27 replies to this topic

[PedroProplayer]

I intend to make a melee, battle sage for the first time. I know my way around this game so I am not too worried about stats, skills, or where to level, but I haven't got a clue as to what gear to wear. Suggestions?

[Anko]

Weapon wise: dagger of counter, ledger of death for aspd, encyclopedia, sages diary are probably stuff you want to look into.

Edited by Anko, 09 July 2011 - 02:29 PM.

[PedroProplayer]

So many days and only a single reply has me believe this kind of build is long forgotten.

[Hamidemian]

The only battlesage that could work is the one that can lvl from 1-99 twice while having fun, not wasting a lot of money on potions and can solo (all clases work within a party so it's always the best choice).

So, I guess it's the auto-bolter with AGI for ASPD (procs), INT (for MATK) and some DEX (although I guess you don't -need- to hit them to actually proc the bolt, so it's your choice).

That was my Battle sage/scholar back in the old days, pre-renewal. Worked, was really fun.

But then Sorcerer....are you sure you want to go Battle sorcerer? Could work, don't know, didn't try. If you already know the basics and the not so basics, then the equip is just what it takes to fulfill your objective. If you want specific help, be specific yourself.

[Anko]

I doubt many people make the melee type anymore. Ever since the sage link came out pure hindsight ing/agi was favored. Even before the link came out the melee type was pretty slow.

[Zeratul]

So many days and only a single reply has me believe this kind of build is long forgotten.

Yeah, STR-based Sages are basically extinct. Almost all Sages now go either Caster (INT/DEX) or Hindsight (INT/AGI).

[PedroProplayer]

If you want specific help, be specific yourself.

I was hoping for some information regarding specific card and equipment combinations to be used on lower levels levelling. I can sort the build on my own, adapting renewal mechanics to make it work.

I doubt many people make the melee type anymore.

Yeah, STR-based Sages are basically extinct.

Of course, the minimal ammount of STR goes into a melee sage, specialy in renewal, where the most of your damage comes from the weapon, rather than STR. My plan would be to use support weaponry, books equiped with Stun, Freeze, Sleep, and other cards, while letting the autocast bolts to the damage. I'd need only enough DEX to be able to hit averagely.

[Anchors]

I'm not sure if it's the same since renewal, but my understanding of stun was that you are guaranteed to hit a stunned target regardless of your hit rating. But Hindsight will activate regardless of whether you hit so, at least if it the flee negation still works, it might be alright to get only minimal dex for whatever yields a comfortable casting time.

I also have experienced the Stunner weapon activating Stun despite missing; if that's true with Savage Babe or whichever cards (and magic bible which procs stun when you take a hit if you'll be using a shield), you may not really need dex at all (it's just really agi now for aspd since renewal) if you're going with Stun-on-attack cards even if you want your melee hits to deal significant damage over time.

I leveled a Sage as melee from 1 to 99 (only just transcended today) with a build that ended on 10 base str, 86 base agi (I got the last few points on the last two levels, not sure why >> ), 16 base vit, 80? base int, and 40 base luk and dex. I chose this setup largely because I knew I'd be using a lot of Safety Wall and making full use of 10 Free Cast. Luk was primarily for Encyclopedia which I only rarely used. Gear was extremely expensive (I was warned that this holds pretty true for just about any class using a lot of melee) and included Principles of/Ancient Magic, Mage Coat, Memory Book, Ledger of Death, Monocle/Sigrun Wings, Well-Chewed Pencil, any int or agi hat, Fricco Shoes, Librarian Gloves, and a Pocket Watch. I hope you have an inexhaustable supply of zeny because I spent a fortune on just this and only carded the Memory Book and Librarian Gloves. @_@

As for combat Sorcs, don't see why not. Striking gives a lot of atk if you master all your endows, and the endows are probably worth it on a low-str sage type since 1) weapon atk is basically all your melee damage and 2) endows, I'm told, affect only weapon atk. No idea whether the endows will affect the Striking bonus atk, however. I don't know much about Spell Fist, but, according to the wiki, it can be used in conjunction with HS. I know that HS procs while you're meleeing during your spellcasting, so I imagine that Spell Fist and HS can both be properly used while spellcasting. Since Sorc gets some really nice AoE spells, changing to Sorc means you can really start handling larger mobs.

