Soulshard + Build Questions

[Bamboozle]

I have just returned to UO after a 10 year layoff and am getting back into the game.

I have 2 soulshard tokens. I am told that these are the best kind to use.

I have 3 main character that I want to reorganize their skills, and I need some help/advice on:

1. How to use a soulshard and any pitfalls to watch out for. They are expensive and I dont want to waste them!

2. Several different builds and what skills to put where.

a. Character #1 - He will be my main mule. He allready is a GM Blacksmith and I have a +20 BS power scroll for him. I plan on transferring the GM mining skill to him, and adding in Tailoring/Tinkering/Arms Lore.

Thats 520 points right there, or even 540 if I can do a +20 tailoring. What else do I need? I will need at least 50ish magery for recalls, unless I want to use scrolls. He allready has....90 or so fishing. Is that worth keeping? What else should I spend skills points on for this guy.

b. Character #2 - 5X (?) GM old school mage. Magery/Meditation/Eval Int/Tactics at 100, and something else. Resist Spells at 80ish, and a ton of crap at 20-60.
Im planning on getting inscription for him. What else do I need to do in order to make him an IDEAL PvP mage. This will be my main kick your ass if you look at me the wrong way guy that I will be playing 99% of the time while I am in game unless Im crafting.

c. Character #3 - GM Miner. Gonna transfer that to character #1 (the mule), which will leave this guy basically worthless. I planned on making this guy a melee PvPer of some sorts. He has 90ish swords 90ish tactics, and will maybe transfer Balthazars 97 mace fighting skill to him. Suggestions for a Melee build?

Thanks in advance!

 

[Cyrah]

I am just useless at building templates but I welcome you back! On the soulstones they only hold one skill. My friend flushed out gm poisoning when he first used one. Thinking they held more than one skill.

Also I would keep them in a bank not locked in a house. Just in case the house falls. Use them in a safe log out spot, like your home or an Inn.

There are players who post heer that are very helpful. They are probably at work now.

 

[Basara]

I can't help with the PvP types (being a PvM player), but for the crafter, here's what to do....

Tailoring
Blacksmithing
Tinkering
Mining
Arms Lore
Carpentry
Magery (60 magery at 700 skill cap)

Check your account age (click the profile scroll to the far left of your paperdoll's feet in 2D). It's typically your actual months played while a paid account, +2; but accounts your age, since you reactivated an ancient one, were also potentially recipients of a goof where the original game didn't specify the account had to be active to age. So, you may have as much as an extra year or so added on, beyond those you actually played.

Accounts that are 12 months or more get a +5 to their total skill cap (705 instead of 700)
that becomes 710 at 24 months, 715 at 36, and 720 at 48 and greater (where the bonus stops)
Note that this limit is for real skill only. Stats no longer effect skills, and equipment with skill bonuses can put you over the overall skill cap (but not over each individual skill's cap, with the exception of some mining/smith items)

If you're now reasonably up to date (have access to Tokuno facet), go there with one of your combat capable characters and do the Treasures of Tokuno PvM event.

Get 10 of the ToT minors (other than the mempo - that is worth a LOT), and go to the Minister of Trade and turn them in for a Tome of Lost Knowledge for your crafter (as it has +15 magery, it will put your crafter to 75 magery, for making stuff that requires it with your carpenter).

Get another 10 items, and get a Rune Beetle Carapace for your mage. Remember that you can insure things on the normal shards these days, so there's less risk of equipment in PvP these days. You'll need to eventally get 120 Powerscrolls for the mage, for Magery & Eval, and those are expensive (around 20 million each, most shards). Note that the ToT minor drop, Gloves of the Sun, are a good complement to the RBC, in that it also has Lower Mana cost, and 18 LRC.

Consider, for non-PvP uses of you mage, getting another 10 ToTs to turn in for Swords of Prosperity. If you retain the Tactics, these will let you attack in melee as if your Magery skill was Swords skill. However, you can't do special moves with them, unless you have Swords skill itself.

