The Ironman general tips and tricks guide! (this page is currently under construction, I have no idea how to save drafts so ill just keep updating this post until its somwhat presentable, sorry in advance) Hey there fellow ironmen, and maybe future ironmen as well! And welcome to my first ever guide on the forums! Well, i call it a guide, but it might not be as comprehensive. my goal with this post is to write down at least some of the ironman tribal knowledge that is usually just passed around in the guild chat which might be less of a common knowledge outside of the challenge. I'll also try to get into what a new challenger can expect to deal with in the challenge, cool places to grind, things that might help you guys decide on which class would be more enjoyable for you, and maybe what kind of goal you'd want to set for yourself. I'll also share a bit of my personal experiences with hp washing in ironman, and about bossing in general. Because this guide is kind of ambitious, i bet that this post will go through many itterations before i'll be ready to remove the work in progress tag from the title. Btw, i want to include as many tips as possible, so any tip my fellow ironmen would want to share would be awesome Table of (future) contents: General introduction to ironman Tips for quests and lvling Tips for grinding equipments, scrolls, and useful items How to approach choosing a class Comprehensive guide for washing in ironman General introduction to Ironman: This part is directed to either very new ironmen, or players that have yet decided if they want to join the challenge. As you might know, the ironman challenge is a solo experience of the mapleroyals gameplay. You'll grind, quest, farm, gacha, and boss, all by relying solely on your self. No trading, no partying, etc etc. (for more details on the specific rules of the challenge, you should read the ironman post: IRONMAN THREAD) This might be my personal opinion, but the result of these limitations is a far stronger feeling of accomplishment, knowing that everything you've achieved was done through your effort alone. You also get to play and enjoy the early game of royals without gravitating to broken mechanics to skip it like leech, orbis xchange, or feel forced to use these tools because of washing. There's one thing that i'd like to suggest for a new ironman coming in to the challenge, don't assume that all the knowledge you have on the game will translate well into ironman as well, because the limitations of ironman basically create their own different meta. Going quickly over a few aspects of the gameplay that change drastically due to how ironman works: SB availability, getting certain skill books will either be tough, or even impossible depending on your class. We cant realistically kill ht, and zak is no joke. Also, when a boss like pap (which you can only do once a day on ironman) has a skillbook you need, you can find yourself waiting for said skill book for a long time. Item availability, you might take certain scrolls or items for granted when the free market exists. but when you realize that its only common because many people visit that specific gacha, or because that item comes from a leech spot, you'd understand the gap between ironman and non-ironman. Some classes rely on gacha more than others, this might not be a big deal at the start, but the further you are into the challenge, the more annoying it would be for you. Mages can only get their ele-wands in gacha, and 90% of their scrolls as well. Endgame weapons and scrolls for other classes can be locked behind gacha as well. Ironman is not as 4th job centric as the normal gameplay, thinking only about 4th job, when its more likely that most of your time you'll be in 2nd and 3rd, could make you make decisions you'll regret. Ex. Picking a class you like the 4th job of, but hate the 1st to 3rd gameplay of. Tips for quests and lvling: In this segment, you can find many tips that will help you to push through the levels, and which maps and quests will help you on that path. I also added some quests on this list that are simply to good to skip, be it convince, or items that are hard to come by. N.D = notable drops Lvl 1-10: Spoiler: Maple Island Just do the quests in maple island. unless you are a mage, this part will be very short. For mages, i suggest to fully utilize the snail throw skill, remember that each lvl of the skill uses a different snail shell, dont lvl it to lvl 2 and 3 if you still have green and blue shells respectively. You should decide on your general class before starting to put ability points in anything, make sure you'll meet the job requirements. Quests worth doing: mai's training, bari's test, bigss's story on victoria island, Fyi, over lvling wont make you miss out on skill points (not sure if it will make you miss out on hp tho) Lvl 11-30: Spoiler: Lvls 11-30 Lvl 11-14: job giver quests. Lvl 15: i highly suggest to take on all the nautilus quests available in this lvl A