Well, I'll assume if you've clicked this thread you've got a character concept in mind and even if you don't really care about power, you don't want to inconvenience yourself and your friends by having a build that dies all day.

I'll further assume you want to try a general fighting style and have set a character to it, or have a character and have selectad a style that fits it. Either way, he/she is going to have to go out into the field and kill a lot of stuff, or help other to do saidsame, so you might as well be reasonably good at it.

The important thing to remember is that Amia simply isn't very hard. As a bare minimum you merely need something that isn't going to be a burden to your party, although plainly it's better to be an asset. It's unlikely you'll need to break your RP to fit in something useful for your pals.

What follows is just some of my ramblings about each class, centred on my belief that once you have the character personality tied to a fighting style, you should build for your party's benefit in PvM first, and solo/PvP power second. That's just the main focus of the server, although there is undeniably a fair bit of PvP and bossfarming going on at any time of day.

What benefits a party?

1) Unique buffing: 'Unique' since, for example, it's better to havea mage and a Druid than two mages or two Druids; the buffs complement each other.

2) Spawn disabling/anti-buffing: A paralysed, stunned, Feared or prone enemy is one you don't need to worry about, no matter how much of a bad mofo it is. To a lesser extent, one that's badly weakened is wormfood too.

3) All-day damage output: Not just a matter of damage/hit; you need enough AB too. A person doing 40 damage per hit and hitting twice a round is less use than someone doing 30 and hitting thrice.

4) Not dying: Even if you're not damaging heavily or buffing or healing, simply being there at the front line makes safer for everyone else. As a rule of thumb, a single buddy is worth 5AC, two is worth 5-10, three is worth 10-infinite if you get lucky with targetting. Clearly if you die, the ones left will then be in deep trouble.

5) Once/day damage/buff output: For the Boss.


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Barbarian.

1) Unique buffing: Fail
2) Spawn disabling/anti-buffing: Pass Taunt with full ranks will barn-door-ify almost anything by 6AC. The big selling point, though is Terrifying Rage. Although at epic most things are Fear-immune, there's never *nothing* that's Fear-immune. It will shriek and run at the mere sight of a Mythal-boosted Barbarian.
3) All-day damage output: Pass . Nothing amazing, but Rage will last for whole spawns with high CON and by epic Barbarian, you'll have enough for the day's hunting. Without it, you're presumably high-STR so doing solid hurt anyway. Thundering Rage also gives a healthy 1d8 Sonic boost for your weapons. That stacks with Flame Weapon and Darkfire, but not with Deafening Clang.
4) Not dying: Borderline Masses of HP is no match for masses of AC, but if you go for heavy DR and/or buy loads of healing potions, you'll live.
5) Once/day damage/buff output: Fail Fail. Rage is something you use on mobs anyway.

General tips on Anger Mismanagement: It's pretty straightforward stuff for a Barb. You hit things till they die. To be frank they're pretty sub-par until epic; you'll be out-performed by caster summons. Then Terrifying Rage comes along and you suddenly have a winbutton for anything not Fear-immune. The Sneak Attackers will love you dearly since a Feared enemy is flagged as being prone(this is why you can't KD a Feared thing), and all their attacks are Sneak. However, it's a real pain in the arse unless everyone's Hasted and can catch the fleeing spawn fast.
Outside of that, do your tankly duty: stay still until the buffer tells you she's finished, then make a beeline for the enemy mages. If you see the buffer in trouble, hit Rage and kick the ungodly stuffing out of whatever's bothering her.

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Fighter. This is an odd class, since all it provide is full BAB and lots of bonus feats to augment other classes. Because of that, it's basically never encountered in pure form past low level. Nor should it be. There is no reason to stay pure Fighter, RP included. It's got precisely zero unique characteristics except one, so I'll ignore the other categories, since they don't really apply to Fighter per se. Likewise for the RP...you're a fighter? So's everyone else that isn't a GS/Mestil-jockey caster.

3) All-day damage output: Honours The one unique thing Fighter has is Epic Weapon Specialisation: 6 extra damage per strike. Very, very nice for anyone that shoots, pokes or wallops.

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Monk.

1) Unique buffing: Fail
2) Spawn disabling/anti-buffing: Fail Not enough AB to KD reliably, Stunning Fist is a Fort saves and thus nigh-useless at epic.
3) All-day damage output: Fail Low damage per hit, so even the Monk flurry can't make you exciting. Exception made for STR-base Monks.
4) Not dying: Honours Monks are like "I wonder what to do with all this AC. Anyone wants spare AC? Spell Resistance? Immunities, then; I've got loads left." Also, Monk9 is a pre-req for Epic Dodge.
5) Once/day damage/buff output: Borderline The Pain Touch and Weakening Touch widgets let you take a hefty chunk of AB off a single target. Nice for bosses.

