UC and why I hate my Dad's PC... (in General)

I just wrote a long post on the lack of merit for UC and clicking back to amend some spelling mistakes wiped the message...

I'm not going through that again so here is the gist;

Why train UC?

You get out tanked by tanks, out damaged by everyone, and if you want to use the UC specific items can't use a tattoo...

If you want a non NW attack, train a DD spell.

If you use a MgS, use a weapon.

UC is redundant.

People wanted a monk-like skill because many of the skills are based on D&D and games like it. Monks or unarmed fighters were always an option in said games, so it is exciting to have it in CB. However, in D&D type games (at least those I have played) UC was overpowered because #1 It was too fast #2 The monks couldn't use armor, but got a huge amount of natural armor, #3 The monks got natural magic resist, #4 The monks didnt need to buy weapons, and #5 The fists did much too much dmg. I went off on a bit of a tangent there, and probably didn't answer your question, but it made me happy.

Unless Jon introduces a ranged only DD spell that goes with it for that kung-fu mage strat that you've probably always wanted to do... =)

Maybe we should have a shop next to the tattoo artist for budding martial artists to pay to increase their skills. Or is that an obvious idiot of an idea?

Has anyone worked on a UC guy coupled with a ToA or a ToE yet?

;)

Back home so a few more of my thoughts.

1) If you use the two UC boosting items, you can't use a tattoo. If you don't you're stuck with a little virtual weapon that's hard to raise and might have a cap.

2) No tattoo means ToA+DB tanks will always beat you. Their DB's will reduce your pth to nothing, and as they have to train 3 stats (not including any enchantments) to your 4, plus a ToA, they will awalys out dex you. You'll get 1 hit to their 3+.

3) CBF hurts.

4) Versus mages; FB/MM will hurt before you get a change to damage and you'll never out damage CoC in melee.

5) Ranged. No possitive/negative here. Archers still own ranged combat.

So if you can't beat Archers, Tanks, CBF Walls, or Mages, just who is a UC minion supposed to fight?

If they're there just to take blows, a full HP CBF/MgS minion would be better.

GL does have some good points. As of now, UC isn't an viable option. It's an option, just not a good one. It'd be like adding another 4x weapon to the game. Sure, it's nifty, but it's not contributing much.

I'm not saying UC mins should absolutely own, but they definitely need a boost to be of reasonable value.

In my opinion a UC minion should never be a solo char...UC minions need enchantment backups, even in CB1...AMF+EC+Prot dedicated enchanters + UC minion properly equipped (Gi,Helm's,DBs, EC) can do very well. It just takes some work.

Mmm, largest UC is Mag's char Brock Sampson's 50206, mpb 13,744. (ToE equipped.) Dunno if that mpb is from the UC or not but if it is, then that's fairly poor if you compare it to compounds and katanas, never mind the larger weapons.

and who said a UC minion cant carry around a bow or crossbow? :P they cant and do well with them, back in CB1 my favorate UC minion ranged was an SoD...smack those pesky mages around pretty well in those rounds

The bottom line is that a UC minion is like a tank that cannot be augmented by NW. Plus the tattoo issue.

I think Gentleman Loser has a pretty tight case here. How can a UC minion ever compete in the long run? Is it meant to be purely a "starter" strat?

could always suggest of putting in some amount of natural endurance into the UC skill..but then that probably turn into a nerf for the toj too lol

Hey Vicious. Old School, eh?

Do you still game? You wouldn't happen to live in the Washington, DC/Baltimore area, would you? I'm jones-ing.

Monks were overpowered to an extent, but if you played in a magic-heavy world, which was normal for us, then eventually you lost out because of the item limitations.

I remember one time my char (Almuric, natch) was fighting a Monk out in the middle of nowhere. The Monk had all sorts of powers and I thought he might be a Monk/Mage dual-class. But he wasn't casting anything, he was invoking powers. Once I'd killed him, I had to just about take his body apart to figure out he had the Teeth of Dahlver-Nar. And I've still got 'em, 25 years later.

There was some debate about 32 teeth actually being 32 magic items, so he was technically over the limit, but since he was an NPC, it didn't really matter.

What were we talking about? UC? Sorry, so underpowered as to be completely uninteresting to me. Did somebody already make that point? Oh well.

"Mmm, largest UC is Mag's char Brock Sampson's 50206, mpb 13,744. (ToE equipped.) Dunno if that mpb is from the UC or not but if it is, then that's fairly poor if you compare it to compounds and katanas, never mind the larger weapons."

