Hi there!

Joined a few days ago and really enjoying BatMUD. I started as a mage but was told it wouldn't be an enjoyable gameplay as a newbie, however going for a giant sized ranger wasn't very appealing to me either. I settled for a Barsoomian barbarian (Barbar for short heh). After a nice talk with Kanis, I decided to add a mount into the mix and go for squire > beastmaster > cavalier > barbarian ... A long (maxes at level 100) but efficient path. I completed my squire training just an hour ago and there's several points I'd like advices about:

1) Skills

Here's the list of those I didn't and probably won't raise:
Compare, Torch Creation, Switch Weapon, Herding, Shield bash, Long blades, Slash and Throw Weight.

Some I did (or will) raise but will probably keep low:
Push, Plant Lore, Kick, Swim, Herding, Brawling

2) Weapons

Not using shield, at the moment I'm wielding a gisarme and 2 daggers. Later I'll switch to 4 bludgeons/axes (to make use of my racial bonuses).

3) bm or cavalier next?

I guess the choice is about having better mounts on a side or better fighting skills on the other.


Thanks for reading!

I'd consider training at least some throw weight, it's passive, and even though barso is small, it still will help some.



I'd personally choose beastmaster first -- at least for a few levels. I forget the thresholds, but you do want to have enough of the ride indoors, etc. Cavalier will let you stay mounted longer in combat though, which will be nice.

Good point, I missread the skill.



That's what I went for. To mount indoor is one of the two last skills tho heh.

Now to find a place to make money, I'm broke and can't advance heh. Thank for the answer!

I'm now worth 30m exp (still very few), and if someone reads this looking for the same answers I was looking for when writting that first post here is what I'd do:

Get only 4 or 5 levels in beastmaster and raise cavaliers instead. Beastmaster is an expensive guild, a newbie can hardly make good use of it. Ride indoor isn't that needed, you can find good mounts that don't need the skill ... It is really expensive to raise and you need it really high to work properly. The same goes for tame and calm mount. On the other hand cavalier guild isn't as expensive to get started, as you don't need to get skills past 90 to be able to make use of them.

For the skills mentioned in first post: Push, Plant Lore, Kick, Herding and Brawling are quite useless with this build ... Throw weight is indeed a must have tho. It's worth it to get shield bash to a decent level too.

For the weapons, polearms probably the best pick as cavalier since you'll have to raise related skills quite high anyway for guild requirements. The other two (blades and bluds) are also viable, I went for the later myself. However cavaliers doesn't give access to pulverize (unlike mangle and decapitate) and you'll need to raise pound thank to another guild to get past 80 battery. Both can be fixed if you go for barbarian next (but can take some time). On that note, if you want to go for barb it might be a good idea to take 3 barb level early (read as early as possible) to start gathering rep. Even if it maxes to 800 at lvl 3 barb, it still adds up without showing until you get some more levels.

You have calculated things nicely but you kinda miss how powerful reincarnation is. So do not try to make char fit lvl 100 requirements from start. You can optimaze to current situation and reinc after you start to stack too many useless skills or want to push several levels in one go.

So you should rather consentrate on one guild and build up exp and after you get enough for two just reinc. Guilds normally give real power at last levels and don't really work at lower. There are only few ones that have really been designed to be used less than full levels. Mainly tank guilds and tarmalens. Bmaster is more like full or nothing support guild.

Many newbie do not really like the idea that some cool sounding guilds are actually one trick ponies and they fit perfectly in certain combos as support guild but not really as first guild and then several that do not really give anything usefull untill at last levels when you get masteries.

BTW. don't use shields as you parry just as well with shield as with sword. Shields just lower crit levels but that is not really usefull unless you actually have backrow that can cover the 1/2 lost damage from tank so atleast 2 full guild blasters or one supermage :)

I already reinc'd once for the reasons you gave. I had close to maxed beastmaster when I realized how tough it would be to get it working.



And that's what I did, went for cavaliers and maxed all used skills up to my racial max, some past it. I really believe this guild suits newbies quite well, you don't get as good camp and firebuilding as rangers but the mount takes away a lot of damages making up for it. Not to mention the ability to carry loots, to travel way faster and the stat increase it gives. From now, whatever I do I'll add exp to my total and can always reinc when I have enough for another build I like. I can do that raising my cavalier skills or working on barbarian.

You say I should go for the first option, don't you? I won't bother explaining how depressing it is to get that few improvement after that much grinding. Levels are better for one's moral. Plus only like 20 levels in barbarian would already give me quite a nice boost. At higher level you at least have eq parties to get something new to toy with time to time, or enough worth to reinc as pretty much anything you want when you get really bored.

Talking about eq parties ... Never been in one. Really sounds fun tho. Challenge and reward. There's challenging things to kill everywhere for newbies, but almost no wearable reward. So all a newbie can do to solve this eq problem is to buy things. I got a mount, had a merchant making saddle and saddlebags for it. Got various pieces of eq that finally start to add up. Regarding this, to reinc as something different would mean going back to square one. If newbies were able to make crap but wearable eq themselves it would be quite different.



I understood that. Barbarian fits probably in the later categorie for someone who already maxed cavalier like me. Still provides some nice tools before unlocking barbaric ways and such tho. Can't wait to get some points in tumbling attack, negate offhand penalty, pulverize and some others.



So far I used shields when facing destroy eq monsters, when being used as a meatshield by a nun or when doing some tough level quests with a well packed party. Those kind of things do happen even for a newbie! And shield bash a nice skill when your damages don't matter much anymore.

Guild that require you to gather rep like reaver or barb might be usefull at even few levels because rep defines a lot of their power and it gathers slowly. I would remember that I had like 30M when i did first multiguild (monktarma with 3 tarma levels for clw 80 something) char but barbs were one of the few guilds with rep back then and I never really liked the rep handicap idea so I pretty much skipped them. I did most of my exp as monktarmalen (30m->150m) and bardsabre (200m->330m). Rest was done with random tank builds.

You need to be usefull to be in eqparty. Levels help there (or they help in getting the party as eq monsters have level checks and they whack shit out of lvl 50 players) so you need to aim cheap guilds. Deftanks normally work best for newbies as long as you just get some multislot armour that gives ++prots and full shield and have dodgeparry at 90. Some pr alch rings also help. You won't tank asmo with that but some midbie monsters are doable if you have good protters. So some crimson+(barb/ranger/cavalier) work best for a newbie. Also you might get in as tarmalen but they need some +spr eq or else the party will wait you to tick :)

Mounts are not so usefull at eq monsters as they normally whack you off the mount and there normally are special exits that cause problems if you do not have full bmaster ride skills.