General tips on Looking at the Moon, not the Finger: I don't like this class since it doesn't do what I prefer to see in a build, at least not very well. You're a pure tank, so again it's: get buffed, target their casters and protect your own. Also, keep your supply of Raise Scrolls full; if your party does get nuked, the person most likely to survive is you. Escape, hole up/heal or run into Cordor/Wiltun and cast Summon Bored Epic if need be.

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Rogue.

1) Unique buffing: Borderline UMD can get you a fair amount of places, but it's no match for a caster.
2) Spawn disabling/anti-buffing: Borderline Crippling Strike will swiftly nuke the AB/damage of anything you can flank, which will help the thing it's hurting, but if you're in that position, it's probably going to be dead very soon anyway.
3) All-day damage output: Pass Much like Barbarian Rage, most things at high-epic are Sneak-proof but there's never nothing that's unSneakable. Target them and you'll rack up the Sneaks. Up until high epic, you're always a nasty nasty man.
4) Not dying: Honours Improved Evasion and vast Reflex, bags of AC and most of all Epic Dodge.
5) Once/day damage/buff output: Pass A Rogue can easily reach the immense DC needed to set Epic traps. It's very timeconsuming and thus unsuitable for mobs, but a carpet of traps will put a great big dent in a boss's day.

General Tips on Larceny for Fun and Profit: You are the only character capable of disarming, setting and picking the nastier traps and locks, so keep those skills nice and high. In mob-combat, learn who's sneakable and who's not, wait till one of the other tanks is engaged, and then flank like mad. If you see the buffer in trouble, equip a ranged weapon and Sneak-spam if its not immune, and Called-shot or go melee and IKD if it is.

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Cleric. Please please please pick a god and take at least one of his/her domains. Without that you're just some person who inexplicably has a bunch of spells, and there's nothing to work with there. That doesn't necessarily mean he/she is a bad character to RP with, it's just that there's no connection between their fighting style and their personality/history and that's meh meh MEH.


1) Unique buffing: Top of the Class Every mage or Bard has Imp. Invis and Haste, there's that many of them you can more or less rely on one cropping up, and Travel/Trickery Clerics have them anyway. Either way you get the gorgeous suite of Cleric buffs that you just can't get anywhere else.
2) Spawn disabling/anti-buffing: Pass There are a few disabling Cleric spells, but mostly I'm counting the 34DC Will Fear Aura on the dragon, should you take EDK. Otherwise Borderline
3) All-day damage output: Pass Clerics hit acceptably hard, CHA-heavy Divine Mighter Clerics more so, but no matter what type they are, they should get to include the summon's output unless the party's full.
4) Not dying: Pass When all else fails, Greater Sanctuary is sitting right there, hotkeyed and shiny, but casting it in heavy combat can be somewhat shaky.
5) Once/day damage/buff output: Pass With the right domain Clerics can get to insane damage/AB for short bursts. They used to pwnzor pwn here when Undeath's Foe stacked.

General Tips on Piety and Pwnage: It's a bit of a chore, but ask your party beforehand what they need, and fill up that spellbook accordingly. At lowbie, you're better casting the Hour/level buffs and extending the others.
Until you gain so many levels that you have all the spells in the world, you'll have to be choosey about who gets what buff. You have some pleasant damage buffs, so apply them to the highest AB in the group, even if that's your summon and especially if it's not you. If you don't yet have the spells to buff yourself *and* the tanks, buff them and retire with grace to Greater Sanctuary or Invisibility.
Magic Vestment is castable on people's shields, so ask them to drop it on the ground or barter it to you so you can cast.
A lot of Clerics choose the GS-jockey route since it's open to them from level 11, but I think that's a mistake unless you can't afford to selfbuff enough to survive. Once you can Magic Vestment/Shield of Faith +5 yourself, you can also fill up level 2 with Extended Divine Favour and become an adequate frontliner. You'll not be the killing gameshow, but simply hanging in melee takes lots of the heat off your tanks, and the ~25-30 damage you can do by midlevel is worth sending downrange.
When trouble looms, pop into GS and go healbot. There's nothing like the warm fuzzy feeling of knowing you've got a Johnny-on-the-Spot Cleric in your team, eagleye on the HP bars, and a shedload of Heal/Mass Heal/Greater Restore/healkits-at-80 skill hotkeyed.
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Druid.

