Keeper's Breed Choice (TL1 - 4)

[Xaijun]

The Keeper's Breed Choice

This guide was originally created for contribution to my org, Keepers of the Source, but I thought I would post it here too to get experienced feedback and to help more Keepers.

If you would like to contact me for questions, modifications or additions to the guide, send an email to xaistar92@hotmail.com, send a /tell ingame or send me a forum mail.

All contents of this guide are copyrighted (c) and any replication of the guide for public use must be authorized by me. Plagiarism is illegal, and in cases of using this guide for profit through plagiarisation, law suits may be persued.

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[Xaijun]

In Anarchy Online, there are four breeds available to each profession. As a Keeper, you have the option to be a Solitus, an Opifex, a Nanomage, or an Atrox. The four breeds of AO will be explained and presented with relevance to the Keeper profession in this guide.

Breed affects many things as a Keeper. As a young Keeper, breed will determine your ability starting values, ability costs, ability caps, AI genome perks available, and certain equipment available to equip.

The 6 abilities of Anarchy Online are:
- Stamina
- Strength
- Agility
- Intelligence
- Sense
- Psychic

Note: Breed does not affect the amount you can raise abilities per level. All breeds can raise all abilities to a maximum of 3 points per level until they hit thier breed caps.

With breed influencing changes in your abilities, there will be minor advantages or disadvantages in certain skills (called trickledown). In my own opinion, I consider the breed trickledown differences of the levels covered in this guide (1 to 149) to be too minor to fuss too much about. Only under extreme twinking cirumstances (If you are in such a position, then you shouldn't have to be reading this guide), does the ability differences matter. Otherwise, the +2/+3 differences in skills one breed would get compared to other breeds are irrelevant.

Also due to ability differences, certain breeds will have an advantage with certain armours requiring the breed's strong abilities. However, the most popular armour choices of Keepers require Strength & Stamina - both being the Atrox's strongest abilities. However, as mentioned previously, this "advantage" only means the difference of 1 or 2 levels (in the early stages), so it's not too drastic.

Your breed also effects your Hitpoints (HP) and Nanopool (NP). Your HP and NP are based on two skills. These skills act just like any other skills, and are raised each level using IP, and are dependant on base abilities and trickledown from them.

Hit Points
Your HP is dependant on the Body Development (BD) skill under the Body section in your skills window. The Body Develpoment skill of a Keeper is aqua*, meaning relatively low IP cost. The Keeper can raise BD 5 points per level. BD is 100% dependant on stamina. The base IP cost of BD for a Keeper is 6.

*A common error made by players is that BD is dependant on the breed. It's not. A nanomage of a certain profession will have identical restrictions from raising BD as an Atrox of the same profession as the NM with equal abilities. NOTE: This does not mean they will have the same HP.

Breed         Skill Multiplier         Points per Level         Beginning Value
Solitus       3                        6                        34
Opifex        3                        5                        38
Atrox         4                        6                        59
Nanomage      2                        5                        25

This table shows that for each point a solitus puts into BD, he or she will gain +3 to his total HP. When a solitus levels from level 1 to level 2, he will receive +6 total HP onto his base of 34 (If he hadn't put any IP into BD beforehand).

Nano pool
Your NP is coincidently increased by your Nano Pool skill increasing. The Nano Pool skill is found under the Body section of the IP window. The NP skill of a Keeper is dark blue, meaning very high IP cost. The Keeper can raise the NP skill by 4 points per level. The NP skill is 70% Psychic, 10% Sense, 10% Intelligence and 10% Stamina.

Breed         Skill Multiplier         Points per Level         Beginning Value
Solitus       3                        4                        32
Opifex        3                        3                        31
Atrox         2                        4                        20
Nanomage      4                        5                        48

Solitus
The Solitus is the middle ground of all the breeds. They are the humans of Anarchy Online. All 6 abilities of the solitus consume average IP, average breed cap and average starting values. Compared to other breeds that excel in certain abilities and fall back on others, the Solitus are equal on all.

The Solitus has an advantage to adapting to any certain setup of a Keeper, not immediately grant you, but given work, the Solitus may adapt from a tanker of near efficiency of an Atrox to an evader of near efficiency of an Opifex.

