a UA monk with splinter weapons actually helps a lot.

I used to vq other areas with the following teambuild before I got the merch pack. Hope it can be useful. AoD derv heals and AoB derv burns:

For the sin construct boss, I usually clear the smaller group with 3 afflicted first. They are close to the bridge. Then death charge to boss directly to attack. After he's dead, kill afflict Rit if there is any otherwise he'll rez the boss. I usually go in this order: boss --> rit --> mes --> monk --> ele.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Bright Star Shine

I don't know howmuch the counter will be, it's at least over 120 I seem to recall, but not sure...

Outcasts fight everything, so pulling them into the wallow group would work.

Once you pass under the bridge, behind the outcast boss group, there is also an Oni pop to your right which you can pop, it will fight the Outcast as well. The ele boss is pretty strong, but the others are rather squishy, it's possible for the ele boss to wipe everything there, but remain the sole survivor. That spot is a place to check afterwards though..

I think you can actually make a farm out of this if you take 2 teams that have 2 rits with spirits and a couple damagers, like mesmers that split up. 1 team goes south and 1 team goes north. I think that if done correctly you could do this in ~15 minutes, but haven't had a team to test it with yet.. And it's probably never gonna be a farm, because it requires actually thinking and that's beyond the average PUGs capabilities... Even MQSC is too much to handle for most of them..

I think the area is manageable with split groups. The only place that may be a problem is the SE corner with lots of jellyfish patrols. But if one team member takes the dragon egg quest from Leviathan Pits, it will wipe out a lot of foes in the area so a split group can manage.

Silent surf has about 250 foes. If 120 of them die by fighting each other, you only need to vq 130 foes, which are around the same number of foes in MQSC. So I think this can be a good source of luxon faction farm.

Jeydra · Jun 08, 2011, 08:55 AM // 08:55

There's something wrong with this area ... like, sometimes I get to a mob and instead of there actually being a mob, there's only one monster left in it. Other times I get to where a mob is supposed to be, but there isn't any mob there. Seems to me that the most efficient way of VQ'ing Silent Surf will somehow involve getting to places after the mobs finish killing each other, and just mopping up. This involves some fairly precise timing. I don't like it. Like, if you kill an earlier mob too fast you actually slow yourself down later.

I'm positive I'll eventually manage to clear this in 20-21 minutes. 19 minutes and under though may be impossible, we'll see. Do you kill Reef Lurkers?

Morte66 · Jun 08, 2011, 10:00 AM // 10:00

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jeydra

There's something wrong with this area ... like, sometimes I get to a mob and instead of there actually being a mob, there's only one monster left in it. Other times I get to where a mob is supposed to be, but there isn't any mob there. Seems to me that the most efficient way of VQ'ing Silent Surf will somehow involve getting to places after the mobs finish killing each other, and just mopping up. This involves some fairly precise timing. I don't like it. Like, if you kill an earlier mob too fast you actually slow yourself down later.

Yup. But the mobs off-camera spawns/movement/fights are not the same each time. Thus I'm not sure that perfect timing will always help.

On Mt Quinkai some time back I had a team that hit 17 minutes every time, like clockwork, except the one time it hit 15 minutes when all the spawns/wandering came right at once and I cut a leg off the route.

The idea I'm working on at the moment is that if you do a double loop around the central northern island, wide then narrow like in the OP, you can get the groups interested in each other on the first circuit then break aggro, and mop up on the second.

But I've only got two runs to go for Luxon r10 to max out SY.

edit: and done! I may have just done my last vanquish ever.

Bright Star Shine · Jun 08, 2011, 10:27 AM // 10:27

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jeydra

There's something wrong with this area ... like, sometimes I get to a mob and instead of there actually being a mob, there's only one monster left in it. Other times I get to where a mob is supposed to be, but there isn't any mob there. Seems to me that the most efficient way of VQ'ing Silent Surf will somehow involve getting to places after the mobs finish killing each other, and just mopping up. This involves some fairly precise timing. I don't like it. Like, if you kill an earlier mob too fast you actually slow yourself down later.

