General

Some information about how to gear right now:

Make the following link skills, get them to level 120.

Kanna - 10% total dmg
Demon Slayer - 15% boss dmg
Demon Avenger - 10% total dmg
Xenon - 10% all stats
Jett - you can get a core with 34atk easily
Phantom - 15% critical chance
Luminous - 15% pdr

beyond that, organize your character cards. Try for three sets all containing only cards over lvl 100. This will give you 3% boss dmg and some atk...for each set, so 3 times.
Having three lvl 100 pirates in one set will also give you 6% pdr
the cards for Hayato give you, iirc, 6% max crit dmg, shade gives you both 3% min and max crit dmg...the cards for Kanna give you 3% boss dmg, demon avenger gives 3% boss dmg. Angelic Buster gives a massive boost to dex. At lvl 200+ I receive 80 dex from it.

Beyond that make sure you have a complete set of superior gollux gear. The tip/trick I'd advise you to use here is to buy a second pendant slot from cash shop. This allows you to equip 2 superior gollux pendants at one time which completes the gear set, giving you 30% boss dmg and like 35 atk, all without having to use the belt. This is important because the Tyrant Belt is incredible once you get it up above 7+ stars.

Make sure you have an entire CRA set and that you're getting the set effect

Collect the tyrant gear slowly over time.

Once gear is all in place...do not give in to the temptation to scroll or enhance any of it. The first move you make is to slowly work out the regular potential for each piece of gear. Don't focus too long on perfecting the lines of any one piece of gear...this is a waste and the money is much better spent on a piece of gear with crappy stat lines vs perfecting a piece so that it can gain a meaningless small amount of of extra %.

You may be wondering which gear to cube first...the answer is easy and this will make a massive difference in how quickly you boost your range. Do not cube any of the gear. Cube first your primary weapon, your secondary weapon and your emblem. This is because these pieces of gear are different than every other by allowing you to get potential lines that include boss dmg, atk%, pdr%, etc. Keep in mind that the Emblem does not allow you to get boss dmg, just total dmg, pdr and crit chance. Try to get boss dmg% lines, atk% and pdr on each item. Once you have decent lines focus on the bonus potential for these three items...and for the same reason listed above. The lines you can get are far better than the lines you'd get on other gear allowing you to increase your range exponentially with just these items. The rough equivalency between these lines is 9% atk = 30% boss dmg, 12% atk = 40% Boss dmg. Total dmg = Boss dmg in the formula so when you have the choice between boss and atk%...its obvious that a line like 9% or 12% total dmg is a waste of a line on your gear. rmbr...this is bc 9% total dmg is added to the range formula identically to boss dmg. So since totaly dmg is the same as boss dmg...9% and 12% are crap when you could get 30% or 40% in their place, or atk which is just as good. All told, once your stat window shows you being between 200 and 250% boss focus on %atk...try for at least 36 to 45% atk or higher. Rmbr that with %atk, bc of the nature of the formula you will never have to account for the nature of diminishing returns.

After these three items...try to slowly boost your other gear so that each piece has like 9% primary stat at first, then maybe 12% and then 15%. Once you get your remaining gear a reasonable amount of stat% bonus pot everything and first make the effort to get at least 1 line that is 10-14 atk. Remember...do NOT buy yourself Tyrant Gloves now. Buy every other Tyrant as soon as you can, but do not worry about Tyrant Gloves until much, much later...I'll explain and outline the process involved with them further down...

