This is a guide specifically for grinding the coliseum for money or leveling dragons to exalt. This is not a PVP coliseum guide. If you're unsure about anything in this guide, feel free to ping me (by typing @Kiena) and ask any questions!
To go straight to the Exalting portion of the guide, click here.
Please note that the team I'm suggesting here is entirely useless for fighting other players - you'll get steamrolled if you try to use them against a balanced team.
1 Leveling a Grinding Dragon
1.1 Summary
This is a very long guide! Can't you just sum up?
Sure! Use high strength dragons to kill things in one hit, using either Scratch or Eliminate. You want to kill as fast as dragonly possible, because the time you spend really adds up. Sell most of the items straight from your hoard to make a lot of treasure!
I suggest a 4 Str/2 Quick/1 Vit stat distribution as you're leveling, with Scratch, Eliminate, Rally, and Sap as your main battle stones, 3 Berserker as your Augment stones, and two Ambush as your Accessory stones. Final stat distribution should be 111 Strength/49 Quickness/11 Vitality at level 25 (not counting augment stones) if you're willing to spend money on a Tincture of Dissolution for each dragon.
If you don't have the money for a Tincture, or want a little bit more vitality, 110 Strength/49 Quickness/13 Vitality (not counting augment stones) is an alternative build.
If you're having problems leveling, I suggest having one magical dragon with 4 Int/2 Quick/1 Vit and Aid as part of your leveling party, but do not farm with them!
Table of Contents
1 Leveling a Grinding Dragon
2 Exalting for a Profit
3 Build Comparisons
4 Useful Information
1.2 Introduction
1.2.1 Why Grind the Coliseum?
First, because there is no cap. The Fairgrounds only allow you to make 75,000 treasure a day. Selling dragons depends on breeding cooldowns. Playing the auction house market requires you to watch prices and have some starting funds, plus you're always limited by other people and whether or not they'll buy your goods or sell what you're looking to buy.
The coliseum, however, has no limit. You can sell most of the items you get directly from your hoard, meaning you don't have to wait for people to buy them from the auction house. It's also a fantastic way to get food, meaning you can spend your gathering turns entirely in digging or scavenging.
1.2.2 How Much Can I Make?
I've timed it several times, and I average about 50,000 treasure in one hour, assuming I auto-sell everything from my hoard.
When I actually take the time to list things on the auction house, it jumps to about 60,000 treasure on average. This isn't taking into account the rare drops like eggs or festival skins, which are both rare and expensive and skew the results, so I didn't calculate them in.
Again, note that if you lag really badly, or can't kill a monster in one Eliminate attack, you won't average as much money.
Note that all this testing was done before June 2014 - things have changed since then, almost uniformly for the better.
1.2.3 Downsides
What's the downside?
There are some caveats, however. It takes several hours to set up and level a team that's best for farming. If it's laggy, your treasure per hour plummets. For some people, Shock Switch or Runestones are faster on average. And it can be very, very boring.
1.3 Training a Dragon
Still sounds great - how do I start?
To start, you need three dragons, all level 1. They can be any breed, but if you choose fae, tundra, pearlcatchers, skydancers, coatls, or snappers, you'll have to buy a few cheap battlestones. Any of the other breeds start with the correct ones.
Element doesn't matter, though it can be very useful to have a variety of elements so they aren't all vulnerable to the same monsters. You won't be doing any elemental attacks, though. See this guide by Riff for a list of what elements a dragon is vulnerable to. If you want to plan ahead, I suggest an Arcane dragon or a Water dragon. It'll be some time before you get to the point where element matters, though!
You want each of your three dragons equipped with Scratch and possibly with Shred. If you choose one of the breeds listed above, you can buy Scratch and Shred from the Marketplace or the Auction House. Just replace whichever skills they currently have and you're ready to go! (Snappers only have to buy Scratch - they already have Shred.) If you can't find Shred or don't want to spend money on it, you don't have to - it's a useful skill to have up 'til level 7, but Scratch is the important one.
Now comes the time-consuming build up. Level all three of your dragons, slowly working your way higher in levels. Look further down for leveling tips, including a suggestion to make one of your three dragons into a magic-based fighter that can heal you.
1.3.1 Stat Distribution
This is not the only way to build a grinding dragon. Lots of people have preferred ways of going about this, and you might find something you like better. However, when I first started, all I wanted was for someone to tell me their preferred distribution - so here's mine.
4 Strength/2 Quickness/1 Vitality
Every level up, I spend the points on this ratio. If I stop partway through the ratio, I write myself a little note and start there the next time they level. (But it works out almost perfectly that every level you can give them these stats.)
Please remember that if your flight is currently first in Dominance, you will appear to have +1 added to every stat. Keep this in mind when assigning your points.
There are two builds, slightly different, that I suggest.
1.3.1.1 Build 1 - Best multipurpose build
Build 1 is the best for farming the Kelp Beds or leveling exalt fodder there. However, it requires a Tincture of Dissolution for each dragon.
Your final build, not counting Berserker stones, should be 111 Strength/49 Quickness/11 Vitality. With 3 Berserker stones, it should be 126 Str/58 Qck/11 Vit. Remember that you can hover over your stats on your dragon's page to see what their base stats (not counting augment stones) is. For a picture of a level 25 dragon with this stat distribution, click here.
Once I reach 49 Quickness and 11 Vitality as I'm leveling, I put everything else into Strength, which gives me 111 Strength at level 25. (It may take a little while to find the best cutoff point for you, but this is my preferred setup.)
With this stat build, at Strength 126 (including Berserker stones), you can kill anything with a Rallied Eliminate at level 25 except the the Depin, Kelp Tender and Mammertee (Kelp Beds), all bosses, and everything in the Golem Workshop. You can also kill anything with a Scratch + regular Eliminate except all bosses and most monsters in the Golem Workshop.
58 Quickness (including Berserker stones) makes you faster than anything but the Abyss Striker and Relic Eel (Kelp Beds). You should still get one turn before they go, but they'll get to go twice when they do.
However, there are some weird things with Quickness thresholds - you might go faster than the monster at first, and then the monster gets an extra turn, or you might just flat-out go faster than the monster as you adjust your Quickness up. The formula hasn't been discovered yet.
11 Vitality gives you 120 extra health points, for a total of 970 health at level 25. This is not a large help at high levels, but makes a difference as you level up. It also means that if your dragon faints and then recovers the next round, they won't be killed in one hit by a Mammertee or Kelp Tender. And if your element takes double damage from one of the bosses in the Kelp Beds, they will survive a single hit from them.
The following is a chart for approximate stat values at each level. This chart only matches if you've used a Tincture. If you haven't, your stats are going to be very slightly different. Always try to have all three of your dragons with the same Quickness, unless you're specifically trying for a difference. This does NOT include augment stones. So if you have any augment stones equipped (such as Berserker), make sure to subtract that amount from the green numbers when you increase your stats.
1.3.1.1.1 Stat Chart per Level
1.3.1.2 Build 2 - Build with no Tinctures
Build 2 is an alternative for when you can't afford (or don't want to spend) money on a Tincture. Instead of 111 Strength/49 Quickness/11 Vitality, you aim for 110 Strength/49 Quickness/11+ Vitality without Berserker stones, or 125 Str/58 Qck/11+ Vit with Berseker stones. I do not currently have a picture of a dragon with this build. Feel free to message me/ping me if you do!
The one point less in Strength means you can't Scratch + Eliminate Mammertees in the Kelp Beds - however, you can use Sap or Shred and then Eliminate. If you don't use Sap or Shred, you either need to do two Scratches or you need to use Rally on either the Scratch or the Eliminate. Put any additional points into Vitality to give you a tiny bit of a health boost. This isn't a huge change from the usual build, but doesn't require a Tincture for any breed.
Both stat distributions are heavy on physical damage and making sure your dragons go first in a battle. They have a little bit of health, however, to be able to take some hits.
I don't put any points into Agility because, while it does contribute to damage, it isn't a consistent amount of added damage. When grinding, you want consistency, to know that every single hit will kill a monster, to keep your average amount of treasure up and your average amount of time down.
Mind and Defense are almost completely worthless. (For reasons, see this thread by Sylvandyr.) In general, those points are better spent elsewhere, except for very specific builds. Intelligence is worthless for Strength fighters.
If you decide to try something different or adjust these suggest builds, I highly suggest first using the Coliseum Stat Preview Tool by Sylvandyr. It will show you the tradeoffs for any stat combos, and may save you from making a mistake that would need a Tincture of Dissolution to fix. Never put any points into Mind or Defense - if you want to be able to take more hits, put the points into Vitality instead. It's statistically better, by far.
1.3.1.3 Build 3 - Farming build
This build is only appropriate for farming. You should not try to level exalt fodder with it. It also requires at least one Ambush stone per dragon, preferably two, even while leveling.
114 Str/41 Qck/6+ Vit without Berserker stones, or 129 Str/50 Qck/6+ Vit including Berserker stones. For a picture of a level 25 dragon with this stat distribution, click here.
Place any additional points in Vit. While leveling, place the points in a 4 Str/2 Qck ratio until you hit 50 Qck. This build does not need a Tincture on any breed, so you can avoid that cost. It's a little rough to start out with, and doesn't really get easy to level until you reach 9 and can equip an Ambush stone on each dragon. I don't recommend trying to level high without those stones - the low health and Qck makes this a painful build without them.
