Chapter 35: Kortef's secret perk.

After hearing Berry’s plan for about 30 minutes I start to comprehend a lot of things about the game. The plan she is talking about it’s not as simple as I thought initially. Although it has 3 hours execution time, I’ll need at least one week to finish all the preparations, I need to level up, get some gear, and be fairly familiar with the game, one mistake and everything goes to waste. This strategy couldn’t be done if the vanguard team haven’t reach the top levels, it could be counted as a tiny little exploit found by Berry.

Well, thinking it better calling it an exploit is a harsh judgement. Berry is just too advanced, I don’t think any other player has an AI of Berry’s caliber, not even close. However, they have clear advantages over me that far compensates for the fact that I luckily found an advanced AI, and that’s team play. A group of 5-20 players can make roll calls, divide jobs, trade items, etc. Since I’m playing solo I have to rely only in myself to cover at least the three primary rolls: DPS, Healer and Tank.

After Berry goes into standby mode I return to Sile. “Can you provide me with the blessing of this area?” I ask politely.

“Of course young hero.” The goddess says with a bright smile, then with a wave of her hand a bright light envelops me.

Received Frontier’s Blessing.

“Just as Berry said.” I laugh with joy. Each zone has a unique buff that is available after someone defeats the last boss of said zone. Frontier has Frontier’s Blessing, Grimaus has Grimaus’s Might, Colima has Colima’s Empowerment, and so on. This buffs automatically upgrades with each successive zone beaten, making the buffs of the early zones relatively more powerful than they should be.

However, you can only get the buff of the zone you are currently in, if I beat Frontier boss and step into Grimaus, I’m no longer eligible for Frontier’s Blessing, if I beat the last boss of Grimaus and enter Colima, I will no longer be able to receive Grimaus’s Might… but here’s the tiny exploit: the duration of the buff.

The plan of Berry is to take advantage of the 3 hours timer of the buff, if I have a good equipment and a good set up of skills, I can stack the buffs from Frontier, Grimaus, Colima, and Risev by beating the bosses quickly. If I’m quick enough I can finish the 10th zone and enter Deiano 1 in less than 3 hours, if I’m slow I’ll fail miserably and be stuck in the first 10 zones for a while.

With the boost of the stats from the Sile’s buff it’s time for me to begin with the basics: leveling up. While walking towards the plaza I open the Skill Tree menu and I use both Competence points in order to unlock two skill trees.

Competence point spent, unlocked Melee Training (Balanced) Lv. 1 Skill Tree.

Competence point spent, unlocked Blunt Weapon Specialization (STR) Lv. 1.

“And now… the 3 skill points.” I say, still walking.

Skill point spent, trained Enhanced Health Lv. 1.

Skill point spent, trained Enhanced Attack Lv. 1.

Skill point spent, trained Parry Lv. 1.

“And also…” I close the skill window and open the status screen, I use the three stat points to increase my STR, DEX, and CON by one. Although it’s obvious that focusing in one main stat is the way to go, there’s no way I can do that in order to be able to survive as a solo player. You get 6 stat points per level up, except in Lv. 1 when you get only 3. At any level raising the first point to any stat cost 1, raising a second point in the same stat costs 2 points, while raising a third point in the same stat will consume the remaining 3 points.

In easier words, there are four possible ways of spending stats points upon leveling up: +1 to all stats, this is called generalist distribution. +2 to one stat and +1 to other three, this is called semi focus. +2 to two stats, this is called dual focus. And finally, +3 to one stat, this is called full focus. By rule of thumb, the most popular stat distributions are full focus and dual focus, having one stat really high and skills that use that stat is a key to increase your performance in whichever role you are playing.

Obviously a generalist has a lot more stat points in the long run, but This shouldn’t be an advantage normally because there’s no way you can gain more benefit from six evenly stats than one or two really high stats, your skill points will be insufficient to make the difference. Here is where Berry’s craftiness played a major roll. Alchemy, Blacksmithing, and Enchanting compliments each other nicely using exactly all the stats, with a setup like this I will not have really strong points like being a top damage dealer or a though to deal tank, but at the same time I will virtually have no weaknesses this rolls possesses.

Berry did a pretty good job showing me a really good build for soloing, how far Kortef can reach in Downfall of the Champions will depend purely on me, on my ability as a gamer. I definitely can’t blame lack of information.

“I picked this sword without knowing… I have to farm some monies to buy a basic mace.” I say while looking at the Big Sword. Unfortunately I picked it before Berry told me about being a Blacksmith. Blacksmiths has high affinity with blunt weapons, that’s why I picked Blunt Weapon Specialization.

“Young hero, you have returned, are you ready to accept my request?” An old man speaks to me as I approach him. He was offering me a quest previously but I declined it since I was still Lv. 0. As he speaks to me a system window is displayed in front of me.