Once you've got your CRA gear, your Sweet-water Glasses and Tattoo up to at least 12-15% primary stat and at least one decent line for Bonus Pot(ie, 10+ atk or 4+ primary stat), as well having at least some decent lines on your primary weapon, your secondary weapon and your Emblem, then you're ready for the next step. That would be scrolling.
In general most people will tell you that the only real way to scroll your weapons is with Primes. In my opinion this is far from true and a serious waste of time and money. I personally would scroll anything other than your primary weapon and your Heart with whatever you feel like. The key at this point is just to make sure that you do it perfectly, which means pass every single slot, hammer it twice and pass the scrolls there as well. A decent route to take for some gear would be a few chaos scrolls of goodness. But to this end and towards being careful...if you don't gain at least 3 atk with the first COG/ICOG...then innocence the item and try again. Once you're working with some decent atk boosts, -->or if you just want to get it done quick and cheap with 30% or 70% StarForce <--, which is perfectly fine and likely will never, not ever, never ever never ever never ever be noticed by anyone including yourself. To make things all pass, if this is something you dunno...do the following:
Use the scroll, whichever you choose, if it fails, go to fm and owl for 10% clean slate scrolls. Once you find a store, normally there are a bunch selling them cheap and in bulk, stand beside the store and just go one after another till you regain the spot you lost. Once you have the slot back, try again to pass the scroll. Do this over and over till you've perfectly scrolled every single slot, including hammered slots, and succeeded on EVERY slot. At this point you can work on enhancing. In general I would suggest you work first to enhance your tyrant gear and your weapon. With tyrants this is where their benefit really starts to shine. For example my tyrant boot started with just 30 attack. However, I've enhanced it to 12 stars. This added a further 88 attack to the boot. It now has 118 attack...
How this works is for the first 5 stars I would suggest strongly that you buy a 5star enhancement scroll. You do this at the VERY beginning before you've enhanced the item AT ALL. Go to cash shop and purchase a Guardian Scroll. Click this and then attach it to your 5 star scroll...these scrolls are fairly expensive so you don't want to have to buy one over and over as you fail them. This item will cause the scroll to be saved and it will not disappear when you fail it. Use the Guardian Scroll on the 5 star scroll over and over until you successfully pass it. You will now have 5 stars on your item. Now, go to cash shop and buy a Superior Shielding Ward. Use this by double clicking it and then applying it to the Tyrant you're working on. Now, buy a few regular enhancement scrolls, the kind that blow up when failed. They're cheap enough that you don't need to protect them with a Guardian Scroll. So, once you have the enhancement scroll and the Superior Shielding Ward successfully on your item(it will be listed on the item that it's there)...now try to pass the enhancement scroll. Each time you fail the scroll you will need to go to cash shop and get another Superior Shielding Ward to protect your item. Just repeat this process until you have passed the enhancement scroll and have 6 stars. Now, repeat this process again just as described above and do it until you have 7 stars on your Tyrant. For me this process, and I've done it more than 5 times, never took more than 25k nx per item brought to 7 stars. At this point things get hard...you'll need a large amount of mesos saved. Buy as many cheap No Boom Enhancement scrolls. These will be over 1 bil mesos each, typically. Before you click buy, double check that the scroll you're buying actually describes in its description that it WILL NOT blow up the item on failure. A lot of disgusting people in the FM try to trick people buy selling a bunch of real No Boom Scrolls...and immediately beside them they'll put up a few regular Enhancement scrolls that DO blow up your item. Make sure you're not falling for that each time. Read the description. Now, once you have the No Boom and have at least 7 stars on your item, go to cash shop and purchase a Guardian Scroll to attach to your No Boom Scroll. This will prevent the scroll from disappearing when you fail it...and you will be failing it a LOT. Now, try to pass the scroll. Repeat this process, buying a Guardian Scroll to use on EVERY attempt, and always read your item to make sure it has the protections you have listed as active on them. Eventually you'll pass the No Boom and have 8 stars. If you're serious about capping you'll want to get every Tyrant that you have up to at least 10-11 stars. At that point most people slack off and just try to work on them periodically. As you get up to 9 or 10 stars things will get seriously hard. The success rate drops below 20% pass rate and then down to 10 and then 5%....it won't be a stretch to say that you'll be spending 50k nx trying to enhance successfully just 1 star at this point. It gets insane.

Now, once you have your Tyrants dealt with, buy primes for you Heart and your Weapon. To perfectly Prime Scroll an item, this is the process: Buy The primes. These will be very expensive unless you gained some via events. Protect the Prime Scroll with a Guardian Scroll from CS, then go through FM and buy Protection Scrolls. Take the Protection Scroll and attach it to the piece of gear you're Priming. This will now protect your scroll from failling and protect your gear from being destroyed on failure. Of note...you only need to do this if you're dealing with an expensive Heart such as a Superior Lidium Heart or a Titanium Heart. Now, when you have the Prime protected with a Guardian and the Heart or the Weapon protected with a prot scroll, attempt to pass the Prime on your item. These are difficult for a lot of people and the success rate seems to be incredibly random. Sometimes you'll pass 5 Primes in a row, first try...other times I find myself buying Guardians and prots 4-5 times in an effort to pass just ONE Prime Scroll...surprising since the success rate listed on the Prime says its 40%. Doesn't feel like it fairly often in my experience. You do this process over and over until your Heart is perfect and until your Weapon is perfectly Primed. At this point you'll move to Enhancing. The Heart is a simple process, but the weapon gets a bit difficult at times. You'll want to get it to 15 stars and the last stars will be very hard. The difference between this and Tyrants is that you'll be best off just doing this via the StarForce Window. Once you get to the higher numbers you'll likely blow your weapon up. At this point you'll receive a Weapon Trace...now, go to FM and rebuy a perfectly clean version of the weapon you just boomed. When you get it, go to enhance the weapon. It'll flash the option to use the weapon trace, do this and it'll suddenly restore your weapon back as it was before you boomed it, minus the Stars you had gotten. You'll have all the stats from scrolling back as well as all the lines of potential. It even returns the item tag if your item had one before. Try again and again until you pass all 15 Stars...the boost for each star is meaningful enough to justify the frustration.

At this point you'll be in the position to just go at your own pace with regards to finalizing your items at the point that you're happy with them. Things left at this point are limited mostly to trying to get your items at the % primary stat that you want them at. Weapons and Emblem you'll be working towards getting as many lines of %atk and %Boss Dmg, combined with %pdr(you'll want your PDR, as listed in the stat window, to be at or above 90% if you have any intention to try Chaos Vellum or other high level bosses. Your damage will likely be extremely, read: EXTREMELY limited and diminished by a boss like CVellum if your PDR isn't high enough...so it's necessary to get a few lines.

