Chapter 341: Preparing for the System Update

After clearing the dungeon there were a few things that Joshua took into consideration about his new guild members that included both their strengths and weaknesses. Joshua had made sure to pay attention for the entire two hours they made their way through the dungeon. Although Ivan, Robin and the rest of the recruits that stayed behind were stronger than the ones that had gone through the dungeon earlier, the fact that the dungeon was of a higher level and they didn't have as many people made it take much longer to clear. So they decided to call it a day when they were done and head back to the hub city.

When Joshua got back he decided to spend some time putting into perspective the strengths and weaknesses of his new guild members. If he wanted to train them over the next few days before the system updated and the arena became available he needed to know what to start with. Getting them use to fighting along his main group was going to be a challenge in itself, but one he was willing to take head on when it was necessary. Right now dealing with their individual issues was something they could work on.

In Ivan's case his issues were plain to see and rather easy to fix if done correctly. Ivan was a master with the sword at a far higher skill level than Joshua since he seemed to be used to using swords from before the system even became a thing on earth. If Joshua had to guess he was probably even better than Adrian at this point when it came to pure swordsmanship, but he knew Adrian would probably surpass all of them in the future do to his dedication.

Even with Ivan's amazing swordsmanship, extreme strength, and ability to use support buffs better than anyone else in the guild he still had a glaring weakness that Joshua wanted to get fixed as soon as possible. As a tank your main purpose in combat was to be able to keep the attention of your group's enemies during battle, but more importantly it's to be able to get their attention at the start of a battle. If a tank isn't able to grab the agro of a tough enemy at the start of a fight then it's possible for them to wreak havoc on the rest of your group.

This was the issue that Ivan currently faced. He didn't have any skills or abilities that would allow him to grab the attention of an enemy from a distance, he had to get close to grab their attention. If he did get close he had plenty of ways to do damage and grab agro, but at a distance he was a sitting duck that had to bide his time for the enemy to attack first. He didn't have Joshua's ability to send out pressure and grab the attention of everyone around, and he didn't have Jayce's enormous shield wall to block all attacks early in battle to grab agro of annoyed enemies. Joshua was going to have to solve that to get the best out of Ivan.

When it came to Victor Joshua noticed that he was an all-rounder that could fit in anywhere when it came to close combat. Quick strikes, great timing, balanced in both offense and defense. He was an all-rounder type of swordsman unlike Adrian who was more offensive or Ivan who was more defensive. This allowed him to be extremely effective in most situations no matter what type of creature they were facing. He had the speed to keep up and take out fast creatures and the power to damage large beast that were armored. Victor was going to be a great add to the team.

The only major weakness that Victor had was the fact that he didn't have a definitive ability that would help him overpower boss class monsters in the future. Adrian had his weak point ability that made him effective in all situations as a swordsman, but Victor didn't have anything that useful. Joshua was going to have to find something that would help fix this issue since he didn't want Victor to have to take a beating all the time just to be useful in boss battles.

Robin added a whole new dimension to his group's combat capabilities. The robes that the alliance had gained from the canyon dungeon that added small stunning effects to the spells of mages had nothing on what Robin could do. Robins lightning magic could completely out class just about any stunning ability they currently had outside of Abigail's stunning strike. Even if stunning strike was really effective it couldn't be chained through consecutive spells to effect several enemies at the same time like Robin's abilities and spells could.

Robin also didn't just rely on her soul beast paralysis properties when it came to fighting. Outside of lightning magic she had also learned some other basic spells from other elements in case they came up against anything that was resistant to electricity. One spell she often used when she explored on her own was a basic earth spell that created a stone golem that could tank a bit for her while she took care of the enemies. All in all she had several tricks up her sleeve that would make her incredibly useful in a fight.

Her one weakness that Joshua could spot was the fact that she didn't have any spells that were powerful enough to do massive damage to enemies. Most of her lightning spells were more about paralyzing enemies and doing large area damage. She didn't have a spell that was just there for pure damage. Lightning spells seemed hard to come by since it was a higher form of elemental magic to learn and Joshua knew that he would need to find a useful damage spell for her in the future to get the most out of her capabilities in a fight.

