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Note: this guide is not done yet - I had to post it because I couldn't save it with the bbcode tags. I will update it asap. I'm asking everyone for help, if you'd like to help - please look at the bottom of this post.

(Euro): Detailed & explained party'ing guide

1. Introduction
2. Party roles
3. Party setup
4. Party places


(Chapter 1): Introduction

Hello guys, I'm William.D and I recently came back to Silkroad Online. I wanted to start playing again on the International Silkroad but because of the new login system it is even harder for me. Then I decided to play the Taiwenese version of Silkroad Online (also known as tSro). The english community was great, and there were lots of English people to party with. The only problem is, that atleast 80% doesn't know how to party on low-levels, which sometimes makes it terrible to level. That's why I decided to write a guide. Since I'm a bit un-experienced I'd like to have some help of high people who have much experiences with parties (please look at the bottom of this post).

As you already know, this guide will be about party'ing with European characters. I will tell you what every class has to do, which skills to use. I will also tell you all basic/common party setups with their altarnatives. I know sometimes it will be a bunch of text to read - but I hope you guys will learn something about it. Let's start!

(Chapter 2): Party Roles

In this chapter I will explain everything about every class. I will explain what they do in a party, what skills they should use and how they usefull are. I will only list the six European classes (so not the Chinese ones!) because this is an European party guide. I guess that's pretty obvious.

• Warrior
  
  • Build & Weapon: A warrior is always pure STR. This increases their HP and phyiscal defence. As a warrior you should equip a one-handed sword and a shield. This shield is the most important of you gear because of the blocking-ratio & defence bonuses.
  • Information: A warrior is the 'body' of the party. As a warrior you have mainly have 3 jobs to do. Luring & tanking the monsters and protecting your 'ints' from being killed. Also you should always buff your group.
  • Jobs: As a warrior you got 3 jobs. Luring and tanking monsters and protecting your 'ints' from being killed by the monsters. The last job is to buff your group, and mainly your 'ints'.
    
    • The first priority of a warrior is to buff your group. You have some usefull buffs which reduce aggro/sharing damage. Sometimes they can save lives of your 'ints' who would've been killed without that buff.
    • The second priority of a warrior is that your 'ints' won't die. So 1 of the 2 warriors in 1 party will ALWAYS stay at the 'ints' to protect them. You will attack all monsters which come in the range of your ints. You will mostly use sprint assault for this.
    • The thirth priority is to bring monsters into the group so you actually gain some experience. Mostly you will move away from the group to get a decent amount of monsters. You will use skills such as Taunt, Shout to get the aggro of the monsters. When you have enough monsters, you return to the group and the wizards will kill them with their powerufull attacks.
  • Important Skills: The most important are you buffs like as Pain Quota, Physical Fence, Protect, ... To lure you should use the skills Taunt, Shout. And to save your 'ints' you should use Sprint Assault.
• Cleric
  
  • Build & Weapon: A cleric should always be Full INT, this will increase their healing power and buffs. You should always wear a cleric-rod as weapon, with a shield to increase your blocking-ratio/defence.
  • Information: A cleric is the 'heart' of their party. A cleric has the most powerfull buffs and healings ingame. This, can save party members and make them much stronger. You should always stay with your 'ints' and not run with the tanks.
  • Jobs: A cleric has 2 'jobs'. The first job is buffing your group, the second job is healing and keeping care of your group. Those are both very important; with a bad cleric a party will never survive.
    
    • The first priority is to buff your group. You got the best buffs ingame, and you should use them. Overall you have buff for every player in your group, some got more, some got less.
    • The second priority is to heal your group and most likely will this be the warrior who is luring. You should always cast a healing cycle on him before he actually starts luring. If your whole group is getting attacked you can always use group heal or any other heal which would fit in that situation. You should always cast Recovery Division because this is a healing-spell which heals hitpoints over-time.
  • Important skills: A cleric will use the most skills in a party. Skills such as Force Blessing, Mental Blessing, Holy Word/Spell and every other skill out of the Blessing series is mainly used for buffing. For healing you should use skills such as Recovery Division, Healing Cycle, Healing, Group Healing, ...
• Bard
  
  • Build & Weapon: A Bard should always be Full INT. Full INT will let you use more mana and also your skills will become better. You will always wear a harp.
  • Information: Bards are the other, less favored, buffers of the party. A bard's job is first to maintain his tambour or dance (depends which one he casts) and second to keep people's MP at max. Bard is one of the most boring classes to play because you will spamming 1 skill every 16 seconds.
  • Jobs: The bard only has 2 jobs, where 1 of them only should be done at the beginning of the party, if the party won't die. The first job is to tambour/dance up, and the second job is to keep everyone's mana full.
    
