What next for midlevel bard?

[bcbrown]

I've always loved grouping with bards, so I figured it was time to roll one and see how it feels to play one. I went with a dex/cha build (something like 170/130 with cheap EC gear) and a venomous axe of the velium brood, and although now I think going dex may have been a little suboptimal, the number of procs has made melee a lot of fun up until now.

I've been trying to explore a lot of zones and not just camp out in a single zone for too many levels, and have been to Crushbone, Oasis, Xorbb, Highpass Hold, Unrest, Mistmoore, and East Karana, alternating between grouping and soloing. Overall it's been a ton of fun; the clicking isn't too bad, and I've never played a toon that felt more like a "group daddy" than this guy. Being able to shift between dps, tank, heals, or cc depending on group needs is really nice.

Even though I'm aware it's the fastest way to level, I have zero interest in swarming. I'm also uninterested in pulling for groups, as my ancient laptop is too laggy. I'm at level 32 now, and while I still plan to spend some time grouping in Mistmoore and hoping to win some Mistmoore Battle Drums, right now I'd really like to explore soloing some of the classic dungeons I haven't spent a lot time in, like SolA/B or Guk.

Where should I go? I've been trying to find a good spot in Upper Guk, everything that was blue but too hard at 30 is now green at 32. I've been exploring from the Froglok Summoner room (#6 on the map) out to the zonelines to the dead side of LGuk, but I haven't found any good spots where I can pull two mobs to charm-kill.

Where should I go at level 32 to solo dungeons? Right now I'm practicing charming on the gnolls outside Splitpaw, but I'd like to find something new.

[Toxigen]

Go inside splitpaw...can either find people there or may be able to grab 1-2 ppl using /who all to join ya, amazing zem.

Hopefully you got yourself a gypsy lute, because that will be by far your most used instrument in groups. There's nothing more important than that.

Also bards are arguably the best pullers for xp groups...eventually you will find yourself in positions where your group needs it. May wanna drop some money and upgrade that laptop

[WarpathEQ]

Often overlooked (which can be a great thing if you want to solo) is the basement in unrest, most people leave unrest at 30 and head to mistmoore but I find the mobs in the basement are easier and better exp than mistmoore and less people going for it so easier to get it to yourself for soloing. The mobs are also set in spawn points where you can easily grab them 2 at a time which is perfect for charm kiting and the charm strat really lowers the difficulty level by reducing the chance you take a nuke from a festering hag, the mob that will generally hurt you the most.

It also is technically an outdoor zone despite playing like a dungeon, so if things go south you can selos your train to zone out. Nearest bind point is Gfay at the BB zoneline, not the most ideal but no worse than mistmoore and there is technically a merchant in the middle of the Cauldron but I tended to go to BB to sell stuff so I could also bank as coin weight tends to be the bulk at this level.

[enjchanter]

I'd recommend buying white scales

[Duik]

I'd recommend buying white scales

Is that blue server price of 850,000 platinum actually correct? For one part of an epic.
If so, you guys are fucked.
On an unrelated matter, do we have a server billionaire yet?

[enjchanter]

Is that blue server price of 850,000 platinum actually correct? For one part of an epic.
If so, you guys are fucked.
On an unrelated matter, do we have a server billionaire yet?

Ppl are asking and I'm sure 0 are paying
I paid 350k for mine many years ago

[Vivitron]

I decided to pull up where I leveled my bard 32-46. The following is a count of "you gain (party )experience" messages by zone and level.

level 32
total grouped solo zone name
152 109 43 all zones
137 108 29 Solusek's Eye
15 1 14 Lost Temple of Cazic-Thule

level 33
total grouped solo zone name
119 88 31 all zones
107 88 19 Infected Paw
10 0 10 Southern Plains of Karana
2 0 2 Solusek's Eye

level 34
total grouped solo zone name
190 148 42 all zones
134 93 41 Frontier Mountains
55 55 0 Trakanon's Teeth
1 0 1 Rathe Mountains

level 35
total grouped solo zone name
286 252 34 all zones
70 70 0 Infected Paw
60 60 0 Lost Temple of Cazic-Thule
43 43 0 Ruins of Old Guk
41 41 0 Frontier Mountains
27 0 27 Rathe Mountains
19 19 0 Southern Plains of Karana
15 15 0 The Feerrott
6 0 6 Grobb
4 4 0 Guk
1 0 1 Oasis of Marr

level 36
total grouped solo zone name
253 175 78 all zones
75 75 0 Grobb
70 70 0 Ruins of Old Guk
50 0 50 Lost Temple of Cazic-Thule
42 23 19 Iceclad Ocean
9 0 9 Oasis of Marr
4 4 0 Southern Plains of Karana
2 2 0 Guk
1 1 0 The Wakening Lands

level 37
total grouped solo zone name
181 83 98 all zones
91 1 90 Iceclad Ocean
90 82 8 Tower of Frozen Shadow

level 38
total grouped solo zone name
153 18 135 all zones
99 8 91 Iceclad Ocean
40 0 40 Crystal Caverns
14 10 4 Tower of Frozen Shadow

level 39
total grouped solo zone name
235 104 131 all zones
136 104 32 Tower of Frozen Shadow
57 0 57 Iceclad Ocean
42 0 42 Crystal Caverns

level 40
total grouped solo zone name
316 114 202 all zones
203 1 202 Crystal Caverns
113 113 0 Tower of Frozen Shadow

level 41
total grouped solo zone name
120 0 120 all zones
76 0 76 Butcherblock Mountains
33 0 33 Great Divide
10 0 10 Crystal Caverns
1 0 1 Eastern Wastelands

level 42
total grouped solo zone name
166 0 166 all zones
136 0 136 Nagafen's Lair
15 0 15 Castle Mistmoore
9 0 9 Kedge Keep
4 0 4 Kithicor Woods
2 0 2 Solusek's Eye

level 43
total grouped solo zone name
157 19 138 all zones
157 19 138 Nagafen's Lair

level 44
total grouped solo zone name
180 0 180 all zones
128 0 128 Temple of Droga
20 0 20 Oggok
12 0 12 Ruins of Old Guk
7 0 7 Nagafen's Lair
4 0 4 Grobb
3 0 3 Guk
3 0 3 Dreadlands
3 0 3 Mines of Nurga

level 45
total grouped solo zone name
214 0 214 all zones
180 0 180 Temple of Droga
19 0 19 Kithicor Woods
8 0 8 Ruins of Old Guk
5 0 5 Nagafen's Lair
1 0 1 West Commonlands
1 0 1 Guk

level 46
total grouped solo zone name
165 0 165 all zones
127 0 127 Temple of Droga
23 0 23 Nagafen's Lair
5 0 5 Kithicor Woods
5 0 5 Grobb
3 0 3 Lost Temple of Cazic-Thule
1 0 1 Southern Desert of Ro
1 0 1 Rathe Mountains


Going from memory on some of the notable camps, been a while apologies if I have misremembered:

The sola group at 32 was a bar camp duo with a shaman, a lot of fun. IIRC my sola soloing was starting at the zone line marked D and clearing towards #18 on the wiki map, but that might have been at level 30 instead of 32.

Paw was a pretty big grouping zone earlier. Doubt there's many groups there anymore but there's some opportunity to solo. IIRC basically nothing sees invis. The entrance mobs are lower level than later mobs.

Frontier Mountains at 34 was at the giant fort. Fun both grouping and solo, pulling in giants and charming.

CT used to be popular grouping too. I assume those solo kills in 36 were gator alley charm killing.

37 in iceclad: the dervishes around TOFS is one of the easiest bard pbaoe camps available. Already slowing by 38 -- if you change your mind and decide to skip 32-38 instead of exploring this is the place to go.

Feel free to ask about a specific zone and I'll try to remember it; maybe this list will give some ideas of places to try.

[Toxigen]

As a bard you can basically add any class and instantly have a much easier time charming in paw / CT / sola.

[bcbrown]

Go inside splitpaw...can either find people there or may be able to grab 1-2 ppl using /who all to join ya, amazing zem.

Hopefully you got yourself a gypsy lute, because that will be by far your most used instrument in groups. There's nothing more important than that.

Also bards are arguably the best pullers for xp groups...eventually you will find yourself in positions where your group needs it. May wanna drop some money and upgrade that laptop

I've been finding some pickup groups inside paw that have been lots of fun, and good xp. Got my gypsy lute, and have put it to good use. The impetus for rolling a bard was actually witnessing an amazing puller in CoM; eventually I should upgrade the laptop, but I use a macbook for everything other than EQ and it just hasn't seemed worth it yet for just this one game.

Often overlooked (which can be a great thing if you want to solo) is the basement in unrest

This was a great suggestion. I've soloed down there before, I think on my cleric, and it's a nice little spot. Those hags are still pretty rough though. On the stairs behind the bookshelf I charmed a hag against a skeleton monk, and it killed the skelly before charm broke, then almost killed me even with a Heroic Bond buff. This might have to wait until I gain another level or two and pick up some hp/ac rings.

I decided to pull up where I leveled my bard 32-46.

Hah, your thread (https://www.project1999.com/forums/showthread.php?t=397393) was one of the more useful threads I found when doing some research on playing a bard, as well as Toxigen's advice (https://www.project1999.com/forums/showthread.php?p=3603322#post3603322) on charming. Knowing where you soloed in SolA is helpful, I'll have to check that out soon. Frontier giant fort sounds intriguing for when I'm ready to leave Antonica/Faydwer.

As a bard you can basically add any class and instantly have a much easier time charming in paw / CT / sola.

