Third most challenging class to play SSF

[Troxx]

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

Kind of depends on the era. Hybrids are actually easy SSF. I think I'll go Ranger just because they are shitty indoors and start being terrible at face tanking in the 50's. This limits what items / camps you have available to you.

I'm actively leveling one ... currently 55. Not SSF by any means but I will say that the easy thing about rangers is you can kill anything you can snare. Bow + cheap arrows (summon, bought or self crafted) puts any dark blue on your menu.

The same can't be said for a paladin that is truly SSF.

DPS is low and for solo and if truly self found for gear - even with a full mana bar to root and back off and heal ... it's gonna be painful.

[Keebz]

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

I'm actively leveling one ... currently 55. Not SSF by any means but I will say that the easy thing about rangers is you can kill anything you can snare. Bow + cheap arrows (summon, bought or self crafted) puts any dark blue on your menu.

Bow kiting is inevitable for sure, but it's dicey indoors. My biggest gripe with my Ranger was the poor indoor toolkit in general, but outdoors you kind of rule. Curious how 55-60 goes. That's really when face tanking becomes rough. But as I said before Panic Animal is a thing now so maybe that's the ticket.

Meta question in relation to OP's phrasing—what should we consider "most challenging"? Are we just looking at raw time played leveling to 60 as fast as possible? Ease of killing specific mobs? Is loot acquisition or dungeon crawling a factor? Overall "fun" level?

[eqravenprince]

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

Meta question in relation to OP's phrasing—what should we consider "most challenging"? Are we just looking at raw time played leveling to 60 as fast as possible? Ease of killing specific mobs? Is loot acquisition or dungeon crawling a factor? Overall "fun" level?

Generally, most challenging is how hard it is to grind exp, find exp giving mobs. Wizard while boring to some is super easy to find and kill exp giving mobs and to do long exp grind sessions. Rogue was very grindy in the sense that I needed money for poisons, I needed to camp various equipment to improve my character enough to solo, and lower HP/AC than say a Warrior meant battles were a lot more close, had to flee sometimes to do fluky random damage done by the NPC. Warrior is not as grindy as Rogue as I'm doing just fine in banded and a Blackened Alloy Bastard Sword, haven't needed to grind for coin as I was able to make banded off coin I got just leveling, haven't really needed to camp for items yet. I suspect Paladin will be similar to Warrior, although more camps will be possible with spells they have. SK, I've done a few to 40+ (not SSF), it was pretty much facetank, throw a dot or two, lifetap, and face tank, never did fearkiting. Ranger, not sure, never leveled one past 20.

[Rader]

SK's clearly ahead of the three with FD snare and fear on all mobs
Ranger v Paladin is almost a tie, but in the end, ranger heal sucks and animal mobs very few and far between in 50's you are bound to get into a battle where it is close and you stick with it only to get sucky RNGs on your attacks and die; paladin DPS does blow and it will be slow AF but probably just a bit less challenging

[Baldwooky]

Its not ranger, wow.

Solo self found, eh, ever hear of tracking?

As someone that has mained all hybrids, I can tell you uniequivically that SK is far harder than ranger to solo up and way, way harder to self gear. In fact, rangers are one of the best at self gearing.

I love how FD is some OP tool to some of you. Its not, Harmony is a way better tool to a soloist. SK's have literally 1 way to effectively level, and they do it slowly. Rangers can do that same thing all the way to 60, plus about 10 other things.

But the answer is actually Cleric. And I've soloed one before when neccasary. Once you hit the 50s in kunark, mob HP spikes up, and you basically go OOM on a single blue.
No quadding, no mana regen, no nothing but an undead DD and retribution, which isn't mana efficient enough to even kill mid blues.

Paladin has free self healing at 45. They're out.

Its either Cleric or SK.

[eqravenprince]

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

the answer is actually Cleric. And I've soloed one before when neccasary. Once you hit the 50s in kunark, mob HP spikes up, and you basically go OOM on a single blue.
No quadding, no mana regen, no nothing but an undead DD and retribution, which isn't mana efficient enough to even kill mid blues.

