Flower Spiritgarden solo farm

[oles]

R/N modified toucher

Equipment:
Druid's Armor
Flat/Long bow (for pulling/interrupting)
Touch equipment (preferably w/ HSR Blood 20%)

Attributes:
Blood Magic - 12
Expertise - 16

Skills:
Vamp. Bite
Vamp. Touch
Offering of Blood
Throw Dirt
Lightning Reflexes
Whirling Defense
Distracting Shot
Dodge

http://www.public.iastate.edu/~pvp/files/GW/spiritg.jpg

First things first. This farm is fairly difficult, my own success rate has been under 100% (80%?). This farm also takes about 10-15 min or more depending on luck with the boss spawn. I wouldn't recommend it as a source of income (25k item), but rather if you want a challenge, need to do something different, or need the staff itself.

General strategy:
1) Obtain a priest blessing and kill the mob A.
2) Evade/run to mob B and kill it. If mob B cannot be killed (see below), kill mob C.
3) Run past mob D to the boss location. Kill the boss and get the rewards.

Individual mob strategies:

1) Mob A usually consists of 2 Undergrowths, 2 Stone Scale Kirins and 2 Dragon Mosses, or variation on the theme. Pull the mob with a flat/long bow and stay out of spell range of the Mosses. Don't pull too close to the priest group or you would lose the credit for killing the mob if the priest group joins the fight. Use Lightning Reflexes-Whirling Defense-Throw Dirt in that order, and reapply as the skills recharge. Kill all Kirins first and make sure to back away for Vampiric Horrors to engage Undergrowths, if they have been raised by the now dead Kirins. Kill Undergrowths, and finally, Mosses. It's ok to run away for a while if things get tough, but do not run toward the priest. Instead, go south-east.

2) Mob B usually cosists of 4-5 Wardens. If there are two Wardens of Seasons, kill mob C instead as above, and evade B. If mob B contains 1 Warden of Seasons, pull with a bow and immediately interrupt Recuperation. Then procede to kill him, and Warden of Summer next, if he's there. Then kill Wardens of Tree, Wardens of Spirit/Earth, and finally, Wardens of Wind/Branch. Again, it's ok to run away but do so to the south. Avoid stepping into Barbed Traps initially, so pulling a bit to the south or north-east is best. If you chose to go for mob C, then use Lightning Reflexes while running past B, then use Dodge as you agro mob D. Arrive at the boss location.

3) Switch to the bow. The exact sequence of skill usage is situational but the basic idea is to Distract both Preservation and Recuperation. Target the boss first and wait for him to use Preservation, which may take up to a minute. As soon as Presevation is cast, activate Whirling Defense. This is used for timing, as the next Preservation will come 62-63 seconds later, right after Whirling Defense recharge. Then try to engage the boss. Do not go past blue lines at point E, or you will spawn a large mob of Wardens and will have to restart. As soon as you pull the boss, he will cast Recuperation, and you need to activate Lightning Reflxes. The next Recuperation will come 47-48 sec later, after full LR recharge.
Now, while still holding the bow, begin to very slowly touch the boss, just to keep your health up, while waitig for Preservation. As soon as Preservation is being cast, interrupt it, activate Whirling Defense, and continute touching slowly. Now wait for LR recharge and distract upcoming Recuperation. Switch to touching equipment and begin touching at full speed. The next Preservation will come after 45sec or 3 quarters of WD recharge. Make sure that you have enough energy to switch to bow and Distract it. Switch to touching equipment and continue touching at full speed until the boss is dead.

[Notorious BOB]

Show off! :laugh:

:afro:

Tell you something though.. I've had more success dropping Greens with 7 henchies than I've had solo. In fact the only one that dropped quickly solo was Chkkrs Bow. Go Figure! :shocked:

:afro:

[oles]

Common mistake is going for the boss directly.
You MUST kill 2 full mobs first to avoid the drop nerf.

EDIT:
Btw, forgot to mention. Jayne Forestlight is very close. All you need to do is run past mob D toward her. Wait for Dodge recharge, then run past Jayne's mob. Going directly in middle has the best chance of avoiding Barb Traps, which usually mean quick death. Then depending on the spawn, she can or cannot be pulled away from the big mob, roughly toward north. If she can, a toucher will finish her off very easily.
I've gotten one Vera off of her, but doing it consistently is tough as hell. Success ratio 1:3, and the farm takes 15-30min. Gets you Vera if you really need it though.

[Nikikatsu]

You're producing some impressive guides recently Oles, keep up the good work :)

[kallick]

The only thing that is missing for me is...where do you start from? It looks like Altrium Ruins?

[oles]

The only thing that is missing for me is...where do you start from? It looks like Altrium Ruins?
Vasburg Armory.

[Reikai]

1.) what is the "Drop Nerf" >.>?

2.) wowzerz, your cranking off boss-solo farm builds like every day! very nice!

[oles]

1.) what is the "Drop Nerf" >.>?

2.) wowzerz, your cranking off boss-solo farm builds like every day! very nice!

