Keeper Knowledge Cannon Part 1

Demoted’s Keeper Knowledge Cannon Part 1

--==Please send PM any additional information you think should be added.==--

--==Introduction==--

Keepers are one of the two new professions that were released with Shadowlands. The Keeper community is trying to get some of our bugs and issues fixed, as we aim at making Keeper’s fun and enjoyable to play at any level. We would like to ask that any good information you have or find that you try to record it on these forums. First and foremost if you want to start a keeper you need to know what it is a keeper is. Please visit Funcom's keeper page.

--==Other guides and information available from the Keeper Forums==--

1. Balrog’s Armour and Weapons Guide for Keepers
2. The Keeper Guide to Rubi-Ka and The Shadowlands
3. Keeper Tier 1 and Tier 2 Information
4. Keeper Weaponry, and the underlying problems with Shadowlands weaponry
5. Keeper Bugs and Issues List

--==Breed Information==--

• You've gotta pick a breed before you finish creation. I'll do my best to be pretty exaustive for the advantages and disadvantages for each. I am going to leave nanomage completely out of the comparison because as a keeper you will not need to cast very often, there is no combat casting and our buffs last a good amount of time. The severe hitpoint disadvantage of nanomage is more of a challenge, with little advantage. End game you will be able to cast everything no matter what class you pick.

ATROX:

• Base abilities:
  
  1. 512\912 : Strength
  2. 480\780 : Agility
  3. 512\912 : Stamina
  4. 400\600 : Intelligence
  5. 400\600 : Sense
  6. 400\600 : Psychic

• Advantages:
  
  1. Highest natural 2hE(Based on Str/Stam), also due to the high Str/Agil/Stam the higher 2hE Symbiants towards endgame will help produce an even higher 2hE skill.
  2. Highest hitpoints due to their high stamina as well as each point of body dev for Atrox yields more hp than any other breed. Don't forget that Legchopper Gloves are Atrox only as well.
  3. Strength and Stamina are the most easily buffed base skills thus if you make your implants based on strength and stamina it is not much of a challenge to get good implants in. Also this will make you getting your tier armor easier and raising it quicker and higher.

• Disadvantages:
  
  1. Lowest natural intelligence, sense, and psychic means you will have to wait a few extra levels to cast those buffs.
  2. Lowest nanopoints due to low intel, sense, and psychic as well and each point of nanopool yeilds the least nano. This can be overcome with -% nanocost reducers and special implants/items to raise your effective nanopool.

OPIFEX:

• Base abilities:
  
  1. 464\764 : Strength
  2. 544\944 : Agility
  3. 480\680 : Stamina
  4. 464\764 : Intelligence
  5. 512\912 : Sense
  6. 448\748 : Psychic

• Advantages:
  
  1. Highest natural evades due to high Agility.
  2. Good at implants because most general implants are easy to be made into agility or are defaulted to agility in their most comon setup.
  3. Very little problem, if at all, with nanopool. Don't have as much as solitus but if the problem arises you can do the same thing as Atrox to make your nanopool more effective and increase it.
  4. Cheapest overall IP expenditure because of having only one dark blue base skill.

• Disadvantages:
  
  1. The cap of stamina will cause the highest 2hE symbiants to be max ql 240 at level 220. To squeeze out 400ish more stamina over base for ql 250 symbiants will be a very large challenge and not very likly.
  2. Least hitpoints of the three breeds. However higher evades and less attack-rating will keep the mobs off you and help if the mob does attack you.

SOLITUS:

• Base abilities:
  
  1. 472\772 : Strength
  2. 480\780 : Agility
  3. 480\780 : Stamina
  4. 480\780 : Intelligence
  5. 480\780 : Sense
  6. 480\780 : Psychic

• Advantages:
  
  1. Average all around in all skills because of having the most even base abilities.
  2. Will have the easiest time getting higher symbiants in due because of not having base skills that have to catch up to the others in order to suffice 3 skills in each symbiant. A solitus will be able to complete all 3 base skills required by ql 240 symbiants with just composite base ability's boost.
  3. Average hitpoints and nanopoints, thus nanopool will not be a problem. The hitpoint advantage over Opifex is negligable however naturally you will have 1.5-2k less than an Atrox.

