[Necro] Iksar Regeneration Advantage Put to Task

[crkhobbit]

On the Necromancer class page, someone added a chart to show the differences in Iksar and non-Iksar regen, with verbiage that strongly recommends Iksar over any other race option for Necromancer.

I've even been told in game that I should re-roll (I'm mid-level) to Iksar before I waste too much time leveling the wrong race, and that Demi Lich is unusable by non-Iksar because it does too much damage.

I find these assertions questionable.

So I decided to do the math. Using the numbers for regen on the chart on the Necro class page, I determined how often an Iksar would need to cast Bond of Death to stay healed (at 60, using Demi Lich non-stop), versus another race. Then I calculated how much more mana per minute a non-Iksar would spend staying healed with Bond of Death.

Assuming you never reach full health or full mana, Demi Lich never drops, and that Bond of Death and normal regen are your only means for healing, Iksar regen equates to about 4 mana per tick while standing and 5.5 mana per tick while sitting. In other words, an Iksar will have the mana to cast one extra DoT every ten minutes instead of casting Bond of Death, given the listed assumptions. Assuming one casts Pyrocruor (and it runs for the full duration), the Iksar is able to do an additional 1278 damage every ten minutes (1978 total damage, minus 720 damage for Bond of Death).

This advantage is diminished, or even completely negated, in camps with enough downtime to reach full mana, or when healed by an outside source. This also assumes that the Necromancer never casts a direct damage lifetap.

I then broke down the level ranges by which Lich spells and which Lifetap over Time spells are available.

Here's my chart:
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0Aoef34NfwbwxdFNYSjVRdGYxd1QwWVhseF9ZYmNBT mc#gid=0

I would love to know if I'm missing something.

[crkhobbit]

After going through all this trouble, I realize that the difference in mana is even easier to discern by comparing the difference between racial regen rates to the hpm efficiency of the given level's lifetap.

A non-Iksar takes an additional 8 damage per tick. Bond of Death heals 2 life for every 1 mana. Therefore 4 mana per tick is needed to offset the difference in health loss while standing.

[Splorf22]

A necro with Lich on will regenerate 20 mana/tick standing, so that 4/tick is a 20% increase. The same necro will regenerate 40 mana/tick sitting, so that 5.5 mana/tick is a 14% increase. Obviously that doesn't mean non-iksar necros are trash, but I imagine that if FT4 items started dropping off of Trakanon they would be going for 1 million pp or more. The good news is that if you ever get the lifetap stick from VP you won't care!

edit: also one problem with your math is that Bond of Death is a net of 60 (assuming lich is on). That means you have to be 500HP under your max before you cast to get the full benefits. If you have a cleric then w/e, but if you are solo that may mean running around with under 1000HP . . . which can be a little risky.

[crkhobbit]

I'm obviously not contesting that there is a mana advantage, or that a mana advantage is good.

I'm contesting the perceived assertion that Iksar is the only viable race.

4 mana per tick works out to 400 mana per 10 minutes. Or, 1278 damage per ten minutes using Pyrocruor, which is 2.13 DPS.

If we're using that mana for twitches, we can enable one cleric to cast one extra Complete Heal every ~23.33 minutes.

Both of those are positive numbers, and positive is good here. But Breeze is far less awesome at 60 than it is at 12.

Put another way, after ten minutes of non-stop action, the non-Iksar will need to med for an additional 1.67 minutes after the Iksar reaches full mana. Both of which will be full mana before any other class in the raid.

[crkhobbit]

edit: also one problem with your math is that Bond of Death is a net of 60 (assuming lich is on). That means you have to be 500HP under your max before you cast to get the full benefits.

This is the kind of feedback I was hoping for.

Edit: Actually, this looks to be an argument for the non-Iksar because less of a health deficit is required to get the full benefit of the Bond of Death. So either the Iksar goes lower on health, or he gets less benefit from his Bond of Death. I.E., his lifetaps are either less efficient or more risky, yet he still needs to cast them.

[Vexenu]

I also analyzed this awhile back and came to a similar conclusion: http://www.project1999.org/forums/showpost.php?p=983252&postcount=8



http://wiki.project1999.org/Magelo_Blue:Erumancer

For kicks I made a Magelo profile demonstrating the degree to which an Erudite Necro can get away with ignoring +INT items. It's pretty impressive. Fully 50% of his slots contain no +INT items at all and he's still sitting at 204 INT. The other half of his slots can be fully devoted to +HP and mana gear. For reference, my Iksar Necro is 54 and similarly geared and has approximately 650 less mana and roughly the same HP.

The Erudite's superior natural INT combined with the non-Iksar items he can use amounts to basically a 50 point INT advantage over the Iksar when both are wearing full HP gear. This obviously gives the Erudite a much larger mana pool, which partially negates the Iksar regen since the Erudite can cast more lifetaps from full mana. The difference is almost enough to allow the Erudite two extra casts of Bond of Death, which would heal 1440 for 720 mana.

I'll warn that the rest of this post is math-heavy and is aimed at Necro enthusiasts and EQ data nerds. Pay attention and don't let your eyes glaze over!

At level 54, every minute while liched the Iksar loses 90 health in exchange for 400 mana, while the Erudite loses 160 health in exchange for 400 mana. So the Iksar efficiency rating is 4.4 mana per hp, while the Erudite's is 2.5 mana per hp. The Erudite must cast Bond every 5 minutes, while the Necro can get away with casting it every 9 minutes. This means the Erudite needs 12 Bonds per hour while the Iksar needs roughly 7.