If you have Alien Invasion, here are the advantages Solituses can get from thier specific perks:
Solitus Genome Perks

From an Escort to a young Vigilante, being solitus will primarily mean four things:
- You will have relative ease with getting enough NP to cast nanos.
- You will have relative ease with getting enough HP to act as a secondary tank.
- You will be adaptable to any setup you feel like, given work.
- You will have average IP consumption.

Ability         Level 1 Value         Level 200 Max         Level 220 Max
Strength        6                     472                   772
Agility         6                     480                   780
Stamina         6                     480                   780
Intelligence    6                     480                   780
Sense           6                     480                   780
Psychic         6                     480                   780

Opifex
The agile breed of AO. Opifex have an advantage in Agility and Sense, but losing in one of the Keeper's main abilities, Stamina. However the Strength, Psychic and Intelligence of an Opifex are average. With similiar traits HP and NP wise to a Solitus, the difference between the 2 breeds is hardly noticeable until breed caps.

Strong Agility and Sense of an Opifex will mean they have an advantage (50%+) with trickledown to these relative skills of a Keeper:
- Evade-ClsC (80%)
- Dodge-Rng (80%)
- Duck-Exp (80%)
- Melee Init (70%)
- Fast Attack (100%)
- Dimach (80%)
- Risposte (80%)
- First Aid (70%)

Also, high Agility and Sense means less trouble with Implants and Symbiants ability-wise in the early levels. Some people consider the advantage Opifex has with abilities and treatment trickledown to make up for the trickledown lost to other primary Keeper skills.

However, I will point out that any breed won't have any ability troubles with Symbiants if they use heaps of IP on them, but that's the defining factor with symbiants in the early levels. The opifex's advantage is that they have to spend the lowest amount of IP on abilities to be able to equip high QL symbiants.

Playing an Opifex Keeper myself, I can honestly say the Stamina an opifex loses hardly makes a difference when twinking into Stamina armour and implants. Stamina has a lot more support (buffing) than Agility or Sense. Having a high Agi and Sen naturally will be advantageous ability-wise.

If you have Alien invasion, here are the advantages Opifexes can get from thier specific perks:
Opifex Genome Perks

Being an Opifex Keeper will primarily mean four things in the early to mid levels:
- You will have relative ease with getting enough NP to cast your nanos when your nanoskills meet the requirements.
- You will have a harder time than an atrox with getting enough HP to act as a secondary tank.
- You will have more support with abilities when it is required.
- You will have average IP consumption.

Ability         Level 1 Value         Level 200 Max         Level 220 Max
Strength        3                     464                   764
Agility         15                    544                   944
Stamina         6                     480                   680
Intelligence    6                     464                   764
Sense           10                    512                   912
Psychic         3                     448                   748

[Xaijun]

Atrox
The big guys. They can take a beating, but not a pop quiz. They have an advantage with Strength and Stamina (2 of the 3 core keeper abilities), average Agility (the third primary Keeper ability), and a disadvantage in Intelligence, Sense and Psychic.

The Atrox is quite unique from the other breeds due to thier unmatched HP. The Atrox gets more HP points per BD skill than any other breed. At endgame, this can mean the difference of 1500 to 2000 HP superior to Solituses and Opifexes and 3000 to 4000 HP superior to nanomages.

However, they have a major limiting factor in nano pool. Atroxes get only 2 points per Nano pool level. Compared to 3 total NP per NP level of the Solituses and Opifexes or 4 total NP per NP level of a nanomage, Atroxes will find themselves having to be raising thier NP skill quite alot throughout most of thier life as a Keeper.

Keeper nanos being very costly of your nano pool means that Atroxes can have some serious troubles here throughout thier life, until endgame where symbs/equipment will start to be enough to cast the top-end nanos. However, for the early to mid game, Atroxes will find themselves either (a) Out of IP because they've been spending too much on 3 dark blue abilities and nano pool (which is dark blue) to be able to cast thier nanos when thier nanoskills can, or (b) Not being able to self-cast the nanos at all because they don't have IP to be almost maxing nano pool each level to keep up with the other breeds.

However, note that if you are stiff on the IP as an atrox, it is possible to work around having to IP Nanopool much if you have convenient access to a MP and/or Trader, nano arul bracers, and albrecht tank armours etc. There is a link to a thread on buffing Nano Pool in the Keeper Rooted Guides. Same applies to all breeds having to IP nanopool. Thanks to Afireinside for this advice.

