53 Shaman dilemma: sell fungi for epic?

[Henlolizar]

At 53, my shaman is struggling to find places to level safely without his epic. My JBB seems to be reaching the end of its useful life, though it has served me well, but I'm still 45k away from buying my epic even if I sell the JBB. My dilemma is this: Do I sell my beloved Fungi Tunic so that I can buy my epic asap? I'm too casual to realistically compete for a Child's Tear through a guild, so purchasing the MQ is my path of least resistance.

Does having my epic at 53 outweigh giving up my Fungi? I suppose root-rotting multiple mobs w/ epic means I'm no longer face tanking, so that might mean I could safely forgo the extra regen during fights?

Thanks for any advice!

[Jimjam]

From the impression I’ve got with epic root rotting you don’t need to spend as much mana on dots, you don’t get as many broken roots so take less damage and spend less mana that way too.

This suggests to me that with an epic the need for a fungi is diminished.

[Andyman1022]

At level 53 I would sell the fungi to get the epic if it meant you could have it now. Epic is amazing leveling tool. Other posts from the past have had folks outline just how much more dps you get out of the epic than the fungi. For solo play- sell it and get your spear of fate and then farm the cash for torp at 60, then you’ll be good!

[loramin]

Selling your Fungi to buy your Epic is a time-honored tradition here on P99! :)

(Of course it's a travesty as far as classic EverQuest goes, because virtually no one sold any epics in the classic era ... not even the Rogue one! But such are the limits of P99.)

[Henlolizar]

Thanks for the advice. Glad to know I'll be taking the beaten path with this decision. If I sell my JBB + Fungi, I can afford epic and an Ikky BP, which might take some of the sting out of selling my fungi for the time being. Cheers, all!

So... In terms of epic tactics for leveling up, is the idea that epic will provide pretty much all my DPS going forward, aside from pet?

[loramin]

Thanks for the advice. Glad to know I'll be taking the beaten path with this decision. If I sell my JBB + Fungi, I can afford epic and an Ikky BP, which might take some of the sting out of selling my fungi for the time being. Cheers, all!

So... In terms of epic tactics for leveling up, is the idea that epic will provide pretty much all my DPS going forward, aside from pet?

It entirely depends on what you're fighting. With just an epic and root I used to hold down 7 Seafury Cyclops at a time ... back when they were worth doing that for gems. But for XPing, unless you're killing lots of barely blue, or light blue, mobs (so many that you need all your mana for roots), you'll probably instead want to fight normally ... but just use the epic as the first DoT you cast in every fight.

(Except when things go south, and you're out of mana, at which point you can resort to just using the epic to kill without mana ... very slowly.)

[DeathsSilkyMist]

Here is my two cents on the matter.

As an Ogre Shaman, I leveled to 60 without Epic. I had:

https://wiki.project1999.com/Fungus_Covered_Scale_Tunic
https://wiki.project1999.com/Fungi_Covered_Great_Staff
https://wiki.project1999.com/Black_Fur_Boots
https://wiki.project1999.com/Jaundiced_Bone_Bracer

JBB is useful up to level 60. Don't think it has run out of steam. I was able to do PoM Rat Maze with this setup, and I was getting 1 blue per hour there at level 59.

The trick to using JBB is you need your pet up for DPS, and you need to focus on one mob at a time. The nice thing about JBB is it does more damage per second than Epic, so it can focus fire mobs down faster.

It has been a while since I was under 60, but here is what I remember for the strategy:

If you have 1 mob, this is the strat:
1. Slow the mob
2. Root the mob
3. Sic your pet on the mob
4. DoT the mob with your best disease spell
5. Spam JBB at the mob
6. Re-root as needed

If you have multiple mobs:
1. Use the strategy above on one mob at a time
2. Root and slow the other mobs
3. If you can, DoT those mobs with your best disease spell

I purposely avoided Malo and poison spells to save mana. There are plenty of mobs out there that don't really need to be Maloed. Until you hit 60, your slow spell has the same chance of landing as your Malo line of spells.

I personally disagree with buying Epic first. This is because Torpor is way better than Epic. You will spend all your money on Epic, get to 60, and be a sad, broke panda for a long time. Instead, you can spend 12k on fungi staff now, and then sell Fungi Staff and Fungi Tunic for Torpor the second you hit 60. Torpor will give you way more bang for your buck than epic.