However, with this build, you can one-shot Eliminate everything up through the Boreal Woods except the bosses. You can Scratch + Eliminate or Rally Eliminate everything in Harpy's Roost, the Mire, and the Kelp Beds except the bosses. A few monsters will go faster than you in the last few zones, and the Kelp Beds will be a little tough if you don't have two Ambush stones per dragon, but this is a great farming build. This is not a good leveling exalt build, however. This build doesn't do well in the Kelp Beds without all three dragons.
Note this is the exact same build Culex recommends in their guide.
Does this count as a "glass cannon" build?
A glass cannon build is an MMO term where a build sacrifices health and defense in order to do more damage.
My old suggested build wasn't technically a glass cannon build, because I recommended more points in Vitality. All my above builds would count as glass cannon, however. But don't get too caught up on terminology, what matters is what works!
For comparisons between multiple popular builds, please see section 3 Popular Build Comparisons.
1.3.2 Battle Stones
1.3.2.1 Suggested Stones
Skill Stones
You start off with two battle stone slots unlocked, which should have Scratch and Shred. Shred's not required, but it's nice to have until you reach level 7. At that point, feel free to replace Shred with another stone - it's fairly useless after this point. Sap is a good choice.
At level 3, you get a third skill slot unlocked. However, don't slot anything yet. Instead, wait until level 7, and slot Eliminate.
Eliminate is the most important stone for grinding. This physical attack does 3 times the damage of Scratch, costs 35 breath, and most importantly, if it kills a monster, you get the breath returned. There are several bugs with this stone at this time (June 2014), such as if you kill a monster with Eliminate and have more than 85 breath, you start the next round with only 85 breath. But overall, this is an amazing skill.
Buy it as soon as you can use it at level 7. Yes, even if you have to go play Fairground games until you have enough to purchase it - it'll make the money back in very, very short order. It's only available on the Auction House, not the Marketplace. This stone is not optional. You are crippling your leveling time if you don't buy this stone.
If you can't afford 3 Eliminates (as they've risen in price recently), buy just one and put it on the dragon that goes last in turn order. (Or second, if you can Scratch + Eliminate everything in an area.) Use that dragon to kill the majority of the monsters until you can afford a second and third Eliminate. But again - at least one Eliminate is required.
Update April 2017: Unfortunately, Eliminate stones have risen in price enough that they are incredibly prohibitive for new players to purchase. See section 1.3.2.3 Eliminate, and What to Do if You Can't Afford It for more information if you can't afford one. It's still the best way to level, but there are some options if you can't afford it yet.
At level 11 you unlock another skill stone. I highly suggest you put in Rally, which will allow you to do more damage with your Eliminate. Remember that Rally's extra Strength is based on the caster's level + 5. This means if your dragons aren't quite the same level, you have to adjust for that when using the Coliseum damage calculator tool. Rally takes a long time to cast, so you should use it all the time. But if there's a choice between Rallying once or Scratching two to three times, Rally is a better idea.
At level 17 you get another stone unlocked. This stone can be anything useful - Sap is an excellent choice, as it heals back a little bit of damage, and can be handy when farming. It does the same amount of damage (actually, a few points more) as Scratch, so you can use it in place of Scratch when you have enough breath.
If you prefer a different stone/want to replace Shred (which I suggest - once you get Eliminate, Shred is useless), Haste can help you out as you build up breath, or Reflect is very useful against the bosses in the Kelp Beds.. But most of the time, you'll be using Scratch and Eliminate.
Augment Stones
Augment stones are the third line of stones on your skill menu. They give you additional stats. As of August 23rd, 2014, they now work!
For a Strength fighter, you'll want to equip Berserker stones as soon as you can at level 17. Before level 17, if you have any Might Fragments of the appropriate element, you may want to equip those, then replace them with Berserker stones later. It's up to you if you want to spend that money, but it will help you kill faster in a lot of cases.
It is assumed that you will buy and equip the Berserker stones by the time you're level 25. The build(s) suggested in this guide rely on these stones. They drop frequently and aren't very expensive on the Auction House.
If you decide to create a mage as a healer (see further down), use Scholar stones at level 17, and possibly Acuity stones before then.
Accessory Stones
There are currently only three accessory stones. Field Manual, which allows you to see the opponents' breath bars, Discipline, which gives dragons that use Meditate a chance for extra breath, and Ambush, which gives the dragon an extra turn at the start of the battle.
Ambush is the second most important stone to equip on your dragon!
According to this post here, well tested by AdeleneDawner, the first dragon to go is always skipped. That means that if you have Ambush on only one of your dragons, they will be skipped until they'd naturally go. If you have Ambush on all three of your dragons, the one that would go first (the topmost position) will be skipped and the dragon in the middle will go first.
If you equip with two Ambush stones, the dragon's first turn is skipped, then they go first because of the second stone, then they would go in the natural order. This means if you have two Ambush stones on each of your three dragons, you will get an extra five turns at the start of the battle.
If you have an Int-based healing dragon, you can use two Discipline stones instead - but Ambush is likely still a better choice. You can always use those two extra turns to gather breath.
You can equip Field Manual on a single one of your dragons, if you wish, but I don't recommend it. Seeing the breath bars of the monsters doesn't help a lot, and the spot would be better taken up by Ambush.
So with all slots unlocked, my grinding dragons would have the following stones:
*
**
*I encourage you to replace Shred with Haste or Reflect.
**Or Field Manual on one of your dragons if you can't afford another Ambush.
1.3.2.2 Ambush, and What to Do if You Can't Afford It
Unfortunately, Ambush only drops from the Coliseum or is a rare find in Pinkerton's Pile. It appears to drop in any of the Coliseum areas, but the drop rate is very low. That means the only place to reliably get it is the Auction House. Now that everyone knows what a good stone it is, the price there keeps going up.
If you can't afford Ambush, you can either keep leveling without it, or you can farm the lower level areas, sell the loot, and buy it on the Auction House. If you want to grind for the money, keep following the guide and simply farm in the first two or three areas, using Eliminate.
If you decide to keep leveling without Ambush, not much changes. Use your turns wisely, Rallying the dragon(s) that will use Eliminate, and be proactive in healing, either with a mage, Sap, or Health Potions. Be ready to reload the Coliseum page as necessary, to avoid losing any energy if all three of your dragons faint.
If you can only afford a few Ambush stones, give them to your physical fighters first (if you have a mage, put Discipline on them instead), and if you have three or fewer, don't put one on each dragon - put one on one dragon and then wait until level 15 and put a second on the same dragon. That dragon will be more useful later when farming or leveling dragons to exalt.
I do not recommend leveling exalt bait with 2 level 25s without Ambush stones. You'll be dragging a useless third dragon along with you, and the loss of those turns makes things very difficult if you don't have the extra 3 turns at the start of the battle - especially if you're leveling them in the Kelp Beds.
1.3.2.3 Eliminate, and What to Do if You Can't Afford It
When I first wrote this guide, and even through subsequent updates, Eliminate was expensive, but not nearly impossible for a new player to get. Now, at the time of writing this, it's over 250,000 treasure for one Eliminate! Like Ambush, everyone realized how wonderful a stone it is.
You can level your dragons without Eliminate, but it's a lot harder and slower, unfortunately. Eliminate is simply that good of an attack! My advice, if you can't afford it right away, is to do one of two things - either try to make the money to purchase it from the Auction House, or level with two fighter dragons and one mage dragon instead, hoping for an Eliminate drop.
To make enough money to purchase an Eliminate stone, you can do a few different things.
One option is to focus on the Fairgrounds and try to reach your maximum each day. With a max of 75,000 treasure, if you can reach the max every day, it should only take about 4 days to get enough to purchase an Eliminate (as of April 2017). Shock Switch is a popular choice for making money at the Fairgrounds - here's a guide about how to chain in the game, which is the best way to make money while playing it. The only two other games that are quick to make money at the Fairgrounds are Runestones of the Arcanist (quit after level 5 or 6 and restart) and Artifracture.
A second option is to level your dragons to about level 9, and then grind in Woodland Path. At level 9, your dragons' Strength should be at about 40, which allows you to kill everything in the Woodland Path in 3 Scratches. If you happen to have any Ambush battlestones, they can be added to the dragons at level 9, as well, giving you more attacks before having to heal by returning to the menu.
After you've farmed for a while, open any money chests in the Other section of your Hoard (such as a Leafy Pack) and sell any food on the Auction House. You might even get lucky enough to get an Eliminate stone in a drop! Before selling any item from your hoard, see this guide for items that drop in Woodland Path that are used in Swipp trades or Baldwin recipes, and sell them on the Auction House. If they're not on this list, feel free to sell any materials or trinkets from your hoard. Especially note the Blushing Pink Rose and Sakura Owl familiar - they are used in a semi-popular Swipp trade and sometimes sell for a decent amount.
If you don't want to spend time making money, you can still level your dragons in the Coliseum without Eliminate. I suggest following the stat build in section 1.3.1.1 Build 1 - Best multipurpose build or 1.3.1.2 Build 2 - Build with no Tinctures for two of your dragons, and then creating a mage dragon following 1.7 Mage/Healing Dragon for your third dragon. Your mage can Rally your fighting dragons and heal them when needed. Make sure your mage has the same or greater Quickness as your melee dragons and is the dragon at the top of the screen so that they will be the one that loses their first turn at the start of a battle (see section 1.10 Bugs - the first dragon to go in a battle will lose their turn). Your two melee dragons should be Rallied and use Scratch and Shred as their primary attacks. You may want to try using their elemental slash attack against enemies weak to their element, but in general, you want to use Scratch and Shred.
