With Lineage II Classic drawing ever so near, getting ready (and psyched up) for the journey ahead is essential. Part of this is understanding just how different L2C is from most MMORPGs, including the current release of Lineage II itself. Through this article, we’re going to look at some essentials for progressing through the game – from the beginning to the end, these will help ensure that not only are you leveling and gearing up, but you’re doing so efficiently.

Partying – A Necessity, Not a Choice

A huge part of L2C deals with grouping with other players. Whether you’re fighting 1x, 3x, or even 4x HP mobs, it’s important to join up with other players. The experience and drops may be lower on a per-mob basis, but the lack of downtime, mixed with the much faster killing, makes this well worth doing. Pay attention to progression over time, rather than for each kill.

Aside from the kill speed alone, later down the line it becomes less and less of a choice. Due to being undergeared and underfunded, you simply won’t be able to afford to venture out alone at higher levels. While you can absolutely do it short-term, it becomes a burden quick enough, and in the best-case scenario, you’re slowing down your own gear progression by doing so. You could get lucky with drops, but that’s not something to count on.

A Strong Clan

The second part of joining up with others is to join a clan. Make friends, level with them, and work together to progress. This makes it much easier to both level and gear, which in turn makes progression much more exciting and rewarding. Just make sure you find a clan that matches your own play style and desires. Just as a clan can help build you up, they can also hinder progression.

Enemies to Target

There’s a lot of arguing about what the best course is in terms of leveling, but time and time again, it’s been shown that the following tips are highly rewarding:

• Avoid raid bosses – up until end-game, their rewards are almost nil, but the cost of doing them is high. Not to mention you earn little experience from them, so you’re paying hard-earned money in a lottery-type event

• Hunt 1x HP mobs in an open area

• Hold down a 4x HP mob room with a full party that requires no downtime

The reason for going for 1x HP mobs is because they’re quick to kill, meaning less downtime. Along with this, their drops are lower per mob, but you kill significantly more of them. With a full party, however, it’s usually more efficient to lock down an area with 4x (or 3x) HP mobs, so long as there’s no downtime. Forgotten Temple, therefore, is a no-go (far too many stuns and bleeds there, both of which equal downtime).

To make things even better, go for AoE parties. Abandoned Camp is a great one that will last from 20 to 34 or so, and then Partisan’s Hideaway will take you to 37-38, of which Cruma Tower then becomes the place to go. These allow fast kills, with a lot more experience and drops than you would otherwise get. Plus they’re relaxing! A more detailed AoE guide will come soon.

Try to Conserve Money

Adena, or the game’s gold, is important. It’s used to buy gear and consumables, of which the most important one is soulshot and spiritshot. Both of these become essential parts of small parties later on, as well as larger groups when doing certain content, but they come at a great cost. The general idea is to do a weighing of the benefits vs. the costs. Usually, the following ring true:

• With a party of 3 or less, use soulshot or spiritshot

• With a party of 4 or more, don’t use it

• When raiding, use it

• When PvPing, use it

Essentially, what you’re doing is saving money while out and about with others, while burning some of it away when solo or in a small party for faster leveling. A good plan is to consider x% of your finances as disposable, meaning that you can burn through it. The rest should be saved up for the next piece of gear, enchantment, or materials for crafting.

Skip NG and D Grade

This is something that some agree with and some don’t. The trick here is that NG items drop frequently enough that you should be able to get geared up while leveling normally. In the case of D grade, it’s not as common, though armor usually comes through normal leveling. But rather than spending all your money working on either of these two grades, start saving up for C as soon as possible. It will hinder leveling slightly, but once you get to 40+ and have the C items (at least a weapon), it gets that much easier to level and farm more money. This is as opposed to getting there and having no money due to spending it all. Always prepare for the future, rather than the present. And due to 9-person parties, it shouldn’t be an issue to use a somewhat less than stellar weapon or armor.

Concluding Thoughts

Ideally, what you want to do is always focus on the top. In the case of L2C, this is likely going to be the release of B grade. The stepping stone to this is C, so that’s where the gearing focus should be. Materials should be saved up for B, however, and nothing other than the top items should be crafted. With how many materials most items take to make, the cost is just too great to waste them on unneeded items or things that aren’t going to last to the end of the current game.