User:Bumcheekcity

How to Speed up your Hardcore Runs

The purpose of this guide is to show you how to break the fve-day barrier as quickly as possible in hardcore, and to comfortably ascending in 6-7 days each time. My first 5-day ascension was as an Accordian Thief when I had 21 skills, so don't go thinking you'll need 50-70 skills to be able to break the barrier. I did have a lot of shiny toys and Mr. Items though, so it did take a bit of meat to get quick.

Starting Off - Your First Five Skills

I'm going to assume you have zero skills (or at least, zero skills Hardcore Permed). In this case, your best bet is to start off being a Disco Bandit (if you've already picked your class and it's NOT a Disco Bandit, don't worry about it, keep going with HC and ascend DB next time).

Ideally, your first five perms should be:

• Superhuman Cocktailcrafting (DB)
• Advanced Cocktailcrafting (DB)
• Pastamastery (PM)
• Advanced Saucecrafting (SA)
• Amphibian Sympathy (TT)

So, if you ascended as a PM, SA or TT, then just perm the relevant skill and then go DB for your next ascension for the Cocktailcrafting skills. Why do I suggest these first five perms? Because turn generation is really key to initial hardcore success, and to your sanity. After only a few ascensions, you'll end up being able to generate far more turns than before, and it will drastically cut your daycount.

Else, if you've ascended as an AT or SC, then I suggest perming Moxious Madrigal if AT, and Musk of the Moose, or possibly Pulverize as a SC.

Either way, get those first five skills permed!

The Next 15

Certainly these are a little harder to really say than the first five, but here's a non-exhaustive list of next good skills to perm, outside the first five I mention above:

• Seal Clubber
  • Musk of the Moose - +5% Combat Frequency
  • Pulverize - Smash Stuff into Wads, gaining you a few precious adventures.
  • Double-Fisted Skull Smashing - Weild two one-handed weapons. It's not that useful, but it CAN make life easier as a low-skilled character.
• Turtle Tamer
  • Empathy of the Newt - +5 Familiar Weight. This isn't as useful as Leash of Linguini as it costs more MP.
  • Shieldbutt - An auto-hit combat skill.
  • Hero of the Half-Shell - If you have a shield equipped and your muscle is higher than your moxie, then you will take SUBSTANTIALLY less damage. I highly recommend this being one of your first skills you perm before you start doing any muscle runs.
  • Tao of the Terrapin - Doubles the power of your hat and pants for defence. For example, when you're doing the Level 12 quest, instead of the War Hippy/War Frat outfits giving you a total of 340 DR, they give you a massive 680. For more information on why this is incredible, see the Damage Reduction page.
• Pastamaster
  • Leash of Linguini - +5 Familiar Weight. This will end up giving you more stats, more items, and more MP over a run.
• Sauceror
  • The Way of Sauce - Allows you to summon an extra 2 Reagents per day. This might not sound like much, but it allows you to use them in many more situations, and to buff for every boss you'll eventually fight.
• Disco Bandit
  • Mad Looting Skillz - This is a passive +20% Item Drop skill, and is useful literally every second of every run.
  • Disco Power Nap - Allows you to cure Beaten Up, which will be a godsend in early HC.
  • Ambidextrous Funkslinging - An incredibly useful skill, this will make the battle against your shadow a thousand times easier.
• Accordian Thief
  • The Moxious Madrigal - +10 Moxie, for a negligable MP cost. This is one of the most useful skills for making Day 1 more liveable ever. With +10 Moxie, you can afford to run more +ML and level up faster.
  • The Ode to Booze - Turn generation. As I mentioned before, turn generation is incredibly important in early Hardcore, and the more turns you get, the quicker your runs will be.