1) Unique buffing: Pass Spell Resistance and Barkskin mean you can ignore most casters and swap out your AC amulet for something better.
2) Spawn disabling/anti-buffing: Borderline Stonehold is a Will save, and that means stuck enemies. Sunburst is extremely good too, but that's your lot, really.
3) All-day damage output: Pass Until you get Dragonshape you suck, when you do get it, you're medium, but your pet is *always* a cannon. Animal Empathy often means you can borrow one of the local wildlife an add that to the mix.
4) Not dying: Fail You pass when you can Dragonshape, though.
5) Once/day damage/buff output: Fail

General Tips on Hugs(Arboreal): You have some lovely lovely toys. Spell Resistance, Barkskin+5, Heal/Mass Heal/healskill are all things I love having around when I'm running with Druids. In terms of getting stuff dead, I hate to say it but you're basically a carrying case for the Big Dawg. It's not your fault, you've had to gimp everything to pay for Dragonshape, but until the scaly look comes in...you, personally, suck. I've played a lowbie mage running with a Druid, and the best thing we could do for many levels was hide her with Invis and let the pooch do the work. And ZOMG, can the pooches do the work. WM's, Divine Mighters and heavy Sneakers are the only things that don't look at a Big Dawg and say "I wish I could do that."

--------------------------------

Bard.


1) Unique buffing: Honours Bardsong is wonderful.It's a damn close run between Bards and Clerics for this category. Bards also have Mass Haste and Improved Invis, so when mages are scare and the priest isn't a Travel/Trickery cheeser, they win.
2) Spawn disabling/anti-buffing:Top of the Class Curse Song means everything in sight become a barn door that's so drunk it can barely stand. I don't think there's anything offensive that you can do to a monster that isn't easier after it's been Cursed, the Bigby/Isaac's lines excepted. Best of all, there are no saves and immunities to Cursesong. Everything from Kobold Scouts to Ao will feel the pain.
3) All-day damage output: Fail
4) Not dying: Pass Bardic AC is Abyss-proof, and with UMD they can wangle enough immunity/saves gear to manage bosses.
5) Once/day damage/buff output: Fail

Elan is a Pussy: You have a tough time from 3-13 or so. You're essential a crap Sorceror, but from 13, Bardsong picks up and you just get better and better. As with any caster, if you can't buff to survivability, then polish the tanks and hide, but with Tumble and the UMD to wear the good kit, you can almost always get the AC to hang in melee, even if you hit like Mary Poppins.
Once you have Lasting Inspiration, which you need an awesome reason not to rush for, you are best suited to being pointman, Curse-singing the whole spawn and then engaging. Your tanks will follow shortly and they will have Power Attack running. With Curse Song, anyone with more than around 47AB(you will buff many people this high with GMW/Bardsong) can run PA and lose nothing in hit rate. It's just free damage, so tell them to use it.
---------------------------------

Wizards & Sorcerer.


1) Unique buffing: Pass It's the big five: Mass Haste, Improved Invisibility, GMW/Keen, and Mindblank. The most common, but doing without them is painful. I'd give them honours since the big five are so big, but they're so very common that I just set the benchmark of Pass in this category as magebuffs.
2) Spawn disabling/anti-buffing: Honours Bigby's, Fear, Sunburst, all very good.
3) All-day damage output: Pass until high-epic. Between a single Wail per spawn and the summon's help, they contribute enough HP to pay their way. Then the Abyss comes along and eats the summons in two seconds and they're all Wail-immune.
4) Not dying: Honours Greater Sanctuary at the very least, but since mages only have one stat to worry about, they whore up CON so much that often the caster has more HP as anyone except the dwarf. When the mage is a Sorc multicheesed to Paladin/BG and Monk/Rogue, they go straight to Top of the Class.
5) Once/day damage/buff output: Top of the Class If you only have one or two things to kill, and you want them really, really dead? Call a mage.

Tips on the Weave being your Bitch(either by Brains or Beauty)

The normal approach is to sit in Invis (and later GS) having buffed your party and summons. That bores me to tears, although my mage did indeed end up doing that from time to time when in a big party that exhausted my spellbook on buffs. So I started off as a Damage Mage, since lowbie spawn HP is so small it's viable, then went for the Status Mage Method from then on. Status Mages do little or no HP damage, but instead attack the mind and eyes of the monsters, or just kill them outright with a deathspell. Find what saves you can pass easiest and attack them. Reflex and Will are generally the targets.

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Paladin.

1) Unique buffing: Borderline Deafening Clang, Prayer and Bless Weapon are rare, but they won't save an under-armoured party.
2) Spawn disabling/anti-buffing: Fail Taunt is there, but when so much of their AC is Dodge, not worth using.
3) All-day damage output: Honours Divine Might and Favour mean you'll hit harder than anything, and only crit less than WM's.
4) Not dying: Honours Their saves are godlike and their AC, although shortlived, is helluva high too.
5) Once/day damage/buff output: Honours Smite Evil in epic can put 500 points of damage downrage in a single round, without crits. Lay on Hands is 400+ if it's undead.