Your eventual goal should be to get enough money (or get lucky in a drop) to buy at least one Eliminate. Once you have Eliminate on one of your dragons, things will move much more quickly.
1.4 Grinding
1.4.1 How to Grind
Okay, got the stones, got the stats - but how do I grind?
The most important thing about grinding is reducing the time it takes to kill one enemy. You want to kill an enemy in a single attack. Killing in two hits takes up several seconds - and that adds up to quite a bit over the course of an hour.
To do this, you need either your Scratch skill or your Eliminate skill to be able to kill in one shot. This is dependent on your strength and the health of the monster.
You can kill all of the monsters in the very first area, the Training Grounds, in one shot with Scratch once you reach Strength 58. This is around level 13 if you follow the recommended stat distribution above.
But remember, your Eliminate does 3 times as much damage as Scratch. This means if you spend the time to build up the breath and get lucky enough to have very few dodges (which makes you lose that 35 breath), you can one shot the enemies in the first area much earlier - pretty much as soon as you can equip Eliminate at level 7.
If you can't one-shot with Scratch, you build up your breath until 35 and use Eliminate constantly. Make sure you're always going on to the next fight instead of returning to the menu - that will let you keep your breath between rounds. If an enemy dodges your Eliminate, build it right back up with Scratch once more.
This damage calculator by Sylvandyr will show you how much Strength you need for each type of monster in an area. With this information, you can know what areas you can grind in.
Some people use only two dragons (or even just one) to grind. This often ties into how they level them (see leveling tips, below). This can work very well - it allows you to build up breath faster, because you're not splitting the attacks between three dragons. Try different setups and see what you like best.
You should not be using Rally to grind! I've gotten a couple people commenting that it slows them way down - yes, that is why you shouldn't use Rally while farming. Rally's animation is very long, and it's not worth it for grinding. Only use Rally while leveling your team or leveling exalt fodder. If you can't kill with one Eliminate, use Scratch first instead of Rally.
1.4.2 Where to Grind
Every area has some good stuff that drops. But here are a few areas that are particularly popular.
The Training Grounds is the very first area. It's easy to get high enough Strength to one-shot with Scratch here, and the monsters do very little damage. If you only have one dragon high enough level to grind, this is the place to do it! Food, especially insects and meat, drop often here. Additionally, Leafy Packs drop frequently - they have 100 gold and some plant food worth 75 treasure inside. You can start grinding here as early as level 7, with Eliminate. Note, however, that this is the least profitable areas, overall. The big attraction is that it's fast to get high enough to farm here.
The Woodland Path is the second area. Monsters come in larger groups and do more damage than in the Training Grounds. You get the Leafy Packs here, too. You can start grinding with Eliminate as early as level 8. Again, this area is slightly better than the Training Grounds, but it's only for low level dragons.
Either of these areas are best if you can't one-shot monsters in the Delta yet.
The Sandswept Delta, the fourth area, is another popular place to farm. The monsters here are easy to one-shot with Eliminate, and they drop a lot of high-value junk, like bones worth 70 treasure per. Fishscale Baskets drop frequently here, which have 200 treasure and some fish food worth 30 treasure inside. You can start grinding here as early as level 13, with Eliminate.
Bamboo Falls, the sixth area, has some rare familiars and a few Swipp Swap items that sell well in the Auction House. You can one-shot Eliminate everything at Strength 85, around level 20.
The Arena is the highest area you can one-shot every monster without using a Scratch or Rally in a typical build. There are a lot of high-value junk items that drop here, and they drop frequently. There are also a few Swipp Swap items that drop very frequently, and which sell on the Auction House for more than their hoard sell value. You can Eliminate every monster but the Sprangryroo, Chimera, and Charcoal Sprangryroo in the Arena at Strength 100 (around level 23 or 24), and you can one-shot Eliminate the Charcoal Sprangryroo at Strength 110, at level 25.
The Crystal Pools is the best area for pure money per minute. It has bosses, and some monsters require a Scratch + Eliminate, but it's still pretty easy to fight there, and it gives good drops, including more Swipp Swap items. It also has a very high drop rate for various food types! Rainsong Jungle is easier and also has a high profit - it also has bosses, but everything else can be Eliminated with no need for a Scratch or Rally.
The Kelp Beds isn't the best for farming, but it is the best for leveling up dragons to exalt (if you're not using a specialized build). So a lot of people spend a lot of time here. However, every monster here needs at least a Rallied Eliminate or Scratch + Eliminate. You simply can't kill fast enough if you're going for pure profit from drops. I don't recommend it unless you're leveling exalt dragons or looking for something specific.
If you're specifically farming for food, the best place to farm for insects is the Crystal Pools or Rainsong Jungle, the best place for seafood is the Kelp Beds or the Crystal Pools, the best place for meat is Harpy's Roost or Ghostlight Ruins, and the best place for plants is the Mire or Ghostlight Ruins.
I prefer and recommend the Crystal Pools. There are a lot of high value junk drops and the Swipp items are both frequent and sell well. But try out the different areas and see what you prefer! And remember, the best place to farm is almost always the location that you can kill all (or most) of the monsters in one hit. As before, check out this calculator to determine those locations!
For more detailed drop and money-making info, there's a great guide by Roenok that lays out how much money they got by farming for an hour per area. You can use it to pick the best location for treasure or for a specific food type. It looks like currently (03/2016), the best locations for treasure are Rainsong Jungle and Crystal Pools.
1.5 Golem Workshop
Since the Golem Workshop is the newest and toughest area, here are some recommendations.
First, if you have a mage, you can pretty much endlessly grind. A mage helps a ton, healing and supporting. Especially if the mage has two Ambush stones - put them in the top slot, use Rally on their one turn at the start, and you can kill at least two of the monsters before they get to go. They are also invaluable for boss fights. Contuse can stand in for Scratch (and actually does a little more damage, if Int and Str are the same) and is wonderful on a boss or just to reduce damage.
However, a mage does slow you down. Meditate and the inability to Eliminate are time wasters. If you only have three dragons, there's a good chance they're all physical fighters.
You can farm with three glass cannons. Sap is required - you want to use it regularly to keep your health up. Boss fights are going to be tough.
My personal recommendation is to farm with a mage if you have one already statted and stoned. Once you're used to the Workshop, perhaps try 3 glass cannons. If you don't have a mage, farm with your glass cannons - the farming build instead of the leveling build, if you have both types of dragons.
1.5.1 Breakdown for Individual Monsters
For 126 Str/58 (or 59) Qck
1 Rallied Eliminate (or Scratch + Eliminate)
Mistral Minion
Spellbound Golem
1 Scratch + 1 Eliminate
Swift Lumen
Swift Volt
1 Rallied Scratch + 1 Eliminate or 1 Scratch + 1 Rallied Eliminate
Coppercoil Creeper
Black Iron Creeper
Sentinel Mith
Construction Mith
Steelhound
Scrapmetal Tracker
2 Scratches + 7 Eliminates (aproximately) or 6 Rallied Eliminates
Frost Delver
Stone Borer
For 129 Str/50 Qck
1 Rallied Eliminate (or Scratch + Eliminate)
Mistral Minion
Spellbound Golem
1 Scratch + 1 Eliminate
Sfit Lumen
Swift Volt
Coppercoil Creeper
Black Iron Creeper
Sentinel Mith
1 Sap (or Contuse) + 1 Eliminate
Construction Mith (If you have 129 Str and do a Scratch + Eliminate on the Construction Mith, it will die, but you won't get your breath back, due to a bug. Sap and Contuse do a few more points of damage, so you avoid that bug.)
1 Rallied Scratch + 1 Eliminate or 1 Scratch + 1 Rallied Eliminate
Steelhound
Scrapmetal Tracker
2 Scratches + 7 Eliminates (aproximately) or 6 Rallied Eliminates
Frost Delver
Stone Borer
1.6 Leveling Tips
Okay, but leveling up with this team is difficult! Any tips?
If you want all three dragons to be the same level, and have the same stats, perfect for grinding, leveling up might be a bit of a chore. The dragons don't have any strong healing skills, and it takes a while to get enough breath to reliably Eliminate the monsters. Here are some tips for sticking with these three grinding dragons.
1.7 Mage/Healing Dragon
It's still pretty hard! Isn't there a safer way to level?
There is! Instead of having all three dragons on your team set up for grinding, consider having only two dragons that follow this guide, and the third dragon be a magical dragon that both does damage and has Aid.
If you're new to the Coliseum, or you can't afford Ambush stones, this is a good way to level your team.
This dragon will help your dragons stay alive, and do some extra damage as well. Once they reach level 12, they can get an element-specific skill that does something in addition to damage. I personally like Ice dragons for this - their element-specific skill is Congeal, which has the chance to freeze the monster in place so they can't do anything. Consider looking at this guide by Maki for a list of battle stones and seeing which elemental magic dragon sounds good to you.
