OK I’ve been able to beat most bosses until now. I’ve been fighting Astel in the Ranni quest for days. Well, days after work. Moonveil +9, Mimic +10, Meteorite Staff, Rock Sling. In videos I see Int build running around avoiding attacks and throwing Rock Sling and their Summons doing damage. I can NOT for the life of me dodge his attacks consistently. My mimic, equipped like me, does nothing. At one point I looked back and my Mimic was just standing on the periphery watching. I switched to Lhutel because at least she jumps in and attacks, but the best I’ve done in all of that time is get it to about 50%. I’m not getting better.
My Vigor is 75, fwiw. Intelligence 78. Mind 31. Yeah I’ve put everything into Vigor INT and Mind.
I also can’t seem to summon anyone for help. I use my finger of whatever, activate the stake, but I don’t see any gold marks on the ground. Are they supposed to be before you go through the mist? I don’t see them anywhere, and of course once I use my Finger I can’t even summon Lhutel once I get in.
I can’t just skip this one because I really want to finish Rannis quest and I want to get up to the plateau you have to get to to get Black Knife Tiche which requires going through this quest.
Well, I kind of cheesed it I guess. I thought about how the rot was so bad down here and I have a rot breath incantation but needed more faith to use it. Boosted my faith by trading out talisman and equipped it. I thought he may well be invulnerable to it since he lives here. Used the Mimic, managed to get close enough to cast it a few times and once it “took.” I noticed that my Mimic was now also using the Rot Breath. Just ran away as far as I could and ran in circles avoiding attacks and watched his health drop. Cool! Then at around half health, it stopped dropping. Managed to get close again (and barely avoided getting killed) and used it again and saw the health dropping and ran away again letting my Mimic keep him busy. Just ran in circles until he died. Big Cheer! It’s not cheating if you use the tools you’ve got! Another reminder to not keep banging away with my normal methods if they don’t work.
Glad you were able to overcome. It was a tough boss. Tricky as hell. I think I might have just got second best lucky when I took it down but I could imagine fighting against it a lot more for hours on end.
Although melee is different from your magic so…the biggest thing was just trying to connect while it moves and attacks about. The bloody head often becomes inaccessible to my giant sword goddammit!
Magic can get frustrating sometimes. I find myself reverting to melee with the moonveil a lot. The weapon you get at the end of the Ranni quest is actually pretty good if you have the specs for it.
IIRC, if you move the cursor thing over top of the marker and hit the same key you used to set it, it will disappear. You can only put down 5, and the sixth one you drop overwrites the first, etc., so if you ever get stuck where you can’t find it, open the map, drop 5 all around one another, and then remove those. Kind of a hassle, but better than following the wrong marker on the last continent you were on by accident!
I liked the magic build a lot because I could spend most of the time doing melee with moonveil or the wing of astel, and the second any fight got too hard I could just cheese it with spells.
Yeah, I was always disappointed by the powerful stuff. I really only used pebble, rock sling, and Loretta’s Greatbow. That last one is the game’s sniper rifle and can be really cheesy.
Levelling up dexterity is a great way to speed up casting time for the more powerful spells. There is some gear options as well. I am usually able to unload some pretty powerful spells against bosses. Even with that though, there are times where either melee or spamming lower level spells is the way to go.
It helps that I started off as a level 1 wretch so I needed to level up dexterity until I was able to scrounge gear and spells to switch over. Kind of wish I went another way though. So much grinding required as a wretch.
Ah, yeah, I never could find the marker. I looked at every inch of that map. The creating new ones around me and then getting rid of them worked. Thanks!
Any suggestions for a full armor set for an INT player, Moonveil, Wing of Astel, and now Dark Moon Greatsword + Meteorite Staff, I have the Carian Regal Staff but haven’t leveled it past level 5 (putting all my Somber stones into my Moonveil and Wing of Astel) and I use Rock Sling as my go to, Glinstone Pebble as my fast hitter, Star Shower just 'cause, sometimes the Full Moon spell but haven’t see and advantage to that over Rock Sling, and now I have Rot Breath equipped too. I’m about level 170 with most of it in Int, Mind, and Vigor.
There are helmets that will improve INT and other attributes. You will have to look up what they are called. Most are in the School area. You know, the weird face mask things the sorcerers there wear. There is 6 different versions I think.
As for armor, I like going as light as I can while still having some poise which kicks in around 30 I think. Poise isn’t a real big deal but with some enemies it will get you past that first hit. I think I am wearing the Carion set you can get in the school or the Cuckoo set you get in either Lyendell or maybe the Carion Castle.
I was planning on posting my Int build and gear loadout in the spoiler thread. Currently in NG+, dumping a lot of points in faith as the best path to juice up my sorcery spells. In terms of items, looks like you just received a weapon that changed how I geared up. Because of that weapon, I became more of a spellsword. Currently ratio is about 65% magic, 35% sword use, almost all of that using the ash of war.
Apart from the headpieces listed by Scuzz and Rock8man, some robe sets provide specific bonuses stats, and spells. Some have drawbacks. I ended up going a different way.
Played around with the greatsword from finishing Ranni’s quest. Don’t think I’ll replace my Moonveil with it.
I haven’t been paying attention, I’m at level 185. I haven’t seen at least half of the map. Haven’t done Caelid, the snowy mountains, the Volcano area, I’ve just entered the Altas Plateau (sp) I think? Where I put the medallions in and something flipped upside down and I entered a new area? Lest anyone think I am overpowered, remember: I suck at intense melee combat games. At the end of Ranni’s quest, it took me 7 tries to kill Blaid. Since the quest finally let me get up to an area I have spent hours trying to get up too, since fairly early in the game, I found the place to get Black Knife Tiche and it took me 10 tries - maybe more - to kill her. I just spent a LOT of hours trying to kill Astel, boss in Ranni’s quest, and I don’t know if I ever would have had I not decided to give up my normal Mage/Blade approach and use rot breath. I’m guessing you can cut my level in half and that’s where I am in normal people’s capabilities.
Anyway - I’ve been wanting Black Knife Tiche for a while and just happen to have all of the Greater Ghostwort I need to go to 10 - except for 8. Now I have to find 8 and will stop my exploring until I get it. Likewise, I want to get my Carian Regal Scepter up to 10 but lack Somber Smithing Stones 6 8 9 and 10 (I’ve used them all on Moonveil and Wing of Astel.) So hunting I will go.