General Tips on Rectal Stick Insertion: At lowbie, you have one thing few others do: a bumpertruckload of Taunt. Spam it without mercy or pity. Your Dodge AC is minimal, so you're losing almost nothing and gaining 6AB.
Once your Pally buffs kick in, you're in the same quandry as any other caster: who best to buff? A lot of the time it will be you, but as a general rule, a party with a Extended Prayer-spammer Pally does better than one who's taken Holy Sword. Bless Weapon and Deafening Clang are so sexy I need to change trousers after an undead run.
The trickiest thing with Pallies is timing the three Divine selfbuffs you need to be much use: Favour, Might and Shield. A lot of the time my Pally spends so long doing that that the spawn is half dead before I run into it. Admittedly I am righteous fury incarnate when that point arrives, but in battle it can seem like that takes forever.

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Ranger.


1) Unique buffing: Borderline There's nothing that can't be gained from items and refeshed all day pretty painlessly, but convenience is no bad thing. They also have the only source of castable Keen that can apply to piercing or blunt weapons, since Blade Thirst is modified on Amia. This is a nice perk, but won't aid much in survivability.
2) Spawn disabling/anti-buffing: Fail
3) All-day damage output: Pass Without Bane of Enemies and a Favoured target, it's poor, but you still have an animal companion. Fuzzybutt of Dhoom. With it: Honours . Bane and Favoured combines to give the same effect as a whole Devcritter's STR mod applied to you.
4) Not dying: Fail Unless DEX-based, they need a lot of friends to stay alive and more importantly to keep the pet safe from Dismissal spam.
5) Once/day damage/buff output: Fail

General Tips on Getting to Pork Arwen: Now that Blade Thirst is uber, use it. Ranger fighting is all about a partnership between you and the pet. Sometimes you have to run ahead to deal with Dismissal casters, other times you need to rely on the pet's hefty DR to draw aggro.

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Prestige classes: This is where it gets tricky, since by definition you must have another class in the mix. I'm going to talk purely in terms of what the prestige class brings, so add it to the base.
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Arcane Archer

1) Unique buffing: Fail (you get that from the arcane caster levels)
2) Spawn disabling/anti-buffing: Pass At high AA, the Discipline needed to beat a Called Shot is fearsome, but Called Shot simply ain't that hot. It does have one excellent use: bailing out a struggling party member. This is normally the mage if GS/Invis has dropped, which means he'll be dancing the Circular Waltz of Panic. Toss a Called Shot:Leg into the critter chasing him and then shoot it to death at leisure.
With the custom AA-only arrows and their nasty Stun/Blind/Slow effects, you can generally take whatever you are aiming at out of the fight completely for the short time it will survive your shooting. If you keep an eye on your pal's healthbars, then you'll know where to direct them best.
3) All-day damage output: Honours They don't do vast damage per hit, but it's nice enough, and they miss only on 20's with a stack of AA levels, and get 5 attacks per round unbuffed. The real trick is that they can focus that hurt on a single target quicker than anyone.
4) Not dying: Borderline No shield? You die. Got shield? You'll live with your uber DEX AC, but you now hit like a sickly kitten.
5) Once/day damage/buff output: Fail The saves on the special arrows are mince.

General Tips on AWP Whoring: Straightforward enough, though; Shoot things, especially their casters and anyone hassling yours. With high AA levels you can multiclass to Cleric or BG and still get excellent AB permanently, which is normally the failing of Divine Mighters. That bumps your damage up yet further. Sneak-whoring AA's are even more vicious, albeit more situational.

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Assassin


1) Unique buffing: Borderline UMD can get you a fair amount of places, but it's no match for a caster.
2) Spawn disabling/anti-buffing: Pass (until epic, then Fail:) Death Attack is a Fort save. It gets shut down by mid-20's.
3) All-day damage output: Pass Same as Rogue
4) Not dying: Pass High AC.
5) Once/day damage/buff output: Fail

General Tips on being a Deadly Viper: Much the same as the Rogue, but your Death Attack means it probably best to be pointman under Invis or stealth, so you can nuke at least one of them in short order.The downside of this is that in a normal party, you'd be as well letting the STR-tanks steam in first and flanking instead. Sneaking just takes too damn long.

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Blackguard.