bit of a detour, but in NLC, the quiz gives good exp for doing nothing. If you are ok with doing jump quests, this is the quickest way to lvl at 15, as it will probably lvl you twice: do the sleepywood jq, then head for the floating market by talking to spinle, at the top left of the map on a roof, you can turn in the screws you got from the jq for massive amount of exp. While you are in the floating market, it has a quest where you just talk to npcs in the area, free exp for walking? Don't mind if i do. Lvl 15-20: bubblings in kerning. Highly suggested for mages or characters with high enough accuracy. (N.D: 100% cape for int) Lvl 22-30: Sleepywood warning sigs kill quests. Pairing those with grinding in Sleepywood will rush you through the lvls The sleepywood training can be paired with other quests: save 100 zombie mush etcs for the lvl 25 cape quest, save 50 evil eye tails for this quest, and that quest. Lvl 23: Camilia's Gem is a very short quest that will probably give you around 70~80% exp from a few mintues of walking. Very worthwhile. Lvl 25-35: Genin map. I can't stress this enough, this grinding map is amazing, good spawn, and very high exp for the hp of the mob. Located in mushroom shrine, talk to the npcs to the left of the gachapon to reach ninja castle, the map is located inside the building, enter through the broken window on the top left. In the genin map, there's a hidden shop that sells cider, an attack potion that gives 20 att and - 12 acc, max stack is 1. You can get to it by pressing up next to the first banner on the wall. Lvl 31-50: How to approach choosing a class: This is one of the most common dilemmas new ironmen need to face with: "what class should i pick?". Because ironman is such a different gameplay, some aspects of classes get turned on their heads in the context of the challenge. I'll start with a few rules of thumb, then give my personal experiences with all the classes I've played in ironman: This one is the most cliche, but also the most important rule, pick what class you think you will enjoy the most. there's no meaning to meta when you need to solo everything, pick what's fun so that you'd actually stick to the character. 4th job is not everything, think about your other jobs as well and how they are affected by the challenge rules, and how fun are they to play for you Give a check for skill books and where they come from Don't think just about ideal bossing situations, cause you will be mostly grinding, and doing hard solo bosses which are far from ideal, dps charts mean nothing in ironman Each class has its own place to shine. Some excel in small map grind, some in large map grind, some excel in single target bossing, and some in multitarget. Depending on your goals with the challenge, some classes will be harder than others (tho, if you are up for the challenge then god speed to you). Now for a summary of the ironman experience in some of the classes: I/L Mage I/L mages are one of the most stable grinders in ironman, from mid 2nd job to endgame 4th job, they always have good aoe grinding skills. Sadly, due to their reliance on gacha for most of their gear, they don't quite benefit much from their grinding prowess for anything but exp in late game. I/L mages also have the highest 1v1 dps from all the mages, but its nothing to write home about. In terms of enjoyment, the climb to 4th job is a delight, your damage grows well with your lvl, and grinding and questing on an il mage is always fun. I personally feel like the fun ends at 4tj job when you mainly spam blizzard, but that might come from my exhaustion of leechstory. Buccaneer Buccs are the jack of all trades, the swiss knife of ironman. It excels in many aspects of the game: Its relatively tanky, it has a rush skill on 2nd job, aoe kit for grinding in all the jobs from 1st to 4th, insane 1v1 damage in 4th job, and a stance. There are a few drawbacks though, the climb for 4th is not easy, cause early on you might have aoe, but the damage and range is not great. And in 4th jobs, there are many skills to max before you reach full potential, so prepare for the long haul. Marksman The best ranged grinder in ironman, with the drawback of an incredibly lackluster bossing experience. Having access to freezing cannot be understated, its a grwat utility. They also have the big benefit of good maps that consentrate their needed items, and himes that drop crossbow 30%. The thing that holds this class back is the accessibility to the snipe skillbooks, if they had snipe 30, they'd be probably the smoothest range experience of ironman, but HT is oof. Beginner: For those who seek a challenge, and enjoy how the game felt way back in oldschool gms, i highly recommend to give this a go. I personally don't feel any achievement of going beginner normally, cause a large portions of high lvl beginners in this server leech themselves. experiencing the grind on a beginner, at least to me, is exactly the point of playing that class. Comprehensive