Thread: Upgrading Might

After hitting 75 last week, I was finishing out the quest line in Nan Curunir (sp?). Things had gone relatively smoothly until I was trying to pick up my Uruk-hai orders, and found that having to battle a woodcutter and any other creature at once proved the end of me. I was only able to make it through this area with my Herbalist helping me on all draws of two or more.

I tend to play Ardour, so hitting this wall is making me relearn the system, making sure that I'm making use of all my skills as best as possible, but I also recognize that I'm not that well-equipped, and this is probably making me squishier than I'd like.

I haven't done any 6-man work since Moria, so my gear is largely a patchwork of stuff from that period and quest drops. I tend to just do open world and solo, so I haven't felt much need to chase gear, but I want to give it some attention (though Rohan is coming). I noticed that my Might was sitting around 740, while my Vitality was around 1200. I figure that the first thing I'd try to do is balance that out a bit. I shifted some gear I had out, and now my Might is around 820 or so.

I'm nearing Kindred on Theodred's Riders, so if there's gear there that would help boost my Might, that will be available to me soon. Other than that, what suggestions do you have for boosting my Might? Any gear that would be worth pursuing, especially stuff that's available from kindred vendors or the like? What's a worthwhile Might goal at 75?

Thanks for any advice!

If you're running in Ardour, I'm going to assume that you've also traited yellow. That isn't really a very good traitset for soloing. It's more advantageous to trait blue and run in glory for survivability or to trait red and run in fervour for increased dps (single target).

Ardour shines as a traitline when fighting large numbers of trash mobs in a fellowship. Unfortunately, trash mobs aren't usually where excellence is needed, as the boss fights (generally single target) are where the difficulty lies. So, I would advise switching to fervour and learning to maximize your dps as a survival strategy.

You didn't mention your virtue set. You can get significant increases to morale and tactical/physical mitigation from choosing good virtues and ranking them up to 14. If you havn't yet, it's really helpful to go back and finish many deeds.

Another thing you didn't mention is if you're using a second age weapon or not. Worn Symbols of Celembrimbor are quite cheap on the auction house or you can skirm to get the marks and medallions to afford them at the skirm camp.

Speaking of skirms, running skirm raids (12 person) is a good place to start getting gear with 122 might per piece. Check your local glff channel.

Again, speaking of skirms, you can go to Galtrev and visit Lugdagnir (near the rep vendors) to buy an armor set (called the dragon set because the helm and shoulder drop from Draigoch) using either seals or medallions (which you earn from running skirms or other instances)



Now, back to your original question of getting loot by reputation. Since you're almost kindred with Theodreds, I'd finish that up and get what you can, but then head to the Great River, since they have awesome rewards. You want to start running the Limlight daily quests as soon as you can (along with the Fangorn's Edge instance) for Limlight Heroes reputation. The other reputation group also has good rewards, but you can finish them up by normal questing.



If you're only interested in running solo, what you have is enough to get by. If you want to be more useful to groups 1200 might is a good spot. If you want to raid regularly, work your way up from there. There is no limit to physical mastery, so just balance your survivability (morale, Tactical Mitigation, Physical Mitigation) with your dps.

Thanks, that is very helpful. I'm wrapping up thinks around Orthanc, then will head to the Great River, so I'll be exploring over there soon. This gives me some good things to be looking at as I keep shaping this character up in anticipation of Rohan.

Thanks!

Wow, you´re really drggging along some things that keep you down. First, your high Vitality doesnt help you diddly squat because it is rather inefficient to get morale through vitality; and you will not need a lot of tactical mitigation in the levelling process. You could try to swap that for might items.

Further, I´d recommend some visits to the auction house. Filter for lvl 75 stuff. The current instances drop pretty good purple gear that can be sold and traded freely. Another step would be some crafted pieces of course, but that will be noticeably more expensive.

Also, I cannot help but think that quite a few items from both the Dunlending and Theodred rep vendors will be noticeably better than some of your current equip. Specifically, go for the might/Agi/crit rating bracelet from the Theodred vendor once you hit kindred.

