source taken from UO.UHall

Lately there have been several posts where people are looking for shortcuts to gain skills, and this includes blocking monsters/pets/etc.
I have removed posts and sent nastygrams to several people requesting that they stop, because blocking is nothing more than an exploit - and it will put your game account(s) at risk.
Yes, I know people have called GMs and the GMs have said that it wasn't an exploit. Those GMs were incorrect.
I asked Wilki from EA about this, and he confirmed that blocking is illegal, linking me to EA's Customer Support site for games. The information can be found here.


Wilki UO Community Coordinator

Jean-Luc is correct, this is not allowed.

That said, some of the barding skills are extremely difficult to raise. I found an email Leurocian sent awhile ago about needing to discord X number of creatures to gain skill, and it was quite high.

So, let me ask all bards this question: How, if at all, should barding skill gain be adjusted?


First of all let me say, I have 2 high level bards. One has Music and Peace. The other is working on 6x Legendary (All bard skills plus Necro & SS).

My Thunter with Music and Peace, 120'd his skills using 8x8. It worked pretty well both skills were raising at the same time.

My Bard did the same with his Music and Peace, 120'd using 8x8. He now has discord left and provoke. His discord is 97 provoke is 103.

For the example below, I didn't include music. It will raise naturally or peace because that can be trained anywhere.

The average skill gain I see, during normal play is about 0.2 skill gains per hour for discord and provoke. If I'm using both skills at the same time maybe 0.3 per hour.

If we were to extrapolate that, from GM levels, that is 40 skill points to gain 40/0.3 = 120 hours, 40/0.2 = 200 hours. Somewhere between 120 & 200 hours to take those skills to Legendary. Some one who is pretty serious may average 2 hours a day of training these skills up. That is still 60 to a 100 days of serious training. I suppose you could double or triple that for the casual gamer. Add even more time to get peace to 120 if the player hasn't done that.

While the overall gain in barding skills might be ok, it is very slow compared to a lot of other skills. The only skills I can think of that is slower is taming.

Barding skills are very powerfull (as stated by Poo), However, for the casual gamer reaching legendary status is an incredibly long process (perhaps a year). Compare that with GM -120 Magery, which can be achieved in about 16 hours.

Perhaps it's not that skill gain is to slow, it's that there is such a wide disparity between what it takes to get to the highest levels of different skills that is being judged.

Just my .02,


Whats your opinion Bards?

I've had my bard for a very very long time and she is in the mid 80's and i'm afraid will stay there till I A. have no life B. see my three small children off to collage or C. they do something about the skill gain.

I know it isn't very constructive but i don't know how to fix it only that it needs to be fixed.
I am a mother of three I haven't the time patence or attention span for this type of skill gain. Which is why to this day i've never had a lumberjack of any skill over starting 50. and never had a gm bard.

I am tediously working a prov, disco bard....Thank goodness for GGS, or I would have no hope of ever reaching my goal of being a useful player, capable of taking on a high end creature. Repetitive actions with little reward do take a toll on one's patience. A change from the Dev team on skills that just don't seem to move could use some adjustments.Maybe I won't have to wait til next year to reach legendary.

I've grown tired of trying to gain discord on my char. I don't even really bother with the skill now. It helps some when we're t-hunting, it just sucks gaining.

If they figure out a good way to adjust gaining some skills I'd vote for it.

I haven't seen a skill gain on my bard in years I don't even bother trying to get a gain.

This is one of the 'rules' that annoy me most in UO. Not because of it making skill gain or hunting harder, that's fine. But because it's just dumb to say something isn't allowed in game when it's been coded so that it's a possible tactic, and one that makes a lot of sense too.

Would it be so hard to just make it so monsters can't be blocked by placing items, if that's something the devs don't want us to do? Or better yet, give monsters ability to destroy blocking objects over time. That way you can build your little fort and try to beat the enemy from there, but the meanies will break through your walls eventually.

Just saying "no you're not allowed to be smarter than the AI" is weak.

I feel the same way. If something is coded in a certain way and someone is smart enough to figure out a way to use it to his/her advantage, then good them. They should be allowed to use it.

What's my opinion on bards? Well my girlfriend plays a bard and I think they are great for assisted suicide :/ she gets me killed more then going an EM event . But I still wubs her, not to mention they make great white wyrm snacks .