So the difference every hour is five casts of Bond the Erudite has to make that the Iksar won't. Five casts of Bond costs 1800 mana.

So essentially, starting at t=0, the Erudite has +700 mana over the similarly geared Iksar. But at t=60, the Erudite is at -1100 mana compared to the Iksar due to the necessity of casting more taps. This means that for any duration under approximately 20-25 minutes, the Erudite is more efficient due to the big mana pool. For anything over that, the Iksar regen makes them more efficient. Very interesting.

Although to keep things in perspective, the math shows in the end the Iksar regen only amounts to an advantage that reduces med time by 3 minutes per hour compared to the Erudite (1100 mana advantage per hour for the Iksar, 3 minutes of liched medding = 1200 mana). Necros gonna necro, mana regen being sort of their thing and all.

But this isn't the whole story. Due to the XP penalty, the Iksar will need to kill 20% more mobs per hour to keep up with the Erudite's leveling speed. Let's say the Erudite is able to kill 15 mobs per hour. This means the Iksar would need to kill 18 mobs per hour to stay even. Does a +1100 mana advantage per hour allow you to kill 3 extra mobs at level 54? And can you kill those 3 mobs in less than the 3 minutes it would take the Erudite to med up and offset the per-hour mana penalty? Probably not.

So ultimately the math tells us that the Iksar is indeed the more efficient Necro race for any time over 25ish minutes. However, despite this advantage they will level slower than the Erudite, because their efficiency increases are not sufficient to offset the XP penalty. It roughly works out to a 5% efficiency advantage for Iksars, at the cost of a 20% XP penalty (Erudite needs an extra 3 min of med time per level to offset Iksar regen advantage; 3/60 = 5%).

At the end of the day, the Iksar will be a more efficient camp holder/farmer due to their regen, while the Erudite will be a faster leveler, superior PvPer, better raider (bigger mana battery) and better at breaking difficult camps and killing tough mobs solo due to their noticeably larger mana pool. It's just a matter of which you prefer.

I would be grateful if anyone could point out any mathematical errors or erroneous assumptions I've made here.

[applesauce25r624]

Thank you for that analysis, Vex! What do you think about the situation at level 60 or when velious comes out with the ridiculous gear that (may) lessen the gap between iksar and erudite mana pools?

[Potus]

I'm contesting the perceived assertion that Iksar is the only viable race.


I have no idea who is telling you that but they're a complete moron. All the races are viable. Iksar are simply better because the regen is so nice. I've played both a Gnome and an Iksar and it's mostly at higher level that you notice the difference and you appreciate the Iksar more as you come across raid mobs that you cannot lifetap.

[Somekid123]

I see the argument for iksar vs non regen race and while my post is off topic can we not consider the benefits of running zone to zone low health yet conviently regaining health while moving towards your target or zone. thats not mentioning the pvp benefactor too towards regen in situational scenarios.

iksar > all. dont hate.

[Autotune]

Iksar is a great race for necromancer, one of the best.

However, it's not going to make or break you. Considering you can max int easier on other races and then stack hp/sta gear in place of int/+mana gear. Meaning you can have a higher HP and Mana pool.

Anyhow, you guys can go back to mathing your gains/loses.

[crkhobbit]

Iksar is a great race for necromancer, one of the best.

However, it's not going to make or break you. Considering you can max int easier on other races and then stack hp/sta gear in place of int/+mana gear. Meaning you can have a higher HP and Mana pool.

This is all I'm going for. The Necromancer wiki page is fairly overbearing about Iksar being pants-dropping amazing. Especially with the giant, in-your-face charts that only tell one side of the story.

I don't want people to feel like they have to be pigeon-holed into playing a race they don't want to.

And I'd like for the people that think non-Iksars should re-roll to be better informed.

The math just supports the idea that the Iksar is only marginally better, even negligibly so or not at all in many circumstances, at the cost of a tremendous racial xp penalty and being KOS nearly everywhere.

[Estu]

This is all I'm going for. The Necromancer wiki page is fairly overbearing about Iksar being pants-dropping amazing. Especially with the giant, in-your-face charts that only tell one side of the story.

I don't want people to feel like they have to be pigeon-holed into playing a race they don't want to.

And I'd like for the people that think non-Iksars should re-roll to be better informed.

The math just supports the idea that the Iksar is only marginally better, even negligibly so or not at all in many circumstances, at the cost of a tremendous racial xp penalty and being KOS nearly everywhere.

If you have a problem with the wiki page's wording (just read through it; doesn't seem THAT bad), just add a line like "many prefer other races to Iksar to avoid the large EXP penalty and the faction problems".

[Tecmos Deception]

tremendous racial xp penalty

So much for not wanting anything to sound one-sided, eh? ;)

[crkhobbit]

So much for not wanting anything to sound one-sided, eh? ;)

Is it hypocritical if I admit to being hypocritical? :D

[Freakish]

All this talk about health and regen, you're all a bunch of hypochondriacs.

Play iksar or don't. You can be lazier if you're an iksar, and i'm a lazy guy.

[Splorf22]

Iksars are just the best, especially when well geared. If you check Butchh's magelo profile it pretty much crushes the idea that Erudites are going to have extra mana, and he doesn't even have a BCG, not to mention wearing the EoE like a boss.