Yeah, seems that way. Had some good duos outside paw with a warrior. It felt a little awkward duoing with an enchanter - I basically just played a support role with healing and being a meatshield on charm breaks.


One thing I've been trying to figure out is when it becomes more effective to DPS with a drum and dots as opposed to melee. At this point I've only got one drum chant, and although the 85DD proc on the venomous axe is starting to fade in efficacy it still seems to be pretty good damage.

Relatedly, I'm also struggling to figure out how to efficiently finish off a charm fight. I've been trying to mez one while meleeing the other, but it's hard to juggle everything and I get hit more than I'd like. It's working for now, but I know I'll need to tighten up my technique at higher levels. It certainly feels harder than charming on my druid felt.

[cd288]

What HP % do the mobs have remaining when you break charm?

[bcbrown]

I'm still not very good with keeping both mobs at similar health levels - sometimes one is at 5% while the other is at 50% - but I expect that to get much better with more practice. Let's say 10% and 35%?

I don't have a ghazugi ring - does that even break bard charm?

[enjchanter]

I'm still not very good with keeping both mobs at similar health levels - sometimes one is at 5% while the other is at 50% - but I expect that to get much better with more practice. Let's say 10% and 35%?

I don't have a ghazugi ring - does that even break bard charm?


Yes

[Toxigen]

I'm still not very good with keeping both mobs at similar health levels - sometimes one is at 5% while the other is at 50% - but I expect that to get much better with more practice. Let's say 10% and 35%?

I don't have a ghazugi ring - does that even break bard charm?

keep practicing itll get easier - i never melee on my bard either

https://www.twitch.tv/videos/1155754690
(thats not me but a damn good player showcasing what can be done)

drum dots get good by 46 when you have fufil's, chant of flame + frost

even if 1 mob gets to 5% and the other is at 50%, you just did 1.5 mobs worth of dmg with charm and dots, so you finish the one at 5% and figure out your next move...snares, having a sense of timing on the charm breaks, and good movement will negate your damage taken

i liked to pre-cast my next charm spell to try to time it with the breaks...if you go a little early just cancel and re-cast it...the idea is to be proactive rather than reactive

as long as you're killing mobs at low health after a charm break, you're getting the XP...perfect is the enemy of good

also: with an enchanter you don't have to just babysit...you can charm your own mobs too...you basically both do your standard solo thing but now you don't have to worry about charm pets taking XP

[cd288]

I'm still not very good with keeping both mobs at similar health levels - sometimes one is at 5% while the other is at 50% - but I expect that to get much better with more practice. Let's say 10% and 35%?

I don't have a ghazugi ring - does that even break bard charm?

I've never played Bard significantly so take this with a grain of salt, but I would think that you can use similar methods to Enchanter to close gaps. If your pet is far ahead you can make your charmed pet sit (just spam the sit button every time it stands up) and when the other mob hits it it will take more damage.

If the enemy mob is ahead and you have a slow song, can you twist it in with your charm song or is that a ton of work? Alternatively I would think you could twist a haste song in for your charmed pet which will might help it close the gap.

But the other thing to keep in mind while charm killing is to check the details of the mobs you're killing. Especially if you're killing two different kinds of mobs entirely. Check their level range, check their HP, try to be charm killing two mobs close in level with similar HP pools.

[Ennewi]

If your pet is far ahead you can make your charmed pet sit (just spam the sit button every time it stands up) and when the other mob hits it it will take more damage.

This works especially well when there's a really annoying lower level mob that you need to get rid of, xp be damned, like Brother Jentry. Usually he dies to Lucan before the 1st charm wears off when being commanded to sit, just have to time it right. Once had Jentry get down to 0% when charm broke. Assumed he died, but out from the militia house he came with Lucan and the one guard add, still sitting, scooting along in hot pursuit. Luckily, he didn't try to cast CH, though IDK if NPCs can while sitting?

Alternatively I would think you could twist a haste song in for your charmed pet which will might help it close the gap.

Bard haste doesn't effect charmed (or summoned) pets unfortunately. In fact, none of the other beneficial songs can be applied to pets either.

[bcbrown]

as long as you're killing mobs at low health after a charm break, you're getting the XP...perfect is the enemy of good

I appreciate the mindset-check; you're absolutely right.

I've never played Bard significantly so take this with a grain of salt, but I would think that you can use similar methods to Enchanter to close gaps.

Your advice is helpful and good, but the big difference between bard charms and other charming classes (I've only really charmed on druid) is that charm only lasts 3-4 ticks, so you end up constantly swapping between the two mobs, charming one and dotting the other. So when there's a significant power imbalance I think you should be just dotting the stronger one, not the weaker one. I think the challenge I was facing was that the gnolls were killing each other so fast I hardly got a chance to notice which was significantly stronger until the other one was already at like 30-40% health. Which isn't really a complaint - that's a good thing that they're dying so fast!

Bard haste doesn't effect charmed (or summoned) pets unfortunately. In fact, none of the other beneficial songs can be applied to pets either.

This answers one of the questions I had. Do slows/hastes stack with enchanter/shaman slow/haste? Someone I was grouping with said that the haste effects stack, but I'm a little skeptical.

I'm almost done with 35 now. I did a couple levels in Mistmoore GY/CE, and it was great fun. I saved a wipe on a bad pull by CCing with charm to keep two occupied, and then when we were down to the last mob, everyone oom and low health, I could twist mez/mana/health until we were ready to take it down.

I'm out at the giant fort in Frontier Mountains now, mostly duoing and soloing. It's been a great place to practice pulling, and it's nice how fast the repops are. After getting Cantata of Soothing my weapons are almost permanently bagged, although I did pull them out to tank for a monk. Just Selo's Consonant Chain wasn't enough to hold aggro, but that plus Chords of Dissonance plus the DD procs from the Venomous Axe was. What's the best aggro twist? I don't want to use Chords of Dissonance if there's an enchanter mezzing.

Duoing with a necro was especially fun. He would dot or dd while adding his pet, and I would tank and dot. The slow is starting to get more and more significant. And it's always nice to feed a synergy like lich and hp/mana regen.

One thing that surprised me is that I was charming far less often than I expected. With the monk there was enough DPS that the added charm DPS didn't appreciably speed things up. Since you can't mez giants, if charm broke at an awkward timing you'd either have to recharm and break up the flow waiting for charm to break before killing it, or have two mobs beating on us until the first mob died. Adding a priest class as a trio probably would have changed that calculus, as healing was our bottleneck. But we were killing almost continuously for over an hour with only a couple breaks to heal up, so it felt pretty good.

I mostly use charm as cc, which worked pretty well. It's also nice to be able to occasionally pause a tough fight to be able to take a breather and regen a couple ticks. I discovered a nice synergy while duoing with a necro. Towards the end of a tough fight with adds we were both at about 30-50% health, as was the one giant left. When the necro announced oom, I decided to charm to give us a breather. Since the necro dots aren't removed when charmed, by the time charm broke the giant was almost dead, and what had been a tough fight was suddenly really easy.

[Toxigen]

I'm almost done with 35 now. I did a couple levels in Mistmoore GY/CE, and it was great fun. I saved a wipe on a bad pull by CCing with charm to keep two occupied, and then when we were down to the last mob, everyone oom and low health, I could twist mez/mana/health until we were ready to take it down.

I'm out at the giant fort in Frontier Mountains now, mostly duoing and soloing. It's been a great place to practice pulling, and it's nice how fast the repops are. After getting Cantata of Soothing my weapons are almost permanently bagged, although I did pull them out to tank for a monk. Just Selo's Consonant Chain wasn't enough to hold aggro, but that plus Chords of Dissonance plus the DD procs from the Venomous Axe was. What's the best aggro twist? I don't want to use Chords of Dissonance if there's an enchanter mezzing.

Duoing with a necro was especially fun. He would dot or dd while adding his pet, and I would tank and dot. The slow is starting to get more and more significant. And it's always nice to feed a synergy like lich and hp/mana regen.

One thing that surprised me is that I was charming far less often than I expected. With the monk there was enough DPS that the added charm DPS didn't appreciably speed things up. Since you can't mez giants, if charm broke at an awkward timing you'd either have to recharm and break up the flow waiting for charm to break before killing it, or have two mobs beating on us until the first mob died. Adding a priest class as a trio probably would have changed that calculus, as healing was our bottleneck. But we were killing almost continuously for over an hour with only a couple breaks to heal up, so it felt pretty good.

I mostly use charm as cc, which worked pretty well. It's also nice to be able to occasionally pause a tough fight to be able to take a breather and regen a couple ticks. I discovered a nice synergy while duoing with a necro. Towards the end of a tough fight with adds we were both at about 30-50% health, as was the one giant left. When the necro announced oom, I decided to charm to give us a breather. Since the necro dots aren't removed when charmed, by the time charm broke the giant was almost dead, and what had been a tough fight was suddenly really easy.

So great to read stuff like this. You're playing bard the way its meant to be played - doing a little bit of everything and trying different duos. Forget the weapons, its lute and drum from here on out.

Necro + bard kicks so much ass. Keep an eye on /who in Kaesora - if you see any necros your level (or up to 40/42 really), hit them up and ask if you can come duo. That will be some of the most fun you can have, because the necro is charming solo and you'll make their life WAY easier if they're open to it.

You just may want to ask them to come up topside (most bind outside when they start their charm journey there) for some help down on your first go, it can be a bit confusing.

So much damn synergy there its absurd. After that you can bring your new necro friends to city of mist for more of that sick duo and then you'll be outdoors for some really nutty barding.

