How to be like Serm
Or
How to be a 3-spec, 3-school Uber Dagger

By Sermeal

Foreword:

This is a guide to help you play a dagger character, a 3 spec, and 3 schools to be exact. There are other Dagger characters out there. I don't have one, so I don't know about them. But I know this character.

This guide will help you in the following ways: Give you the template, give you some idea of how to get this character to level 40 (with minimal help, and mostly solo hunting), give you an idea of the equipment you will wish to have, and also show you what you can look like at level 40, in regards to attributes, skills, and equipment.

I hope this guide helps people out. Thanks go to my vassal Narishma (his orig dagger character, was the inspiration for me to make a dagger char), my patron June Cleaver (Kellin's ubah dagger character, a role model for mine), and all my friends in the FDS and Black Mantis's allegiance.

Introduction:

Dagger users are overpowered. You will hear this all your career as one, if you choose to be one. You'll even hear me saying it. It's true, I will not deny it. But this does not mean that I feel guilty and will park my character! It just means that I will accept that people will say I'm over powered, and complain about me. As a dagger fighter, you will most likely out kill other melee classes up to 5 or so levels above you. And don't get people started on your melee defense. It will be high, enjoy it, but your going to have to deal with more "Daggers are overpowered" talk against you. If someone really goes on, just tell them "Look at mages", and they should leave you alone. =)

Being a dagger user is fun! You are powerful, will have decent magic skills once your more mature (level 30+) and be able to hunt a nice variety of creatures. For the most part, I play my dagger character as a tank, go in, kill a lot of creatures and have a lot trying to kill you. Your high melee defense allows for this. Once you hit level 40, and have a nice life skill, you can play part mage - part dagger, finding a creature, imperil and vuln it, then switch to your buffed bandit and kill it off. With my buffed life skill of 218, I can sometimes land an imperil on a Feral Carnezi, and kill it pretty quick, although this seems to be just luck on my part. With an imperil 4 on a tusker, I can kill them in 2 double strikes if they don't evade.

This is the template I would suggest trying, and the template I used with Serm

Serm
str 10 30
end 10 20
coord 100 100
quick 100 100
focus 70 60
self 40 20

Spec: Dagger, Melee Defense, And Arcane Lore
Train: Item, Healing, and Mana Conversion
Take: Creature (9 or 40), and Life (16 or 40)

Pros: You'll have great melee def and dagger skills fast, and your arcane and magic will be at a nice level. I was casting level 5 in item with the help of a virindi amulet at level 36, and on my own at 40. I took life at 40, and am able to cast 5's in that as well

Cons: You won't be carrying much equipment, since you start quite weak. Until I started fighting Loogies, I did not carry a shield. Only my gerties dagger, my mattie coat, olthoi helm, shoes, gloves, and leather pants. Also, no missile defense can hurt if you want to fight loogies, or Ganin.

Note: I started with 20 endurance and 60 focus, as I was scared to play a character with 5 hit points. I also took too much strength. It has not really affected me much so far, but if I were to remake, I would go with 10 endurance and strength, and 70 focus. Also, it may be an idea to only go 2 schools, and specialize life. I would drop creature if you had to miss one school. Right now, the only use I have for creature is my Dagger 5 buff.


Leveling:

With new characters, I get help. I have friends now, and when they start a new character, I'll help them, when I start a new character, they'll help me. If you can get a friend who can cast Item 4, you'll be set. A mage is even better, but for the lower levels, item will be the best thing to have.

I started my character out in Yaraq. Once he was made, I dropped everything, and my friend handed me my starting gear. With a friend, fight the cows. Get BD on your dagger, get your robe buffed up, and play with the cows until level 5-6. Work on your endurance, health, and stamina for a while.

Once you're about level 5 or 6, head to Glendon Woods. In the dungeon nearest to town, ignore all the baddies EXCEPT the undead, there are about 5 or so on decently timed spawn. Learn to enjoy them. Again, have a friend buff you up, you may wish to up your strength at this point, so that soon you can carry some armor.

At level 12 or 13, head to the Glendon Wood prison, and the zombies. Fight, Fight, Fight, get so that you can hunt on your own here. Work on raising your dagger skill, and your arcane lore.

At level 15, head to the Citadel. Make sure you have all the physical damage buffs you can get (piercing, bludgeoning, slashing). Work your way to double striking with your own buffs; I could do this at level 22. After this, work more on your magic, as well as your dagger, melee d, and everything else.

Finally, and level 30, with a decent hilt or an obsidian dagger, head to the Olthoi Horde Nest. You'll be here a while. I made sure I had over 100 health and 150 stamina before heading here, just to be safe. You'll want a nice amount of healing kits, and stamina potions.

