General-Purpose bragging topic!

[Tinker]

True, I almost managed to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory... Though in hindsight I did make a couple of (even big) mistakes, including the fundamental one about the mana bar of the build, so I guess it's just showing that even on Vicious + VT you have a lot of resources available, and making mistakes can still be OK to a degree...

[Lujo]

Great job! I still haven't tackled any VT Vicious and I haven't actually prepped the Codex on a Bloodmage, probably ever. So my eyebrowys are up in the air right now O.O (I'm also kind of a fan of last-minute mycurvering ftw, I get myself into that occasionally when I play bursty "what endgame?" builds and and havee to engineer a refil or a ding out of nothing ^^)

Your point about mana is in fact interesting - I was going to point out that I'm impressed you went extra mana on the hoarder guy, but thern I realized you had your glyph of choice prepped via the god prep. But now you've ran into the other thing - gnome IS a bloodmage who cares (at least more than most others) about his mana pool size. Lots of fuel, very powerful - but it adds that whole component to bloomage play. This is why I was doing so well with a halfling in the Silver Challenge, btw, as I didn't have to expend gold/inventory space/exploration bothering with getting my mana up. Your choice did give you a lot of power for VT Vicious, but it's questionable whether farming mystera without a prepped fireball would have been explosive enough. Also, extra gold in place of the subdungeon, and codex in place of a mana item, while it obviously worked, probably contributed to having max mana pool be an issue.

Not saying a different BM would've been a better choice for that run, mind you, just that it does have additional valves and levers and buttons you have to fiddle with compared to the more straightforward ones. EDIT: And also - no Bloodmage ever said no to a Mana Pendant

Congrats on the VT Vicious win, I've still to get me any of those in this playthrough

[Tinker]

[Lujo]

^ Yeah, true, halfling BM's don't fare well in longer scenarios, they're just simpler to play. Well, in their timeframe also more powerful while the blackspace lasts, and with some resists on them (and the health) you're kinda fine with 30 sanguine and whatever health pots are left over. Kinda, ofc, not VT DL good. What I wanted to say is that they play it differently, with fewer things to fiddle with or worry about.

My default Mystera Gnome BM package is Elven Boots + Subdungeon + Mystera + Magnet: Fireball - 12 mana and glyph to spam right off the bat. Kinda exactly like the Gobbo Sorc. You're more likely to find and be able to afford the Mage Plate than the Boots. Explore with B2P while you burst down stuff higher than you for level ups and bloodpools. Same deal with the Goblin, except I've taken to going Fire Heart + JJ goblins, for the extra refill goodness.

Blue Bead in the shop is stellar for any Mystic Balance BM, of course.

[Tinker]

[Lujo]

^ Feel free to run it, that's actually how I originally discovered the Gobbo Sorcerer, I branched out from Gnome BM's with that setup. It's also primed to cash in on a Mage Plate Purchase ^^

The Subdungeon is really important, though, extra B2P space and potentially 2 bloodpols, on top of securing the important mana point. You might be aware of this allready, but putting it out there for folks who aren't.

[sitnaltax]

Finally hit 18/18 on VGT! Only VT and Goat remain.

Bloodmage felt tough all the way through because it has the worst set of class features of any class... except oh by the way 4 stacks of Sanguine built-in. I felt like I was barely scraping through most of the floors, but it turns out 43% Sanguine goes a long way against H.

The three Explorer Guild classes all went pretty well. Tinker was probably the most fun--I felt like the extra seals give a lot of options and wiggle room that you don't usually get in a VGT run. The Crusader damage bonus doesn't go very far, but it turns out the immunities are all you need. Transmuter was a little hard to get off the ground, but once the damage gets high, you can two-shot some daunting obstacles--GETINDARE is always very handy, but doubly so for Transmuter.

Half-Dragon was similarly fun and encourages a different style. I went Taurog, not Binlor, but getting knockback working when the layout lets you pull it off feels really good. And Gorgon, as many others have found, is probably the toughest mainstream class, and the last one I did. For this one I did go Binlor, which is huge. My winning run was largely powered by a Rock Heart, which had not done me much good for a while but I'm now pretty glad wasn't in a veto slot.

[Tinker]

[sitnaltax]

[Tinker]

Btw I just realized something. I did my three Vicious + VT wins each with a different Mage Tower class: Gnome Sorcerer for Naga City; Elf Wizard for Dragon Isles; and Gnome Bloodmage for Demonic Library. Hmm what will I do when I get to Namtar's Lair and Vicious Steele? I hope some of the new classes will also be casters