Advice for spec reset please!

At the risk of sounding like a total noob (well, I am to the forums anyway), I'm going to ask this:

I didn't really start using my bear till AO3 came out (used mostly my Mage before then) I finally got it up to lvl 50 now, but realized I messed up on stats and skills (b/c I never read the forums). I want to make sure my bear is the best warrior it can be for farming ao3 loot.

So first of all, I wanted to know if the free "reset attributes" also resets the skills. And I could use some advice on skills and stats. I've read some guides on here, but some aren't completely updated for the new patch. I could really use some advice from successful warriors. Thanks!

Yes, a respec does allow you to redistribute both attribute and skill points. For attributes, to make it simple you could go with 158 Str, and the rest in Dex. However, since all the good AO3 Str gear has Str bonuses, you can go with less Str, and use gear bonuses to build Str for requirements, allowing you to have more Dex. Just ask if you want further explanation on how to do that, or the relative benefits of Str and Dex. For Skills, definitely max out Rage, Ironblood, Evasion, Hellscream, Beckon, Stomp, SMS, and Crushing Blow. I would also recommend maxing out Taunt.

Great, tha ks! I've seen some mixed opinions on str vs dex. I've had mostly str now, but getting hit way too easily. I assume more dex would solve that problem? And what about str affecting damage from skills? Is that too minuscule to make a difference?

While we're at it, if you wouldn't mind helping me out with some gear recommendations. I just read there's no m/s bonuses on any ao3 gear, and I'm trying to figure out the best way to go, which bosses to farm. Right now I'm still wearing my Thoth mynas helm, plus skull shield, templar's luminous harpoon and battleforged armor of destiny. Should I bother farming ao2 for a shock lance or am I better off with the harpoon until I can find a better ao3 weapon?

Thanks again!

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Originally Posted by Lesrider

Great, tha ks! I've seen some mixed opinions on str vs dex. I've had mostly str now, but getting hit way too easily. I assume more dex would solve that problem? And what about str affecting damage from skills? Is that too minuscule to make a difference?

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Dex won't have a huge effect on you getting hit. More dex will raise your dodge a bit, but not a ton. What Dex does do is increase you damage and crit significantly, and the only real tradeoff from losing Str is a small amount of health. Str does increases skill damage. However, Dex increases base damage more than Str, and base damage affects skill damage too. When you factor in that skills crit as well, the benefits of Dex over Str are pretty clear.

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While we're at it, if you wouldn't mind helping me out with some gear recommendations. I just read there's no m/s bonuses on any ao3 gear, and I'm trying to figure out the best way to go, which bosses to farm. Right now I'm still wearing my Thoth mynas helm, plus skull shield, templar's luminous harpoon and battleforged armor of destiny. Should I bother farming ao2 for a shock lance or am I better off with the harpoon until I can find a better ao3 weapon?

Thanks again!

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The best way to go in terms of getting some mana regen is to keep one piece of Thoth as you are doing, though I have heard using the helmet is the worst way to go in terms of armor loss vs. Rift gear. For a weapon, I wouldn't bother farming a lance, since the harpoon is pretty much on par with it, though for a bear, I think the lance might be slightly better, so it's really up to you. Farming a lance is time consuming. Actually IMO, those (harpoon and lance) are the two best 1-hand Str weapons in the game. All the Rift 1-handers are low damage, high speed swords, which are fairly ineffective. The one exception may be the force cutter which has a break armor proc, but I haven't tested it personally yet, so can't really recommend it.

Great, thanks for breaking down the str/dex issue for me!

As for equipment, the reason I kept the Thoth helmet (for now) is because the only other Thoth I had was my pharaohs shield, and the skull shield was a lot better than any other helm I have. So which Thoth item would you recommend then? And which helmet instead? Thanks, I'll stick with the harpoon then. Is Mynas's sword also worse that?

Comparing level 45 Thoth gear (50s are super rare and don't drop any more) to level 50 rift, here are the armor differences:
Overlord Rift Helm (higher armor than Jacobs) - Thoth helm = 22 armor
Rift Plate - Thoth Plate = 22 armor
Rift Shield - Thoth Buckler = 12 armor
So if you can get a Thoth Buckler, that is the best way to go to maintain some mana regen and sacrifice the least armor (it's too bad because the rift shields are the easiest rift pieces to find and look really cool).
As for the sword, the issue is simply that low damage fast weapons are not that great in mid to high levels in this game. Armor negates most of their damage. If you have a good party, mage using nightmare, bird using break armor, and you use hellscream and crushing blow, then a fast, low damage weapon can be effective, but in general, and particularly against some bosses and in PvP, I would recommend against them. Also note that your weapon damage (not DPS) also affects your damage done with skills, so that's another reason to use higher damage (not DPS) weapons. Since there are no 1-hand axes in AO3 (edit: whoops forgot the limb chopper, but I don't think it's very good. Maybe I should try it out though...), you best options are the harpoon, AO2 lance, and 2-hand weapons, though as I said the force cutter sounds like it might be the exception to the underpowered 1-hand sword rule, but I have to get one before I can say for sure ;)

I'd also go with 16 intel because that will get you 1 m/s and 16 points doesn't make a huge difference for str or dex

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Originally Posted by smoae

I'd also go with 16 intel because that will get you 1 m/s and 16 points doesn't make a huge difference for str or dex

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Dex is way overpowered vs. Str or Int, and just FYI, each point of Int still gives you only 0.02 points of mana regen. So a bear with default 1 Int already has about 0.7 M/s and those additional points only matter if you really wanna see that number show up rounded on your avatar screen ;)

Thanks for the advice. I already added a bit of int, after reading the part about 16 int = 1 m/s before and really missing my m/s from all the Thoth. But I only have 8 int b/c my equip gets it up to 16.

Farmed ao2 IV like crazy and finally got a conq shock lance yay! Dps is much better than harpoon!

if youre going to be wearing ao3 gear, put 16 points into intel for the m/s, because no strength ao3 items have m/s (*cough* silly *cough* devs)
also id reccomed putting a lot into str (at least 200 or so) beacuase rift items only give 2 h/s, so youll need more of that from str attribute. (*cough* silly *cough* devs)