1) Unique buffing: Borderline Like the Pally, they have some nice stuff but not lifesavers.
2) Spawn disabling/anti-buffing: Pass Taunt, and the Aura of Despair to help out Wail-spammers and Dev-critters.
3) All-day damage output: (with high CHA) Pass Divine Might really hurts, but the BG Sneaks Attacks aren't useless either, although conditional like all Sneaks. However, unless you've got a heavy AB boost coming from your other classes, Divine Might is going to take a lot from your AB, and misses do zero damage.
4) Not dying: Honours Divine Shield and the uberised saves.
5) Once/day damage/buff output: Fail There is only one Good-aligned bosses in PvM.

General Tips on Being Not The Messiah, but a Very Naughty Boy: There's some pretty nice BG buffs these days, but mostly you're just beating the bejesus out of things.

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Champion of Torm.

1) Unique buffing: Fail
v2) Spawn disabling/anti-buffing: Fail
3) All-day damage output: Fail All comes from generic STR/other classes.
4) Not dying: Pass Saves out the wazzock.
5) Once/day damage/buff output: (With high CHA)Honours Honours. Divine Wrath and Smite Evil are monstercore. Otherwise Fail.

General Tips on Holy Violence: Like Fighter this is a bit of an add-on rather than a class; your fighting style will still derive from your main class(es), you're just a bit savesier and can do nasty things to bosses.

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Dwarven Defender.

1) Unique buffing: Fail
2) Spawn disabling/anti-buffing: Fail
3) All-day damage output: Fail All comes from generic STR/other classes.
4) Not dying: Honours Sneak-proof in combat, bags of HP and more DR than anything except a Shifter Gargoyle.
5) Once/day damage/buff output: Fail

General Tips on Aged Footwear Resemblence: More than any other class, you can bool right into a spawn ahead of your mates and hope the monsters all pick on you. That means the casters can cast without drawing flak, the archers can snipe and the Sneakers can flank. Just be careful of Defensive Stance at low HP: it's a CON buff and will kill you if it clicks off when you've less then 2HP/level.

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Harper Scout.

1) Unique buffing: Borderline Tymora's Smile on Amia gives +5 saves for 10 turns, and it's castable on a friend. Only one friend, mind.
2) Spawn disabling/anti-buffing: Bwahaha.
3) All-day damage output: *falls on floor*
4) Not dying: Stop! Stop! I think I've pulled a muscle in my ribs!
5) Once/day damage/buff output: Fail *begins coughing up blood from excessive laughter*


General Tips on Subtle Goodytwoshoe Hijinks: Try to get some of your many pints of rapidly exiting blood in their eyes. It might distract them a little.

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Pale Master.

1) Unique buffing: If Wizard: Pass, if Sorc/Bard: Fail. They only learn the spells if they're a Wizard.
2) Spawn disabling/anti-buffing: (See arcane class)
3) All-day damage output:Fail.
4) Not dying: Honours High AC/HP, and perhaps the best immunity set in the game.
5) Once/day damage/buff output: (see arcane class) Deathless Master Touch is more or less a 1-only thing on bosses and epic spawns.

General Tips on Black Clothes, Grumpy Music and Sylvia Plath Poetry Appreciation: Same as a mage, but you may want to craft some armour so you can hide your mucky undead-lovin' ways from the Druid'n'Pally population.

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Red Dragon Disciple.

1) Unique buffing: Your mother is a whore.
2) Spawn disabling/anti-buffing: A fat one, at that.
3) All-day damage output: She only gets trade from Turkish sailors, and they'll go for anything tubby.
4) Not dying: But only the deckhands. The ones with more than a fiver aim for the big girls that aren't ugly.
5) Once/day damage/buff output: She's so desperate for business she's even take the ones with syphilis.

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Shadowdancer.

1) Unique buffing: Fail
2) Spawn disabling/anti-buffing: Borderline Shadow Daze can get to a pretty reasonable DC, I think? Dunno, to be honest.
3) All-day damage output: Fail
4) Not dying: Honours HiPS is the defensive Daddy, and Epic Dodge is ubarity incarnate.
5) Once/day damage/buff output: Fail Fail.


General Tips on Fearing Only Pirates: I find HiPSing by partymates to be bothersome, since if I can survive, so can they, because none of my characters yet have had as much AC or as much Epic Dodge as an SD. It crashes me like mad, and I know I'm not alone, so ask your team first before HiPSing, especially if the server's full.

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Shifter: Too much ground to cover.

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Weapon Master.

1) Unique buffing: Fail
2) Spawn disabling/anti-buffing: Borderline They can get into a caster's face and cut its chances of casting down to nil: it only takes one crit of WM damage and they'll fail Concentration, and almost every round of WM combat has a crit in it. Most epic spawns have high Discipline, but hugely AB-heavy WM's can take most things down if they have have IKD.
3) All-day damage output:Top of the Class All day, all week, all year. WM crits just keep on comin' The Duracell bunnies of damage. With the uberised AB an epic WM hits, they don't miss very often. Or very 'ever'.
4) Not dying: Borderline Decent HP and Expertise will suffice in the epic playgrounds with Haste/Imp Invis, but still need Heals. Basically a WM's 'tactic' is to send so much damage downrange that the spawn runs out of HP before they do. This fails at high epic, but is pretty handy before then.
5) Once/day damage/buff output: Fail Ki Damage is their only trick and it's not good.

