Body Strength grinding, is it really worth the effort?

[Benie 49]

So I have 43FS, 30 Longsword. I'm trying to be a good hunter (even been fighting in Manual instead of Autofight, watching the position of my footing (and distance of the mob), and have been using Focus whenever I can) and eventually someone that can assist in unique killings and Rift events(once I feel I get to 70FS and then weld a Huge axe, and train with it in Aggressive fighting). Yet I'm still hitting 'extremely hard' with my Longsword, and it's 85QL (with Animal's Demise, 71 LT, 91 NB, and 81 CoC).

I want to be able to confront trolls and deal with them (instead of run like a scared cat), and the only way I see is to be able to hit harder. Now I'm also using a 70QL plate set with AoSP.

 

Yet I've been told of all the effort I'm doing, thinking 'more FS = the more powerful I am and the harder I hit', feels like was for nothing. Because I'm told that Body Strength affects the damage... not FS. And it's 27.

I've been told to "mine, dig, cut wood" as the best ways of getting it up. Yet my Mining is 46, Digging is 72, and Woodcutting is 38. I'm told that Body Strength needs to be around the mid-40's to be able to get the damage I want.

So, is this going to take me until.. I dunno, 2024 until I'm finally close enough?? Because this is getting ridiculous, and not fun. I want this to feel like I'm actually getting somewhere (and actually be someone who's respectful instead of just another player who has nothing but the clothes on their back). Yet I feel like I've been grinding my life away and have little to show for it.

 

I get Wurm is one big mess of grinds, one way or another, and people enjoy it as it feels like there's purpose. I want to feel this too, yet I also don't want to feel this is going to take years to get to where I need.

Edited January 15, 2017 by Benie

[Aesir 34]

I wouldn't worry about body str unless you're planning on pvping, even then, the FS is far more important.

Just let your str raise naturally with crafting and hunting.

[Lycanthropic 523]

Thats kind of the way WO works, you dont achieve good stats in a few months, you have to work for them at least a year or more (for the body stats you are looking for).

 

The other skills are pretty straight forward and perhaps more important, just kill,kill kill with sb on, get that longsword up to 60+skill, but as a new fighter you might want to do normal stance so you block a bit more then on aggresive, your goal is to stay balanced in what you receive in terms of damage and what you heal with your LT.

 

Get yourself a fast horse and wear some good ql plate and you will be safe against most stuff. If you are starting to collect to much damage, just run off a while with your horse till you loose agro, heal up and go back into the fight. (having your armour enchanted with AoSP might help some to if you dont get trolls down fast enough, it doesnt do much, but in hunting every bit can help if you are not yet strong enough to deal out high damage)

 

Good places (at least I still think they are, been a while since I went on a hunting trip) are exodus and north xanadu (or south xanadu if you want to train on wild cows/bulls/deer).

And yup, dont forget to craft a bit now and then, lots of good stats to be gained from doing blacksmithing and carpentry to.

 

[Madt 1,178]

Strength is important, it's not too slow at lower levels but it's not as hard as you might think to get to an adequate level for PvE.

 

Using mauls and axes gives body strength, swords give body control. So when you're levelling your aggressive skill use axes or medium mauls.

 

Armour types are important, plate is weak vs mauls which is the highest damage hit trolls can do, so if you're against a troll in plate it's gonna beat you up pretty badly. I'm not sure what studded leather is like for PvE, but for PvP it's pretty bad so I've not used it. Might be worth seeing if a good set of studded leather will help you out vs trolls as leather armour types are good against mauls.

 

To level body strength grind skills like mining, woodcutting and digging. Do woodcutting first I'd say then switch to mining, getting those skills to 70 or 80 will help you a ton. The grind never ends but you should be fine once you hit 35 strength which will take some time but its just part of character progression.

[Jaz 2,665]

My Nahjo priest is 70FS, 23 body strength and happily kills trolls in 70-80ql plate using a longsword (80+ql, enchants are good on it). Shield skill is around 30, longsword maybe 50.

So - go for the shield and weapon skill plus the FS.

You only need to find a spot with a lot of easier mobs, hit SB and kill kill kill.

