Help on directions for making a Elf Ranger, 2014?

• leomorn wrote on 2014-07-07 23:33
  Reason of me asking for assistance would be I have read multiple guides, all of which have been several years old, leaving me to think either nothing has changed as far as building them, or that it hasn't been kept up to date. There are people that say that they should still rank wm up to r1, and others that don't. Along with combat skills and life skills, some say work on combat more, others say life skills.
  
  I've played on and off for about 5 years, have only done a couple of the shakespear generations with my main human, NONE of the other generations, and my Elf is as much as new as it gets. Me elf is currently set at (this is ALL skills):
  
  Combat Master: F
  
  Ranged Attack: F
  
  Bow Mastery: E
  
  Critical Hit: Novice
  
  Magnum Shot: F
  
  Support Shot: F
  
  Mining: Novice (don't know why I even have that)
  
  Blunt Mastery: Novice
  
  Smash: F
  
  Rest: F
  
  Defense: F
  
  Counterattack: F
  
  Assault Slash: F
  
  Windmill: F
  
  Magic Mastery: F
  
  and First Aid: Novice
  
  As far as the playstyle goes, I'm aiming towards strong range attacks, but in a given scenario of being overwhelmed or forced into melee, be able to fend for myself. That reason being, I don't know what all the skills are, I've yet to see a concrete method on handling combat. People keep listing some skills as "high priority" but I'm looking for a more specific list, such as rank this first, then this. I guess what I'm looking for is a build that will set me on comfortable ground, with minimum consequence as to having to work twice as hard to level a skill because I decided to level one other skill before it. Also, if theres any generations or places to train said skills at, would be great info as well. Thanks for reading this, and much appreciation if you decide to post your tips. :)
• Kelvas wrote on 2014-07-08 03:34
  Hi.
  Let's get right to it, shall we?
  As an elf, you basically have two options as a primary talent early on.
  1. Magic, and 2. Ranged. From your post, I assume that you pick ranged. If you have some money, go pick up a BDK's bow. I'll explain later.
  
  But first thing's first, work on refine. You need to fail mythal (can't spell, sorry!) ores in order to rank up (r8 onwards I believe), so you'll need a low dex. Although, this isn't required, as you can just use things that penalize dex in the future (Heavy Armor, certian titles and enchants), but it may be easier to work on it now. You can gather ores in barri or buy them off another player, like what I did for my elf.
  
  After you finish refine, you can now focus on combat. As I've mentioned earlier, a BDK(~3mil) is ideal, especially for early to mid game. I recommend a r1, which costs roughly 2 million more, but will save you a LOT of money in the long run. Making a r6 HLB is WAY too costly, especially if this is for an alt, not a main. I also highly doubt that you'll make full use of a r6 HLB, since you'll need 680 max damage for it to be a better than a BDK's bow.
  
  

  Quote from k1nsoo;1199882:

  [Image: http://puu.sh/72AUb.png]

  
  http://mabination.com/threads/78637-HLB-DKB-Bhafel-Bow-Comparisons
  
  1)DKB > R6 HLB if your max bow damage is lower than 680 (w/HLB)
  2)R6 HLB > DKB if your max bow damage is higher than 680 (w/HLB)
  3)Bhafel hunter has the highest dps among all threes
  

  
  
  Otherwise, if a DBK's bow is too pricey for an option, go grab a leather long bow(10k?) or a HLB (~250k? clean), which are both ideal due to the range that it provides. Usage of crossbow for elf ranged is, limited, to say the least, and I highly discourage it. You may need to rank it up much later for the sniper title though. If you do use a HLB, make sure it's prereforged r1 (costs more), as it will save you a TON of money later on.
  
  Anyhow, you'll definitely need magnum shot at r1, since it's spammable as an elf. As far as I'm concerned, typical elf ranged combat goes a bit like this:
  Crash shot > Magnum the rest. (+ Usage of Lullaby or pet for mob control)
  
  Rank Magnum, Critical Hit, Ranged Attack, Bow Mastery, and Crash Shot.
  I also recommend grabbing Final Shot, and Mirage Missile (up to r9?), despite their uselessness in actual combat, as they give dex.
  While you are ranking these skills, I also recommend working on life skills on the side. (handicraft, weaving, tailoring, sleep shearing?, ect.)
  Other useful skills include, but not limited to; r5 song, lullaby, and bfo.
  
  As an elf archer, you will ABSOLUTELY NEED a bohemian set. The full set provides 15% bonus to magnum, and support shot. Support shot is useless, so you can save a bit of money by only acquiring the magnum bonus (10 points). It took me roughly ~400k to complete my set for magnum, so it's not that pricey. Although, using a set like this will make your elf super super squishy early on. And so, I would recommend using mana shield, or master of shields title early on. As for enchants, go for max attack.
  
  As for training, general usage of the skillset is good enough. For Crash Shot, or Support Shot, use the "Their Method" SM for zombies that take 1's.
  
  
  If I missed anything, feel free to ask or to add on. Also to the other players who read this, feel free to correct anything that I may be misinformed about.
  