Here's the first draft build I'm going to try on my second Sorc (which will stay melee. Someday, anyway). Level 2 passive Agni is for making Psychic Wave fire element when I need a fire AoE.

Hopefully this provides you with at least some info and ideas you can use to craft your own battle sage.

[Anko]

I was hoping for some information regarding specific card and equipment combinations to be used on lower levels levelling. I can sort the build on my own, adapting renewal mechanics to make it work.





Of course, the minimal ammount of STR goes into a melee sage, specialy in renewal, where the most of your damage comes from the weapon, rather than STR. My plan would be to use support weaponry, books equiped with Stun, Freeze, Sleep, and other cards, while letting the autocast bolts to the damage. I'd need only enough DEX to be able to hit averagely.

Sleep would be pretty pointless since your next hit would wake them up anyway. Not even sure if any monsters you would level on would be worth stunning. Freeze i can see since you could endow with wind element for a harder melee hit.

[Anchors]

Does anything easily obtainable freeze often enough to make an otherwise isolated frozen target worth the endow?

I think stun is probably the most viable status effect a battlesage could use as there are a number of ways to induce it with gears (Majoruros card on armor 6% on being attacked, magic bible 10% on being attacked, Savage Babe card 5% per card on physical attack. There's also Rybio card for 3% or 9% but it requires 77+ base dex for 9%). And aside from guaranteeing melee hits (and it still does according to the wiki), it also prevents the stunned target from attacking the player.

One thing I'd like to know however is whether stun-on-attack can proc at the same time HS does... Anyone know? It'd certainly help if one didn't preclude the other (the same kind of way activating Guard on a sader will STOP your Magnum break even after you've spent the SP /an ).

[PedroProplayer]

@Anchors

Exactly the kind of information I was looking for. I was thinking of the librarian glove combo too, myself. I'll likely go with something along those lines. Has there been any melee pvp sorcerers? I'd like to know if they're worth making.

I also liked the stacking stun part. I will most definetly use some of that, if not most.

[Anko]

Does anything easily obtainable freeze often enough to make an otherwise isolated frozen target worth the endow?

Sasquatch + hatii bebe. Not sure if the chance is worth it but it would bump up the damage. Stun does not really bump up your damage but disables the target but presumably if you are levelling on that monster you can flee/tank it.

[PedroProplayer]

In the end I did make that character. It's a 102 Sorcerer now. The melee works fine, albeit hugely dependant on SOul Link. Of course, I got PW so I can lvl with it. Now I just need to grind enough to get all the skills I need. Thanks for the help.

[Chigikogou]

Who's the ones scattering wrong information that melee sages suck? (I think no one, its just me)

INT/AGI Hindsight/Fist Spell
STR: 1
AGI: 100-120
VIT: 20-80
INT: 110-120
DEX: 1-50
LUK: 1-40

This is similar to the Hindsight Sage/Scholar build. However a Sorcerer has a new spell available to them: Fist Spell. Since this skill affects only the first number of hits, INT and MATK become more important for the initial burst damage than ASPD. The Hindsight-Bolt (Most effective with Soul Link) is then used to finish the opponent off.

Primary Skills Used:

Fist Spell
Hindsight
Fire Bolt
Cold Bolt
Lightning Bolt

c/o : http://irowiki.org/wiki/Sorcerer (The Best Wiki Ever)

[TheSquishy]

Chijikigou than you for standing up for the battle sage.

Melee sages are good renewal. Melee Sorcerers are rather something special.

Just a bit of advice for skills.

Pick 2 primarybendows and get them to at least lvl 4.
Having Water and Fire is more than enough to level to 99.

If you have a linker slave go with a book for your weapon. Make sure it's one that gives +matk.
Ancient Magic, Principle of Magic, Sage Diary are all nice for this. Ledger of Death may cause you
to grab more aggro than you can handle with it's AOE.

If you are linker-less, use a dagger of counter with endows. You will be very happy with the damage.
Also acquire a auto-proc gear Gazeti, Kasa, Mutant Dragonoid,Windghost all proc separately from your
hindsight bolts.

Frost Driver can be a life saver. Players are hard to freeze but most monsters aren't.

[PedroProplayer]

Aside from ctrl C -> ctrl V from irowiki, which I check regularly, I already have a pretty good idea of what to use. I ll go with up to 20 STR at most, 90-100 AGI, 100 VIT, 100-110 INT, 60-80 DEX, and no LUK. My weapon of choice will be Ledger of Death, and my spirits will be Ventus(already have it) and Agni(Last thing I'll get). I thought of Tera, but the extra lvls of Earth Spike as a Scholar will cost too much, considering I already don't have all the useful Scholar skills.

