Monk or Ranger for soloing melee?

[Ivory]

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

I appreciate your enthusiasm for archery, but where you are getting unlimited arrows and mana?

Sit and med between shots...with the med button its superrrr annoying till 35 on green, but once you get 35, med up and pew pew pew.

Ranger spells largely are small mana costs, so they can really spam stuff.

Also....no archer in their right mind tries fletching their arrows for regular hunting. Early on if you REALLY need to pinch your pennies, then sure (like I did on my early ranger on green)....but once you got some extra plat, then you just buy all your bags filled.

I carry like 7 bags of 8 slots with arrows..... which is about 1120 arrows....

That can last a few hours easily. But knowing arrow merchant spots (they are all over) is important for archers. Commons, kith, several karanas places, akanon, kelethin, ogok, and so on and so on.

And I'm not an absolute purist....when EXPing , you wana take advantage of all you got....so now and then just go melee a blue, and go arrow kite while recovering HP. Melee is a little faster, but the thing is the massive downtime associated with throwing tons of HP at something as it bashes you around. That's why archery shines so much for soloers, because they can just keep going.....and if they gets ads, it doesn't matter, because they can kill it as long as they have arrows.

Though the AE kiting once you get 15 is the most efficient way to hunt. The extra damage per mana is reallyyyyyyy good. You are getting like 3 damage per mana, that is better ratio than anything else soloing anything else (unless it is a wizard or druid quad kiting, but they don't do that till later because they can't go all the way with their mana.....rangers don't need to rely 100% on their mana is what makes them shine there).

Monks don't have the option to go farm giants for plat ....you won't find them taking down the entrance giants at permafrost or doing seafuries much..... but rangers can. Sure, not as great as a necro plowing through them for cash, but at least rangers can hang out in the same room as the top tier soloers...... monks are much more limited.

Oh, and that's still not even mentioning tracking! Ranger tracking is GODLY for if you are doing many many many things. Ranger tracking alone is insane for awareness of a zone and knowing where your targets are (so later if you are doing kunark quests or getting various keys....rangers are godly...or even just walking through a zone and hitting your "what's up right now" button to snag a rare as you pass by).

[Ivory]

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

Ranger is fun but fletching arrows constantly hurts my hand.

Don't fletch your own arrows unless you really need to save money. So many merchants that sell a stack of arrows for 1 gold 8 silver. So 100 arrows for 9 gold.... early on that can be a lot, but once you are about level 10 and can go cheese some giants...money stops being such a problem.

Or go take down the mino hero and get a bracer and sell it for a couple hundred plats (again, you can do this really early with a couple other low levels and a sow if you have a bow).

A poor ranger is a ranger that doesn't use a bow :P

[solleks]

I love your archery fanaticism ivory

[Mercius]

idk how contrarian you would have to be to enjoy the most broken and useless systems in the game

there is nothing fun about kiting a mob for 40 minutes with sow while you attempt to shoot 9 damage arrows at it

[Ivory]

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

I love your archery fanaticism ivory

Archery and arrows is like dreams....anything is possible if you gottum!!!!! [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

[Fireblade7]

I’m a little confused here and getting 2 mixed messages.

Trueshot bow quest is easy. But it’s trivial at 225.
Don’t make arrows, just buy them from vendors. But then how do I get my fletching up? (Also I’m at like 56 and it’s taking forever and starting to get expensive)

[Widan]

Get it up to like 150 and farm for multiple combines

[Ivory]

Originally Posted by Fireblade7 [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

I’m a little confused here and getting 2 mixed messages.

Trueshot bow quest is easy. But it’s trivial at 225.
Don’t make arrows, just buy them from vendors. But then how do I get my fletching up? (Also I’m at like 56 and it’s taking forever and starting to get expensive)

A) NEVER shoot your own arrows past the very basic ones unless you need special arrows for something special (like high ranged for staying out of range of a dragon or kiting a caster).

2) You don't gotta craft your own trueshot....getting fletching up JUST for a trueshot really isn't worth it. Just buy a trueshot or have a fletcher with high skill do the combine for you (they still need a few parts of their own, but if they are that high of a fletcher...then chances are they have extra parts or you can help them farm up some extras to do it).

[YendorLootmonkey]

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

Get it up to like 150 and farm for multiple combines

This. The only reason I can justify skilling up fletching past that is to go all the way to 200+ to make Trueshots reliably enough to convert to Rain Callers to sell.

[YendorLootmonkey]

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

...(archery is all the rage, etc)...

I get all that, and I've done it in a pinch to save my own ass, but why would anyone subject themselves to all that if they can just grab some friends/guildmates and group up?

I really don't want to be a naysayer because as a ranger I respect the bow, but it wasn't really *efficient* until EQ/AM3... maybe I got spoiled in Luclin on Live. Hopefully as an archery aficionado, you got to experience that -- if not, it would have blown your mind. [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

But i feel like you are over-hyping here... it takes a very patient glutton for punishment to exclusively solo the way you are describing. At least I personally feel like it would be.