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View Full Version : Do I absolutely need a Sarnak Battle Shield as a Paladin?


Beaniron
01-05-2013, 04:40 PM
I'm lv10 at the moment and I'm using Clay Guardian shield right now, 25AC 50HP, it's the best I have at the moment for my paladin. People are telling me to get one if I can, which I cannot because my funds are depleted.

Generally I 2h whenever I'm in a group, but for soloing/tanking,I was wondering if this is good enough to hold me into my 40's or 50's, or if I need to get my hands on a Sarnak Battle Shield ASAP.

My weapons are Sword of the Morning, Ghoulbane, and Soulfire.

Ele
01-05-2013, 05:15 PM
Clay Guardian Shield is fine for a long while. The resists are nice, but if you are without funds you can invest in other pieces that will provide a bigger boost.

Beaniron
01-05-2013, 05:23 PM
Clay Guardian Shield is fine for a long while. The resists are nice, but if you are without funds you can invest in other pieces that will provide a bigger boost.

I think I've got the rest of my equipment covered. HBC, Fire Wedding rings and Diamondine earrings for AC/HP, Dragonborn sash for Haste, and a full suit of Armor of Ro.

But if you say the Clay Guardian shield will work fine, I'm happy with it. I'm absolutely broke right now and all funds that I earn from 10-46 are going towards a Book of Scale.

Danth
01-06-2013, 12:48 AM
If you're going for the epic, don't bother with the sarnak shield. If you have the epic, using a 1H will feel like a downer anyway. A shield won't give you THAT much more AC, you can bash with the epic, and any kunark-era 1H will be very much less damage output.

Danth

Beaniron
01-06-2013, 12:52 AM
If you're going for the epic, don't bother with the sarnak shield. If you have the epic, using a 1H will feel like a downer anyway. A shield won't give you THAT much more AC, you can bash with the epic, and any kunark-era 1H will be very much less damage output.

Danth

I want to use the SoulFire exclusively once I hit 20. How does it fare as a weapon after lv20 compared to Sword of the Morning?

Danth
01-06-2013, 01:01 AM
Soulfire is distinctly inferior to a sword of the morning plus a clay guardian shield. Soulfire has a ratio of 23/45. That's worse than the Morning's 16/27 so the Soulfire is both less durability and less damage, too, plus losing bash. You may opt to use it anyway just for the look, but it isn't a very good weapon in Kunark in terms of raw effectiveness.

If you primarily group nobody will care how much damage you do so the Soulfire will do fine in that situation. If you try to solo to 60 you'll die of old age before you get there so it's probably a moot point.

Danth

Beaniron
01-06-2013, 02:12 AM
Soulfire is distinctly inferior to a sword of the morning plus a clay guardian shield. Soulfire has a ratio of 23/45. That's worse than the Morning's 16/27 so the Soulfire is both less durability and less damage, too, plus losing bash. You may opt to use it anyway just for the look, but it isn't a very good weapon in Kunark in terms of raw effectiveness.

If you primarily group nobody will care how much damage you do so the Soulfire will do fine in that situation. If you try to solo to 60 you'll die of old age before you get there so it's probably a moot point.

Danth

How about Avenger/Defender? How do those compare to SotM? I heard something about Fiery Defender having access to Bash, not sure about it though.

Vadd
01-06-2013, 06:16 PM
Clay Guardian Shield has good hp for your level, and if you MUST have a shield with resist for those nasty caster mobs, id just buy a Crested Mistmoore Shield - 10 SVM, 10 SVP, 10 SVD....

Beaniron
01-08-2013, 08:34 PM
Question about the Fiery Defender Epic: It has 15AC on it. Does this mean it doubles as a shield and allows you to get past the AC cap?

BigSlip
01-09-2013, 05:46 AM
youre twinked out your fucking ass at lvl ten with soulfire/cgs/SoM/ etc etc


***** fucking kill something and quit asking for advice with your rmt ass.

Kaino
01-09-2013, 06:22 AM
Yes you can bash with Fiery Avenger/Defender.

So raising 2HS is more important although cycling both while grouping wont hurt you.

Beaniron
01-09-2013, 12:06 PM
youre twinked out your fucking ass at lvl ten with soulfire/cgs/SoM/ etc etc


***** fucking kill something and quit asking for advice with your rmt ass.

There are some REALLY nice people in game in you just look around and ask. And I'm not really asking for advice, I'm trying to learn the mechanics behind my class and my skills so I understand my class better and how to make the most of it.

Kaino: What about the 15AC on Fiery Defender. Does that count as shield AC? Meaning will it let me exceed the Paladin soft cap on shieldless AC?

Nogdar
01-09-2013, 07:04 PM
Still curious about the numbers for said softcap. Anyone has any idea, as inaccurate as it may be?

Lorraine
01-25-2013, 12:00 PM
What about the 15AC on Fiery Defender. Does that count as shield AC? Meaning will it let me exceed the Paladin soft cap on shieldless AC?

I'm curious as to why you're convinced there's a soft cap in here, in the first place. Back in live, the soft cap wasn't even introduced till mid-Velious , and even then didn't play a big part.

Shield AC wasn't changed, until the patch in anticipation for PoP release, where shield AC was added to class-based cap.

Re: Feed back on soft cap

Kavhok
EQ Designer
Posts: 14

Here's how the AC formula used to work before the patch immediately preceding PoP:

The AC from your items was added up, but the value used for it was hard capped based on your level. This was the same for all classes. Once you had 289 raw AC from items (or 385 as a cloth class, since they get less effect from item AC), that was it. More AC from items wouldn't do anything.

After this, it added your class bonuses (including the monk bonus, which is equivalent to your level + 5 in raw item AC), defense skill bonus, agility bonus, and the AC from spell buffs.

Total AC at this point was capped again, this time based on class. In the Kunark-era code, this was a hard cap, but sometime during Velious it was changed to a soft cap for melee classes only. The return was fairly small, though.


The pre-PoP patch did a few things:

- The cap on item AC was no longer used except at lower levels (twinking was a concern since that was before recommended level items were in heavy use).
- Shield AC was added to the class-based cap to give shields more viability
- Class AC caps were changed. Monks were lowered the most, but beastlords were lowered to the same level as druids (yes, they were nerfed too). Cleric and shaman caps were raised above druids. The caps generally followed the armor archetypes of plate/chain/leather/cloth.
- All classes were given returns on AC over the cap, not just melee classes. All casters and priests received the least, followed by the melee classes. Rogues got the same return as monks, as did berserkers when the class was added. Beastlords and rangers got slightly more, followed by bards, then knights, then warriors.

The overall goal was to make the average dps (including mitigation, avoidance, block/dodge/etc.) taken for melee classes to be approximately:
Warrior > Knight > Monk > Bard > Ranger = Beastlord = Rogue


Unless p99 is running on a different patch code (which I haven't noticed during my excessive playing days here, but then I didn't do a whole lot of parsing about it), there should be no ac soft cap, just kunark hard cap.

Beaniron
01-27-2013, 05:04 PM
So if I hit the AC hard cap with armor alone, that makes shield AC completely irrelevent?

Onshuu
01-27-2013, 11:34 PM
If you hit any sort of AC cap, assuming there is one, before you finish your epic then I'll delete my character.

Beaniron
01-30-2013, 12:05 AM
I think Beaniron is that same retarded brony from before. You can tell because he asks the most retarded and easy to find out answers ever about a new class every week.

What? I'm going to ignore the first part because I have no idea what you're talking about, but how is my question retarded? I'm asking about an in-game mechanic that only a select few would know a great deal about. Even Lorraines answer has my head spinning.