HP Washing in MapleStory Classic, and Whether to Bother

HP washing was the old-era trick of using Cash Shop AP Resets to move stat points out of MP and into HP, so that a low-HP class like a Hermit or a Ranger could survive the big hits from Zakum and later Horntail. Whether it exists in MapleStory Classic depends on two things Nexon has not confirmed: whether AP Resets are in the Cash Shop, and whether the old level-up HP and MP formulas are in place. If both are, washing works. If either is missing, it does not.

Our honest take, which we will get to at the end, is that most players should not bother. But you should understand it, because in 2008 it was the single biggest divide between people who could boss and people who could not.

What washing actually did

Every level in old Maple gave you a chunk of HP and MP based on your class, and five AP to place. Normally you put all five into your attack stat. Washing worked like this:

1. Wear INT gear before you level up. More INT meant more MP gained on that level, at least for some classes.
2. Put one or more of your fresh AP into HP instead of your main stat.
3. Buy an AP Reset from the Cash Shop and use it to take a point out of MP and put it into your main stat.

The net effect: your MP went down, your HP went up, and your DEX or STR ended up where it would have been anyway. Repeat that every level for fifty levels and a Hermit that would naturally sit around 3,000 HP at 120 could sit at 8,000 or more.

Warriors gained plenty of HP anyway and rarely washed. Mages had huge MP pools to draw from but it got expensive fast. Archers and thieves were the ones who really needed it, because they had the worst HP and their whole job was to stand near a boss and hit it.

Why Zakum and Horntail forced it

Zakum, in the era we are talking about, was the first boss that could just delete a low-HP character. Its arms and body had attacks that landed for several thousand damage, and a level 100 Hermit with unwashed HP could be one-shot by something it never saw coming. The Zakum Helmet was the best hat in the game and every serious player wanted one, so people found a way. Our Zakum prep guide has the run itself.

Horntail, when it arrived, made it worse. Its attacks hit harder, it had a seduce mechanic that walked you into damage, and the HP a 4th job archer needed to survive it without a Spearman's Hyper Body was well above what any unwashed character would reach.

Hyper Body itself, the Spearman buff that raised max HP by 60%, was the poor man's washing. Bring a Spearman, take the buff, survive. But it could be dispelled, it could run out mid-fight, and it meant your run depended on one person. Washed characters did not have that problem.

We had a guildmate in 2008, a Sniper, who washed from level 30 upward on a plan she kept in a spreadsheet. She was the only non-warrior in the guild who never died at Zakum. We all thought she was slightly mad. She was right.

What it cost

This is the part that put people off. Each AP Reset was a Cash Shop item, priced in the low thousands of NX in the versions we played, and you needed one per point moved. Washing one point per level from 30 to 120 is ninety resets. Washing more aggressively, which the serious people did, could be several hundred.

On top of the NX there was the meso cost of INT gear. Early on it was cheap, a few scrolled INT equips from the Free Market. Later it meant overalls and earrings scrolled for INT that nobody used for anything else, and those were not cheap because every washer wanted them.

And there was the hidden cost: you leveled slower. Every level you spent in INT gear was a level where your real damage was lower, and every AP that sat in HP until you reset it was an AP not making you stronger. Washers were weaker than their unwashed friends for most of the climb.

Will it exist in Classic

Nobody outside Nexon knows. The two pieces it depends on, AP Resets and the old stat formulas, are both things a faithful pre-Big Bang server would include by default, so we lean toward "probably yes". But Nexon has been vague about what its Cash Shop will contain, and there is a real chance they quietly leave the tools out. Our cash shop post tracks what has been said.

If washing is in, expect the price of INT gear to spike in the first month as the people who know what they are doing buy it all up.

Our take: should a normal player bother

No. Not at first, and probably not ever, unless you already know you want to be the archer or thief in a Horntail party a year from now.

Washing was a solution to a specific problem: bossing at the very top end with a low-HP class. If you are playing a warrior, you do not need it. If you are playing a mage, you have better things to do with the mesos. If you are an archer or a thief who mostly wants to level, PQ, and do the occasional Zakum run with a Spearman in the party, Hyper Body will get you through.

The people who should wash are the ones who have already decided on a class, are planning to get past 120, and are willing to spend real money over months on something that only pays off at the very end. That is a small group. If you are in it, start at 30, write the plan down, and expect to be weaker than your friends for a long time.

Everyone else: put your AP in your main stat, pick a class you actually enjoy from our class guide, and let the Spearman worry about your HP.