Attempting VMA for the 1st time today

Megabear · November 2017

Just got back home. Wife and her friends off to watch their friend compete in a beauty contest. I am free to play without interruptions at last..

Loralai_907 · November 2017

I tried vma exactly one time. I was not prepared and I died super fast. Said forget this and never went back. I'm probably way more prepared now, but still. I feel like I would need to be in the right frame of mind, and right now I am not. Like I would have to be hyper focused on vma and the need to beat it. Totally not there lol.

Megabear · November 2017

I'm dying over and over. Also keep crashing. That's when I get on the forum since I need to login anyway.

CiliPadi · November 2017

Good on you. I can't even get past stage 3 due to lag.

Megabear · November 2017

This guy is in the right business. I wonder how much money he's making during the event.

Kalante · November 2017

Megabear wrote: »

Just got past stage 6, was stuck here for the last two hours. I didn't know that I am protected near the free pillar from the swarm buggers until watching the Youtube vid. After I understood that bit I was able to beat it on 2nd try. So happy.

ok?

BrightOblivion · November 2017

Megabear wrote: »

This guy is in the right business. I wonder how much money he's making during the event.

So, so much. Millions, perhaps. But you've got this, and Solkyn will eventually be sulkin'. The first time is the hardest by far.

I beat it for the first time ever yesterday, turned around, and beat it again in two and a half hours from start to finish. This third time's been far more gnarly, but I think it's because I've been worn out and not thinking clearly.

My best advice is when you're starting to get incredibly frustrated, take a break. Get some rest, and attack him fresh. He's not going anywhere. Friday's first clear came after 4.5 hours off and on Thursday facing just the last boss. Some have taken 12 hours plus to get him. But when you do, and your hands are shaking, and your heart's pounding like the drum in a metal band, that's awesome.

Witar · November 2017

Infernal guardian is extremely helpful on mag classes there (exept 7 arena where it would kill mages that's supposed to stay alive while behemoth screams).

Megabear · November 2017

I keep lagging or crashing in the middle of a fight. Nothing happens for a few seconds, then bam I'm dead. Once I crashed, for some reason resurrected in Rawl'kha, and when I went back to VMA I had to start over from stage 1. I think I'm more frustrated with ZOS than the VMA itself.

Time to take a break.

MakeMeUhSamich · November 2017

Megabear wrote: »

I keep lagging or crashing in the middle of a fight. Nothing happens for a few seconds, then bam I'm dead. Once I crashed, for some reason resurrected in Rawl'kha, and when I went back to VMA I had to start over from stage 1. I think I'm more frustrated with ZOS than the VMA itself.

Time to take a break.

Lag and disconnects are the greatest enemy.

Megabear · November 2017

MakeMeUhSamich wrote: »

Megabear wrote: »

I keep lagging or crashing in the middle of a fight. Nothing happens for a few seconds, then bam I'm dead. Once I crashed, for some reason resurrected in Rawl'kha, and when I went back to VMA I had to start over from stage 1. I think I'm more frustrated with ZOS than the VMA itself.

Time to take a break.

Lag and disconnects are the greatest enemy.

*** it...

Daedric_NB_187 · November 2017

Congrats dude. You did way better than I did my first time trying it. I'm still stuck on stage 3. Can't beat it to save my life. Been reading every guide I can find. Watching YouTube videos. I just can't get it. I'm taking a break for now and try to level up some more. Currently CP 380 Magsorc with 5x Julianos, full Skoria set and 4 pieces of Spinners. I'll eventually get it though. But congrats again. That is impressive how far you got on your first try.

When I got through it on normal, I knew vet was going to be hell lol.

laurajf · November 2017

I'm impressed that you've gotten this far. I still have never attempted VMA. I started the "normal" version and got through stage 6, I think, but I found even that frustrating. I can't even imagine VMA.

Just made me realize I'm just not the type of gamer for that type of stuff. Let me go play house and I'm happy.

