"What is food to one man is bitter poison to others."
- Lucretius
Ah, to be an assassin! It can be quite fun and lucrative. But if you're a positive fame/karma seeker, forget about it, this one will ruin it for you. But fear not, you will not go below Unsavory in karma from poisoning.
You can use poison on any cooked food, beverages or bladed weapon (the warfork is the only exception). Weapons are the most commonly poisoned items as they are a favorite of faction members. When inflicting a wound with a deadly poisoned weapons, the victim will be injected with a level 4 poison. Quite a quick and painful death (*chuckles*). If you're aiming to become a nox mage as well, the poisoning skill will significantly increase the potency of the poison you'll cast on your ennemies.
At lower levels, you will poison yourself quite often when you fail at applying the poison. So have some greater cure potions handy as your concentration will often be disturbed if you're trying to cure yourself with magery. I strongly suggest having an alchemist first. Poisoning is fairly long to GM and will required about 50k nightshades.
| Skill |
Poison Level |
| 0 |
Lesser Poison |
| 50 |
Poison |
| 65 |
Greater Poison |
| 99 |
Deadly Poison |
You can GM with Greater Poison, but it will be a lot slower than with DP. You will be able to DP weapons as soon as you hit 80, but you will not gain from it, so stick to GP til at least 98 or 99. You will also never poison yourself when failing at that point. You will need a large number of weapons to poison, so if you do not own a house, it might be quite challenging. On average, 200-250 weapons works best. When you hit a weapon that gives you a gain, keep poisoning that weapon over and again, as long as you gain. You may get multiple gains in a row from it.
Nox Mages
The advent of orange petals and resist powerscrolls have significantly lessened the power of the nox mage. But it is still a very potent tool in PvP. The potency of the poison you will cast is directly related to your combined Magery and Poisoning skill points:
When you are casting the poison spell the level of poison is determined by the combined total of both your magery skill and your poisoning skill.
Less than 130.2: Lesser poison
Less than 170.2: Normal poison
Less than 200.0: Greater poison
GM Magery and GM poisoning: Deadly poison
Most people will not GM poisoning since it's so slow to train and so expensive not to mention not necessary. Many will go 120 Magery (if you afford the powerscroll) and 80 poisoning. You can play with these numbers with a variety of combinations like 110 Magery and 90 Poisoning and still get the full DP benefits. All that matters is that the sum of both skills equals or exceeds 200 points.
DP Weapons
If the character using the poisoned weapon possesses poisoning skills, the decay rate of the weapon will be significantly slowed down, proportionally to the skill level of its wielder. In all cases, you can wipe the poison off the blade using oil cloth. You will need to clean it that way before you will be allowed to repair the weapon
Poisoning and Combat
The Noxer is a very powerful fighter, whether in PvM or PvP. Multiple factors impact the potency of the poison you will cast on your opponent.
Proximity
Standing within a 2-tile radius of your target will allow you to cast much more potent poison. At GM magery and poisoning, you will always cast Deadly Poison on a target no further than 2 tiles from you at the time of the cast. You will also always be able to cast Deadly Poison Fields with a minimum of 200 skill points in magery and poisoning.
The table* below indicates the amount of damage your target will sustain according to the level of the poison cast over time if the poison isn't cured.
| Poison Level |
Damage |
Time |
| Lesser Poison |
2-3 |
every 2.5 seconds |
| Poison |
5-7 |
every 3 seconds |
| Greater Poison |
8-11 |
every 4 seconds |
| Deadly |
25-35 |
every 5 seconds |
* Data taken from the UOSS poison damage study.
Lethal Poison
Before, only monsters were able to inflict this level of poison. Today, the higher skilled assassins also possess this ability.
There are only two ways to inflict lethal poison upon your adversary. One is the application of poison to a weapon and the use of the Special Move Infectious Strike. With the poisoning skill and the use of the Special Move you have a great chance to infect your victim with one level higher poison than the poison you are using. So in order to have a chance to infect a victim with Lethal Poison you must be using Deadly Poison on your blade.
The second method and less known is with the use of the necromantic spell Evil Omen. Evil Omen makes the next negative thing that happens to the target worse. If you have the poison skill and cast Evil Omen followed by poison you will cast Poison one level higher. It is therefore possible for a 200 point Mage/Assassin to inflict Lethal Poison through use of the spell alone this way.
Reviewed and updated by Tristan Beltaine