I was thinking of maybe getting Arrulo, since sleep is always good in PvP. Of course, few people worth killing walk around with stats low enough to be caught by sleep. I am confident in this build, and yes, I do already pack quite a punch, even without Spell Fist(didn't get it yet).

Currently 104/18.

[TheSquishy]

Wait a minute there sir, take that str and put it into luck.

3 points of luck adds matk. Not to mention a bit of pdodge every 10, and flee every 5.
It's common for sorcs to have 20-30 luck on top of 120 int.

Tera is poo, don't get it. Aqua is nice. Lvl 3 gives you +120 equip matk. Not to mention water Pwave
nice for some thors action at later levels. Get Spellfist asap. It's dps is amazing for pvm and opens a lot
of leveling opportunities.

Hold off on the PvP skills. Spellfisters pvp needs are different from a casters. Focus on leveling and
getting a second AOE.
Aurrilo is gonna get hit with the nerf stick in the future, But we are suppose to have usefulness returned
for frost driver and stone curse.

[PedroProplayer]

I am not getting luck becase my main book is Ledger of Death and it gives LUK-20. I would have had LUK otherwise.

I wanted Tera because she gave nice HP and DEF bonuses. I discarded that possibility because it would take way too many points to get the pre-requisite skills. Right now, I am between the useful in Aqua and Agni. Aqua has that nice MATK bonus which I could use for Spellfisting while Agni gives the 100% fire immunity which would help a lot versus nasty trappers in PvP, while the 180 ATK bonus isn't bad at all. Either case, my second spirit will be what I'll be doing with my very last few skill points so I have plenty of time to choose.

My order for skills went like this: I went for Psychic Wave First, followed by Varetyr Spear up to 3. Skill points into spirit skills and Summon Ventus up to max. Healing Spirit and Wind Insignia. Next thing I got was Spell Fist which I recently maxed out and now I am working my way up on Striking.

When the Skill balance patch hits, I intend on resetting my skills and getting a few things I missed which I have later concluded were more important than I initialy thought. That includes Safety Wall and max level Dispell. I will try and determine whether Vaccum Extreme is better than Fiberlock and choose one(I sincerely hope it is, hunting cobwebs is a pain).

Strangely enough, I find myself using forgotten skills such as Spell Breaker, Cast Cancel, and Magic Rod way more often than I could hoped I would.

[RuneLightmage]

Just so you know, I have a battle sorcerer who is almost 150. I am not fully geared and can hit harder than any blacksmith I have ever seen..with my normal attacks. I also do it just about as fast as they do. I have roughly 400 flee and easily can break 500 weapon attack....

I find that going sorcerer to get spellfist is just a lot of wasted levels. But to each his own. A genuine battle build (one that doesn't just cast spells) is not only viable, but makes for a very dangerous pvm build. You can't mob very well. But individual targets stand no chance. I fight with my summons alongside me and my summons are faster than me and deal as much or more damage than many players.

For a genuine battle sorcerer, you'll want Agni, Ventus and Terra. Tera is useful for caster and melee builds. People say it sucks but I 100% disagree with that.
Aqua is better if you want to just use spellfist and hindsight. You'll get much better damage from the bolts and do them much more often.

My sorcerer autocasts fire and lightning bolt without a link, as well as if he had a link. I have not linked myself in over 20-30 levels and hindsight exceedingly well. You wouldn't be able to tell that I was not linked. My bolts do fine damage but magic is my secondary tool to kill with. My main tool is my melee damage which can easily exceed magic damage if you build properly.

You asked about gears?

We'll assume price is not an object because battle sorcerers need to spend some money.
Ledger of Death +9 or higher is your goal for most builds unless you want to crit.
Encyclopedia is great for crits but you're not as fast. Crits are a lot of additional damage and to use the Encyclopedia, you'll HAVE to have luck. There's no point otherwise since it gives bonus crit based on luck. With an endow, you can imagine how big these numbers can get.

Hit IS important. Overly so. Gone are the days of 30-50 dex. You'll need 60-70...base. Anything less and you can kiss your melee damage goodbye. If you're ignoring melee damage, then you'll be just fine with 1 dex or none. If you want cards to proc off the ledger, then you'll need to hit the target first.

