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Started Fresh
UsualSuspect
Member UncommonPosts: 1,243
I've been playing The Secret World on and off since preorder, but never really got to grips with the whole thing, I was learning along the way. The last time I played I got to Transylvania and gave up after getting my butt handed to me over and over. Instead of picking up some new abilities I thought I'd have learnt enough to make a really good character now, so I started fresh.
Well, that was an understatement. This is my current character:
http://chronicle.thesecretworld.com/character/Molony
I have QL10 minor talismans, they're veteran purchases from the store but before I switched them out I had all QL9s in there. QL9 weapon, QL9 in some other slots, finished the Gladiator deck (which is awesome, by the way), on my way to finishing the Exorcist and Executioner decks, and best of all? I haven't even entered Egypt yet! My next story quest is to enter Egypt, which I'm not bothering with until I complete the Exorcist deck by going through Blue Mountain again.
It's strange how much better my character is this time around, I have been using the auction house quite a bit (obviously), but no idea where all these AP/SP's have come from so early in the game. How is everyone else doing in the levelling stage?
Comments
Do you do a certain mission chain daily?
For example in Savage Coast I would port in from Argatha, pick up the bloody trail finish that. From there pick up the burning zombies, turn those two in at what's his name with the black hat. I'd pick up the Black House and so forth.
.. .... .- - . - .-. --- .-.. .-.. ... .-- .... --- .-. . .--. --- .-. - .-.-.-
--------------------------------------------------------
Promote what you love instead of bashing what you hate.
I went straight through to the end of Blue Mountain, doing all missions I could find, doing all the faction quests along the way, until I'd finished the lot. The dungeons, Polaris, Hell Raised and Darkness War, I did a few times each, and after finishing all of Blue Mountain I went back through all the previous zones plus the hubs to pick up the lore and collect all the locations.
After all that, I'd finished the Gladiator deck and was making my way through the Executioner deck, I had 9's in the Talismans and main weapons, and was really wondering where all the AP/SP's had come from, as the last time I played it took me half way through Egypt before I'd finished a first deck. At that point I thought I'd stop before moving to Egypt and pick up a few things in the auction house, got caught on that idea and started repeating a few quests to get some more money, so I could have all QL9/10's before hitting Egypt.
Then I got sidetracked as I really wanted to repeat the dungeons, but found that healers were really hard to find, so I thought hey, let's make an Exorcist as I've already got the Fists inner wheel complete. I'd then be able to cover two roles for dungeons once I hit Egypt. So I went back to the start and did it all over again, every quest except for a few side quests that I knew didn't award much, slowly building it up.
Unfortunately the story missions must award a lot as today I finished Blue Mountain and was nowhere near completing Exorcist, so I've jumped back into Savage Coast to repeat a few more. I'm quite happy doing this really, as I think the first three zones are really the best in the game, I especially don't like Egypt so stalling on entering that area is fine with me. I'll move on once I've completed Exorcist and have a few healing talismans gathered, either from Darkness War or the auction house, as at the moment I'm still having tons of fun in the three starting areas.
I don't remember the AP coming particularly fast at that stage. I imagine the high-QL gear speeds everything up, though. It's good to hear you are finding the game more fun after starting fresh.
I restarted at the beginning when my initial trial and error proved to be mostly error. I found a build I liked online and went from there. I've gone through a variety of builds but I haven't considered starting over after that first time.
I'm interested you seem to be focusing on the predefined decks. I don't think I've completed any of the faction decks yet. I generally find a build online with a core mechanic I find interesting and tweak it to my liking. I've also come up with a few from scratch. The flexibility of the skill system was a big part of what drew me to The Secret World, so I think I pretty much dismissed the "default" builds out of hand. It sounds like you've found them effective?
I'm a bit of a completionist, I've gathered every bit of lore from every place I've travelled through so far, marked off all the locations, I'm definitely going back to find all the bosses later too. So for me, completing decks is just something I have to do - plus, the outfits are nice, especially the Templar ones.
With that said though, I find the decks to be a great jumping off point. Even as you're building up a deck, you're finding other powers on the way that fit nicely into your goal. And then when you have all the powers and start on another deck, you find other things that interlink nicely, so you start switching one power out for another and so on until the original deck becomes much stronger.
The Gladiator deck, on the other hand, seems pretty much perfect. I haven't had a big look around, but the way it's built to deal massive area attacks is really powerful. There's only one power I'd switch out and that's the one that puts down a line of barbed wire. Never really found a use for that so far, but not sure what to switch it out for yet.
I enjoy that feeling as well. New character benefits from all the learnings. Gameplay is understood better, world is a bit familiar, game mechanics are understood. It just makes the character feel like Steve Austin, better, stronger, faster. *da-na-na-naaaa* :-)
How did starting fresh help, though? Maybe I am misunderstanding, or just missing something.
Couldn't you just take your existing character and rerun all the earlier missions, using weapons appropriate for those levels, and gain the points to put into different decks? That would save you from having to do all the collections over again. How is it more beneficial to start over with a new character?
I'm not being sarcastic, I am curious. I have been away a while and wonder if it would be better to just start over, or just rerun the earlier stuff.
i...... want nothing to do with this house..... ever again.
It gives me the fragging creeps.
The Deep Web is sca-ry.
If you have been away for a while, a possible advantage to starting over is being able to redo the central storyline quests. Pretty much everything else can be repeated.
In general, though, I'd suggest picking up where you left off. You can read the description of each step in the central storyline quest, which will bring a lot of it back for you. The progress you have made will make it easier to gain the AP to adjust your build, if necessary. The system is designed so pretty much the only reason you would need to start a new character is to try a different faction.
Great! Thanks. That was what I was thinking. I went back to Kingsmouth, removed my trinkets, equipped some level 0 wepaons, and started running through the missions. It seems that they have added a few while I was away. I'm going to be leveling up a ccouple of different weapons this time.
Yep, the ability wheel and "respec" is something that throws a lot of people -- you may want to check out this thread:
http://forums.thesecretworld.com/showthread.php?t=64032