Shattered Kingdoms

Grinding for hours on end? Seriously? Do you people not train charisma or something?

I haven't played in years and it took less than 50 hours to hit GM, with some of that time used to RP and get into a cabal. There are so many new zones and places to level now that I didn't even have to go to places like the Outer Planes or Temple of Murder.

Have you even played this game? I get the feeling that you clearly have no idea what you are talking about. Compared to the initial incarnations of the spells which could wipe an entire level of xp, back when it was *much, much* harder to level a character, I think they're fine now. Not to mention that players can also use poltergeist now, it's not that bad of a spell.

Just because some one isn't as good as leveling as you guys doesn't mean it's easy. What's easy for one person can be hard for another, and not everyone knows all the leveling places, so you two should really tone down your self righteousness.

Yes, I have played this game. I"ve been playing it for several years in fact, and while I may not know the ins and outs of pvp, I do know a bit about mechanics, so I do know what I'm talking about. The fact that, for a long lived character that can potentially die a lot, they can in fact run out of places to train. This is especially compounded with the fact that people not always are willing to train together with someone. Most people I've run across want to solo, or only group with their little ooc clique that they roll characters with. Also, playing a caster is different from playing melee / rogues because they have downtime due to mana. Leveling a caster can take longer if they don't min-max their mana usage. So yes, it does take "hours." Especially at around champion where the familiarity in places climb faster than you gain levels. A lot of higher level places also have grouped NPCs that not every class can handle, so that effectively limits their choices as well as when you fact in auras.

Yeah, E-drain wiped out levels back in the day, but that was patched. It's not the same anymore, but oracle and constant non resurrection can wipe out experience just the same. Did you ever think about new players that die a lot and there aren't always priests online? Senyn's player is a perfect example. That poor guy has spent so much time dead from experimenting with spells and trying to level like people tell him (Honestly, telling a newbie of earthquake spam..) that it's ridiculous. In fact, the number of darkie priests is a bit slim right now as I myself have had to wait up to a couple of hours for a resurrection because I don't want to use the oracle and lose experience. You guys have an easy time leveling characters. Good for you. Whoopidee doo that you have enough time and knowledge of the game that you can min max your way to GM in 50 hours when the rest of us normal folk can't.

Finally, where does poltergeist even come into this? Yeah, it's useful except when someone pk's you and your corpse is immediately butchered afterwards. Then it doesn't matter. I find it a bit stupid that when you do get pk'd and your corpse is destroyed, if there's no priests on you're screwed. Corpses 99% of the time get butchered and or 'cabal spelled' in most logs where a barb or barb NPC is present.

What's easy for you isn't easy for everyone.
Anyways, yeah. I feel better now and area familiarity is still stupid.

Edit: And for the record, death should be different than losing experience / levels. It should be a deterrent and a punishment, but losing levels and making a person grind isn't the answer. A stronger form of spirit disorientation would be better.

Breath of life is fine in its current iteration. The leveling curve is pathetically easy unless you don't train charisma or you are new to SK.

Step 1. Train charisma to max.

Step 2. ???

Step 3. Profit

If you are having problems gaining exp quickly with this simple plan, it is likely an L2P issue.

CHA is completely unnecessary. Group experience far outweighs any benefit attached to having higher CHA, which is how it should be.

I can tell you I like to level solo for two simple reasons, one I hate you, two My scheduele is all kinds of screwy and I never know when my wife is going to get on me to get off the computer so I hate people relying on me for anything.

You act like leveling together has to be some sort of elaborately planned event. Just go to your favorite leveling area. Is someone there? Then invite them into your group.

Alternatively, grab a near-level fountain RPer and haul them out with you. Most socializers don't mind the grind as long as they have someone to do it with (who really likes grinding alone?).


It amazes me how some people would prefer to level alone even though the process is all but guaranteed to be slower. Yes, one master-level barb can clear the entire mage colony by himself... but he'll get less experience doing so than if he joins another PC, despite the fact he's doing half the amount of damage.