• Disadvantages:
  
  1. Won't get their tier armor as high as an Atrox, but higher than an Opifex.
  2. Generally very few disadvantages, not exceptional at anything though.

• This is all just general information on the different breeds. Read Trajal's thread on Opifex here. None of the above breeds are bad and all will perform well, pick what fits your playstyle and the appearence you want. Ultimately you will be successful no matter what breed you pick, Funcom will not let you change your breed/face without re-rolling and thats no fun if your very high up before you get sick of it. Pick your prefered breed wisely.
• Ability buffing items are located here. There are quite a few, some are very hard to get some are easy. Regardless, all abilities can be buffed a significant ammount the higher you get. For instance by my calculations u can buff Intelligence a total of 372 at level 220 not including perks(ql 200 intel imps included, and some rare items). This link can help you at any level though.

--==Starting you Toon==--

• Now that you’ve picked your breed, you have to start neutral so continue to the Jobe door. After you're level 5+ and want to make your decision you can choose a side or stay neutral. (Never played AO before? Newbie guide)
• Omni and Clan Keepers: The lowbie OT/Clan quests are fun and have a few neat rewards. More information on what quests there are in game are located at Anarchy Arcanum. This site also has great information on various different AO related things, browse around!

--==Levels 1-20==--

Weapons:

• For levels 1-5 go with the starter weapon(looks like a warblade). After that I recommend running a mission for a Dull Longmoon at whatever ql you can at the time. If you don’t have clicksaver get it here. It’s easy to get and a decent weapon. There has been much controversy about raising Brawling and Dimach for some people, in my opinion there is nothing wrong with raising these skills.
• Other weapons people use in these levels:
  
  1. Sword of Sir Galahad
  2. Sword of Sir Tristam
  3. Sword of Achilles
  4. Jobe Defender Naginata
  5. Guard of the Gentlemen
  6. Burning Copper Katana
• That pretty much sums up the viable options for levels 1-20. Some of the above will be far harder to obtain than others.

Gaining those Epicine Levels:

• Level's 1-5 best place is in the backyard, Specialization One books drop in the Jobe backyard off the white birds along with some good 2hE weaponry. If you've got the time to kill a few or a lot of these, take it. If it doesn't drop then don't worry about it, just loot everything you can and sell it to the vendor to make a little bit of cash.
• At level 5 you will get a message telling you where the Borealis subway is, this is a pretty good place to level on RK if you decide on a side you will not get a message telling you where the subway is for omni or clan, if you don't know you can go to the neutral one or ask around. You can also go level more towards the brink in the backyard or outside of Jobe Research across the bridge. You can continue further in the subway to get to level 20+ or continue out further away from research, either way is fine.

Armor and Gear:

• Armor at these levels is really not needed, best to get a treatment suit and some stims, you can heal almost your full health with a stim at low levels. However, the Malah-Anahs drop thars armor, which is really quite good armor.
• You really don't need implants at these levels as ultimatly you will be outleveling them very quickly, mobs go down quite easily, in essence your just going to be wasting your money.
• It is good to pick up a 2x belt or so in the Tools shop and grab some NCU as well, that way when you get buffs for yourself or from another player you won't have to pick and choose. Yeah your going to outgrow this quite quickly so no need to go all out, or spend too much of your money.

Perks:

• My suggestion for the lvl 10 and 20 perks are Aura of Revival and Bio Sheilding in that order. I would recommend working these two as much as you can as for low levels they will help you a lot. You will gain a "Bio Shield" special which will enhance your dammage sheild when you use it, at this level it's not that great but it will be later on when you get more perks in this line. Every perk you get in Aura of Revival(or AoR) will increase your healing power.