 

[Jonydowy 616]

Strength it is usefull but its one of those skills that you don't want to grind,just do other stuff like big projects and such and strength will go up in time

Setting your goal to grind strength only..it will drive you crazy.

[Wargasm 1,927]

Body str affects how hard you hit and how hard you are hit.

Fight skill increases your CR (combat rating) which in turn increases your chance to hit, and reduces your chance to be hit.

 

Want to kill trolls?  You need fight skill.

[McGarnicle 1,463]

Fight Skill is all you really need for PvE. once you hit 70 FS you will notice a huge difference in how often you land hits. While how hard you hit does play a role, what you will notice at low FS when fighting a troll is the sheer number of times you miss. As your FS goes up, you will hit more often and it wont matter too much how hard you hit, as long as you are hitting often the troll will go down.

 

Body Strength is something you shouldn't grind, but it is a skill that you watch steadily go up over time. you might get 0.05 BS per play session without even noticing it, after 20 play sessions you got an extra point. over a year you will see large gains.

Edited January 15, 2017 by McGarnicle

[Griffith 362]

all these offensive damage messages are mostly dependant on the quality of your weapon.

improve your weapon to over 60ql and you will see the message deadly hard.

defensive damage messages are dependant mostly on the ql

of armor rating. BS helps a lot but i dont think it matters too much

on the messages you get . as a complete newbie you can do deadly hits

if you have high ql weapon. and 2h weapons also hit harder but slower. gl hunting                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                   

Damage messages and Strength of attacks

When you encounter an opponent, be it a Venerable Greenish Scorpion or just a young starving dog, a successful strike will give you the following message:

You <Type of Damage> adolescent starving wolf <Strength of your Blow> and <Result> it.

The Type of Damage is the kind of damage dealt by the currently equipped weapon, For example: piercing or mauling.

The Strength of your Blow is how hard the hit itself is. The scale is:

1. Very Lightly

2. Lightly

3. Pretty Hard

4. Hard

5. Very Hard

6. Extremely Hard

7. Deadly Hard

[Madt 1,178]

^ Good info.

 

I think these are the result damage messages, in ascending order.

Tickle

Slap

Irritate

Hurt

Harm

Damage

 

I believe thats it, and they're all effected by the creature/player your hitting's armour level. A wild cat for example has almost no armour so its easy to do damages to them. A dragon has incredibly strong armour which is why most people do slaps and irritates to them only.

[Benie 49]

Thanks for the advice and suggestions. It means a lot. Right now I have no need to do any major mining projects, or dig, or chop trees into logs.

I've also been told that Chain works best on maul-type attacks (from trolls), but it feels like a downgrade from plate. Though I can get why a troll can hit you more as plate can leave dents (in you) while chain bounces off the blow and doesn't dent. It makes perfect sense.

Dunno how much it'll cost for a 70QL chain set with AoSP, though.

 

Also, going over the combat log here, I'm up to 'damage' when I hit;

[04:48:06] You cut an old huge spider extremely hard in the chest and damage it.

 

Going by the advice in here, I'll just keep working on FS. Very glad to hear that it's still worth the effort. I've been mainly hunting in the hills to the East of my deed(I live on the NW corner of F9). There's no deeds here(other than the one at El Rancho), but lots of trees and very sloped terrain. Run into 3-4 trolls everytime I go hunting (who tend to get in the way of the mobs I can kill).

 

Thinking about branching out and hunting in the center of Indy, hoping for less trolls. Any suggestions (in Indy) that are good hunting grounds? I'd love to go to another server, but you know.. you can't bring your horse cross-server. :/ It is a 5-speed, though. So outrunning trolls are no problem for me.

 

 

Edited January 15, 2017 by Benie

[Jaz 2,665]

Indy is not as dense as it used to be - but its true when I skilled up my fighting back 3+ years ago there I usually went to the steppes / tundras on the northeast and east side of the server. On foot - so it involved a lot of running from hellhounds which means north / northwest was not really full of mobs back that times either.

 

On horseback plate armour is in general a real good choice - if you need to walk the best choice is studded leather or chain.

Edited January 15, 2017 by Jaz