I think every bard who discovers this grapples with that very question
including myself. I also feel a bit guilty. I've also been accused of
cheating by another player for doing it. There are a few things I thought of
that makes me feel somewhat better though.
1. A number of casters have root. They can mostly do the same thing without
even having to run.
2. Casters with Spirit of Wolf and a number of persistent damage spells can
lay on the spells and keep running away until the spells finally kill them.
3. It takes a hell of a long time to down something that is worth a decent
amount of experience. Maybe longer than it would take to get the same exp
from blue going toe to toe.
4. There is the risk of Accelerando not kicking in depending on what you are
stacking and then the risk of gettng stunned.
5. The biggest creature in the zone is always over the next hill and the
player that pissed it off just zoned. =)
I generally don't kite for three reasons.
1. Attack skills don't go up when you kite.
2. No room to run in Paws let alone not having Accelerando down there.
3. I'm wearing out my hot keys that are mapped to Bellow and Accelerando not
to mention my left arrow key. =)
Whay you might try doing is kite them to soften them up and then cross
swords with them to feel more of a risk.
Good Journey,
Sineras (Cazic-Thule)
-----Original Message-----
From: John Robertson [mailto:
johnr@...]
Sent: Monday, April 26, 1999 2:51 PM
To:
eqbards@onelist.com
Subject: [eqbards] Kiting - Is it bad?
From: "John Robertson" <
johnr@...>
Reading someone else's post about killing beetles in North Karana got me
thinking about an old debate I have often had with myself and others, namely
"Is kiting bad?"
Kiting, for those who don't know the term, means running along with a
monster
chasing you (like you're flying a kite) while damaging it somehow. The idea
is
that the monster will never get close enough to hurt you, while you kill it.
For bards, this generally means Brusco's Boastful Bellow, though you could
use
Chords or Denon's if you're feeling wacky.
I first discovered kiting when they finally "fixed" the Bellow in beta. I
say
fixed in quotes because they sort of broke it while they fixed it. For a
long
time, the Bellow did not work. When they finally made it functional, when I
was about level 15 or so, the first time I bellowed at something it did 37
points of damage. (The bellow's damage has, of course, been toned down.
Now
at level 15 it does about 9 points) The firepower of the thing was amazing.
I
decided to try it out on something big and nasty, so I went to Oasis and
discovered that I could kill crocodiles easily, without ever taking a point
of
damage. I levelled in about 2 hours, without swinging my axe once.
Sounds great eh? The only problem was, I felt guilty doing it. GMs
throughout
beta had made it clear that if you could kill a monster with no risk to
yourself at all, then you were exploiting. I told myself, "Well, I'm not at
no
risk, what if the thing stuns me? What if I run over a dune into a Sand
Giant?" but it didn't wash with me. These monsters had no chance.
I love levelling as much as anyone. I could have kited my way to level 50
maybe, who knows, all I needed was a nice white or yellow monster and room
to
run. The thing was, I just couldn't live with it, from a conscience
perspective. I stopped kiting. I went toe to toe with things and got the
crap
beat out of me. Maybe if I was pulling a monster to a safe place I'd bellow
at
it as I ran, but that was it. I felt better, but levelled slowly.
Then the kiting word got out. You couldn't go anywhere above ground in
Norrath
without seeing some bard, usually one I'd never heard of before but who was
now
almost my level, running along with a monster occasionally pulsing yellow
behind him. Every time I saw that, it made me a little mad, but I didn't
know
whether I was mad at me, Verant or the kiting bard.
I still refuse to kite. I don't let the druid in my party (druids kite
better
than anyone) kite. I still think it's lame when I see someone kiting, but I
understand why they do it.
The question is, am I alone in my beliefs here? How do other bards out
there
feel about this?
Jyzan
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