    • The first priority is to buff your group. You should get your tambour/dance up and give everyone speed. When you are with 2 bards; one bard should do the tambour and one the dance (Dance of Magic/Wizardy mostly).
    • The second priority is to keep everyone's mana up. Firstly you will cast a Mana Cycle on yourself and then on your group. If you are with 2 bards, you can split it up. Note: if you're 90+ you should start using Mana Orbit instead.
  • Important Skills: You should always use Guard Tambour as your tambour. If you got 2 bards you will most likely cast Dance of Magic (Dance of Wizardy later). To give people speed you will use Moving March (Swing March later). And last but not least, to keep their mana up you will use Mana Cycle and on 90+ Mana Orbit.

(Chapter 3): Party Setup

Your party will mostly be setup the same way. However, if you're missing a wizard or something other you always have alternative party setups. Sometimes also the monster where you are training on have influence, because of their spawn rate/level/etc. In this chapter I will list all main/alternative party setups with their own reasons.

Main setups

4 Wizards, 2 Warriors, 1 Cleric, 1 Bard
This is a setup which is one of the most often used. If you are using this setup, the party gaints/champions should be killed fast enough, so you don't need any warlock. You only got 1 cleric and bard so they should be doing their job good otherwise you will fail. This party setup can be the fastest ingame if you do well.

3 Wizards, 2 Warriors, 1 Cleric, 1 Bard, 1 Warlock
This is almost the same setup as the one above, the only change is that we've got a Warlock instead of an extra Wizard. A warlock will help with the debuffs to make it easier to kill party giants/champions. Also with their DoT skills they can make the party gain zerker some much faster. This can also be a very fast party setup if you look at experience.

3 Wizards, 2 Warriors, 2 Bards, 1 Cleric
This is the setup where you would get an extra bard instead of an extra wizard. This will gain you the ability to get a dance up which most likely would increase the magical damage of the wizards.


(Chapter 4): Party Places

As a party you will never stick to the same monsters. You will party on monsters depending on the avarage party level. Mostly you will party a monster every 7-9 levels on higher levels. Those are the monsters who have the best spawns so they are the best to party. Note that the levels I'm stating doesn't always have to be correct.

(Level 8-12): Wolfs (5), Barpoles (8), Archers (7)
This will most likely be the first place where you will find some parties. The best spot is in the camp above the Forest Of Sorrow. It's a pretty good place and you will stay here till like level 12. The monsters are ranging from level 5 to like level 10.



(Level 12-16): Polimopos (15)
This is the second place you will go party, and this will be hard when you're level 12. You should have a good stable party with atleast a cleric since those Polimopes aren't shit. It's a pretty good spawn-rate and if you have a good party you will enjoy the lovely exp.



(Level 16-19): Nemea's Lion (17), Selene's Lion (19)
After Polimopes you will go to the lions in the Jupiter temple. They have a good spawn and are pretty hard. But you should be able to manage with your new 3D weapon + gear.



(Level 19-22): Megalopes (21), Crab (23)
Now the real job begins, at the crabs. It's at a beach and people really need eachother now. Wizards will die very fast and warriors have the ability to tank. Also Warriors get pain quota now.



