Curse

nutzizme · Oct 13, 2006, 04:10 PM // 16:10

hardest part for me is getting to the smites. i do everything posted here and i catch some of the NMs, but alot of the time they finish their rend a split second before my last shot hits em. even when i run them aatxe are so close to me they always hit me as im running away.

Kcp · Oct 13, 2006, 04:56 PM // 16:56

Quote:

Originally Posted by DeathByAmor

It cost me 15k before I successfully did a whole run and now I can consistently do the runs without dying using this guide and my own strategy I have learned on my own. Made 120ish ectos since the 7th when I read about this build.

Nice

Doesn't take long to make a stack of ectos with this build.

Xxalon Tacotu · Oct 16, 2006, 05:27 PM // 17:27

I've only managed to take down the first room so far (Aatxes, Nightmares and Graspings).

Got past my first 5 Smites last night, but then got Maelstrom'd about 20 seconds later.

Even so, I've had (and sold) around 12 ecto's in the last week, so have easily covered the 40k that I threw at it for very little return in the first couple of days.

Best run so far was last night. Got 4 Ecto's just out of the Aatxes. Be nice to see what I could get on a full run.

Thanks again to kcp.

Akane · Oct 16, 2006, 07:55 PM // 19:55

Fabulous guide and videos. As easy as Kcp makes it look, I know i'll soon be broke trying to get it down.

2 problems - I'm in Vegas and can't try it until I get home... and I have to raid my son's account to use his fully-loaded necro.

All those abusive monks who mistreated SS/SV necros will now be left to team up with other monks (dual SB build) while necros, garbed in their shiny new Fissure Armor, take their rightful place as rulers of the landscape!

Tainek · Oct 16, 2006, 11:29 PM // 23:29

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kcp

Nice

Doesn't take long to make a stack of ectos with this build.

Took me 35 hours to get a full stack, vs 39 with solo ritualist, i still prefer rit solo though, more challange

its an awesome build though xD

The Alliance Maker · Oct 16, 2006, 11:43 PM // 23:43

Thanx For the Great Guide's to both Fow and Uw
but in UW I'am still having trouble with the Jellies
cant seem to stay alive when they come out i use ss as soon as they pop up on my radar and then PS maybe they interupt my ps im not sure
any comments would be usefull

and thx for not keeping these builds a secret
apreciate them alot!!

Tainek · Oct 17, 2006, 12:06 AM // 00:06

Quote:

Originally Posted by The Alliance Maker

Thanx For the Great Guide's to both Fow and Uw
but in UW I'am still having trouble with the Jellies
cant seem to stay alive when they come out i use ss as soon as they pop up on my radar and then PS maybe they interupt my ps im not sure
any comments would be usefull

and thx for not keeping these builds a secret
apreciate them alot!!

precast PS before aggro, this is a rule of thumb

Kcp · Oct 17, 2006, 08:04 PM // 20:04

I need to start taxing all you mofo's on them ecto's

DeathByAmor · Oct 17, 2006, 08:17 PM // 20:17

Quote:

Originally Posted by The Alliance Maker

Thanx For the Great Guide's to both Fow and Uw
but in UW I'am still having trouble with the Jellies
cant seem to stay alive when they come out i use ss as soon as they pop up on my radar and then PS maybe they interupt my ps im not sure
any comments would be usefull

and thx for not keeping these builds a secret
apreciate them alot!!

I tried it a few different ways including the way mentioned in the guild and the one that worked flawlessly for me was to take quest and then immediately casting PS and then cast SS on the closest squid and then cast SB as they are coming toward you. Then just stand there. Recast SB when you can and they will just die off. You can only really take one group at a time safely. Then smites should be a breeze.

Rookwood · Oct 18, 2006, 01:46 AM // 01:46

Ugh...

I'm having a problem. I cast SS on the grasping then ps followed by sb...but like half way into it's like sb just stops working. I have the shing jea armor and all and sb does seem to work at the beginning. But then quits right when I'm about to take them out it seems....I am refreshing it and ps btw.

I've beaten the grasping before and not had this problem. It's just a recent issue I've had. I can't even beat one group of them now though...in about 7 tries

krypt1200 · Oct 18, 2006, 02:36 AM // 02:36

Yeah, im wearing the 15 AL armor from shing jea, along with a 60 AL scar pattern (curses) and when i see graspings, i cast ss on the closest one, ps goes up, afterwards sb goes up, and sb isnt triggering. its not the problem that i cast sb too early, because i can easily recast it, but sb isnt triggering and im wearing the exact specified gear. any ideas?