Back to weapons, you can also just drop the whole book idea completely and get a thorn staff or piercing staff. You won't attack much slower but will see a very substantially boosted magic attack damage. There is a card for armor that gives +3 int, and another that adds +1 int and 10 magic attack. Those would be nice in Valk armor that ideally has dex or int enchanted into it.

If you are going battle, then consider porcellio carded valk armor or Armor of Naga.

The breakdown should be if you're just using spells, you need a rod/staff, int/mag atk boosting armor card and valk armor or typical casters robes.
If you're trying to actually beat something up with physical damage and go battle, then you want porcellio carded valk armor or armor of naga (armor of naga is dirt cheap) and you want to use a book. There ARE rods that give a solid atk spd and magic damage boost. But I think that atk spd matters more when it comes to melee damage or hybridizing the damage.

Spellfist doesn't need as much agi or atk spd because you want greater spike damage more than anything. It's not about hitting fast...just hitting hard to drop the target in 1-2 hits.

Crit builds will want Mercury Riser +9 and pirate dagger.
Normal damage builds have tons of options, such as Mercury Riser, Aqua Diadem/Crown (+7 for the bonus 15 atk), Scorpio crown/Diadem (+10) for the greatest amount of attack speed. I may have these diadems mixed up. Forgive me because there's just too many. But you know what I am talking about so..

Incubus/Succubus horns with Demon Mask is another attack speed boosting deal but it's purely for atk speed and limits other options.
Filirs pinions help as well.

Whatever card gives the 'Artas' prefix is helpful for crit and normal damage builds since you get +2 strength out of it as well.

Elven ears (slotted) and Robo Eyes, Pirate Dagger, Black Devil Mask and Well Chewed Pencil will work wonders for battle builds depending on the aim. Ie, if you need to hit grab a WCP.

Ninja Scroll helps the bolters/spellfisters.

There are plenty of other gear options out there and I haven't found them all. Firelock Soldier carded shoe-items are pretty good for all builds. But Variants are probably better for pure spellfist/hindsight.


In PVP We die pretty fast I imagine. I never PVP because it's not my thing. Agility is frowned upon and usually you just die to magic or crit because that's all people have in pvp. So you'll never learn if you have the ability to survive or dodge anything without just completely changing your whole character.
This is where dex matters more and having less useful skills suddenly become useful (Arrullo, Extreme Vacuum etc).

You mentioned Fiberlock- it's good. It's better than good, it's great. But then, I can't kill anything before it reaches me. So I had to consider my options. I control the battlefield by controlling mobility. I get mobbed. I lock things up and stone curse. Both are fast casts. Anything that's still moving I proceed to destroy with an atk speed that is getting dangerously close to 190....with only an awake....
Nevermind that my summon is doing the same.

You'll want to consider that a shield will slow you down by 5 flat attack speed or so. Probably not worth it unless you simply have 'that' much atk spd already and can get more benefit otherwise. In this case, consider the thorny buckler and bison horn set. You lose substatnially less attack speed and it gives you various other useful abilities. Also, the bison horn gives +2 agi and has a slot.

It's been ignored for a while now but other considerations based on what you may still get could be the Tidal set (bonus HP and cheap to buy now), Panties/Undershirt combo, Dragon Vest/Mantau combo (gives +1 agi over pantie combo and throws in magic defense too). I know there are other armor options out there. Just because something isn't popular doesn't mean it's not good. IF high orc cards reflect triggers bolts (it didn't when I played 6 months ago) you could grab Terra, Shield of Naga or that other shield that reflects damage or an Immune, set hindsight, get your RoFl'S or Siroma card stuffs and make a reflect leveling sorcerer which would be SO neat.

Oh yeah, last note: Ifrit Ears and Bloody Knight card can help with more autocasting. I know there is a card that adds 40% to meteor storm damage as well. I'm not sure what it's called or the slot in goes in. But it's worth looking into. Especially if you have a Cecil Damon card to work with. In a case like that a ledger of death or 3 slotted book might be the way to go so you can get 2 Meteor Storm triggers and a Cecil effect. This is much better for high agi atk spd builds but you're looking at about 50m per card. If you have any other questions or need to know any very specific details- ask me here or PM Rune in game. I am on often (or on my baby, Rune's Tiny Terror).

