Story time: my first vMA clear and a tip for stage 6.

Ivehn

My vMA story is one of pain and hilarity. I’m sure everyone is familiar with the pain part, but the hilarity comes from my absolute ignorance on how tough the content would be. Before I even knew what MA was, I saw players with ‘Stormproof’ attached to their name, and I used to think it was the coolest sounding title in the game. I bought the Orsinium DLC specifically to try the arena, and had my run at around CP250. And when I cleared it, albeit after a lot of deaths, I rushed to whisper one of my friends. They congratulated me and then posted a link with their progress on the veteran achievement. To which I thought to myself ‘Veteran?? 0_o’. I checked my titles and surely enough I wasn’t Stormproof, but I wasn’t disheartened - after all, how hard could the veteran version be...? Mind you, I hadn’t even done a normal dungeon at this point. So I tried the vet mode next, and let’s just say from my one thousand and then some deaths in the arena up to completion, over a half were to Maxus the Many . If I hear the phrase ‘Come forth, my other self’ my blood pressure rises. I gave up after a while, and returned at max CP, and though it was still brutal, I managed to make progress, and eventually clear it. I just kept trying because figured if I tried enough times statistically speaking there’d be a run where things would be in my favour (no poison under Minders/ultimate up when I need it, etc).

Since my completion is basically thanks to stubbornness and a lot of free time, I am in no position to offer advice; I’ve tried many different gears and skills, and I haven’t found something that gave me a particular advantage, besides what is usually recommended for my class (magicka sorcerer), except in one case: I used Ilambris throughout, but switched to Infernal Guardian at arena 6, just to see if it’d made a difference, and I discovered that it was really helpful for the webspinners. One of my main issues with this stage was that I kept missing the spinners and then the boss would either get enraged or the little spiders would get me. However, when the proc from IG fell on them, it alerted me to their presence, and sometimes killed them before I even had to do anything. So if you have problems with catching up to webspinners, throw DOTs pre-emptively on clear obelisks, and use IG - it honestly helps.

Anyway, that was my vMA story, I’m still flying high from completing it (I only realized Voriak Solkyn was down after I got the notification for the Costumes, because I was panicking in those last moments, and wasn’t really registering what was going on ), and I might go back in after a (very long) while. I’m just happy I don’t particularly like the sound of ‘Flawless Conqueror’, because oh boy

Reorx_Holybeard

Congrats! The first clear is always pretty painful but generally your death rate falls pretty quickly after that since it is mostly a learning curve. I think by my third real run I was able to get under 15 deaths...no idea how many times I actually died for my first run.

code65536

Congrats! The first clear is always very painful... and very exhilarating because of that pain.

Jaimeh wrote: »

I might go back in after a (very long) while. I’m just happy I don’t particularly like the sound of ‘Flawless Conqueror’, because oh boy

My first clear officially cost me 120 deaths (not counting the deaths in the previous abandoned sessions; this was back before you could save progress, and when we had a 500-life soul reservoir, so you wouldn't lose count after 15), and after all that struggle, I said to myself, "I got the title, I'm not going back in there ever again, and there's no way I could ever get Flawless." People told me that it gets much easier after the first clear. I did not believe them. But less than a week later, I was back in. And they were right. And eventually, I even got Flawless. That first clear is the big hump, though, and you got past it.

Ivehn

Reorx_Holybeard wrote: »

Congrats! The first clear is always pretty painful but generally your death rate falls pretty quickly after that since it is mostly a learning curve. I think by my third real run I was able to get under 15 deaths...no idea how many times I actually died for my first run.

Thank you! I hope that the next time I’ll attempt it my death count will be lower, at least for stages 1 through 4. Still, 15 deaths is pretty awesome in my books!

Ivehn

code65536 wrote: »

Congrats! The first clear is always very painful... and very exhilarating because of that pain.

Jaimeh wrote: »

I might go back in after a (very long) while. I’m just happy I don’t particularly like the sound of ‘Flawless Conqueror’, because oh boy

My first clear officially cost me 120 deaths (not counting the deaths in the previous abandoned sessions; this was back before you could save progress, and when we had a 500-life soul reservoir, so you wouldn't lose count after 15), and after all that struggle, I said to myself, "I got the title, I'm not going back in there ever again, and there's no way I could ever get Flawless." People told me that it gets much easier after the first clear. I did not believe them. But less than a week later, I was back in. And they were right. And eventually, I even got Flawless. That first clear is the big hump, though, and you got past it.

Thank you!

It must have been a very frustrating affair to be unable to save progress, I would have given up if that was the case still. But yes, subsequent attempts definitely seem to get easier from what I’ve gathered by reading other players’ accounts. I doubt I’ll manage a no-death run any time soon (or ever!) - I tend to panic and run like a headless chicken when I get overwhelmed by adds, and it generally ends in my demise Still, it's a goal to work towards, not to mention the possibility of a nice weapon reward