With Atroxes hitting breed caps in TL4, it should be noted that they will start to use less IP comparitively as thier Intelligence, Psychic and Sense have all capped. However, this happens during the stage that IP is becoming plentiful, and is therefore seen as a disadvantage.

Strong Stamina and Strength of an Atrox will lead to an advantage (50%+) in the following skills:
- 2-hand-edged (100%)
- Body Development (100%)
- Brawling (100%)
- Run Speed (60%)

Additionally, due to low Sense, Intelligence and medium Agility, the Atrox will have the most difficult time with symbiants. Granted, given enough Agility buffing they will be on par with an Opifex implant-wise, but the 3 dark blue abilities truly hurts the Atroxes with symbiants all though the game.

If you have Alien Invasion, here are the advantages Atroxes can get from thier specific perks:
Atrox Genome Perks

Being an Atrox Keeper will primarily mean five things in the early to mid levels:
- You will get enough HP to act as a secondary tank without effort
- You will have troubles getting enough NP to self-cast your nanos when you have the nanoskills
- You will have an advantage with trickledown to some of our primary skills.
- You will have an easier time with Armour, but a harder time with Symbiants
- You will have high IP consumption

Another thing to note is that Atroxes will have access to the Silken legchopper Gloves. These coveted gloves give +40 to 2HE, which proves them to be a truly amazing twinking item for Atrox Keepers. There is a guide on how to obtain the gloves here.

Ability         Level 1 Value         Level 200 Max         Level 220 Max
Strength        15                    512                   912
Agility         6                     480                   780
Stamina         10                    512                   912
Intelligence    3                     400                   600
Sense           3                     400                   600
Psychic         3                     400                   600

Nanomage
The Nanomages are considered the caster breed of AO. Thier traits are designed to grant them thier strongest benefits in casting classes. Keeper is not a casting class, and therefore Nanomage is not a very good breed choice. They have strong Intelligence and Psychic (being the 4th and 6th priority abilities of a Keeper, respectively) medium Sense and Stamina, and low Agility and Strength.
With that ability setup, it's quite evident that Nanomage will fall behind on almost every aspect of being a Keeper compared to other breeds. Thier advantages will be examined first.

Firstly, Nanomages have the highest natural nano pool skill of all the breeds. Therefore, they will have to spend hardly any IP in thier nanopool skill to self-cast thier nanos. However, this comes with the cost of sacrificing alot of HP. At level 100, A solitus Keeper with BD maxed will be approximately 550 HP superior to a Nanomage, and an Atrox will be approximately 1000 HP superior. Naturally. This will make a nanoamage Keeper either (a) Extremely hard to equip to not be so squishy, or (b) Squishy.

Additionally, with the Nanomage's abilities excelling in secondary Keeper abilities, they will have a worse time with implants and armour. I would not recommend a Nanomage for Keeper any day. Only attempt one if you're extremely patient and rich or just insane. It won't be much fun except for when teams go "WTF NM KEEP??? LOLZ".

If you have Alien Invasion, here are the advantages Nanomages can get from thier specific perks:
Nanomage Genome perks

As a Nanomage Keeper, four primary things will apply to you in the early/mid levels:
- You will have a hard time equipping yourself to act as a Secondary tank. You most likely won't, and therefore kill yourself and others in your team often.
- You will have a very easy time getting enough NP to selfcast nanos when your nanoskills can.
- You will have a hard time with Implants, Symbiants, Armour and IP.
- You will have low to no trickledown to the Keeper's primary skills.

Ability         Level 1 Value         Level 200 Max         Level 220 Max
Strength        3                     464                   664
Agility         3                     464                   664
Stamina         3                     448                   748
Intelligence    15                    512                   912
Sense           6                     480                   780
Psychic         10                    512                   912

[Xaijun]

Summary
Atrox, Opifex and Solitus are all rather balanced for the Keeper, I believe. If you prefer to be big, strong but unintelligent with worse symbiants and implants, Atrox is for you. If you like to accomplish getting on the best equipment you can and getting your evades as high as possible, go Opifex. If you like to be adaptable, efficient and general, I recommend Solitus. If you like to be different, roll a Nanomage Keeper.

Wish you luck on your journeys, and I hope this guide has given you some insight into the Keeper breed choice.

~Xai.

