Gideon is BACK! A discussion in another thread led me to thinking about skills, their powerlevel and utility, and the various activities and templates for those activities in our beloved sandbox UO:Renaissance. Below is a series of character template options I've explored over my time here. Feel free to chime in, make suggestions and criticisms, and provide feedback on your experiences! This is a work in progress. Stay hyped UO:R! Tamer-Disco: - Template: Taming, Animal Lore, Veterinary, Discordance, Musicianship, Magery, Meditation - Class Summary: Taming + Discordance allows you to significantly debuff monsters which increases the dps and durability of your pets at the cost of durability of the player. - Thrives in scenarios where single target dps is needed. Fares poorly against multiple npc or pc enemies. - PvM Open world and champ: ✮✮✮✮Best Class for gold per hour - you rek most monster types easily. - PvM Battle Mining: ✮Not effective. I've found the pets to be frustrating versus golems and elementals. - PvM: Amibs, Level 7s, and Xmas Scrolls: ✮✮✮Strong and efficient but pull mobs one by one. - PvM Halloween Instance Event: Useless. - PvM Tracking Events (Xmas Overworld, Easter): Useless unless combined with a tracker. - PvP Field Fights, IDOCs, Factions, Order vs. Chaos, Guildwars: ✮Not optimal as you are extremely vulnerable to dumps. - PvP CTF: Useless. - PvP Tournaments: Useless. - Stealing: Useless. - Rare Hunting: As effective as any other non stealing/hiding class. Certain rares are inaccessible without stealing. - Crafting: Useless. Tamer-Provo: - Template: Taming, Animal Lore, Veterinary, Provoke, Musicianship, Magery, Meditation - Class Summary: Taming + Provoke allows you to crowd control which increases your dps and durability of your pets at the cost of durability of the player. - Less single target dps but you gain the ability to crowd control. Fares poorly against pc enemies. - PvM Open world and champ: ✮✮✮Great Class for gold per hour - you destroy most monster types easily. - PvM Battle Mining: ✮Not effective. I've found the pets to be frustrating versus golems and elementals. - PvM: Amibs, Level 7s, and Xmas Scrolls: ✮✮✮✮Amazing Template as you can control additional monsters to keep your pets safe. - PvM Halloween Instance Event: Useless. - PvM Tracking Events (Xmas Overworld, Easter): Useless unless combined with a tracker. - PvP Field Fights, IDOCs, Factions, Order vs. Chaos, Guildwars: ✮Not optimal as you are extremely vulnerable to dumps. - PvP CTF: Useless. - PvP Tournaments: Useless.- Stealing: Useless.- Rare Hunting: As effective as any other non stealing/hiding class. Certain rares are inaccessible without stealing. - Crafting: Useless. Tamer-Disco-Provo: - Template: Taming, Animal Lore, Veterinary, Discordance, Provoke, Musicianship, Magery - Class Summary: Taming + Disco + Provoke is the ultimate offensive template with absolutely no defense or even mana to survive. - Best support tamer character as single target damage and crowd control are both available. Very very fragile. - PvM Open world and champ: ✮✮✮Great Class for gold per hour - you rek most monster types easily. However, your mana takes forever to recover. This is not suitable as a primary. - PvM Battle Mining: ✮Not effective. I've found the pets to be frustrating versus golems and elementals. - PvM: Amibs, Level 7s, and Xmas Scrolls: ✮Lack of mana will be a real problem with this template. - PvM Halloween Instance Event: Useless. - PvM Tracking Events (Xmas Overworld, Easter): Useless unless combined with a tracker. - PvP Field Fights, IDOCs, Factions, Order vs. Chaos, Guildwars: Useless. - PvP CTF: Useless. - PvP Tournaments: Useless. - Stealing: Useless. - Rare Hunting: No meditation is a no go. - Crafting: Useless. Tamer-Eval: - Template: Taming, Animal Lore, Veterinary, Magery, Meditation, EvalInt, Resist - Class Summary: Taming with Eval and Resist gives your offensive spells power and makes you rather tanky. - Less single target dps and no crowd control but you gain offensive output in pvp and some durability. - PvM Open world and champ: ✮✮✮Great Class for gold per hour - you rek most monster types easily. - PvM Battle Mining: ✮Not effective. I've found the pets to be frustrating versus golems and elementals. - PvM: Amibs, Level 7s, and Xmas Scrolls: ✮✮Lack of Provo or Disco will make these more painful. - PvM Halloween Instance Event: Useless. - PvM Tracking Events (Xmas Overworld, Easter): Useless unless combined with a tracker. - PvP Field Fights, IDOCs, Factions, Order vs. Chaos, Guildwars: ✮✮✮✮Great team member in a big fight. - PvP CTF: Useless. - PvP Tournaments: Useless. - Stealing: Useless. - Rare Hunting: As effective as any other non stealing/hiding class. Certain rares are inaccessible without stealing. - Crafting: Useless. Tamer-Tracking: - Template: Taming, Animal Lore, Veterinary, Magery, Meditation, Tracking + Anything - Class Summary: Taming with tracking is a great template for overworld events and also useful for evading ganks. - Niche class mostly suitable for events. - PvM Open world and champ: ✮✮✮Great Class for gold per hour - you rek most monster types easily. - PvM Battle Mining: ✮Not effective. I've found the pets to be frustrating versus golems and elementals. - PvM: Amibs, Level 7s, and Xmas Scrolls: ✮✮Lack of Provo or Disco will make these more painful. - PvM Halloween Instance Event: Useless. - PvM Tracking Events (Xmas Overworld, Easter): ✮✮✮✮Find monsters and gate in your pets! What could be better? - PvP Field Fights, IDOCs, Factions, Order vs. Chaos, Guildwars: ✮✮✮Great team member in a big fight. - PvP CTF: Useless. - PvP Tournaments: Useless. - Stealing: Useless. - Rare Hunting: As effective as any other non stealing/hiding class. Certain rares are inaccessible without stealing. - Crafting: Useless. Bard-Provo-Eval: - Template: Provoke, Musicianship, Magery, Meditation, EvalInt, Resist + TRACKING - Class Summary: Great character for a variety of very specific game activities. - Easily the best starting template on UO:R. Easy and cheap to train and brings in great gold per hour at little risk. - PvM Open world and champ: ✮✮Good Class for gold per hour at many locations - you rek most monster types easily. - PvM Battle Mining: Useless - PvM: Amibs, Level 7s, and Xmas Scrolls: Too slow. - PvM Halloween Instance Event: ✮✮Amazing team member for any group. - PvM Tracking Events (Xmas Overworld, Easter): ✮✮✮Find monsters and gate in other characters. - PvP Field Fights, IDOCs, Factions, Order vs. Chaos, Guildwars: ✮Only good for scouting and supporting. - PvP CTF: Useless. - PvP Tournaments: Useless. - Stealing: Useless. - Rare Hunting: As effective as any other non stealing/hiding class. Certain rares are inaccessible without stealing. - Crafting: Useless. Dexer-LJ-Provo: - Template: Provoke, Musicianship, Lumberjacking, Swordsmanship, Tactics, Anatomy, Healing - Class Summary: Great character for a variety of very specific game activities. - Niche class useful for dominating instance events for max profit (ironman). - PvM Open world and champ: Lack of Recall is really bad here. - PvM Battle Mining: ✮✮Great damage and crowd control but requires a gate support character. - PvM: Amibs, Level 7s, and Xmas Scrolls: ✮✮✮✮Ironman Champion. - PvM Halloween Instance Event: ✮✮✮✮Unstoppable. - PvM Tracking Events (Xmas Overworld, Easter): Useless unless combined with a tracker. - PvP Field Fights, IDOCs, Factions, Order vs. Chaos, Guildwars: Useless - PvP CTF: Real Bad. - PvP Tournaments: Useless. - Stealing: Useless. - Rare Hunting: Beyond bad. - Crafting: Useless. Dexer-Provo: - Template: Provoke, Musicianship, Weapon skill, Tactics, Anatomy, Healing, Magery - Class Summary: Great character for a variety of very specific game activities. - Excels at instanced events but sucks at most everything else. If you haven't built one of these and run an Amib you are simply missing out! - PvM Open world and champ: ✮✮Great DPS, can recall, but your weapon is pretty pricey. - PvM Battle Mining: ✮✮✮Great damage, crowd control, and you can gate out your ore but still requires a miner buddy. - PvM: Amibs, Level 7s, and Xmas Scrolls: ✮✮✮✮Ironman Champion. - PvM Halloween Instance Event: ✮✮✮✮Unstoppable. - PvM Tracking Events (Xmas Overworld, Easter): Useless unless combined with a tracker. - PvP Field Fights, IDOCs, Factions, Order vs. Chaos, Guildwars: Useless - PvP CTF: Pretty Darn Bad. - PvP Tournaments: Useless. - Stealing: Useless - Rare Hunting: No meditation is a no go. - Crafting: Useless. Dexer-LJ-Miner - Template: Lumberjacking, Swordsmanship, Tactics, Anatomy, Healing, Magery, Mining - Class Summary: Great character for a variety of very specific game activities. - Battle mining is a fun and safe way to either make a lot of cash or decorate your home. Everybody should give it a shot. - PvM Open world and champ: ✮Lack of Provoke and no resist makes this a pretty bad overworld template. - PvM Battle Mining: ✮✮✮✮Great damage, crowd control, and you can gate out your ore. - PvM: Amibs, Level 7s, and Xmas Scrolls: This is just a bad dexer with no crowd control now. - PvM Halloween Instance Event: ✮✮✮Still really strong in this event! - PvM Tracking Events (Xmas Overworld, Easter): Useless unless combined with a tracker. - PvP Field Fights, IDOCs, Factions, Order vs. Chaos, Guildwars: Pretty Useless - PvP CTF: Pretty Darn Bad. - PvP Tournaments: Useless. - Stealing: Useless - Rare Hunting: No meditation is a no go. - Crafting: Useless. Dexer-LJ: - Template: Lumberjacking, Swordsmanship, Tactics, Anatomy, Healing, Magery, Resist - Class Summary: Very versatile melee character. - The bread and butter of dexers - huge hits! - PvM Open world and champ: ✮✮✮There are many locations that this template thrives. - PvM Battle Mining: ✮✮✮Great damage, can gate ore, but requires a miner buddy. - PvM: Amibs, Level 7s, and Xmas Scrolls: Without provo you're going to have a bad time. - PvM Halloween Instance Event: ✮✮✮✮High Dps and durability. - PvM Tracking Events (Xmas Overworld, Easter): Useless unless combined with a tracker. - PvP Field Fights, IDOCs, Factions, Order vs. Chaos, Guildwars: ✮✮Effective, deadly, but obviously weak to sync dumps. - PvP CTF: ✮✮✮✮Very strong team member. - PvP Tournaments: ✮✮✮LJs are one of the more well suited dexers to this environment. - Stealing: Useless - Rare Hunting: No meditation is a no go. - Crafting: Useless. Dexer: - Template: Weapon Skill, Tactics, Anatomy, Healing, Magery, Resist, Meditation - Class Summary: Very versatile melee character. - Roll with a Warhammer, Spear, Bow, Hally, Katana.. choice is yours. - PvM Open world and champ: ✮✮✮There are many locations that this template still thrives. - PvM Battle Mining: ✮✮✮Great damage, can gate ore, but requires a miner buddy. - PvM: Amibs, Level 7s, and Xmas Scrolls: Without provo you're going to have a bad time. - PvM Halloween Instance Event: ✮✮✮Good Dps and durability. - PvM Tracking Events (Xmas Overworld, Easter): Useless unless combined with a tracker. - PvP Field Fights, IDOCs, Factions, Order vs. Chaos, Guildwars: ✮✮Effective, deadly, but obviously weak to sync dumps. - PvP CTF: ✮✮✮✮Very strong team member. - PvP Tournaments: ✮✮Requires a lot of skill to do well but people pull it off. - Stealing: Useless - Rare Hunting: No meditation is a no go. - Crafting: Useless. Mage-Stun-Track: - Template: Magery, Resist, Meditation, EvalInt, Anatomy, Wrestling, Tracking - Class Summary: Pk extraordinaire. - Track them, find them, stun them, and dump them. - PvM Open world and champ: ✮Pretty bad but you still have EV, Blades, etc. - PvM Battle Mining: Useless. - PvM: Amibs, Level 7s, and Xmas Scrolls: Without provo you're going to have a bad time. - PvM Halloween Instance Event: ✮You can still go for that heal award! - PvM Tracking Events (Xmas Overworld, Easter): ✮✮✮Find monsters and gate in other characters. Or PK everybody. Your choice. - PvP Field Fights, IDOCs, Factions, Order vs. Chaos, Guildwars: ✮✮✮✮Amazing damage, support, and scouting. - PvP CTF: ✮✮✮✮Strong team member. - PvP Tournaments: ✮✮✮Great but not the best. - Stealing: Useless - Rare Hunting: As effective as any other non stealing/hiding class. Certain rares are inaccessible without stealing. - Crafting: Useless. Mage-Stun-Heal: - Template: Magery, Resist, Meditation, EvalInt, Anatomy, Wrestling, Healing - Class Summary: Balance. - Stuns and dumps, heals and bandages, you're well equipped for the field. - PvM Open world and champ: ✮Pretty bad but you still have EV, Blades, etc. - PvM Battle Mining: Useless. - PvM: Amibs, Level 7s, and Xmas Scrolls: Without provo you're going to have a bad time. - PvM Halloween Instance Event: ✮✮✮✮Heal award on lock son. Best teammate to have! - PvM Tracking Events (Xmas Overworld, Easter): Useless. - PvP Field Fights, IDOCs, Factions, Order vs. Chaos, Guildwars: ✮✮✮✮Amazing damage and support. - PvP CTF: ✮✮✮✮Strong team member. - PvP Tournaments: ✮✮✮✮Amazing template. - Stealing: Useless - Rare Hunting: As effective as any other non stealing/hiding class. Certain rares are inaccessible without stealing. - Crafting: Useless. Thief-Tracker: - Template: Magery, Meditation, Snooping, Stealing, Hiding, Tracking + 1 more skill - Class Summary: Rogue. - Do things and stuff. - PvM Open world and champ: ✮Pretty