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I'm always help for one of those things:

• Grammar/spelling mistakes
• Wrong information about party'ing
• High-level party places (40+)

[/list]

um thirth isnt a word :S... use third

anyways, you shouldnt say things so definitely, warrior axes can be as good as 1hs...

using xbow to lure instead of a warrior running around is good too or better (people just like 2 warriors because ints whine about having every buff on every int... but they dont need all)

Are you Farking stupid? If you DONT need buffs for your ints, you partying on monsters too low level. You NEED one warrior to protect ints, and keep lure, one to lure w/ speed. Axes SUCK, SUCK, SUCK in parties just like 2Handed swords, YOUR JOB IS TO LURE AND TANK NOT Farking SWING LITTLE AXES THINKING YOUR 500 DMG COMPARES TO 10K FROM A WIZZIE.

Don't talk unless you've partied instead of botted, and by party, I mean on mobs 5-10 levels higher than you.

Come to TSRO, we have plenty. Well, depends what time.. Bot's arrived tho, but they tend to suck balls in parties.

hmm a luring warrior is kinda risky. The dmg from the mobs + quota/fence can kill him easily if not observed by the cleric. At least the luring warrior shouldnt have buffed the cleric, so the cleric wont loose the buffs and the chance of a party wipe is minimal.

I rather prefer a rouge or (sub)warlock (with protect) to lure. It is saver and faster.

You may also add that the 3rd job of the cleric is tanking. Yes even as full int. Because the cleric has many aoe-aggro skills (group heals), is buffed and its easier to watch your hp than the hp of the party members.

And yes not every int do need all the buffs if played right (teamplay ftw). In the end nearly every party set up is possible. 7 ints (one of them an active bard) + 1 luring rogue wasnt that bad at all.

Hey Stun, nice guide there

A few things I'd like to note and add:

- A cleric hardly uses "Healing", we use Group Recovery in case of an emergancy. The rest are correct.
- In a good party, the cleric will most likely focus all his attention on the tanks. Ideally, they're the only ones to take any damage. In such a case, he'll be doing a routine such as: using Healing Cycle (HC) on the first tank, a fast-cast heal such as Healing Division, then HC on the other tank and Healing Division again. If others are being hit, Group Recovery to restore their HP fast and HC on the subject of the hits.

Bard:
Bards are the other, less favored, buffers of the party. A bard's job is first to maintain his tambour or dance (depends which one he casts) and second to keep people's MP at max. If there are two bards in the party they should split the party into two groups of 3 people each, not including the bards themselves. Each bard would MC himself and then his 3 people. If one bard hass higher MC level, he should MC the cleric. Another thing a bard should do is recast speed if someone dies or the buff wears off.
Bards usually get no buffs at all, whether it is STR from the cleric or warrior buffs. That being the case, aggrovated mobs (ones you can't hold off with your Noise) and AoE-damage causing mobs will quickly kill off the bards. They have the responsibility to avoid being hit while keeping their tambour/dance up in case they do.

Heh, PureBuff, good to see you here. I didn't really know about the healing, thanks! Also thanks for contributing bard information - i most likely will add the bard class and some other classes today. I've g2g now, but make sure you're online in about 2 hours, so you can invite me .

Whoa, if you're playing as bard just spamming mana cycle every 16 seconds then u're doing in wrong. You are supposed to do damage too, with booming wave and insanely fast nukes it's awesome fun to run around doing booming waves and nuke, trying not to get killed by mobs, and at the same time keeping party mana maxed.

Mostly you are not buffed by the warriors, which means you will get killed in 1-2 hits from a regular monster. This isn't really efficient.

And occasionally you can test to see if Discord Wave is still bugged. Frankly when I played as a bard, they did not always want me to attack, just add damage occasionally. When done right, you won't get aggro anyway.

Discord wave honestly does come in handy.

@ Stun, that's what Guard/Mana Tambour is for, to allow you - as a bard - to take a hit or two and not die. Cleric still has RD on, and can do healing orbit @ high levels or Healing Division (? whichever skill heals you + 2 other close party members) at lower levels.

You should never party on mobs that are same / lower level than you.
NEVER, learn people what avearge party level is, so it makes things clearer.

I'm tired of seeing people on Helios doing crab's party for level 21 above... come on lol

You're right, on tSro it's mostly even worse, when level 25-26 are still at crab parties.

I know you should never party on mobs that are same/lower then you, but you will almost never get in a wolf party as level 20. 80% of the people doesn't know how to party at low levels.

