• Hail Guest!
    We're looking for Community Content Contribuitors to Stratics. If you would like to write articles, fan fiction, do guild or shard event recaps, it's simple. Find out how in this thread: Community Contributions
  • Greetings Guest, Having Login Issues? Check this thread!
  • Hail Guest!,
    Please take a moment to read this post reminding you all of the importance of Account Security.
  • Hail Guest!
    Please read the new announcement concerning the upcoming addition to Stratics. You can find the announcement Here!

[Imbuing] Can Imbuing be used to modify Random Loot Items' properties ?

popps

Always Present
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
I am back after several Years of not playing so, I am not sure how things work in UO now...

I am particularly having trouble in being able to tell apart bad from good items since the Random Loot comes in way too many different flavours and varieties to be able to tell apart the good ones from the bad ones....

I have been reading here Loot Generation – Ultima Online and here Item Properties - UOGuide, the Ultima Online Encyclopedia but I still feel lost....

What items gotten as Loot are keepers and what are to be unravelled ?

I have seen players wearing Legendary Artifacts items together with Lesser Artifacts items or perhaps even sometimes Major "Magic" Items which, I understand, are a step "below" Artifacts...

So, I am having a hard trouble in being able to "tell apart" the good from the bad....

If Imbuing could "modify" item properties then, depending on what one needs, one could keep items which could easily be modified through imbuing (perhaps removing penalties to those items ?), but is this possible?

Anyone can point me to a good, current item Guide that teaches what items are generally "keepers" and what items are to be unravelled ?

Thanks !
 

Petra Fyde

Peerless Chatterbox
Alumni
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
I've been playing almost 19 years non stop and still haven't worked out what's good loot. However on the imbuing front, you can add and adjust some things, provided your plan is within the limits of what is allowed in the item weight, item type and number of properties. Example, if an item has 5 dci, if there's room in the weight, you might imbue that up to 15 dci. If it has a 'hit spell' effect, maybe harm, you could overwrite that with another hit spell, maybe hit lightning. If it is a ring or bracelet and has + skill you can add to the number, or replace with another skill in the same group.

You might get a better idea by reading here: Imbuing – Ultima Online
 

Xris

Lore Master
Stratics Veteran
UNLEASHED
I'll give a quick synopsis hope it helps:

When looting you want to think of a few things; is this good for a pvp or pvm setup? Is this enhancable? What temp could this fit?

Pvp jewelry: melee (the more mods the better). Antique is less desirable but can still be worth a lot.
15+ HCI/DCI
+15 (or more) in desirable skills
Damage inc
Fc/fcr
Ssi
Enhance potions (this increases value by a lot after 20-25%)
+8 (or more) stats (int dex str)
{things like lmc lrc and regens are less desirable}

Pvp caster:
Fc/fcr
DCI (sometimes HCI for hybrid Temps)
EP (again increases value by a lot)
+15 or more in desirable skills
Spell damage inc (12 or more)
+8 or more stats (int str, sometimes dex)

Pvm jewelry is generally the same but EP isn't needed as much, and things like lmc lrc can increase value.

Armor you want high stats (int dex str mana, stamina, and HP)
Generally you want close to caps as possible. HP, str, dex and Stam seems to be more desirable.
You want +12 or more in eaters.
Decent resists.
Things like 5 HCI DCI are desirable.
High lmc and lrc can be desirable as well.
Reflect dmg can be valuable to the right person.

When looking at an item think: what temp could this be good for? What's the intensity of this item?

This is a basic guide I'm sure I missed a lot. Hope it helps


Sent from my moto g(6) play using Tapatalk
 

Basara

UO Forum Moderator
Moderator
Professional
Governor
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
Wiki Moderator
UNLEASHED
Campaign Supporter
Overall items: Weapons, armor or shields with Massive or Heavy negative properties (one requires 125 STR, that can't be reduced by enhancement, and the other has the item weigh 50 stones) are often killers for the value of the items. However, they are great for unraveling for materials and gains.

Prized, all it does is prevent Blessed status and increased insurance.

Items that are imbued are effectively "Brittle" from that point, so anyone acting "Brittle" is a value killer, while wearing imbued non-jewelry items, is being hypocritical (or an ID-10-T).

Cursed items aren't that popular, from the inability to insure or bless.

However, if you're on Siege Perilous, Cursed and Prized means nothing unless it's the character's BEST item, as they'd use their ONE Bless on one other piece of gear, and none of the rest would be blessable (and insurance doesn't exist there)

Antiques take absurd amounts of damage when they get hit, and can't be imbued, or enhanced. Some jewelry (or shields in the hands of non-parry characters) might be useful, but will require a lot more repairs. You can get a few months to a year or two from those - armor and weapons might not last a month or two. I still don't really understand how powdering's odd limits on Antique work, and since you can't powder Jewelry, the point is moot for the 1 or 2 antique items I have.



And, Xris missed Shields....

With Shields: All the bonuses are desirable with the possible exception of Reflect Physical (Some like it, some hate it - especially in relation to PvP).

100 Luck (before enhancement) as loot and SSI (on shields for melee types) are especially good bonuses. Some of the lower-level ones have room for imbuing, but the high-end ones are best just enhanced, or just left alone.

