Starting a new team (in New players)

Hi everyone!

I started maybe two weeks ago leveling a single fireball mage. I'm enjoying the game, but the mage seems to have hit a point where he can't win many battles with more than 10% challenge bonus, and even so most equally powered opponents beat the snot out of him. So I was thinking of trying a new strategy.

I have a 131k ToE I've been leveling that I can use or re-ink, and a couple other random pieces of equipment I've picked up cheaply from auctions (amulet of AC, displacement boots, blade of thuringwethil, and blacksword of nan elmoth).

Could anyone recommend a strategy to try? I've been reading up on the various strategies and was leaning towards a 4 minion team since that seems to be pretty popular at the high end of the MPR spectrum.

Thanks!

First, I'd recommend not starting a new team, but instead finding a way to adapt your current one. You are in the bonus period, and you'd do well to make the most of it.

Second, ask Natasha :)

Well I considered doing that, but it would cost pretty much all of my cash to hire a new minion, which seems bad...

There isn't anything wrong with a single minion setup, it's just a little more work.

What I like running for a cheap high growth setup is a high dispell magic firefamiliar team.

Novice: What training ratio would you use for that? I've been doing 1/3 HP and Max FB. Should I drop FB and put all that experience into DM instead, or keep some DD?

1/3 hp 1/2 FB max DM (for an even 1:1:1 ratio) is a pretty good place to start. From there, depending on your targets/how you do, you can tweak the ratio. If you're getting owned by big ED teams, add more DM. Alternately, though SFBM is tried and true, I've had a lot of success with PL wall with mage shield and base decay + MM mage(like 1/4 HP and the rest MM) + SF (junctioned to the mage ofc). With this strategy, you want to hunt down teams with a lot of DM (usually SFBM), since against a no-enchantment strategy DM is just wasted experience.

It's a rather specialized setup honestly, allowing you to fight very high on the ablative shield attribute list and maintain a challenge bonus well, however you'll be beaten by people far below you.

The setup I'd suggest is hideously simple

You need a Helm of Clearsight and an Amulet of Junction (both should be available in rentals)

I've got a Fire Familiar you can have to reink your tat

All XP gets trained into DM, pretty much forever, eventually you'll need to find a Cornuthaum and some spellboosters as well as a pair of AG or NSC (likely AG).

http://www.carnageblender.com/stats/minion-spells-all.tcl?field=82&title=Ablative+Shield&realm=Gondor

That page has the list of everyone using AS, what you need to look for is targets with low natural HP and little ranged offense. It's a very time intensive process but yields great results.

If you do decide you'd rather just stay a normal single fireball mage, I've always used a much more agressive balance of HP and FB and skipped DM all together since most of your targets will be other single minions with no enchantments.

ratios approaching one part HP to five parts FB are my favorite

So should I spend my entire NUB with a SFBM? Is there some point where I need to get more minions to be able to compete?

The setup I have - FB/DM works relatively well, but it does have its drawbacks. I would consider grabbing a second minion, possibly just for EO/ED spell (Enchanter)

You can buy extra minions at any time. Just remember that you are only allowed to purchase XP in this fashion 3 times throughout the life of your party. So, each time you do so should be very carefully thought out.