Preperation
Masteries
The different phases require you to have a few masteries. You must have all masteries listed below to successfully play the Tower Chrono
- Forsaken Thicket Waters to receive Healing Cleanse from the cave ponds.
- Forsaken Magic for using Bloodstone Turrets to clear enemies when up on your tower.
- Bouncing Mushrooms for jumping up to your first tower.
- Stealth Gliding makes you invisible on your way to the next tower.
- Ley Line Gliding allows you to move from one tower to another. Also used to get up to the Tower Area again, if you get feared down.
Gear
Your Tower Chrono can technically be played with any gearset. However, there are some attributes and components making your life way easier. Keep in mind that this role is specifically designed for the Escort Event and you will probably not play this build anywhere else. If you can't (or don't want to) switch every gear piece or equip runes/sigills/relic, that's totally fine. You'll have to find out what works best for you. If you're having legendary gear, this will of course simplify your ability to adapt.
That being said, you want to optimize your gear with priorization of the following attributes:
- You want to set your Toughness as high as possible. This should be your main attribute.
- Vitality gives you more HP.
- Healing Power helps you staying alive when you need to use your .
- Boon Duration can help increasing your self provided boons from .
Therefore, we recommend the use of Minstrel's Gear. However, you can also choose Nomad's Stats as an alternative option when playing without caring of healing. This option is more or less considered a 'hardcore solo' option and is not recommended for beginners.
Runes
For Runes, we recommend you to use the as it increases your Toughness and Vitality most effectively.
Alternatives:
- is good for increasing Boon Duration when using your
- is the same as but giving your even more Boon Duration in exchange for Vitality
- will reduce incoming Condition Damage
Relic
Currently, there are only 2 relics that fit our needs. The most notable relic is the . You'll gain Protection and Regeneration after the using your healing skill. Alternatively, you can equip for Stability after using your healing skill. Generally, the first relic offers more defensive options so this would be the recommendation.
Weapons & Sigils
The following weaponset is recommend and will be used for the 'pull & push' strategie later on.
You generally want to play with Focus (Offhand) and Greatsword to perform a pull with () and knock pulled foes back with . The mainhand weapon in combination with the focus is not that important, so we use a sword as an example. The attribute choice does not really play a huge role here, but for efficiency reaons we recommend using Minstrel's Stats once again. The Sigils used are not necessary but may help in terms of surviving and quality of life.
Note: Weapons of all stat types will do the job. As stated above, the listed Minstrel Gear will increase your survivability even more. Same applies for Sigills.
Recommended Skills and Weapons
The most effective choice would be a full Minstrel's Armor with all 6x equipped, as well as Weapon set as shown above.
Traitlines
Your build is designed around the idea that you do not need to deal damage. Your only concern is to stay alive and empower yourself with boons. This results in the following traitline:
Variations:
increases your Stealth time. This is especially useful for your Elite Skill in case you want to be sneaky or need some more time to escape from a bad situation tower.
can be taken instead of for faster uptime on your Focus Skills such as (including ) for fast runs.
Getting started: Gameplay
Now that you've made your way through the infinite ways to gear up your character, it's time to get into the real spice. No worries, getting here was the most challenging part.
As mentioned at the start of the guide, you have a clear mission and you'll be performing this alone. For the case you fail, the group usually restarts or some supports will take over your job.
The following steps will be explained in detail. But in general, your journey during the escort event will look like this:
- Wait for the Siege the Stronghold Event to start.
- Separate from your team by running into the cave and find your way through it. At the end, position yourself at the first tower without spawning enemies.
- Jump up the first tower and capture it. Capturing will be either solo or with your team. You always want to try to capture it solo - but don't worry if that's not gonna work out every time. In case you fail, you might want to teleport your allies up to you.
- Stay on the captured tower and defend yourself by the use of Bloodstone Turret.
- Wait for your squad to clear enemies down the road. This will activate the next Ley Line.
- Ley Line Glide to the next tower and repeat the capturing process until the last tower.
- After successfully capturing all towers, McLeod the Silent will spawn. Go down to your group to kill him.
- Event succeeded!
The Cave
After the Siege the Stronghold Event has started, your task is to run through the Tunnel of Respite. The area is surrounded by Toxic Spores and will kill you pretty quick. To avoid this, you'll need to step into ponds. Everytime you hop into a pond, you'll receive Healing Cleanse, negating the lethal effects from the cave for a short amount of time. That means you'll have to get from pond to pond pretty quick before the effect runs out.