[Ripqozko]

c u in the future when you twist mana song and afk in our riot raids.

[Toxigen]

c u in the future when you twist mana song and afk in our riot raids.

this is the way (to fund your next alt)

[busted]

Do slows/hastes stack with enchanter/shaman slow/haste? Someone I was grouping with said that the haste effects stack, but I'm a little skeptical..

The dots/debuff components of the slow songs stack but the slow component does not.

What's the best aggro twist?

It used to be slow songs but there is a nerf in place on them. See https://www.project1999.com/forums/showthread.php?t=416857

Now best aggro songs are the drum dots. (aka do as much damage as possible to try and hold aggro)

Alternatively, you can "hold aggro" if other classes root mobs on you and you get as close as possible to the mob.

A few more pro tips for you:

1. Get a https://wiki.project1999.com/Goblin_Gazughi_Ring you can insta break charm when mobs at low health and kill em for full exp

2. Some mobs like velious giants/drovargs/etc will social aggro when you charm and attack a group (up to 3 from what I've seen). You can charm 1 mob and attack it on a group of 3 giants and they will all beat on your pet until charm breaks. When it breaks and you recharm, you have to circle around the mob and drag the adds (now on you) over top of the charmed pet to get them aggroed on your pet again. When you are doing this method you can't attack/dmg any of the adds or they won't ever get back on your pet. Add a damage shield to your charmed pet for increased killin speeds.

3. Once you get level 39 charm and you need to use it, it will start consuming mana. Bard mana is very slow to regen (1 per tick standing or 2 per tick sitting). You can "double" this by getting a thurgadin shawl https://wiki.project1999.com/Runed_Coldain_Prayer_Shawl . Its a longggggg quest but very worth it for bard solo charming in later levels. It basically makes you mana neutral and able to hold a pet forever when crawling in dungeons. The method goes like this: Charm mob, attack other guy, twist 2-3 songs for group, cast recharm and time it right so you insta charm your guy again. In between fights, mez your pet and have a seat to regain mana 2x faster to keep the fun times rolling

[Toxigen]

i feel like keeping a designated pet as a bard is a waste in groups

you should be pulling and using charm temporarily on big pulls for added dps / cc

[busted]

i feel like keeping a designated pet as a bard is a waste in groups

If the pet sucks yeah it can be.

But charming a baby golem in ST, or a rat in DN is verrrry good DPS.

You charm, pet attack, pulse mana/whatever for group and repeat. Then mez pet in between fights

[bcbrown]

c u in the future when you twist mana song and afk in our riot raids.

I'll be quoting this in my guild application.

I stayed at the giant fort until 38, when some started greening out and it became harder to find similar-level duos and trios. I kept an eye on Kaesora, but there wasn't a single person leveling in there (on green) at any point while I've been playing. I went to Mistmoore CE for 38 and most of 39 in full groups. One group was pretty rough at first, as the ranger was pulling pretty heavy and I was the only CC, but eventually I got the hang of keeping three mobs mezzed in a loop. Someone else in the group also played bard, and it was nice when they recognized stuff I was doing like using the DD song to interrupt spellcasters. I also at some point here got to try out pulling, and got pretty good at pulling singles from the musician room. One time, on my very first pull for a group, I missed the bridge, plunged straight off the cliff, and promptly died to all the mobs in the pit below, which was pretty hilarious.

Then I went to CoM, where I was underleveled in a moat group with a bunch of high 40s. It was kinda boring to lay back and twist manasongs, but I couldn't land anything offensively and it was also nice to take it a little easy after tryharding most of the previous recent groups I'd been in. After a couple more groups at stables and arena I headed back to the old continent, and now I'm halfway through 42 in the Rathe Mountains, duoing and trioing hill giants with mages.

Mage was a nice duo partner. I could twist snare/dot/dot and mostly keep aggro on myself, with the fire pet chasing after. The trio with two mages was lots of fun, fastpaced chaos as we tried to compete for hill giants against two 60s soloing. It feels like bard really shines the most in duo/trios. Solo is fun, but my tankiness is starting to drop and my DPS isn't keeping up, even with two drum dots. Full groups are fine too, but the jack-of-all-trades aspect of barding becomes less important.

I think I'm going to stay with hill giants in Rathe a little longer, until I get enough plat and fine steel weapons that I need to go bank, then hit up Vivitron's suggestions of geos in Crystal Caverns, SolB, and Droga. Vivitron, how should I run through SolA to SolB? Fight my way through or just train it? IIRC a lot of them see through invis, and every time I've tried to fight my way through on my 51 druid I've gotten bogged down and eventually have to gate out.

Probably also a good time for a gear check. Anything I should be on the lookout for? I can't afford any of the good SS items yet. Getting some 5/55 or 6/65 rings seems like an obvious upgrade, but I'm not sure what earrings or neck I should look for. Arms and feet also seem due for an upgrade. I've got 2-3kpp right now. https://wiki.project1999.com/Magelo_Green:Prosody

[enjchanter]

Aggro kiting using a fire pet
That's a yikes

[Vivitron]

I think I'm going to stay with hill giants in Rathe a little longer, until I get enough plat and fine steel weapons that I need to go bank, then hit up Vivitron's suggestions of geos in Crystal Caverns, SolB, and Droga. Vivitron, how should I run through SolA to SolB? Fight my way through or just train it? IIRC a lot of them see through invis, and every time I've tried to fight my way through on my 51 druid I've gotten bogged down and eventually have to gate out.

It's the easy path through sol a, just a couple right turns and you're there -- you only have to pass a couple mobs. The correct zone line is marked C on the map. In sol b you clear in from that zone line. Stick with the greater kobolds and greater kobold shaman, there should be plenty of them.

You asked about finishing the charms indoors -- it can be messy. Consider ccing the uncharmed target before the last charm break when it makes sense. Sometimes a snare+fear on a shaman is the right thing to do. IMO don't worry about the occasional half xp kill when getting the full xp kill looks like it will be costly.

[bcbrown]

Ah, I've been trying to get to D. C looks a lot easier, thanks.

[Toxigen]

I'll be quoting this in my guild application.

I stayed at the giant fort until 38, when some started greening out and it became harder to find similar-level duos and trios. I kept an eye on Kaesora, but there wasn't a single person leveling in there (on green) at any point while I've been playing. I went to Mistmoore CE for 38 and most of 39 in full groups. One group was pretty rough at first, as the ranger was pulling pretty heavy and I was the only CC, but eventually I got the hang of keeping three mobs mezzed in a loop. Someone else in the group also played bard, and it was nice when they recognized stuff I was doing like using the DD song to interrupt spellcasters. I also at some point here got to try out pulling, and got pretty good at pulling singles from the musician room. One time, on my very first pull for a group, I missed the bridge, plunged straight off the cliff, and promptly died to all the mobs in the pit below, which was pretty hilarious.

Then I went to CoM, where I was underleveled in a moat group with a bunch of high 40s. It was kinda boring to lay back and twist manasongs, but I couldn't land anything offensively and it was also nice to take it a little easy after tryharding most of the previous recent groups I'd been in. After a couple more groups at stables and arena I headed back to the old continent, and now I'm halfway through 42 in the Rathe Mountains, duoing and trioing hill giants with mages.

Mage was a nice duo partner. I could twist snare/dot/dot and mostly keep aggro on myself, with the fire pet chasing after. The trio with two mages was lots of fun, fastpaced chaos as we tried to compete for hill giants against two 60s soloing. It feels like bard really shines the most in duo/trios. Solo is fun, but my tankiness is starting to drop and my DPS isn't keeping up, even with two drum dots. Full groups are fine too, but the jack-of-all-trades aspect of barding becomes less important.

I think I'm going to stay with hill giants in Rathe a little longer, until I get enough plat and fine steel weapons that I need to go bank, then hit up Vivitron's suggestions of geos in Crystal Caverns, SolB, and Droga. Vivitron, how should I run through SolA to SolB? Fight my way through or just train it? IIRC a lot of them see through invis, and every time I've tried to fight my way through on my 51 druid I've gotten bogged down and eventually have to gate out.

Probably also a good time for a gear check. Anything I should be on the lookout for? I can't afford any of the good SS items yet. Getting some 5/55 or 6/65 rings seems like an obvious upgrade, but I'm not sure what earrings or neck I should look for. Arms and feet also seem due for an upgrade. I've got 2-3kpp right now. https://wiki.project1999.com/Magelo_Green:Prosody

bards are kings in com because outdoors

id stay there, plenty of times you'll have less than full groups...gonna be your best xp to 48 or so

also your drum dots will improve a bit when you get chant of frost at 46

get the 65 hp rings asap, singing steel helm for pulling (basically BiS for leveling bard), cloak of the maelstrom is good, mystic koada for cheap fashion, queen's carapace

may be time to farm some plat if you want to be better geared for the long haul of 50-60...crystal caverns / sol A may be good idk i havent farmed for plat on a non 60 in a decade

[bcbrown]

I've continued having a lot of fun on the bard. I did all of level 43 on Crystal Cavern geos, getting 1kpp in the process, by far the most lucrative camp I've done yet. I probably should have stayed for another level, but some of the geos were turning green, and I wanted to check out SolB kobolds, which I did for all of 44. That was a lot of fun, and good charm practice. It turns out that for all my questions and struggles when I was starting out, the solution was just to get good. Most of the time I was able to complete a charm fight without losing more than like 20% health, and mez, snare, fear gave good crowd control. When I had a single pull I could pretty quickly drum-dot it down. I always felt in control, even at low health.

