What's so great about Iksar?

[holsteinrx7]

when i see shaman quadding soloing mobs i cant 1v1 as a sk, i see a jbb being used.

[Tulnavara]

All this talk about whether an ogre or iksar shaman is better is meaningless. Troll is the master race, you're fighting for 2nd place.

[Asap]

Best part of this thread is Sent calling out Chest, needs more quoting imo

[Azure]

Dark elf is the mistress race.

[Taffan]

Tail motherfucken rake.

[holsteinrx7]

hmmm hard choice

[baalzy]

Just to point some things out about the starting stats:
Iksar SK Stats 80str 75sta 90agi 85dex 80wis 85int 60cha
Ogre SK Stats 140str 127sta 70agi 70dex 67wis 70int 42cha

20 points to distribute.
Iksar puts all 20 into sta now has 95sta
Ogre puts 5 into Agi, 15 into Dex for 75agi and 85dex

We all agree that wis/cha/int start values don't matter.

Ogre now has a 60str, 32 sta advantage. 15 agility disadvantage and tied Dex.

Now Warrior (just going to do Str, Sta, Dex and Agi):
Iksar Stats 80str 80Sta 95agi 85dex
Ogre Stats 140str 132sta 75agi 70dex

25 points to distribute.
Iksar puts 25 points into sta giving them 105
Ogre puts 25 points into dex giving them 95

Ogre has 60str, 27sta, 10 dex advantage. 20 agi disadvantage

Or the Ogre puts 15 into dex and 10 into agi to have equal dex and only a 10 point agi disadvantage.


TL;DR Due to bonus points, ogres don't have to worry about dex disadvantages. Their huge starting str/sta make up for it. Agility they clearly lose on, but then how effective is agility for tanking?

[holsteinrx7]

Originally Posted by baalzy [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

Just to point some things out about the starting stats:
Iksar SK Stats 80str 75sta 90agi 85dex 80wis 85int 60cha
Ogre SK Stats 140str 127sta 70agi 70dex 67wis 70int 42cha

20 points to distribute.
Iksar puts all 20 into sta now has 95sta
Ogre puts 5 into Agi, 15 into Dex for 75agi and 85dex

We all agree that wis/cha/int start values don't matter.

Ogre now has a 60str, 32 sta advantage. 15 agility disadvantage and tied Dex.

Now Warrior (just going to do Str, Sta, Dex and Agi):
Iksar Stats 80str 80Sta 95agi 85dex
Ogre Stats 140str 132sta 75agi 70dex

25 points to distribute.
Iksar puts 25 points into sta giving them 105
Ogre puts 25 points into dex giving them 95

Ogre has 60str, 27sta, 10 dex advantage. 20 agi disadvantage

Or the Ogre puts 15 into dex and 10 into agi to have equal dex and only a 10 point agi disadvantage.


TL;DR Due to bonus points, ogres don't have to worry about dex disadvantages. Their huge starting str/sta make up for it. Agility they clearly lose on, but then how effective is agility for tanking?

i believe the AC differential is > the sta differential between ogres and iksar.

the dex and agi on the ogre is piss poor, meaning youll be getting hit more than any other sk, and youll proc less than any other sk. youll also get interupted the most having lowest dex. but hey, ur not getting stunned, i guess?

the str is a bitch for the iksar, and i think is what makes you have to decide between them. personally i will trade str for regen any day of the week. free fungi at 50? yes pls.

the stun immunity would be nice, but its not a game changer on a tank. maybe on a shaman. sks dont MT raids.

the ogre will do 15%ish more dmg than the iksar out of the box, but that isnt noticable until mid 40's and by the ogres not fitting in any dungeon period will be more of a pain in the ass than 15% more dmg from a class that does the least amount of dps in game.

its prefence. but i will say that iksar go from being one of the underdogs to a top dog in velious. the ac bonus, greenmist, and having a regular size/regen, and higher proc rates/cast through basic attack rates/and agi are awesome.

if a iksar sk put 20 points into STA then they are tarded. points should go a few into str and the rest dumped into dex. im personally going 4 agi and 16 dex, or 4 str, 3 agi, 13 dex, as i am using a lot of -agi gear such as rod of mourning and fungi.

do not chase a ogre with ur initial 20 points, you will lose as they have the most stat points avilable early game. you have to bolster the iksar's stregnths and play on those. do you want to be a agile, proccing, cast through basic attacks, sword and board tank with a ac bonus and regen, and a good amount of mana?