For stats, follow the same numbers as the grinders, but put the points into Intelligence instead of Strength: 4 Intelligence/2 Quickness/1 Vitality, capping Quickness at 49 and Vitality at 11. Just replace Strength with Intelligence in the stat chart above.
Some people prefer giving their healers more Quickness and less Intelligence than this ratio. Feel free to play around with the numbers a bit. One ratio several people have liked is 3 Int/3 Qck/1 Vit. This does mean they'll do less damage if you use them to attack.
For the healing spell, I really recommend Aid instead of Regeneration. While Regeneration heals more health over time (a total of five turns), if you have two grinders in your party, you're going to kill fast enough that it won't have enough rounds to heal you. Instead, Aid heals in one burst.
After your grinders are leveled, you can either use a Tincture of Dissolution on the magic user dragon and turn them into a grinder as well, or simply grind with only two dragons.
This is the safest way to level. Make sure to put a Rally battle stone on the magical dragon, and if possible, two Ambush stones.
You might also consider putting two Discipline stones instead of Ambush. Two Discipline stones gives a dragon a 75% chance to gain 60 breath instead of a 50% chance. If you can't afford Ambush, this is the way to go! Discipline is quite cheap in the Auction in comparison.
So with all slots unlocked, my magical dragon would have the following stones:
* **
***
*Obviously replace Congeal with the correct level 12 elemental stone for your dragon, or with Contuse or the level 5 Elemental Bolt. Never use an Elemental Slash, that's a physical skill.
**Haste can be replaced by any other skill. I like having the option of using it, but it is completely personal preference.
***You might want to experiment with one or two Discipline stones instead of Ambush.
For a picture of a level 25 mage with this stat distribution and stones, click here.
1.8 Skill Rotations
Here are some suggested skill rotations.
If you don't have 35+ breath on your second or third dragon, use Scratch to kill monsters until you build that breath.
The following rotation assumes that you have no Ambushes equipped (so your fastest dragon's first turn is skipped, or the top dragon if all three dragons have the same Quickness), that you're in an on-level area (so you're getting victory chain bonuses when you win), that you can kill most monsters with either a Scratch + Eliminate or a Rallied Eliminate, and that you've built up enough breath to use Eliminate on your second and third dragons. Dragons are lettered from top to bottom. To see which monsters you can't kill with with a Scratch + Eliminate or a Rallied Eliminate, see Sylvandyr's Calculator Tool.
If a dragon has been rallied, it will be marked with a (r).
If you have to use Scratch twice (or Scratch + Rallied Eliminate), I suggest the following rotation instead:
Obviously, if you have the breath, you can switch Dragon A and Dragon B in the last round.
Use minor health potions if you need to - they drop very frequently.
If you have a magical dragon as one of your three, replace Dragon A with the magical dragon. When the rotation says 'Scratch', instead use Contuse/Elemental attack or Meditate for breath. Use Aid as necessary.
If you have Ambush equipped, you'll be gaining additional turns. Follow the general idea of the rotation, but you'll be able to take less damage and toss in more healing (either from a magical dragon or from potions). You can see how just one added turn can make a large difference in the amount of damage you take. Ambush is, as always, highly recommended.
Always remember you can reload the Coliseum if you're in danger of all three dragons fainting.
The following rotation is for when you're grinding a low level area for drops, but can't kill with one Scratch.
1.9 Misc Info
Phew! That's a lot of info. Anything else to add?
Just a few last things! After you've spent some time grinding, you'll be used to playing in the coliseum. To alleviate boredom, try watching some tv in another window or listening to a podcast as you grind. I've even successfully read a book while grinding!
Take frequent breaks! I cannot stress this enough. Repetitive stress injuries are no fun. Try a few stretches like the ones from this video or this one, or look for your own favorites. Also, be sure to get up and walk around, and refocus your eyes, at least every 30 minutes to an hour.
You can try to zoom your window out so that you don't have to move your mouse as far to do each action. This can save you some time!
There are several items that are better to sell on the auction house than sell from your hoard. I won't list everything (I don't know everything!) but consider listing food, familiars, apparel, any Swipp or Baldwin item, and certain battle stones on the auction house. I don't suggest trying to sell the basic junk materials - they're not useful for very much, so they're very, very hard to sell.
If you enjoy trading with Crim, keep 2-3 of each item in your hoard, including the cheaper battle stones. Also, you can look at the Swipp encyclopedia entry to see what items are useful to save in order to trade to Swipp.
If you plan on leveling dragons to exalt, I highly suggest having two level 25 dragons, both with two Ambush and 3 Berserker stones equipped and the 111 Strength/49 Quickness/11 Vitality build. These two dragons can easily level lower level dragons in the Kelp Beds. Look to the next post to see some more details about this!
Curious about how experience points work? Check out this guide by Sylvandyr, they explain it all.
I highly suggest figuring out how you want to arrange your battle stones, and then never deviate from this set-up. I have Eliminate in my first slot, Rally in my second, and Sap in my third. My fourth slot is used for whatever other stones I want, such as Haste or Reflect. All my dragons follow this pattern, which makes it a lot easier to switch between them. And Eliminate in the first slot means I can click the Abilities menu and then click once more on Eliminate without having to move my mouse.
1.10 Bugs
This is a section to note any bugs I currently know are affecting the coliseum. This may or may not be out of date - I'll keep it as current as I can.
That's everything I can think of! Thanks for sticking with my long-winded guide, I hope it helps. Leave any questions here, and if I can't answer them, maybe someone else can.
Edit: Added a section on what to do if you can't afford Eliminate. It's gotten so expensive, ouch!
To go straight to the Exalting portion of the guide, click here.
Please note that the team I'm suggesting here is entirely useless for fighting other players - you'll get steamrolled if you try to use them against a balanced team.
1 Leveling a Grinding Dragon
1.1 Summary
This is a very long guide! Can't you just sum up?
Sure! Use high strength dragons to kill things in one hit, using either Scratch or Eliminate. You want to kill as fast as dragonly possible, because the time you spend really adds up. Sell most of the items straight from your hoard to make a lot of treasure!
I suggest a 4 Str/2 Quick/1 Vit stat distribution as you're leveling, with Scratch, Eliminate, Rally, and Sap as your main battle stones, 3 Berserker as your Augment stones, and two Ambush as your Accessory stones. Final stat distribution should be 111 Strength/49 Quickness/11 Vitality at level 25 (not counting augment stones) if you're willing to spend money on a Tincture of Dissolution for each dragon.
If you don't have the money for a Tincture, or want a little bit more vitality, 110 Strength/49 Quickness/13 Vitality (not counting augment stones) is an alternative build.
If you're having problems leveling, I suggest having one magical dragon with 4 Int/2 Quick/1 Vit and Aid as part of your leveling party, but do not farm with them!
Table of Contents
1 Leveling a Grinding Dragon
1.1 Summary
1.2 Introduction
1.7 Mage/Healing Dragon
1.8 Skill Rotations
1.9 Misc Info
1.10 Bugs
1.2 Introduction
1.2.1 Why Grind the Coliseum?
1.2.2 How Much Can I Make?
1.2.3 Downsides
1.3 Training a Dragon
1.3.1 Stat Distribution
1.4 Grinding
1.2.2 How Much Can I Make?
1.2.3 Downsides
1.3 Training a Dragon
1.3.1 Stat Distribution
1.3.1.1 Build 1 - Best multipurpose build
1.3.1.3 Build 3 - Farming-only build
1.3.2 Battle Stones
1.3.1.1.1 Stat Chart per Level
1.3.1.2 Build 2 - Build with no Tinctures1.3.1.3 Build 3 - Farming-only build
1.3.2.1 Suggested Stones
1.3.2.2 Ambush, and What to Do if You Can't Afford It
1.3.2.3 Eliminate, and What to Do if You Can't Afford It
1.3.2.2 Ambush, and What to Do if You Can't Afford It
1.3.2.3 Eliminate, and What to Do if You Can't Afford It
1.4.1 How to Grind
1.4.2 Where to Grind
1.5 Golem Workshop
1.4.2 Where to Grind
1.5.1 Breakdown for Individual Monsters
1.6 Leveling Tips1.7 Mage/Healing Dragon
1.8 Skill Rotations
1.9 Misc Info
1.10 Bugs
2 Exalting for a Profit
2.1 Introduction
2.4 Advanced Exalting
2.6 Thanks
2.1.1 Summary
2.1.2 How Much Can I Make?
2.2 Leveling with 2 25 Dragons (Best Way)
2.1.2 How Much Can I Make?
2.2.1 Stat Distribution
2.2.3 Elements
2.2.4 How to Level Exalt Fodder
2.3 Leveling with 3 Level 1 Dragons (Worse Way)
2.2.1.2 Build Comparison
2.2.2 Battle Stones2.2.3 Elements
2.2.4 How to Level Exalt Fodder
2.2.4.1 Skill Rotations
2.2.5 Non-level 25 Dragons
2.4 Advanced Exalting
2.4.1 Leveling two Exalt at once in the Mire
2.5 Misc Info and Tips
2.4.1.1 Stat Distribution
2.4.1.2 Battle Stones
2.4.1.3 Elements
2.4.1.4 How to do this
2.4.1.5 Alternate Two Exalt Locations
2.4.1.2 Battle Stones
2.4.1.3 Elements
2.4.1.4 How to do this
2.4.1.5 Alternate Two Exalt Locations
2.4.1.5.1 Ghostlight Ruins
2.4.1.5.2 Harpy's Roost
2.4.1.5.2 Harpy's Roost
2.6 Thanks
3 Build Comparisons
4 Useful Information
4.1 Experience Chart per Level
4.2 Elemental Chart
4.3 Highest-health Monster per Area
4.4 Average Exalt Payout Per Level
4.2 Elemental Chart
4.3 Highest-health Monster per Area
4.4 Average Exalt Payout Per Level
1.2 Introduction
1.2.1 Why Grind the Coliseum?
First, because there is no cap. The Fairgrounds only allow you to make 75,000 treasure a day. Selling dragons depends on breeding cooldowns. Playing the auction house market requires you to watch prices and have some starting funds, plus you're always limited by other people and whether or not they'll buy your goods or sell what you're looking to buy.
