Spotting for a good Greater Dragon : Order of importance ?

[popps]

I know there is many posts about what are the stats ranges for Greater Dragons but so far, I have not found it said anywhere what should a tamer look for first.

That is, since it is very difficult to find the best Greater Dragon with all stats maxed out, is there an order of importance of which stats should be the most important to look for ?

Hit Points, Stamina or Mana ?

And which resistances are a must to have as close as possible to maxed out ? Physical? Fire ? Cold ? Poison or Energy ?

What are the skills which a Greater Dragon should better excel in ? Wrestling ? Tactics ? Magic Resistance ? Anatomy ? Poisoning ? Magery ? Evaluating Intelligence ? Meditation ?

Thanks.

By the way, when trying to Lead Tame one alone (no honor nor peacemaking), how does one get its health to drop if they dispel Energey Vortexes right away ?

 

[EnigmaMaitreya]

I have seen Archers with (presumably) the correct Slayer weapon, take a Greater Dragons health down fairly ..... efficiently.

Other than that, Another Greater Dragon and a lot of Vetting/Greater Healing works.

It is my opinion, that taking the GD down in health just makes it harder to tame. Harder as in more dangerous. They seem to teleport a lot more when low on health.

What I have done in the past is to Lure the GD to were I want it. Go to the stables and get the killer pet. Come back (Trammel side) and knock the Greater down. Go back to the stable, stable the killer pet. Go back and try to tame the Greater.

Just be careful ... as I said, my opinion, that Greater is far more likely to kill you now than when it was at full health.

It is also my opinion, that the Great Greater Dragons of Old are pretty darn near Mythic/Fabled etc, unless your into some serious turning them over. If your Solo then that is one tough nut to crack.

I look for HP, STR, PhyRes, FireRes, EnergyResists, the rest, Wrestling, Tactics, Magery.

Order of Priority, Resists then Stats, then Skills.

 

[Pindershot]

It is my experience that a pet's resists are the most important thing, but that may be because it's the only thing I can directly observe.

If the resists are lower, I have to vet more.

When skills are lower, I don't see the difference that much.

 

[Vantobia]

Not trying to hijack your thread mate, but its pretty much similar to what your asking.

After looking through the destard bunch in fel/tram for a good few hours. It seemed to me that it was always either low hp good resists and decent stats OR high hp and ****ty resists lowish stats (but yeah this was only over a few hours searching).

Until i lored one that had about 64% total hp possible, good str decent intel but low dex (like 50% total dex possible) BUT over 90% possible for each resist!

I tamed it thinking that a loss to HP and dex would not be a huge thing.

What does everyone else think ? Would about 650 hp be too low for a greater to be effective in pvm ? Keeping in mind it has good stats (minus the dex) and good resists ?

 

[GreywolfUK]

Main thing for me with any pet let alone a Greater, is pre tame hits & its resists are the main things I look at, also mana but not very important, If a greater has over 1600 hits pre tame, and about 90% of max resists then I will tame it, if not, I either move on or kill it.

For GD's and Cu's I prefer just to use honor now, getting old, and slowing down these days, thats if I have enough honor, plus saves a lot of hassle and insurance, if not then I would just lead tame at full hits, hate redlining pets.

I have always thought if your going to lead tame do it with full hits, dont be a wimp and redline it , sure you usually get a few deathrobes, but that all part of taming.

 

[EnigmaMaitreya]

Not trying to hijack your thread mate, but its pretty much similar to what your asking.

After looking through the destard bunch in fel/tram for a good few hours. It seemed to me that it was always either low hp good resists and decent stats OR high hp and ****ty resists lowish stats (but yeah this was only over a few hours searching).

Until i lored one that had about 64% total hp possible, good str decent intel but low dex (like 50% total dex possible) BUT over 90% possible for each resist!

I tamed it thinking that a loss to HP and dex would not be a huge thing.

What does everyone else think ? Would about 650 hp be too low for a greater to be effective in pvm ? Keeping in mind it has good stats (minus the dex) and good resists ?

