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Post by bort on Dec 16, 2007 0:02:15 GMT
Kobolds focused more on Rogues, while Goblins focused more on Bloodfire Mages, which turned out to be the deciding factor. We did have a single BFM, Kobra, but it was a pretty stark power imbalance. I brought a Druid for partybuffs, which turned out to be a bad idea since I never got to use those buffs - everyone was running too far, too fast. We got separated via porting very quickly, and several of us couldn't get the jumping boots to work. I personally couldn't get them to work for about 3/4 of the match, which kept me on the same tiny platform to be repeatedly killed. Well i thought that having 3 BFMs would be great.... except that most people had evasion/improved evasion or SR or something, cos my firebrands rarely hit anyone. Bigbies and hellballs were good fun though And don't sell Kobra short, he KICKED ASS, as did Tyran's shifter, who my BFM could barely touch. Shame your had troubles with the boots, better luck next time
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Post by Boxey on Dec 16, 2007 0:18:43 GMT
I like the sound of Goblins 2 - 0 Kobolds. Ill be up for another one if such a thing is possible.
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Post by Acaos on Dec 16, 2007 0:24:50 GMT
My personal thoughts on the match:
The goblins were much more organized. They got their equipment second, but were done gearing up before the kobolds were. They also tried harder to make sure everyone on their team had the equipment they needed, and discussed the available equipment beforehand, having read the thread. The kobolds took a much more free-for-all approach to the provided equipment.
The more experienced players on the goblin team were also sure to help and explain things to others who had not done a Pillars match before.
The goblins knew the rules of the match allowed pickpocketing and at least one of them spent the entire match complaining he couldn't carry everything he had pickpocketed, due to the shortage of available Strength gear. I didn't see a great deal of pickpocketing from the kobold side. The goblins also took a stronger swarm approach, tag-teaming the kobolds when possible.
The kobolds probably had some individually stronger builds, but I think a few of them were into the Hells build mindset and constructed their characters as if they were taking them to 60. They also didn't take advantage of the fact that they were the only team with significant divine caster power. It did not help that at least two of the kobolds were relatively inexperienced builders or had to build their characters in a short time.
One of the high points of the match was certainly watching Kobra blow apart an enemy mage with a Fireball.
Neither team took real advantage of the fact that wand and potion crafting materials were provided. I think these would have proved to be a significant benefit.
Both teams had significant trouble with the Ssithraks. I attribute this to the fact that few people playing Higher Ground have recent experience playing level 40 characters in the Ssithrak areas with terrible, motley gear.
Acaos
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Post by bort on Dec 16, 2007 0:38:05 GMT
Both teams had significant trouble with the Ssithraks. I attribute this to the fact that few people playing Higher Ground have recent experience playing level 40 characters in the Ssithrak areas with terrible, motley gear. Acaos The way gear was split made the whole thing fun IMO. There were guaranteed to be holes in at least a few peoples immunities (although careful build choice could negate this to a certain extent) and I know that whenever I saw kobra, I had split seconds to act to try and immobilize him before he annihilated me (which he did several times). It was fun -Bort
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Post by Acaos on Dec 16, 2007 0:46:21 GMT
I would love to have people post what they played, for future comparison. I'm sure everyone else would like to hear just what works well in the goblin and kobold world (and what builds are only suitable to find grubs for tomorrow's lunch).
I'm glad people had fun. Thanks for playing!
Acaos
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Post by bort on Dec 16, 2007 0:49:58 GMT
I played a variation of Kobra's burninator (as a Goblin): highergroundpoa.proboards3.com/index.cgi?board=builds&action=display&n=1&thread=6905&page=5Ethereal Visage wasn't worth it for a level 40 character (think it worked out as 40% conceal with kobra's build at that level), so i used displacement instead and swapped a few other spells around too. I took heal instead of tumble for better healing. I used forceful hands, grasping hands, clenched fist and crushing hand (although I noticed forceful worked well, grasping rarely worked and i couldn't land crushing once).
