Advice Wanted: Rusty 54 Necro

[EliteJackson]

Hey all. Hoping for some advice from the EQ experts out here on where I should try to grind out the last of my levels. I'd like to focus on something other than XP gained per session, since watching bubbles sloooowly expand is starting to make me nuts. I'm just returning from a few years away from EQ, so I've avoided grouping so far. Really don't want to ruin a zone's day because I sat at low HP or something.

A spot where I can regain some plat would be ideal. Gaining faction would also be a nice perk, as I currently need to be a skeleton to do any banking in Neriak.

I have read a lot of the guides on the P1999 Wiki, but none of them seem to refer to any Velious zones as potential spots to level. Are the mob HPs too high for effective leveling?

Based on guides, I tried Charasis. It was awesome for soloing, but extremely difficult, and I rarely gained more XP than I ended up losing. I am hoping to find something that's easier to maintain than the basement. A single resist usually meant I had to flee.

Kedge Keep was really cool because it was dead empty, but water pathing is a nightmare, and resulted in a lot of wasted time gating out and starting over. So I wasn't super keen on making that my temporary home.

So I guess my main question is: What are the lesser-known, or perhaps just less popular, leveling spots for necros? Would love to get some advice on some good camps to get back into the swing of the game. I don't have anything crazy in terms of items, but I do have the invis clickable for Necros, which makes some camps more manageable. I'm up for charm-soloing and the like, but would prefer something with a little more forgiveness than HS.

Thanks in advance,
-Hork

P.S. This project and server are just mind-blowingly cool. Big thanks to the people that built and maintain this

[Swish]

The Neriak wine quest should fix your banking woes? If not just stand outside and pan the camera around while in bankable range.

The upper floors of CoM arent bad at 54, maybe a bit scary at first. Also The Hole is usually quiet if you fancy a trip in there, just be careful not to die in an awkward spot :p

Other thoughts:-

SolB
Lower Guk (not sure how many more levels you can do in there)
KC if you want to group and know how to do grouping as a necro (most are happy if you charm a pet for dps)

Also get your Howling Stones key if you havent already, that's necro paradise.

[Tecmos Deception]

HS is about as good as it gets for a necro soloing from 50-60. There's other spots where you can take advantage of charm undead too (KC, especially basement is the biggest one) though. Of course you can root rot or fear kite just about anywhere, but the XP and loot generally won't be as good as if you tuck into a dungeon somewhere and make the enemies do the work for you.

It sounds like you might just need to polish up your game in HS basement. It can be hairy down there until you figure it out, but when you do figure it out you shouldn't have any trouble getting on a role at 54. Without more info on how you were fighting down there, I'd say make sure you keep harmshield and feign death ready at all times, be mindful of pathers and respawn timers, and make the most of the room you have available down there while charming undeads and letting stuff beat each other close to death before you finish them off for full xp.

[Topgunben]

FYI all. Charasis is howling stones.

[EliteJackson]

HS is about as good as it gets for a necro soloing from 50-60. There's other spots where you can take advantage of charm undead too (KC, especially basement is the biggest one) though. Of course you can root rot or fear kite just about anywhere, but the XP and loot generally won't be as good as if you tuck into a dungeon somewhere and make the enemies do the work for you.

It sounds like you might just need to polish up your game in HS basement. It can be hairy down there until you figure it out, but when you do figure it out you shouldn't have any trouble getting on a role at 54. Without more info on how you were fighting down there, I'd say make sure you keep harmshield and feign death ready at all times, be mindful of pathers and respawn timers, and make the most of the room you have available down there while charming undeads and letting stuff beat each other close to death before you finish them off for full xp.

All sources seem to point to HS. Thanks for the tips.

I was trying to charm the undead mobs in basement and use roots and some dots to control the pace. The two steady pathers through the basement did not seem to follow a repeatable pattern. They would wander around the pyramid and stop at various points, sometimes overlapping one another. I sat and watched for maybe 5-10 minutes, and tried to suss out when I'd have the most time to pick a fight. The instant I tried to engage I was resisted and swarmed, so I used FD. But when I stood back up, all the mobs would rush me again, so had to gate out.

It seems like I need to plan on starting with the pathers as my first kills, and need to be able to pick up after an FD, since they appear to remember their aggro. I definitely was able to hold the basement a few years ago when I had been leveling the character steadily, but I can barely remember what all the spells do now. And it's EQ, so you gotta nuke yourself or open the wiki to find out what something does.

I'll dust the sand out of my cooter and give it a few more tries. Thanks all.

[Topgunben]

https://youtu.be/XpjhDVLiQYg

This is a fantastic guide on how to manage the basement in HS.