It is. The reason I went UC is explicitly so I can blow CB2$ on both BA and "upgrading" my weapon at the same time to be a good forger, and I'm a poor guy. :D I'll tell you I do much worse than if I bought a cheap weapon, and the lack of a Gi really, really hurts. I have an effective skill of 34. The AMS is only level 1100 as protection against base-level decay, and Vampiric Aura is trained because it's the only real advantage physical damage has over magical these days.

If I wanted to be ultra-powerful, I'd go for HP and fireball and call it a day.

Almuric,

I'm a grad student in DC...I'd be interested in some old scool gaming (no experience).

Here's the way I think it went:

CB users: "We want to use fancy Kung-fu! We don't need weapons, we're awesome!"

Jon: "Alright.. but if you don't need weapons we're not gonna make you uber powerful. In fact, sword vs fist, sword wins, we'll give you what you want, but your gonna suck."

Unarmed combat is taught in martial arts schools not as a form of offense, but as a form of defense. They pound it into your head not to even try to attack someone that has a weapon if you don't, but if your backed into a corner and someone is GOING to hurt you, here's the best you can do. UC is exactly this, it's the best you can do without a weapon, and just like real UC, it still sucks VS. a weapon. I think this is on purpose.

I have a UC minion... he's doing alright, but I bought him... Just seeing if he is going to get better or if i need to rethink his strat...

Actually, someone trained in advanced methods of unarmed combat should be trained in disarming an opponent with a weapon. Especially if the person with the weapon is only relying on their ultra powerful weapon to do all the damage for them. (keep in mind I'm still only referring to hand-to-hand weapons)

Magic damage in general. I'm burnt to a crisp before I have a prayer. It makes me want to dump all my UC into a gigantic AMS and get a nice weapon, but that would be rational, so I'll keep pumping UC.

I'm more interested in how to fix IE so it doesn't lose the message when you hit "back". Very annoying and not just on CB. Although it has saved me from posting lots of stupid stuff. HA! But not this time!

Man, I thought I was the only one with this problem. If I ever get caught will too many spelling mistakes, and need to hit "back" Poof.. the message is gone, or I get "page not found". Happens everything. And I use IE at work (ifs fine with Firefox.)

And yet another reason I love firefox *which I think should be added to the dictionary on here*

I have the page not found problem too.

But anyway, UC doesn't work as a starting strat too, maybe that's because I was above the "starting" ratio when I thought it up, but you need a lot of real good, expensive rares to make a good UC char.

I've always wanted to work on getting the equipment for an UC char, but I'm too cheap to get the equipment to get one, so it doesn't work out.

Here's a general question for everyone here: choose to gird your UC minion with one of the following, and explain why;

A) Combat Gi

B) Tattoo of Augmentation

C) Tattoo of Endurance

I've obviously chosen the Endurance just because those things are extremely powerful. Having a multiplier that large on your HP is impossible to pass up. But lacking the 15 skill is really brutal, and would 15 skill always/necessarily be better than the ST/DX from the ToA(I bet so.)

Would *love* other opinions here.

It's fine on my comp (both use IE). But my dad's also has a problem hitting back on the auction page...

He messes with his PC a lot. >_<

It causes me no end of frustration... I'm the one he asks to fix things when they mysteriously go wrong...

Put Firefox on, you wont look back ;)

Just seem the UC modification thread in changelog. :)

It looks like UC is going to be/supposed to be anti ranged. That's a great idea! Something needs to fill that void.

But I don't think double evasion for UC would really help. Mags, what effect is your UC?

As for equipment, UC minions need ToA's. That archer you're dodging probably has one, so if you have a large enough pair of DB's that and your UC skill will reduce his pth to nothing, but the dex gap still means you're hitting for 1 attack in each ranged round (whatever your choice of ranged weapon is) and he's hitting twice.

As for a ToE, if you want a massive soaking minion, a pure HP CBF/MgS minion would probably be better...

The ToA would also help with your low damage. I suppose it depends on what form you want your UC minion to take. Tank or damage dealer...

;)

"Unarmed Combat: 107,977/53,521 (35)"

It'd just be straight 53,521/25 without Helm's Gauntlets. A Gi would probably bump my effective skill level to nearly 200,000. You can see how an effective rough million XP for no PR cost is hard to pass up, so this might partially answer my own question.

As far as anti-ranged goes... it's so far been much easier to wait out the ranged rounds with a ToE than make a positive damage differential for yourself. Chances are the archer's going to do more damage than you in the melee rounds anyway, and any magic vs. your ToA will just be gory. It already is with a ToE. I don't care what happens in the ranged rounds beyond really, really strong mages. I never die or even get somewhat wounded then.