Okay, I'm not happy because I can't afford housing and can't get the furnishing plans because the drop rate sucks for the newer stuff.

Hmmm. Never mind. I guess I have nothing to contribute to this thread. Sorry.

I guess I'll just end this with congratulations and good luck.

LOL.

Taleof2Cities · November 2017

Megabear wrote: »

*** it...

Had you taken the healing sigil that might have prevented a disconnect.

In all seriousness, you're doing a lot better than most on the first try ... head back in if you can before the event is over. Good luck!

Jaimeh · November 2017

Megabear wrote: »

This guy is in the right business. I wonder how much money he's making during the event.

His surname should be changed to either Repairius or R.I.P.arius for reasons...

SupremeRissole · November 2017

Good luck man. I died a lot on stage 5 and always gave up. Eventually pushed myself to finish it. First run: 15hrs, second run: 2hrs. It gets easier believe me.

Storymaster · November 2017

@Megabear charging into Stage 7:
PF8s9V3QRayP50SaBzZk_Ultimate%20Warrior%20Scream.gif

Also--Congrats!

Robo_Hobo · November 2017

Tip for anyone doing Vma and dying a lot:

buying grand repair kits from guild stores is immensely cheaper than using a merchant to repair damaged equipment. Although I imagine it's hard to find those in guild stores at the moment.

nolangrady · November 2017

Robo_Hobo wrote: »

Tip for anyone doing Vma and dying a lot:

buying grand repair kits from guild stores is immensely cheaper than using a merchant to repair damaged equipment. Although I imagine it's hard to find those in guild stores at the moment.

Pretty sure the merchant in vMA sells repair kits but could be wrong...

Asardes · November 2017

nolangrady wrote: »

Robo_Hobo wrote: »

Tip for anyone doing Vma and dying a lot:

buying grand repair kits from guild stores is immensely cheaper than using a merchant to repair damaged equipment. Although I imagine it's hard to find those in guild stores at the moment.

Pretty sure the merchant in vMA sells repair kits but could be wrong...

The NPC rate is about 4.5x more expensive than what you would find in guild stores. Repair kits are selling for about 90 gold on EU-PC, while the NPCs sell them for 420 gold. Rather than buying those you are better off repairing gear via the dialogue option. Fully repairing 7 pieces of gear is about 1.8K gold, or ~256 gold per piece. A repair kit does indeed repair a piece fully but only the guild bought repair kits are economical if you are getting hit a lot. And vMA ends up degrading gear even if you don't die a lot. For some reason by the end of the 7th arena at least one of my armor pieces is at less than 20%, even if I sustained less than 2 deaths.

Flaminir · November 2017

Asardes wrote: »

And vMA ends up degrading gear even if you don't die a lot. For some reason by the end of the 7th arena at least one of my armor pieces is at less than 20%, even if I sustained less than 2 deaths.

@Asardes gear degrades based on XP earned as well as deaths. There's quite a lot of mobs (& therefore XP earned) in vMA, thats why the gear is breaking as you go through.

Apache_Kid · November 2017

Flaminir wrote: »

Asardes wrote: »

And vMA ends up degrading gear even if you don't die a lot. For some reason by the end of the 7th arena at least one of my armor pieces is at less than 20%, even if I sustained less than 2 deaths.

@Asardes gear degrades based on XP earned as well as deaths. There's quite a lot of mobs (& therefore XP earned) in vMA, thats why the gear is breaking as you go through.

And here I thought gear degraded based on damage taken. It's wild how I still learn things about this game at this stage of my play.

GrigorijMalahevich · November 2017

makreth wrote: »

Valera Progib wrote: »

Good luck at level 7 watch out for exploding flowers. It should take you another 4-6 hours to finish vMA...

lol

what? if it took someone 4 hours to get to level 7, then it will be about another 4 hours to finish vMA

if not more...

