Nec - What now?

[Izmael]

Originally Posted by Teppler [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

I'm not sure that's totally true. I used to spent countless amounts of hours in north wing. I think iirc there's a lot of the same types of mobs but the mobs that exist in north wing tend to be the higher level type and there's a certain mob that spawns in north wing that's higher level that won't spawn in basement. Basement will green out by 60 mostly while north wing will mostly stay dark blue.

And then west has a lot of the same mobs as north but then they start adding in elemental bones which are higher level than the average non boss mobs in north.

North greens out by 58-59, at which time you have to move west. I don't think the level distribution of mobs in north is any different from the basement (except for the named mobs).

I would say North is easier than the basement if you stick to the safe ramp and don't do anything silly. Basement has lots of roamers, weird pathing and you have to deal with lawyerquesting every other time.

[Teppler]

Through my time in crypt I recommended heavily never moving onto west. North remains the best exp up to 60. The higher level mobs in West aren’t worth the trouble.

Yeah looking at the mob list of the zone it’s coming back to me now. There’s less plaguebones in north which are the lowest level skellies in the zone. Instead they have more specters that quad and sepulchers and war bones.

So my point isn’t that the same mobs are lower level in north but there’s less ‘plaguebones’ which are the lower level skellies that green out a lot sooner. This is why basement is recommended first.

[Teppler]

In my time in hs I mean. I’m spending too much time in crypt nowadays. XD

And actually now that I think about it. The bigger problem with West vs North is really that the layout isn't as friendly as soloing in basement or north and that's compounded by the higher level mobs in that area.

In north its really easy to bunch up tons and tons of mobs a few times before repops. I'm not sure you can do that in West. And I recommend practicing the bunching up tactic in basement first before north. If nothing else, you'll have more regular access to clerics who come to zone in when you inevitably die while playing this zone.

I always found the loot stronger in North too.

[thebutthat]

Originally Posted by Teppler [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

In my time in hs I mean. I’m spending too much time in crypt nowadays. XD

And actually now that I think about it. The bigger problem with West vs North is really that the layout isn't as friendly as soloing in basement or north and that's compounded by the higher level mobs in that area.

In north its really easy to bunch up tons and tons of mobs a few times before repops. I'm not sure you can do that in West. And I recommend practicing the bunching up tactic in basement first before north. If nothing else, you'll have more regular access to clerics who come to zone in when you inevitably die while playing this zone.

I always found the loot stronger in North too.

I felt west was superior xp wise after 58 or so. Also, being a necro, that regen clicky on the boss room key is sooo amazing. The hardest part of west is the initial break in because there isn't the safe ramp like there is in North. Once you get a foot hold, You can do double and tripple pulls all the way down to the drop down and then restart from there. Or if you're feeling comfortable with it, you can double invis to the back hall by the boss room and pull to there and get a shot at the Key boss's loot. Erudite illusion mask and rapier of orion sell for a few k still i think. North having more PH's for the club and then the mask/belt still sell for a few 100 and pretty common drops. It's less risk for probably what would equal out to the same amount of plat.

[Izmael]

I leveled like 4 or 5 characters in HS on both blue and red. Doing North post 58, in my experience, is painfully slow. West is just a lot faster, exp wise.

The main challenge in West IMO is the pit that separates the wing in two parts. The "easy" first part where you can CR by /corps'ing from the basement, and the "hard" part where you'll have to CR the old fashionned way, which means getting a north + west key, fighting back naked etc, or getting SC or getting someone to CR you (or if you've done your homework, looting a corpsed west key and maybe grabbing some backup gear from the bank).

The west pit alone can be tricky even for experienced players because if you mistime the pathers (and this will happen ever so often even to the best of us) and/or get really unlucky with calms you can end up with a pull of 12+ mobs, half of them harm touching your ass so hard, you won't even leave a corpse when you die. If you do something like 56-60 on a character in west, you'd be really lucky not to have to deal with that kind of situation at least once.

The pussy ass way of doing west is to kill everything up until the pit, then wait for the repops, but that's not really better exp than killing all of north. The good exp in west means you clear it all with your level 50 quadding weaponized pet.

