Breed
Breeds are like races in other Role Playing games. In the universe of Anarchy Online breeds, with the exception of the Solitus, are genetically engineered with specific purposes in mind. There are many breeds in the galaxy all (presumably) developed for specific planets by numerous corporations. The Opifex, Nano Mage and Atrox were all developed by Omni-Tek for Rubi-ka.
Solitus
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The Solitus is the breed most similar to an original human being having naturally evolved during the time of the Omega. They are the well rounded of Rubi-Ka, and their abilities allow them to perform well in most professions and skill sets. The drawback would be that they might not be as well suited for specialization as some of the other breeds. |
Opifex
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The Opifex is agile and cunning. What they lack in strength they compensate for with their smarts and evasive nature. A lot of people seem to not trust the Opifex although they are normally jovial and likeable people. |
Nano Mage
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The Nano Mage were constructed especially to control Nano-bots, and in that department they perform extremely well. They are more fragile than the other breeds as they are more geared towards intelligence and mental abilities than raw strength and physical prowess. The Nano Mage relies so much on nano-bots that they can't live beyond the orbit around Rubi-ka. |
Atrox
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The reason Omni-Tek ever colonized Rubi-Ka is the magnificent ore of Notum on the planet. To extract the Notum, they obviously needed a workforce optimized for that sort of strenuous and excruciatingly demanding task. The Atrox was the perfect breed! Their enormous strength and stamina along with their dedicated and loyal nature, made them both extremely adept miners, and frighteningly effective fighters. The Atrox are androgynous (without gender) and are often considered to not be intelligent. |
Max Abilities
Max ability level 200:
| Breed | Strength | Agility | Stamina | Intelligence | Sense | Psychic | Max IP Spent. Abi. |
| Atrox | 512 | 480 | 512 | 400 | 400 | 400 | 1.209.545 |
| Nanomage | 464 | 464 | 448 | 512 | 480 | 512 | 1.336.100 |
| Opifex | 464 | 544 | 480 | 464 | 512 | 448 | 1.253.075 |
| Solitus | 472 | 480 | 480 | 480 | 480 | 480 | 1.371.732 |
Max ability level 220:
| Breed | Strength | Agility | Stamina | Intelligence | Sense | Psychic | Max IP Spent. Abi. |
| Atrox | 912 | 780 | 912 | 600 | 600 | 600 | 3.055.545 |
| Nanomage | 664 | 664 | 748 | 912 | 780 | 912 | 3.317.700 |
| Opifex | 764 | 944 | 680 | 764 | 912 | 748 | 3.277.475 |
| Solitus | 772 | 780 | 780 | 780 | 780 | 780 | 3.633.132 |
--Landcast 00:45, 8 Jun 2005 (CEST)
Nano cost modifier cap
| Breed | cap at % |
| Atrox | 45% |
| Solitus | 50% |
| Opifex | 50% |
| Nanomage | 55% |
--Baffle 04:08, 8 Jun 2005 (CEST)
Multipliers
While the actual amount of a Body Development Skill and Nano Pool Skill a character may buy is dependent on their profession, their breed determines how many points of health or nano energy are added to their pools per point of skill. To find the base health of a character, take their body dev score and multiply it by their breed multipler in the table.
| Breed | Body Dev | Nano Pool |
| Atrox | 4 | 2 |
| Solitus | 3 | 3 |
| Opifex | 3 | 3 |
| Nanomage | 2 | 4 |
--Berael 23:22, 9 January 2007 (CET)
Breed Advantages and Disadvantages
From the descriptions and statistics above, you will see that the different breeds have different advantages and disadvantages. This becomes important when looking for a profession. These have their advantages and disadvantages as well, so it is a matter of mixing and matching breed and profession to best advantage, or to make the character that you want.
Solitus is the "neutral" character, from which all the others are based. The Solitus is a general character, having no special abilities, but then again no bad abilities. They are good all-rounders, but excel at nothing in particular. However, Solitus breed has some very compelling advantages. Balanced abilities make the Solitus suitable for all types of symbiants and good choices for classes with access to several different lines of symbiants. Solitus also has access to some of the best defensive perk actions in Anarchy Online.
Tacky Hack is a short term root resistance perk that can be trained as low as level 35, providing 90% resistance to roots for 15 seconds.
Survival is a heal perk that can be trained at level 207. Survival provides your entire team with 3360-3600 healing over the course of 30 seconds.
Sphere, trainable at 207, provides your entire team with 100 aao, 100 aad, and +3% crit chance.