I'm positive I'll eventually manage to clear this in 20-21 minutes. 19 minutes and under though may be impossible, we'll see. Do you kill Reef Lurkers?

I really think 15 is possible, and I'm even willing to test it. I know the mobs by heart from chest running there, I know all the patrols, I know which mob to pull into which mob etc etc. With some luck I can wipe the entire north side of that map except for 1 group.

If you would do this with a split you would have to do the following:
1 groups (preferably the strongest group) goes SE to get all the jellyfish stuff. 1 group goes north, gets the Afflicted + the monk boss, then goes to the little bowl where I run through first to clean up any mess that's left there, then cleans up the north side -which will probably will still be fighting- after that goes up the hill at the ssin boss to clean up whatever is left from that.

The runner does exactly what I described earlier.

The SE team cleans the first bunch of jelly fish. By the time they reach the rit lord boss, I should be there (a full tour, WITH opening chests takes me 3 minutes, 4 minutes if I deliberately pull every mob into each other, without avoiding a single one), if they're fast, they can clean the south most groups as well by the time I reach them. I could ball up the monk boss spawn and help them spike it, same for saltsprays etc, thus speeding them up a lot. While the north team cleans up their mess, we will go and kill the entire south side of the map. If I succeed in pulling the mesmer boss group into the assassin boss group, I'm fairly certain they would still be fighting by the time we get there (haven't tried that yet, it was just a thought that came to my mind) meaning the two teams should meet just about there, leaving just that group as a cleanup.

Benefits over MQSC:
-seems like more fun, because for the love of god MQSC is boring
-you kill just about as many foes, but your kill counter is a lot higher, giving you more faction

Downsides:
-having to set it up and learning new stuff seems to be impossible for some people

I don't have any benefits with this myself, since I maxed both my allegiance titles, but I'd like to help testing this stuff to see how fast we can go with split teams..

aspi · Jun 08, 2011, 01:28 PM // 13:28

Bright do you start from seafares or unwaking?
Also do you mind making a small movie about the route, I know nothing about silent surf since it's usualy just a pass through for me to get to unwaking. :/
And yeah mqsc is quite boring even though I have done it once...

untitled2005 · Jun 08, 2011, 01:41 PM // 13:41

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jeydra

There's something wrong with this area ... like, sometimes I get to a mob and instead of there actually being a mob, there's only one monster left in it. Other times I get to where a mob is supposed to be, but there isn't any mob there. Seems to me that the most efficient way of VQ'ing Silent Surf will somehow involve getting to places after the mobs finish killing each other, and just mopping up. This involves some fairly precise timing. I don't like it. Like, if you kill an earlier mob too fast you actually slow yourself down later.

I'm positive I'll eventually manage to clear this in 20-21 minutes. 19 minutes and under though may be impossible, we'll see. Do you kill Reef Lurkers?

I think you trigger the patrols when you are within certain distance from them. It's farther than the mini-compass. So if you take the "wrong" (or "right") route, they will finish each other off when you actually get there. I usually do the vq clockwise, but after reading Bright Star Shine's tips, I think counterclock (i.e. following the outcast ele boss) may be more efficient (less foes to kill).

And no, I don't deliberately kill the reef lurkers, but many times the poor creatures are just collateral damage. There are also 5 or so oni spawns that are on your route, you can pop them too for additional 20 easy foes.

I just maxed the luxon point last weekend and tried MTSC last night for the kurz point. Oh its so boring even just after 2 vq's!! I'll really miss silent surf

Bright Star Shine · Jun 08, 2011, 01:47 PM // 13:47

Quote:

Originally Posted by aspi

Bright do you start from seafares or unwaking?
Also do you mind making a small movie about the route, I know nothing about silent surf since it's usualy just a pass through for me to get to unwaking. :/
And yeah mqsc is quite boring even though I have done it once...