guide to wash in ironman: So you thought that washing in normal royals is hard? Buckle up you naive fools, as we'll dive to the challenge and options ironmen have in the path to a slightly washed character (in non ironman standards). I'll first start by mentioning that unless you have dumb ironman goals like mine (soloing crazy tough bosses), washing is completely excessive. The majority (and i do mean MAJORITY) of ironmen do not bother washing at all, so if you don't do it, tbh you aren't missing much. First, I'm assuming in this post that you guys are aware of what washing is, and how it is done, as i won't go into it here. You can brush up on it here. Instead, i'll focus on the washing experience on ironman exclusively. (the following suggestions focus on non mage/thief washing, i will add a focus for these two in the end as well) Stage 1: choosing a goal Before you do anything, you must first choose a goal, be it some specific goal like "i want to tank bigfoot melee hits" and "i want 30k hp drk after HB" , or something absurd like "i want to be lowest lvl hero with 30k hp" ( looking at you @Dylanducki) or "i want to show the world that washing an archer to 8k hp before lvl 130 without leech is doable" (looking at you, @LichWiz). You can check this list to see the damage of all the bosses, and decide if you want or even need to wash for them. Also, when you decide to wash, consider that you just doubled the difficulty of your run, be prepared for the long haul. Btw, remember that the hp quest gives you extra HP, which makes certain washing goals more attainable than you might realize. 500 hp for non warriors, 1k for warriors. And with the addition of the repeatable HP quest, you could even round up your HP to a new hp goal if you reach lvl 120. the new system for the hp quest actually make washing almost pointless for ironman now cause its far more attainable to reach high hp, but ill still keep this part in for whomever might be interested Stage 2: planning A washing goal without planning (unless you do really minor washing) is doomed to fail, either by being over ambitious, and leaving you with millions of nx in debt, or by undershooting your goal. I'll start by setting your expectations low, i've voted on my MM for more than half a year collectively, and made her a year ago, which allowed me to get all the event items. But even at my peak int gear setup, my equips gave me 75 extra int. You guy might get luckier with scrolling, but don't expect the int gear to be any good, especially on the lower levels. If i consider how many lvls i had without good int gear, on avarage i might've had 30 int in gear at any given level. That means that base int will be doing the heavy lifting for the most part. You can use the hp washing calculator, but tbh, the calculator assumes you'll take the most efficient path to washing, which is not realistic in ironman, so do take the numbers there with a grain of salt. I personally use the charts in that calculator for my own manual calculations, stuff like your expected hp or what's the min mp at any given lvl is pretty useful. (if you guys are having trouble with calculations i can give you a hand in discord). At the end of the day though, it all boils down to how much base int are you willing to play with until your goal, and if you are willing to put it all at the start (makes 2nd job a slugfest) , or if you prefer to slowly increase it over time (less mp at the end from the same int). After the calculations you will be able to know, roughly, how much nx will you need to wash. You should start saving up so that when you hit your lvl goal, you could at least remove the base int A small tip, i suggest to check every once in a while as you lvl where you are standing, and if you are progressing like you should be, just run the same calculations, but with your newer stats. (insert stats on lvl 1-10 lvling later) Stage 3: gearing up! As i mentioned before, the int gear would not do the heavy lifting in heavy washing, but it will make it vastly cheaper on nx at the end, and also save you the need for crazy high base int as you lvl. Do note that some of the lvling gear needs the weapon or shield slot, so be sure to equip them when you are 99.99% and kill a weak mob or lvl up with a quest reward/orbis exchange exp. (if you have summon, use it for the lvling instead). Equipments you can realistically make/get under lvl 50 : Lvl 25 cape +5 int. The cape can be gained from this quest. I suggest farming the 100% int scrolls for cape in bubblings far ahead of lvl 25, as soon as you can fight there without missing too much. After you get 5, head to sleepywood, and farm 100 zombie mush etc (if you started the kill quest for them, don't turn it to avoid overlvling much) and start the quest. Kill boars for the quest item, and craft your first int gear! Works best when you have X5 base int so it will round it up. Rocky masks at perion drop earring for int 60%, and wooden masks drop 60% int cape