bad but you still have EV, Blades, etc. - PvM Battle Mining: Useless. - PvM: Amibs, Level 7s, and Xmas Scrolls: You aren't really hard core til you ironman an amib on a thief. - PvM Halloween Instance Event: ✮You can still go for that heal award! - PvM Tracking Events (Xmas Overworld, Easter): ✮✮✮Find monsters and gate in other characters. Or steal from everybody. Your choice. - PvP Field Fights, IDOCs, Factions, Order vs. Chaos, Guildwars: ✮✮Amazing support character. A welcome teammate depending on the circumstances. - PvP CTF: Nope. - PvP Tournaments: That's not a bingo. - Stealing: ✮✮✮✮Get that top shots or thief of the month award. - Rare Hunting: ✮✮✮✮The one and only. - Crafting: Useless. Crafter: - Template: Blacksmithing, Tailoring, Carpentry, Tinkering, Magery + 2 more skills - Class Summary: Pretty dirty. - Make things and stuff. - PvM Open world and champ: ✮Pretty bad but you still have EV, Blades, etc. - PvM Battle Mining: Useless. - PvM: Amibs, Level 7s, and Xmas Scrolls: Without provo you're going to have a bad time. - PvM Halloween Instance Event: ✮✮✮✮We don't win this thing without our crafters, folks. - PvM Tracking Events (Xmas Overworld, Easter): Useless - PvP Field Fights, IDOCs, Factions, Order vs. Chaos, Guildwars: Haha - PvP CTF: Nope. - PvP Tournaments: That's not a bingo. - Stealing: Also not a bingo. - Rare Hunting: No meditation is a no go. - Crafting: ✮✮✮✮That is a bingo. Other Template Options on UO:R: Dexer-Poison (✮✮✮✮CTF) Dexer-Tamer(✮✮✮✮Instanced Events) Dexer-Disco(✮✮✮✮Single Target DPS) Dexer-Peace(✮✮✮✮Spankin' Balrons) Dexer-Miner-Smith(✮✮✮✮Halloween) Dexer-Scribe(✮✮✮✮LOL Blaise) Mage-Stun-Scribe(✮✮✮✮PVP) Mage-Stun-Poison(✮✮✮✮PVP) etc. You might be asking... "Why did I just read all of that?" Or more importantly, "why did Gideon write all of that?" UO, the UO:R era, and specifically, UO:Renaissance provides an unbelievable game experience. We have so many different things we can do here and there are so many templates to pick from. Tamers are strong at some things. Provos are strong at others. Dexers are strong at another variety of in game activities. No class is best at all. Most importantly, those classes which are the best at any one thing often sacrifice greatly and are horrible at many other things. In fact, that is the case in every situation. Want the highest single target sustained dps? You're probably wanting a disco-LJ with a slayer or a disco tamer. But both those templates are glass cannons. Want the best field combat character? Sure, but don't expect to be winning halloween or soloing an instance event with that same character. Can you slap Taming on a dude and be better at everything? No. Are 8 bondable control slots for 200 skill points overpowered? Probably a bit. The burst damage can be too heavy versus other players, their ability to tank and deal dps over long periods of time, and their ability to deal damage through high AR probably sets the bar for boss monster difficulty automatically. If players had less tanky pets with less burst dps and less damage coming from fire breath (ignores AR), a lot of rebalancing might need to occur. It would be an interesting situation. I have no opinion on it one way or another. Are dexxers a hobby class? Most definitely not. Dexer dps is crazy. Try rolling a dexer, especially a Lumberjack, and put a simple slayer in their hands. I'm not even talking about a good slayer. Just a silver double axe. That thing hits hard and very fast. The slayer market is very active and slayers are very reasonably priced. You don't need a 400k weapon. You can often do just fine with a weapon that costs 3k-10k. Most importantly, a pure dexer is one of the more versatile archetypes. Jack of all trades, master of none - and easy to build too! A great starting point alone with the Mage-Provo-Eval. Considering everything in this thread, there are still things that I consider need some work in UO:R but it's never been enough to get me super worked up. My current list of suggestions are: - Some new activities for thieves specifically to engage in. - Some new activities for crafters to engage in (Carpentry BODs would be this). - Slayer Shields to make Dexer-Parry is a desirable template in various PvM situations. - Either very slightly buff Archery damage by 10% OR - Have GM Bowcraft/Fletching synergize with Archery in some way. (Ideally improving the HeavyX and X more so than Bow). Thanks for reading!