General Tips on Having a Howitzer attached to your Swordarm: About the only difference between you and any other meleer is you'll often have enough AB to run Power Attack and not lower your hitrate. Learn when those times are and get pummeling when it's so.

Wow, what a comprehensive post, well done!

_________________
Andorian Fetters- the bard your mother warned you about.
Mischa- 100% organic fey druidess
Rosherm- earth genasi, tough as granite and not much smarter

I love the colours!

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Say 'no' to JSBF!

Yes, color-coded for your convenience!

Based on that chart I think then the best class combo must be bard/blackguard/weaponmaster because I can get 2 purples and 3 blues. I could get more blues with sorceror instead of blackguard but I think that doesn't count for only a few levels.

Hmm.. *starts playing with numbers* Bard.. 20.. WM.. 7.. BG.. 3! It works!

_________________
Andorian Fetters- the bard your mother warned you about.
Mischa- 100% organic fey druidess
Rosherm- earth genasi, tough as granite and not much smarter

Not to be nit-picky; but I think Stonehold is a will save, not a reflex save. Otherwise a very comprehensive list, oh sacred cow.

Edit: w00t! Eat it Belgian!

_________________
Working on tastey new adventures!
Playing: Theos Gend, Perry Sawmir, Mers Larin
Good? Bad? I'm the guy with the two giant wolves.

It's a will save that paralyzes, so immunities are mind effecting and paralyze, which means freedom OR mind blank is enough to block it.

So it's below borderline actually. Don't get me wrong, untill epic it's a nice spell, but once you get passed the giants it's turned pretty useless.

[edit] bah Funi you beat me to it

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Click here for the navis & lukavi portraitpacks preview & download.

Arcane Archers do great at fighting Undead with low spell resistance, as far as damage output goes; better than any other dexterity based class. I don't think I have to say any more on that.

A special note out there to Mages: Green on this Chart does not mean You are the direct damage output. I know it may be tempting to prepare a bunch of flashy fireballs and whatnot, but honestly: Cast as many defensive spells on party members as you are capable of. This means: Keen, Greater Magic Weapon, Improved Invisibility, Mage Armor, Haste, as just the essentials. (Party members who want stoneskin over improved invisibility don't know what's good for them. If you can, give them both). Save the other spells for a summon. It might be tempting to want to do 10d6 damage once, but that won't scratch most monsters, and it's really really cool watching some fighter shred monsters that he should be fighting 5 levels later without spells, if at all.

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Those trees won't burn themselves down. (by Maryn)

I see that you hate RDD's.

As for the WM thing....

It's the ENERGIZER Bunny, not the Duracell Bunny, get it right!

Very nice list, though Nice work!

Both use the bunny




.and they are both pink!

*facepalms* I forgot all about the AA toys.

I bow to your gift for understatement.

I would vote for this to be stickied *nodnod*

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Na'yann - Dark skin, white heart


If you disagree with what Amia actually is, there are enough other servers out there to choose from.

Do not try to change Amia to your personal liking, but change yourself to suit Amia instead.

I like to think Shada can with her heal kits keep a party alive hiding in greater sanctuary, if I dont lag, get distracted. that is in theory

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2006/2009 2nd craziest Character

Go here to learn more about Shada - http://fjook.piczo.com/?cr=3&rfm=y

*nodnodnod*

_________________
Andorian Fetters- the bard your mother warned you about.
Mischa- 100% organic fey druidess
Rosherm- earth genasi, tough as granite and not much smarter

*nodnodnodnod*

_________________
Working on tastey new adventures!
Playing: Theos Gend, Perry Sawmir, Mers Larin
Good? Bad? I'm the guy with the two giant wolves.

very nice post.. and the point is good; even if RPed very well, you can't have real power if you die every five seconds X.x (( one of my biggest problems....... ))

but lol, i did like the RDD explanation.

My personal opinion:

Druid: Awesome
AA: Awesome

That is all.

