[Treasure Hunting] Adding GM mining to a complete char template.

[Ozzmandias]

Hi All

So I have a dilemma that I'm sure many of you are in right now, and many more will be in come the 30 day map change.

My Thunter is a Provo Disco hunter, which means he is rather good at soloing maps. Trouble is, it uses lots of points:

120 Mage
120 Medi
120 Music
120 Disco
120 Provo
GM Lockpick

=700 points

Stoned Carto

So yes, all those 'true' Thunters with detect hidden and remove traps etc may scoff, but y'know, it's a fun char to play.

So the trouble? Where am I gonna shoehorn GM Mining into that?

Well I have 20 points spare, so I need 80 points. Also, I am wearing the Novo Bleue Luck jewels so at the cost of some luck (and it only affects the guardain loot anyway) I'm planning:

15 Medi 15 Music on both jewels = 60 skill points.

Where to find 20 more? Well, my current set sees me using a 10Medi / 10 Magery Scrappers in hand rather then the 140luck + SC FC weapon I was using. But since I have no Eval Int, the SDI is kind of a waste.

So... My solution and question...

Fishing Poles!

Yeah baby, two combined skills, could easily be 12 or so even with a Yew saw, plus if made with frostwood it'd be Spell Channel, and could also fairly easily have FCR, LRC, or LMC too.

Yay, fully awesome.

Trouble is... FISHING POLES!

Has anyone else noticed an EXTREME skill bias on these things? I made 300 on TC and NOT ONE had magery, provo, or music!

a HUGE majority had parrying, with far too many of the rest having Stealing, Stealth, Bushido, Mysticism or Veterinary.

Disco was quite common too, and I *Could* use it, but, please don't make me wipe 120 Disco!

Also, I've seen some worrying posts from the end of last year suggesting that they break! BREAK! If I use the tonne of saw charges that it would need to get the right mods, I DONT WANT IT TO BREAK!

Sooo, I'm interested in you thoughts, has anyone broken a fishing pole recently, and for those making them, have you noticed a serious bias in which skills are more common?

Cheers!

Oz

 

[Old Man of UO]

Mining is a waste of 100 skill points. You don't need it.

You are better off taking the time learning to read map details, and using those 100 skill points for the cartography that you stoned or another offensive skill.

 

[Basara]

Depending on your suit, Med may not be needed either.

 

[Silverbird]

You could have a look at http://vboards.stratics.com/uhall/218158-question-about-fishing-pole-5-skills.html . Even if its not officially confirmed, I assume that not all skills are available on fishing poles. (Probably mainly to avoid skills, that would be fully useless when wielding a fishing pole like, sowrds, tactics, archery etc. With skills sorted in groups taht leaves out some of the interesting skills like magery, music and others. )
With latest changes to soulstones you simply could add mining into your 'skill-swapping-rotation'. Like stoning cartho/mining/lockpicking. Once the chest is digged out you could stone of mining and add in lockpicking.

 

[convas]

The Song Woven Mantle adds 10 points to musicianship and also to luck which you seem to like, provided you are an elf I also think that there is no need for mediation however, just get 40lmc and as much mr as possible. About mining, I haven't tried it on my t-hunter yet, but I am having an awefully hard time digging out the chest without it. It's easy to see where it is approximately but I have spent hours and hours covering large areas without success... I don't understand why

 

[weins201]

Humm a few choices there .....

With a nice suit you can definatly do away with meditation.

But i have amost the exact same template and dont use the disco

It may take a little longer to kill them off but the ability to cast alot of spells faster is a benefit. :gun:

 

[LeBaiton]

I've removed GM Meditation with GM Mining and don't really miss it. My suit doesn't really have a lot of Mana Regeneration, but I'm using a Tamer/T-Hunting template where my Greater Dragon is the one fighting the baddies...

I usually only have to vet my pet, unless there's a necro caster amongst the horde of guardians. If there are necro casters I usually stand back casting Greater Heals with my existing mana pool and try to get my dragon to kill those first, then I move in to heal with bandages...

It can get hairy, but so far I've only had my pet die on me twice in about a hundred maps I've done, and they were mostly high end maps...

Then again, I've heard that several people are having great success digging up maps with less than GM Mining. You might want to consider just leaving Mining at 60 or 70 and go with that. All GM does is add a few extra tiles. If you get better at 'guessing' where the chest would be on the new random maps, you'll notice you'll get better at it. I often end up standing but a few tiles from it on the first or second try, even stood on top of it once on the first go

 

[Mandrake of DF]

120 Mage
120 Medi
120 Music
120 Disco
120 Provo
GM Lockpick

=700 points

Id stone the Disco, and invest in a leet mage suit thats imbued - or at least imbue the parts U dont need for skill raise. My mage and tamer has each suit with max resist, 40 lmc, 100 lrc, total of 19 mr (with tangle) and some more mods. That makes medi useless.

120 Mage
120 Music
120 Provo
GM Lockpick
GM Carto
GM Mining

= 660 skills

You still got room for to put in some eval, and add on eval on jewels and from a scrapper - and u get to GM at least (if you have 720 skill points).