Old Vet with some new Questions

[KageEBK]

Hello everyone,

I’m an old vet returning to the game after a long absence, and holy crap have things changed. I played from 97-2001, and then briefly tried getting back into it around 2004, but ultimately stopped playing. I just reactivated my accounts a week ago and was pleased to find my old characters and items and what not, even though all my Towers fell. rolleyes:

Since coming back there has been a big learning curve while I try to figure out new systems and I don’t have even a fraction of the infrastructure I used to play with (limitless resources, friends, etc). I have a list of questions I was hoping someone could provide some feedback on as I’ve tried to speak to random people on my server (Napa Valley) and I’m ignored.

Is there any way to turn a Red Character Blue other than macroing forever? My friend reactivated his account to and 3 of his chars are red with 20+ kills. It’s going to be weeks before he can even really play with me in dungeons (except Fel, which is only frustrating because you can’t recall in/out anymore). Back when factions out you could get a reprieve… is there anyway to do that nowadays?

Is there any point to farming magic items anymore? Can you find things that are better than what can be made with imbuing? I’ve picked up imbuing and it seems like a really cool skill although I have many frustrations with it. One issue I have is I can’t help but feel that looting monsters in hopes of finding a cool item is fruitless… especially when I can make one with specific enhancements I like.

Does 100 Anatomy + 100 Eval still equal 100 wrestling?
When carrying a spellbook, is wrestling checked in combat?
What happened to the mining system? Back in the day I had runes to different color veins and now my runes seem worthless as veins seem to give random ore. Case in point: The spot right outside my house can spawn shadow,dull, and reg copper, but only one at a time. How the hell am I supposed to find gold ore?

Gargoyles… can they wear helmets or gloves? My friend is trying to make a ninja gargoyle and I crafted some armor for him but for the gargoyles there’s no gloves or cap… what’s the deal?

Where are popular vendor locations? I realize every shard is different, but on all there are a few locations where you can pretty much always find player vendors. On Napa, the only spot I can seem to find is around Luna. Any other areas you can think of?

Has anything major changed with Champion spawns? I want to get 2-3 friends together to try this as we used to get close to doing it ourselves a long time ago. Have they increased/decreased the difficulty?

Are there any new apps that are “must have”? I have UOA and UO Automap – even though automap doesn’t seem to work.

Have most people switched to the new client? What are the pros/cons? Back in the day I know the new client was pretty much a running joke, but I guess they’ve made a lot of improvements. My friend uses it while I use the old one and we’ve run into a number of differences.

Where is the best place to farm gold and magic items? I’m currently doing blood eles and Elder gazers (which still seem effective 10 years later… lol), but I feel like there’s probably better spots these days. I have the Samurai and Abyss expansions.


What would you advise 3 friends who all have high level characters but are completely foreign to the last 7-10 years of UO to do since coming back?

My current plans are to get us re-established here on Napa, then using our server as an ideal place to farm without being harassed we use Napa as a training ground to get better top end items (powerscrolls, artifact drops, etc.) and then move over to another more populated server (like Atlantic) so that when we enter the shard we come with the thunder and death follows in our wake. :gun:

I appreciate any help someone could give me. It's good to be back!

 

[UO Relic]

hehe lots of ?'s here will try my best.

Red to Blue - nope still need to be in game to let the hours tick by.

Farming - imbuing (still learning this myself but even if your not going to imbue those nice items, u can unravel them for the Ing. u need for imbuing)

Mining - yes ore randomly spawns now and a spot can randomly change once you have finished mining it. If your account is old enough you can get an ore cart that will randomly spawn some ore every day, or else you frustrate yourself mining for hours (most people just buy from other player vendors nowadays, EA has killed this skill)

Garg's - have different slots for armour in some instances, earrings replace helmets, forget gloves trade off . .

Luna main player vendor area's, some shards might have other small communities but thats hit and miss as they come and go

Champ spawns - they have increased difficulty of champ but can still be done with 3 good people (depending on spawn)

New apps - check main forum at top and you should find uo-cartographer, people are trying it out as a replacement for UOAM

Spots to farm - people seem to freq. Swoop in twisted Weald, Navrey in Abyss, know some do Melisande (peerless boss), lots of others but those 1's I can think of right away

What to do after a major leave and coming back - probably find a good guild to join so you have people that can show you the new areas, explain new skills and just generally help you out

 

[KageEBK]

Thanks for the information.

On my server the only ingots I can find are 550,000 for 5k. Friggin ridiculous. I remember arguing with a guy back in the day between 50gp and 60gp a peice. Now their around 1000... lol.

For imbuing, I do extract the magical residue, but that's all I can find to do with magical items these days. I remember killing things and hoping for an awesome peice of armor or weapon... is that just totally unfeasible these days? My 80 imbueing has already seemed to make my 115 smithing and 115 tailoring obsolete (Since I can imbue items better than I can craft them), so I'm curious if looting monsters for items is obsolete as well?

