Class/Skill Rework Destroyed Park 2 to make solo AM leech more viable

Great discussion, if anybody would like to add anything or suggestions for a new feedback thread, I will begin that tonight after work and gym and have this one locked. Let me know what everybody is looking for in a farming area.

 

The requirement to actually kill 999 mobs * x maps will limit the usage of ToT maps as leech sites to a minimum degree. People might self leech but if one is buying leech for the sake of fast living, going through those quests would be the last option they'd choose when other options are available.

Mobs in Road of Regret always had a better drop table than oblivion mobs, including items like Red Craven and Female warrior skirt. Back when ToT was still regarded as a viable grinding site, most players preferred RoR over oblivion for income unless they prioritized exp. Recently, Oblivion mobs received additional drops that may attract more interest from I/L mages. I think the 2 roads are pretty balanced as of now in terms of drops.

If one spent a while grinding at ToT with one's mage, it's wouldn't have been difficult to notice the biggest obstacle from making a good income. The Eye of Time mobs, due to their tiny body size, are protected from the mage ults if they are below the platform the mage char stood on. Their survival adds a serious delay in the grinding routine. If their positioning or hitbox can be reworked (or if most of them are replaced by monk/guardian mobs), with telecasting, ToT may produce decent NPC income even when compared with ulu maps.

Exploring new maps such as Neo Tokyo is definitely a great direction but I feel that only super late game mages with heavy investments will benefit from this area. If we are discussing a good grinding spot for "AMs" to match bishops who start leeching from a very early stage, I believe it should include middle-tier AMs who are still working toward their high TMA goal. With that in mind, I think ToT is still the best option with the least amount of rework in need.

 

Fair points. If anybody has a rough mesos/hour rate to have hard data that we could work from, I would be interested. In my limited time at ToT, the money was very poor in comparison to other, easier to access options.

 

I remember when I first made my il mage I was told that at some point, mages lose their purpose since they can't boss so after you 1 hit petris that's the end of the road for your character. At the time I hated being told that because I was highly attached to my mage. Not long after getting it to 130 I was able to 1 hit ulu2. I started selling ulu2 leech so I could afford to fund it enough to 1 hit petris, which was MW20 (2.15b), shield (1.35b), glove (1.3b), earrings (1.3b), htp (200m), int eyewear (700m), int leaf (150k nx=750m), int overall (600m), int shoes (100m), wand (self-scrolled but around 1b?). Unlike lower level petris sellers, I was 155. I sold 3-4 hrs and then stopped because my mage had lost its purpose and existed only to sell leech. I downgraded my gear, selling any gear that got my mage over the 1260 tma threshold because it was pointless to have extra tma. As they prophesized, my mage had lost its purpose.

About half a year later was when trio duku came out. I had a lot of friends with lower level mages (140-150ish) that aspired to 1 hit petris/skeles, but with the new meta they used their mage to leech up 3 new ones and abandoned their higher level mage. This is what leechstory has done to us mages: your sole purpose is to sell leech so adapt to whatever the current leech meta is. Stop levelling yourself or your buyers don't want you anymore. Buy the everstone because the lower the level, the more attractive the seller. Just get to 130 for max bliz/meteor and wand5/7. Doesn't it sound so backwards that you spend months of time and 10b raising up your mage to sell end-game leech just for you to realize that real endgame leech is making 2/3 new ones to sell trio duku, as my friends have done? It was mentioned before but mid-tier mage gear prices have plummeted because no one needs it anymore since you can sell your 250m/hr leech with barely any gear. The same shield I bought for 1.35b is now worth 800m, the earrings worth 800m, the overall worth 400m. And my 164 mage... is just my latest fm mule.

Sob story aside I don't think it was ever intended for AM's sole purpose to sell leech and be useless outside of that purpose. I have tried to farm earring str 60s when it first came out and got 10 of them in 45 min if anyone is curious. I have also farmed mossy mushrooms for ellin pre and I think they drop helm dex 60 and earring int 10, but neither scroll is worth much. My AM has also helped my shad and my bish do NT prequests, but with 1290 tma and tanky mobs, 2/3 hit is terrible for farming honestly. In these 3 cases, mesos definitely isn't as good as selling 1 hit petri or 1 hit skeles so again, my mage has no purpose if I don't want to sell leech.