That doesn't mean you can't be effective as a non-iksar, but they are simply the minmax choice and if you don't like that, reroll. I have an iksar warrior, and he is just 5-10% worse than a comparably geared Ogre - something like 50 item AC and 250 hp. There is no getting around it.

[crkhobbit]

I'm fine with Iksars being the best minmax choice. There is always a minmax choice.

I'm not fine with people saying that Demi Lich is unusable by non-Iksar, or that any other race should reroll. And that's what I'm arguing against here.

[Estu]

I'm fine with Iksars being the best minmax choice. There is always a minmax choice.

I'm not fine with people saying that Demi Lich is unusable by non-Iksar, or that any other race should reroll. And that's what I'm arguing against here.

Is anyone saying either of those things?

[Splorf22]

How about you stop worrying so much about what other people think? Your posts on this thread make me think you are a candidate for the office of thoughtcrime suppression.

[crkhobbit]

Is anyone saying either of those things?

In this thread, no. But in game, yes. I have been harassed to reroll. And by that I mean that I received tells from a person for over a half hour about how I'm playing the wrong race that I will regret for the rest of my time playing that character.

How about you stop worrying so much about what other people think? Your posts on this thread make me think you are a candidate for the office of thoughtcrime suppression.

Quite the opposite, depending on how you mean it. I'm going to play what I want regardless of what others think. But I'm also going to understand the implications of the choice that I made, and I'm going to share my findings with others so that they can make informed decisions.

The reason for creating this thread is to give information to those who may seek it on the true differences between the races. "Iksars are best because of the regen" is a mantra that seems to be repeated as fact. It is important to understand how much advantage the Iksar has.

Why are you offended that I'm interesting in fully understanding my class? I don't get it - you seem to be a guy that's interested in collecting data to better understand mechanics.

[DrKvothe]

I think it's important to clearly quantify each pro and con for iksar on the wiki. As a newly returning player, I thought of necro as iksar only based on the strong recommendation of the wiki. A 5% improvement in efficiency is pretty big, obviously, but the cons are hated everywhere, requires 20% more kills per level up, and starts in kunark (higher hp mobs).

Here's how the wiki influenced me. I'm leveling a shaman, which I absolutely love, but I need alts to play around on when I'm bored of the shm or when I'm waiting for a spawn (totemic helm, fml). I wanted a class that could comfortably solo. When considering which class to choose, I also needed to account for race as well. I narrowed my choice down to magician or necro, but ultimately chose magician because I didnt like the iksar racial penalties.

But if I hadn't realized that the 'iksar only' message on the wiki was simply for min/maxers, I might have compared gnome mage with erudite necro, and made a necro in the end...

[arsenalpow]

If you want the best person to comment on this look for uteaenyar or sesserdrix. Leveled a DE necro to 60, realized the power of an iksar and is almost 60 on his iksar necro.

[Splorf22]

So, some dude told you to reroll. You were enraged and got out your napkin and did a bit of basic math and concluded that Iksars get about 15% more mana regeneration when solo. At this point, you could have a) rerolled iksar or b) decided that you were content having inferior mana regeneration because you were emotionally attached or preferred how gnomes looked or felt you could make up the difference with skill or whatever.

Instead you created a long thread on the class forums trying to convince yourself and everyone else that it didn't matter that your necro was just as good as an iksar. It reminds me of the Seekers cult. They believed that aliens would rescue them from a cataclysm on December 21, 1954. Needless to say, the aliens did not arrive. You might think that this would result in the destruction of the cult, but in fact they immediately began to proselytize heavily precisely at that point when their position was weakest. One possible explanation is that they needed social proof to override or at least exculpate themselves from the massive empirical evidence that they were idiots.

Based on your reactions in this thread, I suspect you should reroll. I'm way too emotionally attached to my little iksar warrior to reroll him, but as a competitive min-maxer type every now and then I just get irritated at wearing sebilite scale armor for 2+ years. When I rolled him I had no idea that Velious would take this long, and warriors aren't really a skill class that can make up a large gear disadvantage.

[crkhobbit]

So, some dude told you to reroll. You were enraged and got out your napkin and did a bit of basic math and concluded that Iksars get about 15% more mana regeneration when solo. At this point, you could have a) rerolled iksar or b) decided that you were content having inferior mana regeneration because you were emotionally attached or preferred how gnomes looked or felt you could make up the difference with skill or whatever.

False.

Someone told me to reroll. I broke out my napkin to find out if I needed to. My conclusion is that I do not. I shared that conclusion.

And the reason why I shared it is:
When considering which class to choose, I also needed to account for race as well. I narrowed my choice down to magician or necro, but ultimately chose magician because I didnt like the iksar racial penalties.

But if I hadn't realized that the 'iksar only' message on the wiki was simply for min/maxers, I might have compared gnome mage with erudite necro, and made a necro in the end...

[Borador]

You are making an Iksar to raid with? That is what people should be telling you not to do...

You should change your hypothetical scenario from an extended fight in a group to solo farming, since that is the only reason a sane person would play a necro. You FD, see invis mobs near, you are low HP/mana, now tell me you are happy to lay there almost three times as long on a gnome vs an iksar.

[crkhobbit]

You are making an Iksar to raid with? That is what people should be telling you not to do...

You should change your hypothetical scenario from an extended fight in a group to solo farming, since that is the only reason a sane person would play a necro. You FD, see invis mobs near, you are low HP/mana, now tell me you are happy to lay there almost three times as long on a gnome vs an iksar.

