berserker or Shadowknight in duel

[therealgeneral]

<p>hey guys, ive been playing everquest 2 for 3 weeks and have managed to make myself a lv.41 berserker, however <img src="/smilies/9d71f0541cff0a302a0309c5079e8dee.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" /> my freind Samanosuke has a lv.39 shadowknight, and i can NEVER beat him in a duel, i come close, but he still beats me <img src="/smilies/9d71f0541cff0a302a0309c5079e8dee.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" /> , now heres the thing, i have MUCH MUCH better armor, (its stats are better, i have about 600 mitigation more overall) i have 34 AA points and have spent them all on Stamina, Strength , agility, and the corrolating attacks to those (rank 8 str and sta, rank 4 agi, rest of points are put into powers available after rank 4 of those) now its extremely frustrating, i have 3600 hp, and he only has 2700, i mean what gives guys, i know the first conclusion is, you suck, but i really dont beleive i do, if i really did suck how could i make a 41 in 3 weeks,  ive played many mmos and i know im not that bad, so please give me your opinion on the matter at hand and why hes owning me so badly , also he doesnt even use Harmtouch to beat me, only used it once , and it made it a shameful defeat <img src="/smilies/9d71f0541cff0a302a0309c5079e8dee.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" />, please help</p><p> therealgeneral (email me at <a href="mailto:[email protected]" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">[email protected]</a> if you have questions)</p>

[Squigglle]

get reaving

[Skivley101]

<p>Every player has tells such as in poker .... They've just figured you out ..... I suggest change of stratagey.</p><p>but definately research it .... some classes just own others naturally .... but idk why a shadow would own a bezerk nessacarilly.</p><p>Ps edit : get a screen shot of you examineing him ... so you can research with some hard #'s</p>

[Lasai]

<p>You are missing important considerations.</p><p>SK is a hybrid, Spell damage (disease) and melee.  What are your spell damage resists? Mit is nothing vs Disease and does nothing, considering that nearly every SK spell and CA has a disease component should give you a clue as to what is killing you.  What is the level of his spells, particularly the reactive health leech spell.  What are the levels of your spells.  What is his int?  What stances?  A high Int SK with good spells in Offensive stance (and probably 70% spell crit) is going to hurt you as if you were wearing cloth.</p><p>HP and armor are nothing compared to an SK statted to maximize his spell damage and reactive leeches.  Add in Adept 3 or Masters and its going to be even worse.</p><p>I would guess that at your level, given your choices, that your wis is minimal and your resists the same.</p><p>And, this may sound cruel, but any warm body can level to 41 in this game, and many have.</p>

[Mwahaha]

<p>As with PvP what it comes down to is player skill, gear, spells/CAs and now AAs.  I don't know anything about zerker AAs so I won't go into that.</p><p>You have all this nice armor but how good are your combat arts?  What kind of weapon(s) are you using and do they have procs?Do you spam your stuns/knockbacks or time them to interrupt his big spells?  And like was said earlier what stances are you guys using?</p>

[RanmaBoyType]

<p>1) squiggle - read the fooking post before you post.....</p><p>2) as an owner of a level 80 SK, the fact that his max hp is lower than yours is irrelevant when you consider how much of it he can heal back in the course of the fight, while at the same time all doing damage to you (all SK heals are a lifetap of some sort, be it DS/leach, or plain old lifetap, or DoT/HoT depending on his aa makeup)</p><p>if you plan to beat the sk, you will need to focus on disease resists.  I would also carry some cure potions, as alot of SK damage is DoTs, and that can be severely mitigated with cures.</p>

[therealgeneral]

<p>okay thx guys for replying so fast, i thought about what you said and came to the conclusion that it probally is my low ammount of dis/poison resistance, and to help you guys understand better, here are some screen shots</p><p><a href="http://img184.imageshack.us/img184/5379/eq2000031pz8.jpg" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">http://img184.imageshack.us/img184/...q2000031pz8.jpg</a> </p><p><a href="http://img205.imageshack.us/img205/3015/eq2000032zx6.jpg" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">http://img205.imageshack.us/img205/...q2000032zx6.jpg</a></p><p><a href="http://img338.imageshack.us/img338/1631/eq2000033ih2.jpg" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">http://img338.imageshack.us/img338/...q2000033ih2.jpg</a></p><p>okay those are just my stats, as for his, imagine a regular lv.39 SK with low/medium armor, and a pretty good two handed weapon, hes spent 8 AA points on inteligence, and im not sure waht the rest were put to, ill get a pic tomorrow, enjoy</p>