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Post by Akar on Dec 16, 2007 1:13:22 GMT
I am sorry about bailing ½ way through. Kid issues in IRL. My build was a Ranger with 2 levels of rogue (Since I would not get Evasion from Ranger since I was only 40). Everyone on the goblins was talking about our builds before we started. We tried to put together a well-rounded team. This was best seen in the fact that I could call shot kill many players and lizards, but when the bard was around to curse it became even better.
Note: Everyone in our team was advised before or during character creation to take spot to counter the PP.
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Post by Jenna on Dec 16, 2007 1:53:54 GMT
Thanks Acaos for hosting this throwdown. At last we have an answer to the age old question: Goblins or Kobolds. I think you were right on with that comment regarding the level 60 mindset build. Two of the goblin team went the RDD route figuring there would be lots of kobold rogues. RDD had a definite advantage: immunity sneak attack (haha kobold rogues), True Site (haha rogues/shadow dancers), 100% fire immune (haha BFM), and being a large size would give us definite advantages in terms of knockdown should any kobolds be lacking that immunity. Personally, I put heavy emphasis on buffing up my reflex and will saves to help with avoiding spells. I also took improved knockdown, Improved Disarm, hoping to surprise some kobolds out there. However, it was not as effective as I would have liked. Since this was my first time in pillars, I didn't understand the Heal portion and thought the skill points only applied to caster spells and not the potions. Healing was a waste of time for me since by the time I drank the potion I had lost any hp I would have gained. I have to acknowledge my fear of the kobold's shifter. I saw him and knew death was immenient unless I could get to him before he killed me (he always ended up killing me). I also kept expecting to be hit by some divine spells: WoF and Harm primarily but fortunately that never happened. Anyway, Good game to all! Jenna, Slayer of Kobolds
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Post by terroken1 on Dec 16, 2007 2:00:35 GMT
I played BFM close to Burnitator also. 30 sorcerer/10 RDD had max, empower, silent, still, esf evo, 4 rows of firebrands final stats i believe str 15 dex 8 con 20 wis 8 int 12 cha 34 Mainly firebrands, my hands couldnt grab. Usually hit ssiths that teammates were workin on as one firebrand would almost take out 2, so they could grab the gems and if any left i grabbed if I made it. Kobra was like friggin bad tail cowboy beatin me to the draw every time Awesome, my level 16 bfm hopes to be as good as him some day lol. Ben(kobold was PPin alot - me but he got my chat cmmands and book heh plus heals. Sorrry Ben for taggin u while u were obviously afk heh.
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Post by kaldair on Dec 16, 2007 2:06:12 GMT
I did a SD - had the highest AC on our team - but I was sorely disappointed overall in the effectiveness. From what I saw it was either RDD or BFM all the way .... Kaldair
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Post by Ashley on Dec 16, 2007 3:38:44 GMT
\o/ \o/ \o/ yaaaaaaaay goblins!!!!!!!
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Post by tyranlthixis on Dec 16, 2007 5:42:45 GMT
Couple of things....
I really wanted to write out a few tight level 40 builds for my team mates but I got stuck working 7pm-7am 3 nights in a row and barely even made the event.
Shifters are definitely a good idea if you know how to play one. Only thing I would have changed would be to use a preepic feat to take craft potion to make some death ward potions for the group. Getting a decent fort save was fairly important with all the potentially fatal fort save spells one could face about. I thought hide in plain sight would be much better than it was. I could essentially be invisible to players, but the monsters all had true seeing....and it wasn't players who were generally killing me. I had a very hard time if a couple of lizards spawned around me. Late in the match I had some great success with vampire form. A grabbed ssithrax stayed loyal a good long time and ports around with you. Manticore was not as good at killing lizards as mindflayer was...but you had to also be on your toes with all the BFMs around so you couldn't really get comfortable in one particular form.
