#CG Alternative Paths/Ideas

134 messages · Page 1 of 1 (latest)

vagrant gyro
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I'm a mid-game ironman (85 magic, 87 range, ~83 melees, 80 slayer) and CG is evaporating my desire to play this game. I really enjoy PVM (tons of barrows chests, a decent amount of Muspah KC, and some TOA raids w/ friends but I'm really not geared for that grind yet). I'm at ~70 KC CG (not even close to dry I know) and I'm already so over it. My kills are ~12 minutes in T2 armor, maybe I can shave off a couple minutes in T1 but those get very sweaty. I get maybe an hour or two of this game a day, and spending it doing ~10kc cg means that I'll spend the next 30 days doing one piece of content that I don't really enjoy that much so my question is.... what can I do instead?

If I did slayer to get my magic & ranged to 90 would that cut down the time/make t1 prep more viable/make runs way more chill? Has anyone actually skipped BowFa and gone to BP or ACB?

I've absolutely loved ironman up to this point, my main will collect dust unless I need a wildy boss scout. I know there is so much awesome game ahead if I can get to it.

Just to try and get ahead of it, I know TBow is like 500 hours... My goal for this account is not to get BIS gear, it's to experience all the content in this game with friends, strangers. and everyone in between. A lot of the discourse on reddit has been "buckle down and do 800 KC or you aren't an Ironman". I love Ironman, it's the only mode worth playing for me, I'm just trying to figure out what the path is to doing more of the parts I like to do.

halcyon iron
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The only real way to skip Bowfa is to spoon shadow or tbow

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You've hit the point where iron starts turning into long grinds

midnight girder
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Unironcally best bet is to get shadow then go gwd with shadow methods

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It will be painful and long but atleast you get to skip cg and all the loot it gives Shrug

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I spooned cg finishing at 208 kc and I am sorely lacking the cash it gives. (Also partly cause I spooned claw at 300 kc from hydra)

I spent all my gp to get con to 99 and still have fetching, smithing and runes for upkeeping shit.

Unfortunately people kinda forget that if your goal is to max cg boosts that along so much because most of the time all your buy able skills are solved by the time you finish.

glacial lagoon
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there is no good route that doesnt involved early bowfa

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your best bet is to set yourself a reasonable goal of x kc per day/week whatever that you can stomach without burning out

midnight girder
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But the biggest point to be made is this is a game. Enjoy it. If cg isn't enjoyable skip it and do enjoyable things. If cg is a slight pain but let's you do loads of enjoyable things weigh it up and maybe it's worth it.

glacial lagoon
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and spending the rest of the time doing stuff that isnt very reliant on bowfa

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such as skilling

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doing slayer without bowfa is not necessarily terrible

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you're free to try to skip it if you like but you will just make future content much harder on yourself and (imo) make those less fun too

midnight girder
glacial lagoon
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torso is perfectly fine

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can get obby legs and youre only missing 1 str

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anyway i would suggest to try to change your mindset around cg

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instead of thinking "i hate this place, cant wait to get my bowfa and get out and never touch it again"

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you can try thinking something like "the drop will come when it comes, what can i do meanwhile to improve at this content to make it more fun for myself and also learn useful pvm skills for other content down the road?"

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if youre doing 12 min t2 runs you have a ton to improve on that is completely separate from stats

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cg honestly teaches you a lot of skills that are very useful for practically all pvm content and will make you a much better player if you just try to improve every run

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and the grind will go faster too, faster times and less deaths

vagrant gyro
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My hunleff kills bounce between 4:30 and 6 minutes depending on rng, if I'm noodling hard I've gotten 7 minute hunleff kills (and boy do they feel like it)

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Prep I usually get in with ~ 1 minute left, depending on rng. I know it's unlikely but the times where you have to search 15 rooms for the 3rd ore/tree/cloth vein are not so unlikely that I don't see one every 5-10 runs

west swan
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And then after the fang + pipe we went to Barrows, got one set and hopefully tank gear
Then did Zammy and Bandos with high-90s melee stats + DWH

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And after that the grind was lance and then dex

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I tried doing this myself, and right as I got the lance and was going for dex, the pipe got nerfed

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This is the experience in CoX with blowpipe and Eagle Eye right now:

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You will probably hate it even more than CG

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I know I did, because stuff like this and trying to do Vasa with nerfed pipe was miserable