This is a good point.

[planarity]

Proud erudite necro because I don't want to be a stupid lizard person.
No regrets!

If Butchh can do anything that Complexity can't, it's only because he's a very clever dude that knows the mechanics of his class well.

We have roughly the same gear. Both of us can solo all of HS west, neither of us can solo HS south.

[gotrocks]

Iksar necros can fd to bank anywhere they want, get both types of invis and are one of the most powerful solo classes in the game

Being hated everywhere and the racial penalty mean nothing.

but theres also no reason to minmax a necro. de gnome whatever is fine. all the cool kids pick iksar tho.

[Uteunayr]

Hello everyone!

I am the person that has, over the past month, been making significant alterations to the Necromancer page to give a more accurate account of what Necromancers are like on P99 than what was previously available on the wiki. Part of this was updating the race information to include some detail as to the benefit of Iksar regeneration, and a table to display the different stages. A new player has no idea what Lich is and how regen plays with it, and lacking that information, cannot make a truly informed decision. I have also added updated text to the spell tables, and updated the loot tables. I have also put out a Necromancer Soloing and Strategy guide available under the guides section to offer a thorough look at the basic strategies and mechanics of Necromancer.

Everything I say is up to argument. If you see something faulty, *please* point it out. I am not attached to this information, I am only trying to offer the best information so that people can make well informed decisions.

I did this after reaching level 60 on a Dark Elf Necromancer (Uteunayr) and then realizing that I was a gimp to my class, and changed to an Iksar Necromancer (Sesserdrix).

Please note, I am a dirty, dirty fucking min/maxer. I adore being at the peak of my strength whenever possible in a game (probably because of D&D 3.0). I am of the opinion that being a Non-Iksar is not game breaking... It is simply not optimal in the sense of min-maxing. If you have any desire to push your absolute fullest potential, go Iksar. If you want to go flavor, go other races. In the end, it isn't going to screw you over to be a Non-Iksar.

Now then... I wrote this up in a discussion on this with a friend. I am going to try and snip in the pieces that are important, because it is very, very long...

If anything seems out of place, note that I didn't write it for this audience.

------------------------------
First off to the XP penalty:
------------------------------

The XP penalty is not that big a deal. You have a 10% penalty and a 20% penalty stacked together to make a 32% penalty. As an Iksar, your HP regen will make you more mana efficient so that way you can kill more things, faster. Why is this? Allow me to explain.

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Lich Efficiency:
-----------------

This is perhaps the most important factor of a Necromancer. You want to be as efficient as possible. The more efficient you are, the more things you can kill in a given time period. If you burn all your mana on 1 add, you're inefficient. If you stretch one mana pool to 4, you're more efficient.

One thing underlies all this, and that is the fact that Lifetaps/HP drains are horribly mana inefficient. The Lifetap/HP drain line becomes more efficient as time goes on, beginning with Lifetap (4 mana for 4 hp/damage, 1.0 efficiency), and ends with Touch of Night (400 mana for 720 damage, 1.8 efficiency). The DoT lifetaps, which begin with Leach (72 mana for 72 healing, 1.0 efficiency) to Vexing Mordinia (500 mana for 1000 healing, approximately 2.0 efficiency) are similar, but slightly more efficient.

Compare these efficiencies to Damage Per Mana efficiency of Splurt, has a 6.1875 efficiency, Pyrocuor which has 4.995 efficiency. What we see is that non-Lifetaps are significantly more efficient, meaning you get more bang for your buck.

Now, we also need to talk about Lich Efficiency. I hate to keep using this word, but it is all linked. The more efficient spells you use, the more things you can kill. The more efficient you are with Lich, the less you need to use inefficient spells.

What I mean by this is... Lets assume level 60 for simple math, you can do it yourself if you go to (http://wiki.project1999.com/Necromancer) and look at my color chart. When I refer to Lich Efficiency, the lower the number, the less Hp is lost per point of mana. So lower = better for gaining more mana efficiently.

1) When a Non-Iksar has Demi-Lich up, they have -25 hp per tick and gain +32 mana a tick. This means the Lich Efficiency is .78125. Meaning, you lose .78125 HP per 1 Mana you gain from Lich.

2) When a Non-Iksar has Lich up, they have -15 hp a tick and gain +22 mana a tick. This means the Lich Efficiency is .6818. So .6818 hp is lost per 1 mana gained.

3) When an Iksar has Demi-Lich up, they have -14 hp a tick (less than a Non-Iksar with the lesser version) and gain +32 mana a tick. That brings up a .4375 Lich efficiency. So .4375 HP lost per 1 mana gained.

4) When an Iksar has Lich up, they have -4 hp a tick, and gain +22 mana a tick. This brings a .1818 Lich efficiency. So nearly 1 hp = 5 mana for an Iksar.

For this reason, Iksar is strictly speaking the most Mana Efficient.

What this means is that you will not lose much HP while you gain a lot of mana.

Why does this matter? Because the more HP you lose while gaining mana from Lich, the more often you must use Non-Mana efficient spells to Lifetap back your HP.