Regarding your style, you can do what you want of course, but running Ardour when questing seems rather suboptimal for me. With the removed damage penalty of glory, you may as well use that. It is generally good for questing to run 3 reds/4 blues as long as your gear isnt that good.

Most of the Great River crafted armor pieces are very good. I actually think the crafted heavy armor is better than the Draigoch set because it is more balanced stat wise. But I agree with others. Switch your stance and class traits.

Quest gear gives a lot of might... frankly, there's really no reason to stack might as a levelling champ. At worst when I levelled from 65-75 I was down in 3.8k morale and didn't run into things that were impossible. So go ahead and stack as much might as you want and don't worry about vit

Hello,

My 2 cents: You'll naturally find your might climb and your vitality and agility drop as you start to pick up Armor and Jewelry Items at 75.

As mentioned before the Draigoch set (minus head and shoulders) is an easy pick up in Galtrev and will raise your Might significantly. Also some decent armor and cloak pieces can be had in the Auction House at very reasonable prices. Great River Armor is often available as well, although it will tend to be much more expensive. I personally liked the Great River Armor to start as it is much more balanced and although it won't give you the Might totals the other armors will, using it you won't go from 8000 Morale to less than 6000 (which can be quite a shock).

Jewelry is probably even more readily available in the Auction House. Several Great River pieces are keepers even after being a veteran 75er (Earrings come to mind). Once you reach Kindred with Stangard, Dunland, Theodred and Limelight regions you will have a variety of options. Bracelet of Wrath's Hour (Theodred) and Ring of the Dragon (Dunland) are just some examples of items you can get a lot of mileage out of. The Limelight jewelry is especially good but make sure you get the Physical Mastery ones not the Tactical.

Your legendary Items will now how access to much more powerful relics so be sure to take advantage of those. Make sure you explore and level you virtues as well.

As for the Stance advice: play what you enjoy. As a T2 Orthanc Raider, I tend to go in Fervour (Although I have done it in Ardour). As for 6-Mans or Skirm Raids I prefer Ardour. Of course I put a lot of time in getting the AoE Orthanc Armor Set and the proper legacies and relics on my Legendary items. I almost always switch to Fervour for the boss fights, however. Some instances I might find myself using all 3 stances. Start in Ardour, switch to Fervour in Boss fights, and switch to Glory if the tank goes down.

Remember that skill always trumps gear and exploring all options is always a good thing. Play what you enjoy and your Might will easily climb over 2000 if you so desire.

Thanks for the advice. I traited for Fervour this weekend, and I'll give it another try as I'm making my way through Great River. Didn't really realize just how much there is there until this weekend, so I wouldn't be surprised if this takes me past the release of Rohan. Looked at the pieces available from the vendors in Stangard, and I can see what people are saying about the upgrade possibilities.

My virtues need work. I traited up a few years ago everything I was using to 9-10, and some are higher now, but most of the traits were Vitality centered, and my Might-based ones are pretty low. That will be a long-term goal to boost them.

I checked the auction house some, and I'll keep my eye on it in, though I didn't see much this weekend.

You guys have given me a bunch to do. Guess I'll let my SWTOR subscription lapse so as not to be so divided in my playtime for awhile!

Thanks.

btw don't feel too bad... I remember those woodcutters being a huge pain.

My advice is... While leveling, find or make a weapon that has the sudden defense cooldown legacy on it, and max that out. This will drop your sudden defense cooldown to 1 minute. Also run with the call of the wild trait, if you have that... It will make it so using wild attack drops the cooldown of sudden defense by 5 seconds each time.

With that method you can have a bubble up pretty often, at least once per fight. If you find yourself with both sudden defense and true heroics (Another bubble) on cooldown, hit sprint and run away because you're probably not long for this world!

The two greatest things you can do for your dps potential are:

Get the Galtrev set or armour from the rep vendor there. You can pick up the draig pieces (shoulders and helm) at some point too. In a total of 2 completed Draigs I managed to get both with no trouble.