45-48 was mostly CoM. I had an absolutely fantastic session with a warrior/shaman trio where I was chain-pulling for an hour or two at stables. Then I had an experience at Arena that kinda bummed me out. We had a weird group composition, pally/bard/cleric/wizard, and I was playing a ton of different songs, sometimes three dots, sometimes haste/slow, sometimes damage shield, sometimes manapump. The group wasn't killing very fast, though. Later, as other people joined and my wrists were tired, and we had pally/melee/mage/bard/cleric/wizard where I had swapped to cleric. The new bard mostly just pulsed mana, and it seemed a lot smoother. I don't know how much of it was the song choices and how much was the full group, but it does seem that in groups at higher levels just pulsing mana might be the best contribution, and that's real boring.

All the casters in Droga left me a little scared to try charming in there, and not sure if it would still be worthwhile now that I'm level 48. I did a little duoing with a wizard at Cobalt Scar against drakes and wyverns, and might head back there to solo a bit, interspersed with some more City of Mist. I also need to head down to Guk to get my DE mask; what level would I need to be to solo that camp? With three mobs in camp and not much room I'm not sure how I'd split it or fight them, either.

I got some gear upgrades, some meaningful and some not. I've got my 5/55 rings, which certainly help, but I don't think the Heavy Dragonhorn Boots and Crystal Chitin Armplates are very impactful. And then I got a free Pegasus cloak from someone farming Quillmane and giving away loot rights over this past long weekend. It's a lot of fun to be able to levitate everywhere now. And then I got the SS gauntlets for the worn Enduring Breath, which makes me want to go see if there's anything I can do in Kedge Keep.

Anyway, I can probably let City of Mist carry me to 50, but where should I go after that?

[Toxigen]

I've continued having a lot of fun on the bard. I did all of level 43 on Crystal Cavern geos, getting 1kpp in the process, by far the most lucrative camp I've done yet. I probably should have stayed for another level, but some of the geos were turning green, and I wanted to check out SolB kobolds, which I did for all of 44. That was a lot of fun, and good charm practice. It turns out that for all my questions and struggles when I was starting out, the solution was just to get good. Most of the time I was able to complete a charm fight without losing more than like 20% health, and mez, snare, fear gave good crowd control. When I had a single pull I could pretty quickly drum-dot it down. I always felt in control, even at low health.

45-48 was mostly CoM. I had an absolutely fantastic session with a warrior/shaman trio where I was chain-pulling for an hour or two at stables. Then I had an experience at Arena that kinda bummed me out. We had a weird group composition, pally/bard/cleric/wizard, and I was playing a ton of different songs, sometimes three dots, sometimes haste/slow, sometimes damage shield, sometimes manapump. The group wasn't killing very fast, though. Later, as other people joined and my wrists were tired, and we had pally/melee/mage/bard/cleric/wizard where I had swapped to cleric. The new bard mostly just pulsed mana, and it seemed a lot smoother. I don't know how much of it was the song choices and how much was the full group, but it does seem that in groups at higher levels just pulsing mana might be the best contribution, and that's real boring.

All the casters in Droga left me a little scared to try charming in there, and not sure if it would still be worthwhile now that I'm level 48. I did a little duoing with a wizard at Cobalt Scar against drakes and wyverns, and might head back there to solo a bit, interspersed with some more City of Mist. I also need to head down to Guk to get my DE mask; what level would I need to be to solo that camp? With three mobs in camp and not much room I'm not sure how I'd split it or fight them, either.

I got some gear upgrades, some meaningful and some not. I've got my 5/55 rings, which certainly help, but I don't think the Heavy Dragonhorn Boots and Crystal Chitin Armplates are very impactful. And then I got a free Pegasus cloak from someone farming Quillmane and giving away loot rights over this past long weekend. It's a lot of fun to be able to levitate everywhere now. And then I got the SS gauntlets for the worn Enduring Breath, which makes me want to go see if there's anything I can do in Kedge Keep.

Anyway, I can probably let City of Mist carry me to 50, but where should I go after that?

KC is really your only option for grouping at 50. And it sucks balls.

[Salaryman]

KC is really your only option for grouping at 50. And it sucks balls.

Yup, game sucks and the class you play is dommed to be in the worst zone in history even though thats where the best monk pvp weapon drops if you play on a server that isnt for n00bs (blue and gren is for n00bs).

Listen to this guy, hes got an avatar making facial expressions that would get you kicked out of any real life social situation, your class sucks if you dont zem +15% just log out.

You blues play in museum thats supposed to emulate the classic experience but wont level up anywhere that isnt KC. your playing bard, giving yourself carp tunnel fish hand down syndrome and you wont give up that sweet Zone Experienc Modifier.

And this guy with an avatar making facial expressions that would get you kicked out of any real life social situation never even played the only classes that are fun.

[Toxigen]

Yup, game sucks and the class you play is dommed to be in the worst zone in history even though thats where the best monk pvp weapon drops if you play on a server that isnt for n00bs (blue and gren is for n00bs).

Listen to this guy, hes got an avatar making facial expressions that would get you kicked out of any real life social situation, your class sucks if you dont zem +15% just log out.

You blues play in museum thats supposed to emulate the classic experience but wont level up anywhere that isnt KC. your playing bard, giving yourself carp tunnel fish hand down syndrome and you wont give up that sweet Zone Experienc Modifier.

And this guy with an avatar making facial expressions that would get you kicked out of any real life social situation never even played the only classes that are fun.

filed under drugs

[Troxx]

Yup, game sucks and the class you play is dommed to be in the worst zone in history even though thats where the best monk pvp weapon drops if you play on a server that isnt for n00bs (blue and gren is for n00bs).

Listen to this guy, hes got an avatar making facial expressions that would get you kicked out of any real life social situation, your class sucks if you dont zem +15% just log out.

You blues play in museum thats supposed to emulate the classic experience but wont level up anywhere that isnt KC. your playing bard, giving yourself carp tunnel fish hand down syndrome and you wont give up that sweet Zone Experienc Modifier.

And this guy with an avatar making facial expressions that would get you kicked out of any real life social situation never even played the only classes that are fun.

I’m guessing you are heavily medicated most days?

[Duik]

Faff and twaddle.
Would you care for some salt with that sour bitterness you carry with you?

[Troxx]

For the record, I consider Tox to have the best avatar on these boards. I’m a little jealous every time I see it.

[Toxigen]

For the record, I consider Tox to have the best avatar on these boards. I’m a little jealous every time I see it.

lmao

i just noticed your location and almost spit my water out

[Troxx]

:p

[Vivitron]

I've continued having a lot of fun on the bard. I did all of level 43 on Crystal Cavern geos, getting 1kpp in the process, by far the most lucrative camp I've done yet. I probably should have stayed for another level, but some of the geos were turning green, and I wanted to check out SolB kobolds, which I did for all of 44. That was a lot of fun, and good charm practice. It turns out that for all my questions and struggles when I was starting out, the solution was just to get good. Most of the time I was able to complete a charm fight without losing more than like 20% health, and mez, snare, fear gave good crowd control. When I had a single pull I could pretty quickly drum-dot it down. I always felt in control, even at low health.

45-48 was mostly CoM. I had an absolutely fantastic session with a warrior/shaman trio where I was chain-pulling for an hour or two at stables. Then I had an experience at Arena that kinda bummed me out. We had a weird group composition, pally/bard/cleric/wizard, and I was playing a ton of different songs, sometimes three dots, sometimes haste/slow, sometimes damage shield, sometimes manapump. The group wasn't killing very fast, though. Later, as other people joined and my wrists were tired, and we had pally/melee/mage/bard/cleric/wizard where I had swapped to cleric. The new bard mostly just pulsed mana, and it seemed a lot smoother. I don't know how much of it was the song choices and how much was the full group, but it does seem that in groups at higher levels just pulsing mana might be the best contribution, and that's real boring.

All the casters in Droga left me a little scared to try charming in there, and not sure if it would still be worthwhile now that I'm level 48. I did a little duoing with a wizard at Cobalt Scar against drakes and wyverns, and might head back there to solo a bit, interspersed with some more City of Mist. I also need to head down to Guk to get my DE mask; what level would I need to be to solo that camp? With three mobs in camp and not much room I'm not sure how I'd split it or fight them, either.

I got some gear upgrades, some meaningful and some not. I've got my 5/55 rings, which certainly help, but I don't think the Heavy Dragonhorn Boots and Crystal Chitin Armplates are very impactful. And then I got a free Pegasus cloak from someone farming Quillmane and giving away loot rights over this past long weekend. It's a lot of fun to be able to levitate everywhere now. And then I got the SS gauntlets for the worn Enduring Breath, which makes me want to go see if there's anything I can do in Kedge Keep.

Anyway, I can probably let City of Mist carry me to 50, but where should I go after that?
Glad you got to do geos and kobolds.

I think the problem in your pally/wizard/bard/cleric group was probably not enough dps, that's a rough group composition. Could look for opportunities to pbaoe if you end up with clerics and wizards; I'm not sure about pulling a chunk of CoM at 48 though, and you'd have to be careful to get enough aggro in before they nuke.

For the bard in the latter group, if you don't get to pull/cc/haste/slow it can push you to a less interesting role; mana/regen, interrupt casters (outside of CoM anyway), backup cc, what dps you can. The busy swiss army knife vs sleepy mana song can be frustrating but sometimes it's the right change of pace too.

Someone recommended snare/fear/drum dot bloodgill goblins as a good camp to 51; I haven't tried it on a bard but I mean to if I take another bard through that level range. If you can get the VP key piece while you're there it would be worthwhile; bards are a good vp class, good pullers in there. I think charm soloing CoM moat is probably pretty decent while they're blue as well. Wyverns sound fun too.

