A 6 Boxing Question

[Zebrn Beasword]

/strug my group between me and a bud is

Beastlord, Druid, Druid, Monk, Warrior, Wizard. 

[Bulge]

Yes, Hand of Ro has a nice attack debuff and there was another one. There were some nice  parses posted some time ago about how an attack-debuffed mob was hitting for max damage much less frequently. They should be around these forums somewhere but it sure was an incentive to start using those attack debuffs. I hope this is indeed still true.

EDIT: I found that post with the parse of a non-debuffed mob and an attack-debuffed mob: http://www.eqrf.net/rf/viewtopic.php?p=24058

Note how pretty much all the Max damage hits disappear, while the min damage hits are raised by about the same amount. I really wonder if this is still the case.

[Khauruk]

Hand of Ro, Sun's Corona, and Fixation of Ro will all stack.  Also, TBS has a cold resist version of Corona (can't recall name atm).  Hand + Corona = -190atk (effectively a softcap increase of 190Ac).

Look on thedruidsgrove.org for Fenier's parses on atk debuffs.

I see a huge difference when I've been grinding in MPG w/ bst/druid.

[Bulge]

Well, I am going for it. I rolled a new SK, a Druid, A cleric and 3 wizzies. I decided I wanted to keep things as simple as possible, which is why I ditched the Mage. After playing a beastlord and a pet-heavy combo for so long, I am sortoff done with all the pet grooming and buffing and giving them toys all the time and what not, so this is a very pet-light group. Also, I keep talking about off tanking with a Mage pet, however I never have been a very subtle (or smart) player, so basically my two "survival" tactics with adds have always been: quickly kill them before they kill you, or SUCCOR. :D  With the 3 wizzies, the first tactic will hopefully be more viable. The second tactic sure has its bases covered with 3 wizzies and 1 druid. :)  I have no slower: again, keeping it as simple as possible. I never minded slowing when my beast was my Main, but if I have to use a non-main char to slow (Enc or Shammy) I already start to find it a hassle, especially since I always loose time by checking if the mob resisted or not.

Reslowing and stuff just takes precious seconds away from nuking that mob to smithereens. This was already true for my old Combo and moreso with this new combo. Avoiding adds is something I always was pretty carefull with , I just never see myself develop a playstyle where I have several mobs in camp on a consistent basis.  I will have to learn to pull with an SK though: I do not think I have the patience for FD splitting, so hopefully better tactics have been developed?  :) To be honest, I have no idea how FD splitting even works.  I can see myself splitting mobs with root though: I have 5 root classes, and since I can kill mobs fast, hopefully root-parking is a viable tactic for pulling. Now for the unfortunate add: Rooting will not be viable, since the mob will still be near me and beat on me. Moving myself or the group away is too much hassle. So I guess I'll pop my defensive discipline in case of an add and start nuking. :D

So it's like this: HoT from CL on SK, SK pulls mob with dot or snare or some, while incoming Druid does HoR(fire debuff), SK melees a bit, then 3 wizzies and maybe Druid nuke to death, rinse and repeat.


Sound good? ;)

[bham]

I would go:

Warrior
Bard
Cleric
Shammy
Wizard
Wizard

if I was to start again from scratch.

I have no intention of doing so, so ill probably just add a bard to my current 5 and call it close enough....

I dont give a damn how well you pull, sometimes you will get 2-3, and without any slow or any CC; you will have to evac everytime. Whats the point of crawling through a dungeon towards a named if you have to evac everytime you make the slightest mistake?

Also, DPS is dependant on uptime. If you can burn a mob in 20 seconds flat thats great. But if you then spend 2 min splitting off the next one with your SK, cause you cant handle 2 or 3, you overall kill speed isnt actually all that good. Bards make insanely good fast pullers, and if an add wanders into camp, he can mez it and you can forget it till the current mob is dead. A bard can add so much to a group, even if all they do is:
A) pull with HoS (resist debuff)
B) melody some cool songs once the mob is in camp
C) mez an add that wanders into camp evert now and then.
D) they track!!

You talk about simplifying you group? a decently geared/AA warrior is much simpler to play than an SK. Get 4 aggro procs, cast bazu below on incoming, use taunt/mock/scowl if you lose aggro. Thats all you need to do.... You dont need to chain cast aggro spells... your spells dont get fizzles or interupts... Also Warrior DPS is appreciably higher than SK. If you arent going to raid defensive disc will make a huge difference on how big a named you can take down. People who say that defensive is irrelevant in group content are in RAID gear. When doing group content in group gear, the ability to HALVE the damage a named does is very powerful. The main advantage that a SK has is that they can hold aggro better with gimp gear than a warrior can.

A shaman is pretty damn handy. Malis stacked with HoS means about 99% of you wizard spells will land for full. Slow isnt what it used to be, but on hard hitting mobs its still almsot essential (unless you are RAID-geared). They have a lot of tasty buffs and their DPS, while no match for a wizard is not insignificant.