This is a tough call no matter how you slice it.

The damage done by the GD's Fire breath is related to the GD's Hit Points. So you have given up some damage and you have given up some of the Buffer (Hit Points).

Fundamentally the question is how important is, oh say, giving up 20% on lets say the Physical Resists vs oh say 300+ Hit Points and what lets say 30% (just assuming a 0 to 100 scale of 0 hps to 1000 hps) of the Fire Breath Attack.

The previous poster suggested an 800HP (After Tame) *Squirms*

Me personally anymore and 849 and lower I would not tame it unless it was by request.

850 to 874 is a Grey zone more dictated by how I feel than anything realistic.

875+ and it is going to need 80+PhyRes, 85+ Fire and Energy Resists, it is going to need 140+ Wrestling, 120+ Tactics, (Post Tame) 110 Magery, Str 620+

But then I have 4 (2 each account) Greaters that .... probably .... more than likely I will never see an upgrade for. So far it has been 6 months, twice daily, 7 days a week, of checking Greaters, Fel, Tram, Ilsh, since I last upgraded a Greater Dragon.

One of the Measures I use, *Caugh*, Post tame and fully trained, is the Barding Difficulty, that just keeps seeming to be a pretty darn good indicator to a pets value from a generalized perspective.

 

[Farsight]

For me, a lot of the stats are mandatory.

If it has less than 880 hit points, I will likely not touch it.

If it has less than 80 physical and 85 fire resist, I will likely not touch it.

If it has less than 130 wrestling pre-taming, I won't touch it.

There are exceptions to all those rules. For example, my current dragon project will have more than 120 resist spells when I'm done with it, but about 113 wrestling, but fits the rest of my criteria. I tamed it for a specific purpose...

 

[Turdnugget]

I definately think post-tame trainable wrestling is very important... i've got a GD with great resists, mediocre HPs and less than good wrestling/tactics...tried soloing Baracoon with it... dang GD couldn't hit the broadside of a barn.

 

[RichDC]

I would also rank Magery as quite an important skill, they heal more of there own hp with high magery, meaning in a tight spot they stay alive longer.

I personally agree with people that Hp str int resist skills.

I pretty much lucked out early in taming and got a 900+hp 600+int high resist(think about 80's in the top3) 126wrestle 121tactics 120.ish magic resist but (this is what i will find at a later date) 105magery.
Hes an incredible tank, solo grizz...Pfft, 2man trav...Pfft, 2man mel...Pfft, 2man shim...little less of a Pfft but Pfft.

Agree with most I would say its all about resist and HP +wrestle and tactics.(mana is next)

 

[Mark Trail]

It's hard to check out everything about the dragon while you're struggling to stay alive before taming it. The barding difficulty is one number that sums up its quality. Difficulty 148 and up is a keeper for me. It includes stats, resists, and skills in one number that is fast and easy to get.

 

[Grimm_of_Oceania]

Long time tamer, first time greater.

I just tamed my first greater after removing my finger from the proverbial.

The stats your talking about 850-900 health, are these pre or post tame.

I honored and tamed so quickly I forgot to lore this thing before I tamed it. Upon getting back to luna I lore'd it only to find 787 health, 612 str, 65!! dex, 6xx int. Resists high 60's top at about 83, 101 post tame magery 43 eval and med.

My new gd appears to be a dud. I am going to bond it anyways as it is my first but if you all say I can do much better this, will be back regularly till I find one.

 

[Farsight]

For the post tame maxes for skills, multiply the pre-tame by 0.9.

For the post time max for hit points, divide the pre-tame hit points by 2. So less than 1750 hit points is a dud by my standards. Most people look for 1800+.

The resists remain the same pre and post tame.

So when I look for the perfect greater dragon, I want the skills I'm looking for to be more than 130 (117 post tame max).

And yes, you can do much better. (and don't worry about dex, it'll max at 125 anyway)