I think you can probably solo the de mask already, but I'm not 100% sure.

If you are up for AEing I think TD raptors and BW should both be good next spots. This boat tracker can help if you do raptors, note it relies on user reports to keep the schedule accurate https://discord.gg/j46cVcJH. You can pick up an OT hammer just by casting bard charm on the foreman and turning in the jade.

AE snare (at 54) is a fun bump to grouping -- can pair well with singing steel helm eyeball pulling in areas with fewer casters and where you are high enough level for your songs to land well, and cantana at 55 is a nice power bump to grouping.

I've clipped where I got xp 48-55 below. The hole had a big xp modifier at the time and I leaned on that. Also a fair bit of Raptor ae and some BW.

level 48
total grouped solo zone name
130 59 71 all zones
40 8 32 Nagafen's Lair
29 25 4 Kedge Keep
19 0 19 Dreadlands
14 14 0 The Hole
14 0 14 The City of Mist
11 11 0 The Burning Wood
1 0 1 Northern Plains of Karana
1 0 1 Southern Desert of Ro
1 1 0 Karnor's Castle
level 49
total grouped solo zone name
135 47 88 all zones
51 0 51 Dreadlands
47 47 0 The Hole
36 0 36 The Burning Wood
1 0 1 Lake of Ill Omen
level 50
total grouped solo zone name
161 161 0 all zones
161 161 0 The Hole
level 51
total grouped solo zone name
344 304 40 all zones
292 292 0 The Hole
26 12 14 The Wakening Lands
25 0 25 Nagafen's Lair
1 0 1 Neriak Third Gate
level 52
total grouped solo zone name
304 286 18 all zones
208 208 0 The Hole
49 49 0 Kedge Keep
29 29 0 Timorous Deep
8 0 8 South Kaladim
8 0 8 The Wakening Lands
2 0 2 Butcherblock Mountains
level 53
total grouped solo zone name
242 21 221 all zones
128 0 128 The Burning Wood
77 0 77 Timorous Deep
18 18 0 The Hole
7 0 7 Nagafen's Lair
4 0 4 The Wakening Lands
3 0 3 Velketor's Labyrinth
3 3 0 Plane of Hate
1 0 1 Neriak Third Gate
1 0 1 South Kaladim
level 54
total grouped solo zone name
434 188 246 all zones
209 37 172 Timorous Deep
78 78 0 Permafrost Caverns
71 69 2 The Hole
70 0 70 Nagafen's Lair
3 3 0 Trakanon's Teeth
1 0 1 South Kaladim
1 1 0 Kithicor Woods
1 0 1 Velketor's Labyrinth
level 55
total grouped solo zone name
756 696 60 all zones
278 276 2 The Hole
117 117 0 Old Sebilis
112 112 0 Howling Stones
69 52 17 Skyfire Mountains
63 39 24 Velketor's Labyrinth
36 35 1 Permafrost Caverns
35 35 0 The City of Mist
17 17 0 Great Divide
14 10 4 Trakanon's Teeth
6 0 6 South Kaladim
5 0 5 Kaesora
3 3 0 Karnor's Castle
1 0 1 Swamp Of No Hope

[Tann]

Someone recommended snare/fear/drum dot bloodgill goblins as a good camp to 51; I haven't tried it on a bard but I mean to if I take another bard through that level range. If you can get the VP key piece while you're there it would be worthwhile; bards are a good vp class, good pullers in there.


Did/currently doing on my bard atm, since some are just outside the mana free charm level. Snare - fear - chant - chant - aoe dot - snare.. let them swim away and come back to rinse and repeat. Has worked great so far. Would recommend to any bard wanting something more engaging than aoe kiting half a zone.

Could do essentially the same thing in TD with the chickens if you don't fancy water sports. If only real swarm (charm) kiting worked like it did on live.. that's where I leveled into the 50s super fast back in the day :(

[Vexenu]

What stats are you guys prioritizing on a grouping/non-kiting Bard these days? Are the returns from CHA/DEX worthwhile? Or are you better off going for more survivability with AC/HP/STA?

[Toxigen]

What stats are you guys prioritizing on a grouping/non-kiting Bard these days? Are the returns from CHA/DEX worthwhile? Or are you better off going for more survivability with AC/HP/STA?

id go survival...you're probably gonna be pulling with singing steel helm

[Tann]

What stats are you guys prioritizing on a grouping/non-kiting Bard these days? Are the returns from CHA/DEX worthwhile? Or are you better off going for more survivability with AC/HP/STA?

My bard is only mid 40's here so can't speak for "these days" kinda experience but back in the day on live I always focused on CHA for pulling, charming (those 3 ticks are precious), and a misguided belief that it helped reduce mez resists.

[Vivitron]

Anyway, I can probably let City of Mist carry me to 50, but where should I go after that?

Did you find anything particularly fun 50-55? I'm slowly leveling a second bard and am unsure what I'm going to do in this range.

[Snaggles]

Did you find anything particularly fun 50-55? I'm slowly leveling a second bard and am unsure what I'm going to do in this range.

Cobalt Scar charming would be fun if you can avoid the high levels (Azuredrake and Yolcarn?). Wakening Lands or giants in GD, south of the fort there are a ton of high levels to charm. I charmed Expedition Dwarves 57/8-60 and had a lot of fun. XP was pretty solid.

For swarmers I don’t know. Likely DL and BW to 60, or TD raptors.

[busted]

53+ Western wastes can be kind of fun if you are charming rhinos / mammoths and suiciding them into ice burrowers. You gotta get positioning right to avoid the 500dd frontal AOE cone blast but you get the hang of it. I level here in between scout rolls. A side bonus of killing these is you can spawn stronghorn and tantor. You gotta be non kos to dragons or you gonna get smashed by something

Velks is also fun if there are no swarms going on. Charm killing + melee solo is great fun 54+. You need fungi to make it viable. Snare + fear at lower than 25% to save on downtime.

[Goregasmic]

Cobalt Scar charming would be fun if you can avoid the high levels (Azuredrake and Yolcarn?).

Crazy exp 45-50 then at 52 a bunch of them are greens. I left after 51. Also a very good idea to be at least dubious with COV for general safety.

[plzrelax]

My bard is only 45 but I was playing my enchanter in HS the other day when I got a crit lull resist while breaking in to north. I was standing in the area where the first 4 mobs spawn lulling the mobs on the other side of the drop down, as you do. I managed to camp out safely when because the mob pathed through the entire wing, fell through the trap and pathed back up through the basement. Must have been a train of 30 mobs.

I had a vision of taking advantage of this as a bard in order to do a huge pull and kite it around the wing. Someday I’ll try it. Not exactly a mid level strategy but cool to think about

[Vivitron]

These are some fun ideas, thanks. I always forget about those giants, and that ice burrower technique hadn't occurred to me.

I did 46 and 47 fear kiting bloodgills and then 48-50 charm solo / duo at CoM arena. Both were solid (although that's coming from the perspective of a twinked bard.) Alas no bloodgill marauder while I was there.

I did some HS solo on my first bard. I like to pull with a charmed mob to bleed the harm touches, and there can be casters to deal with, so I think I'd find that crit pull a little too spicy.

[Crede]

Did you find anything particularly fun 50-55? I'm slowly leveling a second bard and am unsure what I'm going to do in this range.

Bard solo falls off hard 50+. Your new charm costs mana and only lasts for 3 ticks instead of 4. Also your melee dps can no longer really keep up with mob hp. I’d probably just try to swarm, maybe td raptors?

[bcbrown]

Did you find anything particularly fun 50-55? I'm slowly leveling a second bard and am unsure what I'm going to do in this range.

Not especially. I've put the bard on the back burner for the time being. I'm halfway through 54 and almost all my xp in that range has been in KC. I had a good time duoing with a pally just outside the entrance, and now that I have aoe snare I've been learning how to cc a big pull by kiting them around camp until they're all rooted/mezzed. I've been meaning to check out Burning Woods, either charming giants or swarming hornets. My gear still isn't great (no fungi), so that limits my options a bit.

I did a little Cobalt Scar 49-51, either dot-kiting or charming. The problem with charming is making sure you avoid getting an add, especially any of the cobalt drakes with their aoe dd/dispel. But if you can pull two wyverns down to the othmir it'd be pretty good. I root rotted on my druid up until 53, when it finally completely greened out. Getting non-KOS with dragons is definitely recommended.

I had a vision of taking advantage of this as a bard in order to do a huge pull and kite it around the wing. Someday I’ll try it. Not exactly a mid level strategy but cool to think about

It's not quite the same but check out https://www.twitch.tv/videos/1155754690 to see a bard soloing in HS.

Bard solo falls off hard 50+. Your new charm costs mana and only lasts for 3 ticks instead of 4. Also your melee dps can no longer really keep up with mob hp. I’d probably just try to swarm, maybe td raptors?

I agree bard solo falls off, but charming still seems viable. I never ran into a problem with the mana cost while charming. By the time my mana gets low I'm ready for a break anyway. The one huge annoyance is how long it takes mana to regen after getting a rez.

[Goregasmic]

I did a little Cobalt Scar 49-51, either dot-kiting or charming. The problem with charming is making sure you avoid getting an add, especially any of the cobalt drakes with their aoe dd/dispel. But if you can pull two wyverns down to the othmir it'd be pretty good. I root rotted on my druid up until 53, when it finally completely greened out. Getting non-KOS with dragons is definitely recommended.