Get your Limlight Gorge dailies done, every day, until you are Kindred with heroes of Limlight Gorge. There is simply nothing comparable to the Empowered Anduin Victor's bling set (ring, earring, bauble) for Champ.

This is going to kill your Vitality, so find as much stuff for the other slots as you can which includes Max Morale. I lost 1k Morale doing the two above things, however I gained 600 Might and several thousand Physical Mastery. The Great River set may be more balanced, but we're not about balance, we're about KICKING BUTT!

Originally Posted by Odaroff

There is simply nothing comparable to the Empowered Anduin Victor's bling set (ring, earring, bauble) for Champ.

That's kind of arguable. I used to run the full Victor's Set for quite a while but have now turned to using the Exemplar's Bauble and 2 Earrings of Wrath Unleashed, as I value crit higher than pure mastery alone.

Originally Posted by Odaroff

This is going to kill your Vitality, so find as much stuff for the other slots as you can which includes Max Morale. I lost 1k Morale doing the two above things, however I gained 600 Might and several thousand Physical Mastery.

I you build for DPS I don't see any reason not to kill your Vitality. Don't kill your DPS by going for Max Morale or Vitality unless you plan on some serious tanking duty. I have 5.9k Morale in my DPS build and run Orthanc T2 just fine.

hmm, that might be a good idea

Originally Posted by Vodomir

I you build for DPS I don't see any reason not to kill your Vitality. Don't kill your DPS by going for Max Morale or Vitality unless you plan on some serious tanking duty. I have 5.9k Morale in my DPS build and run Orthanc T2 just fine.

QFT, Simply put group buffs in any raid situation will give you enough morale that you can survive anythign which won't result in a wipe. Vitality is way down the list of things to look for, its useful but it's no more critical than Agi...that is you need SOME but you are probably going to get all you need from your existing armor/jewellry sets without specifically going out looking for more.

Now maybe for an occasional off-tanking (e.g. Fervour tanking Penrith) you might want a bit more Vit but one or two pieces is all you'd need at most.

Originally Posted by Vodomir

That's kind of arguable. I used to run the full Victor's Set for quite a while but have now turned to using the Exemplar's Bauble and 2 Earrings of Wrath Unleashed, as I value crit higher than pure mastery alone.



I you build for DPS I don't see any reason not to kill your Vitality. Don't kill your DPS by going for Max Morale or Vitality unless you plan on some serious tanking duty. I have 5.9k Morale in my DPS build and run Orthanc T2 just fine.

Have to agree, even with my latest champ who is far from fully geared cos he just hit 75, and probably won't be on account of I'm grinded out and in five weeks it's all obsolete anyway. 20% crit, 1400 might, 6100 morale, around 475 vit. Nothing on the landscape has killed me yet - except I fell off something outside of Stangard and died (I thought Rohirric lands were FLAT!).

It was a bit tough from about 72 on with old gear, and more vit/morale, but less might and far less crit - still didn't die from questing, though it got a bit close at times. We really are about killing them before they kill us - unless you're geared for tanking, you're not going to win a battle by drawing it out and outlasting the mobs. That includes wading into orc camps, dens of beasties, and other evil things in groups.

Thanks, all. I figure this is all getting to change when Rohan comes out. I did pick up some Galtrev pieces, and just got kindred for Stangard, so I'll head there and see what's available that might help improve. Haven't started on Limlight Gorge yet, but I did pick up some reputation pieces in the store sale, so hopefully that process will go quicker than others. I'm probably up to about 1100 might or so, and yet my vit/morale have definitely taken a hit, but morale is still around 6500 or so. I have enjoyed those massive crit damage that I wasn't seeing in my earlier build, so the battles are already going faster. I've encountered a few challenging areas, but mostly due to pulling too many at one time.

Don't be surprised if you never go above that morale point again BTW. Most DPS-geared champs at endgame are built with lots of Might, lots of PhysMastery and lots of Crit. Once you start getting the Empowered Anduin jewellry and/or the Kindred Theodred Rider's ones you shoudl continue to see your Might go up but your morale may dip even more (6k is a good target point but the exact point will vary with your own comfort level).