ratspike is my dagger tank. he is cool cuz he is an exceptional tank. nom has a dagger tank as well and i like calling them "the dagger twins" cuz for a while they both used dirks and superior shields (yeah, the shield with the level 4 sword buff... it was a step up from the explorer buckler he was using previously). we want to hunt our daggers with one of opti's low level chars, a battle mage i think, but to do that we both have to be 32.
a few nights ago, nom and i made a couple of trips to the scalavs citadel. contrary to my usual playstyle, we got some level 7 buffs and went *NUTS*. we made it all the way to the bottom and put on like 6 levels (rat started at 24, and hit 30 before the trip was thru) he died once. with that rather large piece of the level 32 goal out of the way (another motivator for 32 was the 12th skill credit i'd need for life magic) so last nite i decided to hunt alone, using just my item and jewelry buffs.
i tried the lugain cit for one buff, and it was ok. i have hunted probably a dozen characters there from 15th to 30th level, so while it's great fun with a friend, it's just not that great alone. i also tried to solo the scalavus citadel, and while i could take on two of the big guys at once, i couldn't kill them quickly enough to go too far in.
it was then that i decided to hit the arcade. i was using the quiddity dagger that pandy gave me when she cleaned out all her mules and trying to get enough XP to double tap with it. i had baned everything, popped a lugian gem of acid protection, and i was ready to go to work on the bugs when i found that they had trouble hitting me. in time i was on the drone floor, casually stomping bugs. i ran out of stamina potions a while ago. and i was making big progress even tho my banes had gone and i was sort of chatting with opti and keeping my stamina up by fizzling out revit1 with my explorer life wand.
i was getting ready to recall out so i could focus on chatting, when a bunch of young dudes came thru and added me to their fellowship. normally i say "no thanks" because dudes in the arcade are buffed to hell and back and just roll down to the worker floor and camp the 12 bugs that live down there rather than trying to work their way around the arcade. well, these guys were all lower than me, and couldn't stay together too well. so i went on, killing away on the different floors, including the worker floor, with this dude named "pleasure toy" tagging along. i gave the central part a try, and rat's not quite ready to solo there just yet.
well the XP came pouring in, and i kept tossing it into my coord, quick, dagger, and focus skills. before i knew it, i had killed tons of bugs, hit 32nd, trained life magic, and pushed my dagger up high enough to double tap with my quiddy.
so now ratspike has sex appeal. he can cast his own protects (yeah they're just level 3's for now, but that's gonna change real soon) and when he hit's 40th he'll dump lore for creature magic and be 3 schooled. his dagger and meleeD are pretty high for a dude in his low 30's and not getting hit by level 40 something olthoi is really nice. what's funny to note is that he doesn't get touched by most drones or servants, but if he goes to the arcade central, he has issues with the workers. so he either eats olthoi for beakfast, or becomes breakfast himself. i figure he needs better buffs, time to get critter :-)