Re: Back after 3 year hiatus 11/17/2016 08:34 AM CST
Your shield/parry is quite relevant as well. Assuming they're on par with your armor you can probably do a short stint in rock guardians then hop to Geni. I would lock my skinning in leucros real quick before heading to one of the hunts nearby.
Re: Back after 3 year hiatus 11/17/2016 02:25 PM CST
I would take the time to get shield up to par ASAP....while doing so you could backtrain some extra weapons or something...you really will pay for not having shield at level. Maybe something like gargs right outside of Crossings?
Re: Back after 3 year hiatus 11/17/2016 08:35 PM CST
Seconding this suggestion. I know it sucks now having to backtrain shield, but later on you will heavily regret not having done so. Better deal with it now than years from now when you're looking at 250 backtraining ranks (at high skill levels, which take much longer rank-for-rank than low skills levels) instead of like 100.
Re: Back after 3 year hiatus 11/23/2016 08:59 PM CST
Third and fourth this advice. With the bows the way they are, shield is really handy for protecting you while picking up your arrows and skinning (won't protect you though while loading so do it in hiding if you can).
Also work on your magic. I regret I didn't work it very much before and now that I have come back, our spells are actually nice! And useful!
And welcome back!
Zinaca and her young wolf, Lucky who howls a friendly howl at you
Re: Back after 3 year hiatus 11/27/2016 10:41 PM CST
>(won't protect you though while loading so do it in hiding if you can)
I don't think that's been the case since 3.0 ish? I hunt out in the open against enemies who would train wreck me if I dip my shield defense at all, and I have 6 second load RT's with 4 enemies. I'd never finish a hunt alive if that was the case.
Re: Back after 3 year hiatus 11/29/2016 12:53 PM CST
Yeah, shields work during all parts of using a bow now. I load my bow in the open for a few extra seconds of training defenses, aim, stalk, poach and repeat.
From the few times I didn't get switched to shield stance before pulling my bow out and nearly dying, I know I wouldn't have survived those few seconds while loading if my shield wasn't being used.
Re: Back after 3 year hiatus 11/29/2016 01:27 PM CST
We never quite got an official rundown on how bow and shields interact, but as far as I can tell everything on the wiki bows skill page is accurate; shields work with bow, there is a penalty to one or the other, but that penalty is waived if you are armor secondary (eg, a ranger) or a Paladin and using a small shield (and nobody uses any other kind).
"Warrior Mages don't bother covering up their disasters.