at very low droprate. At lvl 3x you'll probably be loaded with base int, so training here while farming these scrolls is not a bad idea. Event items. So pilgrim hat, anni pendants, rings, shiny nose, witch hat, etc etc. Almost all of them give all stats so get them while you can. If you get a 10 slot cape, scroll it with 60% int cape if you have any. Event items are usually available from lvl 30 onwards, if you want to take your time with washing, at least bring your chara to lvl 30 for the events asap. Niche equipment: diao chan sword. Can be gained at cloud fox, questers usually get it from doing the cloud fox quest. Its a good replacement for the wand if you have it, cause unlike the wand, you can actually deal more than 10 damage with it, easier gear to lvl with. Magic sword 60% scroll farmable at Ratatulas (lvl 59). Wand for matt can be gained as early as jr. Gupins, but droprate's crap, tbh not worth to chase this scroll early. Black bandana, basically poorman's int helm. (add info about the +1 all sandal later). White belt, +1 all, only need 200 points, even a low lvl 2nd job can kill the first 4 bosses. So just 50 cycles of that to get the belt. Goes well with easter event's 100% int belt scrolls. Cape for int 60% drops from jr. Grupins, normal and ice sentinels. droprate isn't amazing, but still a good idea to farm a few ahead of time to try for a lvl 50 cape 10 int. Scuba pepe and king blocktopus both drop 10% earrings for int, great way to get the first slot of an earring done Over lvl 50: This catagory splits to two segments, gacha, and non-gacha items. Gacha items: Gachaing aggressively for int gear as soon as possible is a bit counterproductive, if you gacha for better normal class gear, your lvling becomes smoother, and some of the items will serve you later on as well. But if you only focus on int, you'll soon reach a point where ghe nx you "saved" by it being int gear instead of base int, is nx you could've used to strengthen your character massively. Thankfully, for most classes, mushroom shrine strikes a good balance between class scrolls and int scrolls, with the added bonus of CS for the future. But if you want to instead gacha a bit on your class' main gacha, you should go for it, some even have the occasional random scroll or item for washing. Notable items to get in shrine: Ova for int Helmet for int Glove for int Earring for int Wand for ma Shield for ma Cape for int Sword for ma Chaos scroll Non-gacha items: Just to further complicate things, i'll split this yet again, for equips, and scrolls farming spots. Equipments: Some equipments here can be gained before lvl 50, but couldn't be scrolled yet. Green bandana, drops from leprechauns, 10 slots helmet, nuf said Maple shield, at platoon chronos, nuf said x2 Bathrobe from showa hot spring bath, gives any class access to overalls. You can also use you own class' ova, cause all of them have 10 slots. Orange to black dojo belt. +all stats, and also hp on the better belts. I suggest trying for it only after 4th job, unless you are bored or in dire need for that 1 extra int. Scrolls: Once you are at a high enough lvl, camp kimera! This boss drops all 60% capes and all 60% ova, so you can get both int and main gear scrolls, also, never say no to nx! The map of booper scarlion is a solid training spot for lvl 80~, but it also doubles as an easy way to get ova for int 60% if you clear the yabber doos in the ground lvl. Ideally use those on an ova that passed 30% on the first slot. (bonus, boopers drop 10% cape int). Sage cats and mr. Alli are both good mobs to farm the 60% earring for int scrolls Ratatulas drop sword for ma 60%. If you went for the niche sword int gear build, this place is the only realistic way to finish your weapon. Stage 4: The end of washing You've collected enough mp to wash to your goal, now what? I suggest getting one apr, and using it to see in its UI what's your current base hp and mp is (it won't show the hp/mp you get from equips), dont worry, that doesn't spend the APR. Now that you are sure you reached your goal, you have two options: Wash int out first, then wash mp to hp (over time or immediately depending on your saved up nx) Your other option is furthering your wash, if you find lvling still easy with your int, and you believe you can push a few more levels, then why the hell not. Congratulations, you're now a washed ironman! Notes for thiefs and mages: For thiefs, as you may already know, your washing is kinda different, to wash efficiently you must put a fresh ap to HP. That factor will dictate the pace in which you'd lvl, as you will need to use a few aprs every time you lvl once you reach the point where its necessary to do so. This together with spending nx might slow you down at times or have you train with unused ap. For mages, just playing normally will give you a lot of mp. You can just wash some of it to hp whenever you feel like, no planning needed. Just calculate hpw many aprs you need and you good to go.