For NEBs, the first move you need to make is to buy two 25% boss dmg nebs. If you can't find these, a 20% boss neb will likely be your only option. Put one on your weapon and the other on your Secondary Weapon. Your Emblem is different, even though the potential lines were the same...for Emblem just try your best to get a 3-4% Primary Sta/All Stat neb and attach it. You'll also want to pass 3-4% primary stat or all stat nebs on all of your other gear as well. The reason you'll likely avoid 4% Nebs is because the price for them is typically insanely high whereas nebs specific to you primary stat, with the small compromise of maybe 3% instead of 4% will be far more easy to find and afford. For me I mostly tried for 4% All Stat nebs just on items that I really prized, such as my Tyrants, Superior Gollux Ring, Pendants and Earring, Lightning God Ring, etc. Work at it the way that fits your mood, no one is likely to ever notice that you have a 3% luk neb instead of a 4% all stat neb on an item.

Tyrant Gloves. These are something you do not worry about until you're finalizing your gear. In general Dojo gloves are extremely good and relatively easy to acquire as needed. Once you get your gear to the point where it's virtually done and finished, purchase a clean Tyrant Glove. Cube it until Legendary. It needs to be Legendary because, in order to compete and surpass the Dojo gloves, you will need at least one line of 15% max crit or 15% min crit dmg. Try your best to get this line in combination with at least one other useful line. Then for bonus potential you'll also be aiming for Legendary as you can get another max/min crit line. However you're fine with just trying to get a decent amount of atk, such as 14, and two lines like 4% primary stat, 4% primary stat. Once you're at this point, follow the same process used to scroll your other Tyrant items. You'll want do this as best as possible and then get your Tyrant Glove to at least 11 stars. This is why you wait till so late in the gearing process to do this. It's insanely expensive, especially when you realize that in the end the glove will still be only slightly better than the Dojo gloves you've been using. Vaguely, Hero Glove is equivalent to a Glove with the potentials I outlined combined with 8-10 stars.

Decent items. You'll also most likely be interested in acquiring some items intentionally scrolled to allow you the option to cast various decent skills like Speed Infusion, Adv Blessing, etc. To this end, you'll be best off using:

Adv Blessed - Use Chaos PB Helm, the lvl 135 one. Cube the helm until it hits Legendary Tier. Now keep cubing and if you get lucky, you'll eventually get the line for Advanced Bless.

Speed Infusion - Cube a high level glove, such as Pensalir or High Quality Dimension Glove. Get the item to Legendary and keep going. This one took me quite a lot of time to finally get the Decent Speed Infusion Line but I did get it eventually.

Combat Orders - Any shoe that you can equip above level 100. Pensalir is an easy option to find in fm. Cube till Legendary and like the others it'll happen eventually. I found this skill to be fairly easy and I've seen it many times on other boots I was working with.

Sharp Eyes, Hyper Body skill can be acquired as Nebs. In general HB isn't a very common skill to get.

Thats virtually covers everything about making your gear that i can think of. Try for at least 250% boss dmg, perhaps 80%+ atk, 90% pdr and 100% crit. You'll want to work at your Inner Ability the way that best works for your class as it changes completely from class to class.

Some easy tips to make some money:
Get involved in Professions. I highly suggest getting the Alchemy Profession. Work carefully to level this up past level 10, then to Master and finally Meister Level. At this point, go to random maps that you know to be very active with people training, even maps frequented by botters. Look around and you'll find mysterious herbs and ore veins. Mine or collect these...by doing this often when you have free time you'll acquire many of the items needed for Alchemy for free. When you need specific Herbs in bulk and feel like farming them, the best option is to go to Evo and attach the cores specific to what you're looking for. Buy a few Lucky Winter Drop coupons. Also, if you've been doing MPE fairly regularly to farm green and red mpe potions, you'll find eventually that you'll get a Greed pendant as a drop. This will give you a significant boost to your drop ratio as well. Combining these together will acquire for you a significant number of herbs.

Some recipes that sell well: Make Advanced Hero Potion(10% atk boost) and Advanced Boss Rush Potions(20% boss dmg). These sell fairly well over time and for a very high price. Furthermore, if you boss often, particularly Zakum, you'll likely occasionally acquire some EXP Potion Recipes. Once you've acquired a ton of the herbs necessary(Juniper Berry Seeds) make these en masse. Remember that once you click the recipe and learn it...it will disappear in 24 hours. Now start mass making these potions as much as you can till it expires. These sell insanely well in the FM.
You can also make 12 slot bags as a Meister level alchemist...from my experience Mineral Bags sell for far more than herb and much faster as well. Do this often and consistently, maintaining yourself at Meister level at all times...and you'll slowly but surely build up a great amount of savings eventually.

Hope that helps.

Thanks for your guys' help

@quil: [b]December 2009:[/b]
Release of the 1st "Legend" class, Aran, a warrior wields the mighty pole arm, Maha. Aran was the legendary hero who defeated and sealed away the black mage, losing all his powers years later. This is the first "combo" class which requires button mashing.