So, although you lose 22% more XP, you can kill things significantly faster. Trust me on this. Anyone who has played 2 Necros, one non-Iksar, one Iksar, they all have felt it. It is HUGE. 3-4 mobs on a 6 minute timer was average for Uteu in Highkeep (2 nobles, Isabella, maybe a bard every 20 minutes) while leveling, 6-7 in the same area was average for Sesserdrix (2 nobles, Isabella, both bards, upstairs noble, front gate captain). And it wasn't just skill from having done it before. Not needing to life tap as much is big mana conservation.

For that reason, 22% xp is in no way a gimp. You can generate the same mana with a less gimp on health, that requires less mana inefficient spells.

-------------------------
Races: Iksar vs Other
-------------------------

As for the Necro race. Erudite is possibly the worst you can do, and hear me out as to why. I am not counting in their quest specific gear, as that is nice, but... Again, hear me out.

All necro gear is statted to Int. We need to go outside of stuff to things that may not normally be thought of as necro gear to find HP. This means that it is easier to get Int, than it is to get HP.

Next point to have for this argument is the balance between Hp and Mana. HP is in a unique spot for Necromancers because Lich burns it into mana. This is the efficiency thing.

So, think about this... The more mana efficient a necro is, meaning, the more mana they gain per 1 HP, or if you wish, the less HP lost per mana gain, the more free the necro is to stack int. To try to clarify: The less Hp a necro loses to Lich, the more they can afford to not be stacking HP, since they are going to lose less HP. Since an Iksar loses less HP per Mana gained, it means that more Hp on an Iksar is not as necessary as it is on say... An Erudite who has very high int.

Why does HP matter? Why not just lifetap it back? Look above. You lifetap less, means more efficient spells, means no need to stack high HP for the same safety of a padded HP. An Iksar will get to low HP insanely slower than a Non-Iksar, and so they will not be under as much pressure.

This also means that Iksar can itemize heavily towards Int without much issue. An Erudite or Dark Elf will soft cap int at 200 quickly, and have the same stringent itemization in getting rid of it to stack enough Hp to make lifetaps spread out enough over the course of a Lich to remain mana efficient. Int over 200 offers half the mana as int before it, and that is stat that could be used better.

------------------------------
Why Does It Matter at 60?
------------------------------

Why does this matter at 60? After all, HP does best when you have steady pulls, with moderate time between pulls (so you don't cap 100% mana from medding).

This matters because Necromancers are not a DPS class. As said by a friend, you don't pick a Necro in your raid for DPS. They can do DPS, but that isn't why you bring them.

How many times have you heard a call "Necros twitch clerics/enchanters!"? You should say often. How many times have patch heals been needed? How many times have you seen a wipe happen, and the group lead ask "Did a cleric camp? No. Did we get a necro out?"

The Necromancer in groups and groups is a Support Class.

Now lets look at Int vs HP in relative uses.

You want Int/Mana to cast a lot of spells in a small period of time. In other words, when you burst, and don't have fast pulls (and time to med to 100% mana), you want to stack int. This way you have a lot of mana stored up to keep casting spells without a break.

You want HP when you have to cast a moderate number of spells over the course of a period of time, but in which you don't have much of a med break. This will make it so you can spend less time casting lifetaps to get back HP, and more time periodically medding and constantly liching. When you cast a steady flow of spells, rather than a burst, Lich is better since you're more efficient.

So why does this matter?

It matters because of a Necromancers job. If the Necromancers job on a fight is DPS, they will primarily be bursting spells and need Int/Mana. In this case, an Iksar can swap over to their Int gear and be super effective because there is a ton of it, without capping their int and getting less advantage out of their stats. A non-Iksar more easily risks softcapping their int and getting less advantage out of it.

However, more often than not, your job as a Necro is to play super support. While supporting, you are twitching over the course of a long period of time, keeping casters topped off, perhaps rooting/STing. This means that the more mana efficient you are, the more you can twitch/support. An Int build may have more saved up, but they wont regenerate it as fast without needing heals. And every heal a Necromancer receives, or lifetap they do is a loss of mana efficiency, and a waste of group mana that could go to healing someone else. So when an Iksar is twitching, he or she will almost never need a heal, and so most of the mana generated can be twitched directly. A non-Iksar will lose more HP, and require a heal, therefore detracting from what they were doing by twitching.

Additionally, the more mana efficient you are, the more easily you can throw in a nuke every now and then while living up to your best role as a Necromancer. Remember, when you're with a group, things generally die too fast for dots... You need to make yourself stand out in another way.

While playing support, you are casting spells over a steady period of time, without bursting them. This makes HP stacking very useful. Less time before the next heal is needed.

Another purpose a Necro may serve is charming. While charming, if your charm pet breaks, you're going to be very happy that you have more HP than more Mana, since you'll have more padding between you and death when your Charm pet with an epic haste on it charges and pushes your shit in.

So at level 60, an Iksar Necromancer will help a group recover faster by offering twitches with less of a cost. One necro is effectively boost to a Cleric's mana recovery by a minimum of 20% just from Lich, not even counting meditate. That's significant.

------------------------------
A Concluding Simulation
------------------------------

Imagine that a Necromancer just feign deathed out of a pull. Everyone dies. The Necro gets up, and EEs a cleric. Start the timer. Over the next 10 minutes, the Necro will spend 100% of all mana twitching buffers and clerics to make the recovery go faster. A recovery may take less time, maybe more. I am saying just 10 minutes.

Over the course of these 10 minutes, if you assume 100% med time (which is unrealistic, you're going to lose a tick or two every so often).

