Leveling - It's that time again - PL main XP with Anniversary Quest

[tarquinn]

Just ignore the task steps. I realized after I wrote this up that you don't need to do any of the task. I updated the main post.

Also today I finally have time to play so I'm currently doing this and I'm testing a few things.

Thus far:

94 Wizard went from 75% -> 81% in 15 minutes @ 1 second hail delay. I average that out then to 3600 mobs killed (very rough number, would have to parse the log and check # of XP messages, it could be considerably less if I was not aggro'ing the pile fast enough to keep the constant 4 per hail spawning). Everything seems to be just fine for me. I guess this method is not recommended if you cannot "swarm" fast enough.

I'm going to run her for 30 minutes next to check for this "Shroud XP Cap" and report back.

 

[TreeHuginDruid]

Thanks so much for putting this info out there, definately a nice post / exploit to use during anniversary time.

However.. once I read your macro.. I got weepy and started to cry.

I am away for the weekend, but when I get back I will post a better version. It will include checks to make sure you are in the correct zone before it starts the spamming, that you are in fact in the correct shroud form, that you are rouge SOS form.. and hide/sneak if you are not until you are in SOS form. It will also check for GM's, check that you are still in the correct zone, check that you are not dead .. and pause/stop the macro if any of these conditions are met.

This will prevent you from spamming if you die and return to bind / get booted from zone. Also.. it will replace any hard coded delay for the spams.. and only spam for a new set of 4 mobs once your extended target window shows one mob left or no mobs. This will prevent your main killer from being overwhelmed at any point.. enabling you to truely afk kill with confidence.

It may not be as awesome as spawning trains of mobs to tear through.... but it is safer. I will also explain how to change the trigger ammount to your desired setting.. giving you the opportunity to directly specify when you want to spawn more adds... (like if you want to spawn 4 more once extended target window has less than 10 mobs in it).. This will give you to freedom to adjust it by how many mobs you want up at any given time... and not rely on a set timed delay.

ALL these functions are standard subs/functions that I use in all my macros... they are well tested and proven. I litteraly have a library of over 200 sub functions I wrote to handle just about any scenario... and just make calls to the sub functions i require for that particular macro.

I want this site to have a resource for macros.. and will be doing ALLOT of contributions for my part. If I can get established as a primary macro writer / developer for red guides... and help the community via my years of experience with coding and macro work... I will have a great feeling by knowing I helped to make a difference.

Been a member of this site since early 2004... but took a long break from redguides. I'm back now... and going to start kicking ass with my help for the community!

Look for the revised macro later on Monday afternoon.

 

[tarquinn]

94 Wizard -> 30 minutes @ 1s hail delay -> 81% to 88%.

So there is indeed a new cap placed on Shrouded XP. Guess I'll have to try a 10 minute interval now and see how that goes.

Also to Treehugin: Cool, have at it. I knew my macro was very crude from the get-go but by all means make whatever you'd like. As far as setting a limit to the number of mobs, I'm not really sure that'd be very efficient. The only way this work is if you are 100% non-stop killing. Any down time like that would pretty much render the entire idea of this useless. However if it were to be implemented for a full AFK type of thing then I could see it being more useful. Also in light of confirming this cap on Shroud XP some other things can be done as well.

 

[TreeHuginDruid]

Hmm... definately seeing the new adjusted shroud xp cap.... kinda puts a fairly big kaibosh on the usefullness of this splot... F'ing hate SOE....

 

[tarquinn]

10 minutes under all the same circumstances 88% -> 92%. So about 15 minutes is the sweet spot for me right now working on this Wizard, and I'd daresay without any more testing that killing at this fast pace for 15 minutes at a time before unshrouding should probably be a pretty good baseline.

As for it's usefulness, yes, it is somewhat crippled with the cap, but I guess it just depends. It doesn't slow me down that much to Spirit Send out and walk back over, it takes a whole extra 1 minute.

As for making this fully-auto, then yes, there are a lot of kinks. You'd have to set a big macro to be basically time based or kill based (based on a set amount of XP messages or something), have the macro spirit send out, remove shroud, re-get shroud, then go back to the gnome and get back into the instance, etc etc.. lots of work and way above my knowledge :p

For now, for me, it is what it is, and I can still PL plenty fine using it.