[Lasai]

<cite>RanmaBoyType wrote:</cite><blockquote><p>1) squiggle - read the fooking post before you post.....</p><p>2) as an owner of a level 80 SK, the fact that his max hp is lower than yours is irrelevant when you consider how much of it he can heal back in the course of the fight, while at the same time all doing damage to you (all SK heals are a lifetap of some sort, be it DS/leach, or plain old lifetap, or DoT/HoT depending on his aa makeup)</p><p>if you plan to beat the sk, you will need to focus on disease resists.  I would also carry some cure potions, as alot of SK damage is DoTs, and that can be severely mitigated with cures.</p></blockquote><p>It's pretty funny, there are some Iksar SK mobs in Kylong that actually USE thier reactive buff and other arts, and they do take a bit more time to take down compared to a same level melee only mob.   Finally seeing SK mobs doing something besides tossing Coil and pulling a pet once in a blue moon.</p><p>I run with my SK in offensive stance most of the time, simply because the reactive and leaches more than make up for the defense loss, and the huge Int buff makes for far faster kills.</p>

[Lhrlnd]

<p>Zerkers dont really excel solo until t6 - t7.</p><p>Try levelling up and giving him a 1v1 at a later point. Zerks get some really nasty CA's</p>

[Longfangz]

<p>My guess would be by looking at your pics (though they all seem to be the same pic...) is simply you seem to be a bit more defensive geared, and possibly due to newness in the game I can only imagine what your AA build is. Simply put, as many posters above have stated, you need to up your disease resists vs an SK. I have both a zerk and SK and can tell you total hitpoints and raw mit is nothing regarding a dual with a class that can bypass your physical mitigation and make your health his while still doing damage.</p><p>First, you need to work on resists. Second, check around regarding AA builds as I see you have a tower shield equipped though vs an SK you should be in more of an offensive build (Buckler spec preferred, though some 2handers or DW specs aren't bad for your level). The fact is, the longer the fight is, the more likely that the SK will win due to tapping your health to recover his. Go offensive stance, check out some offensive AA builds and work on your resists. It's not that you are poorly geared for PVE, just not well equipped/AA'd for PVP.</p>

[therealgeneral]

<p>ah okay those are some good thoughts thanks, as for the pics being all the same, they are and they arent, look closely, each one has the stats for my 1h weapon ,shield and the 2H spear <img src="/smilies/3b63d1616c5dfcf29f8a7a031aaa7cad.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" />, heres a link to my AA build, right now ive spent it all on Str and Sta pretty much, if i need to reset it and make a new tree please tell me, and tell me what to make with all my points, note , i get AA points at a decent rate so it would be cool if you told me what to invest in for the future <img src="/smilies/3b63d1616c5dfcf29f8a7a031aaa7cad.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" /> </p><p><a href="http://img515.imageshack.us/img515/1464/eq2000034jd7.jpg" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">http://img515.imageshack.us/img515/...q2000034jd7.jpg</a></p><p><a href="http://img230.imageshack.us/img230/3328/eq2000035xn4.jpg" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">http://img230.imageshack.us/img230/...q2000035xn4.jpg</a></p><p><a href="http://img515.imageshack.us/img515/4493/eq2000036vk2.jpg" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">http://img515.imageshack.us/img515/...q2000036vk2.jpg</a></p><p><a href="http://img230.imageshack.us/img230/9038/eq2000037ff5.jpg" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">http://img230.imageshack.us/img230/...q2000037ff5.jpg</a></p><p><a href="http://img104.imageshack.us/img104/329/eq2000038of4.jpg" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">http://img104.imageshack.us/img104/...q2000038of4.jpg</a></p><p>okay thx guys, and please dont say, OMG your an idiot thats not how you spend AA points noob, im completely open to suggestions and even critisism , just not rude remarks from ranting ten yearolds lol</p>

[Rahatmattata]