The bard couple was the last pair of people he had to think of, but for the most part they were there for support instead of damage so there wasn't too many issue that he could see with them. He knew he needed to catch them up level wise to get the most out of their abilities so they wouldn't freeze up against bosses or run out of mana to quickly from playing their music. These were easy issue to solve with a little bit of training, but there was one thing that he could help solve if he could find a decent skill for the both of them.

What they both needed the most was a way to protect themselves while they were playing music. They were basically sitting ducks whenever they were playing their music since they weren't able to move around well. Of course the tanks of the group could protect from being directly targeted, but when it came to large area attacks that could hit the entire group given the chance neither of them had any way of protecting themselves. So Joshua needed to find a way around that before they went into any particularly difficult dungeons with them around.

All in all the new recruits had their strengths and weaknesses, but Joshua had a pretty good idea of how he could help fix those weaknesses. It was just a matter of time before he could, in fact he was waiting for the end of the count down for the system update to take place to do just that. He planned to do that by taking advantage of the new access that would be given at the auction house.

Thanks to Thoren Joshua had a big heads up on how the new form of the auction house was going to work out, so he planned to make use of it as quickly as possible. He could sell all of the unnecessary things he had piling up in his inventory on the world auction house to make sure it didn't go to anyone in the local area that could be out to get him. This would make him a lot of extra money quickly even though he had a lot of system points piled up already. After that he and the rest of his guild members would focus on buying interesting skills that could be useful for them.

Joshua knew that the best versions of skills probably wouldn't be put up on the auction house right away, but skills for unique jobs would most likely be there since most people couldn't use them even if they got them, overlapping skills would be there even if at a lower level than he'd like, and several spells that could be useful for the mages in the Fenrir Guild would be made available as well. Having a lower level skill wasn't an issue either since if you found the higher version of the same skill in the future you could easily upgrade it without losing any progress.

Raiding the auction house was going to be Joshua's main priority to put his guild in a better position going forward so he would be heading there first. After that he and the rest of his guild members could go to the battle arena to check things out. He was sure Madalyn and Laura would do the same thing since he had given them the heads up.

Over the next few days waiting for the system update to happen Joshua and the rest of his original guild members were busy training up the new recruits. With the new and improved dungeon it was much easier to train them. He didn't always push them through the dungeon in the same groups of sixteen, but made sure to mix and match them to make sure they were used to working with everyone in the guild. The progress they were able to make over those five days was fairly decent. The average level of the group went from around fifty-five and was now approaching sixty thanks to the extreme boot camp.

The five main group new recruits were trained even harsher than the others. While the others were now taking on the dungeon at level sixty for their training to improve. Ivan and the rest were now going through the level seventy dungeon regularly which was fairly challenging for them. Of course Joshua planned have them trained alongside his group in the canyon dungeon soon enough, but he was planning to wait until after the system update for that. There was a possibility for them to gain some more new recruits thanks to the guild upgrade and their future performances in the arena so he was going to hold off until after that.

Even so the guild members made a lot of progress and Joshua was even able to gain a level during the time frame since he tested out the town dungeon at its strongest current level a few times while the recruits were taking a break. He needed to be in his best condition possible before the arena matches since he planned to use them as a way to show off his personal capabilities and to rise up in the local power rankings. It would take him at least a few more years to catch up to all of the large guild leaders in the power rankings if he did it just by strengthening his guild and dungeon diving, but if he gained status in the arena then he could cut that time in half.

The last thing Joshua did before the day of the system update was have another talk with Thoren. It was as informative as the last one, but he did learn about what to expect when it came to the new features of the system. Joshua was looking forward to what was in store, but he knew now was his only chance to relax for a long time to come. So he spent the evening drinking with Thoren which made him quickly learn not to try to keep up with a dwarf when it came to alcohol.