1) Demi-Lich, Non-Iksar: -25 hp, +32 mana. Lets assume 1.25k hp. 25 Hp loss a tick over 10 minutes (1 min = 10 ticks, 10 minutes = 100 ticks) means a loss of 25 hp x 100 ticks = 2500 hp lost. If you have 1.25k, you are not above this, and will require at minimum 1 heal. Over the course of these 10 ticks, you'll get 3200 mana. Since you spend 400 mana for +150 mana on a cleric/buffer, you can spend 3200/400 = 8 twitches = 8 x 150 mana = 1200 mana. But you need a Heal to survive, and at the end of 10 minutes, you'll be barely alive. A standard heal will run you 400 mana or so, so your 1200 mana twitched becomes 800. You'll probably need a 2nd heal to not be at around 200 hp at the end of this, bumping to 400.

2) Lich, Non-Iksar: -15 hp, +22 mana. Same hp. 15 hp a tick over 10 minutes means a loss of 15 x 100 ticks = 1500 hp. 1 Heal is more than enough. You generate 22 mana x 100 ticks = 2200 mana, divided by 400 mana (twitch) is 5.5 twitches for 825 mana, minus 400 for 1 heal. So you have 425, but you end with more Hp than Demi-Lich.

Now for an Iksar...

3) Demi-Lich is a -14 HP for +32 mana. Same hp. 14 hp a tick means 1400 lost (1 heal necessary) for 3200 mana gained. This means 8 twitches, the same as the non-Iksar, but you have lost 1100 less HP, so you definitely don't need the 2nd heal. This means you're twitching 1200, minus a 400 for 1 heal. You're never going to need that 2nd heal, because at the end of 10 minutes, you'll be around 1k, not near dead. So 800 mana, no circumstances.

4) Lich is -4 HP for +22 mana. Same hp. Over 10 minutes, you lose 400 health, and gain 2200 mana. This means 5.5 twitches, with absolutely no heals. This means 825 Mana twitched, with 800 hp left over after 10 minutes.

As you can see, an Iksar can deliver more twitch mana over the course of time than a Non-Iksar could, due to the less drain on healers to keep the Necro machine running.

The numbers calculated do NOT count meditate mana. That is constant across races, so a Necro can easily pump more than this. It doesn't change the math. This is how much Lich mana gives you in twitches.

You can also see that, as stated earlier, a lot about whether a necro needs a heal is contingent upon their HP total.

1) If the Non-Iksar Demi-Lich (loss 2500 hp, gain 3200 mana) had more than 1.25k, lets say... 1.75k, than only 1 heal would be fine. The 2nd wouldnt be as necessary, making mana twitched 800, rather than 400 from 2 heals.

2) The Non-Iksar with lich (loss 1500 hp, gain 3200 mana) had 1.75k, then the 1 heal wouldn't be necessary, meaning a full 825 can happen, or a 425 from 1 heal being optional.

3) The Iksar Demi-Lich (loss 1400, gain 3200) had 1.75k, then he or she wouldn't even need 1 heal and end at 350 hp. Sure, might need a heal, but you could start basic regen at this point, and put all 1200 into others, or Maybe get a heal to make it 800. Not necessary.

4) The Iksar with Lich (loss 400, gain 2200) had 1.75k... Not much would change. You only lost 400 hp. Be happy, you're an Iksar. You take less damage and are OP as fuck.

Again, you can see here how the more mana efficient a Necro is (in this case the Iksar), the less value HP has, since you don't need it for the 400 hp loss. This means the Iksar can gear more towards what Necromancers are itemized for, more of the time. This also continues to reinforce the truth that a Necro loses less HP, so they can cast more efficient spells, and kill more things, to get more XP.

Iksar is strictly better. Bar none. If you are a min-maxer... DO NOT MAKE MY MISTAKE!

[applesauce25r624]

^ holy crap! text wall of doom! thank you for the reply, Uteunayr

[Uteunayr]

If you have a problem with the wiki page's wording (just read through it; doesn't seem THAT bad), just add a line like "many prefer other races to Iksar to avoid the large EXP penalty and the faction problems".

I have added such a line. The post originally read:

"This writer recommends Iksar above all others due to the diminishing of the negative effects of the Lich tree. Lich reduces your health per tick to increase your mana, and is one of the most useful spells the necromancer has. The following charts show the race, Iksar vs Non-Iksar, what stage of Lich is used to calculate, and the amount of health lost/gained by each of the following three states: Standing (lowest hp regeneration), Feigned (Just barely better than standing), and Sitting (Most HP regeneration)."

I added the following line to indicate that when I say "This writer recommends", that it is coming from a min/maxer.

"Please note, Iksar is not the only way to go. Go Iksar if you care about min/maxing and having a significant leg up in terms of efficiency."

I'm not fine with people saying that Demi Lich is unusable by non-Iksar, or that any other race should reroll. And that's what I'm arguing against here.

Did I write that in anywhere? While it is something that I hold as an opinion, I was striving to make anything that is opinion labelled as "In this writers view..." etc. I went searching through the document, and couldn't find when I said that Demi-Lich is unusable. My point was that it is significantly better for a Non-Iksar.

I'll gladly be fine with my words being altered if you point me to where I say it is unusable.

Nor do I think I said that the Non-Iksar should reroll. My goal here is to help prevent someone like me who came along to the last version of the Wiki Page, have no understanding of how Lich influences the way a necromancer does their job, and think that there is absolutely no distinction, and then re-roll later.