[b]March 2010:[/b]
Release of the Legend Mage class who is accompanied by the Dragon, Mir - Evan. The Evan storyline is similar to that of Eragon. A boy stumbles upon a dragon egg and is the chosen one who leaves home to seek an adventure to defeat the Black Mage. Evans also are the first class to have different evolutions and your dragon, Mir evolves as you level up through many growth stages attacking with you.

[b]June 2010:[/b]
[i]Original release of hidden potential and equipment enhancement.[/i]
Hidden potential are stats on your equipment that adds an additional 2-3 lines of stats improvement either by a set base amount or a percentage amount. Some drop with hidden potential or you can use a potential scroll to reveal these stats/

Equipment enhancement is also another way to increase the stats on your equipment, however this is after all the slots are used up. Each successful enhancement gives a yellow star at the top of your equipment if your scroll succeeds or explodes when it fails. The more amount of successes on the equipment, the chances of success are less. Depending if you used an advanced equipment enhancement or a regular equipment enhancement, your chances are less. This is stated on the scroll.

[b]December 2010 - "Big Bang":[/b] This is the biggest noticeable change in content.
[i]Pretty much all all you know and loved has been altered. The user interface has changed, map layouts and monsters are now changed and adjusted for user friendliness.[/i]
Release of the "Resistance" branch of classes in the city of Edelstein, which has fallen under control of the Black Wings, who work under the black mage.

Three new classes are of this branch:
Wild Hunter - Crossbowman who rides a jaguar [first mounted class]
Battle Mage - Melee mage who uses staves
Mechanic - a mech-suit gun user

[b]June 2011 - "Chaos":[/b]
Arans & Evans got their skills buffed.
[i]This is the release of the Profession system which replaces the old Maker system and completely overhauled crafting.[/i]
Now you can learn:
Alchemy to brew potions.
Jewel Crafting to make accessories.
Smithing to make weapons & armor.
You can currently chose 2 different types.

[i]New Boss: Cygnus [Empress][/i]
New Empress [Cygnus] boss has been released, dropping 140 equipment for each class with set bonuses.

[b]September/October 2011 - "Ascension":[/b]
PQ revamp, adjustments were made to PQs and new PQs were released.
The three primary explorer classes [Warrior, Mage, Archer] received a buff.

[b]November/December 2011 - "Legends":[/b]
Release of Cannoneer the additional Pirate Adventurer class which has a different storyline and Mercedes a new Legend class that uses Dual Blowguns which goes by an elf storyline, Demon Slayer a new Resistance warrior who uses 1h Mace/Axe which uses the new Demon Fury system instead of MP.

[b]June/July 2012 - "Renegades":[/b]
Release of Phantom, The Thief Legend class
He has the ability to steal one skill from any of the explorer classes for each job advancement as well has having his own.
Explorer thieves & pirates skills received a small buff.

[b]November/December 2012 - "Tempest":[/b]
Release of Luminous the mage Legend class along with the release of the Nova classes:
Kaiser - A dragonoid human who uses 2-handed swords, being able to transform using Dragon-like skills.
Angelic Buster - A dress-up character which also has the same wings as Kaiser having a transformation form. Angelic Busters can only be made as female being the first Gender-locked class. They were also the most OP at their prime due to being the first class to break the 999k cap. They also use a new soul charge system instead of mp.

[b]April/May 2013 - "Mark of Honor":[/b]
Release of Sengoku classes:
Hayato: a warrior samurai who uses the new weapons Katana
Kanna: a fan wielding mage class

[b]May 2013 - "Cygnus Returns":[/b]
Dawn Warrior/Wind Archer/Thunder Breaker completely revamped with completely new skills as well as their max level cap raised to 250 from 120.

[b]June/July 2013 - "Unleashed":[/b]
[i]-Damage cap raised to 50,000,000 from 999,999.
-Seen damage range cap increased to 2,000,000 from 1,000,000.
Level cap of all classes increased to 250 from the previous 200.[/i]
Bosses were also revamped to align with the new damage cap.
Release of Xenon a Resistance class based on cyborgs, also being the first hybrid class being both Pirate and Thief and Demon Avenger the second Resistance Warrior class to also following the demon theme using a newly developed HP system for their skills instead of MP.

[i]New Bosses: Queen, Pierre, Von Bon, Vellum[/i]
Release of Root Abyss where the bosses drop lv150 set armor/weapons which drop from the Chaos version. These equips were a new set that made Empress obsolete.

[b]November/December 2013 - "RED":[/b]
Explorer classes got revamped to balance out the newer classes receiving their necessary buffs.
Release of the Zero class, the first tag-team 2h-sword warrior class where you control 2 characters in one. Also the first class to be created starting at level 100.

[b]January 2014 - "Chase, The Beast Tamer":[/b]
A new class, Chase, the Beast Tamer was released. This is a mage class that uses animal friends to assist in battle. This class is based on modes where you can use Cat, Bear, Snow Leopard, and Hawk which have different personalities and are used differently depending if you want to be supportive or offensive.

[b]June/July 2014 - "Rising Heroes":[/b]
Release of Shade, the forgotten Pirate Legend using animal spirits as an aid to their fists.