Paladin has free self healing at 45. They're out.

Its either Cleric or SK.

I thought about adding Cleric to the list, but I played a Wizard to 50 SSF and it was extremely easy. Boring to some yes which I could see how some could see that as a challenging, but it wasn't for me. I just watch a lot of TV or play console games in between pulls.

[Keebz]

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

Its not ranger, wow.

Solo self found, eh, ever hear of tracking?

As someone that has mained all hybrids, I can tell you uniequivically that SK is far harder than ranger to solo up and way, way harder to self gear. In fact, rangers are one of the best at self gearing.

I love how FD is some OP tool to some of you. Its not, Harmony is a way better tool to a soloist. SK's have literally 1 way to effectively level, and they do it slowly. Rangers can do that same thing all the way to 60, plus about 10 other things.

...

Paladin has free self healing at 45. They're out.

I have also done both SK and Ranger and find SK much easier, but YMMV. As you pointed out, tracking is definitely nice for picking off outdoor loot. I made my fortune with tracking. That being said pet tracking is also a thing here which has its advantages. I solo'd my peggy cloak on my SK for example.

FWIW, SK has more modes than just feat kiting, though that is a great tool. The attack, tap, attack, etc. is the ole standby, but you can also bow kite just fine with snares, strafing, dots and a pet. There are lower skill caps, but eventually you can get a weighted axe.

Regarding the Paladin free self-healing, presuming you're talking about DW Helm—that drops in crypt in Seb, so you're not getting that.

Ranger on the other hand might be able to cheese Swarmcaller in KC, so that's something.

I might be talking myself into Paladin now, but without having played it beyond the teens I can't say.

[Baldwooky]

Wizards got can solo far easier than clerics solo as soon as they can start quadding. Cleric soloing putters out after 40/45 or so when mob HP gets higher.

Do you know how much faster harmony is vs trying to pull singles with FD?
Its night and day. Sks are basically garbage tier until they can FD. Then proceed to be super mid until 60. They have literally 1 way to solo efficiently.

A ranger could definitely get a Tantors Tusk or Wurmslayer EZ.

[DeathsSilkyMist]

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

Do you know how much faster harmony is vs trying to pull singles with FD?
Its night and day. Sks are basically garbage tier until they can FD. Then proceed to be super mid until 60. They have literally 1 way to solo efficiently.

A ranger could definitely get a Tantors Tusk or Wurmslayer EZ.

Sure, Harmony can be faster at pulling. But bow kiting is slower, and Rangers are going to be facetanking what they aren't bow kiting. Facetanking things on a ranger means downtime recovering HP. Fear kiting saves you on recovery time and kills the mob faster than bow kiting. Both of tese make up for the slower pull.

Wurmslayer isn't better than Swarmcaller, so it isn't too relevant. Just get Swarmcaller from KC. Tantor's Tusk is nice, but very rare, and the process would be extremely slow with bow kiting. I am not sure what you would use Tantor's Tusk on anyway. You basically use bow kiting for anything you couldn't melee, like Tantor, and you would have swarmcaller for mobs that are easy enough to facetank.

[cd288]

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

Sure, Harmony can be faster at pulling. But bow kiting is slower, and Rangers are going to be facetanking what they aren't bow kiting. Facetanking things on a ranger means downtime recovering HP. Fear kiting saves you on recovery time and kills the mob faster than bow kiting. Both of tese make up for the slower pull.

Wurmslayer isn't better than Swarmcaller, so it isn't too relevant. Just get Swarmcaller from KC. Tantor's Tusk is nice, but very rare, and the process would be extremely slow with bow kiting. I am not sure what you would use Tantor's Tusk on anyway. You basically use bow kiting for anything you couldn't melee, like Tantor, and you would have swarmcaller for mobs that are easy enough to facetank.

Yeah I agree with this. Pulling speed isn't really relevant. We're talking about downtime in terms of how fast you can kill once you're engaged and how fast you can be 100% and ready to engage another mob once you've killed the first one. SK will generally be higher than Ranger in all of that.