In this thread, no. But in game, yes. I have been harassed to reroll. And by that I mean that I received tells from a person for over a half hour about how I'm playing the wrong race that I will regret for the rest of my time playing that character.

If you are a person ingame that has spoken to me and asked me about it, then yes, I promoted Iksar Regen over all. And as I emphasize in every conversation, my point is not to make you reroll, simply to make it so that you know what the cost is, so that when you hit 60, if you are someone that cares about being optimal, it wont burn you so much because you knew about it.

If you are a person that I spoke to, you should know that at no point do I force or push anyone to listen to me. If anyone who talks to me about Necromancers says "That's fine, but I don't care.", that's it. I inform, I don't jam information down people's throats.

I am sorry if it was me and you didn't simply say "Nah, goodbye." Now if it wasn't me, good deal. Just in case it was, I added to my wiki bio that people should be aware that I am longwinded when I discuss things that require detail.

You are making an Iksar to raid with? That is what people should be telling you not to do...

You should change your hypothetical scenario from an extended fight in a group to solo farming, since that is the only reason a sane person would play a necro. You FD, see invis mobs near, you are low HP/mana, now tell me you are happy to lay there almost three times as long on a gnome vs an iksar.

This is the greatest thing about Necromancers. I love how much our class changes in situation. You're totally right, when solo farming, you want to look at the necromancer as a DPSer, and all that good stuff. But when you're in a raiding scene, or a group scene, you play a very different role as Necromancer, and that means different calculations are needed.

^ holy crap! text wall of doom! thank you for the reply, Uteunayr

Heh. This is why I suspect the OP here was someone who spoke to me about necromancers, and when I was describing the benefits to Iksar, got offended by something I wrote. I in no way ever mean to offend people, but as readers can tell... I am a long winded person, because all of this is incredibly connected, and requires a good bit of detail to truly tease out the different variables at work.

If you want the best person to comment on this look for uteaenyar or sesserdrix. Leveled a DE necro to 60, realized the power of an iksar and is almost 60 on his iksar necro.

uteaenyar or sesserdrix

Proof that Sesserdrix is not as difficult a name to spell as Uteunayr. :P

[Splorf22]

And as I emphasize in every conversation, my point is not to make you reroll, simply to make it so that you know what the cost is, so that when you hit 60, if you are someone that cares about being optimal, it wont burn you so much because you knew about it.

I think its a good idea really. For example, I knew my iksar warrior was going to suck until Velious . . . just not how far away Velious was going to be. He is simply best in slot right now (enjoy your 1M pp, TMO guildbank) except for a Crown of Rile and the Plane of Sky shoulders. Result: 5000HP, 195 item ac (5200HP when I drink a 35p potion). An ogre warrior can hit 5300HP and 225 item AC even without cobalt or the epic or vp gear.

So, although you lose 22% more XP, you can kill things significantly faster. Trust me on this. Anyone who has played 2 Necros, one non-Iksar, one Iksar, they all have felt it. It is HUGE. 3-4 mobs on a 6 minute timer was average for Uteu in Highkeep (2 nobles, Isabella, maybe a bard every 20 minutes) while leveling, 6-7 in the same area was average for Sesserdrix (2 nobles, Isabella, both bards, upstairs noble, front gate captain). And it wasn't just skill from having done it before. Not needing to life tap as much is big mana conservation.

This I find kinda hard to believe though. But i've never played both side by side.

[Uteunayr]

This I find kinda hard to believe though. But i've never played both side by side.

Sadly, I can provide no evidence other than my word as someone who has done both. I remember HHK specifically because I remember that camp well on both Uteu (who I did 50-60 less than 6 months ago), and Sesser (who I did 51-55 about 2 months ago. Note, double XP was not active at the time I did nobles. Double XP ended at level 35 for Sesser)... They were near enough together that I had good memory of both.

[arsenalpow]

This is one of those things where you need to try it yourself to understand the differences, much like ogre warrior vs non-ogre warriors. The math is pretty convincing (and I've played an iksar necro, soloing felt like cheating)

[Splorf22]

The whole stun immunity thing isn't quite as convincing to me regarding warriors. Some rough back of the envelope math:

If mobs get their secondary attack every 8s, bash instead of kick 3/4 of the time, miss half the time, and stun half of those hits, then that's 3/4*1/2*1/2 = 3/16 successful stuns or one stun every 40-45 seconds. Sakuragi attacks every 1.2 seconds, so he loses 1.4 seconds of threat time on average. 1.4/42 = 3% of hate/damage.

It's not trivial of course; that's about the aggro difference obtained by upgrading the primary slot from a Blade of the Black Dragon Eye to a Sword of the Shissar. But I find it hard to believe this would really be noticeable in practice. 15% is a much larger difference than 3%.

Of course if your warrior is an iksar wearing sebilite scale with horrible HP/AC, then that's a different story.

[arsenalpow]

I've played a DE warrior and tanked/positioned raid mobs and an ogre warrior doing the same. I can 100% say it's easier as an ogre. Positioning by walking a mob backwards is infinitely easier without getting bashed over and over again. I wasn't a convert until I experienced it for myself, but it is unequivocally easier.