Opifex are very agile, which means that they have a green agility skill, and can thus have a higher evade skill than other breeds. The payoff for having good agility is that they don't have such good stamina and consequently have slightly fewer hit points - but they tend not to get hit as often. Opifex are natural choices for classes such as Martial Artist and Fixer, who rely on evades as their primary defense. Opifex affinity for agility and sense also result in generally higher ranged skills due to trickle down (agility and sense are also primary trickle contributors to initiatives, runspeed, treatment). Opifex breed is particularly suited to Support symbiants, which rely on Agility and Sense for every slot, although Opifex abilities are generally fairly balanced and allow good use of most symbiant sets. Due to trickle Opifex has very slightly less HP and nano than Solitus, however the low stamina of Opifex breed means they are among the last to reach the threshold for 2-second healdelta tick (811 stamina). The Opifex breed has only one compelling breed-specific offensive perk, however there are several Opifex-only items available.
Blinded by Delights, trainable at level 35, is a 25 second blind attack that also lowers your opponent's nanoskills by 5% (5% of base, which at 220 is ~60 for nanoclasses).
Specialized Dustbrigade Vambrace - Opifex Breed is a special bracer that adds evades and is only usable by Opifex, however it is difficult to obtain.
I am the Eel a special evade ring which drops from Hollow Island.
Supporting Carbonan Holster a special strength enhancing bracer that drops from Jack the Legchopper.
Other trivial items such as Aurea's Boots of Escape, Blackpack, Flaxen Notum Pants, Modified A-4000 Sensory Panel are also locked to opifex.
Nanomages are very intelligent and bookwormy types, they are the ones that tended to pore over the books all night long and didn't join in the sports that much as kids. They look a bit pasty, aren't very quick on their feet and couldn't lift a Reet feather without help. This means they are lacking in the hit point and evasion departments. At higher levels the benefits of being a nanomage are vastly outstripped by the detriment of having poor HP. While the Nanomage can cast programs earlier, most high level nanoprograms have level requirements which nullify the benefit of high intelligence. Their nanodelta addition and nanocost cap is better than for any other breed, which adds a lot of questions into choosing Doctor and Nano-Technician breed. Nanomages are well suited to control symbiants, and quite terrible at using infantry and especially artillery symbiants. Several defensive nanoprograms (for NT and trader) provide more benefit to nanomages than to other breeds. The nanomage has no compelling breed specific perks, although quite a few items.
De'Valos Sleeves and The Expensive Kevlar Vest of Professor Jones are cheap and easily obtainable items for nanomages that add to nanoskills.
Nanomage Enhanced Alien Tank Armor is a special version of the alien tank adding 530 HP for nanomages, compared to 300 on the normal version (disclaimer: nanomage version also makes you look like a froob).
Shades of Lucubration are a buffing item that adds +30 Intelligence and Psychic and can be equipped at very low levels.
Dreadloch Endurance Booster - Nanomage Edition is a new HUD item for nanomages, adding 500 HP and 20 str in addition to 25 aad. This item can be right clicked to activate a 5000 point absorb sheild, which is very handy for all professions in PVM and PVP.
Atrox were designed big and strong, to carry out a long, hard days work in the mines - before they revolted. They have a big advantage in Strength and Stamina, which translates into higher hit points, but things like intelligence and agility are left by the wayside (hence the common expression "as thick as two short Atroxes"). The Atrox breed ends up being one of the most reasonable choices for all professions, as at high levels, items can be used to get high enough nanoskills to cast all nanoprograms that aren't out of the character's level range. The huge boost to HP becomes one of the few attributes of the breed that actually matters. The Atrox is particularly well suited to Infantry and Artillery symbiants. Atrox breed also has several compelling perks and a nice set of gloves.
Silken Legchopper Gloves are a pair of Atrox gloves that add 40 2he and 1he and can be equipped at low level.
Mongo Rage, trainable at level 207, is a perk that adds 1500 aao for a brief period (20 seconds), allowing Atroxes to perk people with high evades.
Wit of the Atrox, trainable at level 35, adds 320 dodge ranged as well as +60 to several damage types for 30 seconds.
When choosing a breed, you need to consider your profession as well. Some professions just scream out for a certain breed as an obvious choice (MA's and Fixer's are often Opifex because they rely on being able to evade attacks, although it is perfectly acceptable to use the professions strength in avoiding being hit and combining it with the HP and damage bonus of an Atrox (higher strength = higher damage for an MA), he'll get hit more often, but will have more HP to compensate)). Nanomages usually choose to take a profession where they don't expect to get hit - Pet owners and doctors, NT's also, but they tend to take a lot of aggro...
There is no "perfect" breed for a profession, the player needs to make what he can out of the combination of advantages and disadvantages. Nanomages don't have many hit points, but they have higher nano-skills, so if you aren't expecting to get hit very often, but will be using a lot of nanos to attack/defend yourself, then you would choose nanomage.
Typical Combinations
Adventurer: Solitus (Adventurers are generalists and the solitus is the ultimate generalist breed), Atrox (good add melee damage and extra HP, but problems casting the bigger nanos as soon as some other breeds and an embarassingly small nano pool to boot), Opifex (Adventurers tend to get a lot of aggro, so countering the attacks is an advantage, small nano pool can be a problem). Nanomage is not a good choice, plenty of nano skills, but low evades and low HP aren't very good when everybody is trying to hit you...