My strategy in a nutshell was to increase my effective HP with a ToE, but leech large amounts of health in melee with VA against my normal damage; it's a multiplier on the health I get back from VA too. UC is totally orthogonal and possibly counterproductive to this.

I'm starting to believe no tattoo is the best approach for a single UC minion with massive AMS to protect against mages, or just declare defeat against magic. That's probably too much to train. Even then I won't have the dex to keep up with anyone.
The price of being different...

So your UC gives you;

1) ~ Level 35681 Evasion (somewhere around an effect of 20/25?) for ranged, compared to half that for melee.

2) A (with the HG) x35 +35 weapon.

The problem is that (unlike DD) UC needs both Strength and Dexterity to be effective. I'd be interested to see the effect of a 100k+ level UC, to see how it would compare to a DD spell of equal level.

A ToA could be used to allow concentration of xp into UC (to give spending much like a mage). This would allow UC to hit and do damage.

A ToE just (It's not trivial...) gives more hit points.

The UC items on the other hand give a straight boost to your effect (+20/25? for both), which is independant of your UC level (gives better returns the higher your UC is) and PR. This bonus has no effect on UC's natural evasion.

The more I think about it, the more it seems that a UC minion is never going to win the dexterity battle, so should maybe focus on pth. Dump points from dexterity into UC. Couple UC's pth and natural evasion with DBs.

Actually, the ToA seems the only choice. Dump all points from Strength and Dexterity into UC. This gives a higher multiplier, higher pth and higher evasion. The ToA will allow you to get doubles on mages, at least hit versus tanks and gives an additional +10 Evasion on top of your UC granted and DB evasion.

AC is poor, either way you look at it. A tattoo gives no AC, and the Gi gives a base of 1. The Gi/HG's combination gives slightly more AC, but you're never going to have as much as even light tanks.

But this is all just musing, and could be completly wrong!

:)

Verus mages, AMF is a must. MgS reduces UC, so it's not really an option.

With a ToA (strength for damage is weighted towards the lower end of the spectrum anyway...) you could spend xp like;

HP: 1/3
UC: 1/3
AMF: 1/3 - when you get to a happy level, pump points into UC
VA: some small amout.

Very similar to the spending of a (my :P) single mage (just swap VA for Prot). The only question is whether the use of a ranged weapon with multiple hits and multiple hits for melee would out perform a DD spell, coupled with regening HPs due to VA (But then weapons win out on this as well with un dispellable VA...). An a/exbow would probably work wonders here.

CBF s will still eat you alive, but at least you don't have to put up with MgS+CBF+AMF! ;)

Can anyone think of a better set up for a UC minion?

Bahh, it would probably work better with a melee weapon anyway...

;)

I agree that the future for UC lies in the ToA, it's the obvious choice. But maybe a ToA could also give some small bonus to UC?

I also think it's possibly misplaced in 'skills'. After all you can be an expert in uc and an archer at the same time in RL. And, although it's not necessarily a fitting combination for the martial arts, bloodlust and UC here would go together nicely.

I guess there is the biggest problem - is it a skill or is it a weapon?

Maybe I'm being a little too harsh with UC. A x25 +25 weapon is nothing to sneeze at.

I think the problem lies with the Gi. It's bested in every way by the teo non familiar tattoos.

ToA: Either allows stats equal to the big tanks with a little loss to weapon power, or funnel xp from strength and dexterity into UC and accept you'll never out stat a tank. With an extra +10 Evasion on top.

ToE: 75% reduction. Even though AC comes before Endurance, the + on a Gi will never catch that sort of reduction.

:/

A little info for the continuation of this discussion. My UC character is more effective with a Mage Shield on and taking the -5 to UC than having that extra 5. The Mage Shield is +12. Inspect Melian.

:) Beren uses both a Gi and HG, which lessens the -5UC from the MgS. MgS are great when combined with AMF!

How do you find your UC minion performing versus tanks of your level? Especially Tanks using ToA s?

Your setup does look like it will take care of mages nicely though! Why not a CBF on your UC minion as well?

Do you think you would perform better by dropping UC into stats and using a melee weapon? Especially an expensive VA granting one?

mmm GL, doesn't the CoBF negate UC completely?.... Or was that just in CB1?