Also, to the person that wanted bishops to get a boost, why? They get free leech because of hs from lvl 81 onwards. 2 randoms gave me bf leech for max hs and you can duo himes with cb/dk or get leeched by an AM. Bishops can sell low level leech without any gear. That's 80m/hr just because you got to lvl 120 and did htpq for gen. Before trio duku, AM had to get to 130 to 1 hit ulu2 AND make a hs mule to sell ulu2 leech. Also, no one will think badly of you for levelling your bishop because maybe your bishop is a HT bishop. But AMs? We'd be asked why tf we levelled them and didn't just stay at 130 like we should have as a trio duku mule, because that's how we're supposed to progress in the current meta right? But seeing as you're happy with the trio duku meta, it makes sense that you'd still want bishops to reap even more benefits (in addition to being the only mage that can zak/krex/ht/dojo/etc, and selling skeles leech at similar prices to petris without the hs mule situation) since low level leech bishop requires a similar amount of effort as making one of the three mages in trio duku.

 

"In discussion" you say...

 

Hopefully because they know leeching is a disgusting mechanic and they aren't going to encourage it by specifically changing the layout of a map so you can get better meso/hour, instead of adding content that people who actually play the game can enjoy. But that's just my 2 cents~

 

You don't have to leech. You can leech/sell leech and also "play the game". The change to DP2 was a suggestion to equalize the power of trio Duku and single AMs.

That being said, with trio Duku eliminated and Ulu still being nerfed, I'm curious to see what exactly the future for Archmages will be. Bossing is a no go, and any new viable farming/leeching spot gets nerfed to the ground. Seems we've regressed to 2013 where AMs are mostly pointless and Bishops are the only viable mage route once again.

 

stopper farm mule

 

Bishop can do that in 3rd job

 

Duku was reworked to give AMs a place to shine just because Bishop is actually usefull everywhere and comparing to them, they haved no place to shine(Shure petris and leechers with hs mule were better, but still) so, hey just killed their work and bring back AMs to darkness...i do not understand. Yes maybe trio duku was too much, but raise the lvl to 115 for example, or fix the respawn and add more mobs(so you have to make 3 really powerfull AMs to 1 hit) wasnt a better option than just straight up killing it?

 

Quoting my comment from another thread; I think there is definitely an opportunity to modify Dukus so that it can become a place for arch mages to shine, encourage players to truly level their mages, and create a market for end game / perfect mage equips

 

I would imagine so, ToT might be worth it as well with the drop buffs but haven't tested.

 

Great suggestion. As a matter of fact, I would love to see a new method for the solo AM mage (that requires actual funds and efforts) but I am traumatized by the trio duku (even though I was a seller myself). DP1 will still be viable to the trio duku if the platform is "flat" out imo. The mages still can 2 hit duku before getting stunned. So far I don't really have a good idea on encouraging the AM mage play without reviving the trio mages meta

 

A farming spot with exclusive drops locked behind high TMA requirements and elemental weakness. Basically a better ToT.

 

I remember seeing someone suggested Neo Tokyo mobs. Do you have any suggestion on it? I’m thinking about the pre-nibergen map where it has a very good spawn and map layout and safe spot. I am not sure about the exp/hr or whether if high TMA mage can 2hit or 3 hit the mobs
Or people don’t wanna buy leech at late level I assume

 

1 hitting is virtually impossible, 2 hit would still require absurd funds, meaning they would need to provide double the exp of a 1 hit map like Petri to be worth it. They are also far too high level to be worthwhile. Mages aren't really useful in Neo Tokyo. I can farm faster on my Buccaneer.

 

I'm not in favor of making Neo Tokyo a farming place for mages. Neo Tokyo drops (especially silver coins) are the only drops not being farmable by mages so far. Furthermore, certain maps are great for grinding on non-mage classes (e.g. Mavricks - map before Nirbergen), giving people not participating in the bossing/leeching-meta the chance to make decent exp/meso. Opening the maps for mages would just turn them into silver coin farming spots (someone mentioned 100 coins/hours). Especially with the layout of the Mavericksmap, it would be an easy one to hog multiple channels (I know, lots of funding would be needed to kill them efficiently, but let's be serious, this won't be much of a barrier for those in favor of these changes)
I'd rather suggest reworking Dukus or increasing single target damage to make mages more viable.