I love battle sorcs and am more than willing to help out. I may even have a spare Ledger or other gear for you.
Hope I helped!

Edited by RuneLightmage, 02 December 2011 - 06:40 PM.

[PedroProplayer]

Upon reading your topic, I see lots of things I had come up with myself, and some I know don't work. Reflect does NOT send bolts back. I tested it first thing.

I am not the slightest bit worried about my weapon attack. Yes, using Striking, lvl 3 Agni, and a good book do give me about the same, but I am not gonna kill anybody with that. Linked Hindsight and SpellFist are the only way to go. Currently, I am going Tera and Agni, with controll skills, and Poison Skills,(which I am still testing on). So far, I don't like poisons. Taking full advantage of the cheap resets here.

[NeoNilox]

I'm gonna show my few experiences during pre-patch (quote replies in black italic):

Just so you know, I have a battle sorcerer who is almost 150. I am not fully geared and can hit harder than any blacksmith I have ever seen..with my normal attacks. I also do it just about as fast as they do. I have roughly 400 flee and easily can break 500 weapon attack....

I'm going to suppose you're over level 140, because I have around 385 flee or such and I can get +20 flee with pine jubilees. And my Spell Fighter sorc is lvl 121 btw.

Firstly, where did you level before reach lvl 120 and between 121 and 140?

I find that going sorcerer to get spellfist is just a lot of wasted levels. But to each his own. A genuine battle build (one that doesn't just cast spells) is not only viable, but makes for a very dangerous pvm build. You can't mob very well. But individual targets stand no chance. I fight with my summons alongside me and my summons are faster than me and deal as much or more damage than many players.

For what reason is Spell Fist such a waste? Once I began to learn Spell Fist, I never ever returned to Hindseer style because the DPS I got with SF... no way my Hindseeing abilities would be able to exceed the SFing DPS.

For a genuine battle sorcerer, you'll want Agni, Ventus and Terra. Tera is useful for caster and melee builds. People say it sucks but I 100% disagree with that.
Aqua is better if you want to just use spellfist and hindsight. You'll get much better damage from the bolts and do them much more often.

I don't know why Tera is so useful, I just see + HP% and + Def in some cases. When leveling, the first summon I got was Aqua, it was due to the + Matk I could get with her, it greatly increased the SF power with almost any foe. Thanks to it I could kill 2 Bradium Golems with just 1 Spell Fist load (6 hits total, 3 each).

My sorcerer autocasts fire and lightning bolt without a link, as well as if he had a link. I have not linked myself in over 20-30 levels and hindsight exceedingly well. You wouldn't be able to tell that I was not linked. My bolts do fine damage but magic is my secondary tool to kill with. My main tool is my melee damage which can easily exceed magic damage if you build properly.

In most of the cases, yes, melee dmg would exceed the magic dmg, because in the majority of the times the base Atk (plus several extras + Agni 3)'s number is higher than Matk (Ledger of Death = Atk 137, Matk 100). There're few exceptions but due to the prefered weapon for hindseers this issue is true very often. Not to mention you may have STR in your build. I don't know, just speculating.

You asked about gears?

We'll assume price is not an object because battle sorcerers need to spend some money.
Ledger of Death +9 or higher is your goal for most builds unless you want to crit.
Encyclopedia is great for crits but you're not as fast. Crits are a lot of additional damage and to use the Encyclopedia, you'll HAVE to have luck. There's no point otherwise since it gives bonus crit based on luck. With an endow, you can imagine how big these numbers can get.

When I began my job as sorc, I left my Principles of Magic for my Soul Staff + Spiritual Ring. It's because pre patch the ASPD for books and all rods used to be same (high AGI makes the difference negligible even with Study 10), not to mention the pretty high Matk I could get with that combo. Those amayzing days of SFing ended when the patch applied the Kronos' ASPD penalty to all 2-H staves, not to mention the SF nerf. Again, no way to exceed the DPS I used to get if I were to switch back into Melee Hindseer build.

Hit IS important. Overly so. Gone are the days of 30-50 dex. You'll need 60-70...base. Anything less and you can kiss your melee damage goodbye. If you're ignoring melee damage, then you'll be just fine with 1 dex or none. If you want cards to proc off the ledger, then you'll need to hit the target first.

Two words: "Spell Fist". It doesn't need Hit in order to hit the foes with magic charged fists.