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After that I stopped CoX and went straight to CG

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I camped it straight for like 2 months (719 kc)
Miserable? Slightly yeah but it was worth it

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Still use bowfa to this day, over 2.5 years later

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The moral of the story here is: you can try to skip bowfa but both CoX and ToA will be really horrible

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If you're OK with not doing raids then I guess it's not as bad but generally people like to go to raids at some point. The main thing is that the items from raids complement each other at other raids:

  • fang is legit at CoX
  • shadow is legit at CoX
  • tbow is legit in ToB and ToA
  • scythe is legit in CoX
  • ancestral is legit in ToA and ToB
  • claws are legit in ToB
  • dinhs is legit in ToB
  • kodai is legit in ToB
  • rapier is legit in ToA pre-fang
  • sang is legit in ToA pre-shadow
  • lightbearer is legit in ToB (sweaty)
  • ward is legit in ToB
  • masori is legit in CoX
vagrant gyro
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@west swan While it's not the silver bullet I was hoping for, I appreciate you laying it out so clearly and even showing an example. This place is a bummer, and I'll probably burn out for months, but I guess better to burn out for months then play half a game for years

west swan
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Honestly yea I didn't want to do CG at first either but I came to almost enjoy it (despite going dry) by spending like 200 kc optimizing runs
It took a while to like get prep down to be very consistent and also to get boss times down under 4 mins for me

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Main thing that helps is learning halberd so that you can just take the first two weapons you see

west swan
glacial lagoon
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it really doesn't have to be torture

west swan
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Buuuuuut ever since then I used bowfa at:

  • CoX to get dex+arcane
  • Inferno for my first cape
  • all four GWD bosses
  • ToA (seriously. super good in ToA)
  • about to start Leviathan
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It's just used in too many places to not have sadly

west swan
glacial lagoon
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focus on learning every run instead of focusing on whats in the reward chest

west swan
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Same as CoX basically

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CoX is a looooong haul grind but there is so much to learn

glacial lagoon
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applies to every long grind where the content is relatively deep

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which is most of them

west swan
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Feel like it's easily possible to be 500 kc and not know the most advanced tactics yet

glacial lagoon
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you can be way higher than that even

west swan
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Yeah true

glacial lagoon
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cg being torture is just a mindset thing

west swan
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Meanwhile ToA, which doesn't have nearly as much depth...

glacial lagoon
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especially when youre this low kc still

west swan
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I'll concede that CG isn't too bad but holy is ToA bad

glacial lagoon
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referring to op

west swan
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Ah yea for sure

vagrant gyro
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It's not torture, it's just a soul sucker. Losing any run feels like an incomparable waste of time since you've spent 12 minutes sweating for 10k/h exp rates and nothing else. This game has always been about long grinds, but there have always been dozens of them to coexist at the same time, it's just this one point in the ironman journey where there aren't really dozens, if you want to do anything meaningful with your account there is 1

glacial lagoon
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you can do lots of skilling and slayer is probably not too bad like i said

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cant really expect to be a master at any content after only 70 kc, of course you'll struggle but thats not unique to cg

vagrant gyro
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I do some skilling, and slayer I actually enjoy now that I'm a little higher combat and have ppots for days

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If I could just get sub 10 minute runs for the ones I actually complete, that would be 1/6 of the time off my future CG grind

glacial lagoon
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like i said before, my advice is to chip away at it with a couple kc a day or whatever you can budget time for while still getting to do other activities

glacial lagoon
vagrant gyro
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Realistically now it's more like a 150 hour grind, 12 minutes for the run, 8 minutes of tricking myself to go back in 🙂

glacial lagoon
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also just because it's more fun and satisfying to get better

vagrant gyro
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Should I just brute force T1? At least then once I get them down they will be faster

glacial lagoon
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yes, but that won't fix everything on its own

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5-6 min hunllefs likely mean youre hitting on the wrong prayer a decent bit

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or not using boost prayers

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if dying is a major tilt factor for you, perhaps it would be more enjoyable to keep doing t2 for a bit and improve at the hunllef fight first

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if you want advice on improving at cg, feel free to record a run you feel you did well in and post it

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lots of helpful people who can help point things out

jovial umbra
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You could also detour a bit and get 92 range from chinning for more max hits.