The coliseum, however, has no limit. You can sell most of the items you get directly from your hoard, meaning you don't have to wait for people to buy them from the auction house. It's also a fantastic way to get food, meaning you can spend your gathering turns entirely in digging or scavenging.
1.2.2 How Much Can I Make?
I've timed it several times, and I average about 50,000 treasure in one hour, assuming I auto-sell everything from my hoard.
When I actually take the time to list things on the auction house, it jumps to about 60,000 treasure on average. This isn't taking into account the rare drops like eggs or festival skins, which are both rare and expensive and skew the results, so I didn't calculate them in.
Again, note that if you lag really badly, or can't kill a monster in one Eliminate attack, you won't average as much money.
Note that all this testing was done before June 2014 - things have changed since then, almost uniformly for the better.
1.2.3 Downsides
What's the downside?
There are some caveats, however. It takes several hours to set up and level a team that's best for farming. If it's laggy, your treasure per hour plummets. For some people, Shock Switch or Runestones are faster on average. And it can be very, very boring.
1.3 Training a Dragon
Still sounds great - how do I start?
To start, you need three dragons, all level 1. They can be any breed, but if you choose fae, tundra, pearlcatchers, skydancers, coatls, or snappers, you'll have to buy a few cheap battlestones. Any of the other breeds start with the correct ones.
Element doesn't matter, though it can be very useful to have a variety of elements so they aren't all vulnerable to the same monsters. You won't be doing any elemental attacks, though. See this guide by Riff for a list of what elements a dragon is vulnerable to. If you want to plan ahead, I suggest an Arcane dragon or a Water dragon. It'll be some time before you get to the point where element matters, though!
You want each of your three dragons equipped with Scratch and possibly with Shred. If you choose one of the breeds listed above, you can buy Scratch and Shred from the Marketplace or the Auction House. Just replace whichever skills they currently have and you're ready to go! (Snappers only have to buy Scratch - they already have Shred.) If you can't find Shred or don't want to spend money on it, you don't have to - it's a useful skill to have up 'til level 7, but Scratch is the important one.
Now comes the time-consuming build up. Level all three of your dragons, slowly working your way higher in levels. Look further down for leveling tips, including a suggestion to make one of your three dragons into a magic-based fighter that can heal you.
1.3.1 Stat Distribution
This is not the only way to build a grinding dragon. Lots of people have preferred ways of going about this, and you might find something you like better. However, when I first started, all I wanted was for someone to tell me their preferred distribution - so here's mine.
4 Strength/2 Quickness/1 Vitality
Every level up, I spend the points on this ratio. If I stop partway through the ratio, I write myself a little note and start there the next time they level. (But it works out almost perfectly that every level you can give them these stats.)
Please remember that if your flight is currently first in Dominance, you will appear to have +1 added to every stat. Keep this in mind when assigning your points.
There are two builds, slightly different, that I suggest.
1.3.1.1 Build 1 - Best multipurpose build
Build 1 is the best for farming the Kelp Beds or leveling exalt fodder there. However, it requires a Tincture of Dissolution for each dragon.
Your final build, not counting Berserker stones, should be 111 Strength/49 Quickness/11 Vitality. With 3 Berserker stones, it should be 126 Str/58 Qck/11 Vit. Remember that you can hover over your stats on your dragon's page to see what their base stats (not counting augment stones) is. For a picture of a level 25 dragon with this stat distribution, click here.
Once I reach 49 Quickness and 11 Vitality as I'm leveling, I put everything else into Strength, which gives me 111 Strength at level 25. (It may take a little while to find the best cutoff point for you, but this is my preferred setup.)
With this stat build, at Strength 126 (including Berserker stones), you can kill anything with a Rallied Eliminate at level 25 except the the Depin, Kelp Tender and Mammertee (Kelp Beds), all bosses, and everything in the Golem Workshop. You can also kill anything with a Scratch + regular Eliminate except all bosses and most monsters in the Golem Workshop.
58 Quickness (including Berserker stones) makes you faster than anything but the Abyss Striker and Relic Eel (Kelp Beds). You should still get one turn before they go, but they'll get to go twice when they do.
However, there are some weird things with Quickness thresholds - you might go faster than the monster at first, and then the monster gets an extra turn, or you might just flat-out go faster than the monster as you adjust your Quickness up. The formula hasn't been discovered yet.
11 Vitality gives you 120 extra health points, for a total of 970 health at level 25. This is not a large help at high levels, but makes a difference as you level up. It also means that if your dragon faints and then recovers the next round, they won't be killed in one hit by a Mammertee or Kelp Tender. And if your element takes double damage from one of the bosses in the Kelp Beds, they will survive a single hit from them.
The following is a chart for approximate stat values at each level. This chart only matches if you've used a Tincture. If you haven't, your stats are going to be very slightly different. Always try to have all three of your dragons with the same Quickness, unless you're specifically trying for a difference. This does NOT include augment stones. So if you have any augment stones equipped (such as Berserker), make sure to subtract that amount from the green numbers when you increase your stats.
1.3.1.1.1 Stat Chart per Level
Code:
*Str w/3 *Qck w/3
*Level* *Str* *Qck* *Vit* Berserker* Berserker*
1 11 7 6
2 15 9 7
3 19 11 8
4 22 13 9
5 26 15 10
6 30 17 11
7 34 19 11
8 38 21 11
9 42 23 11
10 46 25 11
11 50 27 11
12 55 29 11
13 59 31 11
14 63 33 11
15 67 35 11
16 71 37 11
17 75 39 11 90 48
18 79 41 11 94 50
19 83 43 11 98 52
20 87 45 11 102 54
21 91 47 11 106 56
22 96 49 11 111 58
23 101 49 11 116 58
24 106 49 11 121 58
25 111 49 11 126 58
1.3.1.2 Build 2 - Build with no Tinctures
Build 2 is an alternative for when you can't afford (or don't want to spend) money on a Tincture. Instead of 111 Strength/49 Quickness/11 Vitality, you aim for 110 Strength/49 Quickness/11+ Vitality without Berserker stones, or 125 Str/58 Qck/11+ Vit with Berseker stones. I do not currently have a picture of a dragon with this build. Feel free to message me/ping me if you do!
The one point less in Strength means you can't Scratch + Eliminate Mammertees in the Kelp Beds - however, you can use Sap or Shred and then Eliminate. If you don't use Sap or Shred, you either need to do two Scratches or you need to use Rally on either the Scratch or the Eliminate. Put any additional points into Vitality to give you a tiny bit of a health boost. This isn't a huge change from the usual build, but doesn't require a Tincture for any breed.
Both stat distributions are heavy on physical damage and making sure your dragons go first in a battle. They have a little bit of health, however, to be able to take some hits.
I don't put any points into Agility because, while it does contribute to damage, it isn't a consistent amount of added damage. When grinding, you want consistency, to know that every single hit will kill a monster, to keep your average amount of treasure up and your average amount of time down.
Mind and Defense are almost completely worthless. (For reasons, see this thread by Sylvandyr.) In general, those points are better spent elsewhere, except for very specific builds. Intelligence is worthless for Strength fighters.
If you decide to try something different or adjust these suggest builds, I highly suggest first using the Coliseum Stat Preview Tool by Sylvandyr. It will show you the tradeoffs for any stat combos, and may save you from making a mistake that would need a Tincture of Dissolution to fix. Never put any points into Mind or Defense - if you want to be able to take more hits, put the points into Vitality instead. It's statistically better, by far.
1.3.1.3 Build 3 - Farming build
This build is only appropriate for farming. You should not try to level exalt fodder with it. It also requires at least one Ambush stone per dragon, preferably two, even while leveling.
114 Str/41 Qck/6+ Vit without Berserker stones, or 129 Str/50 Qck/6+ Vit including Berserker stones. For a picture of a level 25 dragon with this stat distribution, click here.
Place any additional points in Vit. While leveling, place the points in a 4 Str/2 Qck ratio until you hit 50 Qck. This build does not need a Tincture on any breed, so you can avoid that cost. It's a little rough to start out with, and doesn't really get easy to level until you reach 9 and can equip an Ambush stone on each dragon. I don't recommend trying to level high without those stones - the low health and Qck makes this a painful build without them.
However, with this build, you can one-shot Eliminate everything up through the Boreal Woods except the bosses. You can Scratch + Eliminate or Rally Eliminate everything in Harpy's Roost, the Mire, and the Kelp Beds except the bosses. A few monsters will go faster than you in the last few zones, and the Kelp Beds will be a little tough if you don't have two Ambush stones per dragon, but this is a great farming build. This is not a good leveling exalt build, however. This build doesn't do well in the Kelp Beds without all three dragons.