You know how you got that little blue window from Anet in the top right corner of the screen warning that the monster drops are going to get rather poor if you keep killing the same mob repeatedly, then rezoning. It also recommends to explore the entire area and kill more mobs to get normal drops. Well, this doesn't happen if you kill 2 full mobs before killing the target. I call it the "drop nerf", others may call it the "farming code". That's what I was refering to.
And thanks.

[Fay Vert]

Common mistake is going for the boss directly.
You MUST kill 2 full mobs first to avoid the drop nerf.


Is there any evidence for this? I often wondered how much you needed to do to avoid it.

[Quiet Lurker]

I don't have any "hard" proof but from my experience the various bosses will very rarely drop the green unless you have killed a couple mobs on the way there. If i don't kill the mobs I don't get the farming code warning but I don't get the green either.

And Oles, right now you have my vote for KING of soloing greenies.....keep up the excellent work.

[Fay Vert]

well, that's two separate things. One is the "bosses wont drop if you don't kill the mobs" thing, which I personallty think is a myth. The other is how much of the zone do you have to do to not trigger the anti-farming code. I would be suprised if it's just two mobs because most farming is about hitting several mobs anyhow (albeit of the same creature).

I've never had the anti farming code kick in for icey farming, but that is a big area to clear, same with totem axe farming. In fact, I don't think I had it with grawl bombing either, but you hit a lot of mobs there.

[Quiet Lurker]

well, that's two separate things. One is the "bosses wont drop if you don't kill the mobs" thing, which I personallty think is a myth. The other is how much of the zone do you have to do to not trigger the anti-farming code. I would be suprised if it's just two mobs because most farming is about hitting several mobs anyhow (albeit of the same creature).

I've never had the anti farming code kick in for icey farming, but that is a big area to clear, same with totem axe farming. In fact, I don't think I had it with grawl bombing either, but you hit a lot of mobs there.

You are right it is two separate things. I think oles was talking about the boss/greenie setup rather than the farming code (I may be wrong though). It may be a myth about the boss/green/2 mob setup...isn't it funny how those type things just become accepted....sortof like the theory elder pets being doing the most damage before the testing by epi and jeno.

And I agree that two mobs should not be enough to "trick" the anti farming code. There are at least 5 mobs in the toll cave outside droks and the farming code kicks in there...or so I have been told, the same goes for the ettins in Kryta.

[oles]

well, that's two separate things. One is the "bosses wont drop if you don't kill the mobs" thing, which I personallty think is a myth. The other is how much of the zone do you have to do to not trigger the anti-farming code. I would be suprised if it's just two mobs because most farming is about hitting several mobs anyhow (albeit of the same creature).

I've never had the anti farming code kick in for icey farming, but that is a big area to clear, same with totem axe farming. In fact, I don't think I had it with grawl bombing either, but you hit a lot of mobs there.

When I test a build, I have to do a farm 10-15 times in a row, even after having finished tweaking the build. I'm fairly certain that the farming drop nerf comes after 3 farms where insufficient number of baddies were killed before the boss. Also, I know for a fact that killing a single mob, or not completing a mob also invokes the nerf. I know for an absolute in-plain-view on-open-frequency true-to-god fact that killing 2 full mobs before the objective will not invoke the nerf. The only thing I'm still a bit fuzzy on is when npcs get involved in the process (this farm and soulwhisper farm).More often than not, their involvement would mean the nerf.
And finally, the best for last. Even if you managed to have triggered the farming drop nerf code thingy, you can rectify the situation by killing 2 full mobs before the boss :).
EDIT: forgot to mention. I have farmed about 50 hours with these solo builds, besides the time involved in just testing.

[Quiet Lurker]

When I test a build, I have to do a farm 10-15 times in a row, even after having finished tweaking the build. I'm fairly certain that the farming drop nerf comes after 3 farms where insufficient number of baddies were killed before the boss. Also, I know for a fact that killing a single mob, or not completing a mob also invokes the nerf. I know for an absolute in-plain-view on-open-frequency true-to-god fact that killing 2 full mobs before the objective will not invoke the nerf. The only thing I'm still a bit fuzzy on is when npcs get involved in the process (this farm and soulwhisper farm).More often than not, their involvement would mean the nerf.
And finally, the best for last. Even if you managed to have triggered the farming drop nerf code thingy, you can rectify the situation by killing 2 full mobs before the boss :).
EDIT: forgot to mention. I have farmed about 50 hours with these solo builds, besides the time involved in just testing.

That makes allot of sense that your build testing would trigger the code.
It would be logical too that the code would be different for bosses than other areas and that 2 mobs would be enough to avert the more strict "boss farming code" from kicking in. I am curious though, do you get the farming code message if you don't kill the couple of mobs, or just notice a reduction in the drop quality (no greens) from the boss.

[oles]

That makes allot of sense that your build testing would trigger the code.
It would be logical too that the code would be different for bosses than other areas and that 2 mobs would be enough to avert the more strict "boss farming code" from kicking in. I am curious though, do you get the farming code message if you don't kill the couple of mobs, or just notice a reduction in the drop quality (no greens) from the boss.
I've never seen the message since it appeared on my first ice imp farm. However, I think the bosses have a change to drop 3 items and gold (or maybe 4 items). The probability of a random but consistent 0 drops in 3-4 consecutive tries is very low, and I take that as a sign of the farm drop nerf code kicking in.