Seafarer's. I will when I have the time for it, but you can basically find the route on one of my maps in the Chestrunner's thread, I'll link it later on..

Quote:

Originally Posted by untitled2005

I think you trigger the patrols when you are within certain distance from them. It's farther than the mini-compass. So if you take the "wrong" (or "right") route, they will finish each other off when you actually get there. I usually do the vq clockwise, but after reading Bright Star Shine's tips, I think counterclock (i.e. following the outcast ele boss) may be more efficient (less foes to kill).

And no, I don't deliberately kill the reef lurkers, but many times the poor creatures are just collateral damage. There are also 5 or so oni spawns that are on your route, you can pop them too for additional 20 easy foes.

I just maxed the luxon point last weekend and tried MTSC last night for the kurz point. Oh its so boring even just after 2 vq's!! I'll really miss silent surf

You trigger a patrol when you come within the distance you need to see it. I.e. when you hit control and you can see them,they're triggered, this is slightly larger than compass range..

Also, my way is only more efficient if you have the runner pulling groups. It does not benefit you if you do it with full hero team, because you will walk into the fights while they are still going. If you wanna do it full hero team, I'd advise, follow the ele boss up, trigger everything on the northside, don't fight them, go do ssin boss, go SE, get everything there, go back north through the SW side, and finish up what's left.

FoxBat · Jun 08, 2011, 07:36 PM // 19:36

If you want to get *really* practiced at it for the long grind, it's conceivable to flag your heroes so they fight some groups on their own, while you run around and spawn everything else. If you learn where the groups are flagging them "blindly" won't be an issue.

Morte66 · Jun 10, 2011, 11:31 AM // 11:31

So I couldn't resist Silent Surf. Looks like I'm going for Luxon r12 after all...

After about 20 hours faffing about with various form of AoE -- Esurge, Invoke Lightning, Searing Flames, Putrid Bile, Putrid Explosion, Splinter Weapon, Death Blossom, 100B/Whirlwind/MoP etc -- I seem to do best with this:

That gets me about 25 minutes, picking up all loot, with the wrong gear/runes on half the heroes, no micro as such but some care with position and timing, no fear of wiping, and no mercs. It tackles the "do spirits slow you down?" question by teleporting the damn things (except Life which is 20s cooldown). It cuts waiting for minions to be raised/nova-ed by parallel processing. I has quite lot of hex removal, some of it on signets, because those Jade Kirin groups with Backfire spam were the bane of my caster teams.

5x Esurge goes off for 528 damage + 48 energy drain with nearby effect. This, ISTM, is the kicker -- ESurge is decent on one mesmer but when you get enough of it it becomes wide AoE spike and shutdown. The wide AoE means you get balling benefits far more easily/often (I found that Searing Flames was as good as Invoke Lightning for similar reasons).

It seems to have a little more hex removal than needed ATM, and maybe the UA could do more damage. I do sometimes get up to 30 minions but it's usually more like 20, so I would try cutting it to two minion masters if I could think of a better use for one of them. I'm actually wondering about an ESurge Paragon, but I don't know Paragon's from a hole in the ground so that might be silly.

On routes... I didn't get any clear advantage by leaving from Seafarer's Rest, it seems you can spawn the Ele boss when you kill the Kirin Mesmer boss and that's soon enough. I had a route planned from Leviathan pits which looked good, but before I could test it the Kurzicks conquered half of Cantha overnight and that shrine became unavailable. This is obviously Untitled2005's fault for starting MTSC.

edit: I don't know "running" stuff, but I took a scamper through the north of the map on my warrior alone and without attacking anything or trying to lure groups together he got 90 kills in 4 minutes, before dying ignominiously. I think somebody who actually know what they were doing could get 30-50 more. But to make use of this you'd need multiple players, and it wouldn't be heroway that you could do when it took your fancy.

untitled2005 · Jun 10, 2011, 01:56 PM // 13:56

Very solid build. Glad you like ES bots. I think you can lower command from 8 to 7 since that's the break point for FB to 7 sec and put the attribute points into inspiration instead.

