Overview of AA Paths to take

[Hereki]

I can see that the core of this guide makes some sense; I especially like the division into "paths".  However, I would disagree with quite a lot of the details.

For instance, metabolism isn't really better than regen for vah shir; it's a convenience option that many take, but only of significant value if you use stat food all the time (and aren't a baker yourself).  ND isn't of much use to a soloer, as has already been covered.  SCR should come a lot higher up the list, as should MC, in my opinion.  The different routes show a different recommended path for offensive AAs (Ambi, FoS, BF) - and no mention of CF or SCF.  I'd also probably put mend companion over HA/HG for most paths.

Next up, I'm not convinced that anyone who comes near these boards ever actually plays as a "pet cleric", certainly at levels where discussing AAs is meaningful.  We maintain a balance of meleeing alongside our warder, backing off at times to cast or heal - or just to transfer damage to our warder.

I can see several paths in our AAs: defensive, offensive, mana saving, and utility.  Each set of AAs can be allocated an order in each path, and we should advance along each path in the correct order, picking between paths depending on what our constraints are at each moment.

These are just my opinions, and I'm likely to be wrong on several of them.

[lonyn]

I solo nearly all the time and I have taken on board a lot of what's been said here.

No one has mentioned Finishing Blow at all I put 2 pts in here jus to do my 12 archetype so i could get to the class AA's and paragon. I have found it to be very affected for those irratating times when the mob starts to flee and you have an add to deal with. With one little tap wham 32013 hp damage a little over the top but mightily impressive cetrtainly stops you getting any more hits from the add than is necessary.

just my 2cp

Lonyn

[Tastian]

Main problem I have with finishing blow is the level cap.  In certain places it can be nice, but as I recall a lot of stuff I was fighting it simply wouldn't have effected, or atleast not until I put a lot of points into it.

[Fionnah]

It's really dependent upon how "high end" your 'raiding guild' is.  If they're elemental and have killed more than 1 of the EP bosses (Fennin, Coirnav, Xegony, The Rathe Council), then you probably need ND3, but honestly, until you've got around 5500hp buffed, you won't see enough benefit from ND3 and most guilds don't require it unless you're in an EP raiding guild.  Even at 6750hp buffed, I'm only getting around 450ish from ND3, which is nice, but not more important than SCR3....

BTW, I do note those who have actually killed some EP bosses because I know of EP guilds that have been carried past RZ and couldn't take down Sol Ro, let alone RZ by themselves... not to mention any of the EP bosses.

Also note, Diost wasn't putting those in order of importance, he was simply stating that they require ALL of those, not some first, then you can get others, you need all of those before you can get into his guild.

Some noted MC for soloers and I agree... you regen 12 standing still/fighting/casting with SD up, bumping that up to 15 means you just increased your mana regen by 25%... not half bad.  I have FT15, but I remember what it was like at FT1 (just the solstice earring), every point of mana regen is vital and 3 more points can make the difference between that nuke that stops a runner, that last heal on you or the pet that saves your butt or just a slow that keeps a mob from stomping you into the dirt.  Still... SCR3 > MC3

I did go CA/LR5 before ND3... I love ND3, but just for bragging purposes about current hp on raids.  CA3/ND3 was all the difference for me when playing group/raid slower (BST slow is resisted less often than Shammy slow, so it's not uncommon to see me hit Thall Va Kelun or Aten Ha Ra with a preslow just to keep our shammys alive if they get resisted and summoned to a mob that won't get another attack until the tank hits his AE taunt ability).  I think that there should be a EP/Time raiding guild listing and a pre-elemental raiding guild listing.

[DiosT]

I changed the Meleee/Solo path to put Combat Agility up first for archtypes...


As for the raiding path, Most raiding guilds -require- ND3 as a general requirement for all classes... and they typically -require- paragon and such... but SCR3 isn't 'always' required, sometimes guilds look over the AA... I just put the list in that order in case someone wanted to apply to a guild soon, but didn't have the required AA's yet...


Feedback is welcome you all, please keep it coming..

[Incite]

It is general concensus that Combat ability > Combat stability, and that raw HP > 'phantom' HP, That is why I recommend Natural Durability before Stability... between ND and CA it's a hard call, if you are tanking occasionally, CA is better, if you frequently off-tank in groups and such, ND would be the better choice.

Why is that?  For AEs and such, yes; but surely if tanking CS will be more useful due to the "scaling" factor, ie if the mob hits harder you mitigate proportionally more.

[Mahes]

Combat Stability, and it's PoP version Innate Defense, are not worthless, but you'd be hard pressed to notice the difference.

It's long been an accepted fact that CA is greater than CS.  The logic on this is basically that dodging a blow(CA) is far better than getting hit and taking a small percent of less damage(CS).  I believe the warriors or pallys did some extensive parsing on this.  If you have CA3, or even better LR5, you'll see it clearly.  I remember trying to slow General Reparm in PoFire one time and getting instant agro.  Two rounds of melee from him, 7 misses, one hit.  If I didn't have LR5 the number of hits would have been much higher and no level of CS would have saved me.  Woulda been one rounded.

I don't entirely agree with the whole ND approach to AAs.  Hitpoints are king after levels.  But Combat Stability and LR5 are some of the best AAs we have.  I'd get CS3 just to get Physical Enhancement, but save Innate Defense for well down the line.

