The Soloist: Shooting your way to success

It can be a bit difficult to get those fighting abilities up to par sometimes. Melee fighting carries with it the ever-present risks associated with being "up close and personal" with the creatures you're trying to slaughter, and magic doesn't really help build one's strength, stamina and hit points.

Enter the art of range fighting.

Range fighting - or the art of blasting critters in the face, as I like to call it - has its advantages and disadvantages. The latter consists mainly of having to keep a close eye on one's ammunition (and haul around a LOT of said ammunition - you ain't diggin' and shootin' at the same time unless you're the kind of person that likes destroying things in your inventory or you like hauling around mektoub packers and exposing 'em to danger), but the former column has one plus that potentially outshines any deficiencies:

Range combat is the fighting style that lets you move around and fight at the same time!

So, if you're hard-up for fighting upgrades and find grinding melee to be a bit cumbersome, here is what I would suggest. (NOTE: This advice will not work on Silan. You must be on the mainland to make use of firearms; apparently, someone passed the Brady Bill on Silan and firearms simply can't be had by anybody. Just one more reason to come on down!)

It's not a 30.06, but it'll do.

STEP 1: Craft or buy a suitable firearm. Everyone's got their own preference; I'm a fan of rifles myself. (NOTE: Pistols, sadly, cannot be dual-wielded... yet. Let's hope that changes.) You're looking for max firing rate first, max range second. At this time, if you have not yet already done so, set up a stanza for range fighting - one that preferably includes as much Hit Rate + upgrades as you can manage. (A little Accuracy can't hurt either.)

STEP 2: Learn how to make ammunition. You're going to need a lot of it. I've had success using Dung resin, Koorin oil and Beckers bark as my ingredients. They don't produce the best bullet, but the bullets they DO make get the job done rather well. You can learn how to make ammunition from the crafting trainers.

STEP 3: Find something nice, big and SLOW to hunt. Bodocs make great targets, but for the purposes of this demonstration I'm going to pick on the cloppers again. (One of these days, I'm sure the cloppers are going to get their revenge on me for my continued use of the critter in these demonstrations.) You're going to want to target these critters in an area that allows you some nice running room. Fairhaven has a nice area for clopper hunting to the east of the city, on a peninsula that affords a lot of running room without aggressive creatures in the immediate way, as well as ample amounts of water to dive into for safety should anything go wrong.

Remember, anything 20 levels above your Range Fight level is a waste. And probably will be difficult to hit. So, don't go tangling with named boss creatures or anything silly like that. All the ammo in the world isn't going to help you if you can't even inflict damage on what you're hunting.

STEP 4: Get JUST inside firing range, and double-click on your Range Fighting stanza to allow it to be used automatically. If you get a message saying your out of range, inch up closer until your character starts firing.

Giving new meaning to the term "run and shoot offense"!

STEP 5: Run like hell in the opposite direction. Your character will continue firing over his/her shoulder at your target. (Can't do THAT with spells and swords!) Keep an eye on your target's hit points, and don't let 'em catch up to you. Live to fight another day - that's the goal!

Once the critter falls, harvest its materials if you like (remember, though, that keeping a ton of ammo means you're not going to be able to harvest a ridiculous amount of stuff - be picky if you must), target another one of its kind, and lather/rinse/repeat.

Before you know it, you'll have all kinds of Fight skill points to spend on all those nifty 50-point abilities as well as strength and stamina boosts to further buff your character and allow further exploration of the wide, wide world of Atys.

Keep your powder dry and your sights aligned, fellow adventurers! As always, comments/criticism/anything that's not spam is welcomed in the comments below.