Point:
2) No tattoo means ToA+DB tanks will always beat you. Their DB's will reduce your pth to nothing, and as they have to train 3 stats (not including any enchantments) to your 4, plus a ToA, they will awalys out dex you. You'll get 1 hit to their 3+.
Counter-point:
Evasion/DB's doesn't reduce UC's pth. this is the way it was in CB1, as far as i know, and it's probably the same here.
High UC + high dex = 2 hits.

plus you can use Db's, combined with the natural evasion you have, = more evasion. add in the fact that you have very little to upgrade, and you have big DB's, low armor, but are really hard to hit.

And where are you getting this "train 3 stats" from? my single tank has HP, STR, Dex, AMF, Prot, BL. A UC tank should have similar skills. except probably VA instead of prot.


I thought about a UC minion, and it's not a really viable option for a single tank, but it can be done. just requires some planning, and good items. mind you that was in CB1, not 2, but the same priciples should still apply.

"Counter-point:
Evasion/DB's doesn't reduce UC's pth. this is the way it was in CB1, as far as i know, and it's probably the same here.
High UC + high dex = 2 hits."

Woah! Evasion doesn't reduce UC's pth? That's something I'd never heard of. If that's correct, it makes UC a lot more viable. In this case, I would seriuosly advocate dropping dex altohgether, and pumping UC as high as possible, with Gi and HGs. At +100, an automatic hit. Every Time. Load up on Strength and go to town.

No UC minion is going to have a high enough dex (versus tanks, everyone can versus enchanters/mages...) to ensure a second dex based hit, and will probably have trouble hitting with the first...

"plus you can use Db's, combined with the natural evasion you have, = more evasion. add in the fact that you have very little to upgrade, and you have big DB's, low armor, but are really hard to hit."

Yeah, but this is the same, and better, using a ToA to a Gi. More evasion, and possibly more UC. But you will be hit by other Tanks bex based hits. More often twice. And unlike Tanks, you won't have a large armour to soak it, unless you tke a hit to your damage and pth.

"And where are you getting this "train 3 stats" from? my single tank has HP, STR, Dex, AMF, Prot, BL. A UC tank should have similar skills. except probably VA instead of prot."

I'm purposely ignoring any enchantments. Both Tank/UC can train AMF/EC/DM and VA/Prot/GA/whetever to the same sort of levels and usually do. So it's just easier to leave these out of the discussion when looking at xp distribution.

;)

Your tank, compared to a UC minion (and ignoring Prot and AMF, as I'm assuming the UC minion would have these as well...) would have to train BL significantly lower than the other would have to train UC. Plus, BL could be dropped entirely, and your tank would still function in the same manner.

A UC minion could leave thier UC low, train it to only around 1/4 of thier strength, but then again, you could also use a whip to attack with! ;P

"I thought about a UC minion, and it's not a really viable option for a single tank, but it can be done. just requires some planning, and good items. mind you that was in CB1, not 2, but the same priciples should still apply."

I'm not just considering it as a single minion, but it's hard to justify it's use on a multi minion team, where for a xp based attack (as opposed to NW) DD spells do so much more of a better Job. Not good as a starter strat, too many rare items required, and no good at higher levels...

:(

Oh yeah, and CBF does negate skills....

>_<

LOL!

Empirical testing, took the plunge, rented a Gi, and apologized to my tatt.

"Unarmed Combat: 191,474/53,521 (45)"

On the upside, everything has a heck of a time hitting me. On the downside, when they do, I die. Of my favorites list -- which I can beat fairly routinely with the ToE -- I can win against 4/15. Might have the wrong caste of chars but there's a few immediate, obvious differences:

1) With many small hits, no damage redux, and relatively low HP due to all the points in physical stats and UC, Guardian Angel is like a bazooka to the head.

2) The few magic users I did fight are now insurmountable.

3) My damage didn't increase nearly as much as I would've guessed. Only ~25%. It looks pretty linear.

4) Most interestingly, character Heath whom I could beat very easily now kills me. He's pretty vanilla; nothing but stats. I only give up ~25% HP.

I don't think a Gi's the way to go.

Part of the problem is that UC was designed to be inherently defensive so I feel like I should stretch that for all it's worth with the ToE...

Why did they have a harder time hitting you? The Evasion bonus from UC is taken before increases from items, so the Gi should not have increased that.

(Still confused by the Gi granting evasion on pre bonus UC property)

If you had a natural UC that granted a 20 evasion and equipped a Gi, would the Gi then also give you an extra 20 evasion?

:/

Gi's give 15 evasion as well as 10 UC when you have UC trained.

So the question I would have would be, should I keep a ToJ on my front enchanter? Change to a ToE on my front enchanter or on my UC minion, or change to a ToA on my UC minion? Inquiring minds want to know!