Cleaved Asunder

Happy New Year to al the blog readers, probably just one or two of you but hey it is all good. Today I want to roll through a few thoughts about Stormcleave Outpost. There is always basic information on the quest in the wiki but as a level 8 quest I do enjoy it especially the fact that there are a couple of spots where rares can occur.

Fire and Death Aura seem to be a good combo

At the moment I am running Stormcleave regularly with my  level 7/2 pale master with a monk splash who is third life. So this fits into my comfort zone and I only run a cleric in case of stupidity or mana top up from divine vitality. Due to the low spell points I tend to melee whilst extending Death Aura to self health/injure mobs. Plus having a Skelly on my side sort of helps.

Time to dance

I tend to run Stormcleave on normal/hard rather than Elite simply because I am happy to grind rather than rush my leveling and as it is a third life it will take time to get my character up anyway. I will settle for the onslaught bonus in terms of killing because I don't want to run all over the place for a few extra bodies which will increase the amount of time I will need to send to complete the quest. I have settled on a route that allows me to slay 177 monsters which is just about the most economical time I can find that will complete the collection of 4 shards and light up the 6 runes.

Will they ever run out of Giants?

I know there are optionals that many people enjoy completing but for me I would rather avoid the outpost supplies one as my route misses a couple of crates and I would prefer to stay on the route I have learned. Perhaps I could learn or add to the route but I guess for me it is all about comfort in running the quest rather than a mad rush for experience. If I was working one of my first lifers it may be different but a character is not interested in rushing then the path of least resistance seems sensible. I am sure that many readers will question my wisdom but I am happy with how it works. I do think that the key to enjoying a quest is to be able to complete the tasks without increasing blood pressure.

Bit slow getting round

I will test myself by trying to do some of the optionals but the 4 rares only occur in 2 places so guessing you will never get more than 2. I did find it interesting that the cleric hirelings seem to have 18 intelligence or better to operate a rune on an optional. Which is not a problem anyway for my pale master but really help when running my barbarian through the quest on occasion. One serious tip for when you are taking out the undead that surround Pious Grew'el remember to not have death aura running otherwise I think you will be healing the undead  yourself.

Anyway just an excuse for me to enjoy myself have fun giant slaying

Grousewiz