There's a big rock on the main ridge close to skyshrine which is safe from pathers, they wander like 50-75yards from the rock and turn away. I always pulled to that area but they come in pairs so you might have to lull one first.

If you charm from the tower and pull to land, you have to go down the staircase waiting for your charmed mob or it will fall on the rocks below and aggro a bunch of bulthars, which is bad news.

The beach is safe but if you cast any offensive AE you have to make sure to stay out of othmir range. They're sowed and hasted which means a very quick death.

[WarpathEQ]

My favorite for 50+ on the bard is charm kiting geonids in WL. Incredible exp, very efficient, and great coin from all the vendor gems plus you can stock up on jewelcrafting and velious armor gems or sell them for plat too.

[Crede]

My favorite for 50+ on the bard is charm kiting geonids in WL. Incredible exp, very efficient, and great coin from all the vendor gems plus you can stock up on jewelcrafting and velious armor gems or sell them for plat too.

How long would you typically go before going oom? And would you say bard is the one class worth going prayer shawl for?

[WarpathEQ]

I was doing a rotation of 6 geos (3x2), with a short med break before repops, and would go at least 3 hours on a full mana bar before going OOM, could be extended to 4-5 hours if you really min-max the crap out of sitting in between each song twist (I put sit on a hotkey and twisted it in to stretch mana bar or when I was running low at times to get through the end of the cycle). Took about 1 hour to med back to full so great for taking a food break, ect. Alternatively you could easily do 8 or more geos before repops if you wanted to burn your bar faster and condense your timetable.

I was using a 6 song twist with selo's drum equipped.

1. Charm (switch target)
2. Fufils
3. Chant of Flame
4. Chant of Frost
5. Fulfils
6. Chant of Flame
1. Charm/repeat

If you keep your twist semi tight you will start over at 1 and charm will break just slightly before you land a new one, charming the mob that you were previously DoTing (if you twist close to perfect you can actually complete the twist and land the charm before it breaks so sometimes I had to recast my charm on the repeat so it didn't land too early).

You can do this without ever taking any hits from the geos with a little bit of practice. I prefer the middle of the back 3 caves as there is a perfect round of 6, pullable in 2s with a ton of room to move around and not run into others).

I decided not to pursue a prayer shawl (hoping for CT brains some day) for a few reasons:
1) The exp I got using this method is the best exp I've ever experienced both grouping and solo'ing accross multiple classes (a high skilled enchanter is probably the only class capable of exp'ing faster)
2) Because I was gaining so fast I determined the amount of time it would take to obtain a prayer shawl would not be recouped by the time I would hit 60 doing this without one.
3) Outside of this specific use case FT1 isn't really that useful to a bard.

The only way I could see prayer shawl really paying off here is if you wanted to use this strat to power level others and therefore would be spending much more time here than just leveling 50-60. Based on my efforts to min-max sitting at times I suspect you could go non-stop killing atleast 8 geos before repops with little or no sit time and an effectively infinite mana pool. I intend to go back someday when I have drums of the beast and CT brains to test that expectation.

[bcbrown]

Thanks for the details on WL geos, I'm going to have to go check that out.

[Amhran Ogma]

I went with a dex/cha build (something like 170/130 with cheap EC gear) and a venomous axe of the velium brood, and although now I think going dex may have been a little suboptimal, the number of procs has made melee a lot of fun up until now.

If by some odd chance you see this, OP bcbrown, I'm about to roll a bard, but it's my first toon starting on p99 (gave away 56 rogue acct 20+ years ago), so I'll be lucky if I see a hand-me-down or two. I want to make sure I don't misspend/allocate a single starting stat.

I'm rolling Wood Elf no matter what. I planned on putting 10 to Dex (to start at 100), 10 STR (still low at 80), and the rest (5) in CHA (90)

Is there something I should know regarding your hindsight about "going dex being suboptimal"? Thanks

[WarpathEQ]

If by some odd chance you see this, OP bcbrown, I'm about to roll a bard, but it's my first toon starting on p99 (gave away 56 rogue acct 20+ years ago), so I'll be lucky if I see a hand-me-down or two. I want to make sure I don't misspend/allocate a single starting stat.

I'm rolling Wood Elf no matter what. I planned on putting 10 to Dex (to start at 100), 10 STR (still low at 80), and the rest (5) in CHA (90)

Is there something I should know regarding your hindsight about "going dex being suboptimal"? Thanks

I rolled 2 bards, first went STR heavy, second went DEX heavy (with the final points going into the other). I would concur that I had a much better QoL on the STR build. The Dex build had issues with encumbrance all the way up to 60 and only overcame it once I was raid geared. Even in that case playing for the ultimate late game meta build in hindsight I would say STA would be the stat for virtually all melee classes as the other stats are easy to buff up STA/WIS/INT are the stats that have the least buffs.

[busted]

Go dex build. Str items are easy to come by and getting 100% WR bags are pretty easy.

Dex is the most underrated stat in the game IMO. Proc city with high dex and supposedly fewer missed notes.

Bard with https://wiki.project1999.com/Essence_Mace + https://wiki.project1999.com/Silver_Whip_of_Rage + high dex becomes pretty beastly. Highly recommend this setup

[bcbrown]

I'm rolling Wood Elf no matter what. I planned on putting 10 to Dex (to start at 100), 10 STR (still low at 80), and the rest (5) in CHA (90)

Is there something I should know regarding your hindsight about "going dex being suboptimal"? Thanks

Man, I don't know. I recently rolled a second bard and went strength. The first dex/cha bard is only like 20-30 stone away from encumbrance and is constantly overweight after a couple hours worth of loot. The second bard has a lot more carrying capacity, but I'm getting more missed notes and noticeably fewer procs (at level 19 now). Obviously the lack of procs won't matter as much from 30-onwards as you stop meleeing so much, and probably the missed notes won't be as big a deal as my musical skills get closer to the cap.

I think 10/10/5 seems like a decent split. WarpathEQ and Busted both make good points. The first bard was 15 dex/10 cha. I guess I'd start by thinking about what your goal is for the bard. If you plan to swarm to 60 and raid heavily, sta/dex might be a good idea. If you just want to fuck around through the lower levels, dex/str might be the way to go. If you're starting from scratch without any twinking, you probably won't be able to afford a good proc weapon before melee starts to become less relevant, which imo makes dex less useful.

I guess I'd recommend 15str/10dex or 20str/5dex. Strength is especially useful on a first toon on a server since you'll want to be able to carry as much loot as possible to buy gear. I found it pretty easy to get a good set of cha gear: opalline earrings, gypsy medallion, mask of deception combine for +32cha. I've got 148cha right now and that's probably overkill. I've only noticed charm breaking early once, and that's not a big deal anyway since you're gonna get a lot of experience swapping charm between the two mobs. Lull, sure, but if you're pulling for a group a crit fail shouldn't be too big a deal since you can mez-lock three mobs with a bit of practice.

Are you planning on swarming your way to 60 as quickly as possible in order to raid, or are you going to level kinda slowly and explore as much of the world as possible without worrying about raid gear?

[WarpathEQ]

Definitely wouldn't worry about CHA. I've never added starting starts or focused on +CHA gear and its extremely rare that anything relevant to CHA works at less than 100% success for a bard.

[WarpathEQ]

Go dex build. Str items are easy to come by and getting 100% WR bags are pretty easy.

Dex is the most underrated stat in the game IMO. Proc city with high dex and supposedly fewer missed notes.

Bard with https://wiki.project1999.com/Essence_Mace + https://wiki.project1999.com/Silver_Whip_of_Rage + high dex becomes pretty beastly. Highly recommend this setup

Seems like a waste to me, by the time you have that type of gear you should be able to max out dex pretty easily without using starting stats on it. If you're looking at ultimate meta game min/max seems like STA would have been the choice at that level of gearing.

[busted]

You need several Vulak items to max un-avatared DEX. This is very hard to do

https://wiki.project1999.com/Silver_Disk is also key for mega dex

STA is over-indexed IMO. 80hp lifetap + 150 rune proccing several times in a fight will net you more survivability than 100hp (25 base sta * 4 hp per sta)

Here's the setup:

- High dex (or avatar wep *but proccing with low base dex sucks)
- https://wiki.project1999.com/Essence_Mace
- https://wiki.project1999.com/Silver_Whip_of_Rage
- Primary lute twisting in https://wiki.project1999.com/Niv%27s_Melody_of_Preservation + https://wiki.project1999.com/Hymn_of_Restoration
- Ring 10 regen
- Fungi (or 8 regen from 4x aura of battle items)
- Then HP / STA items to boost base hp

These things + 60 bard slow make you a beefy boy.

Bonus:
- Chardok ring for 25 extra DS
- Sky shoulders fury clicky for an extra 10hp regen

I call this the "battle bard" setup

[WarpathEQ]

You need several Vulak items to max un-avatared DEX. This is very hard to do

Agreed. At the same time I would also state that people that have the type of gear you're referring to (such as the essence mace and silver whip of rage) also likely have several vulak items.

I would consider Vulak BIS gear, I would consider those as beyond BIS gear as most bards are going to focus DKP spend on epic/primary instruments for their hands and focus on gearing their other slots before going for min/max solo-quest funsies type of items that have more niche use cases.

[bcbrown]

I call this the "battle bard" setup

Gearing up to be a battle bard looks fun as hell, but I'm still a ways away from that.


You can do this without ever taking any hits from the geos with a little bit of practice. I prefer the middle of the back 3 caves as there is a perfect round of 6, pullable in 2s with a ton of room to move around and not run into others).