To Do List:
- Explain relevance of breed choice if reader is aiming for high levels (Shadowbreed, Genome Perks)
- Grammar, Punctuation, Spelling >.<

[NoGoal]

All contents of this guide are copyrighted (c) and any replication of the guide for public use must be authorized by me. Plagiarism is illegal, and in cases of using this guide for profit through plagiarisation, law suits may be persued.

Sorry but that make me laugh. Other than that the guide is great and nice to read.

If you prefer to be big, strong but unintelligent with worse symbiants and implants, Atrox is for you.

Nice cliché. : )

[Kleever]

I know this was linked elsewhere, but its most excellent for help picking breeds. Clearly shows differences in all stats, based on trickle, at 220.

http://www.lotekk.net/ao/trickle/index.php <- Use the breed buttons on the right.
Also shows difference in available IP (assuming abilities are maxed).

I forget exactly who posted it on these forums some months ago, but it's most awesome.

[Wakizaka]

Nice guide, well thought out.

I forget exactly who posted it on these forums some months ago, but it's most awesome.

That was Chrome

[Chrome]

I forget exactly who posted it on these forums some months ago, but it's most awesome.

Glad you like it!

That was Chrome

That's true.

[Xaijun]

So liek, no criticism at all? Come on, there's gotta be something...

And if it's apparently polished, wtb link for this in the rooted guides from xpression.

[Somniforum]

However, they have a major limiting factor in nano pool. Atroxes get only 2 points per Nano pool level. Compared to 3 total NP per NP level of the Solituses and Opifexes or 4 total NP per NP level of a nanomage, Atroxes will find themselves having to be raising thier NP skill quite alot throughout most of thier life as a Keeper.

Keeper nanos being very costly of your nano pool means that Atroxes can have some serious troubles here. They'll find themselves either (a) Out of IP because they've been spending too much on 3 dark blue abilities and nano pool (which is dark blue) to be able to cast thier nanos when thier nanoskills can, or (b) Not being able to self-cast the nanos at all because they don't have IP to be almost maxing nano pool each level to keep up with the other breeds.

This will also be the case end-game. Atroxes will be spending the least on abilities out of all four breeds (Due to earliest breed caps with 3 dark blue skills), but will be losing IP on having to spend more in Nano Pool to be able to self thier nanos.

omg... please just delete that before ANY trox keep puts ANY single IP into nano pool.

given that it provides us with 2(!) points max nano for every point raised, it just doesn't make any sense to put IP into nano pool.

Aruls don't start being expensive until you want 3-gem bracers. And nobody wants Broken/Infinite gems anyway, so will most likely get them for free. 2x 1-gem Aruls (lvl100) will provide you with +440 max Nano.

As soon as you can self it, get an Albrecht Heavy Tank QL 197+ it offers +400 max nano and 50 nano init, pure buffing love.

And if when you can self your NCUs you can always pop in a CPU Upgrade for buffing...


WTF? we only have to buff every 2h from pretty early on... make use of it and don't waste IP!

[Xaijun]

omg... please just delete that before ANY trox keep puts ANY single IP into nano pool.

given that it provides us with 2(!) points max nano for every point raised, it just doesn't make any sense to put IP into nano pool.

Aruls don't start being expensive until you want 3-gem bracers. And nobody wants Broken/Infinite gems anyway, so will most likely get them for free. 2x 1-gem Aruls (lvl100) will provide you with +440 max Nano.

As soon as you can self it, get an Albrecht Heavy Tank QL 197+ it offers +400 max nano and 50 nano init, pure buffing love.

And if when you can self your NCUs you can always pop in a CPU Upgrade for buffing...


WTF? we only have to buff every 2h from pretty early on... make use of it and don't waste IP!

I don't mean the trox has to IP nanopool for convenience when buffing, I mean they'll need to do that be able to cast some of the nanos -alone-.

You may have forgotten what it was like in the early levels, but roll a 2nd Atrox Keeper, get him to 50~ and then tell me you shouldn't be raising nanopool.

Or a better alternative - have a look at the keeper nano listing, then see how much nanopool a low lvl atrox keep will have at lower levels. Can I raise NP now?

EDIT: But I will take out the "Atroxes needing to IP NP endgame, I don't really know tbh but I'll take your word for it. My opinion still stands troxes wil lbe having to IP NP early-mid game tho

[Sythoid]

I don't mean the trox has to IP nanopool for convenience when buffing, I mean they'll need to do that be able to cast some of the nanos -alone-.