GrigorijMalahevich · November 2017

Svenja wrote: »

Wow, I think it's very impressive that you got this far so quickly. You'll manage to do the last stage as well! Last boss can be a real pain at first, but once you get used to the timing of his mechanics, it's one of the easier fights of vMA, and this is coming from someone who was stuck on him for ages.
The argonian on stage 7 is a lot more annoying due to those rng-death-mechanics, and you got past that one already.

If you manage to do vet mode, you could try to use normal mode to level up new chars. The gap in difficulty between vet and normal is insane. I did nMA on a level 6 magicka warden a few weeks ago (I have max CP though), the char was level 11 once I was finished, and running around with the "maelstrom arena champion" title at that level feels pretty funny.

If I see someone with "Maelstrom Arena Champion" title, I automatically assume they are bad. Even if it is level 1 character.

Ch4mpTW · November 2017

Megabear wrote: »

Ch4mpTW wrote: »

So far so good, OP. Keep up the fantastic work. You can do it. ^_^

Thank you, I"m crying inside though. I just want this to be over. I thought games were supposed to be fun lol.

Those are the ropes, unfortunately. The first few clears essentially are moments of dread. But, once you’ve learned: The spawns, the patterns of attack, etc. The content becomes quite easy. I personally used to use it for testing out new builds and tweaks to builds I’ve made, but have chosen to leave the content be. This is all due to the numerous amounts of bugs and lag I’ve been experiencing.

Regardless, you can definitely overcome VMA. And if this helps at all, I’d classify VMA to be more challenging than Dark Souls games, and classic franchises like: Mega Man, Devil May Cry, Castlevania, etc. So if you can manage to Conqueror VMA, there is a good chance you can breeze through much harder games like those I mentioned and many more.

Kay1 · November 2017

I got to stage 9 on my first try.

But it took me 12h non stop for the stage 9 lol so, some people struggle more in the stage 6, some in the stage 8, some in the stage 9, ect...

It really doesn't depend on how good you are but in how smart you are to understand everything because to be honest it's easy as *** once you understand what to do.

RABIDxWOLVERINE · November 2017

Tried vMA on Stam DK and got my ass handed to me repeatedly. 1st round was a breeze 2nd was an aggravation and 3rd I died about every 20-30 seconds so I went and ran trials. Apparently this (vMA) is to hard or time consuming for me. Maybe Ill try again this weekend.

Ch4mpTW · November 2017

RABIDxWOLVERINE wrote: »

Tried vMA on Stam DK and got my ass handed to me repeatedly. 1st round was a breeze 2nd was an aggravation and 3rd I died about every 20-30 seconds so I went and ran trials. Apparently this (vMA) is to hard or time consuming for me. Maybe Ill try again this weekend.

I’m a Flawless Conqueror on all my toons (minus Wardens), and I’ve even been getting my ass handed to me. I can assure you that VMA has been screwed-up recently something fierce. And that it’s usually not as infuriating. I legit can’t stomach VMA as of recently.

Robisok74 · November 2017

Valera Progib wrote: »

Good luck at level 7 watch out for exploding flowers. It should take you another 4-6 hours to finish vMA...

Remeber at last stage - fire breathing daedroths - if you struggle to kill them before they make serious damage, put on back bar your dark magic ultimate - supression field, under it, daedroth doesnt breath fire, just put it every time daedroth spawns and try to get another mob or boss in to the field. You will thank me later.

Or just put your destro alt down on the boss deadroth and healer after you interuppt and your on your way up top

Robisok74 · November 2017

VaranisArano wrote: »

Good luck! I was thrilled to beat the first round in VMA on my stam sorc today, but the spinning trap blades in Round 2 just annihilate me. I'll have to try again later.

Crit surge (or whatever the morf is that gives heals back) and vigor with boundless storm for extra resistance. Just make sure you are hitting things for crit heals and just use vigor between rounds..