Note this is the exact same build Culex recommends in their guide.
Does this count as a "glass cannon" build?
A glass cannon build is an MMO term where a build sacrifices health and defense in order to do more damage.
My old suggested build wasn't technically a glass cannon build, because I recommended more points in Vitality. All my above builds would count as glass cannon, however. But don't get too caught up on terminology, what matters is what works!
For comparisons between multiple popular builds, please see section 3 Popular Build Comparisons.
1.3.2 Battle Stones
1.3.2.1 Suggested Stones
Skill Stones
You start off with two battle stone slots unlocked, which should have Scratch and Shred. Shred's not required, but it's nice to have until you reach level 7. At that point, feel free to replace Shred with another stone - it's fairly useless after this point. Sap is a good choice.
At level 3, you get a third skill slot unlocked. However, don't slot anything yet. Instead, wait until level 7, and slot Eliminate.
Eliminate is the most important stone for grinding. This physical attack does 3 times the damage of Scratch, costs 35 breath, and most importantly, if it kills a monster, you get the breath returned. There are several bugs with this stone at this time (June 2014), such as if you kill a monster with Eliminate and have more than 85 breath, you start the next round with only 85 breath. But overall, this is an amazing skill.
Buy it as soon as you can use it at level 7. Yes, even if you have to go play Fairground games until you have enough to purchase it - it'll make the money back in very, very short order. It's only available on the Auction House, not the Marketplace. This stone is not optional. You are crippling your leveling time if you don't buy this stone.
If you can't afford 3 Eliminates (as they've risen in price recently), buy just one and put it on the dragon that goes last in turn order. (Or second, if you can Scratch + Eliminate everything in an area.) Use that dragon to kill the majority of the monsters until you can afford a second and third Eliminate. But again - at least one Eliminate is required.
Update April 2017: Unfortunately, Eliminate stones have risen in price enough that they are incredibly prohibitive for new players to purchase. See section 1.3.2.3 Eliminate, and What to Do if You Can't Afford It for more information if you can't afford one. It's still the best way to level, but there are some options if you can't afford it yet.
At level 11 you unlock another skill stone. I highly suggest you put in Rally, which will allow you to do more damage with your Eliminate. Remember that Rally's extra Strength is based on the caster's level + 5. This means if your dragons aren't quite the same level, you have to adjust for that when using the Coliseum damage calculator tool. Rally takes a long time to cast, so you should use it all the time. But if there's a choice between Rallying once or Scratching two to three times, Rally is a better idea.
At level 17 you get another stone unlocked. This stone can be anything useful - Sap is an excellent choice, as it heals back a little bit of damage, and can be handy when farming. It does the same amount of damage (actually, a few points more) as Scratch, so you can use it in place of Scratch when you have enough breath.
If you prefer a different stone/want to replace Shred (which I suggest - once you get Eliminate, Shred is useless), Haste can help you out as you build up breath, or Reflect is very useful against the bosses in the Kelp Beds.. But most of the time, you'll be using Scratch and Eliminate.
Augment Stones
Augment stones are the third line of stones on your skill menu. They give you additional stats. As of August 23rd, 2014, they now work!
For a Strength fighter, you'll want to equip Berserker stones as soon as you can at level 17. Before level 17, if you have any Might Fragments of the appropriate element, you may want to equip those, then replace them with Berserker stones later. It's up to you if you want to spend that money, but it will help you kill faster in a lot of cases.
It is assumed that you will buy and equip the Berserker stones by the time you're level 25. The build(s) suggested in this guide rely on these stones. They drop frequently and aren't very expensive on the Auction House.
If you decide to create a mage as a healer (see further down), use Scholar stones at level 17, and possibly Acuity stones before then.
Accessory Stones
There are currently only three accessory stones. Field Manual, which allows you to see the opponents' breath bars, Discipline, which gives dragons that use Meditate a chance for extra breath, and Ambush, which gives the dragon an extra turn at the start of the battle.
Ambush is the second most important stone to equip on your dragon!
According to this post here, well tested by AdeleneDawner, the first dragon to go is always skipped. That means that if you have Ambush on only one of your dragons, they will be skipped until they'd naturally go. If you have Ambush on all three of your dragons, the one that would go first (the topmost position) will be skipped and the dragon in the middle will go first.
If you equip with two Ambush stones, the dragon's first turn is skipped, then they go first because of the second stone, then they would go in the natural order. This means if you have two Ambush stones on each of your three dragons, you will get an extra five turns at the start of the battle.
If you have an Int-based healing dragon, you can use two Discipline stones instead - but Ambush is likely still a better choice. You can always use those two extra turns to gather breath.
You can equip Field Manual on a single one of your dragons, if you wish, but I don't recommend it. Seeing the breath bars of the monsters doesn't help a lot, and the spot would be better taken up by Ambush.
So with all slots unlocked, my grinding dragons would have the following stones:
*
**
*I encourage you to replace Shred with Haste or Reflect.
**Or Field Manual on one of your dragons if you can't afford another Ambush.
1.3.2.2 Ambush, and What to Do if You Can't Afford It
Unfortunately, Ambush only drops from the Coliseum or is a rare find in Pinkerton's Pile. It appears to drop in any of the Coliseum areas, but the drop rate is very low. That means the only place to reliably get it is the Auction House. Now that everyone knows what a good stone it is, the price there keeps going up.
If you can't afford Ambush, you can either keep leveling without it, or you can farm the lower level areas, sell the loot, and buy it on the Auction House. If you want to grind for the money, keep following the guide and simply farm in the first two or three areas, using Eliminate.
If you decide to keep leveling without Ambush, not much changes. Use your turns wisely, Rallying the dragon(s) that will use Eliminate, and be proactive in healing, either with a mage, Sap, or Health Potions. Be ready to reload the Coliseum page as necessary, to avoid losing any energy if all three of your dragons faint.
If you can only afford a few Ambush stones, give them to your physical fighters first (if you have a mage, put Discipline on them instead), and if you have three or fewer, don't put one on each dragon - put one on one dragon and then wait until level 15 and put a second on the same dragon. That dragon will be more useful later when farming or leveling dragons to exalt.
I do not recommend leveling exalt bait with 2 level 25s without Ambush stones. You'll be dragging a useless third dragon along with you, and the loss of those turns makes things very difficult if you don't have the extra 3 turns at the start of the battle - especially if you're leveling them in the Kelp Beds.
1.3.2.3 Eliminate, and What to Do if You Can't Afford It
When I first wrote this guide, and even through subsequent updates, Eliminate was expensive, but not nearly impossible for a new player to get. Now, at the time of writing this, it's over 250,000 treasure for one Eliminate! Like Ambush, everyone realized how wonderful a stone it is.
You can level your dragons without Eliminate, but it's a lot harder and slower, unfortunately. Eliminate is simply that good of an attack! My advice, if you can't afford it right away, is to do one of two things - either try to make the money to purchase it from the Auction House, or level with two fighter dragons and one mage dragon instead, hoping for an Eliminate drop.
To make enough money to purchase an Eliminate stone, you can do a few different things.
One option is to focus on the Fairgrounds and try to reach your maximum each day. With a max of 75,000 treasure, if you can reach the max every day, it should only take about 4 days to get enough to purchase an Eliminate (as of April 2017). Shock Switch is a popular choice for making money at the Fairgrounds - here's a guide about how to chain in the game, which is the best way to make money while playing it. The only two other games that are quick to make money at the Fairgrounds are Runestones of the Arcanist (quit after level 5 or 6 and restart) and Artifracture.
A second option is to level your dragons to about level 9, and then grind in Woodland Path. At level 9, your dragons' Strength should be at about 40, which allows you to kill everything in the Woodland Path in 3 Scratches. If you happen to have any Ambush battlestones, they can be added to the dragons at level 9, as well, giving you more attacks before having to heal by returning to the menu.
After you've farmed for a while, open any money chests in the Other section of your Hoard (such as a Leafy Pack) and sell any food on the Auction House. You might even get lucky enough to get an Eliminate stone in a drop! Before selling any item from your hoard, see this guide for items that drop in Woodland Path that are used in Swipp trades or Baldwin recipes, and sell them on the Auction House. If they're not on this list, feel free to sell any materials or trinkets from your hoard. Especially note the Blushing Pink Rose and Sakura Owl familiar - they are used in a semi-popular Swipp trade and sometimes sell for a decent amount.
If you don't want to spend time making money, you can still level your dragons in the Coliseum without Eliminate. I suggest following the stat build in section 1.3.1.1 Build 1 - Best multipurpose build or 1.3.1.2 Build 2 - Build with no Tinctures for two of your dragons, and then creating a mage dragon following 1.7 Mage/Healing Dragon for your third dragon. Your mage can Rally your fighting dragons and heal them when needed. Make sure your mage has the same or greater Quickness as your melee dragons and is the dragon at the top of the screen so that they will be the one that loses their first turn at the start of a battle (see section 1.10 Bugs - the first dragon to go in a battle will lose their turn). Your two melee dragons should be Rallied and use Scratch and Shred as their primary attacks. You may want to try using their elemental slash attack against enemies weak to their element, but in general, you want to use Scratch and Shred.