Thanks again for the info.

Heh, I'd love to find a guild on Napa... but in order for a guild there has to be people.

 

[Basara]

Is there any point to farming magic items anymore?

Yes and no - You can make better items with imbuing, and you need to unravel really high end items to get relic fragments (something you'll need to be much higher imbuing to do.

But, the idea that Tailoring and Smithing are obselete are about as far from the truth as you can possibly get.

You CANNOT make items with Imbuing that are as good as the theoretical best one can make with the crafting skills. Simply, the way the Imbuing weight system for properties works, means that you can't make most items with 100% intensity in all 5 properties, while any crafting tool can make all properties it gives at 100%. Note - the tailor and smith runics were given a MAJOR low-end boost, and the caps on max intensity that were lower than 100% were removed 2+ years ago, so even a DC hammer can make a nice weapon suitable for imbuing. (2 properties, + DI as a 3rd property).
elemental damage no longer counts as a property (but can occur in addition to those rolled).
Arms Lore now adds +1% DI/+1 extra random resist per 20 skill, on top of the existing exceptional bonus (but only to exceptional items).

End Result: with a verite or valorite hammer, or barbed kit, you can easily get 6 properties with combined intensities of 500+, with a weight of 600%+, when Imbuing stops at 500% weight. The difference is that you don't always get the exact properties you need with crafting, and you can't POF imbued items.

A good comparison might be on a piece of armor. Say, you want something with 2 runic properties at max, and max resists from the other 3 runic properties.

An imbued item will probably end up with about 60 total resist points and the two properties, as you lose any material properties and exceptional/arms lore resist bonuses when you imbue the resists (it uses the non-exceptional leather value as base). Plus, the weights of the two other properties would be likely to keep you from going 100% intensity on the imbued resists.

Theoretically, with a barbed runic, one could get an item with the two properties, plus 83 resists (15 base, + 6 exceptional, +5 Arms Lore exceptional bonus for GM, +12 for barbed leather, + 45 for 3 resist properties at max). IT would take many more attempts, but most items crafted with the first two properties would still have more resists at MINIMUM intensity for the resists, than the imbued item.

Does 100 Anatomy + 100 Eval still equal 100 wrestling?
When carrying a spellbook, is wrestling checked in combat?

It's actually (Anatomy + Eval -20)/2, if I remember correctly, so one would have to be 120, or both at 110, but yes, that still is the case. Not sure on the wrestling, since I've never used the skill.

What happened to the mining system? Back in the day I had runes to different color veins and now my runes seem worthless as veins seem to give random ore. Case in point: The spot right outside my house can spawn shadow,dull, and reg copper, but only one at a time. How the hell am I supposed to find gold ore

You find Gold ore, by mining. The ores were originally meant to randomize, but they didn't activate the system for almost 7 years after the colored ores were implemented (the ore system being static just fed the scriptors for both ingot-sellers AND those abusing the Britain Library collection system). You need to get Prospector's tools and Gargoyle Pickaxes for your miner, then just start mining down a mountainside, or every spot in a cave. The instructions on how to use the above tools can be found in my FAQs in the Craftsman forum. Also, Acquire a Fire Beetle. These can be used to smelt your ore in the field, so you only have to carry ingots, and not have to risk packies on the trip (now that humans get a carry bonus, and character packs hold 550 stones, not 400, you can sometimes bring back 5000 ingots a trip - more if you send iron ingots to the bank with a bag of sending once they get to 1000+)

If you can kill the ore elementals from the Gargoyle pickaxes, you'll get 25 colored ore plus what the pick gives. The eles drop REAL quick with an earth elemental slayer (as minor slayers now do TRIPLE damage, with super slayers doing only double damage). Dull Copper, Shadow & copper spots, combined with use of both a PT & a GPA, become copper, bronze and gold spots temporarily - and will eventually respawn as something else. My miner will go out with 1 sturdy shovel (200 uses), 8 gargoyle pickaxes, and 1 prospector's tool, and typically come back with 1200-1600 iron ingots, 500-700 each DC, Shadow, Bronze & Gold, and 100-300 of copper and the 3 top ingot types each (if something would give copper, I either advance it to bronze or gold, if possible, or switch to a normal tool to drop it back to Shadow or DC - I just don't need much copper, and hate copper elementals).

One thing to use those old mining books for... Go to the spots with a normal tool and a prospector's tool. Use the PT on the spots, to insure that they are giving colored ore. Make several trips through each book, recording the ratio of iron to colored ore. Contrary to what the current batch of Devs think, each resource square is hard-coded with a quality percentage, meaning that if a resource square normally gives crappy colored ore ratios (say, 1 in 4 is colored), it will do that no matter what the colored ore type is (if it's currently an iron spot, if you elevate the spot with a PT or gargoyle pickaxe, the percentage chance once again applies). The same will hold true of the spot routinely gives more colored than iron each trip. The spots that give 2/1 or better colored should be moved over to a new book for mining trips, as you will always get good amounts from them, and eventually those spots WILL give all possible types, with or without the manipulation of the mining tools.