Another good ToT item, gained from 10 turn-ins, is the Kasa of the Ra-jin. Very good resists, and SDI for the mage. The down side is that it becomes difficult with the Kasa & and Carapace together, to get 100% LRC (so you don't have to carry reagents) onto your suit, and still have other good bonuses or fill out your resists.

 

[Bamboozle]

On the soulstones they only hold one skill.

I was told that a full soulstone TOKEN holds as many skills as you want?

Is that not correct?

TY for all of the advice everyone!

Looking forward to getting some PvP mage advice too

 

[aarons6]

no the stones hold one skill.. you either have to flush it (erase it to 0) or put it on a junk char to hold for future to use it again.

the advantage of the full stone compared to the fragments is they don't have charges so you can move around skills.. you still have to wait 24 hours tho per skill.

as for your pvp char.. be prepared to spend a fortune on his armor..
a good temp now days is a necro/mage with spell weaving or a wrestle/mage with spell weaving or if you have a ton of gold a parry/wrestle/mage...

 

[Bomb Bloke]

http://www.uoguide.com/Soulstone_Fragment

 

[Harlequin]

Welcome back! Been seeing lots of people coming back recently. If you don't mind my asking, what triggered your desire to play again? Is there a recent advertisement campaign somewhere that people are seeing? Facebook perhaps?



As to your question:

Both soulstone fragments and full soulstones can only hold 1 skill at any point in time. You need to have a char to retrieve the skill from the soulstone first, if you want the soulstone to hold another skill. Or if you don't want the skill at all, you can delete it from the soulstone (this doesn't use up charges if you use a soulstone fragment).

Regarding charges, soulstone fragments can be used a maximum of 5 times (as mentioned flushing unwanted skills do not use up charges). The charge is used only when a stored skill is retrieved from it. Full soulstones can be used an unlimited number of times. Both can only be used once a day.

So to save charges (I'm a miser among other things), my recommendation below requires that you use only 1 charge (to transfer fishing if you want to keep it):


Char 1
120 Smithing
120 Tailoring
100 Carpentry
100 Tinkering
100 Armslore
120 Imbuing (reserve this for this upcoming skill in Stygian Abyss)
60 Magery

If your skill cap is less than 720 points, reduce magery accordingly. Use
+magery items to boost magery when required (spellbooks, rings, bracelets, totems, several artifacts, travesty's mask etc etc, lots of ways). Plus you can use scrolls to cast spells if you can't get magery high enough. You only need high magery for the odd gates (gating nps and unbonded pets) and evs (to get fame) mostly.

Your crafter will be able to make every single add-on available. The only things you can't make are musical instruments. To make those, you need 45 music. You can get to 45 easily using +15 music ring/+15 bracelet/+10 songwoven sleeves/+5 singing axe.

I say transfer fishing to a treasure hunter character (say char 4, make it a tamer too). It's the only way to get white pearls and takes a long time to train.

This crafter can't smelt stuff, to do that, put everything you want to smelt into a salvage bag (slavage bags give better returns) and pass it to char 3.


Char 2
If you plan to train inscription, he'll be your scribe to make your own magical spellbooks. Also take a look at the stickied "Tips" thread and look at the tips there. Should you need a quickstart, there's also a section for powergaming a newbie that explains how to quickly and profitably train several skills in New Haven to 50.


Char 3
Leave mining on him and make this into a dedicated combat miner/lumberjack/resource gatherer (reason is for hunting ore elmentals). Add stealth and hiding to get to dangerous places (eg, going to champion spawns or Destard for hides). Also your smelter.


Other considerations
Does any of your characters have personal bless deeds? These will save you the 600 gp insurance for 1 item whenever you die. I personally prefer using these characters for tasks that will get me killed often (like pvp and hunting). Crafters die less

 

[Podolak]

I can only comment on the crafting template.

