Hi there! I've returned after some time away and I'd very much appreciate input on whether I should invest on damage or crit padding for what I plan to be my character's long term armor. I have some basic 4x vultite half-plate (with 2x armor training) that is near and dear to my character for RP reasons, and now as I begin to approach cap (currently low 80s) I'm interested in beefing it up, particularly through grit and perhaps Duskruin eventually - though I'm hoping I can squeeze in a few services from the WPS wagon before it leaves tomorrow (I only have ~3-4 million to spend at the moment).

My warrior pretty much just swings a claid and a maul, but he has some training in brawling as well (~1.5x on the way to 2x), but mostly for flavor/RP as a holder over from being a long-time Voln Master that used to kick on undead situationally. Also, as a dark elf, his health total of 175 - even including CMAN Toughness - feels a little light. Though I find he seems to die in roughly equal amounts to both HP loss and crits (outside of my own mistakes or bad luck). He tends to hunt solo, both undead and normal critters when possible - I'd prefer he be well-rounded as a trade off for being optimized for either type. I'm a patient hunter, and not afraid to run when things go sideways, so I guess I lean towards damage padding, but I'm not sure what's to come.

So I guess I'm wondering what I should expect at cap? Is there is a decided benefit towards either crit or damage padding at cap and post-cap hunting? Or are there common pros and cons to each I should be especially aware of?

Bonus question: I find that I have enough grit for to add a service myself right now. With that in mind, is it more economical to add that prior to the WPS wagon service? Or is getting the service done via the WPS wagon first a better choice?

Thanks for any thoughts and advice!

Personally, I put adding flares to my armor ahead of padding. The magma flares I added to my warrior's plate at the EG auto-flarer aid her survivability a lot more then adding padding to what's already very effective armor would have.

Starchitin, the OG

A severed gnomish hand crawls in on its fingertips and makes a rude gesture before quickly decaying and rotting into dust. A gust of wind quickly scatters the dust.

::perks up:: Do you recall which auto-flarer merchant that was? And do you mean that you just talk to the npc and they put the flare on the armor? Does it work with shields and weapons as well? Anything I can do where I don't have to interact with a GM run merchant is something that I prefer. I've far to many bad memories of the antics and crap that gm run merchants have pulled over the past thirty years to make me seek them out. It's why I wish the premium point system worked a bit differently, I love using it to alter my items, mostly it's small changes here and there.

<Do you recall which auto-flarer merchant that was? And do you mean that you just talk to the npc and they put the flare on the armor? Does it work with shields and weapons as well?>

The half-krol NPC close to the entrance of EG if I remember correctly, bring him a token for the flares you want (either get them from various games or buy one from a player) and he'll add flares to your item in exchange for seashells (the alt currency of EG). Works with anything that'll take flares, so weapons, shields, armor, and (I believe) accessories. Tokens for a good variety of flare types can be found, including a couple exclusive to EG, but the more desirable ones can get quite expensive on the secondary market (anywhere from 1m for cold flares to 40+m for dispel flares). The seashell cost can also get prohibitively expensive pretty fast depending on the properties of the item, so I'd do this before adding any type of functional script (ex Bubble flares) if this is the way you want to add flares to something.

I should also note the HESS at DR sells certs that can be used to add various flares to gear. This is going to be less expensive then EG for items that are already extensively improved and/or scripted, but more expensive then EG for items that have only been improved a moderate amount or less. You can also use premium points and (I think) one of the other regular events to add flares to things, but I have no idea how those costs stack up against EG/DR.


<Also, I, too, would prefer to use an auto-flarer than to muck about in the chaos of a merchant. Is that an EG-exclusive, or has it been know to show up at other events?>

The Auto-flarer is exclusive to EG


<I'm actually considering having my armor ensorcelled too in order to mitigate the spell deaths, though I'm not sure the +10 CvA is worth the expense and hassle.>

This depends on how well you tend to get warded by what you're hunting. If the endrolls max out around 150 or less you'll prolly notice quite a bit of improvement.... the higher above that, the less you'll appreciate it though. Note that a LOT of CS spells use the enroll to determine how hard you're hit by them, so while +10 might not prevent them from hitting you, it does have a good chance to reduce the severity of the hits (though if you're mostly seeing endrolls of 200+, that's prolly just academic).

Starchitin, the OG

A severed gnomish hand crawls in on its fingertips and makes a rude gesture before quickly decaying and rotting into dust. A gust of wind quickly scatters the dust.

I would look at how you typically die and take the padding that would most mitigate that. Do you die from your health being taken down to zero from multiple hits or are you instantly killed by critical strikes.

>> When my warrior dies, it's almost always because a spell either out-right kills her or incapacitates her long enough for a group of critters whittle down her health to 0. Either way, I don't think any amount of either type of padding would save her most of the times it's happened.

Interestingly I think either could help you here. Crit padding could potentially mitigate the severity of how long you are incapacitated (thus allowing you to escape before death) or on the flip side damage padding could allow you to survive longer, potentially outlasting your incapacitation and being able to escape.

For my capped characters and my play style (I have two now), they nearly always die from a critical (instant kill) strike and almost never die due to loss of all health. So for these characters, critical padding seems the most beneficial option for me.

-- Robert

From the pitch of the vibration you determine that the purpose of the shield is as a shield.

>Interestingly I think either could help you here. Crit padding could potentially mitigate the severity of how long you are incapacitated (thus allowing you to escape before death) or on the flip side damage padding could allow you to survive longer, potentially outlasting your incapacitation and being able to escape.

>For my capped characters and my play style (I have two now), they nearly always die from a critical (instant kill) strike and almost never die due to loss of all health. So for these characters, critical padding seems the most beneficial option for me.

My level 60 warmage (I call him a reduxmage since he's sitting around 15.5% redux) tends to die from health loss wearing his studded leather. 180-some health doesn't last long when a small group of bandits or critters gets you knocked down and stunned. Taking 10-25 health a shot while you're stunned a few rounds, the heath loss can kill you quick. He's got +7 CER crit padding (5 from spell 520 and 2 on the armor itself + more from 520 Earth being active if he is stunned) and he's also got +6 CER damage padding on it. I find it nice when, even though he's knocked down and taking hitsthe damage padding helps from getting whittled down so fast, hopefully allows him to stay in the fight long enough to recover and continue fighting or run away.

Personally, I would work on adding some damage padding and at least a few ranks of crit padding, too. Once you have your armor at a level of padding you're happy with, enchant level your happy with and if even found flares to add to it, then start looking for folks to ensorcell it for you. Save ensorcell work for last.