EDIT: I also hasted my pet with the best haste spell. Do not use Spirit Quickening, it is garbage. Also be sure to get your 55 pet when you get to that level. It is a beast. It can tank almost any mob under 60 when that mob is slowed, and the DPS is pretty good when hasted.

EDIT: I think I actually let my pet build up agro on the mob first. This allowed me to spam JBB without needed to re-root the mobs too much. You root the mob initially, because the slow/disease DoT will set you high on the agro list initially. After a little while, the pet should take over as the top agro. This allows you to spam JBB safely, without re-rooting the mob all the time. This also saved mana. Then you just heal your pet as needed.

[loramin]

I personally disagree with buying Epic first. This is because Torpor is way better than Epic. You will spend all your money on Epic, get to 60, and be a sad, broke panda for a long time. Instead, you can spend 12k on fungi staff now, and then sell Fungi Staff and Fungi Tunic for Torpor the second you hit 60. Torpor will give you way more bang for your buck than epic.

EDIT: I also hasted my pet with the best haste spell. Do not use Spirit Quickening, it is garbage. Also be sure to get your 55 pet when you get to that level. It is a beast. It can tank almost any mob under 60 when that mob is slowed, and the DPS is pretty good when hasted.

EDIT: I think I actually let my pet build up agro on the mob first. This allowed me to spam JBB without needed to re-root the mobs too much. You root the mob initially, because the slow/disease DoT will set you high on the agro list initially. After a little while, the pet should take over as the top agro. This allows you to spam JBB safely, without re-rooting the mob all the time. This also saved mana. Then you just heal your pet as needed.

I think the main thing missing there is that, even without Torpor, a 60 Shaman can farm plat much faster than (say) a 50 can. Now to be fair, I have never used a Fungal Staff to level a Shaman, so I can't speak to how much it helps vs. an Epic ...

... but what I can say is that when you're doing stuff like the Sebilis King or CE camps (even in groups; you can't solo Crypt until you have Torpor) earning 100k is so much easier than when you're doing ... whatever the best thing is that a 50 Shaman can do for plat. I mean statistically speaking, if you do 6 King camps for maybe four hours each, you'll get a Fungi, and that's like half of Torpor right there (and that's IF you don't win a Torpor by amazing luck at CE).

[DeathsSilkyMist]

I think the main thing missing there is that, even without Torpor, a 60 Shaman can farm plat much faster than (say) a 50 can. Now to be fair, I have never used a Fungal Staff to level a Shaman, so I can't speak to how much it helps vs. an Epic ...

... but what I can say is that when you're doing stuff like the Sebilis King or CE camps (even in groups; you can't solo Crypt until you have Torpor) earning 100k is so much easier than when you're doing ... whatever the best thing is that a 50 Shaman can do for plat. I mean statistically speaking, if you do 6 King camps for maybe four hours each, you'll get a Fungi, and that's like half of Torpor right there (and that's IF you don't win a Torpor by amazing luck at CE).

This assumes you want to do King, or can get a King group. Not everyone has the time to sink on that camp, and you can get horribly unlucky. I myself have spent quite a bit of time there, and have yet to get even 1 Fungi Tunic to drop. No split and no roll when no Tunic drops.

Epic is really only a Leveling/Soloing tool. If you can level to 60 at roughly the same rate with the strategy I described above, there is no real reason to get Epic to level, unless you are an Iksar specifically, due to the lack of JBB. Having Torpor at 60 opens you up to way more money camps, and high level groups. You will also be more likely to get King groups. A Torpor shaman is much more appealing than a 60 Shaman without Torpor but with an Epic at that camp.

[Henlolizar]

Thanks for that perspective, Shamwowi. I suppose my issue with JBB's utility at higher levels is that I can't find too many camps that facilitate this JBB spamming that don't also require splitting a group of high HP mobs that need 2 full minutes of JBB and pet gnawing on their ankles each. After slows and roots, I don't really have mana left for DoTs. I guess the Fungi staff might help in that regard, though I'd still need to figure out how to kill Black Dire for the boots. For instance, I'm thinking of CoM ramparts as one leveling path that might open up to me with epic that I definitely can't split with my current setup. But I certainly take your point that Torpor is the ultimate game changer, but with my current play time availability, it might take me a seriously long time to get to 60.