Crafter 1:

120 Tailoring
120 Blacksmithy
100 Tinkering
100 Carpentry
100 Fletching
100 Arms Lore
80 Magery

This Character can craft anything in the game (as of now) and can also get bods along with turning in the reset bods. Also, as described use items for the 45 music.

Crafter 2:

120 Tailoring
120 Blacksmithy
100 Mining
100 Alchemy
100 LJ
120 Imbuing (when it comes out)
60 Magery

This character is on a second account. The 120 tailor and smithy are for getting bods. I do a bunch of resets now but he was 120 smithy/tailor was there before resets were available.

 

[Harlequin]

Actually, Podolak's method is better. Put in fletching on char1. Imbuing has no synergy with armslore, but fletching does. Meaning you don't need armslore on a second crafter.

Then make a different crafter for the other skills:
Alchemy,
Cooking,
Inscription (in case you don't intend to keep scribing on your PvP mage. just note that higher magery gives you a better chance to get more properties when scribing spellbooks, and you might not want to spend the money on a 120 magery on a crafter),
Imbuing,
0.1 tailoring to get bods for your main crafter to recycle
30-50ish smithing to get weapon bods for your main crafter to recycle
Magery

 

[Bamboozle]

Wow TY all for the info!

I have a lot of stuff to digest and think about.

What brought me back to UO? I was in between games and trying out a bunch of older games I used to play, and UO was the one that stuck

Any mage PvP templates or suggestions out there? I read a sticky in the spellcaster forum about mage templates but the bulk of it appears to be from 2005. Thats quite an old set of templates to follow without some recent confirmation

Thanks again

 

[Bamboozle]

A few questions after digesting everything.....

What is a BOD? What is a reset?

I moved my mining over to my BS, added the +20 BS scroll, added tailoring and carpentry but havnt leveled them up yet.

Do you really think its most advantageous to separate out your mining/blacksmithing?

Keep in mind I am only using 1 account.

Char 1: BS/miner (as of now)
Char 2: PvP Mage
Char 3: Kris Dexxer for PvP (in the works)
Char 4: Planned on a treasure hunter/fisher.
Char 5: Open...perhaps a 2nd crafter?

 

[Tjalle]

Keep in mind I am only using 1 account.

Char 1: BS/miner (as of now)
Char 2: PvP Mage
Char 3: Kris Dexxer for PvP (in the works)
Char 4: Planned on a treasure hunter/fisher.
Char 5: Open...perhaps a 2nd crafter?

Nowadays you can have up to 7 chars on one account.

The 6th slot came with an expansion and the 7th slot can be bought. Or something like that...

 

[Bamboozle]

Nowadays you can have up to 7 chars on one account.

The 6th slot came with an expansion and the 7th slot can be bought. Or something like that...

Hmm......I upgraded my account with a 9th ann edition update and I still only have 5 as far as I can tell.

Ill have to look into that.

 

[Harlequin]

Hmm......I upgraded my account with a 9th ann edition update and I still only have 5 as far as I can tell.

Ill have to look into that.

BOD is short for Bulk Order Deed. NPC tailors and blacksmiths will offer you a BOD every few hours.

The small BODs will ask for x number of a certain item, from skull caps to barbed leather armour pieces for tailor BODs, or daggers to valorite platemail pieces.

Large BODs will ask for a specific combination of small BODs eg a large bod for valorite platemail will ask for the following 6 small bods - valorite plate helm, gorget, chest, arms, gloves and leggings.

Once you complete the BOD, you return it and will be given a reward that is unique to the BOD system. Including magical runic smith hammers and sewing kits that lets you create your own magical items.

See here for more info:

http://www.uoherald.com/guide/guide.php?guideId=240


6th character slot was included as part of the Mondain's Legacy expansion. 9th anni included ML, so I think you should get the 6th char slot. Just in case something was missed, there are 2 codes in the box, 1 to upgrade your account, 1 to create a new account. You need to logon to your account on the account management page and upgrade your account there. If you have done this and it still does't work, contact billing.