Wooden shields are often better than metal ones, as the woods for enhancing for carpentry differ between armor and shields. Bloodwood adds 40 luck AND can add HP Regen 2 to a shield with no regen, or raise HPR 1 to HPR 2 (though it will drop higher amounts to 2 - known bug). Enhancing 100 luck shields (wood or metal) succeeds far more often than enhancing armor, because it starts with 1 point in one resist - and wooden shields only get 1 resist increase check instead of 5 for enhancing with gold.

For those that have Parry skill, regular and Prized shields are the most desired. Brittle is a little shorter lived, because of the inability to powder, but can last years (let it get down to 20 or so, repair and lose 1 durability, and you can get 200+ repairs - and I doubt repairs would need to be done more than a couple weeks). Dirty Secret - Once an item drops about 30 points from its current max durability, it reaches 100% chance of the loss of 1 from max durability.

Without parry, ANY shield is fair game, especially for elves. Only Humans with the phantom 20 Parry from JOAT will EVER take damage in combat to their shield, and environmental damage is relatively rare. I've been using a legendary artifact Brittle wooden shield on my Tamer/Bard for almost 3 years, and last I checked, it had dropped from 255 to 236 in that time. An antique shield would have dropped to the low 100s in the same time. However, repairing antique (as opposed to powdering) works like repairing any other thing.
 

Mayhem_wushu

Adventurer
Overall items: Weapons, armor or shields with Massive or Heavy negative properties (one requires 125 STR, that can't be reduced by enhancement, and the other has the item weigh 50 stones) are often killers for the value of the items. However, they are great for unraveling for materials and gains.

Prized, all it does is prevent Blessed status and increased insurance.

Items that are imbued are effectively "Brittle" from that point, so anyone acting "Brittle" is a value killer, while wearing imbued non-jewelry items, is being hypocritical (or an ID-10-T).

Cursed items aren't that popular, from the inability to insure or bless.

However, if you're on Siege Perilous, Cursed and Prized means nothing unless it's the character's BEST item, as they'd use their ONE Bless on one other piece of gear, and none of the rest would be blessable (and insurance doesn't exist there)

Antiques take absurd amounts of damage when they get hit, and can't be imbued, or enhanced. Some jewelry (or shields in the hands of non-parry characters) might be useful, but will require a lot more repairs. You can get a few months to a year or two from those - armor and weapons might not last a month or two. I still don't really understand how powdering's odd limits on Antique work, and since you can't powder Jewelry, the point is moot for the 1 or 2 antique items I have.



And, Xris missed Shields....

With Shields: All the bonuses are desirable with the possible exception of Reflect Physical (Some like it, some hate it - especially in relation to PvP).

100 Luck (before enhancement) as loot and SSI (on shields for melee types) are especially good bonuses. Some of the lower-level ones have room for imbuing, but the high-end ones are best just enhanced, or just left alone.

Wooden shields are often better than metal ones, as the woods for enhancing for carpentry differ between armor and shields. Bloodwood adds 40 luck AND can add HP Regen 2 to a shield with no regen, or raise HPR 1 to HPR 2 (though it will drop higher amounts to 2 - known bug). Enhancing 100 luck shields (wood or metal) succeeds far more often than enhancing armor, because it starts with 1 point in one resist - and wooden shields only get 1 resist increase check instead of 5 for enhancing with gold.

For those that have Parry skill, regular and Prized shields are the most desired. Brittle is a little shorter lived, because of the inability to powder, but can last years (let it get down to 20 or so, repair and lose 1 durability, and you can get 200+ repairs - and I doubt repairs would need to be done more than a couple weeks). Dirty Secret - Once an item drops about 30 points from its current max durability, it reaches 100% chance of the loss of 1 from max durability.

Without parry, ANY shield is fair game, especially for elves. Only Humans with the phantom 20 Parry from JOAT will EVER take damage in combat to their shield, and environmental damage is relatively rare. I've been using a legendary artifact Brittle wooden shield on my Tamer/Bard for almost 3 years, and last I checked, it had dropped from 255 to 236 in that time. An antique shield would have dropped to the low 100s in the same time. However, repairing antique (as opposed to powdering) works like repairing any other thing.
I have played for almost 13 years actively, one thing I have never understood about parry on a humans joat, is the 20 skill inherent even if i get say 0.1 real skill? I only play elves and gargs so no real world exp. any knowledge if it would override the 20 joat to buy 0.1 parry?
 

Basara

UO Forum Moderator
Moderator
Professional
Governor
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
Wiki Moderator
UNLEASHED
Campaign Supporter
No, it's real skill or 20, whichever is Higher, for JOAT. It's one of the reasons why many of my human characters do the Spellweaving quest, so that they can cast Gift of Renewal, Arcane Circle and Nature's Fury as a caster with 20 skill - and they can circle with any number of other characters with no skill (even if they didn't do the quest).

There were a lot of STUPID changes made around 2010, after Draconi's departure, though. Things that were intentional (And stated so under Draconi) were then declared to have been "unintentional bugs" and nerfed, ranging from the extra ingot per item from salvage bags, to Human JOAT counting toward the special move LMC.
 
Top