No disagreement with everything people have said but cg is definitely more bearable with more dps

mellow crest
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I'm at ~270kc in CG right now and (in my own experience) it does get better. I absolutely still loathe the content and it tilts me to no end and I wish I never have to see this place ever again, but it does get better/easier. At some point it will click to you and begin to be more smoothly. For a lot of people that is where they start to enjoy it, but for me I hate every round I do and wish bowfa weren't such a necessity for a lot of endgame stuff. If I fuck up a round, which isn't often, it still makes me just not want to play the game at all.

Have tried GWD bosses, ToA, demonics, etc with full crystal + crystal bow, but it just isn't the oomph that Bowfa will give me.

What's helped me (again, anecdotal) is just doing a couple rounds each day. I've got my 270kc over the span of about a year or so, many weeks I just completely avoid it, but at some point I'll get it. Hope this helps in some way to know you're not alone 🙂

unkempt kiln
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I want to really stress what Raze said multiple times and para and others expanded on, though I'm less polite about it. Your 12 minute t2 runs suck, which contributes to CG being unfun. The route up is to improve at the content. There is a lot of help out there, quite some of it written by me even. Getting down to sub 9 minute runs will speed it up and imo make CG more enjoyable, though it can still be a slog.

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In my mind your approach and attitude are a big part of what created this unenjoyable situation. As Raze said if you aim to improve instead of get loot I think that will improve matters a lot for you

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There is a lot of room for improvement with those times at those stats, and learning new content can be fun

solar charm
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Thats the whole ironman spirit. Working for your own drops.
I went quite a bit dry (1418 kc) and i enjoyed the part where i had to improve.
Sometimes i would do 30 kc t1 in a Day without dieing and i was so proud of myself.
All this to say you need to change your mindset if you want to progress into PVM cause there are worse grinds than CG. And you might go dry on any.
If not,you either become an Iron skiller (which is fine if thats what you want) or play a main account.

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Sorry if i sound rude, not english native. Its sometimes hard to say what im thinking with the right words.
Just dont give up or think about how you want to play the game

sage bobcat
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Just do 1-2 kc a day at cg and then spend the rest of your time playing something else. You have a ton of skilling you can work on alongside it still and other fights

burnt pulsar
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Gunna piggyback off what a lot of people have said but give my personal experience. I went from absolutely dreading doing 1-2 CGs a day to trying to get out of work as soon as I could so I could fit in more than 15 runs that day. Changing my mindset to actually improving at the content was a game changer and I still use that mindset for every single piece of content to this day. Its helped me improve my pvm skills and enjoy the game so much more

sage bobcat
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Yeah I loved my 2 runs lol. There were some days I had more free time and did 5-10 and other times I just did my 2 and my dailies and logged because life got in the way. I just meant don’t think you have to silo yourself into a single grind and make yourself hate the game

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Cg is also convenient because you can stay geared and keep your inventory ready for something else and swap activities with ease

vagrant gyro
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Apprecaite all the comments in here, I think for me it's got to be a combination of higher stats to make the first weapon frame & hunleff kills faster, less sweaty, and maybe some T1? I'm not a huge dailyscape person but the idea of banging out 30 of them per session and only having to do it 11 more times to be on rate is really enticing. Maybe that's the way I can do it

halcyon iron
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I did a small number on my work days and a couple hours on my days off

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Some people find that more intense grind easier

unkempt kiln
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The stats don't matter much

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If anything you are overstatted

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CG is notorious for relying on skill and execution rather than stats, gear or prayers

cedar mason
# vagrant gyro Apprecaite all the comments in here, I think for me it's got to be a combination...

My two cents: I took forever to get to 400 kc because I was doing (at most) 5 kc a day for a long time, and I was taking frequent breaks. Once I got past the drop rate, I said “fuck this” and just went super hard, like 15 kc/day minimum. On weekends I’d probably do 25-30/day. I’m very glad I did because I went fairly dry, so it took me a lot less IRL time (in terms of days) than it would have.

In any case, you’ll have to get more consistent and preferably get good at T1 before you start thinking about sending 30 runs per day.

