simple question ... what do you think is the best class to level solo? (i played L2 way way way back in the day and im gonna be playing it again for a while, but i dont really remember much of the details)
taking into account both survivability and quick/efficient killing
i prefer melee classes so lets divide the question into best caster/ranged, and best melee
is summoner melee in the sense that they have no damaging spells so they auto attack with a melee weapon, even though they dont have special melee attacks either?
what about a warrior/rogue type class, one designed to use melee abilities? which would be the best of them?
Their pets do most of the damage, thats why they are melee.
Some pets have spells, but most of the time u will be meleeing mob with the pet (some elemental summoners choose to AOE mobs with their pet, since it has a aoe water attack).
warrior/rogue classes needs buffs to solo, hence they dont solo so good.
Summoners get some buffs for pets and bishop-like heals.
Their pets do most of the damage, thats why they are melee.
Some pets have spells, but most of the time u will be meleeing mob with the pet (some elemental summoners choose to AOE mobs with their pet, since it has a aoe water attack).
warrior/rogue classes needs buffs to solo, hence they dont solo so good.
Summoners get some buffs for pets and bishop-like heals.
so summoners pretty much just summon a pet and then melee mobs, with the pet doing most of the damage
would it be advantageous to get heavy armor and a nice patk weapon for better meleeing, or would that be a bad idea for some other reason?
I've not ever played a summoner myself, but what I can tell you is that a summoner is like several characters rolled into one. The summoner character itself is basically a buffer/healer for it's pet. The pet is a DD/Tank all in one. Many summoners like to get a good weapon and assist the pet with killing the mob, but the pet will always do more damage than the summoner.
You have several summons to choose from, some of which are better for pvp (and steal tons of xp if you use them in pve), others are better for pve (steal less xp.) Each summon is a little different and has different strengths. I believe someone already mentioned that ES has a unicorn that can use spells to AOE.
One good thing they've done for summoners is add party buffs. These are somewhat similar to BD or SwS buff, in that it affects the whole party and only lasts a short period of time. This was a good addition for summoners because previously, they were excluded from most parties. Since they added this, it's quite common to see warlocks in archer parties or ES in mage parties.
If you really want to know more about summoners, go to the Dark Elf Mage, Elf Mage and Human Mage forums. There are several good threads on each of them about the different summoners.
As far as your traditional melee classes go, none of them are going to be a blast to solo without buffs. This game is heavily buff dependent, which is why so many people dual box and why people are recommending summoner to you - it's the only DD class that can pretty much buff "itself" (by buffing it's summon.)
Now if you were planning on dual boxing, the recommendations would be quite a bit different; something like a Tyrant/WC duo or Glad/SE duo.
i first made an L2 account when it launched 4 years ago, i played for a few months then quit, i came back a couple years ago and forgot my pw and hint and all that stuff so i made a new account (the one im playing now) then i quit shortly thereafter again
now im trying to retrieve the info from my original account, so when i get it back i may dual box, i dunno
as far as summoners go, is there significant difference between the dark elf, elf, and human version? or are they pretty much the same?
also, a few people have said spellhowler is the best caster class for soloing
since spellhowler and phantom summoner are both dark wizards, should i level to the second class change as if i were going to be a spellhowler (buying and using nukes) even if im gonna go PS, or should i level if im going PS (buy and use summons) ???
because ive noticed with my other characters that i dont really have enough skill points to buy every skill
btw, sorry for the nub questions, it so much easier to ask my question than it is to spend endless hours searching other threads for things that only sort of tell me what i want to know
The three classes share a basic set-up, but they are actually quite different from each other.
Warlock: Probably the most widely played summoner, these guys summon kitties to do their bidding. They have a nuking cubic that is somewhat useless and an anchoring cubic that is very useful. The Nuking cubic is also their party cubic. Their main grinding summon is Kai who has passive reflect damage and can summon Kat to recharge their MP. Their PvP summon is pretty generic. The party summon is Queen and she has a focus/Death Whisper buff that stacks with all other buffs. In Gracia Queen will also get two new party buff, but I can't recall what they were. Basically, Queen will be a mini prophet.
Warlocks can use Windwalk, Shield, Magic Shield, and Haste to buff their summons.
Elemental Summoner: Elven summoner get two useful cubicsm the healing cubic, which heals anyone in your party, and the ice cubic, which causes your enemies to bleed over time. The ice cubic is their party cubic. They have a generic PvP summon like the Warlock (it has a simple nuke) and Unicorn Boxer can be summoned to recharge them. Their party summon is Seraphim, she has party buffs that remove debuffs and help regenerate magic. In Gracia, Seraphim will get a new party buff that gives clarity, empower, wind magic, and acumen all rolled into one buff. Finally, Merrow is their PvE summon and comes with a nice AoE water nuker, many elemental summoners will do AoE grindingwith merrow instead of single-mob grinding.