--==Levels 21-40==--

Weapons:

• For these levels until you can get a Frost Scythe of Stygian Destolator out of the Temple of Three Winds(aka ToTw) the weapons pretty much stay the same as before. Obviously try to upgrade to a better weapon. I would not spend too much time or money into getting too uber at these levels as they go by pretty quick.
• The following two weapons become your bread and butter for a bit so make sure to grab at least the Frost Scythe. If you can get a team or pay for someone to get you a Stygian Desolator it is the best choice. Both of these weapons can be viable good weapons into the early 100's. If you don't get one or both of them before you get locked out of ToTw at level 60 you will regret it as you will be significantly disadvantaged for the next 65ish levels.
  
  1. Frost Scythe of the Legionaire
  2. Stygian Desolator

Gaining those Epicine Levels:

• Temple is a great place to level if you are used to the game, can deal with some training, and can be a little bit patient. There are many good items that drop here. If you are atrox be sure to grab the Notum Splice from Defender of the Three, it can be worn by anyone and adds a healthy 195 nanopool. Also grab the Rockcrusher Gauntlets from The Curator, they are strength/stamina based, have more AC's than ql 75 Omni-Pol Elite Gloves, add 9 dammage and 5 strength, very nice gloves indeed. I won't go into everything that drops in ToTw here, but there are more that are worth getting.
• In SL you can easily level from various camps in Nascence, some nice areas are the Steppe of Despair and the Two Mountains be ware of the Hecklers though as they are level 80. Wander around, there are places hidden that may be good soloing material. Or find a team that needs an extra hand. Armor, nano's, and weapons drop from all kinds or different mobs, collect what you can.

Armor and Gear:

• Personally I still don't really worry about armor at these levels except for the Exarch Robe out of ToTW. But if you feel that you need armor, Malah-Anas drop Thars, and there are plenty of different armors out there. You can also go blitz yourself a set of Omni-Pol, Titan Plasteel, Graft, and Organic are the decent 'old school' armors.
• NCU wise you should try to grab a Guardian Circuit Board off of Guardian of Tommarrow in ToTw. If you want to, Lein the Memorystalker also in ToTw drops Memory Loop(rarely) and Dark Memories(fairly frequently) notice the +nanopool on the Dark Memories.
• Implant wise you should have gotten some ql 30's in around level 20 and ql 50's in about level 30-35. I'll put a few general implant set up in at the bottom of this guide. Also keep in mind I'm really not talking about any excessive twinking here.

Perks:

• Once again I suggest putting one each in AoR and Bio Sheilding. This will help you heal a bit more and protect you better. You'll notice that you dammage sheild gets bigger as does the extra shield from your perk button.

--==Levels 41-60==--

Weapons:

• Very important: If you don't have one of the ToTw weapons shown above, get it now. During this time period there is nothing better, and you will never get back inside after level 60 with this toon.

Gaining those Epicine Levels:

• One of the best places to level in this range is in SL, goto one of the temples (opposite side of you or if your still neutral it doesnt matter) and kill the mobs there. During this time you can collect the rest of the books for your first specialization if you have not allready. You could also goto Elysium and hunt Mire Rafters be careful though if your without a team Elysium has some rather tough con's there for this level range.
• Another decent place to level is still in the ToTw down at the Deathless Legionaires(aka Legos) the con level 50ish are are pretty easy to solo by now. You could kill Exarchs repeatedly if you need to gain some cash, loot the Robes then go outside and trade em with the cult guy. The passes he gives back to you are for Inner Sanctum(you probably wanna hold onto a few for when you have to go there), they sell for about 100-200k a pop on the market(might be getting to be less but it's still decent cash for the work involved).

Armor and Gear:

• Now it should be time to get to getting a full set of armor (while still wearing the Exarch Robe (or Guardian Tank Armor(rare drop) if your lucky). You need to get armor based on your 2 primary base skills which as a Keeper should be strength and stamina the list of armor covered in 21-40 range fits those requirements. Balrog's Armor Guide really covers most of this though.
• NCU wise, if you haven't done what I covered in 21-40 for this yet, do so now it's the best way to save a little cash and have good gear on as well.
• Implant wise around level 50 you should have about a ql 90 implant set in possibly ql 110's if you getting the hang of how they work(or allready know).