Next thing for me to test is some numbers on my 97 Shaman to see how those rates go, or if it even gives you any XP at all post 95.

 

[no_one]

I modified the orginal Hail mac to include a zone check so if the expedition times out your not sitting in PoK saying the command over and over again. It is still very simple.

Sub Main

/declare i int local

:MainLoop
/if (${Zone.ID}!=447) {

        /end
    } 
	
	/target The CPU
	
	/for i 1 to 5

	/say 993333
	/delay 430	

	/next i

/goto :MainLoop

/return

 

[TAR]

I'm not sure what this Shroud exp cap is that you guys are talking about. I just ran a level 91.2 through it for 6 hours (with my monk, killing 96 mobs every minute) and he came out level 93.6. Are you saying that he capped at 93.6 a long time before the 6 hours was up?

 

[PeteSampras]

Well if you are going to do it, this may be a little more precise. I dont know what the name of the adds are, so you need to fill that in for:
/declare KillNPC string outer whatever

But this would keep 104 of them up, recheck every .2 seconds to add 4 more. Change settings as needed. I use something similar to this for some stuff i do.

Sub Main
/declare KillCountCheck int outer 104
/declare HailTimerDelay int outer 2
/declare HailTimer timer outer
/declare KillNPC string outer whatever
/declare HailNPC string outer The CPU
/declare Phrase string outer /say 993333
/declare ready bool outer TRUE
:loop
/if (${Zone.ID}==447) /call Hail
/goto :loop
/return


Sub Hail
/if ((!${Target.DisplayName.Find[${HailNPC}]}||!${Target.ID}) && ${SpawnCount[${HailNPC}]} && ${SpawnCount[${KillNPC} npc]}<${KillCountCheck}) /squelch /tar ${HailNPC}
/if (${SpawnCount[${KillNPC} npc]}<${KillCountCheck} && !${HailTimer} && ${Target.DisplayName.Find[${HailNPC}]}) {
	/if (${ready}) /docommand ${Phrase}
	/varset HailTimer ${HailTimerDelay}
}
/return

 

[dannuic]

Well if you are going to do it, this may be a little more precise. I dont know what the name of the adds are, so you need to fill that in for:
/declare KillNPC string outer whatever

But this would keep 104 of them up, recheck every .2 seconds to add 4 more. Change settings as needed. I use something similar to this for some stuff i do.

Sub Main
/declare KillCountCheck int outer 104
/declare HailTimerDelay int outer 2
/declare HailTimer timer outer
/declare KillNPC string outer whatever
/declare HailNPC string outer The CPU
/declare Phrase string outer /say 993333
/declare ready bool outer TRUE
:loop
/if (${Zone.ID}==447) /call Hail
/goto :loop
/return


Sub Hail
/if ((!${Target.DisplayName.Find[${HailNPC}]}||!${Target.ID}) && ${SpawnCount[${HailNPC}]} && ${SpawnCount[${KillNPC} npc]}<${KillCountCheck}) /squelch /tar ${HailNPC}
/if (${SpawnCount[${KillNPC} npc]}<${KillCountCheck} && !${HailTimer} && ${Target.DisplayName.Find[${HailNPC}]}) {
	/if (${ready}) /docommand ${Phrase}
	/varset HailTimer ${HailTimerDelay}
}
/return

The only problem with this is that the NPCs that spawn aren't uniquely named. There are quite a few more in the instance.

- - - Updated - - -

I'm not sure what this Shroud exp cap is that you guys are talking about. I just ran a level 91.2 through it for 6 hours (with my monk, killing 96 mobs every minute) and he came out level 93.6. Are you saying that he capped at 93.6 a long time before the 6 hours was up?

I definitely don't get those kinds of exp results. I use an SK to swarm kill everything, which kills faster than 96 in a minute (this is using about a 3s delay since 20 hails = 100 mobs). In the end, my 75's only got about 1.5 levels in 3 hours. 2 levels in the low 90's takes a lot (like orders of magnitude more) more exp. Something is inconsistent, I wonder what?

