Coming back after a few years, choosing what to roll - Barb or BM

Hey. Old PW player here. It's been a few years since I last played the game. I had a Barb and a BM back then, but the toons were on a US server (RT) and the event times there no longer suit me. I was wondering which class is more sought after these days - Barb or BM? I'm planning to invest quite a bit of time into one toon and I wouldn't want to find myself unable to find groups for whatever the current endgame activities are (still trying to wrap my head around that). All advice appreciated :)

Comments

  • iw8ing4u
    iw8ing4u Posts: 37 Arc User
    hmmm start by define what your goal in game... PvP PvE or both... solo farm or squads instence runs... 4 squads PvE instence runs most easy 2 get squads as BM couse its HF and lack of BM's in game right now... world chat is full of msg "... squad need BM"... so + - as BM u allways get invite in the lvl 100+ instences that ppl make squads for them in WC
  • uglyfaceyo
    uglyfaceyo Posts: 18 Arc User
    Definitely both PvE and PvP (both solo and mass). I used to solo farm TT on my BM, never liked the whole claw Barb thing (that really is the reason I rolled a BM and stuck with it - in the era of APS, non-APS Barbs weren't very useful), but yesterday I saw videos of str Barbs solo farming 3-3 and that gave me some hope.

    One more thing - back in the day one could pay some coin and get levelled up in FC with hyper stones. I take this is no longer the case. What would be the fastest way to level up these days? I'm really not looking forward to plowing through a hundred of levels having already done that the slow way on a dozen of characters before hyper exp stones became a thing.
  • catgirldesu
    catgirldesu Posts: 993 Arc User
    edited December 2016
    uglyfaceyo wrote: »
    One more thing - back in the day one could pay some coin and get levelled up in FC with hyper stones. I take this is no longer the case. What would be the fastest way to level up these days? I'm really not looking forward to plowing through a hundred of levels having already done that the slow way on a dozen of characters before hyper exp stones became a thing.

    New quests have been added, and if I'm not mistaken many of the old quests were updated to be shorter/faster (requiring fewer kills/drops) and give more EXP. You can receive rewards from the Perfect Questmaster NPC once you complete x amount of quests and those include EXP fruits. After level 20, Lucidsilver and Lucidgold NPCs give you chests daily at 8pm and 9pm server time. Those chests can give you some useful items, including EXP fruits (though they might also give you cosmetic items like all-class pets).

    The are unique rewards every 5 levels that give you a lot of useful items and sometimes we get arc codes that provide us with various quality-of-life items. You can also try forming PV squads (which is an EXP instance with various level ranges) and, of course, the daily Bounty Hunter quests. Lastly, you have the auto-cultivation feature so you can grind on mobs while you're AFK doing something else or you can grind overnight until your gear breaks.

    Leveling a new character can go pretty fast if you put a little effort into it. It's definitely faster than it used to be years ago, and a lot better thanks to the amount of quality of life items you receive for free (teleport stones, charms etc.). The real grinding starts after you reawaken and it comes in the form of "daily quests" in Primal World to get your passive skills and sky levels.
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  • yoabu#2667
    yoabu#2667 Posts: 50 Arc User
    I'll piggyback on this thread and ask my own questions. Coming back to PWI like the OP. Back when I last played, APS was the way to go as far as farming, which naturally favoured Sins and BMs. I'm wondering if it's still the case - I imagine NV is no longer the endgame content so perhaps there's a chance for a class like Seeker or Barb to get their stuff farmed without rolling an alt Sin...
  • shopcheese
    shopcheese Posts: 758 Arc User
    edited December 2016
    Aps is still useful and is recommended to have if you are farming an older instance (you dont have to be sin for aps tho), but its no longer 'the way to go'. Even as a sin, youll be fine wearing dph gear and not even owning an aps set.
    Any class can solo and farm any instance. Some classes have an easier time and can solo in lesser gear than others, depends on instance. For farming in pve i would always recommed one of the classes which can get bp though.
  • iw8ing4u
    iw8ing4u Posts: 37 Arc User
    u can solo farm + - anything include TT 3-3 this days with any class... u can solo abba... so basicly all class will fit 2 farm TT 3-3 or nirvana... the game changed... lvl 100 as used 2 b is just start of game considerd low power... very low... there much more lvls and skills above it now... u DONT need BP or APS 2 farm things no more... ppl solo Lunar np...
  • jsxshadow
    jsxshadow Posts: 1,414 Arc User
    uglyfaceyo wrote: »
    Definitely both PvE and PvP (both solo and mass). I used to solo farm TT on my BM, never liked the whole claw Barb thing (that really is the reason I rolled a BM and stuck with it - in the era of APS, non-APS Barbs weren't very useful), but yesterday I saw videos of str Barbs solo farming 3-3 and that gave me some hope.