A huge help can be your to leap over large distances. Don't hesitate using it!
Hint: You can use your before blinking to refresh the cooldown of . Using this trick will get you through the cave in no time.
Also, be aware of enemies! Near every pond, there is a set of enemies surrounding it (Mushroom Stompers, Veteran Mushroom Spike Throwers and Elite Mushroom King). Make your to dodge incoming attacks as they Cripple or Stun you otherwise. Try to avoid them by walking fast or using . Do not fight them!
Once you've reached the end of the cave, you want to position yourself near the Bouncing Mushroom. Getting up to the place can be quite tricky because you spawn a horde of enemies if you move to the wrong place.
Make sure not to go to the red area and jump/climb your way up to the first tower. If you fail this, you'll have to deal with some more enemies, which can be quite annoying.
Capturing
Now that you have made it through the cave, it's your time to shine. We will introduce you to both capture variants: Solo and Squad. Of course, The most efficient way is the Solo Variant. However, depending on the random type of spawned enemies on the tower, you sometimes have to go with the Squad Variant.
In real gameplay situation, you normally decide what variant you are going to play from tower to tower in just milliseconds. You always want to capture solo. But you can't avoid mistakes. For that, there is always the backup to bring your squad up in case you fail capturing it solo.
Note: It's highly recommended for beginners to exceptionally use the Squad Variant to get a feeling on what's actually going on up there. If you feel comfortable enough, you can try to solo capture the first tower as it is the most easy one to complete. Once you've mastered that, you can freely choose to try as many solo captures as you want.
Capture: Squad Variant
Up on your tower, the goal is to bring up your squad via a portal. If the amount of allies is greater than the foe's, the capture process begins.
To do so, get up on the (next) tower, try to dodge incoming attacks and lay down . Jump and glide down the tower in direction to your squad. Once arrived, press before laying down .
Heal yourself () if necessary.
Hint: ping your to your allies before laying it down. This signals your squad that it's time to get up.
Capture: Solo Variant
For solo capturing, we are going to use the 'pull & push' strategy. In best case, you became invisible either by using from the first tower, or the running down effect from Stealth Gliding when you got to your tower that way. The idea is that you push the enemies out of the capture circle, so you would be standing there alone - easily capturing the tower in a second.
While being invisible, you are obviously not targeted by the enemies. This lets you utilize the fact that they are standing still:
- Arrive at the tower (invisible or ley-line).
- Give yourself stability to not get knocked down by using a Shatter Skill.
- Lay down your either in the middle of the tower or the middle of the enemy group (sometimes they spawn in a weird way).
- By using , perform a pull.
- Weapon Swap to your Greatsword.
- Aim between the tower's merlons and perform a 'kickback' with .
- Auto attack the enemies with your Greatsword whiling walking to them to prevent their auto pilot from following you back into the circle.
- Wait until you captured the tower.
Between Capture Phases
When a tower is captured successfully, it's time for you to 'relax' and wait for your team to activate the next Ley Line so you can glide up and continue. To stay alive and defend your life, you'll need to protect yourself by the use of (for defensive boons). The Bloodstone Turret will become usable once your tower is captured. Use Bloodstone Turret off cooldown to knock down enemies while damaging them.
Tip: Do not kill all enemies on the tower. Try leaving at least one foe alive. As long as there is a minimum of one enemy, they will not respawn on the same tower.
Worst Case Scenarios
- You die while running through the cave: Restart the event. Make sure you dodge incoming attacks from evil mushrooms. In sweaty cases where your Healing Cleanse runs out, use .
- You die on your tower: Either ask for a restart or inform your group. The boon supporters often take over the job together with 1-2 DPS players.
- White Mantle Cleriks fear you off the tower: Don't panic. You can always glide up again. Go down the road and glipe up with the help of a Ley Line.
- Enemies force you into downstate. Immediately ask for help and try to survive as long as possible.
Tips & Tricks
- You can twice in cave by the use of before casting to be as efficient and fast as possible.
- Do not kill all enemies on the tower. As long as there is a minimum of one enemy, they will not respawn on the same tower.
- In case you feel like you can not survive after a capture, you can always go back or glide to a safe location outside the stronghold. When you're healed up and the next Ley Line is activated, you can continue your journey.