ES and mistrust have 2 sec casting time, which may be a problem for non-mes primary heroes. I would let one mes switch from ES to Stolen Speed, which would shorten the casting time for all spells targeting enemies. Since you only use 1 Rit hero, you can also switch the 2nd rit hero (Razah) to mes primary.

If starting outpost doesn't matter, you can leave from Unwaking Waters since the priest outside is always luxon. The priests at Leviathan and Seafarer's are sometimes Kurz.

Jeydra · Aug 13, 2011, 02:06 AM // 02:06

It took a while, but I finally got it. The key was, as always, to run less healing.

This time was achieved without picking up items, without killing Reef Lurkers and without opening Locked Chests. 18 minutes might be doable because I actually wiped once this run (pro tip: don't run 2 Death Pacts as your only resses when you're running with a total of three heals in the team, jeez) and lost maybe 30s.

gw_poster · Feb 06, 2012, 09:50 PM // 21:50

old thread res - but i couldn't resist. I need to start farming lux and MQSC's are nothing but lots of talking, bitching, noobing, and 15 min runs - that is, when you can actually get into a group! I don't mind the grind (I did >150 ferndale runs to max kurz!), so I'm going to give Silent Surf a try. I've done plenty of chestrunning there and I've vanqed it once a few years ago. Anyway - thanks for the builds and ideas! I'm going with standard pvx 7-hero team build as i cba to do all that fiddling again with skills/weapon/armor sets!! Hope it works

Morte66 · Feb 26, 2012, 06:48 PM // 18:48

I've been plugging away at this, made it to Savior of the Luxons today. I switched Domination to Fire after the HM update, but at heart it's the same unsubtle build I ran earlier:

This runs about 27 minutes ambling around listening to music and picking up all loot, +2 if you want to kill all the Oni, -3 if you skip looting. It's relaible, I don't get good and bad runs. It's not as good as Jeydra's speed runs, but there came a point where I decided to stop fiddling.

I suspect that if I weren't looting I would come up with an utterly different team, probably based on my warrior. But the spirit spammer has lots of spare time during fights to pick things up.

My rit uses spirits to take aggro, and tanks just well enough herself with Shaman's Insigniae and prots. There is a lot of Disenchantment and Backfire, which I draw onto summons. For RoJ afflicted, I flag the team and run out in front to draw RoJ on myself. Then I scoot back out of it, pulling the afflicted onto spirits/minions. You need to know the area well to do this; but if you're working on a Luxon title, familiarity is one thing you will gain...

The three necros cut waiting for minions to be raised, and -- glory be -- they actually seem to cast enough Death Nova to make themselves happy, leaving time for other skills that bombers often ignore. But they just won't spam Order of Undeath when they should, so I use Icy Veins instead. Order of Undeath is way better if you micro it.

The eles seem fine for energy and pump out AoE spiky good damage, and generally seem to use their AoE spells at the right time. The rit and minions are single target killers.

I usually like to run two hybrid backliners instead of one specialist, but the build just wouldn't refactor. It needs the three bombers to get the "hey, my bombers aren't being annoying" thing, and the three eles for a big enough spike, and the player is too busy looting, so that leaves room for one backliner.

I do like the Rt/Mo heal and prot a lot, I think it's by far the best single hero backline I've used; but one usually can't spare a rit hero except in an oddball setup like this.

Resha · Apr 06, 2012, 07:49 AM // 07:49

Mini necro here but I figured I shouldn't make new thread just to ask this - I have a lot of trouble in this map with my paragon on account of all the soothing spirits, since I rely pretty much entirely on adrenaline to function.

I am, however, able to vanquish MQ in a reasonable 15 minutes with just h/h.

Am I better off just sticking with MQ on my paragon or trying to build my heroes up on another character (mes or rit) in order to be able to vanquish SS in 20ish minutes?