    One more thing - back in the day one could pay some coin and get levelled up in FC with hyper stones. I take this is no longer the case. What would be the fastest way to level up these days? I'm really not looking forward to plowing through a hundred of levels having already done that the slow way on a dozen of characters before hyper exp stones became a thing.

    Well, ofc I would recommend barb. In terms of Survival-Power/Damage there is just no better classes to get started. Heck I started on my Server as a Barb and purely farmed way beyond 50b coins on the barb alone during the years I've played. APS-Barb is also way superior to APS-BM if that ever comes into question.

    For PvP I love both BM and Barb equally. Barbs are a bit more limited when it comes to roaming freely since they are very vulnerable to CC but ofc you can stay alive quite some time with them :D

    Starting out alone could be tough these days so I highly recommend you level a cleric with the barb at the same time. This way you can do pretty much everything alone and can slowly but surely built up your gear.
  • uglyfaceyo
    uglyfaceyo Posts: 18 Arc User
    Thanks for all the replies, they're really helpful! Levelling does seem much faster indeed and I can put my toon to work through auto-culti when I'm at work :D

    @jsxshadow I found your channel some time ago and watched a lot of the videos. Really impressive stuff! One thing I'm slightly intimidated by is whether my barb would be of any use to groups in PvE and PvP during the gearing process. I imagine a BM can at least HF regardless of their gear... I'd be willing to shell out some coin to get me started with something like g16 + 5/7 (still debating whether g16 weapon is better than g15 with GoF). What do you think would be the optimal setup to a) not be a burden in group runs, b) be able to solo farm stuff to slowly put coin aside for better gear? Now I started thinking g16 with refines as low as 7 might not be enough to handle solo farming at a comportable pace, so perhaps some kind of APS setup and farm TT like there's no tomorrow...
  • jsxshadow
    jsxshadow Posts: 1,414 Arc User
    uglyfaceyo wrote: »
    Thanks for all the replies, they're really helpful! Levelling does seem much faster indeed and I can put my toon to work through auto-culti when I'm at work :D

    @jsxshadow I found your channel some time ago and watched a lot of the videos. Really impressive stuff! One thing I'm slightly intimidated by is whether my barb would be of any use to groups in PvE and PvP during the gearing process. I imagine a BM can at least HF regardless of their gear... I'd be willing to shell out some coin to get me started with something like g16 + 5/7 (still debating whether g16 weapon is better than g15 with GoF). What do you think would be the optimal setup to a) not be a burden in group runs, b) be able to solo farm stuff to slowly put coin aside for better gear? Now I started thinking g16 with refines as low as 7 might not be enough to handle solo farming at a comportable pace, so perhaps some kind of APS setup and farm TT like there's no tomorrow...

    Aps gear really isnt that expensive..Barbs are always needed, just as BMs. In the majority of the new instances APS is nerfed and thus nearly completely useless. With lower gears, yes BMs might be better since you can assist the best geared players with your HF and thus contribute massively to the overall damage output. For some scenarios you will find that you kinda need a barb to be able to beat a boss unless you are with OP people ofc.

    I suggest you get basic full g16 nirvana gear no matter which class you chose first and then get another set of APS gears. Skill Damage isnt as low as it used to be and if you switch the gears decently you should be able to beat most TT bosses even tho your aps gears would render you a bit too squishy. So get full g16, then APS-gears.