[Borador]

This is one of those things where you need to try it yourself to understand the differences, much like ogre warrior vs non-ogre warriors. The math is pretty convincing (and I've played an iksar necro, soloing felt like cheating)
I don't think its as complicated as some people think. Someone else mentioned how an iksar can just simply be travelling and go from half to full HP, where the non-iksar would still need to heal up when they got where they were going. Similarly, over the course of XPing, you can all but ignore the random damage you may take, since it regens over time, other races don't have that luxury.

[crkhobbit]

Someone else mentioned how an iksar can just simply be travelling and go from half to full HP, where the non-iksar would still need to heal up when they got where they were going. Similarly, over the course of XPing, you can all but ignore the random damage you may take, since it regens over time, other races don't have that luxury.

Other people have already mentioned this, but I think this is the best argument for Iksar.

I wasn't convinced on the mana argument, but this point is the one that resonates with me.

I thought the faction issue would be made irrelevant by Velious, but I'm KOS everywhere as a Gnome anyway. And apparently Iksar can use the underground merchants in Qeynos and Freeport that I've been using.

[Uteunayr]

I don't think its as complicated as some people think. Someone else mentioned how an iksar can just simply be travelling and go from half to full HP, where the non-iksar would still need to heal up when they got where they were going. Similarly, over the course of XPing, you can all but ignore the random damage you may take, since it regens over time, other races don't have that luxury.

It really isn't. The complicated statements I made were an attempt to map out the benefits of it to Necromancers specifically. This is definitely a very strong advantage to the Iksar all together.

I think I put it in that previous post, but being able to ignore random damage you take is very, very helpful when charm killing. Your charm breaks, the dude quads you for 100, you're down 400 hp before your ST + Recharm goes off, that 400 could be a Touch of the Night, but then you lose 300 hp. It is better to just let it regen if you're not hurting for mana.

You can also run around with Lich on fairly safely, only losing 10 hp a tick, which is comparable to Call of Bones for a Non-Iksar while sitting. So when running somewhere while OOM, or Levanting a bunch, you can be generating 22 mana a tick, which is just shy of what others sit for. Sure, other races can do it, but at a -18, a bit steeper.

So, spot on.

[crkhobbit]

So, you may have answered this somewhere else, but I'm curious how long it has taken you to get to 55 after you rerolled?

[Uteunayr]

I had double XP to level 35, and that took about a week. After that, it took me about 3-4 days to get up to 40. Then a friend offered me some free PLing up to 49 so I could start root rotting, and that took a week. From 49 to 51 took about a day or two because Bloodgills are sexy. 51 to 55 took about 3-4 days. And then grad school resumed, and my time has since plummeted.

[NegaStoat]

Uteu, thanks for writing all of that out. I came to the same conclusion involving Shaman and the regen from Iksar / Trolls. It's really big. Huge.

There are two questions a person has to ask when making either a shaman or a necro from the start - how much will the regen affect the character at max level, and how much will the regen help in getting through levels vs. faction / exp penalties? Those are the two big ones.

You did the extra work in explaining fully what the Iksar player for a Necro will experience.

[Uteunayr]

Uteu, thanks for writing all of that out. I came to the same conclusion involving Shaman and the regen from Iksar / Trolls. It's really big. Huge.

There are two questions a person has to ask when making either a shaman or a necro from the start - how much will the regen affect the character at max level, and how much will the regen help in getting through levels vs. faction / exp penalties? Those are the two big ones.

You did the extra work in explaining fully what the Iksar player for a Necro will experience.

Personally, I think shaman is a significantly harder choice. While yes, the regen is great, shaman have access to three things that call it into question. First off, shamans can wear a Fungi, which gives them that regen they can use. So while 2x Fungi is good, 1x Fungi for any Shaman is still good. While not needing it is less expensive, Necromancers have no such option for regeneration, we have only one source beside buffs and short term, low efficiency lifetaps, and that is being an Iksar.

The second factor is that Necromancers have no option of being an Ogre which gives frontal stun immunity helping make sure your spells/roots/etc. stick reliably. This is reduced in effectiveness given that Shamans can also slow, significantly reducing enemy DPS, making frontal stun immunity less valuable, and so one may lean toward Troll/Iksar more heavily even in light of Fungi.

The third fact is JBB which Iksar cannot use, and is a free nuke for mana efficiency.

So to me, it seems like if you are willing to take frontal stuns for regen and jbb, Troll is the way to go. If you want immunity to stuns, you can still wear a fungi.

But in the end, this is all conjecture based on what I have seen of the glass. Absolutely none of this comes from experience, so I don't know. All I am confident of is that shamans have a much harder choice than necromancers.

Oh, and thanks. Hope you enjoyed reading it.

[Autotune]

Iksars are just the best, especially when well geared. If you check Butchh's magelo profile it pretty much crushes the idea that Erudites are going to have extra mana, and he doesn't even have a BCG, not to mention wearing the EoE like a boss.

Extra mana? No one can have extra mana, really.

You can have more mana, but not extra. All the races can max intelligence. Being a Erudite, you can max it with less intelligence items than an Iksar can, allowing you to then use +hp (or sta) items in places where an Iksar will have to use a +int. Itemization is pretty limited in kunark for class/race combos, so at the moment it matters.

This is to say, that an iksar who goes for the soft cap will generally have less HP than a erudite or de who has hit the soft cap and geared for HP.


This will all probably change with Velious and then Iksars will be a flat out better choice. From what I remember, in Velious, any good raiding guild will have their necros all Int max'd easily which means all races will have very similar hp/mana pools.