Who needs AC? (in General)

It's time to load up on Dexterity. Combine as much natural dex you can afford to train and slap a ToA on top.

Sell all your armour. Buy the biggest DB s you can afford. Don't worry bout the PR increase.

Train as much AMF as you can, and rely on the ToA for strength.

You're now unhittable to physical weapons and hopefully have a large enough AMF to make DD spells manageable.

Just watch out for GA! ;)

pfft, you go get your DB's and DX, ill just grab myself a +200 BoNE and laugh ;) /me wishes he could have a +200 BoNE >.>

thats probably one of the worst strats ive heard :D
no offense GL, but i have a fairly large AMF for my level..ask Frod :D
with half my team devoted to amf, even if your single minion only trained amf, he wouldnt have the same size on as me at the same level, because of his pr differece due to the tattoo. in other words...

Magic will OWN you. without the ac, and most of your exp going to dex, ur going to have a low hp, and if not that, a low amf.

with a 160k total amf casting from my character at 200k pr (80% of my level, if you remember, ranger was the one who had a giant, effective amf and he kept his at 66%) i still get HAMMERED by those stupid DD tats. with a single minion, expect to take an easy 100k a round from some of those, and even with my huge amf, it still takes 2-3 rounds for them to kill themselves (on the teams without DM even.)

so unless you are weilding a x100 ELB with upgraded seekers...(and even still you will get hammered by fireball) u probably dont stand a chance agianst magic...

on the physical side, u better have some really nice DB's, (around +100) cause the toa still gives around 30% for the average im assuming, and most weapons have around +20-40 so your looking at 50-70 % chance to hit you....remember, u have low hp, so a couple of hits is all it takes, and then ur dead...

"Magic will OWN you. without the ac, and most of your exp going to dex, ur going to have a low hp, and if not that, a low amf."

You're right. I don't stand a chance against magic. :(

I think your right. I stripped the armor off my Tank (Death) and my score jumped while my pr plumeted. Now my score is more than twice my pr.

Hi Soul, i don't think you're thinking this through.

Take a single tank. It trains (on average) 1/3 xp into HP, 1/3 into Dex and 1/3 into AMF (barring any skills...). As a ToA tank he already has a low AC and gains hardly any benefit from stat boosting armour.

The majority of AC a ToA tankwill have will be base AC, they don't wear the cheap upgradeable heavy AC (Adam etc). Base AC does nothing to reduce Magic damage, only enchantment pluses count.

How much is a ToA tank really going to have? +50? That's around a 10% reduction in magical damage.

*Shrugs*

I'm theory crafting again, because I'm plowing my cash into heavy tank armour, but if it makes more sense to you, do this on a 4 minion team. ToA tank all your cash into DB s, and three other 20 hp AMF enchanters. Smaller tank, bigger AMF and you'll spread out multi hitting DD s / soak up three MM rounds.

Either way the point is, why increase your PR by armour that doesn't really help, when you can focus all your NW into a single item, and with a large enough dex (with the help of a tattoo) become unhittable to physical attacks?

But GA will still hurt.

50AC still works out as a 12% HP bonus...

and 100 AC still works as a 24% HP bonus (which is on 2 of my minions)

it's linear like that?

100AC is a 26.6% HP bonus ;)

Large enough Dex and DB's are 100% HP bonus to physical attacks.

Worth more than 12-26.6%?

261 AC here, it soaks up a lot of damage, keep in mind GA apparently doesn't retaliate against dmg you take after AC, it retaliates against the damage that was sent before the damage reduction. So theoretically high AC armor is much better than having targets miss in hits. Now perhaps you guys are right, DB's + high dex would work(only with tanks around), but keep in mind there are mages around and amf is not exactly something people would be trying to have that will reduce magic damage to 0.

keep in mind GA apparently doesn't retaliate against dmg you take after AC, it retaliates against the damage that was sent before the damage reduction

Where did you pick up that piece of misinformation?

I got it from a strange test I did, I ended up doing around 20k dmg against a target that only did like 5k dmg to me physically. So from that I concluded that ga goes after actual damage and not the reduced damage.

Bart and Shade...you accounting for the VB and its wonderful little tendency to cut AC in half? It's not like VBs are going to be exceedingly rare, especially in the higer levels.

GL, as usual, I am on board with everything you say, and would add the VB as another reason that armor is less useful than ever.

Soul you have a point, but the mage team has to be VERY specific to beat these big tanks. For example, The First can beat Spid and almuric, while I cannot. However, I can beat The First because his DM affects me not. If he swapped out his DM for AMF, I would start to lose, but I would bet almuric and Spid would start to win. Huge magic focus and DM is a great tank-buster. But it won't be long before Spid has the AMF to beat The First, and that is with a rather paltry net worth (compared to a lot of the large ToA teams out there.

Right now, the quick kill seems to be the way of things (at least at the top-top). That is the number one indicator that defense is either not a priority or simply not feasible against these monster tanks. I tend to think it is more the latter than the former, though defense has never really been in favor since it lacks the glamour of carrying huge, savage weaponry. *smile*

Ok fine maybe I am wrong on the GA thing, but from my fights it still looks as if the retaliation works the way I said. Unless I am told the % ga retaliates I will have no idea what should be the right #. So far I have hit to around 60%, but during the early fights I have hit 70-75%.

any day now...

/\88/\

The fact that Chet and Bast can beat Avoid while I can't and yet I can beat them is a painful thorn in my side. Very, very painful.

But, I'm consoled by the fact that almost everyone else up here can beat him. His favorites list is very small because there are so very few characters he can beat. But I am one of them, so it's a small consolation.

Oh and if a ToA ELBow archer is worried about Mages, just equip seekers.

As long as you have a MgS/AMF/Enough HP s to survive one round versus the large DD you face (And that's if you face FB, or 2+ MM mages...), your seekers will kill the mage.

All the while, the poor ToA less tank you face with either a compound or a A/EXBow will miss their attacks because of your High Dex and High DB s.

Huh. What can beat a single ToA ELBow archer with all their NW into their bow and a pair of DB s? Mages can't last, and Tanks can't hit... Walls? Maybe. Unless the Archer also uses a VB in melee.

The ultimate minion.

GL, in that scenario, the mage will win. No AMF? Sure, it will need to be an FB or MM mage to even get some offense out during ranged, but those are plentiful. *smile*

Also, remember that one cannot heft an MgS and wear a ToA at the same time

Doh! Getting too frenzied! ;)

Stick with the ToA. Use a big Elbow and you're getting doubles and triples versus mages, who have no Dex or AC, their only defense will be a ToE. That is of course unless the Mage has a massive pair of DB s...

Hmmm...

What single minion would win out for pure damage?

Single Tank, ToA, ELB etc.

or;

Single Mage, ToE, FB/MM With a massive pair of DB s.

The mage would have no need to spend money on their weapon, so could plow all their cash into thier DB s!

They'll have no dex, but if they exceed their opponents pth by +100, they negate all their opponents dex anyway...

Go go single mage!

I get this feeling all this talk about how ELB, TOA tanks being the perfect strategy are going to get it nerfed in the coming months...

Maybe it's just me...

"They'll have no dex, but if they exceed their opponents pth by +100, they negate all their opponents dex anyway... "

Now ToA gives pth and evasion and DB don't just sum their levels anymore this looks pretty impossible unless the tank has been severely scrimping on pth.

You give the answer to what beats single tank with ELB and ToA in your opening statement. AS/GA should do the job.

;) a pair of +220 DB s shouldn't cost too much....

o_O

Or depending on how dex cth works, +320...

O_O

If I can snag a pair in the upcoming auctions I'll get straight on it.