Raids progression (ToA/ToB order and questions)

[delicate stump]

Hello! I'm still buzzing from finally getting my infernal cape, but now I'm looking forward for goals. With the cape achieved, it looks like I'm pretty much looking at raids. I've got a lot of questions, so here we go:

I've always wanted the Shadow, so I'm tempted to lock myself in ToA until I get it, but ToB is positioned first because I assume the things remaining from ToA don't help out much with ToB? Once I reach this point in the Ladlor progession, am I good to focus ToA until Shadow? Or is it worth making the detour and learn ToB to get the avernic defender hilt first?

If ToB is the way to go, what's the best way to go about learning it? Are there any video resources that are recommended? Would I still start off using triple void setups, or would it be better to start already using my better gear (oathplate instead of void melee mainly, maybe dragon claws in addition to chally)? Are there recommended gear setups to copy?

For ToA, I've learned up to 400 RL from the pinned recommended invocation progression list; what invocations should I start looking to add next? It looks like I'm at the point where I'd be adding some of the more annoying invocations, so how much time would I be wasting if I just stayed at my (finally) comfy 400s?

Thanks in advance!

[hardy acorn]

Your not trolling by sending toa prior to finishing TOB; just do the content you enjoy/find teams for

Getting a shadow for cox is basically the major time save in the raids sequencing

After the rework the two "hard" parts of a 500 toa is the extra akkha invos and doing last row warden with ambrosia

Just pick what you want to learn first and start at it

[edgy oasis]

Ordering toa and tob at this point makes no functional difference I think

[steel linden]

Gz OP! In a similar boat to you cycling through raids right now - I would recommend the Learn TOB Discord, I think you have all the requirements already. The fact that you have Dragon Claws already is awesome, it's pretty much the BIS dps spec weapon at TOB.

You should start off with triple Void but once you get more proficient at the raid you can increase your gear switches and bring in stuff like Oathplate - I just assume that Avernic isn't too long of a grind (relative to other raid purples, similar to dex/augury from CoX and fang/lb from ToA) so it could be nice to grab one before you lock yourself in to the Shadow grind since it might be a nice little DPS increase for your setup at Baba, Kephri, Wardens, etc. and maybe you spoon a Scythe along the way!

[delicate stump]

I know avernic's supposed to be the most common drop like the prayer scrolls, but I thought dex would be a quick grind too and it took me almost 6m points to get haha.

But yeah, sounds good, looks like I'll just send ToA until I get sick of it, then swap over to learning ToB then.

Good shout on the Learn TOB discord, didn't know there was something like that.

[steel linden]

I got dex around 200kc so I understand the concern lol

Yeah like the other ppl have said, you can't really go wrong cycling through all 3, just do whatever you find fun / enjoy / leads to less burnout

[delicate stump]

Do you mean doing last row without ambrosia? I'm guessing due to dehydration? If so, oof I really like the ambrosia safety net so I was hoping to delay dehydration lol

[steel linden]

This is the point of our progression where we're suppsoed to have fun right

[delicate stump]

Yeah man it's about the journey, or so I hear

Would be nice to be using some megas on the journey though

[hardy acorn]

Yeah as you push past 400 thats the right time to turn de-hydration on

Things you can consider which may help:

Save your 2nd liq adr dose for last row for yellow keris specs
Bring a surge pot to squeeze out another keris keris

OR go the other way and bring a surge pot and 5x VW spec in final phase to reduce the overall time you spend on final row

You can also consider turning off the normal food invo so you get the health bandages which elps with final row also

[hardy acorn]

Each to their own ofc and play the game the way you want to play it; but personally the thing I enjoy and get the most satisfcation out of is pushing myself into learning new content/methods to improve

[steel linden]

Yeah learning ToB is probably the most fun I've had on this game in a while, saw a b2b purple today for the first time

[fervent niche]

tob teamfinding is also a bit more tricky but feels great when you find a group of people you can consistently run with

[sand estuary]

I agree with whatever others have said, one thing I would add is that grinding a single raid until a megarare is a long time to spend on the same content. personally I would mix it up between tob and toa, tob if you can find a team, toa if soloing. Some people don't mind grinding the same thing over and over for sure but I think most people like to mix it up

[wheat nacelle]

can also perfectly grind cox if doing 2+13/2+16 meta and you have a lance for melee role, dont need scythe or shadow for that at all

[open dust]

You can eye for mage role its better than shadow in duos anyway

I think shadow better in trios not 100% though

[wheat nacelle]

true can eye in duos but its most definitely not better than shadow

[open dust]

nah it is, I think you spec to lower its def

Its what JYHY did

[wheat nacelle]

ayak speccing mage hand instead of hammering melee hand is giga troll

[open dust]

This does assume max gear so maybe if no arcane which is a very valid assumption its worst

[open dust]

Yeah I dont remember the exact reason it wa better then shadow. Just that it was

Obviously youd 0 def melee first

It was a hot topic , I was asking a lot of questions but I got a gold fish memory lol

[wheat nacelle]

you aint never ever getting melee hand to 0def in a duo wtf this guy smoking that's giving you advice

[open dust]

Oh idk the reason it was better then shadow then lol

I kinda remember the convo now, idk why we didnt just ask jyhy why it was meta. We just knew it was because he was using it and we were trying to figure out why lol

[queen helm]

idt its better then shadow could be wrong. but its close enough atleast in mega scales to not really matter imo having a shadow or not

[hardy acorn]

Its possible someone thought eye was better then shadow if the duo was attempting to balance their dps? (Eg if the melee is missing items the mager may nerf their own damage to balance the dmg on the hands in a duo)

Last I checked eye was about 10% worse then shadow in my own gear plus its obviously cheaper and will turn the head more consistently so I would swap to eye as my first choice if I needed to nerf my damage

[delicate stump]

Well, did one raid to try out the setup changes and looks like I'll have to adjust it again

[sand estuary]

All this yapping for nothing

[delicate stump]

I'm assuming a shadow shifts the setup away from range and into mage, since you'd only need range for P2 pretty much?

Would I be bringing a minimal bowfa + blowpipe setup for monkey room, boulders, and p2? Or can you get away with just using bp for everything range related

[azure prairie]

Efficency wise, id just go to chambers.

[delicate stump]

Fair enough

[azure prairie]

You don't really need masori until you have a tbow anyway.

So unless you really want to do TOA, chambers is way more valuable for you now.

If you want to do TOA id calc blowpipe vs. Bofa at P2. Im assuming you are gonna lose a ton of DPS for dropping crystal body/top though. Could maybe consider dropping helm.

[delicate stump]

You're right, chambers being the main focus now makes sense.

Although just for future reference, it seems like even a minimal anguish/quiver/crystal body/blowpipe seems to be better dps than the minimal swap mage setup I was using for p2 before, and adding crystal legs makes it 1.3 dps lower than if I bring bowfa, which seems good enough? Would bowfa just be worth dropping, or is that dps difference too large

[sand estuary]

I'd bring bofa for p2 still, but probably a minimal range swap with top/anguish/cape

With that you have tons of room for supplies to push high invo

[delicate stump]

Would you bring blowpipe then, or would it be better to just learn boulder skip with bowfa?

[delicate stump]

Also, is eye ever worth bringing for the spec?

[sand estuary]

Need blowpipe for swarms on kephri anyways

Not sure about eye spec tbh, that came out after my time