The Elemental summoner buffs are: Empower, Shield, Magic Shield, and Haste.
Finally the Phantom Summoner: Propbably one of the least-played of all the summoners, these guys are a little different from the other two. The Phantom summoner will be very different once Graica comes. Well, they have a stunning cubic and a debuffing cubic. The debuffing cubic is their party cubic, the best party cubic of any summoner class. They have Shadow who, instead of being able to recharge their master has passive Vamperic rage, so he is a good solid tank to grind with. Shilouette is their PvP summon and has a drain health nuke instead of a normal damage-dealing nuke. Soulless is their grinding summon and has an AoE posien attack and an AoE corpse burst that is useless. He used to drain the summoners MP when summoned, but in Gracia this will be removed. Nightshade is their party summon. He has AoE curse gloom/hex, he can hate and has higher Pdef and Mdef than other summons so he can tank. However, Nightshide is more commonly used as a healer, he has a heal skill which sacrifices his HP to heal other players like a Paladin. In Gracia nightshade will be given a Focue/Deth Whisper. Guidence party buff.
The Phantom Summoner can buff their demons with Might, Shield, Magic Shield, and Haste.
In Graica the Phantom summoner will also be given Death Spike (at a lower power) and posien. So, this summoner will be able to nuke as well as summon, making it ver different from the other two summoners and better at PvP.
This is a short over view of the summoners, if you want more details, look at previously posted in formation in past threads.
simple question ... what do you think is the best class to level solo? (i played L2 way way way back in the day and im gonna be playing it again for a while, but i dont really remember much of the details)
taking into account both survivability and quick/efficient killing
i prefer melee classes so lets divide the question into best caster/ranged, and best melee
kamael toons like berserker and soul breaker are easily to solo without a buffer. soul breaker are a mix of ranged and melee, while berserker are melee only. both have good self buffs, but remember to carry pots, they don't have lots of hp, but when u can 1 hit mobs it hardly matters
kamael toons like berserker and soul breaker are easily to solo without a buffer. soul breaker are a mix of ranged and melee, while berserker are melee only. both have good self buffs, but remember to carry pots, they don't have lots of hp, but when u can 1 hit mobs it hardly matters
If you play without a dual-boxed buffer I believe summoner will be faster than anything else. If you dual-box, then I would suggest a mage (spellhowler, spellesinger, necromancer or sorceror).
The problem with summoners is that they are EXPENSIVE. Beast shots, and crystals to summon them and the cubics. SH is a good soloer that can get by with crap armor, a good weapon and shots.
Pls make a new summoner on Luna, try to make money on it, and you will see just how easy it is.
60 minutes of grinding on light blue mobs for adena=600-700 adena (1 d crys).
A summoner can wear devotion set all the way to 75 if they want to and xp in safe areas (devotion set is like 60k or so in shop.)
Summoners are expensive if u want to lvl fast, and use cubics all the time.
They are one of the cheapest classes to make money with.
At lvl 56 with SE+PP buffs on my PS I could kill a room in first wave in Apostate using no shots, keeping the spawn down, and even waiting a few secs for next mob. Can u imagine how much money I could make using the 1 dcrys summon to do that? Not to mention the time it would take before I forcefully outgrow that place due to lvl?
Edit: My buffers weren't their current lvl back then either, my PS xped my prophet so they were roughly the same lvl. And I only had VR3 on ITMT.
I don't know if it's the best but for me my SR worked all right. Judging by what other people say regarding their xp rate I'd say a SR levels up quite fast. I think I did, up to 65. 95% of the time solo, only with self-buffs on and being in D grade armour till I was mid B-grader. You will only need good bows as you go up, and if you kite a lot you will not have to worry about healing potions.
I think you guys are missing the "solo" part here. Solo does not mean with a SE and PP. It doesn't mean with a OOP SE/EE/SwS/BD either. Imagine if you were really starting over as a brand new player with NO assets or friends. A SH would still be 2-3 shotting mobs even in semi junky gear up to 60 (devo/karmian and a +3 homu).
Im not basing summoner on oop buffs. PS does fine on self buffs. Even in crappy gear.
And its not expencive. U either do xp mode or adena mode.
Just because I have the buffers doesnt mean I've never tried solo.
My PS could solo catacombs with ease without oop buffs. Not when mobs are yellow and white, but when they are green and light blue. It's still good xp.
Im not basing summoner on oop buffs. PS does fine on self buffs. Even in crappy gear.
And its not expencive. U either do xp mode or adena mode.
Just because I have the buffers doesnt mean I've never tried solo.
My PS could solo catacombs with ease without oop buffs. Not when mobs are yellow and white, but when they are green and light blue. It's still good xp.
past 58, yes.
40-58 is a BIT hard with just self buffs either nuking, or summoning.
and no, tried the NG gear thing, takes forever to kill a 2x mob self buffed. and THEN you got to heal.