I checkout out the geos on my druid, was able to find them easily enough, but it was a little confusing to navigate and I'm not sure what you meant by "middle of the back 3 caves".

[Keebz]

You need several Vulak items to max un-avatared DEX.

Just proc avatar then? If we're talking about essence mace and vulak items then you have a primal.

[Vivitron]

Not especially. I've put the bard on the back burner for the time being. I'm halfway through 54 and almost all my xp in that range has been in KC. I had a good time duoing with a pally just outside the entrance, and now that I have aoe snare I've been learning how to cc a big pull by kiting them around camp until they're all rooted/mezzed. I've been meaning to check out Burning Woods, either charming giants or swarming hornets. My gear still isn't great (no fungi), so that limits my options a bit.

BW could be fun, I haven't tried those giants on a bard.

53+ Western wastes can be kind of fun if you are charming rhinos / mammoths and suiciding them into ice burrowers. You gotta get positioning right to avoid the 500dd frontal AOE cone blast but you get the hang of it. I level here in between scout rolls. A side bonus of killing these is you can spawn stronghorn and tantor. You gotta be non kos to dragons or you gonna get smashed by something

I tried this a little, I don't think it's going to be a big xp source for me but was fun to play with. I also tried pulling the pirates to klandi's spawn to pbaoe down; unfortunately I got caught and they insta killed me because of the backstabs. There aren't a ton of pirates and I don't know their respawn time but I might give them another try.


Bard solo falls off hard 50+. Your new charm costs mana and only lasts for 3 ticks instead of 4. Also your melee dps can no longer really keep up with mob hp. I’d probably just try to swarm, maybe td raptors?

Velks is also fun if there are no swarms going on. Charm killing + melee solo is great fun 54+. You need fungi to make it viable. Snare + fear at lower than 25% to save on downtime.

Cobalt Scar charming would be fun if you can avoid the high levels (Azuredrake and Yolcarn?). Wakening Lands or giants in GD, south of the fort there are a ton of high levels to charm. I charmed Expedition Dwarves 57/8-60 and had a lot of fun. XP was pretty solid.

For swarmers I don’t know. Likely DL and BW to 60, or TD raptors.

I do like TD raptors, if I get stalled before 55 I may go grind it out there to get OOS and Cantana. I might try those dwarves when I'm higher too; could be a good alternate if velks is taken or vice versa.

I did a little Cobalt Scar 49-51, either dot-kiting or charming. The problem with charming is making sure you avoid getting an add, especially any of the cobalt drakes with their aoe dd/dispel. But if you can pull two wyverns down to the othmir it'd be pretty good. I root rotted on my druid up until 53, when it finally completely greened out. Getting non-KOS with dragons is definitely recommended.

Crazy exp 45-50 then at 52 a bunch of them are greens. I left after 51. Also a very good idea to be at least dubious with COV for general safety.

There's a big rock on the main ridge close to skyshrine which is safe from pathers, they wander like 50-75yards from the rock and turn away. I always pulled to that area but they come in pairs so you might have to lull one first.

If you charm from the tower and pull to land, you have to go down the staircase waiting for your charmed mob or it will fall on the rocks below and aggro a bunch of bulthars, which is bad news.


Good tips; I didn't have any issues killing them between the rock and the skyshrine ramp. I found if you dot instead of charm from the tower the bulthars will not social the wyverns. I only had this camp for a few cycles but finished out 51 here and really liked it. I may try to get the camp again for some of 52.

I tried wl some when this camp was taken; the giants were already largely greening out. There might be some promise in killing the faerie dragons though. I also found out you can charm lieutenant krofer to do the https://wiki.project1999.com/Velium_Studded_Cloak quest without faction.


Bonus:
...
- Sky shoulders fury clicky for an extra 10hp regen


Can you confirm whether the sky shoulders are rechargeable? The wiki and forums are unclear. If they are I will prioritize them.

Go dex build. Str items are easy to come by and getting 100% WR bags are pretty easy.

Dex is the most underrated stat in the game IMO. Proc city with high dex and supposedly fewer missed notes.

Just proc avatar then? If we're talking about essence mace and vulak items then you have a primal.

Seems like a waste to me, by the time you have that type of gear you should be able to max out dex pretty easily without using starting stats on it. If you're looking at ultimate meta game min/max seems like STA would have been the choice at that level of gearing.

You need several Vulak items to max un-avatared DEX. This is very hard to do

Stats
I think STA is a good default. Especially if the end goal is a bard geared in practical gear for typical raid roles. I agree STR could be a nice quality of life bump early game for a first character. CHA is mostly for crit lull rate (how often the mobs attack you when you try to lull) -- it has a huge effect here, but it's completely feasible to get CHA to a satisfactory level when/if you need it without using starting stats.

I went CHA on my main bard which was maybe a silly choice. Gearing, I've been focused on hp/resists/sta, although I'm starting to think I have been under valuing ac.

My weapons include the ones busted mentioned and my goals include trophy solo kills.

Of my 18 non-held slots I have 9 tunnel-tier, 7 bis-ish, and 2 solid but lower tier raid drops. With drum/epic, vindi bp on instead of fungi, and not in resist swaps, my stats are:
207 STR
200 STA
162 DEX

My STR already feels like a dead stat: with weapon procs and/or werewolf illusion I think I'm usually capped even without FoS.

My STA is around the 205 that would let a single buff cap it; but I want to max it unbuffed and pumping it up warps my gearing decisions.

Busted has a decent point that max DEX would be nice for high end face tank solo. I do have a primal, but if I proc haste then primal that's two procs relying on unprimaled DEX. And getting a primal on a bard is admittedly weird. Some of the high dex vulak items are debatable (no hp on the boots/arms and belt of dwarf slaying is an interesting dexless belt option). That said I still find myself chasing STA not DEX in my gear decisions, and probably would go STA if I could re-allocate.

[WarpathEQ]

I checkout out the geos on my druid, was able to find them easily enough, but it was a little confusing to navigate and I'm not sure what you meant by "middle of the back 3 caves".

The 2 main entrances people use are the North and East Entrance. Inside the caves there are 5 rooms with a hallway that runs in a big circle that leads to each of them. The furthest North room is the largest and includes a named mob (Phenocryst (sp?)), there is a small room to the east just off the hallway.

On the south end of the cave there are 3 seperate rooms each with 6-9 mobs in them. I was referring to the middle of these 3 rooms which is the most spread out, it has a group of 3 mobs you can see from the opening into the room and then 6 mobs along the back wall as you follow it around. Including a safe spot in the very back where no mobs spawn within line of sight, often a place where people camp out or med.

[busted]

Can you confirm whether the sky shoulders are rechargeable? The wiki and forums are unclear. If they are I will prioritize them.


I couldn't get them to recharge. This seems like a bug though. Every other sky item is rechargable via mana batteries and box of the void. Surely this one should be too

[Vivitron]

I couldn't get them to recharge. This seems like a bug though. Every other sky item is rechargable via mana batteries and box of the void. Surely this one should be too

Dang, thanks for checking. There are some other unrechargeable sky items. I believe the key p99 research on sky recharges was here: https://www.project1999.com/forums/showthread.php?p=769478#post769478, which suggests the item lore strings were used to determine the mana batteries / rechargeability. Assuming there's no lore string, it might be worth looking through some bard archives to see if there's any era evidence of someone either claiming to recharge the shoulders or complaining that they can't.

[Vivitron]

I couldn't get them to recharge. This seems like a bug though. Every other sky item is rechargable via mana batteries and box of the void. Surely this one should be too

I found this post which suggests maybe it was rechargeable; https://www.project1999.com/forums/showthread.php?p=2838652#post2838652.

[Vivitron]

The 2 main entrances people use are the North and East Entrance. Inside the caves there are 5 rooms with a hallway that runs in a big circle that leads to each of them. The furthest North room is the largest and includes a named mob (Phenocryst (sp?)), there is a small room to the east just off the hallway.

On the south end of the cave there are 3 seperate rooms each with 6-9 mobs in them. I was referring to the middle of these 3 rooms which is the most spread out, it has a group of 3 mobs you can see from the opening into the room and then 6 mobs along the back wall as you follow it around. Including a safe spot in the very back where no mobs spawn within line of sight, often a place where people camp out or med.

Thanks for sharing this, it's a nice spot. I tried it; a rotation of 6 geos gave me about 5% exp at 52, and maybe a 4 or 5 minute break before respawns if the clear was smooth. (14:30 Respawn timer in WL.)

I was able to do about 14 CS wyverns per cycle when they were available. I forgot to note how much xp that yielded. (20 min respawn timer there.)

I also did a few TD raptor aes. Those gave about 10% exp per. It takes me roughly 10 minutes to do the pull + the kill. (12 min respawn timer in TD.)

I felt a little silly trying geos at 52 knowing they are still blue at 59, but it worked better than I expected. The shamans felt dangerous at this level and I avoided any double shaman spawns. Cash and armor gem loot seemed pretty solid. Subjectively heavy on mana use, but that's fine for short sessions with mixed afk. Raptors are easier xp if you can ae consistently without dieing; but I die sometimes, don't like the lock-in of having to kill a pull before I can afk, it gets boring, and no worthwhile loot there. I'll probably do more of both camps.

[WarpathEQ]

Thanks for sharing this, it's a nice spot. I tried it; a rotation of 6 geos gave me about 5% exp at 52, and maybe a 4 or 5 minute break before respawns if the clear was smooth. (14:30 Respawn timer in WL.)