Your eventual goal should be to get enough money (or get lucky in a drop) to buy at least one Eliminate. Once you have Eliminate on one of your dragons, things will move much more quickly.
1.4 Grinding
1.4.1 How to Grind
Okay, got the stones, got the stats - but how do I grind?
The most important thing about grinding is reducing the time it takes to kill one enemy. You want to kill an enemy in a single attack. Killing in two hits takes up several seconds - and that adds up to quite a bit over the course of an hour.
To do this, you need either your Scratch skill or your Eliminate skill to be able to kill in one shot. This is dependent on your strength and the health of the monster.
You can kill all of the monsters in the very first area, the Training Grounds, in one shot with Scratch once you reach Strength 58. This is around level 13 if you follow the recommended stat distribution above.
But remember, your Eliminate does 3 times as much damage as Scratch. This means if you spend the time to build up the breath and get lucky enough to have very few dodges (which makes you lose that 35 breath), you can one shot the enemies in the first area much earlier - pretty much as soon as you can equip Eliminate at level 7.
If you can't one-shot with Scratch, you build up your breath until 35 and use Eliminate constantly. Make sure you're always going on to the next fight instead of returning to the menu - that will let you keep your breath between rounds. If an enemy dodges your Eliminate, build it right back up with Scratch once more.
This damage calculator by Sylvandyr will show you how much Strength you need for each type of monster in an area. With this information, you can know what areas you can grind in.
Some people use only two dragons (or even just one) to grind. This often ties into how they level them (see leveling tips, below). This can work very well - it allows you to build up breath faster, because you're not splitting the attacks between three dragons. Try different setups and see what you like best.
You should not be using Rally to grind! I've gotten a couple people commenting that it slows them way down - yes, that is why you shouldn't use Rally while farming. Rally's animation is very long, and it's not worth it for grinding. Only use Rally while leveling your team or leveling exalt fodder. If you can't kill with one Eliminate, use Scratch first instead of Rally.
1.4.2 Where to Grind
Every area has some good stuff that drops. But here are a few areas that are particularly popular.
The Training Grounds is the very first area. It's easy to get high enough Strength to one-shot with Scratch here, and the monsters do very little damage. If you only have one dragon high enough level to grind, this is the place to do it! Food, especially insects and meat, drop often here. Additionally, Leafy Packs drop frequently - they have 100 gold and some plant food worth 75 treasure inside. You can start grinding here as early as level 7, with Eliminate. Note, however, that this is the least profitable areas, overall. The big attraction is that it's fast to get high enough to farm here.
The Woodland Path is the second area. Monsters come in larger groups and do more damage than in the Training Grounds. You get the Leafy Packs here, too. You can start grinding with Eliminate as early as level 8. Again, this area is slightly better than the Training Grounds, but it's only for low level dragons.
Either of these areas are best if you can't one-shot monsters in the Delta yet.
The Sandswept Delta, the fourth area, is another popular place to farm. The monsters here are easy to one-shot with Eliminate, and they drop a lot of high-value junk, like bones worth 70 treasure per. Fishscale Baskets drop frequently here, which have 200 treasure and some fish food worth 30 treasure inside. You can start grinding here as early as level 13, with Eliminate.
Bamboo Falls, the sixth area, has some rare familiars and a few Swipp Swap items that sell well in the Auction House. You can one-shot Eliminate everything at Strength 85, around level 20.
The Arena is the highest area you can one-shot every monster without using a Scratch or Rally in a typical build. There are a lot of high-value junk items that drop here, and they drop frequently. There are also a few Swipp Swap items that drop very frequently, and which sell on the Auction House for more than their hoard sell value. You can Eliminate every monster but the Sprangryroo, Chimera, and Charcoal Sprangryroo in the Arena at Strength 100 (around level 23 or 24), and you can one-shot Eliminate the Charcoal Sprangryroo at Strength 110, at level 25.
The Crystal Pools is the best area for pure money per minute. It has bosses, and some monsters require a Scratch + Eliminate, but it's still pretty easy to fight there, and it gives good drops, including more Swipp Swap items. It also has a very high drop rate for various food types! Rainsong Jungle is easier and also has a high profit - it also has bosses, but everything else can be Eliminated with no need for a Scratch or Rally.
The Kelp Beds isn't the best for farming, but it is the best for leveling up dragons to exalt (if you're not using a specialized build). So a lot of people spend a lot of time here. However, every monster here needs at least a Rallied Eliminate or Scratch + Eliminate. You simply can't kill fast enough if you're going for pure profit from drops. I don't recommend it unless you're leveling exalt dragons or looking for something specific.
If you're specifically farming for food, the best place to farm for insects is the Crystal Pools or Rainsong Jungle, the best place for seafood is the Kelp Beds or the Crystal Pools, the best place for meat is Harpy's Roost or Ghostlight Ruins, and the best place for plants is the Mire or Ghostlight Ruins.
I prefer and recommend the Crystal Pools. There are a lot of high value junk drops and the Swipp items are both frequent and sell well. But try out the different areas and see what you prefer! And remember, the best place to farm is almost always the location that you can kill all (or most) of the monsters in one hit. As before, check out this calculator to determine those locations!
For more detailed drop and money-making info, there's a great guide by Roenok that lays out how much money they got by farming for an hour per area. You can use it to pick the best location for treasure or for a specific food type. It looks like currently (03/2016), the best locations for treasure are Rainsong Jungle and Crystal Pools.
1.5 Golem Workshop
Since the Golem Workshop is the newest and toughest area, here are some recommendations.
First, if you have a mage, you can pretty much endlessly grind. A mage helps a ton, healing and supporting. Especially if the mage has two Ambush stones - put them in the top slot, use Rally on their one turn at the start, and you can kill at least two of the monsters before they get to go. They are also invaluable for boss fights. Contuse can stand in for Scratch (and actually does a little more damage, if Int and Str are the same) and is wonderful on a boss or just to reduce damage.
However, a mage does slow you down. Meditate and the inability to Eliminate are time wasters. If you only have three dragons, there's a good chance they're all physical fighters.
You can farm with three glass cannons. Sap is required - you want to use it regularly to keep your health up. Boss fights are going to be tough.
My personal recommendation is to farm with a mage if you have one already statted and stoned. Once you're used to the Workshop, perhaps try 3 glass cannons. If you don't have a mage, farm with your glass cannons - the farming build instead of the leveling build, if you have both types of dragons.
1.5.1 Breakdown for Individual Monsters
For 126 Str/58 (or 59) Qck
1 Rallied Eliminate (or Scratch + Eliminate)
Mistral Minion
Spellbound Golem
1 Scratch + 1 Eliminate
Swift Lumen
Swift Volt
1 Rallied Scratch + 1 Eliminate or 1 Scratch + 1 Rallied Eliminate
Coppercoil Creeper
Black Iron Creeper
Sentinel Mith
Construction Mith
Steelhound
Scrapmetal Tracker
2 Scratches + 7 Eliminates (aproximately) or 6 Rallied Eliminates
Frost Delver
Stone Borer
For 129 Str/50 Qck
1 Rallied Eliminate (or Scratch + Eliminate)
Mistral Minion
Spellbound Golem
1 Scratch + 1 Eliminate
Sfit Lumen
Swift Volt
Coppercoil Creeper
Black Iron Creeper
Sentinel Mith
1 Sap (or Contuse) + 1 Eliminate
Construction Mith (If you have 129 Str and do a Scratch + Eliminate on the Construction Mith, it will die, but you won't get your breath back, due to a bug. Sap and Contuse do a few more points of damage, so you avoid that bug.)
1 Rallied Scratch + 1 Eliminate or 1 Scratch + 1 Rallied Eliminate
Steelhound
Scrapmetal Tracker
2 Scratches + 7 Eliminates (aproximately) or 6 Rallied Eliminates
Frost Delver
Stone Borer
1.6 Leveling Tips
Okay, but leveling up with this team is difficult! Any tips?
If you want all three dragons to be the same level, and have the same stats, perfect for grinding, leveling up might be a bit of a chore. The dragons don't have any strong healing skills, and it takes a while to get enough breath to reliably Eliminate the monsters. Here are some tips for sticking with these three grinding dragons.
- Make certain you are using Eliminate and have Berserker (or other augment stones) stones equipped. They are an incredible help in leveling. You will quickly make the money back that you spent on them, once you've finished leveling. They are required for this guide.
- Use Ambush stones. They are an amazing benefit to both leveling and farming. They are expensive, yes, but they will speed up your leveling tremendously and make farming simple and easy. You will eventually make back the money you spent on them.
- Culex has a leveling guide here. There are several things I do differently, but it's a great guide to check out if you're having problems or just want another opinion.
- Know how much damage you do, and how much health the monsters have. Again, use this damage calculator. Learn which monsters need one hit with Scratch + one Eliminate, and which need two hits, or Rally to be put on the dragon using Eliminate. In relation to that...
- Use Rally. This increases the damage you do with one Eliminate a lot. Figure out which of your dragon most often goes first (it is dependent on their position, if everyone has the same Quickness/Ambush stones), and make sure they Rally the dragon using Eliminate. Remember that you don't want to use Rally while farming, however - just while leveling.