To the above poster who recommends doing north to 60 - have you ever gone through level 59 in north? That would burn anything out of EQ. In west you can go through level 59 in 2-3 days and still remain almost cool and normal.

[Baylan295]

Originally Posted by Teppler [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

In my time in hs I mean. I’m spending too much time in crypt nowadays. XD

And actually now that I think about it. The bigger problem with West vs North is really that the layout isn't as friendly as soloing in basement or north and that's compounded by the higher level mobs in that area.

In north its really easy to bunch up tons and tons of mobs a few times before repops. I'm not sure you can do that in West. And I recommend practicing the bunching up tactic in basement first before north. If nothing else, you'll have more regular access to clerics who come to zone in when you inevitably die while playing this zone.

I always found the loot stronger in North too.

The last bit is verifiably false. Except for the boss mobs, the loot is identical in both wings because the nameds are also the same; and the West boss loot is better than the North boss.

[Teppler]

Originally Posted by Izmael [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

I leveled like 4 or 5 characters in HS on both blue and red. Doing North post 58, in my experience, is painfully slow. West is just a lot faster, exp wise.

The main challenge in West IMO is the pit that separates the wing in two parts. The "easy" first part where you can CR by /corps'ing from the basement, and the "hard" part where you'll have to CR the old fashionned way, which means getting a north + west key, fighting back naked etc, or getting SC or getting someone to CR you (or if you've done your homework, looting a corpsed west key and maybe grabbing some backup gear from the bank).

The west pit alone can be tricky even for experienced players because if you mistime the pathers (and this will happen ever so often even to the best of us) and/or get really unlucky with calms you can end up with a pull of 12+ mobs, half of them harm touching your ass so hard, you won't even leave a corpse when you die. If you do something like 56-60 on a character in west, you'd be really lucky not to have to deal with that kind of situation at least once.

The pussy ass way of doing west is to kill everything up until the pit, then wait for the repops, but that's not really better exp than killing all of north. The good exp in west means you clear it all with your level 50 quadding weaponized pet.

To the above poster who recommends doing north to 60 - have you ever gone through level 59 in north? That would burn anything out of EQ. In west you can go through level 59 in 2-3 days and still remain almost cool and normal.

I did up to 60 in HS north and I spent a lot of time at 60 in every wing in HS. It was my home for months. North is where I spent the most time.

I always found West more dangerous, slower and worse loot. Basically inferior at every aspect but I guess different styles of play handle this all differently.

Testing around I could never find a spot I liked as much as safe hill in basement or the hall after the picture in north.

While the person above says North is painfully slow at 59 I find it to be hands down some the fastest EXP in the game outside of being a bard or chardok AOE. In fact, when I PL people, my favorite spot for upper level PL is HS north because it has the best mix of being safe and mowing down mobs.

[thebutthat]

Originally Posted by Baylan295 [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

The last bit is verifiably false. Except for the boss mobs, the loot is identical in both wings because the nameds are also the same; and the West boss loot is better than the North boss.

I think he was referring to the fact there are 3 spawn points for named mobs in north vs 1 in West (not counting key bosses). I'd say sheer volume of drops is higher in North even if you're clearing the named in West. Although, I'd never recommend either wing for a source of income, and would recommend burning through to 60 in west so you can farm South.

[Teppler]

Kind of bugs me that that guy is using a term like 'verifiably false' when he's talking to people who have played the zone for countless hours and he's looking at a loot drop sheet.

Not to mention, if you're in this for solo exp, you aren't dealing with either north or west bosses.

[Baylan295]

Originally Posted by Teppler [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

Kind of bugs me that that guy is using a term like 'verifiably false' when he's talking to people who have played the zone for countless hours and he's looking at a loot drop sheet.

Not to mention, if you're in this for solo exp, you aren't dealing with either north or west bosses.

The loot is the exact same. Are there more drops in North? Sure, if you are clearing the entire wing, but the loot quality is identical for everything the boss mobs. Usually when people say “better” they are referring to quality - so if the OP mean quantity, I’m sorry for assuming he mean quality.

Kind of bugs me that that guy is assuming I’ve never spent any time in hs and am just looking at the drop sheet.