Perks:

• Once again I suggest putting one each in AoR and Bio Sheilding. This will help you heal a bit more and protect you better. Now you've gained another perk button, Bio Cocoon, which at this point in the line gives a nice 800 absorb.

--==Levels 61-90==--

Weapons:

• Doh! now you can't get into ToTw anymore, hope you got everything(especially since I've been stressing this since you could get inside). Well, for these levels keep running with the Frost Scythe or the Stygian Desolator. If you didn't get either this is gunna hurt, here is the 2hE list for ql's 70-110. Not all of these are good, but they are all there... sift through it, find something to keep you afloat.

Gaining those Epicine Levels:

• My favorite spot to have fun in this level range is on RK. Head to the Bot-Hacker Camp (800x800 Pleasent Meadows) you can get there easiest from Harry's gridpoint... take the ferry, if your clan, be sure to run around the omni OP not through it. Get a team togeather(most likly you will want a doc), only kill the bothackers and only they will add, they are relativly easy kills as they are NT mobs. They con about level 90-95 and will nuke you from time to time.
• Another decent place to level is Hecklers in Nascence. This is not the greatest because it is usually camped and the spawn is not very fast. These con level 80 and aren't too hard to kill, by level 80 you should be taking 2-4 at a time.
• Yet another place is Elysium. Mire Rafters, Bone Dragons, and Cripplers are great sources of XP. There are camps all over the place and not hard to find... just stay away from the hecklers as they are about level 160ish.

Armor and Gear:

• Make sure to upgrade your armor in this stage, if you can find a better back peice than the Exarch Robe or GTA slide it in.
• NCU wise you shouldn't be hurting too bad, if you are find some bigger chips and stick with the Guardian Circuit Board.
• Implant wise around level 65-75 you should be getting a full set of ql 125 implants in. Some people upgrade later on to 150's and then 200's but I prefer to run 125's till i get 200's in for expense reasons and you really arent that far behind.

Perks:

• Put 2 in Bio Shielding and 1 in AoR. Your absorb shield is not a prettly large 1600. AoR will start to feel pretty weak as you're growing faster than it is, around level 90 you should be making your decision if you want to move to Blessing(perk button heals) or stick with AoR, either is fine.

--==Levels 91-100==--

Weapons:

• Upgrade your weapon if you didn't have one of the ToTw weapons and perhaps even so if you find something better that you can fit. Otherwise stick with it.

Gaining those Epicine Levels:

• And here is the big change, it's now that dreaded time, but definatly the best time to do it... its TOKEN FARMING TIME
  
  1. Omni: Pull from Rome Green to Lush Resort of Harry's 1 tick below 50%. As your going through to find these, pull up your world map, and click yeach one, if it's within a 1-2 min run of the grid grab it. Because of the very short travel distance this will be your fastest method. Grab 9 or so at a time and go kill all the mobs and complete, trying not to level(if you get close run outside and get killed by a Slayerdroid (which will pool the XP you gained)). Don't forget to bing a bunch of empty bags and loot everything you can, while getting all those tokens you will be able to make an easy few million credits.
  2. Clan: Still awaiting a similar method.
  3. Neutral: Disregard above as you can not have token boards.

Armor and Gear:

• Make sure to upgrade your armor in this stage, if you can find a better back peice than the Exarch Robe or GTA slide it in.
• NCU wise you shouldn't be hurting too bad, if you are find some bigger chips and stick with the Guardian Circuit Board.

Perks:

• Okay, now make it so you have 5 in each Bio Shielding and 5 in AoR (or in Belssing if you working that way). Your Cocoon is now a hefty 2500.

...Espansion Space...

Now that's a good post.

Locked by request of Hyperlink

Refer to Demoted's Keeper Guide Part 1 (1-100) if you have something to add.