Kcp · Oct 18, 2006, 03:53 AM // 03:53

Was triggering for me steadily earlier, unless they did some update w/o a download.

I'll check in the morning and post back.

Spirit bond only has to go off a few times, mending fills in the gaps. Against 2 squids you don't even have to use spirit bond, so you shouldnt have any problems staying alive vs 3 or 4 if spirit bond only triggers a few times.

elleray · Oct 18, 2006, 05:35 AM // 05:35

@ krypt http://gw.gamewikis.org/wiki/Fiery_Flame_Spitter
I think you can guess what to do

Black Destroyer · Oct 18, 2006, 04:45 PM // 16:45

i use totem axe but i only have 9 prot, i don't know why....
i had ecto's so far and i almost paid all the practise back

Kcp · Oct 18, 2006, 04:55 PM // 16:55

Rook, and Krypt spirit bond triggers on squids np. Just tested it. You may have got your armor pieces mixed up? Or were using 105 health when fighting them.

Black you may have put 9 into healing thats why you only have 9 protect. You only need 8 heal for mending +3.

Xethrion · Oct 19, 2006, 05:18 AM // 05:18

Hello kcp, have a question for you about the NMs.

Vids covered the scenario of NMs spawning on the first group of cows, after the first and before the second group, and everything else after.

I can do the first part fine, and the last part as well(mostly). It's the middle part which gets me most of the time when I try to combine both 1st and 2nd groups as in your NM clearing vid..

After clearing the NMs that spawn with the first group of 3 cows, I'm often stuck as to what to do with the 2nd group.

If the patroller is stuck, I KNOW there's a NM that's gonna spawn, but should I run it and target it, or lure the group back and somehow, dispatch the NM as it's running in?

And if he's not stuck, the same question applies, do I run in all the way to trigger the NMs to spawn and kill them at the same time, or do I aggro from extreme range to try to pick the 2nd group off without touching any NMs?

Minor question, if the aatxe normally stuck on staircase (with a NM above him) is patrolling instead, and you can get him as he comes in close to the main chamber, do you still bother clearing the top of the stairs for any suspected NMs?

PS : Thanks for making this guide, great great info and detail

And an easy way I've used of timing your first SS on the smites after your shadow of fear, is to PS immediately after SoF, refresh spirit bond while it's recharging, and just as PS is recharged, cast SB once, wait for it to recharge, cast it again, then start casting SS + Reckless Haste. That counts out 7-8 seconds, which is about the time that the smites all need to use up their Smite Hexes. I think. Plus you get to renew SB just before chain casting SS/Reckless Haste/SOF, which is equal to, or longer than the duration of SB on the 105 health swap.

Kcp · Oct 19, 2006, 05:44 AM // 05:44

Sounds like you're pretty up to speed in terms of figuring out how the nightmares spawn based on the aatxe.

Sometimes you can't just run right in and wand them, or wait for them to come to you because alot of times you will attack too late and not be able to get that second wand hit in to drop the nightmare.

If the second group above the lost soul is stationary 99% of the time a nightmare will spawn you can either run towards him and get the nightmare kill by rend enchantment suicide or run back downstairs and hide behind the ghost and wand/or let rend.

If there is a patrolling aatxe in the above mentioned group, instead of them all being stationary, you are usually cool to pull them by wand or bow. It "usually" will not make a nightmare appear and you can just clear the nightmares before getting your second group of cows together after dispatching the first group.

Pretty much the same deal for the bottom aatxe on the long staircase, if he gets stuck you know there's a nightmare at the top and you can either bum rush the DN and attempt to wand it ( risky), run up stairs with the aatxe in tow and let the nightmare rend then immediately recast PS,sb then run back downstairs and re-enchant or tank the 1 aatxe and re-enchant if energy permits. There's sweet spots that the aatxe wont run past as well for the last group of 5. You can run to edge of the spot once you get familiar with it and wait for the DN to catch up and start casting rend, then run, the aatxe will turn around and rend will complete , the DN dies and you just re-enchant. The aatxe won't even make it back up the staircase before you get re-enchanted and are back after them.

The sweet spot is above the lost soul running towards the first set of aatxe you cleared upon entering. You should be familiar with the turn around point there being as observant as you are.

