Backyard to Mainland transition question

[kymaene]

please forgive the n00b question. i just started playing this game a few days ago. i had heard on the region channel to stay in the backyard area until around 30ish, so i did. had some fun and made some dappers doing it.

however ...

i went to the mainland today and discovered that my expectations had not been set correctly.

in the backyard, i spent a lot of time farming puny cloppers and weeny kipees. i got to where i could kill a kipee rather quickly. and these mobs both dropped ql21ish parts and gave a fair amount of xp.

now that i'm on the mainland, i'm finding gorged and vigorous (insert mob type here) mobs that are harder to kill (which i would expect) but give a fraction of the xp and way less ql mats (ranging from ql 12 to 15).

is this the way it's supposed to be or am i doing something wrong? needless to say, i was somewhat dismayed.

again, apologies for the n00b question. thanks in advance for any constructive comments given.

[stygeon]

No this is the way of it. It has been mentioned a few times in different places.

[svayvti]

You are doing something wrong.

First thing to note is that mob AI from noobieville and mainland is completely different.

Other than that, same name mobs are not any different. A weanling yubo is a weanling yubo. The yubos are often a good place to start if you're feeling uncomfortable with everything else.

[phoenyx]

now that i'm on the mainland, i'm finding gorged and vigorous (insert mob type here) mobs that are harder to kill (which i would expect) but give a fraction of the xp and way less ql mats (ranging from ql 12 to 15).

is this the way it's supposed to be or am i doing something wrong? needless to say, i was somewhat dismayed.

again, apologies for the n00b question. thanks in advance for any constructive comments given.

After a few false starts, bringing chars to the mainland too early, I'm fairly convinced that you should grind on kipees in the newblands until you have melee fighting at level 35, have 40 in strength, and 40 in constitution with the appropriate regen skills also at 40.

The reasons are this:

A. With 40 in strength, you can get a choice Q50 weapon from a crafter when you hit the mainland. That 152 max damage / 21 speed (on a 2h weapon, for example) will be significantly better than the 92/21 you had in newbieland. Granted, at level 35 fighting skill you'll only be doing about 124 damage per hit till you level up closer to 50, but that's still 30 points per hit better than you could get with your Q20 choice weapon from newbie land. Also, it gives you a weapon to grow into as you level closer to 50, saving you money in the long run.

B. With 40 in constitution, you have the HP you need to fight the mobs that will yield you more like 1500-3000 exp per solo kill. You need at least 400 base HP, which can be pushed up to 500 HP easy with some +10 HP jewelry (or better) and some armor that has +10 HP stats on some or all of the pieces. Ideally, you will have purchased 8-10 pieces of such jewelry in newb land for fairly cheap (1-4K per piece) before you come over to the mainland.

C. With 40 in constitution, you can also equip Q50 armor, which will make a big difference in your survivability. You *can* successfully solo those mobs that give you 3000 per kill even in your choice Q20 medium or Q20 heavy armor from newb land, but if you brought about 200-300K with you from the mainland, you can even buy the NPC vendor versions of the Q50 armor (med or heavy) and you will get significantly more protection than from your best Q20 armor. I soloed scowling gingos, for instance at level 35 in my Q20 armor from newbland (3000 xp per kill), but its important to note that I had to do those one at a time. Multiple mobs usually meant death unless they were easy to kill, allowing me to go back to the scowling gingo.

D. At level 35 in melee fighting, your skill level relative to the mobs that give decent exp/mat drops is high enough that you have a chance to hit them more often and for more damage, and to dodge or parry them more often for less damage to yourself. Regardless of your armor protection. I tried doing mainland at level 25 and just couldn't dish out the damage or dodge/parry often enough. At level 35, that seems to be the sweet spot. At level 30, I dunno, but I imagine it's worse than at 35. I do know, however, that it takes at most 2 extra hours to grind up from level 25 in fight to level 35 in fight on kipees in newbland. 2 extra hours in newbland for a much easier time on the mainland seems like a good tradeoff to me.

-----

Since you're already on the mainland, I'd suggest getting a good choice Q50 2handed weap. Pike or longsword, depending on the vulnerability of the tough aggro mobs in your land. One of each if you can afford it. I'd also suggest that you buy some better armor from the mainland vendors. Q40 or Q50 medium or heavy, depending on what you can afford. If you can afford (and can find) crafted Q40 or Q50 then even better.

Get away from the lowbie mobs around your city and experiment with the aggro loner mobs until you find the ones that yield 2000-3000 for solo kills. In Matis lands that would be the gingos, which are vuln to piercing damage. In Tryker lands that would be the Cloppers, which are vulnerable to peircing as well, if I remember correctly. Learn how to pull one at a time (try using taunts) and grind up on them for 2-3K exp per kill.

[aylwyne]

I agree that the starting island does not properly set your expectations for the mainland. It seems that a LOT of people head to the mainland too early. This in itself tells me that it's not setting the proper expectations. I think this is because you get to a point where you can totally own everything on the island so you think you'll be fine on the mainland. Then you get over there and realize it's not just a small step you took but a rather large one. I don't actually think the mainland is too hard, I really think the problem is that the starting island doesn't have hard enough mobs in the open regions between towns.

As for dealing with difficulties when coming to the mainland, I came over as a L30 melee fighter with L20 choice light armor and a L20 choice sword and dagger and haven't had any problems. At those levels, I can take on the growling clopper and gorai. I set my char to dodge mode and make heavy use of the attack after dodge and increase damage skills. This allows me to take the growlings while using virtually no stamina and rarely taking a hit. If two growlings get on me, I usually have to use my self heal and rest between but otherwise I can kill these for about 3000 xp with little to no downtime.

Granted, this isn't everyone's desired fighting style. Some like to be a tank that can absorb a ton of damage but that's not what's worked best for me as a beginner on the mainland.

[tekkor]

Sorry I did not read the 2 lengthy posts at end there but.....one thing for sure.... if your melee is at like 30 your fine to come over. The one thing you may be having a bit of a problem with though is you surely came over with like a QL 20 weapon and armor.

You should have had some money saved up when you came over so immediately buy you a nice QL 50 weapon and some better armor. This should significantly upgrade your killing capabilities on the mainland.

I came over with 31 on basically everything (melee, offensve magi, harvesting and crafting) and havent had problems. I bought a QL 50 Pike and some QL 50 light armor and went out and started killing the slightly harder guys just outside town (past the real low guys). If you can just find one friend to team with then you can go out and kill the harder Kipees and stuff just a bit outside of town usually.

But upgrade your equipment and you will see improvment.

[mosdef]

Other than that, same name mobs are not any different. A weanling yubo is a weanling yubo. The yubos are often a good place to start if you're feeling uncomfortable with everything else.

do this only if you're comfortable with being bored for a very long time. my zorai char spent 28-35 killing the same 3 mobs over and over and over and over. occasionally i'd attack something else just to kill the monotany and of course i'd die.

the only 3 i could kill that were worth my time were bloated izam, scampering (?) yubo and mekotub. the bloated izams were the most abundant there, so i spent only a small time awy from killing them.