You will probably never be able to kill equally skilled/geared shadowknights in a duel as a warrior. The life taps and all are just too much to deal with, even with a ton of nox resists. Some class combos are just not balanced in dueling, such as brigand vs monk. I get owned vs an equally skilled/geared monk on my brigand almost every time. They do too much burst dps and I can't hit them even with parry/defense/deflection debuffs in... which by the time those go in I'm dead anyway.You can try saving shield bash and any other stuns/stifles/interrupts you might have for when you see him casting. Also don't forget Unyielding Will <img src="/eq2/images/smilies/69934afc394145350659cd7add244ca9.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" width="15" height="15" />  You will eat a real death if it procs, but hey if it gets the job done.... if you really want to bust out the cheese pop a miracle/blessing.Edit: I just looked at your AA tree and it definately needs work lol but no worries. I'd start off in str first probably.... the sta line is nice and you will want it, but at low levels (level 20 or so) you really want a tower shield. Anyway... str: 4,4,8  The goal here is just to max out your melee crits. The hate gain can be nice, but you shouldn't really need it if you keep your char up to date and aren't tanking against some ubah twinks or mentored 80s. Next I suggest the sta line for the buckler build. sta: 4,4,8,6,1  This should have you around 60% double attack and some extra avoidance. Then I would decide do you want agi or int. Reflexes in agi is awesome and has saved me many times, and the aoe dps is nice, especially for a guardian (my warrior)... however I spec'd out of it and went down the int line and I love it. +haste/parry, reduced reuse timers and recovery times is nice.I've never met 2 warriors with the exact same AA build... but consider this build....str: 4.4.8   sta: 4,4,8,6,1   int: 4,7,4,7,1   and then you have 5 AA left to spend where you want (such as maxing riposte, or getting hate gain from str, belly smash from wis... etc...) To get the maximum benefit from your AAs, DO NOT put more than 4 in each level 1 stat AA and stay away from the wisdom line.Can't help you with zerker tree AAs, but check your class forums and also check the zerker boards at eq2flames... join the zerker worldwide chat channel and just lurk for a bit... you will learn a ton from other zerkers.

[therealgeneral]

well i am quite new to the game , so i dont know what you mean by unyielding will, or the miracles and blessings lol, how do i get those, thx again

[Rahatmattata]

Unyielding Will is a save vs death spell that both warriors get. It is level 35 and is obtained in Bloodlines adventure pack (/claim ring to start bloodlines). You can do the quests in the adventure pack to eventually obtain the spell, or you can buy it off the broker (get the ad3), or you can hire an alchemist that has the recipe to make it for you (meaning they have to have done bloodlines to get the recipe).At level 20 you have the option to worship a deity. More info can be found <a href="http://eq2.wikia.com/wiki/Deity" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">here.</a>

[therealgeneral]

awsome okay, now i understand, and yes i can claim that ring, i have every expansion /adventure pack possible right now, as for the deity's , what would you reccomend for me, i want to be a good dueler and soloer, thx

[Longfangz]

Looking at your AA build I would reccommend respecing the warrior tree to take the points out of the initial str/sta/wis/agi/int areas. Pretty much you only want to have the required 4 points in a particular tree that you intend to spec in, because the abilities in a given tree in the higher ranks (such as STR3 and STA3) and much more important in both PVP and PVE than the base stats gained from putting points in. I see you have some scattered points in int and wis as well as added points into the STR1 and STA1 trees that could have been used to gain higher abilities in those trees.Right now it make look like you benefit from those added stats, but as you get a bit higher you will see those gains are extremely small considering the abilities you are sacrificing to get that slightly higher str and sta. Trust me, my zerk was my starting toon as well, though there were no AA's when I made him, but it was a learning process to determine which build is the best for what YOU actually do with the character and which build suits you best. Most zerks tend to go with the  STR/STA/INT build as  crits, double attack, and haste/reuse is more beneficial for most that what the other trees give.  Bucklers at you level are typically priests stats mainly  (though I think the Shiny Brass Shield HQ buckler has melee stats) but at the minimum I would go STR3 for crits till maxxed then work on either the STA tree for double attack or the INT tree for haste/reuse if you so choose. Unfortunatly our EOF tree is pretty much junk for Zerks, so spend all your points in the warrior tree first.Also in the end it comes to skill. You need to learn to see what types of spells he is casting and what those particular casting animations are. Dots are a pain and can pretty much only be removed with pots solo, but you need to find out two particular animations: one being this single target lifetap (kinda a hands in front of the body swirling type animation) and the other being the reactive lifetapp rune (bending over slightly with arms spread out wide to the sides then curling up in front of the body)... sorry can't describe them much better verbally). Also, depending on his AA build he may have goen the reaving line in the EoF tree which allows all of his spells to have a lifetapp componant added for each spell cast, so each of his spells will tap back 2% of his health, or more if he has gone the INT tree for spell crits as if the spell crits the tap will also.Good luck, and know that dueling is not PVP, so unless you are on a PVP server I wouldn't worry whether or not someone can beat you in a duel. Heck, in a duel you have a countdown which allows you to precast abilities prior to engaging whereas in PVP you have to react to an attack vice having some sort of countdown.