[kempoguy80]

You may want to consider raptors in TD. Only problem is you cannot bind in the zone, the raptors have a huge aggro radius, theres no loot, and it's kind of out in the middle of nowhere. But, I find it often uncamped and has been decent solo xp even with my 57 mage.

[EliteJackson]

Thanks for posting the video guide. I had read the wiki version, but seeing it helps so much.

Aaaand somehow, not sure how, I have never, ever used the spell Screaming Terror. That seems pretty handy. Can't figure out how I managed to overlook that, I guess I just assumed it was a regular fear spell.

Today I Learned.

[Nuggie]

CoM upper floors are pretty good at your level. the 54 charm works wonders up there. you want a dual wielding greater warboned. you get an occiassional gem. if you want lot and faction you could kill in droga neart the chief camp. stuff there is high green so you should be able to mow it down plus work on your chardok faction.

when you FD, if you have a wanderer aggro you should /q out, if in a safe spot, and come back instead of gating out.

cheers and welcome back

[Swish]

Thanks for posting the video guide. I had read the wiki version, but seeing it helps so much.

Aaaand somehow, not sure how, I have never, ever used the spell Screaming Terror. That seems pretty handy. Can't figure out how I managed to overlook that, I guess I just assumed it was a regular fear spell.

Today I Learned.

It's huge! If you ever want to split 2 mobs, ST Mob A to pull Mob B.... when he's out of aggro range of Mob A, set the pet on him. Then crucially, don't stand up til Screaming Terror wears off Mob A :p

[Spyder73]

I would recommend going to KC and relearning how to charm properly because charming is the easiest solo path you will find.

[Tecmos Deception]

Your issue with FD was that pathers won't auto clear aggro after a FD; you have to get lucky to blur then. Best bet when you FD off pathers is to make sure you only fd in relatively safe spots then /q and log back in to be sure aggro is cleared.

Static mobs, mobs that have a set span loc and stay there, will more frequently blur from a FD as long as you let them wander all the way back to their spawn point before getting up

[Pyrocat]

If HS is too busy try giant fort in BW, stack dots and root rot, use pet to finish off the last 5%. Don't under any circumstance fear kite.

[Bruno]

Thanks for posting the video guide. I had read the wiki version, but seeing it helps so much.

Aaaand somehow, not sure how, I have never, ever used the spell Screaming Terror. That seems pretty handy. Can't figure out how I managed to overlook that, I guess I just assumed it was a regular fear spell.

Today I Learned.

It's a very common oversight, so don't feel bad. There's a lot involved in being able to maximize a necro's potential. The video is a solid guide. If you make it to HS send me a pm on here if you want. I'm retired these days, but I don't mind hammering over and helping you work on some stuff for a bit.

[EliteJackson]

The advice here is much appreciated. I really could not understand how the aggro was working with FD. Howling Stones and City of Mist have been pretty hopping lately, so I have been tucking into less crowded spots.

The giant fort in Burning Wood was fun, super nostalgic. Brings back memories of playing in Warsliks Woods giant fort way back when. Skyfire Mountains was good also, super convenient placement-wise (from the Overthere hammer). Fear kiting and root rotting took a while per kill, and fire stuff doesn't work. But I got to kill dragons, which is always nice, and it provided pretty comparable XP-per-hour to Burning Wood.

Chromodracs...man. Fuck those guys. They are the real fist in the b-hole of the whole Skyfire experience. I am fiddling around with junk buffing and baiting the sons of bitches into spending their time dispelling me, but I can't seem to get them to behave consistently. I need to read up on NPCs, if they're abilities have cooldowns, or if they use mana, or what.

Karnor's is next to give a shot, but that place is so packed all the time, I'm not sure I'll be able to do anything except join a group. And joining groups is for classes that can't suck the juice out of their victims to fuel their spells, amirite?

Thanks for your advice and suggestions, really impressive community of gamers on here. Much appreciated.

[Izmael]

Skyfire HAS to be the absolute worst zone in classic EQ from any standpoint.

[EliteJackson]

Skyfire HAS to be the absolute worst zone in classic EQ from any standpoint.

Killing dragons is basically the point of any fantasy-themed game. I'm not sure what standard it's worst by, but by the "has dragons that I can kill" metric it beats the snot out of any other zone I can find.

[Topgunben]

Skyfire HAS to be the absolute worst zone in classic EQ from any standpoint.

I think most are there for spell drops. Dragons have rediculous hp.

[Nuggie]

In the north part of the zone there is tons of room to fearkite as long as Talendor doesn't spawn.