Anyway, I might just change it - thanks.

It makes me sad to always hear that bard is the most boring. Also annoys me not to hear anything about a warlock since they are one of the greatest dmg bringers in the party.
Bards have the fastest nuke in game, wich makes them quite strong. Warlocks do disease, physikal- and magical raze making the mobs more vulnerable. Quite the help at giants and pt giants.
Sometimes wizards and rouges arent the highest dmg makers...

You are correct.

Only a few things you don't take into account is: a bard has just 2 skills to attack with until 60, needing 2 seconds of waiting after casting both to re-cast the first. I know "60 is low manz" but it takes time to get while grinding by hand. Of course most people here got no idea what that means..
When you're in a party with 2 tankers, a cleric and 3 other non-bard ints - you don't get warrior buffs. Of coures you "don't get much aggro" but you do get some and if your pt isn't good enough, you'll die a lot.

Warlocks are awesome. The only reason I'd prefer a 3rd (or 4th) wizard over a 1st warlock is when I know the player behind the warlock is a noob. This build requires much more skills than the casual wizard. And if you have forgotten, especially in iSRO, most people can't play for shit.

That is solved by handing over the protect buff to the bards. At higher level partying this is required for their safety, since they should take part in attacking (bards who don't doesn't deserve their spot in the party). Its actually a much better defense for a bard having protect then quota or fense, because it'll make sure the bards more or less never get attacked by normal mobs when combined with noise. An important detail for a bard because of how the tambours and dance buffs works.

Pretty good guide. I'd like to add another party setup that worked great while I was in Venus.
2 Warriors, 2 Wizards, 1 Cleric, 2 Bards, 1 Lock. Works great at PEGS and later on. W/ 2 bards you have greater magical dmg increase than adding a wizard, and with a good warlock, you should get zerk every few minutes because of the awesome spawn rate :]


Well at lower lvls you dont really have many buffs, so its kinda risky going to dark wolves & up, plus those evil order archers have range and 1 shot wizards.

^^ I was surprised that you didnt include this party setup. Basically its the best party setup IMO. Not only does zerk help alot , PTGS just go down like 75% faster and warlocks can also tank/lure to some extent.

BTW are you playing TSRO ? Cause I cant imagine that there are still europe parties.


But on lower lvs you can afford to died. Furthermore wizards can do more then enough dmg by only casting non aoe casting

when you are warrior in party you are not suposed compare your dmg with wizards dmg. i doesn't matters what weapon u use, what it matters is that u keep mobs attacking u (why then u have aggro?) and not fragile wizz/bard/cleric.

anyway nice guide, but u mentioned it's hard to find bards for party (these days everyone has cleric sub)

To give people an idea of the effectiveness of the warlock's debuffs : i was partying on mujigis yesterday, we had two warlocks and whenever the mob was debuffed correctly i was doing 50% more damage than when it was not. It is a huge boost.
Add to that that the lock debuffs are also a help in defense (stunning, sleeping, lowering mob damage and hitting speed etc.) and it's a winner class and party-role. And the lock does damage on its own also. And it increases zerk rate... crazy toolset.
Since Everquest i'm used to seeing the necromancer class being favored so i always kept an eye on locks. I figure game designers take a particular pleasure in making the "evil" class powerful, funny and surprising.




yeah guys
there are still players on venus
not the "legits", but the real players who play without botting and play in real parties most of the time (not plvling).
most of these people have not seen the awesome legit parties of the time of the legit confederation but nevertheless they are good players, at least very dedicated and seasoned ones.

Some are great players and are still playing. I meet these people everyday in the field.

The parties are nothing like what a good organized euro party can be, but it is halfway there so to speak. It only needs more organization in the guilds/union department to have a good party play community going again.

The "legit" craze is out of fashion, not the party players. There will always be players who prefer real parties to botting or plvling.

To get back to the OP's topic : this guide is a sketch, it is unfinished and incomplete. There is much more to say and it can only serve as an introduction to what party roles are about.
It is a great topic though, which definitely should be treated somewhat thoroughly.