By Level 40, your complete with all three schools in magic. You should be able to be at the point where at least 2 schools are buffable so that you can cast level 5's. For me, it's Life and Item. Also, you should be around 200 for buffed arcane, and 300 for both dagger and melee

As for level 40 and beyond, well.... just /tell me, I'm still working on it!

Magic:

I did not use my own magic until around level 15 or so, and that was mainly just for portal recall and lifestone recall. When I got into my twenties, I started casting my own item buffs, and by level 30, was able to cast item 4's with little or no fizzle, using an Item IV orb. Although for much of my 30's, I had a good friend providing me with lovely level 6 item buffs. (Mucho Thanks V!)

I took creature before life magic. I regret this. Life magic is a great skill, for the protections, the mana management, healing a friend while he fights, and eventually for imp and vuln creatures. Creature magic is great, but when you have decent gear (Dagger IV gloves, Sim Shield, Sim Helmet, Quickness bracelet), you don't need it all that much. It can wait till level 40.

One thing to note though: I save all my experience from lvl 38 until lvl 40, and pumped it into life. It was around 4 million XP, and turned into 180 base life. This was a blessing. It now costs 300k a point in life magic, but with minor buffage, my life is at 220, and I can land imperils on tuskers, feral carenzi, and lot of other high xp creatures. So fun!

Equipment through the ages:

As I said, I would hang out with a buddy who's a higher level for the first 10 levels or so, and be in welfare mode, without a shield. Best bet for armor is: Olthoi Helm (or another lightweight helm, maybe Superior Helm), Gaunts, Solls, Leather Legs, and a Mattie Coat. Great Noob wear, and overall, great armor for the lower levels. Eventually, I switched myself to MSA, which was a decent set of armor for my mid teens to early twenties, and eventually moved into my GSA. GSA is great, as you will never be in a state of nakedness trying to get your armor off a well-guarded corpse. You may wish to use plate armor, but I wouldn't suggest trying this for a while. You're a dagger fighter; you don't have all that much strength.

In regards to weapons, the best one to start out with is a Gerties (8-9) or an Obsidian dagger (4-8). The Gertties is RARE; I paid alot for the one I was using. Another option is if you already have an obsidian dagger, use that. An Ash-Tooth Dagger (4-7) would work as well. The last option is normal 2-6 or 2-7 dagger.

Get the Dagger of Tikola as soon as you can, it's a decent quest, and it's a good weapon to use at the lower levels, as well as a good backup. I've pulled it out against the Olthoi a few times when I wasn't quite ready to leave to rebuff.

Hilting a dagger is something you can only do once every 4 months. So choose wisely. If you have an obsidian dagger, don't worry about a plain hilt right away. For Serm, my first dagger was a 2-7 +4 Attack, +8 Melee S/P dagger (Thanks Kellin!). It's great against olthoi, and pretty much everything else.
After my 4 months were up, I was planning on hilting a nice 2-6 +8 Attack dagger (Thanks Vidar!), when Kellin gave me the best present a dagger user would ever wish for... a 2-7 +5 +5 fire dagger! These are not easy to come by, and I understand why it cost Kellin both our souls! I have no problem giving my soul up for that baby. With level 6 buffs, I was hitting tuskers often for over 150, even higher.

I would say for your 1st two hilts, one should be fire, one should be slash/pierce. This may be different depending on what you are going to hunt. Acid, Frost, and Lightning are good against what's weak to them, and they may be handy. My next hilt will most likely be frost, 2-7 +5 +5 again.

Get the Simulacrum Shield and Helm. Just do it! It's the ultimate Melee Love! Unimbued, the Coord 4 is nice, so is the Invuln 4. Once you imbue them, the Armor V, the Coord V, the Str V, all of the nice V's are so nice to have. JUST GET THEM! Their AL is a bit low, but you have high melee d, don't worry!

Get a dagger 4 pair of gaunts or shoes when you're in your late twenties.


At lvl 40, Serms outfit was this:
Imbued Simulacrum Helm (Invuln V, Impen V, Impreg V, Magic R V)
Greater Shadow Celdon Armor -OR- My Ubah Koujia Set (AL150 bottoms, AL180+ upper)
Steel Toed Boots (AL135)
Dagger 4 Gloves (AL50, Impen IV)
Simulacrum Shield (Str V, Coord V, Armor V, Impen V)

As for jewelry, it depends on what I'm hunting...
I have a full set of level 4 life protections (2 rings, 2 bracelets, 1 amulet, pants, shirt) that I wear in general quests and running around ML.