or do you want to be a giantic brick wall with 200 more hp and a stun immunity, but get interupted and hit the most, and proc the least? its up to you.

i rerolled from troll to iksar. and i believe troll is better than ogre stat wise, except the -20sv fire.

also i believe that ogres MAY end up aggroing more from being awkward sized. i dont think normal or small characters draw aggro as easily...but does this mean that point blank aoe procs like earthshaker have a larger effective radius? dunno.

at the time of velious release they knew tht the only good sk was a ogre/troll. they wanted to make something that had the lore and the reward for playing a normal sized sk. the DE doesnt have the str, and is classic gear dependent/takes a big hit when vel comes out, and the human eurodite suck. they made a viable alternative with their own gear set, their own epic, lore, everything to compete with the ogre and troll. in this way the iksar became the new sk relative to the ogre and troll, which almost appear to be seperate classes. rarely will the original compete with the next generation.

in this case i would compare them to fuel injected and carbeurator. usually when things superceed something, theyre improved apon. notice that all the weaknesses of the ogre are exactly inverted into the iksar. with full incarnadine gear and many agi/dex items, my troll was only hitting 90 agi and 85 dex after rod of mourning and fungi. o wait, thats what iksar START AT. no incarnadine required!!!!

now if the iksar dumps 15 points into dex and 5 into agi from the start, and the gears ontop of that, youre looking at a HUGEEEEE difference between dex and agi. we're talking 20-40 points difference per stat. and the two things that make me happiest as a sk isnt casting a low lvl spell through an attack round. what makes me the happiest is when the enemy flat out misses me or i when i proc a 6 second 90dd stun. that proc coming up every fight is more important than 15% of my damage, especially in a group instance with rogues and monks. it increases my tanking mitigation much more than another 60 sta. esp since sta hits a cap at 120 or so.

gotta evolve past classic STR/STA war mentality. its a hybrid. use all of ur stats except wis and cha. remember that the iksar is 'balanced' now with all of its penalties. those penalties, along with other hybrid penalties go away in vel. that means the iksar benefits the MOST from the expansion..not to mention greenmist epic/armor, again.

[rgostic]

Originally Posted by holsteinrx7 [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

youll also get interupted the most having lowest dex.

Dexterity is the stat which governs the skill-up rate for the Channeling skill.

The channeling skill is what prevents interrupts.

Additional dexterity does not.

[baalzy]

Originally Posted by holsteinrx7 [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

*snipped*

Agility should be of no benefit for having attacks miss you, it does help with mitigation some but requires large amounts. How agility behaves on p99 is, of course, unknown.
(source: http://www.thesteelwarrior.org/forum...php/t-379.html).

If you're going with 16 starting points into dex then you're 16 points ahead of the ogre (but now 43 points behind on sta) which is actually pretty marginal, it takes more 100 dex to go from 2 procs a minute to 4 procs a minute .. When talking about PvE you get +60 from Shaman buff, another +100 if getting avatar'd and you're capped without gearing or starting points. Without avatar you're looking at 85+60 = 145. Regardless of if you're in Velious or Kunark era you're getting 9+ from your BP. 154dex now. RBB you're looking at +10. 164 dex. Another +5 easy on your arms (planes armor). 169. +7 with gauntlets of fiery might on your hands 176. Looking at +9 or more on your back (CoF, SBC, Cloak of Shadows) for 185ish and make up the last +15 with your sky shoulders. This is with itemization that isn't compromising just to raise your dex letting you use you gear for Hp/Mana/Resists on all your other slots while maintaining a 43 base sta advantage and 60 base str advantage. Throw in that you'll be wearing a NoS (or Velious dragon equivilant) on your neck and you can switch out the fiery might gaunts for anything you prefer. This is assuming a well-equipped (but not uber/BIS) shadowknight.

If you're PvP'ing where you can assume there are no shaman buffs and you're relying on procs to save the day for you then you're doing it wrong, if you're thinking that 16 dex advantage is going to make a noticable difference in interruption rate then I'll ask for some actual proof. Meanwhile, this thread says Dex does nothing for interrupt rates: http://www.eqclerics.org/forums/showthread.php?t=1727. Iksar Regen in PvP is worthy of note however.

TL;DR The AC bonus is the only real advantage an iksar has in PVE and thats extremely dubious on P99, everything else is 1999 noob voodoo mechanics.