Agent: Opifex (the classic choice, good at evading some of the aggro coming their way after getting off that 10k Aimed Shot), Solitus (again a generalist, and while the agent can change themselves into any profession, being a master at nothing, but ok at everything can have its benefits). Nano and Atrox are very rare as Agents (can't recall having seen any in recent times on the German server).
Doctor: Solitus (reasonable nano skills, but still also reasonable HP), Nanomage (popular choice, can cast the heals early, but a lack of HP means they quickly eat reclaim if their tanks can't hold the aggro at low levels), Opifex (less nano pool than a NM and less HP than a Soli, but easy to put high level Symbiants), Atrox (if they can work out what a heal is, they might be Ok, but very low nano skills and a nearly non-existent nano pool can lead to big problems when a team has a lot of trouble and expects the doc to keep everyone alive, best saved for IP masochists. Another problem is a low Nanodelta cap which makes Atrox very tough in casting high level poison nanos as well as heals).
Enforcer: Atrox (massive strength and stamina mean more damage and more HP, and as they are pretty big and clumsy, they tend to get hit a lot, that's not a bad thing), Solitus (not as powerful and a little behind on HP, but better on the nano front and at least they have the nano pool to keep casting their combat nanos without running dry), Opifex (an unusual choice, doesn't get hit as much, but doesn't have anywhere near as many HP for the same set-up as an Atrox). Nanomages are a very strange choice. Though they are great tanks at very high levels due to nanodelta, nanopool and higher nanocost cap (HP is not a problem when you are 214+ and mainly gotten by perks and nanos), the way to this high level is very hard due to low HP amount at startup. Besides in Player versus Player combat nanomages are very weak by definition.
Engineer/Crat/MP: Nanomage (MC/TS skills are king in these professions and nobody can skill them higher naturally than a nanomage, the problem comes when the opponents get bored of bashing the pets and pick on the master...), Solitus (probably second best MC/TS skills, but a few more HP and Evades thrown into the mix for when the pet doesn't cut the mustard. Besides with Alien Invasion expansion out, all casting professions can raise their nanoskills dramatically, thus making Solitus, Opifex, Atrox very good options. Doctors and Nano-Technicians are not in this list, since their nanos require a lot of nanopool, nanocost and nanodelta, not obtainable by Atrox for example)
Fixer/Martial Artist/Shade: Opifex (both are professions who make their reputation from speed and sidestepping attacks, so a breed which maximises this trait is an obvious choice - which also means that every second one you bump into is Opifex), Solitus (good alrounder, but doesn't really bring much to the mix, more Soli MA's than Fixers around), Atrox (when they stop bumping into walls, they don't do too badly, a good choice for PvP as well), Nanomage (a few NM fixers around, but a relatively poor choice, they aren't good at playing dodgeball (or dodge-200lb-iron-beams come to that) and go splat very easily).
Keeper has mainly two common choices - Atrox which makes it very hard to live at low level, when there are cases, that the whole nanopool is not enough for casting just one buffing nano. Later on Atrox gains more nano, and finally becomes able to make everything as well as Solitus do. Which is second common choice for Keepers.
Trader has lots of choices. If one is planning to make a low level Player versus Player character, especially for tower wars, there is one line of choices. For example, 25- level Traders for tower wars prefer to be Atrox, since they got more HP and huge boost to Strength and Stamina which are very easy to increase by outside buffs and items. 60- level traders are split into two strains. First way is "More HP" which makes Atrox the best option and second way is "More Nanoskills" which allows very good Nanomage and Solitus traders. High level traders are mostly Solitus and Nanomage.
Soldier has two common choices - Atrox for their HP and Solitus for their nanopool and easier nanoprogram casting. It's hard to say what breed is better at highest level for Soldier, since both types are very good. Opifex and Nanomage is a very uncommon choice, though with dedication one can make a good Soldier even with this breeds.
Nano-Technician (NT): While the "caster" nature of this profession seems to point to Nanomage breed, a Solitus might be a easier ride for a beginner. Key strength of NT is ability to damage several mobs at once with AoE nukes, which means that NT will sometimes find themselves being hit on by several mobs. This makes low HP, evades and runspeed of Nanomage a disadvantage.
Recent trend among experienced players has been the use of Atrox for almost every profession; the view behind it is that for PvP and soloing, large HP offeres the critical advantage, and resulting disadvantages can be offset by careful use of Symbiants, Perks and Research. Players without a paid account or years of experience in the game (and large amounts of credits that come with it) are advised to think real hard before creating an Atrox Bureaucrat.
That isn't a comprehensive list, but as can be seen, certain breeds and professions go together well, others not. There is no right or wrong choice, just what is right/wrong for the player. Some choices are more obvious (and more successful) than others, whilst others bring a lot more challenge. Run your Atrox Enforcer up to 220 in a couple of weeks? Why not try again with a Nanomage for a real challenge?