“Aptitude points… Berry told me about this, System Command: Display Skill Status Windows.” I say as I read the rewards of the quest.

Aptitude points are gained parallel to experience. 1 aptitude point increases your affinity with one Skill Tree by 1%, if the Skill Tree is at Lv. 1. With a Lv. 2 Skill Tree is required to spend 2 aptitude points to increase it by the same amount, at Lv. 3 you will require 3, and so on. Training a skill under a Skill Tree will increase your affinity by 3%, and you will have automatically 100% affinity with that skills, but in order to level it up you need first to level up the Skill Tree. For example, if I want to upgrade Health Mastery to Lv. 2, although I already have 100% affinity I need first to upgrade Melee Training to Lv. 2 and then I’ll be able to upgrade Health Mastery and Defense Mastery by spending enough skill points.

“Rats and moles? Is this really a quest fitting for a supposed hero?” I say with a sarcastic voice, “Fine, I’ll help.” It’s just a game after all, not all quest will be epic.

“I’ll await for your safe return young hero.” The old man says with a slight bow.

You have accepted the quest: Moles, moles, and rats!

After accepting the quest I summon Berry again, “Do you know if there’s a hunting ground nearby?” Before going to a kind-of dungeon I want to test my movements in a more unrestricted place.

“The hunting areas that are nearby are one to the south and one in the north, the boss gate is at the east.” Berry answers me immediately, “The hunting area in south is harder than the one in the north.”

“To the south then.” I say and I immediately start running towards the south of the map. I don’t have to run for too long before noticing that there are less and less houses and in the distance there’s an endless prairie. There’s actually vegetation in this underground city and that’s fine for me, after all I’ll pick Alchemy and I’ll need to gather materials.

After a few more steps I notice a translucent membrane in front of me, this are the city limits. Without thinking it too much I cross the membrane and a system message pop ups.

Abandoned Frontier’s Safe Zone.

After dismissing the system message I start looking everywhere, the ambience changed drastically. That transparent membrane thing is some kind of shield, the ambience in the interior of that shield is dark and somewhat gloomy, but the green prairie in front of me it’s a hundred times more vivid than anything I have seen before. Looking up, I see that in the ceiling of the cave there are innumerable translucent massive stalagmites hanging down, in the middle of each of this stalagmites there’s a bright core, this stalagmites are like huge lightbulbs that illuminate all the surrounding land.

“The details are pretty well done, but I came here to level up.” I say with a self-mocking smile and then I turn to look everywhere in search for monsters. In any RPG is classic that the first monsters in the starter areas are bunnies, foxes, and wolfs. That couldn’t be so far from the truth here in Downfall of the Champions.

Everywhere I turn to look there are some sort of translucent beings, at least three meters tall. They possesses huge claws and their lower half is totally transparent. Their upper half radiates a greenish glow and there’s some sort of shackles surrounding their bodies, they seem to be really imposing and menacing. There’s few of them scattered alone, most of them are in groups of 3 to 5. “Inspect enemy.” I try to execute a basic game command.

“Well, seems like I have to go blind since I don’t have any real skill for that.” I say with a sigh. I don’t have the luxury to spend skill points in detection skills, at least not for now. I inspect carefully and look for one that is aisled. I peek my stats one last time in order to confirm that everything is alright before starting the fight.

The questions marks at the right of my health is the space reserved for my secondary resources. There’s at least 10 types of different secondary resources such as mana, ki, energy, rage, combo points, among others, I’ll need mana in order to do alchemy, but there’s no rush right now since I will not have an immediate use for it. In order to gain secondary resources I have to obviously unlock the respective Skill Tree.

I approach slowly the mana wraith. When I’m 15 meters away it immediately notices me and turns to look at me, not hesitating at all it extends an arm and swipes it wildly from afar. Four translucent beams shot towards me with a high speed. I react quickly and I raise my sword in an attempt to block the incoming attack, but those beams just go past through the sword.

”Mana Wraith’s [Arcane Claw] dealt 6 damage to you.

”Mana Wraith’s [Arcane Claw] dealt 8 damage to you.

”Mana Wraith’s [Arcane Claw] dealt 6 damage to you.

”Mana Wraith’s [Arcane Claw] dealt 5 damage to you.

A ranged attack and dealt 25 points of damage, without Frontier’s Blessing I would have 242 HP, this attack would obliterate any new player considering they don’t have the gear I currently have. Aside from that, there’s something that really bugged me, “Why I can’t block that attack with the sword?” I ask with a baffled expression.

“This is a Virtual RPG, not a Virtual Reality, this world is not designed towards realism but towards the experience of a role playing game, remember that.” Berry immediately summons herself and answers me.