 

[TAR]

I'm working up a level 70 now. I'll record my progress once I get him to 70 and start running him through. I just ran another level 70 through the other day, and I'm fairly sure that he was level 86 after the 6 hours. I use my own macro (not this one), so there is that difference. My macro is specific to a monk, and I'm fairly sure a Monk is the best class to do this with.

 

[PeteSampras]

if the spawns arent uniquely named, then just take ${SpawnCount[npc]}, add 104 to it as the KillCountCheck, and leave the KillNPC as blank. Then it knows to add 104 npcs over whatever the starting point was.

 

[dannuic]

if the spawns arent uniquely named, then just take ${SpawnCount[npc]}, add 104 to it as the KillCountCheck, and leave the KillNPC as blank. Then it knows to add 104 npcs over whatever the starting point was.

Good point. Didn't think about counting the mobs before spawning (seems obvious now haha).

 

[tarquinn]

I'm not sure what this Shroud exp cap is that you guys are talking about. I just ran a level 91.2 through it for 6 hours (with my monk, killing 96 mobs every minute) and he came out level 93.6. Are you saying that he capped at 93.6 a long time before the 6 hours was up?

I'm not entirely sure at this point to be honest. Like I said, I went for 15 minutes and 30 minutes at the same speed on a 94 Wizard and got the exact same amount of experience (roughly 7% of a level). 2 years ago I took a guy from 90-95 in under 4 hours. It seems wonky or varying for some random reason right now and I just haven't had the time to play or test it enough to pin point it. Either way I'm glad to hear it is working for you though

 

[beastdaddy]

IMO Zerker is still the best class for this as Decap fire but it does seem wonky from what it was. Not nearly as good

 

[weed_guy]

i used to pl capp toons few years back using this. now that sk swarm is nerfed u cant do 500 at a time but u can still shroud 70 whole group get task , go unshroud ungroup your cleric to shining and blood the herd for sk to slay or mage to surge /ds or both if u really want to kill fast . doing 40 or so greys at a pop still not bad , if u over spawn em , while ur backed into the nook next to door (u have to shrink ) u can tag one back into spot it will run goofy to find u getting rest to follow it . then youll have em all on ya with no worries about push or getting hit from behind .

 

[TreeHuginDruid]

i used to pl capp toons few years back using this. now that sk swarm is nerfed u cant do 500 at a time but u can still shroud 70 whole group get task , go unshroud ungroup your cleric to shining and blood the herd for sk to slay or mage to surge /ds or both if u really want to kill fast . doing 40 or so greys at a pop still not bad , if u over spawn em , while ur backed into the nook next to door (u have to shrink ) u can tag one back into spot it will run goofy to find u getting rest to follow it . then youll have em all on ya with no worries about push or getting hit from behind .

If you could please use some form of grammar .... punctuation.. and separate your sentences.. I might actually be able to understand what this post means. I got totally lost after the word shroud... because it just becomes one huge run on sentence.

 

[beastdaddy]

Not to mention you could never get 500 mobs up at a time. They maxed out at 104 =).

 

[Mordail]

I'm unclear on 1 thing. Do you actually complete the mission when you're done grinding? I ask because I thought Anniversary missions could only be completed once per toon.

 

[dannuic]

I'm unclear on 1 thing. Do you actually complete the mission when you're done grinding? I ask because I thought Anniversary missions could only be completed once per toon.

No. Just /taskquit.

 

[Noobhaxor]

Not worth it imo, I'd rather just afk macro somewhere and not worry about running all my toons back and forth dealing with shrouds. Forget that! lol.

Edit: Please note that this used to be awesome before they did the cap on shrouds. I did toons from 65 to 100 in only a couple hours, but now... definitely not.

 

[playj]

I am also puzzled by the shroud cap, how exactly does it work?

My slow killing 85 hero PLed another 85 hero(shrouded as 60) all the way to 95. This took about a week of slow AFK killing grey/green mobs to 85 (yellow/red to 60).

So, the shroud cap must be somehow time limited but not a hard cap.