You may have forgotten what it was like in the early levels, but roll a 2nd Atrox Keeper, get him to 50~ and then tell me you shouldn't be raising nanopool.

Or a better alternative - have a look at the keeper nano listing, then see how much nanopool a low lvl atrox keep will have at lower levels. Can I raise NP now?

EDIT: But I will take out the "Atroxes needing to IP NP endgame, I don't really know tbh but I'll take your word for it. My opinion still stands troxes wil lbe having to IP NP early-mid game tho

Ok, agree with Xai about this deffaintly. Nanopool for trox's is pretty much a must unless you want teh sux for nano's. (not endgame as much, but you still need points in it.)

Don't max it ofc if low on ip, but I always had enough ip to keep it maxed at every title cap if i remember that well. Even at 150ish I had troubles casting some nano's self. Using ring's an that IS thing for +nanopool helped a bit i remember. Also hard when your ncu is low an don't have enough room for mochy;s+ -% nanocost.

[glitch]

One could also make friends with a trader for those lend nano buffs

[TheJackal]

I've reset nanopool....at 220 though...still have ~5k nano. At lower level otoh I think some IP into nanopool is required, regardless of breed.

[NoGoal]

I maxed nanopool until TL 5 cap. It's not really needed but it's always nice to be able to cast several buffs before needing to refill. Now I have 5-6k nano pool depending on items and, tbh, I'd like to have more.

[Somniforum]

I don't mean the trox has to IP nanopool for convenience when buffing, I mean they'll need to do that be able to cast some of the nanos -alone-.

You may have forgotten what it was like in the early levels, but roll a 2nd Atrox Keeper, get him to 50~ and then tell me you shouldn't be raising nanopool.

Or a better alternative - have a look at the keeper nano listing, then see how much nanopool a low lvl atrox keep will have at lower levels. Can I raise NP now?

EDIT: But I will take out the "Atroxes needing to IP NP endgame, I don't really know tbh but I'll take your word for it. My opinion still stands troxes wil lbe having to IP NP early-mid game tho

I have never put any single IP into NP past level 50 or so. As I said... there are plenty of options that make a lot more sense than wasting IP.

[Xaijun]

I have never put any single IP into NP past level 50 or so. As I said... there are plenty of options that make a lot more sense than wasting IP.

According to my Skills Eumlator, a level 50 trox keeper with maxed Nanopool and 103 psychic (base) will have 530 NP. I don't know what you did to overcome that, but most atroxes will lean towards to IP'ing NP instead of aiming thier setup at it and implanting it.

Of course, one thing works for some where it doesn't for others - IP'ing NP instead of aiming a setup at it would be my preference.

[Somniforum]

...will have 530 NP. I don't know what you did to overcome that...

It is written in my first post in this thread. Aruls, Albrechts and NCR-buffs as well as other minor stuff...

but most atroxes will lean towards to IP'ing NP instead of aiming thier setup at it and implanting it.

Of course, one thing works for some where it doesn't for others - IP'ing NP instead of aiming a setup at it would be my preference.

That's why I suggested stuff that is easily swapable and does not require you to wear it 24/7...

[Xaijun]

Firstly, I said "I don't know what you did..." because the mentioned items would not be able to satify the nano programs for very long, unless you're saying you found a MP/Trader every time you wanted to cast your buffs - In which case anyways, I don't see how you would consider raising NP to be wasting IP, sounds like you could've made pretty good use of it...

Anywho, as for the mentioned things for NP:

Albrecht Tanks will prevent you from doing any twinking on your back item, let alone you'd need twinking in the first place to equip a good QL albrecht. Or when you get your AC on for example, I don't think there'll be much swapping going on here.

Aruls are very expensive/hard to get for someone who would be reading this guide for knowledge (newb).

I would not recommend for newbs to have to find a MP/Trader every time they want to cast thier Fury, Immininence, Damage Aura, healing Aura or Sanctifier.

BUT like I said, some things work for some where it doesn't for others, so I'll add to the guide about it being possible to work around the trox's nanopool.

[Xaijun]

Added.

However, note that if you are stiff on the IP as an atrox, it is possible to work around having to IP Nanopool much if you have convenient access to a MP and/or Trader, nano arul bracers, and albrecht tank armours etc. There is a link to a thread on buffing Nano Pool in the Keeper Rooted Guides. Same applies to all breeds having to IP nanopool. Thanks to Afireinside for this advice.