(I may or may not be completely impartial)

~~~~~~~~

No, but seriously... Druids have their companion, a summons, and usually an animal that they can Animal Empathize. That's a party of four. And if you get Dragonshape... Seriously. They're scary-awesome. With buffs! Extended buffs! And True Seeing (so the pets can attack the drow that casts darkness...*cough*)!

And as for AA's... They're your friend. Really. Maybe not very good at soloing, but if it's done well, they're wondrous for a party. At lower levels, you just wanna hug the AA who's shooting the fireball arrows at the trolls. And at higher levels, you wanna hug the (preferably hasted) AA that, while standing far enough back that the monsters tend to leave her/him alone, is shooting monsters and dropping them (Imagine! Not even paying attention and, Boom! "Hey, what happened to that frost giant mage?"). And actually, lag and AA's aren't at each other's throats as much as you'd think.


*cough* Just my two cents. ^^ Any comments?

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I remember having a party full of archers fighting at Minmir Bridge once. It might not have been the most effective thing in existence, but it was extremely impressive watching that many arrows flying towards a single target and watching foes get cut down faster then they could reach us. With a little formation, tactics, and organization, you don't need a tank.

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Those trees won't burn themselves down. (by Maryn)

as for "Shifter: Too much ground to cover" I can try and help with that ((quick list dont look for any thing too good))

over all shifter not that good unless you go lame Monk Dragon form or know what your doing

1) Unique buffing: Fail None for class
2) Spawn disabling/anti-buffing: Sub-par Basilisk and Medusa have Petrify Gaze and its trash Mindflayer on the other hand has a Mind Blast skill that deals ok damage and can knock them on the ground(helps for people sneak attacking) Vampire Dominating Gaze crap and Rakshasa gets Dispel Magic
3) All-day damage output: Pass Dragon Shape(Epic Humanoid Shape would be the best damage forms other then Dragon but any Epic forms using a weapon are your best bet)
4) Not dying: Pass Dragon Shape, Risenlord, Epic/Kobold Commando HiPS and Epic Gargoyle has some nice DR too slowdown death (alot of the forms have some DR just nothing that stands out as much)
5) Once/day damage/buff output: Fail No Buff skills and all Damage skills they do have are unlimited use

All around best shifter form is Dragon Shape(best till you have too go in a door arc-way)
Note for the Damage part if you you pick the skills for the weapon that form uses it helps a fair bit

Unarmed forms are kind of pointless because they have +0 weapons and a Misty potion will cut the damage down too near nothing(other then Vampire +5 and Dragon +6 fist/claw)

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================-<Cory ShadowFlame>-================
Risenlord-Shifter(OMG a Non-Dragon Shifter that can hold his own in PvE)

Hang on, that's a direct quote from me!

Is it?

I rest my case.

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Hrm...I suppose the ability to direct your damage more precisely at any one target does add mucho to effectiveness, and I freely admit I dropped the ball entirely when it came to the On-Hit arrows. Upgrade to Honours, yus.

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If there is no enemy within,
The enemy outside can do us no harm.

Manticore! Fleee!

I'll disagree because I'm argumentative. A lowbie mage tossing Fireballs works pretty well: that's half the spawn's HP gone, and it's reasonably painless to manage one fireball per spawn for much of a day's hunting.

Midrange, yes: buffs usually win. However at the 20+ stretch, Wailspamming with Epic Necromancy will drop half a Spires group instantly, as will Undeath to Death in the Manor. It's best to be point man for that because nothing's more annoying than doing your tankly duty and getting right up into a Witch/Priest's face to disrupt Concentration, only to have them drop dead after you've walloped it down to Near Dead.

That's easily reconciled by the fact that the Mage has no party buffing spells at level 9. Use as many wails or AoE Disabling spells as possible at that stage. There are just some times though when that won't work. Take the abyss for example. Everything is immune to death magic, fire, Mindspells, and Isaac's gets expensive.

As far as At low levels, there's usually a choice between enough fireballs and elemental resistance spells so that the caster can survive what he hath sown, or maintaining a summon and buffs for 8 hours. The other part of surviving is that casting an offensive spell removes normal invisibility, which usually means the low-AC, Low-DR, and even lower Hit point mage has to run around and hope the party takes care of the problem, or die horribly.

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Those trees won't burn themselves down. (by Maryn)

I much prefer having a mage that doesn't go invisible and instead hacks anything that gets too close with a big axe. During those early levels though you need to avoid melee combat because Ghostly Visage doesn't last long enough (1 turn/level) to be useful.

Still, it's sound enough to say that the best way to avoid losing hit points in a fight is to finish off what you're fighting. Running away generally earns the early mage an AoO in the back, which usually results in them falling face first and bleeding like a Harper Scout.

So from your biased opinion we shouldn't really take notice in anything that you have posted! For you said it yourself.

You are the the proverbial hole between the buttocks of Amia and full of shit!