[Hereki]

Whereas there is a general consensus that CA > CS, there is no such thing saying ND > CS.

If you check other boards, you'll see that they all agree that CA reduces damage more than CS, based on parses.  That makes CA better value all round.  However, a tank with CA/LR maxed and no CS/ID suffers from massive damage spikes, when tanking typical PoP/GoD mobs, making them very hard to heal.  So for tanking classes, CS is still very important; less so for beastlords, but varying aaccording to your style of play, of course.

ND is of value specifically for AEs and caster mobs.  Personally, I'd place it lower than both CA and CS unless you were raiding, in which case I'd go with the CA > ND > CS theory.  

The relative value of increased HP over reduced hits logically depends on the amount you get hit for; the only case where the relatively small gain of HP from ND would be preferable to CS reduction over a fight would be when fighting old world mobs exclusively - in which case even a beastlords AC would be over the mobs atk value, and I doubt you'd be taking any noticeable damage in old world or Kunark, and very little in Velious.

PE doesn't have any prerequisite, and it appears to have an effect even if you only have level 1 of CA/CS/ND, but only onto the AA you already have level 1 in.  So PE is actually worth getting after CA2, potentially.  I'd probably choose to go CA3, CS1/ND1, PE, LR5, CS3/ND3, then ND3/CS3 - taking CS and ND in your order of preference.  Then ID5 to finish defensive.

[Incite]

It's long been an accepted fact that CA is greater than CS. The logic on this is basically that dodging a blow(CA) is far better than getting hit and taking a small percent of less damage(CS).

Absolutely no question there, IMO anyway, having experienced both when AAing my SK.

Seems to me that CS is more sensible for tanking than ND, although as you say, old world mobs you're not going to notice much difference, but for tanking things where you need an edge CS would give it ... so I suppose my feeling is that CS is more useful than ND tanking wise.

[Tastian]

The main reason people say CA > CS is the situation that they are in and the side benefits of the skill.  See even if CA and CS offset the same amount of damage most would take CA for it's other benefits.  Like fewer interupts when casting.  Also like Mahes mentioned the "burst" damage avoidance.  Having AoW wiff is amazing.  Avoiding bashes, etc.  CS helps smoothing out the damage curve if you are getting CH'd and stuff.  For most beastlords the fewer interupts and the chance at more burst mitigation is key.  For a more solo(ish) beastlord CA/CS are definetly amazing and I'd take long before ND like I mentioned.  If you tank LDoNs or planes or solo or whatever I would have all of them before ND.  If you raid and stuffs then the extra hps can help and you may not find yourself tanking much.  In raids and stuff though I find myself offtanking various mobs quite a bit (up to a point where LR50 and ND30 wouldn't save my @$$ lol).

[Mahes]

Oops.

Didn't mean to imply ND was better than CA or CS.  Thing I worded it poorly.  I'd defintely get ND and PE before ID5, however.  Such a marginal gain for cost.

In the end, there's not much I'd trade for CA/LR5.  Great AA set.

[Xalmat]

Where would you place Pet Affinity? Expensive as it gets, but a very powerful AA in the right situations.

[Killian22]

I'm dont have all these yet as I am just now starting to AA since I got new pet but heres my breakdown since I am in a raiding guild and when I group I always have a war or Knight to tank unless its a LDoN. FYI guild is just about to be hitting VT atm

Gen: these are pretty mindless 3 of em are a nobrainer imo

Run3--A must have I dont care who you are
Reg 1--play an ikkie so doesnt really matter but might if you dont
Met 2--I only use stat food so the less plat I gotta spend on food the better

Arch: This one has been hard for  me to decide but this is what I came up with

CA3--lets face it its nice and wanna get LR5 ASAP
SCR3--for extended buffs

Class: Depends on what you do mostly another hard one

Paragon--a must have imo even though I dont have it yet can save you and turn tide of OOM clerics
Pet Hold--I hate havin to kill my pet cause of those dang AEs so its second on my list
FoS--this is because I am gonna gear my BL for offense before I round out his def
HM--nothin like a clicky pet heal for when I am oom or need to get one off fast cause I wasnt payin attention to my pet's health
PE--so I can at least have CS2 and ND2

then back to archtype to get CS1 and ND1

PP 2 or 3 at least depends on what gear I have when I get to these
BF5
LR5

would like some feed back on this as it subject to change

[Hereki]

I'd generally go for the defensive over offensive, with certain exceptions.  The argument has been run through in many threads here (and probably in this one), but it comes down to you doing zero damage after you die.  We get so much aggro even when not really trying that this is a compelling argument.  I'd go CA3, LR5, CS3, ND3, plus PE relatively early in that sequence (as soon as I had any 2 out of CA1/CS1/ND1).

The exception is to get BF5 ahead of almost everything.

Don't get planar power until you are both capped on important stats AND have the basic archetype AAs.

Use the dps calculator to work out the value of AAs for offense; this will push FoS way down your list, below CF1 and SCF3.  You will also want Ambi relatively early on.

[Killian22]

good tips I didnt put it down but I had planned on gettin FoS soon on probably almost before I had gotten BF5 so its good to know atm as well as the PP things I neer planned on maxing it till the gear I was wearing at the time but me over my cap and I would need PP lvls to get the most outta my gear