[DeathsSilkyMist]

Thanks for that perspective, Shamwowi. I suppose my issue with JBB's utility at higher levels is that I can't find too many camps that facilitate this JBB spamming that don't also require splitting a group of high HP mobs that need 2 full minutes of JBB and pet gnawing on their ankles each. After slows and roots, I don't really have mana left for DoTs. I guess the Fungi staff might help in that regard, though I'd still need to figure out how to kill Black Dire for the boots. For instance, I'm thinking of CoM ramparts as one leveling path that might open up to me with epic that I definitely can't split with my current setup. But I certainly take your point that Torpor is the ultimate game changer, but with my current play time availability, it might take me a seriously long time to get to 60.

My leveling path was as follows:

South Kaladim Guards to 54 or 55. You need to learn the pathers, since you can get more than one guard if you are not careful, but it is good xp and money.

The two level 50 giants under Frontier Mountains giant fort from 55 to 56 or 57. They are on a 6 min timer, and do not agro each other. Only downside is they don't drop anything.

I haven't tried PoM Rat Maze at 55, but you might even be able to do that from 55-60. This is the best place to level hands down when going to 60. As I said, I was able to get 1 blue per hour solo at level 59. I couldn't find any camp that was better.

The best alternate spot is the Ogre/Troll trainers in Neriak Foreign Quarter. I was getting something like 3 blues per 5 hours there. Not as good as PoM Rat Maze, but it was the second best camp I could find.

Fungi Staff is a great leveling tool. It is basically a Flowing Thought 2 item for Shamans. You save 1200 mana per hour by not casting Regrowth for 300 mana every 15 minutes. You should get the Black Fur Boots, however, since you can instantly switch from regen to run speed. Black Dire is easy, just get a few high level friends together. You need 1 group max, and can do it with less if people are good.

[Henlolizar]

My leveling path was as follows:

South Kaladim Guards to 54 or 55. You need to learn the pathers, since you can get more than one guard if you are not careful, but it is good xp and money.

The two level 50 giants under Frontier Mountains giant fort from 55 to 56 or 57. They are on a 6 min timer, and do not agro each other. Only downside is they don't drop anything.

I haven't tried PoM Rat Maze at 55, but you might even be able to do that from 55-60. This is the best place to level hands down when going to 60. As I said, I was able to get 1 blue per hour solo at level 59. I couldn't find any camp that was better.

The best alternate spot is the Ogre/Troll trainers in Neriak Foreign Quarter. I was getting something like 3 blues per 5 hours there. Not as good as PoM Rat Maze, but it was the second best camp I could find.

Fungi Staff is a great leveling tool. It is basically a Flowing Thought 2 item for Shamans. You save 1200 mana per hour by not casting Regrowth for 300 mana every 15 minutes. You should get the Black Fur Boots, however, since you can instantly switch from regen to run speed. Black Dire is easy, just get a few high level friends together. You need 1 group max, and can do it with less if people are good.

Great tips. Thanks!

[DeathsSilkyMist]

Great tips. Thanks!

No problem! Getting to 55 is the big goal here. Your level 55 pet is MUCH better than your previous pet. It will allow you to save more Mana and HP. This is because it can tank mobs really well when they are slowed. This means you can use your pet to save HP, due to the pet tanking the damage for you. It also has pretty good DPS when hasted, especially with Celerity at 56.

With a hasted level 55 pet, your pet can get to the top of the agro list, and maintain that agro. This means you can have your pet tank a single mob INSTEAD of having to re-root it all the time. This saves quite a bit of mana in itself. From what I recall, I usually only had to root the mob once when my pet was attacking it. By the time the root wore off, there was a good chance the pet was at the top of the list. If it isn't, just root one more time and you should be good. You can even try out your lower mana roots, since you will be JBB spamming.

[Snaggles]

Do you have a schedule for grouping? If so go to the Hole and enjoy the heal/buff-bot mana from a fungi. A fungi is always worth plat and can always be put on an alt.

My sham is going slow, 58 and very casual. I’m curious what the epic allows a torp Sham do that an epic-Less one can’t. Farming seems still doable just less easy/efficient. It’s prob the last thing I’ll pay for (but I’m strange).