Ya that's pretty much how I time when the smite hexes are done, by the refreshes of PS and SB. 9 times out of 10 I'm in process of casting as the last smite hex is coming. It's fairly easy to get the hang of it. But if you miss the perfect window it sucks and you're usually better off waiting for all their smite hexes to recharge and restart the process. Sometimes they just dig SS out so fast if you screw up on your initial cast.

Xethrion · Oct 19, 2006, 08:37 AM // 08:37

Cut my teeth on the UW soloing it with the monk so I'm not a total newbie

But it's REALLY different to kill NMs with a wand, used to take them out with a PS triggered Zealot's Fire.. still getting used to the shift, as well as shortened enchant times due to not having Blessed Aura. All worth it though, as this build beats the Mo/W solo build so far down into the ground in terms of time taken, that I'd be willing to blow 50-100k on learning it. That is, if ANet doesn't nerf SS sometime in the near future

Another interesting thing I noted bout the NM at the top of the stairs you rush, is that the possibility of a 2 hit kill goes down the further you are from him. AKA, if you target him, and just press spacebar at maximum range, your shots do pathetic damage.

But if you run forward a few more steps, and THEN spacebar him, chances of a 2 hit kill go up pretty significantly. Delicate balance though, run forward too far and you don't have enough time to get off 2 shots before he rends, don't run forward enough, and you won't kill him in 2 shots most of the time. Definitely understand why you call bum rushing it risky.

But hey, that NM's been the bane of all solo characters since the day it's been introduced

What REALLY messes my day up is a double spawn there, sucks to the max, which is why I normally make a habit of counting how many nightmares there are in the first room, as well as the adjacent one. VERY rare to have more than 5, so at least if I trigger too little in the beginning, my mind will do a little 'uhoh' before the stairs.

Thanks again KCP, you rock for doing this guide AND answering the questions we raise. Time to get back in soloing mode and get my 5th set of fissure XD

PS : For the timing, I cheated actually

I was thinking, no way he can time it so well everytime without some form of aid, so I looked at what you did with PS and SB after you casted SOF, and voila! Helped that I used to use PS and HB for the same reason to not trigger Zealot's too rapidly

Oops, before I forget, what about that very very rare scenario, where one of the NM/Darkness group in the 2nd room, gets stuck on one of the aatxes, and the remainder is in the passage leading to the smites? Even if you do wand the NM (which I did), it's still VERY dangerous trying to lure interrupts with the squiddies having Skull Crack. Just leave and restart the run?

Kcp · Oct 19, 2006, 11:56 AM // 11:56

Quote:

Originally Posted by Xethrion

Oops, before I forget, what about that very very rare scenario, where one of the NM/Darkness group in the 2nd room, gets stuck on one of the aatxes, and the remainder is in the passage leading to the smites? Even if you do wand the NM (which I did), it's still VERY dangerous trying to lure interrupts with the squiddies having Skull Crack. Just leave and restart the run?

Aggro the closest one hopefully it isnt the nightmare, if they all chain aggro from your initial aggro run back in the main chamber and stay on top ledge, run past the lost soul, they will usually stop following at the turnaround pt just above the lost soul.

Most times the squids get stuck and the aatxe will reset leaving the nightmare in the 2nd chamber without the squids. The squids can become unstuck so be careful.

Rarely the turnaround pt is by the doorway to the obsids, still not a big deal if they follow that far, they will turn around and go back. Just make sure that if the squids do get stuck and you decide to kill them to wait 20 secs for them to lose their adrenaline......don't want to catch a skull crack on your first cast do ya?

Never restart a run unless you die

If you can safely skip the last chamber before smites if they are bugged up and stuck without catching the rend do it.

Slainster · Oct 20, 2006, 07:44 AM // 07:44

Hi KCP, I tried the build last night, spent a bit of cash getting to the UW before finally taking down my first group of 8 aatxe's (well 3 groups really), and that only because no NM's spawned! Im sure Ill get the hang of it, for me atm the NM's are the problem, I had a few runs where my enchants were rendered while an aatxe was beating on me, and death was immediate!

So one of my questions to anyone, are ALL your enchants nuked by NM's if they succeed? (ie PS and SB in addition to the 3 maintainables?) I managed to make it to the safe spot twice after been rendered, so that was quite handy to know. Guess I just need to get used to dealing with NM's fast!

The other problem I had was timing SS, almost every time I thought the cancels were complete, and tried to cast SS, I had it canceled. I guess this just comes down exp. but if you can add any extra insight here I'd appreciate it!