I was able to do about 14 CS wyverns per cycle when they were available. I forgot to note how much xp that yielded. (20 min respawn timer there.)

I also did a few TD raptor aes. Those gave about 10% exp per. It takes me roughly 10 minutes to do the pull + the kill. (12 min respawn timer in TD.)

I felt a little silly trying geos at 52 knowing they are still blue at 59, but it worked better than I expected. The shamans felt dangerous at this level and I avoided any double shaman spawns. Cash and armor gem loot seemed pretty solid. Subjectively heavy on mana use, but that's fine for short sessions with mixed afk. Raptors are easier xp if you can ae consistently without dieing; but I die sometimes, don't like the lock-in of having to kill a pull before I can afk, it gets boring, and no worthwhile loot there. I'll probably do more of both camps.

Yeah I did the Geos starting at 50 so definitely very viable, shamans can definitely be a bit risky at first until you really dial in your twist timing, eventually you get to the point where they rarily even cast on you. Additionally once your base resists (with gear) start to exceed around 100 you will resist a lot of their spells (the blizzard - cold resist seems to be much harder than all the poison based stuff). To your point the camp probably shines more as you get closer to 60 and still get awesome exp from blue cons where the other camps probably start to die out.

[Vivitron]

I'll add I'm about 85% through 53 and I did this level so far on Faydwer guards.

Felwithe: already a few greens at 53. I see necros sticking around longer, presumably because they all drop a 21p sword. I suspect corruption in the city leading to guard enrichment. They're paladins so some care towards getting them fleeing without casting too many heals helps to keep it efficient. My top choice at 53, but often camped.

Kelethin: seemed to be the same level as the Felwithe guards, but with a captain and lieutenant just slightly higher. They're all warriors, mostly dual weilding so charm kills are efficient. About half as much plat per mob as Felwithe though. You can run off the side when you aggro them and kill them on the ground. I still don't know my way to all the spawns.

Butcherblock: easy mode charming. Seemed slightly higher level; I expect it to still be fine xp at 54. Mostly spawn in isolated pairs, just a green con citizen add at one of the huts. NPCs in the huts don't seem to social through the hut walls. I didn't fully explore all the possible spawns, but following the path from gfay up past kaladim and towards the dock killing as you go (skip the entrance to Kaladim guards; they're buffed in this era) seemed solid. The dock guards are tougher than the hut guards but doable. Butcherblock is the worst plat of the Faydwer guards though, they mostly drop ~4p axes.

Of course bards can sneak to sell to hostile vendors, so you get to loot everything and sell it immediately.

[Jimjam]

Every other sky item is rechargable via mana batteries and box of the void.

Not true, wizard snare cap doesn't recharge either. Perhaps there are more examples?

[busted]

There is evidence of it costing 10pp per charge here https://www.tapatalk.com/groups/theconcerthall/poa-songweavers-mantle-t2994.html#p25769 on May 09, 2001

Also some "out of era" proof here https://everquest.allakhazam.com/db/quest.html?quest=597#m1705722245193788

[Vivitron]

Did you find anything particularly fun 50-55? I'm slowly leveling a second bard and am unsure what I'm going to do in this range.

Thanks for all the suggestions. I finally hit 56 and here's what I ended up doing:


level 50
total grouped solo zone name
62 0 62 all zones
62 0 62 The City of Mist # Charming around Arena was solid
level 51
total grouped solo zone name
181 0 181 all zones
86 0 86 Dreadlands # Trying for RS, already higher level than optimal
39 0 39 Cobalt Scar # Wyvern charm, great camp
23 0 23 The Emerald Jungle # Misc Charming, Too high already
13 0 13 Kaesora # HS Key piece solo
5 0 5 Karnor's Castle
3 0 3 The City of Mist
3 0 3 Trakanon's Teeth # Seb key piece solo
3 0 3 Western Wastes
2 0 2 Frontier Mountains
1 0 1 Swamp Of No Hope
1 0 1 The Wakening Lands
1 0 1 Eastern Wastelands
1 0 1 Skyshrine
level 52
total grouped solo zone name
146 0 146 all zones
71 0 71 The Wakening Lands # Geo charm, we're going to be seeing more of these
46 0 46 Cobalt Scar
29 0 29 Timorous Deep
level 53
total grouped solo zone name
239 0 239 all zones
103 0 103 Greater Faydark # Guard Charm
46 0 46 Butcherblock Mountains # Guard Charm
43 0 43 Northern Felwithe # Guard Charm
16 0 16 Timorous Deep
14 0 14 Southern Felwithe
12 0 12 Nagafen's Lair
5 0 5 Ruins of Old Guk
level 54
total grouped solo zone name
303 140 163 all zones
79 79 0 Old Sebilis
73 61 12 The Burning Wood # Giants, not terrible
68 0 68 Howling Stones # Pbaoe; slow without denon's bereavement because aoe snare blocks the 48 dot
36 0 36 Butcherblock Mountains
23 0 23 The Wakening Lands
13 0 13 Nagafen's Lair
8 0 8 Trakanon's Teeth
3 0 3 The Overthere
level 55
total grouped solo zone name
261 3 258 all zones
231 0 231 The Wakening Lands # Geoooooos
23 2 21 Nagafen's Lair
2 0 2 Velketor's Labyrinth
2 0 2 Eastern Wastelands
2 0 2 Ruins of Old Guk
1 1 0 Lavastorm Mountains

[WarpathEQ]

Thanks for all the suggestions. I finally hit 56 and here's what I ended up doing:


level 50
total grouped solo zone name
62 0 62 all zones
62 0 62 The City of Mist # Charming around Arena was solid
level 51
total grouped solo zone name
181 0 181 all zones
86 0 86 Dreadlands # Trying for RS, already higher level than optimal
39 0 39 Cobalt Scar # Wyvern charm, great camp
23 0 23 The Emerald Jungle # Misc Charming, Too high already
13 0 13 Kaesora # HS Key piece solo
5 0 5 Karnor's Castle
3 0 3 The City of Mist
3 0 3 Trakanon's Teeth # Seb key piece solo
3 0 3 Western Wastes
2 0 2 Frontier Mountains
1 0 1 Swamp Of No Hope
1 0 1 The Wakening Lands
1 0 1 Eastern Wastelands
1 0 1 Skyshrine
level 52
total grouped solo zone name
146 0 146 all zones
71 0 71 The Wakening Lands # Geo charm, we're going to be seeing more of these
46 0 46 Cobalt Scar
29 0 29 Timorous Deep
level 53
total grouped solo zone name
239 0 239 all zones
103 0 103 Greater Faydark # Guard Charm
46 0 46 Butcherblock Mountains # Guard Charm
43 0 43 Northern Felwithe # Guard Charm
16 0 16 Timorous Deep
14 0 14 Southern Felwithe
12 0 12 Nagafen's Lair
5 0 5 Ruins of Old Guk
level 54
total grouped solo zone name
303 140 163 all zones
79 79 0 Old Sebilis
73 61 12 The Burning Wood # Giants, not terrible
68 0 68 Howling Stones # Pbaoe; slow without denon's bereavement because aoe snare blocks the 48 dot
36 0 36 Butcherblock Mountains
23 0 23 The Wakening Lands
13 0 13 Nagafen's Lair
8 0 8 Trakanon's Teeth
3 0 3 The Overthere
level 55
total grouped solo zone name
261 3 258 all zones
231 0 231 The Wakening Lands # Geoooooos
23 2 21 Nagafen's Lair
2 0 2 Velketor's Labyrinth
2 0 2 Eastern Wastelands
2 0 2 Ruins of Old Guk
1 1 0 Lavastorm Mountains


Howling stones pbaoe sounds.....interesting....Never really spent any time in there but now I'm curious.

[Vivitron]

Howling stones pbaoe sounds.....interesting....Never really spent any time in there but now I'm curious.

Sugz4 streamed himself doing it on twitch a few times, I think someone may have posted a link earlier in the thread but I didn't see it on a quick skim.

The main things are to use bind sight / lull to help movement and avoid casters (can mez park a caster in a pinch too, but try to avoid). Then use charmed mobs to pull a room and bleed the harm touches. There's enough space to kite on the entrance pad, in the south side of the basement, in the west tunnels, etc.

I'm a little more risk averse than Sugz and usually end up with a smaller kite, like 8-12 maybe. And still die a fair bit.

[bcbrown]

Sugz4 streamed himself doing it on twitch a few times, I think someone may have posted a link earlier in the thread but I didn't see it on a quick skim.

https://www.twitch.tv/videos/1155754690 I think is the video you mean. I'd love to attempt that eventually but I've put the bard on the side while I get my druid to 60. Thanks Vivitron for posting where you leveled this toon!

[Duik]

I watched that twitch stream, but only because bcbrown suggested it.
I wished I didnt now, it just proves how much I SUUUUCK at eq.
I blame everyone but me.
Also that dude has real trouble looking (or not looking) at the webcam.
I would have fallen through the VS "picture" right at the very beginning.

[WarpathEQ]

https://www.twitch.tv/videos/1155754690 I think is the video you mean. I'd love to attempt that eventually but I've put the bard on the side while I get my druid to 60. Thanks Vivitron for posting where you leveled this toon!

Will have to check it out, thanks for linking

[shovelquest]

https://www.twitch.tv/videos/1155754690 I think is the video you mean. I'd love to attempt that eventually but I've put the bard on the side while I get my druid to 60. Thanks Vivitron for posting where you leveled this toon!

I love how like, good classic eq is basically speed running. Warping through locked doors reminds me of that. I am a fan of these non designed events and its what i love about EQ.