[DeathsSilkyMist]

Do you have a schedule for grouping? If so go to the Hole and enjoy the heal/buff-bot mana from a fungi. A fungi is always worth plat and can always be put on an alt.

My sham is going slow, 58 and very casual. I’m curious what the epic allows a torp Sham do that an epic-Less one can’t. Farming seems still doable just less easy/efficient. It’s prob the last thing I’ll pay for (but I’m strange).

Epic should be the last thing purchased on a Shaman, unless you are an Iksar, or very wealthy. Non-Iksars get JBB, which is more than good enough to power level yourself when combined with Fungi Staff, Fungi Tunic, and Black Fur Boots.

Epic is good for soloing with a Torpor Shaman. Even with Torpor, you still spend a ton of mana on spells. Casting Malo, Turgurs Insects, Insidious Decay, and Pox on a mob ONCE costs 1130 mana. In a 15 minute fight, such as WW Dragons, you need to cast Turgurs Insects 2 more times, Malo one more time, Insidious Decay one more time, and Pox 7 more times. This means you are spending 3960 additional mana after that, for a total of 5090 mana, assuming no resists or fizzles. My Shaman has a 3079 mana pool at the moment. This scenario assumes you are using Epic for your second DoT. If you are not, then you would need to use Bane of Nife. This means casting another 425 mana DoT 6 times to make up for that damage. Epic saves me at least 2550 mana in this fight, assuming no fizzles or resists.

Saving mana is good in fights when you need to face tank. This is because the act of face tanking destroys a LOT of HP that would normally be used for cannibalize. This means your mana regeneration also suffers quite a bit. On a tough mob, it is possible to run out of mana eventually, if the fight goes long enough, and they hit hard enough.

Epic is great when you need to farm lower level mobs as well, like orcs in Crystal Caverns for Velium Ore. Without Epic, that would be a much slower affair, due to how much mana you would spend on DoTs.

EDIT: The other benefit to Epic is the DoT is magic damage, rather than Cold/Poison/Disease. This means any mob that can be slowed can be DoTed with Epic, even if they are normally immune to some combination of Cold/Poison/Disease. Velious has quite a few cold immune mobs, which removes your direct damage spell from the equation.

[Snaggles]

Great insight! Thx for that :). Yea troll here with jbb. I’ll keep grinding the slow path, save for torp and prob give the fungi back to my 60 ranger. The epic will happen eventually.

[Sacer]

The shaman epic is really only good solo, as soon as you duo it already lose a lot of value, in groups you will barely ever click it.

but what I can say is that when you're doing stuff like the Sebilis King or CE camps (even in groups; you can't solo Crypt until you have Torpor) earning 100k is so much easier than when you're doing ... whatever the best thing is that a 50 Shaman can do for plat. I mean statistically speaking, if you do 6 King camps for maybe four hours each, you'll get a Fungi, and that's like half of Torpor right there (and that's IF you don't win a Torpor by amazing luck at CE).

That's so misleading, the chance to get a seb king group as a 53 shaman is almost impossible, even at 60 with torpor it's not easy to find a king group.

As far as CE since the ZEM change sebilis is often a bring your own group kind of place, it's not impossible to find a group but realisticaly you will spend a lot of time siting LFG at the entrance.

People underestimate the cash you can make leveling solo, on my sham I did 50 - 58 in WL killing faerie dragons then goos, it was super boring but I easily made 75k and leveled quite fast at the same time. I had epic at 50 but you can totally do the same thing without it's just a tad slower.

But if I had to relevel a shaman post ZEM change I would probably just group in the hole, the bonus exp is stupid and you will get 60 much faster than anywhere else, the money won't be very good but that time saved you can use it to make money at 60.

[Henlolizar]

Thanks all for the advice.

Do Black Fur Boots work indoors?

[loramin]

That's so misleading, the chance to get a seb king group as a 53 shaman is almost impossible, even at 60 with torpor it's not easy to find a king group.

Yeah, my quote was terribly misleading ... if you just completely ignore the first sentence of it :rolleyes:

I think the main thing missing there is that, even without Torpor, a 60 Shaman can farm plat much faster than (say) a 50 can.