as Always ruce has superbly put his knowledge of spawns and the system that works best on amia to best use, combinding buffers, with a melee class will always win ontop, Like a level 18 sorc, 15 (charisma based) cleric, 15 Drawven defender(did swap to a drawven pali between) and a 16 Bard can take it to the royalty of the spires quite well. and on the not dying everyspawn, it's not rp to suck alot and die every spawn
and on the topic of stone hold.. never, never ever fall for the trap when your a druid to cast stonehold at the pesky rangers and find out they all have freedom of movement and laugh embarressedly..

Also;
Think ahead

It is better to suck for the first 12 levels, than to suck the rest of your life
^_^


-Aes

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"We claim to be just and upright. No wrath from us will come stealthily to the one who holds out clean hands, and he will go through life unharmed"
-The Three First

To some extent I'd say the opposite is true as well: a build that becomes uberuberuber too early gets stale. My Cleric matured at level 23, and although extra spell duration/penetratin/resistance is in no way bad, he's not noticeably more powerful at his current 27 than at 23.

But that's a little off-track for the target audience of the original post. If you care enough about power that you know what it's going to look like from levels 1-30, then you don't need this thread. It's not so much Power Build as non-Party Burden.

Wizards and sorcs, dont underestimate the polymorph self spell.

People scoff at it, but if you actually use their abilities it works!

The umberhulks confusion gaze is near unstoppable for the average monsters a 3-11 wizard can face.

My wizzy once confused three entire groups of malar spawns at once (tripple spawn accident) then him and the others waided in and cut them down.

The spider form also has poison and unlimtied web! Thats a very good thing if you have choke points.

my wizzy has traveled with fighters who have a 100+ hit points and does 15+ damage a pop, and my wizzy still out killed them!

Bump.

I'd actually like to see Ruce update this a bit, just to see if he's gleaned any additional wisdom from his experiences in the field.

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Morgan Blancrest: The Rage from The Cage
Lucas Baker: Humble Swordsman
Wesley Fletcher: Greasemonkey Extraordonaire
Also known as: EmoPinata

Good bump. I reckon it needs updating but.

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I play: Gage le Gris
Socially and recently politically Inept Knight of Xymor

*bows before the might of Uberuce's knowledge*

A truely excellent posting and it should be stickied for sure.

And quite right almost all Ranger builds struggle if you dont balance them just right. Which is why Bella is so awesome and can handle a suprising amount of nasty stuff.

Like all things it is getting the balance of the build right with what you are getting for your rp as well.

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Siggy by Maryn

not the shifter part, they are as fail now as they were back then.

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================-<Cory ShadowFlame>-================
Risenlord-Shifter(OMG a Non-Dragon Shifter that can hold his own in PvE)

And don't forget Elemental swarm, that thing will tear through the barbarians like a hot knife through butter.

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"Most assume that all the followers of Lathander are great morning people. They're very wrong."
"I think we are the only group where AD&D stands for Attention Deficit Disorder."

Total level - Ranger level= effective class level

it's true and it always will be, unless you have one of those certain types of rangers

That's a great list. Individuals can have special niches within those categories too - my Sally cleric is utterly useless for most of the party-leach categories, but she'll stand there all day spamming 100+ HP heal kits and quickened Heal.

I have to agree with you on the RDD though.

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2009's Second Most Overall Contributing Player

يمكنني استخدام مترجم جوجل

I'm still pissed off about assassins not being as good as they should be. I miss having good poisons...

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Technology, no matter how simple, is magic to all those who do not understand it. ~ Florence Ambrose

What if you have no friends?

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I keels u with my axe!

"Do ye know where the Holy-Flamin' Frost-brand Gronk-slayin' Vorpal Hammer o' woundin' an' returnin' an' Shootin'-Lightnin'-out-yer-bum is?"

Get some.

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Davion Telemos - Monk of the Four Winds
Korthan Isharnos - Dragon Shaman of Thunder Spirit Zamasham

what if they turn out too be shifters

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================-<Cory ShadowFlame>-================
Risenlord-Shifter(OMG a Non-Dragon Shifter that can hold his own in PvE)

Then they're the party leach, not you

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2009's Second Most Overall Contributing Player

يمكنني استخدام مترجم جوجل

Better an RP shifter than a Buff Hogging Bard.

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I play: Gage le Gris
Socially and recently politically Inept Knight of Xymor

Time to stop RPing with Shifters :) >.>

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Jys'zyne Do'larn

Man, this account is over 10 years old. Where do I get my old man beard?

The tips are AWESOME, but the above two quotes in a boat of others are what I'll always remember.

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~ Alexandria Do'Maetri, Champion of Tyr
~ Glam Snowfell, of mysticism and magery

did I just see you bag a bards in the buff department? bards do in i buff what clerics only have wetdreams about to other people.