- Keep going, even if your dragons are hurt. Once you have enough breath to use Eliminate, fights get a lot easier. If you go back to the menu to heal up, though, you'll lose that breath. So go ahead and take some risks. If a dragon has fainted, they'll come back with 1/4 of their health the next battle. Use that to your advantage. If you're badly hurt and know you can't survive this fight, you can refresh the page or click on the Coliseum link on the sidebar to go back to the menu without losing energy.
- You don't have to level to 25 in order to grind! Depending on the area you want to grind in, you only have to get up to 7 or 13. Higher areas are not necessarily better to grind.
- Likewise, you don't have to level in the highest area possible! You can level for a while in the area just below your dragon's level - you won't get a Victory Chain bonus, but you can probably one-shot a lot of the monsters with Eliminate, so you'll kill faster than you would in an on-level area.
- If all else fails, you might want to try adding a bit more Vitality points to your dragons, or giving them more Vitality at lower levels (and then not giving them as much at higher levels). This will affect what level you have to be in order to grind certain areas - you might have to be a level or two higher. Do not bother with adding Mind or Defense - you get more benefit from adding directly to Vitality. I don't recommend this step until you've tried out others, because you'll likely want to use a Tincture of Dissolution at level 25 if you do this.
1.7 Mage/Healing Dragon
It's still pretty hard! Isn't there a safer way to level?
There is! Instead of having all three dragons on your team set up for grinding, consider having only two dragons that follow this guide, and the third dragon be a magical dragon that both does damage and has Aid.
If you're new to the Coliseum, or you can't afford Ambush stones, this is a good way to level your team.
This dragon will help your dragons stay alive, and do some extra damage as well. Once they reach level 12, they can get an element-specific skill that does something in addition to damage. I personally like Ice dragons for this - their element-specific skill is Congeal, which has the chance to freeze the monster in place so they can't do anything. Consider looking at this guide by Maki for a list of battle stones and seeing which elemental magic dragon sounds good to you.
For stats, follow the same numbers as the grinders, but put the points into Intelligence instead of Strength: 4 Intelligence/2 Quickness/1 Vitality, capping Quickness at 49 and Vitality at 11. Just replace Strength with Intelligence in the stat chart above.
Some people prefer giving their healers more Quickness and less Intelligence than this ratio. Feel free to play around with the numbers a bit. One ratio several people have liked is 3 Int/3 Qck/1 Vit. This does mean they'll do less damage if you use them to attack.
For the healing spell, I really recommend Aid instead of Regeneration. While Regeneration heals more health over time (a total of five turns), if you have two grinders in your party, you're going to kill fast enough that it won't have enough rounds to heal you. Instead, Aid heals in one burst.
After your grinders are leveled, you can either use a Tincture of Dissolution on the magic user dragon and turn them into a grinder as well, or simply grind with only two dragons.
This is the safest way to level. Make sure to put a Rally battle stone on the magical dragon, and if possible, two Ambush stones.
You might also consider putting two Discipline stones instead of Ambush. Two Discipline stones gives a dragon a 75% chance to gain 60 breath instead of a 50% chance. If you can't afford Ambush, this is the way to go! Discipline is quite cheap in the Auction in comparison.
So with all slots unlocked, my magical dragon would have the following stones:
* **
***
*Obviously replace Congeal with the correct level 12 elemental stone for your dragon, or with Contuse or the level 5 Elemental Bolt. Never use an Elemental Slash, that's a physical skill.
**Haste can be replaced by any other skill. I like having the option of using it, but it is completely personal preference.
***You might want to experiment with one or two Discipline stones instead of Ambush.
For a picture of a level 25 mage with this stat distribution and stones, click here.
1.8 Skill Rotations
Here are some suggested skill rotations.
If you don't have 35+ breath on your second or third dragon, use Scratch to kill monsters until you build that breath.
The following rotation assumes that you have no Ambushes equipped (so your fastest dragon's first turn is skipped, or the top dragon if all three dragons have the same Quickness), that you're in an on-level area (so you're getting victory chain bonuses when you win), that you can kill most monsters with either a Scratch + Eliminate or a Rallied Eliminate, and that you've built up enough breath to use Eliminate on your second and third dragons. Dragons are lettered from top to bottom. To see which monsters you can't kill with with a Scratch + Eliminate or a Rallied Eliminate, see Sylvandyr's Calculator Tool.
If a dragon has been rallied, it will be marked with a (r).
- Dragon B - Cast Rally on Dragon C
- Dragon C (r) - Eliminate Monster 1
- Monster 1 - Dead
- Monster 2 - Attack/gain breath
- Monster 3 - Attack/gain breath
- Dragon A - Scratch Monster 2
- Dragon B - Eliminate Monster 2
- Dragon C (r) - Eliminate Monster 3
If you have to use Scratch twice (or Scratch + Rallied Eliminate), I suggest the following rotation instead:
- Dragon B - Cast Rally on Dragon C
- Dragon C (r) - Scratch Monster 1
- Monster 1 - Attack/gain breath
- Monster 2 - Attack/gain breath
- Monster 3 - Attack/gain breath
- Dragon A - Scratch Monster 2
- Dragon B - Scratch Monster 2
- Dragon C (r) - Eliminate Monster 1
- Monster 2 - Attack/gain breath
- Monster 3 - Attack/gain breath
- Dragon A - Scratch Monster 3
- Dragon B - Eliminate Monster 2
- Dragon C (r) - Eliminate Monster 3
Obviously, if you have the breath, you can switch Dragon A and Dragon B in the last round.
Use minor health potions if you need to - they drop very frequently.
If you have a magical dragon as one of your three, replace Dragon A with the magical dragon. When the rotation says 'Scratch', instead use Contuse/Elemental attack or Meditate for breath. Use Aid as necessary.
If you have Ambush equipped, you'll be gaining additional turns. Follow the general idea of the rotation, but you'll be able to take less damage and toss in more healing (either from a magical dragon or from potions). You can see how just one added turn can make a large difference in the amount of damage you take. Ambush is, as always, highly recommended.
Always remember you can reload the Coliseum if you're in danger of all three dragons fainting.
The following rotation is for when you're grinding a low level area for drops, but can't kill with one Scratch.
- Use Scratch over and over until you have 35 breath.
- Use Eliminate.
- Repeat step 2 forever.
-
If you already have 35 breath going in:
- If you're up against magic-using monsters, use Scratch on the first round, until you get up to 85 breath. If you're up against physical monsters, skip to step 2.
- Use Eliminate.
- Repeat step 2 forever.
1.9 Misc Info
Phew! That's a lot of info. Anything else to add?
Just a few last things! After you've spent some time grinding, you'll be used to playing in the coliseum. To alleviate boredom, try watching some tv in another window or listening to a podcast as you grind. I've even successfully read a book while grinding!
Take frequent breaks! I cannot stress this enough. Repetitive stress injuries are no fun. Try a few stretches like the ones from this video or this one, or look for your own favorites. Also, be sure to get up and walk around, and refocus your eyes, at least every 30 minutes to an hour.
You can try to zoom your window out so that you don't have to move your mouse as far to do each action. This can save you some time!
There are several items that are better to sell on the auction house than sell from your hoard. I won't list everything (I don't know everything!) but consider listing food, familiars, apparel, any Swipp or Baldwin item, and certain battle stones on the auction house. I don't suggest trying to sell the basic junk materials - they're not useful for very much, so they're very, very hard to sell.
If you enjoy trading with Crim, keep 2-3 of each item in your hoard, including the cheaper battle stones. Also, you can look at the Swipp encyclopedia entry to see what items are useful to save in order to trade to Swipp.
If you plan on leveling dragons to exalt, I highly suggest having two level 25 dragons, both with two Ambush and 3 Berserker stones equipped and the 111 Strength/49 Quickness/11 Vitality build. These two dragons can easily level lower level dragons in the Kelp Beds. Look to the next post to see some more details about this!
Curious about how experience points work? Check out this guide by Sylvandyr, they explain it all.
I highly suggest figuring out how you want to arrange your battle stones, and then never deviate from this set-up. I have Eliminate in my first slot, Rally in my second, and Sap in my third. My fourth slot is used for whatever other stones I want, such as Haste or Reflect. All my dragons follow this pattern, which makes it a lot easier to switch between them. And Eliminate in the first slot means I can click the Abilities menu and then click once more on Eliminate without having to move my mouse.
1.10 Bugs
This is a section to note any bugs I currently know are affecting the coliseum. This may or may not be out of date - I'll keep it as current as I can.
- First, check this list of acknowledged bugs, and those further down, that are being tracked. I'll just list some of the more important ones here.
- The first dragon to go in battle is always skipped. This can make Ambush stones appear not to work.
- Augment stones Quickness bonus don't appear to be applied until after the first turn. The Strength bonus works immediately, however.
- Enamor (level 12 Light battle stone) does not apply the debuff.
- Many problems with Eliminate, such as the maximum breath after using Eliminate being 85, or occasionally breath not being returned even on a kill.
- If you get a monster down to exactly 0 health with an Eliminate, your breath is not returned, even though the monster dies.
- Killing a monster with Shred's bleed may freeze the Coliseum and require you to refresh the page.
That's everything I can think of! Thanks for sticking with my long-winded guide, I hope it helps. Leave any questions here, and if I can't answer them, maybe someone else can.
Edit: Added a section on what to do if you can't afford Eliminate. It's gotten so expensive, ouch!