The entire point I was making was that a 60 Shaman can do more valuable camps than a level 50 (or 53) Shaman! And as for the ease of getting King (or CE) ... I was just giving examples of camps (to show how much better the 60 ones are than the 50 ones) ... not listing the entirety of a 60 Shaman's options.

[loramin]

Thanks all for the advice.

Do Black Fur Boots work indoors?

Nope.

[DeathsSilkyMist]

Thanks all for the advice.

Do Black Fur Boots work indoors?

No. This is another reason why I like Fungi Staff. You can keep the same number of junk buffs in a dungeon. Black Fur Boots and Fungi Staff don't stack anyway. Outdoors, you switch between Fungal Regrowth and SoW. Indoors, you can exclusively use Fungal Regrowth. You only need to click it off if you need to run. Luckily, Shamans don't move much when they are killing stuff. You can easily side step with the snare on relatively quickly. Only when you are moving to a different spot in the dungeon do you need to remove Fungal Regrowth. It is also good training for Torpor. You will be snared a good portion of the time once you get Torpor.

[Jimjam]

If you want to cast sow indoors you need to have the spell in the correct spot and disconnect in a fashion that engages npc mode :p.

[Sacer]

The entire point I was making was that a 60 Shaman can do more valuable camps than a level 50 (or 53) Shaman!

Okai my bad I misunderstood, then we're just saying the same thing. :o

Another good spot to make plat as a 60 sham is selling Hammered Golden Loop loot rights.

[dbparden]

Add on question! If you made 60, had Torpor, and a JBB is it worth the expense to get epic (100k)? Am I missing out a lot on not having it?

[DeathsSilkyMist]

Add on question! If you made 60, had Torpor, and a JBB is it worth the expense to get epic (100k)? Am I missing out a lot on not having it?

I basically already answered this on page 2.

Epic should be the last thing purchased on a Shaman, unless you are an Iksar, or very wealthy. Non-Iksars get JBB, which is more than good enough to power level yourself when combined with Fungi Staff, Fungi Tunic, and Black Fur Boots.

Epic is good for soloing with a Torpor Shaman. Even with Torpor, you still spend a ton of mana on spells. Casting Malo, Turgurs Insects, Insidious Decay, and Pox on a mob ONCE costs 1130 mana. In a 15 minute fight, such as WW Dragons, you need to cast Turgurs Insects 2 more times, Malo one more time, Insidious Decay one more time, and Pox 7 more times. This means you are spending 3960 additional mana after that, for a total of 5090 mana, assuming no resists or fizzles. My Shaman has a 3079 mana pool at the moment. This scenario assumes you are using Epic for your second DoT. If you are not, then you would need to use Bane of Nife. This means casting another 425 mana DoT 6 times to make up for that damage. Epic saves me at least 2550 mana in this fight, assuming no fizzles or resists.

Saving mana is good in fights when you need to face tank. This is because the act of face tanking destroys a LOT of HP that would normally be used for cannibalize. This means your mana regeneration also suffers quite a bit. On a tough mob, it is possible to run out of mana eventually, if the fight goes long enough, and they hit hard enough.

Epic is great when you need to farm lower level mobs as well, like orcs in Crystal Caverns for Velium Ore. Without Epic, that would be a much slower affair, due to how much mana you would spend on DoTs.

EDIT: The other benefit to Epic is the DoT is magic damage, rather than Cold/Poison/Disease. This means any mob that can be slowed can be DoTed with Epic, even if they are normally immune to some combination of Cold/Poison/Disease. Velious has quite a few cold immune mobs, which removes your direct damage spell from the equation.

Buy Torpor first once you hit 60, then work your way towards Epic. You can re-buy things like JBB, Fungi Tunic, and Fungi Staff along the way to help speed up your farming for Epic. Then sell them to hit 100k and buy epic. Then farm again for JBB. Fungi Staff and Fungi Tunic are optional at that point.

At the end you want Torpor, Epic, JBB, Malo, Pox, and Bane. That maximizes your solo damage potential. Fungi Tunic and Fungi Staff still have good situational use, but they will not help as much as Torpor, the damage clickies, and the damage spells.

EDIT: Forgot to include Malo as a spell for some silly reason.

[dbparden]

Thanks!