Back to weapons, you can also just drop the whole book idea completely and get a thorn staff or piercing staff. You won't attack much slower but will see a very substantially boosted magic attack damage. There is a card for armor that gives +3 int, and another that adds +1 int and 10 magic attack. Those would be nice in Valk armor that ideally has dex or int enchanted into it.

Or you can use a Principles of Magic which still gives reasonable Matk, and it's a book. I'd use a Piercing Staff if its Matk were much higher. Or have tried the Spiritual Ring + Soul Staff or Wizardry Staff, not now due to the nerf.

Thorn Staff + Skull Cap = better than everything else. It gives a huge ton of Matk, a vessel-sized bump to SF.

If you are going battle, then consider porcellio carded valk armor or Armor of Naga.

The breakdown should be if you're just using spells, you need a rod/staff, int/mag atk boosting armor card and valk armor or typical casters robes.
If you're trying to actually beat something up with physical damage and go battle, then you want porcellio carded valk armor or armor of naga (armor of naga is dirt cheap) and you want to use a book. There ARE rods that give a solid atk spd and magic damage boost. But I think that atk spd matters more when it comes to melee damage or hybridizing the damage.

Again 1H staves have same ASPD than books, and again very high AGI makes the ASPD difference negligible even with Study 10. I have either Thorn Staff (*hmm*) or the CaneStaff in mind for this.

Spellfist doesn't need as much agi or atk spd because you want greater spike damage more than anything. It's not about hitting fast...just hitting hard to drop the target in 1-2 hits.

You'll want AGI for an additional reason to just ASPD: Flee.

Whatever card gives the 'Artas' prefix is helpful for crit and normal damage builds since you get +2 strength out of it as well.

Vanberk Card.

Ninja Scroll helps the bolters/spellfisters.

Like the Dokebi pet, no?

I control the battlefield by controlling mobility. I get mobbed. I lock things up and stone curse. Both are fast casts.

When I'm still aware, I use Wall of Fog (aka Blinding Mist), it works with the majority of the foes. It saved my **** tons of times. I know it hinders the Hindseeing due to Wall of Fog's side effect (75% chance to fail magic/ranged skills) but it's not an issue at all for SF and ground AoE skills.

----

Anyway, SF is gonna be more "cumbersome" if you don't get Free Cast 10.

[TheSquishy]

On topics of spellfisters and hindsighters...

Gear

You are missing out on some serious dps and survivability being poorly geared.
Especially with the new reduced HP of sorcerers flee is all the more important.
I use a +9 deluxe(ninetails) valk mant. With the perfect dodge you get from valk mant you hardly get hit
more than you can handle.

Thorn staff/skull cap is the best damage you can get and with the nerfs to 2-handed staffs
and spellfist there isn't really another way to get the damage needed to kill high level monsters with spellfist.


Spellfist or hindsight?

Spellfist is very versatile. You can kill low tier mvps and you can pvp without sacrificing anythng in the
way of other skills,gear and stats. It's DPS is superior to hindsight in every way even with the nerf. Casting is
a bit cumbersome but you get used to it. There not a reason to not get spellfist on any non-caster build. You just
miss out on too much.


Summons

I still can not see any reason to have terra. The others do so much more for you. I use agni the most for leveling.
while the others I use mostly for their armor change cuz tanking mvps is teh lulz.

Stats

If you only use spellfist "technically" you don't need DEX because it almost always hits. I have 70 dex on my build
because I like to moonlight as a caster/supporter as needed.
For AGI i recommend 100-110. This will get you nice aspd with any weapon you choose and sexy base flee

Useful Skill

[i] For defense, Blinding mist, fiberlock makes you win the game against both players and monsters. Fiberlock works
regardless of the targets defenses unlike stone curse and frozen which both carry chances of failure. And cobwebs are much easier to amass than gems for constant stone cursing. If you have enough flee, you can even hide and let
a summon tank mobs for you. I found this tactic useful in places like scarabs and ygg tree

[Anko]

And cobwebs are much easier to amass than gems for constant stone cursing.

They are? Is there a source for webs other than monsters? Since red geme can be obtained from an npc by exchanging npc blue gems.

[TheSquishy]

You can hunt about 200 cobwebs in 30 minutes on average with little effort.

200 webs is more than enough to last you a few days of leveling.

Not everyone has zeny to burn on consumables.
And you can carry 3 times as many webs as you can gemstones.

[Anko]

Nuuuuu that takes effort. lol