Hello. I recently got my Awakening Guardian to 257/264/323 AP/AW/DP with TET Nouver Shield, but I've been hearing there are some places good for solo which need 233 (edit: 333) or so DP but don't need more than 250ish AP (such as Kratuga Ruins). As I'd saved up a bit over 2 billion silver over the last couple of months, I saw I could afford a TET Kutum shield, so I bought it.

First the Background:

Comparison of stats Nouver vs Kutum:

Nouver

257 (+83) AP

264 (+101) AW

323 DP (147+346 Evasion, 180+49 DR, DR rate +17%)

Nouver has All resistances +10% and AP vs Monsters +4

I added crystals which add +5 and +5 All AP

Kutum

245 (+48) AP

252 (+57) AW

334 DP (157+376 Evasion, 181+49 DR, DR Rate of +18%)

Kutum has AP vs Monsters +58 and Ignore all resistances 10%

I added crystals which add +5 and +5 All AP

I then tested with Kutum a couple of rift bosses and various monster spots which were fairly easy with the Nouver shield.

Right away I noticed I got knocked down a lot more, and the lower 10% resistances on Kutum seemed to make a significant impact. I also felt like it took quite a bit longer to kill rift bosses with 252 AW compared to 264 AW in spite of the +AP to monsters from the shield and the TET BlackStar awakening Jordun I was using which adds +8 vs all species and +15 vs monsters.

Basically I feel like I wasted 2.2 billion as I feel weaker defensively and offensively with Kutum.

The Question:

I have ten or eleven alts, including a Lahn, a Sorceress and a Witch which I like to give my best hand me downs from my Guardian. And I have a coupon to convert a sub weapon to another class for free.

Should my guardian sit on the shield until she gets higher AP gear on the hope the Kutum Shield will eventually be useful to her, or is it better to give the Kutum sub weapon to another class who would benefit more from it?

Thanks :)

Nouver is garbage offhand abandoned by developers, its doesn't have main stats - accuracy and evasion.

Hi, Potato. Although I appreciate the answer, it seems like you did not read the question and are giving a general opinion instead of one related specifically to my Guardian at her current gear level.

Right now the Kutum is unquestionably inferior to Nouver on my Guardian. Are you suggesting she keep the Kutum shield in a bank box until she gets some PEN AP gear to compensate for the severe loss in AP and resistances, or is there another class who would well make use of it.

On my Guardian right now the Kutum is junk, but perhaps on a different class there is more benefit?

[Damn this forum for making me type the reply twice because it logged me out between the first post and the second.]

First off, Rift bosses are different from normal bosses, they scale to your gear, so ignore any testing vs them.

Second, 261 is a large bracket and Nouver hits it Kutum doesn't.  261/265/269 it's better to use Nouver, however when you get to 261K Kutum will be better 100% of the time.  Right now you are in the "sweet spot" for Nouver.  That being said, if you are facing mobs that Knock you down, learn to rotate your Super Armor attacks so that the mobs can't knock you down.

Looks like you only have 7 more AP to go, yeah you can sell the Kutum and get AP but you will lose out on the taxes hit when you rebuy it.  I suggest holding onto Kutum, you only have to get 7 more AP, that is 1 done easily by upgrading some of your accessories.  Do not, and I repeat, do not use a weapon swap coupon for Tet gear.  Unless it is a Pen Yellow or Tet Blackstar it's a waste to swap the weapon over to another class, the coupon is worth billions and should only be used for a hard reroll on the harder to get weapons.

One thing you can do, roll a warrior/valk since they both use the same offhand and try them out.

Quick piece of advice, stop playing too many alts, get one to Full pen weapons and start earning big silver.  Once your Guardian hits 269k you can easily buy a full set of tet weapons for an alt with only 12 hours of grinding, where as where you are at that would be around 45 hours of grinding.

If you doing PvP, stick with Nouver.  If your doing PvE than stick with Kutum.  For PvP you will not beat Nouver for PURE AP against other players.  For PvE, before 261 Kutum use Nouver, after that use Kutum.  The +AP against monsters that Kutum gives after 261AP Kutum is more than having Nouver since Nouver doesn't have any +AP against monster stats.

[Friggin' damned this cursed forum for deleting my long reply because it timed me out and forced me to log in again wiping out what I typed]

That's doubly great advice, Werbs, and I thank you for it and will heed it. I had not thought to save the exchange coupons for PEN. That's great advice, and now I wish I'd have saved my awakening exchange coupon *Laughs*  I used it to give my TET Dandelion to my witch after my guardian made the TET blackstar jordun. So I'll hold onto the remaining coupons and the Kutun until I get my guardian up 7 or 8 more AP. I estimate that'll cost around 20 or 25 billion to do, and as I earn around 1 or 2 billion a month, I'm guessing I'll achieve that extra AP in a little under a year. Thanks again.

I don't voluntarily do PVP, but I think there's a lot to what you say. When my guardian was still 259 Awakening AP and maybe 320ish DP (a few weeks ago), a 281 AP 382 DP sorcerer attacked me at the forge mines across the desert. I treated the wizard just like I do monsters and used only super armor attacks and alternated life leech attacks (with super armor) every other swing, and we fought for a couple of minutes until I finally beat him. It's the first time I won a PVP match, and AP-wise he should have clobbered me. But as you said, having the Nouver and perhaps some luck on the timing of my super armor attacks pulled me through.

Even when I eventually can upgrade my set to Kutum I'll hold onto the Nouver just for such cases in which I'm forced to PVP :)

Your better off with a Kutum even at those AP points with a kutum for PVE. The monster AP from a tet kutum will balance out the lose in hidden AP from reaching the 261 bracket (anyone that tells you otherwise is just looking at the bigger # and going "oooo big # mean big damage" if I had to guess). Plus on top of that your a guardian so unless your trying to fight turo's or Elvia realm mobs you won't have any issues killing mobs thanks to guardian's godly AP scaling. Even star ends mobs should be doable at 250 AP tet kutum with guardian. Will it be better than hystria or aakman at that AP? Most likely not but you can still do it. An in the end even if you get into PVP your better off with a kutum for late game gear fights sense accuracy is a bigger facter in PVP than AP & guardian has some very bad accuarcy multipliers as well so she struggles bad against evasion builds.

Also crystals get those AP crystal break them and put some 10% crit crystals in there. 5 more AP will never be better than 10% boost in crit damage multiplier sense were talking about a multiplier which scales based off your AP vs just more AP.

I really appreciate practical advice like that. It's interesting you mention the turos. Part of why I've been working up so hard the last several months to increase my AP/DP is because I have a quest to kill 50 turos. I killed 3 of them around 250ish AP and then decided they were way too hard to continue. I was thinking of trying again, but maybe I'll wait to upgrade a bit more if even at 264 AP 323 DP (or 252 AP 334 dP) I'm not supposed to be ready for them :)

Don't forget Turo's is a duo grind rotation to begin with. If you're soloing there you need to be well above the recommended ap to kill even remotely fast.