[b]August/September 2014:[/b]
The continuation of the Cygnus revamp finishing with Blaze Wizard and Night Walker revamp. The skills have been changed and the max level has been changed to 250 from 120.

[b]November 2014 - "Star Force":[/b]
Equipment enhancement scrolls are now obsolete with the new Star Force system allowing you to reach stars on regular equipment up to mainly 12 stars prior to booming. [Low level equipment has a maximum of lower stars] Special equipment such as tyrants boom much earlier. This system also has the chance to drop in the amount of stars.
Release of Star Planet, a smaller world where you can play the event mini-games such as one-card all the time for special prizes and bonuses.
Reward Points were introduced in this patch, these points are acquired by killing bosses and special daily tasks as well as reach certain levels. These are used in the cash shop for rewards shop prizes as well as being able to use them as a 30% discount on most items if they are eligible.

[b]April/May 2015 - "Black Heaven":[/b]
[i]New Boss: Lotus[/i]
A new storyline that unlocked the currently new hardest Boss Lotus, the brother of Orchid a member of the Black Wings. This also has another set of equipment arguably better than the CRA set but has not been yet proven, though it's said CRA set is still better.

In between Nexon has been doing more events such as more frequent 2x, Spell Trace fever[additional success rate chances to scroll items with Spell Trace], Miracle Time[additional chances to raise potential tier when cubing with cash shop cubes and double tier ups]. Most maps at this point have been revamped and everything you know and have come to love pre-bigbang is no more. Monster levels and HP have been adjusted to the new level ranges as well as damage ranges and party-play in maps such as Lionheart Castle, Strong Hold, Hall of Honor are no more.
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I'll send you the guide that I wrote for someone else a little while ago. I hope it helps.

If you need help in any of the steps below, feel free to PM me. [Note: Most things in this guide does not require NX, you just need patience]

[b]Basic training guide:[/b]
[i]Training, most people grind lower levels til you can PQ and PQing pretty much levels you fairly quickly to the major grinding phases at ~160. FM seems a little more empty now but there are a lot more shops around, especially in Scania. Since owls are now purchased through pot shops, you can easy pick some up and just search for the items you need[other than Perm NX items]. [/i]

-Starting from level 1-10, you pretty much just job advance as usual.
-Once you're level 10, you can go to Golem Temple in Henesys in which you can level there until 25-30.
-Once you're level 25-30, you can move to Gold Beach. I would start on the left side map with the coconuts and work my way up to Shockwave Beach 1. I would stay here until around maybe level 50-55 or so.
-Alternative maps include Pantheon until 40, then Mummy dogs in Perion until about 60.
-Starting at level 50, you can go LudiPQ. PQs are now all gathered in one place available by the Dimension Door in most towns. I would Ludi PQ until level 60. [If you do not wish to PQ the whole way, you can go to drakes at around level 55-60 and work your way to 70]
-At 60 you can do White Fangs in El Nath until 70 as well.
-Once you are 70, I would do Romeo and Juliet PQ and stop and grind at the stage with the Roids. This stage is the best for exp even grinding outside of PQ best optimized with a Phantom/Priest with HS and a Kanna for Kishin. Other Alternatives are Sahel 2 in Ariant. You can stay grinding in this PQ until 140-150, it's pretty much the fastest way to level IMO, unless you wanna try to grind in some maps in Magatia which is a bit slower.
-If you don't want to PQ, at 70 you can train in Ariant at Dessert Rabbits. You can move to Sandrats/Cube Slimes at about 80.
-At 85-90ish you can go to Roids or Homonculus in Magatia,
-At ~120 or so you can do Monster Park Extreme or continue to do RnJ.
Note you can start doing your 2 daily Zakum boss runs here. 120 is the minimum requirement to do Easy Horntail and you should be running that as well. You can try Ranmaru and Hilla as well but they may be a tad bit difficult depending on your range and class.
-Once you hit 140 you can do a party for Dimension Invasion PQ if you can't solo it yourself, you can pretty much do your daily 10 PQs and then go grind at Mysterious Path 3 in Singapore. Once you reach 165, you can now enter Stronghold. [b]Note:[/b][i]Honestly, I really don't recommend it unless you have friends to leech off of or unless you can do 1-3 hits. Otherwise, the exp isn't as great and you're better off doing your daily DIPQs.[/i] You can pretty much farm the gloves in DIPQ and sell in a shop for a couple mil apiece, I'm not sure where the price stands right now.
-Alternative maps for Strong Hold are in Twilight Perion, the map that I recommend is the mixed golems map though it's a bit big, the spawn is great and the hp/exp ratio isn't bad. If your range is a little bit lower you can try this out as well

You can boss in-between and continue to do so for optimal experience. The default key is O in-game I believe for the boss tab so you can check the requirements there. [You can NPC the drops and make a couple mil a day, more bosses, more money. Start with the easy and work your way up. Most bosses have 2 entry limits]
You can boss in-between for optimal experience. The default key is O in-game I believe for the boss tab so you can check the requirements there. [You can NPC the drops and make a couple mil a day, more bosses, more money. Start with the easy and work your way up. Most bosses have 2 entry limits]

[b]Items to think about having eventually for end game:[/b] (This may prove to be expensive, but I will post the affordable equips after]
-Chaos Root Abyss Set [Hat, Top, Bottom, Weapon]
-Tyrant [Glove, Shoes, Cape, Belt]
-Sweet Water [Glasses(Eye), Tattoo(Face)]
-Superior/Reinforced Gollux Set [Ring, Pendant, Belt, Earring] (if you use Tyrant Belt, you would have to use NX to purchase a pendant slot to equip 2 pendants to get the full set bonus]
-Rings [Since the Gollux Set takes up a ring slot and unique equips, you can pretty much get one of each Gollux RIng, if not Lightning God Ring for the best stats]
[b]Note:[/b] This is the generally ideal set but by all means you do not need to chase this as this is VERY expensive.