Gargoyles… can they wear helmets or gloves? My friend is trying to make a ninja gargoyle and I crafted some armor for him but for the gargoyles there’s no gloves or cap… what’s the deal?

There are special jewelry types that function AS those equivalent armor types for Gargoyles. Those are best Imbued or found as loot, since they are tinkered items, and tinkers do not yet have runics.

Vendors: Tokuno's city Zento, and the Yew & Britain moongate areas are probably the best bets for vendors not in Luna or in player-run communities (which are now coming back with the new EM system).

Has anything major changed with Champion spawns? I want to get 2-3 friends together to try this as we used to get close to doing it ourselves a long time ago. Have they increased/decreased the difficulty?

The Bosses had their HPs upped by a factor of 3 or so, a few years ago, but are about the same otherwise.
The individual spawn has no changes in TYPE, but a number of the undead spawn types now cast Necromantic spells, making a Neira spawn MUCH harder.
There are also replicas and rare loot that can drop in packs or be found as loot (varies by type), from the champs. Most of the replicas are of old EM items from before 2003, that were originally one-of-a-kind, but got duped into oblivion. You have to kill a certain percentage of spawn and get some credit on the champ, to have a chance to receive the drop.

The spawn creatures can now (1 chance in 400) have a Scroll of Transcendency drop, that can give free points to their skill type. The value on these is 0.6 to 1.0 in Fel (and take the place of half of the old 105 PS drops), 0.1 to 0.5 at spawns elsewhere. For those hard to raise skills like the bard skills and taming, these can be worth farming for, even if you never fight the champ.

Note also for Fel dungeon champs, that fighting in ANY of the classic (original, anti-virtue) dungeons in either Fel or Tram, there is a point system where 7 of the 8 pieces of a blessed, all-70s, suit (the 8th is from a quest that starts in Trinsic and Magincia) and a number of other artifacts, can drop from fighting any of the creatures in the dungeon. If you're newly returned, some of these could be quite useful (like the luck statue that gives you 200 + 50 times your character's age in years as a 1-hour luck bonus, once every 24 hours).

Are there any new apps that are “must have”? I have UOA and UO Automap – even though automap doesn’t seem to work.
Have most people switched to the new client? What are the pros/cons? Back in the day I know the new client was pretty much a running joke, but I guess they’ve made a lot of improvements. My friend uses it while I use the old one and we’ve run into a number of differences.

Automap stopped being supported by its maker 5 years ago. Go for UOCartographer.

Note that the "new client" now is actually the THIRD new client. The old 3D was put down like the rabid animal it was, in 2007 (though some people strangely liked it). Then came Kingdom Reborn, which was pretty, but a resource hog, and was also forced into a premature release (when it should have been still in closed Beta), because EA Japan promised it to be on store shelves by the end of June 2007, and would have lost face (And lots of money) if they postponed the release. The Stygian Abyss Enhanced Client replaced KR back in September, and is a lot better than KR in performance, but with reduced art, in comparison. There are a number of people with really good machines that want the KR art back in the SA EC. OF course, UOAssist doesn't work with the new client, as it's so different.

To use UOCartographer with 2D (now called the classic client), you have to run UOAssist (even if only the expired trial version). To run UOC with the Enhanced Client, you need a plug-in found in most of the packages of custom User Interfaces (see the Enhanced Client forum for information on those. If you like the new client, you'll like it even better with a custom UI).

There are things you can do in each client, that you can't do in the other, and it is primarily familiarity and those exceptions that keeps about 80-90% of the players playing the 2D client at least part of the time. Even most people that play the EC will still use the 2D client for some chores.

Where is the best place to farm gold and magic items?
What would you advise 3 friends who all have high level characters but are completely foreign to the last 7-10 years of UO to do since coming back?

Yeah, Shame is probably still a good bet for finding gold and items, plus those artifact/armor drops I mentioned before. Swoop is good, if no one is farming it, as is Miasma (both are in Mondain's legacy areas - swoop requires doing a quest for a guy in Heartwood, to enter, and its entrance is in the old mushroom cave at Spirituality, Ilshenar. Miasma is in the Minotaur Labyrinth on the Island in between the two continents in Malas - have to use a teleporter or marked rune to get there).

For 3 experienced characters, you might want to try your luck collecting keys for the Dreadhorn Peerless, in the same area as Swoop. You go through the desert, and the changelings are a pain in the butt - then you run into the Named Creature stuff that has 4 of the 6 keys in the back end of the desert, and the swamp. Look up guides for getting into the peerless - frankly, the Dreadhorn is less a danger than the named changelings and spiders you have to kill for those keys (and their siblings that don't have keys, but are even tougher). They do have LOTs of gold, minor artifact drops, and occasionally pieces of special armor suits in their loot (as well as high-end loot items), so they are definitly worth the effort once you can handle yourself there.