  EDIT: Oh ya, one more thing, and it regards windmill. It's somewhat useful for an elf ranged, but I rarely ever use it. As you have mentioned, some older guides recommended ranking windmill first. This is because, back in the day, the highest CP monster you had easy access to was TNN zombies. With SMs, you can control the overall CP of monsters with difficulties. As far as I can tell, elf range gives very little CP compared to the other talents. Even now, my elf only has a CP of ~1100, even at master archer and champion warrior.
• leomorn wrote on 2014-07-08 04:24
  This is a good guide indeed, and I appreciate the lengthy text! I have my hands on a HLB, but there is a budget i have to go buy, till I find quicker and efficient ways to go off of. I'll probably end up mining the ore at barri and waitin till i get the myth so that will take some time, are there other skills or methods I could work on during the off time I'm not on refining?
• Kelvas wrote on 2014-07-08 04:57

  Quote from leomorn;1230916:

  This is a good guide indeed, and I appreciate the lengthy text! I have my hands on a HLB, but there is a budget i have to go buy, till I find quicker and efficient ways to go off of. I'll probably end up mining the ore at barri and waitin till i get the myth so that will take some time, are there other skills or methods I could work on during the off time I'm not on refining?

  
  
  Thank you. xD. Well, like I said before, you can always work on refine later, or as you go. Just may be a bit harder. However, if your main character is still under 1k, you can reset skills. You can utilize this by ranking up other ranged skills, and whenever you have enough material to rank refine, you can train it (with lower dex thanks to reset). However, any skill training you receive for the current rank prior to resetting will be removed. In other words, say you have 50 exp done for r9 ranged attack, and you reset, you can rank it back up gain to r9, but it will not have the training that you did for that 50 exp.
  
  You can always work on other life skills as well.
• alwmiioktm wrote on 2014-07-08 08:31

  Quote from leomorn;1230916:

  This is a good guide indeed, and I appreciate the lengthy text! I have my hands on a HLB, but there is a budget i have to go buy, till I find quicker and efficient ways to go off of. I'll probably end up mining the ore at barri and waitin till i get the myth so that will take some time, are there other skills or methods I could work on during the off time I'm not on refining?

  
  
  An easier method that I took advantage of when ranking refine was to get the ingot version of the ore/ ore fragment you will be needing and duplicate those through the use of the "synthesis" then taking the ingots and fragmenting them into their basic ores/ ore fragments. Saves so much time and energy so I seriously recommend this be the way that you go about refining. You will need someone with high rank synthesis/ fragmentation. So if you are serious about getting refine done easily I suggest maybe putting an add up on your server's page. Goodluck! In my experience life skills are a grind that kills the appeal of the game for me, so don't overwhelm yourself with these types of things too early on, [S]unless you're a masochist[/S] but refine is definitely a first on to do list.
• imagine95 wrote on 2014-07-08 11:30
  I just finished refine (from F to 1, and gathered all of the materials myself) on my human and it doesn't require fails anymore. However you still should rank it simply for its dex.
  Honestly I think elves are not in a good position currently. Human has the strongest puppetry and giant gets the best gunslinger. Now ninja doesn't even use dex.
  
  One little thing I will disagree with Kelvas above is the bohemian set. It is not an absolute necessity. You can just transfer some +max enchanted items from your main and use them as a cheap alternative.
• alwmiioktm wrote on 2014-07-08 15:59

  Quote from imagine95;1230976:

  I just finished refine (from F to 1, and gathered all of the materials myself) on my human and it doesn't require fails anymore. However you still should rank it simply for its dex.
  Honestly I think elves are not in a good position currently. Human has the strongest puppetry and giant gets the best gunslinger. Now ninja doesn't even use dex.
  
  One little thing I will disagree with Kelvas above is the bohemian set. It is not an absolute necessity. You can just transfer some +max enchanted items from your main and use them as a cheap alternative.

  
  
  for an elf it is necessary like a thames set is for a giant, sure you could get by without using one but you're not taking advantage of one of the key aspects of maining range.
• Murasaki wrote on 2014-07-08 20:00
  A bohemian set is definitely a good place to start. One of the few things we elves get is a ridiculously fast cooldown on Magnum Shot, so taking advantage of it is great. If you have better gear for this than a Bohemian set though, I say go with it.
• ironwoman wrote on 2014-07-09 00:34
  Just remember, refining is MUCH easier than it used to be, and it still wasn't even hard before. You could take advantage of the shop reforges and go for refining exp level 2 bracelets.
  
  Another thing you need to keep in mind for ranging is that there is no other thing you need besides max damage, as windmill and critical hit should give you enough will for you to crit, as well as crit from your weapon. That being said, when you make a bohemian set, basically cover your set with max damage enchants. The only non-damage enchant I could see possibly getting enchanted on a bohemian piece is elegant, and elementalist, and only because the more useful damage suffix for gloves are harder to find than the others (but still not rare).
  
  As for reforging, there are only two skills you focus on: magnum shot and crash shot. Since you're an elf, and your strongest skill is your magnum revolver, it'd be wise to reforge your gloves for magnum damage, as that will maximize your DPS. You can possibly get it on your accessories too.
  
  Also use the wiki if you have any questions, because for many of the answers can be found there.