[b]Cheap but Efficient Equipment Guide:[/b]
The CRA set is a couple hundred mil apiece but there may be some pieces out there depending on class for a couple mil. If you cannot get this, you can try to buy the empress set for the bonus effect stats. Personally, I would say save your money and at around 140, you can grind at the higher leveled monsters in Leafre or the Pirates in Herb town. They drop the new level 130-140 set which gives a set bonus as well. If you take this process, you can save your money but slowly increase your damage. These level 130-140 sets are also tradeable so you don't need to purchase use SoK or pSoK to transfer them character to character. Next I would try to purchase cheap solid/reinforced gollux pendant/belt for small range increase. If you hunt bosses, easy bosses around be Zak/Horntail/Hilla/Magnus/Ranmaru in the easy/regular modes(you can do these twice daily, bring a friend if you must), I wouldn't attempt harder modes until you're geared and much stronger. The bosses drop accessories[Eye,Face,Ring,Earring,Badge, etc.] that also have set equips. If you find some Epic / Unique accessories, you may make a quick buck. Remember, though you won't be getting rich fast but patience is the key.

[b]Scrolling:[/b]
-The scrolling system has been semi-replaced with the Spell Trace system which you collect a required amount of traces to use a scroll. How it works is you double click the Spell Trace in your etc tab or the Pink Hammer in your inventory window and place the item in there. You can then see how many traces is required per scroll. If you're poor, I recommend 70-100%ing your items, except for weapons which I always recommend at the very least 70%ing it.
-The enhancement system is semi-replaced by the Star Force system, this system takes effect after you finish scrolling an item. Once the item does not have any slots left, you can add additional stats by enhancing it with Star Force which is done by the Pink Hammer. I recommend Star Forcing all your equips until 10 stars because it is fairly cheap to do so. This will also increase your range by a pretty fair amount.

[b]Potentials:[/b]
There a certain tiers for items to have potential which has 4 different ranks. I wouldn't really worry about potential items unless they are above level 75 which is the 3rd tier.

First Tier: 1-30, items will generally have lines in multiples of 1%. (2%, 3%, 4%)
Second Tier: 31-74, items will generally have lines in multiples of 2%. (4%,6%,9%)
Third Tier: 75-159, items will generally have lines in multiples of 3%. (6%,9%,12%)
Fourth Tier: 160+, this one is a little unique because the lines are 4% (7%, 10%, 13%)

How it works:
if your item is Rare, you will generally have the lowest multiple.
if your item is Epic, you will get the maximum landing at 2nd multiple.
if your item is Unique you will get the maximum landing at 3rd multiple.
if your item is Legendary you will get the maximum landing at highest multiple.

So for example, your Legendary item unlocks the potential to have the maximum % but you can land any of the %s below it, such as rare, epic, unique. So if you get VERY lucky, your lines would all be of one stat but don't be so sure to expect to get that easily. You will be spending many, many, packs of cubes. The best time to cube is during miracle time when nexon does a 2x-like event for cubing, increasing the chances of rank up. Again, I don't recommend cubing anything below the third tier.

Weapons and armors have different potentials. Weapons have additional stats such as att/matt where as armor is generally stat based. You can make cubes but farming the materials and leveling the skill level takes time. I would recommend picking up professions as soon as possible to start leveling it up. Sometimes when you make equipment, such as earrings, you can get epic/unique items which you can sell for a fair amount, meaning you can make money this way. When you mine mysterious rocks you also have a chance to find cubes(other way would be bossing)!

[b]Nebulites:[/b]
You don't really get to see this much but people generally applies this to weapons. Select few rich players have acquired a lot of nebs for their armor as well.

How it works:
You can purchase a nebulite socket opener thing from the pot shop and apply it to your item. You can then apply your nebulite of choice depending what you have.

Weapon: I would put on a %boss or %pdr neb or % att neb for endgame. If you can't afford it, you can use an att neb or crit neb. Think wisely because removing a neb costs NX.
Armor: I always recommend %stat nebs but if you're poor, again you may choose to use simple +stat nebs

There are some useful but expensive skill nebs with skills such as Hyper Body for pants and Sharp Eyes for gloves meaning that regardless of class you can use both those skills but at a nerfed rate. The stats only apply to yourself however.

If you use a neb on an item, you can remove it via cash shop and the original neb is lost forever.