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I know a lot of people here would be happy to help you improve, if you’re interested. It’s common for people to post recordings of kills and/or prep and get feedback on them. It can be really helpful for identifying things you didn’t even realize were problems.

vagrant gyro
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Stats have definitely helped me, going from <80 to mid 80's made the runs feel way more consistent fwiw. I'm not under-statted to do it right, I've done it 70 times and seen people do it with way less. The real question was if stats would help me do it less.

vagrant gyro
halcyon iron
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Stats for sure do something, especially ranged. The reason people say not to think about stats is because its common to use stats to cope for a skill issue when CG is mostly skill

vagrant gyro
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Real, I'm not mid 90's talking about getting to 99 hah I'm 85 mage talking about getting 90 just to help with consistency. One of the big challenges when your runs range from 4-6:30 is that unless I prayer flick (which I can it's not an outlandish thought/strategy, but assuming that's off the table in the interest of making runs more chill) I need 3 potions to make sure prayer is a non-issue, esp. with halberd

halcyon iron
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Feel free to grind stats in-between CG, just don't do it instead of CG 🙂

vagrant gyro
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Understand a little bit of defense, some more tick precision, etc. will help with that. I've gotten perfected cg ca , I'm still bad, but I'm not helpless 🙂

unkempt kiln
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this is exactly the coping Kozi mentioned 😅

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im sorry but you are overstatted if anything, that really is not the issue

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the CA achievement is a nice goal to knock out early, usually people make about 30-40 mistakes on a 'perfect' run

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so once you get that consistently you can really get to improving

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if you want to improve make sure to check the resources mentioned earlier in the conversation. CG can be a lot more enjoyable than you describe your experience, as long as you look into your options 😄

versed spruce
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For me it was 3 runs before bed and tob/toa/gwd to mix it up, doing other content will help you with switches/prays/movement and give some more confidence in the fight, or was the case for me

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“If I live verzik there’s no way Clifford the big red dog takes me out”

vagrant gyro
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Was doing a warmup before I recorded and encountered some horrendous rng. I'll start a separate thread for getting better, but this screenshot is what I mean by bad rng affecting my runs. First path is blue, second path is pink (more or less) (H halberd, S staff, B bow) but importantly there were 0 mining resources until that very last room.

This doesn't happen super often, but in this case having to run to so many rooms I only got 12 fish, 2 potions, and hunleff was smack dap in the middle.

These runs in particular feel like total throwaway runs, and they suck, but trying to keep a good attitude here, how do I get fewer of these? I learned about the guaranteed 3 fish stackin at least 1 room adjacent to hunleff, that doesn't exist for resources though too does it? This one I hadn't seen any ore, but there are others where I search too many rooms for that one last resource

Screenshot_2024-03-16_184059.png
glacial lagoon
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you should open more rooms without entering them

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something like this for example

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theres prob a more efficient pathing but hopefully you get the point

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t1 helps a lot with this since you only need one node of each resource

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big reason t2 sucks

outer maple
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On that first cirle check the boss rooms so you don’t have to go back if there is nothing of value there and u can just go straight to the side

glacial lagoon
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ye that too

west swan
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There's a variation you can do on the "C" where you expand it by a bit
It increases the average time per CG but lowers the variance by a lot

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McClumpy shared that strategy with me about two years ago, figured I'd pass it on

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One sec, let me hunt for the picture...

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(credit to McClumpy)

Screenshot_from_2024-03-16_21-43-01.png
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One last tip I personally have is to rotate your camera as soon as you enter CG so that Hunllef is always relative south of you
Same as the orientation in the picture above

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Then it'll be the same thing every time and you won't get confused/lost

cedar mason
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You can scout more rooms as you're going through your path, if you're worried about not finding resources. Sometimes you do just get unlucky, but it's pretty rare so I wouldn't put too much thought into it.

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T1 would also help in that you should always be able to do full prep even with a shitty layout

unkempt kiln
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These are the main 3 paths I use, depending on prescouts

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its not set in stone, especially the green paths, but its close enough

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the idea is that we want as many diagonals as possible to light up rooms, as usually we're only looking for one or two specific items by the time we're near the end of the second excursion

vagrant gyro
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Okay so more of a zig zag, and checking rooms as I go by is better. Cool! That I can do, thanks all!

unborn marsh
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Rip just have fun and do whatever content you feel like doing at the time. Who cares if your gear is sub par. People did pvm before bowfa existed. You only get 1-2 hours so

crimson ermine
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I just became a skiller fuck cg haha

white fjord
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I feel like people are putting too much pressure into gear at toa. You can start much earlier then you imagine.