A plant cleric would have been absolutely devastating in the match but neither group made one. UEF and potions for the group would have been very nice as well.
Tyran
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Post by sabregirl on Dec 16, 2007 6:02:45 GMT
Well I built an unarmed 26monk/10SD/4CoT combo which was very effective and probably the same AC as Kaldair's character. The damage types on the monk gloves given to use were great. Monk speed was very helpful for me and I scored highest in individual gems gathered. BFMs were generally not a problem for me personally, save the occasional annoying hellball - more for the KD than damage. Their one big advantage is being able to clear out ssiths before they kill you. But in terms of PvP I wasn't too worried about them. Once I got FoDed by the pm I think. I definitely killed more goblins than those that killed me (and yes I cheered over your corpses ). I think I was tanking half the team at one point, never died myself but ended up killig 2-3 of the gathered members (with help of course) It's the ssiths that are far more painful than opposing team members. I don't think experience has anything to do with it . . . a 200+ crit or two when you have 400 ish HP is pretty devastating. I'm with Ty on the utility of HIPs and stealth in general . . seemed like nobody on the goblin team was lacking TS. However if I were to build the character again I'd probably do the same thing since I got epic dodge out of the 10 sd levels. It's just very very hard for the average build to stay up around so many archers. What really ruined me was a lack of KD immunity . . . forceful hand was not good. But I had a great time regardless of who won but of course a rematch would be fun too. -S
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Post by the1kobra on Dec 16, 2007 13:59:07 GMT
My character was pretty much my standard burninator, with a couple of modifications for the match. I took the 8th level hand instead of the cloud, which I found to somehow be fairly useless. I took for 6ths, tensers, forceful, and TS, and the forceful seemed pretty hefty especially since most of the other team likely had a Str along the scores of 8. Other thing I did was I subbed out DB fireball for spell mantle, which turned out to be a great asset when taking on other mages, I would empower them, and they could soak a lot of spells, I think it was a significant playing advantage I had over the other casters, since a lot of people don't take mantles for the base game. I think I had the easiest time of my team against the ssithrak, but then again, if you've seen a bfm take the sith bridge, you can figure out what it's like. Ssithrak have little to no fire immunity, which is partly why I think their team scored higher than we did, even if it seemed to me that the kobolds came on top every time we fought directly. I mean, I just press two buttons and the Ssithrak are toast, literally. The others have to slug through them painfully. I think they had 3 arcane casters, we had 1. I do have to admit our team was significantly disorganized, I think that is partly my fault though. When the match was announced, I was scrambling to recruit every person I could get. I was planning on getting recruits on Thursday, go through the plans/builds on Friday, and go into the match well prepared on Saturday. To my dismay, my recruitment drive did not go very well, instead, I got no members on Thursday, got one on Friday (Thanks Johann), while managing to make no plans, and the rest logically followed. I know there are plenty of things I could have done better, both in match and before, but theres no use in lamenting over my spectacular failure. Thanks for hosting the match Acaos, even though I'm less than happy with the results.
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Post by johannhowitzer on Dec 16, 2007 23:07:57 GMT
My Druid was probably the most "unconventional" character on the field, compared with everyone else's shifters, bfms, and SD/rogues. I restructured my Hells Druid build from the ground up for kobold, and took Dragon Shape... which turned out to be worthless, as Dragons can't move on the Pillars pathways! Planning-wise, I did talk to Kobra quite a bit the days before and of, about equipment and strategy. Unfortunately I was the only one. Major mistake on my part to prepare so many buffs - I should indeed have just crafted potions for everyone and buffed myself at the bare minimum. When operating under my most crucial buffs, I did fine, nearing 100 AC and taking out several Ssithrak with spells... which unlike the bfms, were in very short supply. I agree the Kobolds were far too disorganized. Some advice from the Pillars veterans would have been extremely helpful; most of our team found themselves totally isolated most of the time due to the porting and trouble with boots. Next time I'm seen in Pillars, I will surely be better prepared.
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