[b]Souls for Weapons:[/b]
This is a newer system where you can even more stats to your weapons.

How it works:
You use a soul enchanter on your weapon, these drop from monsters and some bosses. Once your item is a soul weapon, you equip your weapon and apply the soul. If you do not have a soul, you would have to hunt bosses which drop soul shards. Collect 10 shards to trade for a random stat soul in which you can apply to your weapon. Some souls are attacks, some are summons. You get a random stat soul upon trading in 10 shards. The soul you apply on the weapon is changeable for another soul in the future but the original soul is lost forever.

[b]How do I make money?[/b]
[i]This section is a work in-progress but I will post some basic notes.[/i]
Take advantage of all events with a coin shop. Invest in a pet because looting with a pet is much more helpful and it helps you when you train with the auto hp/mp skills too. Things that sell all the time are spell traces, collect them. Potions and other things from bossing can be NPCed for mesos but they can also be extracted and broken down for Monster Crystals used for crafting, extract them in Ardentmill to farm monster crystals that also sell for a pretty decent amount.

I would learn your profession skills and start mining/crafting as soon as you can to get those levels up. High level potions, accessories, and even equips can be sold at a pretty decent amount. Work for it. If you're not willing to put in the effort, don't expect to be as rich as everyone else. Every little bit counts.

Another thing is to keep note of prices. Spell traces generally go up during fever time so it's possible to do some reselling here but I wouldn't depend on that.

[b]Things to look out for/Advice[/b]
Take advantage and read the notes on the website, there are many events that cubing and scrolling are listed on the main page. It's not hard to find and don't spam around asking for it, you'll easily see it there with flashing colors and you are told way ahead of time to prepare. Training during 2x times doesn't hurt but grab a map a head of time by a few hours because they get packed in the higher level areas. Don't fret, you may choose alternative training areas.

Pick up a spider familiar for drop rate, it really helps with farming. If you wish to hunt for one, at around level 80 go to Verne Mine in Edelstein, these also fetch a pretty decent profit at about 10m a familiar depend on server. What's neat is using the spider familiar will also help you find more familiars quicker.

Investing in a pet is also a good choice, you can now do so by farming rewards points in star planet and by daily bosses. The rewards shop includes a pet and water of life when your pet dies.

If you choose to do MPE, collect your daily free passes so you can use them later. [Pre-140]

It is recommended to spell trace / star force as soon as possible due to lower level equipment requiring very small amounts of spell trace.

I came back a few months back and I found this due to personal research/playing so I hope it helps. I don't know everything so I answer most things to the best of my ability.

[quote=AshleyAttacked]Regarding population...you might be better off starting over in Scania. It's not so much that in game population has declined, it's more that population has shifted towards 2-3 different servers as people settle in and look for more active communities. Scania, as usual, has one of the most active communities. There are always plenty of people training at the primary training maps. Ch 1 freemarket, fm's 1-22 are almost always entirely filled, ch2 fm1-6 are also filled and random guild HQ's and fm1's are filled with stores scattered across the rest of the channels. Regarding changes, you can probably deduce what's occured since the trend was set in motion before you quit previous and has only continued progressing in that direction. There are more classes...though the differences between each class are becoming less and less over time. Virtually every class can become a dps oriented bossing class if you make it right. Basically that means just pick what you like the most and what annoys you the least and play that. Considering what it was 4 years ago vs what it is now, probably the biggest changes in my minds would be the fact that hp washing is no longer a thing and, in general, most classes have various pathways to getting massive levels of hp or dodge making staying alive at bosses nowhere near as challenging as it used to be. There are a lot of different mage classes out now, most of them seem to vaguely follow, with only minor functional differences, the concept of a 'battle mage' in other rpg's. You were a bishop so I'm assuming you're somewhat interested in support classes...theres a new mage type called 'kanna' which has a skill that basically does what HS does in the end, but accomplishes it by boosting the spawn timing of all mobs on the map and by increasing the number of spawn it increases the number killed over time which increases the collective exp gained and in the end boosts the exp you and your party get to a pretty similar degree that HS does. However, Kanna is also a relatively decent bossing class, especially solo, so it's a bit more diverse than playing a bishop is/was while giving you a skill that will ALWAYS put you in the position where parties will beg you to join.

Training areas follow this basic pattern currently: do quests til level 2x, then go to gold beach until 35-40, then go to wooden masks outside of Perion until 45-50, then go to drakes at the first map to the right of Sleepywood. Train there until 60-65, then head to el nath and take the danger taxi to the first map, train there till 70...once you hit 70 go to the pq map you'll find located in the dimensional mirror. you can access it on the upper left side of your screen by clicking 'quick move', then 'dimensional mirror', then select party entry from the choices provided. Go there and find a Romeo and Juliet party quest (RnJ is the abbreviation used universally to refer to this)...just enter with a party, watch what they're doing and you'll figure it out sooner or later, either way someone will always know what to do and be able to solo it for the rest of the party if you're confused. Then mid RnJ theres a map with great spawn and typically the party will just cease moving along with the quest at that move and just stay there and use the map as a regular training map. After 15 minutes you'll be kicked out with your party and typically your party will just head back in and repeat the process over and over. Do this PQ till lvl 100, then do it along with Monster Park Extreme, 3 times a day. Add to this the 'questline' for 'evo world', finish that and then basically do a mix of all of those until you get to around 170. My knowledge of these later levels is limited since I haven't done them on any character recently enough to know specifically what is best...but it's not much more than what I've already outlined from what I've heard others say. Once you hit 170-180 you're basically at end game level and you'll try to train either second drill hall or first drill hall, which is accessed from the Future Henesys map...and available after a fairly short line of quests thats basically anyone can explain to you once you get there. Then just cc around fdh and sdh looking for a party...and thats where you train till level 250.

