Beast Affinity

Is beast affinity worth it at level 99? I have looked it up and have found lots for lvl 90 or 95 cap. But not much on 99 cap. I know there are alot of good jugs that cap at 99 so is it still worth merits? Or put them somewhere else.

I've been wondering that too. Here are my thoughts on it. Sheep caps at 86. Full Beast Affinity will push that to 96. If you get AF2+2 hands, you can get a level 99 Cheapsheep. That's really the only argument I could see for full Beast Affinity. I still went 5/5 on because the other Group 2 merits were Z_Z.

Put them somewhere else.

plenty of affordable pets besides sheep.

All the T2 Merits for BST are pretty useless anyway... So, put them wherever you want or keep them where they are for the rare chances you'll use a sheep?

Beast healer is.. Nice? I mean, 5 more hp/tic isn't going to hurt anything.

I still use sheep alot, how often to u fight something long enough to make the higher price jugs worth it.

Far from useless really. 5 hp regen can also be expressed as a good amount of -damage taken that doesn't count towards cap. If pet getting hit for 100 a round, that -5% is often overlooked.

I suppose. It doesn't include TP moves or Magic, So its only 5% if your pet only takes 100 Damage every 3 seconds or so.

Though i can agree COMPLETELY useless is not the right word. They're all on equal level of usefulness i think. >_> Except maybe Killer Instinct.


Sheep is a good throw-away :O

If i want a cheap DD Pet i'll use tiger >_>. I like him, He hurts.

Seconded. Also, Feral Howl is great for stunning -aga. These two merits capped are just more -DT. I capped both of these and removed all merits from Beast Affinity.

Sheep may be convenient for a BST that's short on gil. But a 99 sheep isn't going to be soloing Hedjedjet. If you want to kill big; spend big.

The recent augments on monster +2 gear makes all of them significantly better also.
SE is going to adjust Killer Instinct. that was posted today on forums.

5 min recast and 3 min duration. looking at merits adding +2 to killer effects as well.
That could mean up to + 25 killer effects from it... that's separate from the +15% damage boost. Between This and Gausape +2, we'd get a HUGE boost to damage and reduction of damage taken. We can already use it to spike our damage +40% (using gausape, monster helm & killer instinct).

Feral Howl recast makes it perhaps the least useful. the Mst. Jackcoat +2 makes a BIG difference in the potency/duration.

Keeping pet options at higher levels is very useful. A level 90 Carrie (bubble curtain) is a big improvement from a level 75 or 85 carrie. Although BA merits do make me feel a bit cheated (why do we have to spend merits to KEEP pets viable)

Beast Healer isn't just +5 hp/tic anymore. it can be +10 w/ augmented hands +2. Whichever food you use its an additional 600 hp. w/ theta its 30/tic.

Our t2 merits are all useful. Healer and killer instinct are the most widely useful while the other 2 are more situational.

Killer Instinct is incredibly situational though.

While The +2 Body and its effects are quite amazing, You'd have to be using the right pet on the right family to have Killer Instinct worthwhile. Which can be quite rare.

+2 Relic does make a difference, Had no idea what some of the +2 Relic did =.=a - 10 more HP/tic per the regen makes it a bit more viable.

Its still really a toss up, each one of them is marginally useful at best... So I think it still falls on matter of preference.

How old is this? its... Pretty awesome >_>

beast healer is one of the most useful merits for bst, you can stack those with food regen, on top of that dipper yuli does have auto-regen (daytime)

only a few hours old now, the killer instinct & circle effect change announcment.

its pretty incredible though. BST get to double dip w/ the damage increase from this by using gausape. My last test on test server made 40% increase in damage on primal rend by using kller instinct w/ gausape and monster helm +2 and having the 5/5 Killer effects merits.

funny thing is, if they add +2 killer effect for each of these killer instinct merits.. they will be worth alot more than the actual killer effects merits.

IF it goes into effect though, I wouldnt have a hard time keeping a 35~40% boost in damage dealt & reduction in damage taken going on.. and a 40% intimidation rate on mobs... well 3/5 of the time anyway.

40% intimidation rate almost makes you want to have bst main tanking.

I already see a 20% intimidation rate all the time now.

also just to make it clear for the merit augments on monster gear:

helm extends Killer instinct duration by 3 sec/merit

body increase duration and accuracy of Feral howl aproxiamately doubles duration at full merits.

legs increase familiar duration for 10 min

hands increase BA to 3 levels/merit

feet increase Beast Healer you get 2hp/merit instead of 1hp/merit

While we're on the subject of killer effects and killer instinct, has anyone else noticed that intimadation doesn't work on Nightmare mobs like it should? Like Plants won't intimadate even if you have Dipper out and use Killer instinct?

However the +dmg and -dmg aspects via the Ferine gausape +2 still work :>

with the AF+2 enchantment u can use any pet76+ as if it were a 99 that means u can choose the right pet for the right situation.

It can add up to 15 so wouldnt it be 84+?

Yeah, its only 84+.

looks like sabotender and antlion can go up to 85. so you can get those back (not sure why you would want to) and nazuna or any of the jugs that started above 75.

I'd say it may be worth it to have 2 merits into Beast Affinity if you like to use the Raptor and/or Lizard.

Those jug pets cap at 94 and 95 respectively so 2 merits (even without the enhancement on gloves) would raise their levels to 98 and 99.

At this point the only real reason to keep the sheep as a 99 option would be for Sheep Song (aka Crowd Control) in a situation where you expect to be getting a lot of links or what not.

i found this link on bg wiki. does this mean you need 5/5 if you want a 99 NN?

Yes. It's already been said in the thread if you go back a few posts.