For Olthoi, I wear:
Piercing V shirt
Acid V ring
Quickness V ring
Rejuv V amulet

For magic, I wear:
Virindi Amulet
Focus V ring
Willpower V ring

I currently carry my 2 hilts, Dagger of Tikola, 2 Atlans, and my Ravenous Dagger. I carry one pack full of Death Items (robes, gems, large mana stones), 20 of all my components, and a pack with 50 stamina potions, 4-5 healing kits and the rest is full of mana stones. I also carry a Creature V, an Item IV, a Life IV, and an Arcane IV staff/orb/wand.

To top everything off, a pair of Sprint VI running shoes, Aluv and Diff 179.

The story of my 40's
---------------------

The lvl 40-50 range did take me long. I pretty much PL'd through all of it, made loads of XP, and was able to finally reach the 50+ club. Heres the places that I hunted in, with their pros and cons

Teth and OP BSD
Pro's: Tuskers are worth alot of XP, and are easy with a fire hilt, easy to find a fellowship to share xp with.
Con's: It's BSD. People can act like jerks, and it's usually too busy to even bother with. Plus people macro there now.

I started hunting here with my vassal, him a mage, me a dagger. The XP was good when it was not busy, but that was rare. I would recommend trying this place out for a bit, but don't make it a home.

Stonehold OHN
Pro's: Bugs, Bugs, Bugs and more Bugs. Fast Spawn, not too hard with 2x and 3x strike.
Con's: Can be a bit busy, but not too bad. Not usually many people for a fellow.

I hunted here in my low 40's, and my high 40's. As your weapon skill increases, you can kill more and more soldiers per buff round, and increase your XP/Buff Cycle. Fellows work great in here.
(Note: I am hunting here still at lvl 52, as I can make around 500k/Buff Cycle or more when fellowed with another melee). My belief is the higher the level you are in here, the more accommodating you should be to the lower levels who hunt here. If there is a fellow of a Lvl 30's or 40's hunting here, go play somewhere else, let them hunt =) )

Emp Grotto
Pro's: Olthoi Legionarys on a comfortable spawn, worth 10k each, not much harder than Soldiers.
Con's: When people come for pincers, it can get too busy.

I hunted here in my mid 40's. The experience is good, it's not too hard, as there is not the huge spawns of OHN. The only problem is the pincer people. Since you can get the legionary pincers, people come here and it can sometimes get busy.

Outside
Pro's: Outside is fun!
Con's: Less XP

Hunting in the dires is fun. You get a wide variety of creatures to try, and different challenges with each. One minute you could be fighting tuskers, then loogies, then virindi, then grievers, and so on. It's nice to get outside the stuffy dungeons and take a break from heavy-duty hunting, and just go out and casually kill what you wish to try.

lvl 50!
---------------------

Just recently I made lvl 50. I'm now lvl 52. 1st thing to do when you hit lvl 50, head to the Evis Lair on ML. It's up near the Emp Grotto. In here are Olthoi Eviserators. These are so far the coolest Olthoi I have seen. Don't worry about your Acid protection. Blade and Piercing are what these guys do. Also, they hit low... always. Bane your boots, shield and legs, and your good to go. They take longer than soldiers to kill, but like the grotto, most of the time it's not too intense. They drop excellent loot. In one buff cycle there, during a busy time, I went around to the floor, picked up gems and clothes, got my pincer, went and sold, and made an M note.

In regards to the pincer, 8.4 Million XP every 3 weeks! For me, it got me from lvl 50 to lvl 51 and 1.5 mil xp to lvl 52. Not too bad!

Currently, I have raised my stats to

Here is my current armor/jewelry/clothing situation:

Armor - GSC legs, with Heavy Ursuin Coat -or- Mattie Coat and Leather Legs, AL76 with Impen IV, Acid IV, Piercing V.
(The second set if strictly for bug dungeons, it works well, is light, and I can carry lots of stamina potions and comps, so I can stay there for a few cycles).

Jewelry - Quickness 6 collar, Coord 6 Bracelet, Strength 6 ring, Rejuv 5 bracelet

Clothing - Armor V Shirt, Acid VI Pants

Shield - Diamond Shield (This cost we about 12 smalls, thanks to Vidar and Narishma for all the help)

Questions, Concerns, Comments, Want to complain to me about being overpowered.... PM me

Code of Conduct | Message Boards (General Discussion, Quests and Lore, The Goodwill Drop-Box) | Quests | Tales
Our Family Tree | Event Calendar | Guides and Templates | Lore | Allegiance Contacts | Links | Home

Copyright 2000, 2001, Gamejag
Please send all questions or comments to the Webmaster