Some good ways to make money would be Star Planet and also getting a profession, I personally think Alchemy works best, leveling it to the Meister level(basically level 12) and then just consistently maintain it at that level by crafting stuff for exp each day. If you stop for too long you slowly lose exp and can end up fall back first to level 11/master and then to level 10. But once you're meister you can craft various potions to sell, you can make 10 or 12 slot bags to hold minerals or herbs which always sell for a decent profit, and to get the items to make it all possible you just walk around relatively active maps, cc around and collect all the mysterious herbs and veins you can, and then further farm specific herbs at the evo map.

Hope that helps.[/quote]

I read it all. Thanks. What are the various pathways for HP?

Regarding population...you might be better off starting over in Scania. It's not so much that in game population has declined, it's more that population has shifted towards 2-3 different servers as people settle in and look for more active communities. Scania, as usual, has one of the most active communities. There are always plenty of people training at the primary training maps. Ch 1 freemarket, fm's 1-22 are almost always entirely filled, ch2 fm1-6 are also filled and random guild HQ's and fm1's are filled with stores scattered across the rest of the channels. Regarding changes, you can probably deduce what's occured since the trend was set in motion before you quit previous and has only continued progressing in that direction. There are more classes...though the differences between each class are becoming less and less over time. Virtually every class can become a dps oriented bossing class if you make it right. Basically that means just pick what you like the most and what annoys you the least and play that. Considering what it was 4 years ago vs what it is now, probably the biggest changes in my minds would be the fact that hp washing is no longer a thing and, in general, most classes have various pathways to getting massive levels of hp or dodge making staying alive at bosses nowhere near as challenging as it used to be. There are a lot of different mage classes out now, most of them seem to vaguely follow, with only minor functional differences, the concept of a 'battle mage' in other rpg's. You were a bishop so I'm assuming you're somewhat interested in support classes...theres a new mage type called 'kanna' which has a skill that basically does what HS does in the end, but accomplishes it by boosting the spawn timing of all mobs on the map and by increasing the number of spawn it increases the number killed over time which increases the collective exp gained and in the end boosts the exp you and your party get to a pretty similar degree that HS does. However, Kanna is also a relatively decent bossing class, especially solo, so it's a bit more diverse than playing a bishop is/was while giving you a skill that will ALWAYS put you in the position where parties will beg you to join.

Training areas follow this basic pattern currently: do quests til level 2x, then go to gold beach until 35-40, then go to wooden masks outside of Perion until 45-50, then go to drakes at the first map to the right of Sleepywood. Train there until 60-65, then head to el nath and take the danger taxi to the first map, train there till 70...once you hit 70 go to the pq map you'll find located in the dimensional mirror. you can access it on the upper left side of your screen by clicking 'quick move', then 'dimensional mirror', then select party entry from the choices provided. Go there and find a Romeo and Juliet party quest (RnJ is the abbreviation used universally to refer to this)...just enter with a party, watch what they're doing and you'll figure it out sooner or later, either way someone will always know what to do and be able to solo it for the rest of the party if you're confused. Then mid RnJ theres a map with great spawn and typically the party will just cease moving along with the quest at that move and just stay there and use the map as a regular training map. After 15 minutes you'll be kicked out with your party and typically your party will just head back in and repeat the process over and over. Do this PQ till lvl 100, then do it along with Monster Park Extreme, 3 times a day. Add to this the 'questline' for 'evo world', finish that and then basically do a mix of all of those until you get to around 170. My knowledge of these later levels is limited since I haven't done them on any character recently enough to know specifically what is best...but it's not much more than what I've already outlined from what I've heard others say. Once you hit 170-180 you're basically at end game level and you'll try to train either second drill hall or first drill hall, which is accessed from the Future Henesys map...and available after a fairly short line of quests thats basically anyone can explain to you once you get there. Then just cc around fdh and sdh looking for a party...and thats where you train till level 250.

Some good ways to make money would be Star Planet and also getting a profession, I personally think Alchemy works best, leveling it to the Meister level(basically level 12) and then just consistently maintain it at that level by crafting stuff for exp each day. If you stop for too long you slowly lose exp and can end up fall back first to level 11/master and then to level 10. But once you're meister you can craft various potions to sell, you can make 10 or 12 slot bags to hold minerals or herbs which always sell for a decent profit, and to get the items to make it all possible you just walk around relatively active maps, cc around and collect all the mysterious herbs and veins you can, and then further farm specific herbs at the evo map.

Hope that helps.

@traitor