“So, I have to think of this as a game, if I don’t have a skill I can’t perform the action.” I have to say that it took me by surprise, but being surprised is a luxury I can’t afford as I see that the Mana Wraith is preparing to launch a second attack. Without hesitating I stop the slow approach, gripping my Big Sword with both hands I start running with all my might towards the mana wraith.

*Sha sha sha sha.*

As I run the tall green grass make noises as I step on it. The mana wraith launches a second [Arcane Claw] before I’m able to reach it, being a little overconfident in my health pool I don’t dodge at all and I just receive the attack directly.

”Mana Wraith’s [Arcane Claw] dealt 8 damage to you.

”Mana Wraith’s [Arcane Claw] dealt 8 damage to you.

”Mana Wraith’s [Arcane Claw] dealt 16 damage to you.

”Mana Wraith’s [Arcane Claw] dealt 9 damage to you.

The second barrage of attacks is way more powerful than the first, it’s a wild guess but I think that each ranged attack buff the subsequent attacks, in other words, each attack will become more powerful the longer I stay without moving or trying to flee.

By the time the last beam of the attack hit me, I am just two meters away from the Mana Wraith. Ducking my body and lowering the sword, I take two more steps and then I do a huge upwards swing.

”Your [Hit] dealt 15 damage.

A blue scar appears where my sword slashes, the Mana Wraith remains unfazed and now that I’m at melee range it starts to throw punches at me. With 380 attack speed, I only can make one attack each 1.25 seconds, having some dead time, I start running in circles around the mana Wraith to avoid some hits.

A few hits later I finally start to understand how to manage efficiently the swing timer, but yet again, there’s something that is bugging me. Obviously the Mana Wraith has a swing timer too, watching it attentively, I wait until it’s going to throw a punch at me. The Mana Wraith raises its punch in a very slow motion and does a downwards swing aimed at my head. If a move like this will hit me, even in real life, I would be really ashamed. I tilt my head to the right while at the same time my whole body dodges the punch, I see as the punch just hits the air, it doesn’t touches me at all, but…

”Mana Wraith’s [Hit] dealt 9 damage to you.

“What’s the meaning of this? I dodged that punch!” I say while I clench my teeth and then I swing my Sealed Heroic Big Sword in a horizontal slash. The hit literally trespasses the Mana Wraith, it is a sure hit, but…

You have Missed.

“What’s the meaning of this?!” I repeat myself while yelling loudly.

Berry noticing my struggle sighs, “Even if you hit someone there’s a chance that the accuracy vs evasion check fails, resulting in a miss. Even if you don’t contact someone with an attack, there’s a chance of hitting the outer hitbox.” She says while looking at my struggle.

“Outer hitbox? What’s that? If there’s an outer hitbox then there’s an inner hitbox?” I ask quickly. By this time I have dealt over 120 damage while receiving 200 damage, but Berry’s words fills me with curiosity, it seems that I’m doing something wrong.

“Your inner inbox is delimited by your avatar. Think about it as your physical body. If you receive an attack there’s a system check of accuracy vs. evasion, if you have really high evasion, even if you are hit, you can avoid the damage. The outer hitbox is a 1 meter radius sphere centered in your position, if someone hits that zone, even if they don’t physically touch you, there’s a system check of 70% of the attacker’s accuracy vs. evasion, if the check succeeds the attack will do 80% of the total damage.” Berry says with a quick speech.

“I think I get it…” This time I do a swing trying to test what Berry just said, instead of aiming at the Wraith’s body this time I aim near its body.

”Your [Hit] dealt 13 damage.

“Cool.” I say grinning widely. After a couple more of hits the Mana Wraith starts to shake, it holds its head with both hands as if it is in pain and then explodes.

”Mana Wraith’s [Arcane Instability] dealt 25 damage to you.

The explosion throws me back 2 meters and in the place where the Mana Wraith was appears 3 miniature Mana Wraiths. Each one is around one meter tall, and the three of them immediately rushes towards me. Seeing their size an idea immediately springs to my mind. “The fact that I’m child size means that my hit box is smaller?” I look towards berry and ask expectantly.

“Indeed, but also your reach and line of vision are shorter.” Berry answers me calmly.

“I’m a melee player, I couldn’t care less about my line of vision, but losing reach is indeed a problem…” I say with a mind filled with thoughts. When a mini Mana Wraith approaches me I do a huge arc with my sword trying to hit at least two of them. Fixing my gaze in the tip of the Big Sword an idea comes to my mind, “… Unless I forge a weapon with a really big reach.” I start to laugh like a madman while starting to slaughter the three mini Mana Wraiths.

END OF CHAPTER 35.

Nothing much to say this time, I started the treatment for the pain of my leg and I have a bit less time since I have to lay on the bed for most part of the day, that combined with all the tables this chapter has, it was really time consuming. Enjoy.