Hello everyone. I believe that question was asked before but forum search don't come with answer to me. Will be it viable trio and how far it can take me? And what to add as 3rd char. Bard - main Mage - box 3rd one - wiz/shm/mag/enc/dru/clr? BRD/MAG/MAG/SHM/ENC/DRU as 6 box?
The best character to add to a mage / bard duo is a plate tank. Shadowknight or warrior are your best options. SKs have more survivability without getting heals, but warriors are easier to box effectively. If you don't have a plate tank you'll be reliant on the mage pet, which can't effectively hold aggro on multiple mobs simultaneously and generally has worse mitigation compared to a geared/AA'd warrior. A war/sk + bard + mage will take you through most of the game. You'll have to find some help for a couple of the latest expansion's group missions, but otherwise you can do the rest of Ring of Scale. Switching from 3boxing to 4/5/6 boxing shouldn't be done lightly. If you can coordinate 6 boxes your DPS and survivability will be greatly increased, but it's a lot more effort, and requires more tools (ex: Inner Space Boxer) to do effectively. I currently six box a melee focused group (war/brd/ber/bst/rng/sha with a mage and cleric as options). You can take a look at my setup here: https://forums.daybreakgames.com/eq/index.php?threads/tucos-setup-critique-welcome.240258/
I 6 box Monk, Warrior, Bard, Cleric, Berserker, Mage no 3rd party on Tunare. I'll second the idea of adding a plate tank, but either 3 boxing or 6 boxing, extra software not required (although 2/3/4/5/6 boxing is not for everyone). Conq
Similar to what Tucoh said, I actively have a 3-box crew of SK / MAG / BRD. I normally use a healer merc on the SK and 2x caster DPS mercs on the others. My experience tells me that I would be a little worried about the bard as your "main". Sure, you can give him gear preference, but the bard really shouldn't be taking any hits. I've tried a couple configurations - different macro hotkeys, flipping between maining the SK and Mag, using bard ADPS songs vs DoTs and slows. The best I can come up with is this: I main the SK, and split my time about 60 / 30 / 10 between the Mage, SK, and Bard respectively. My best DPS comes where I do the following: I start with maining the SK - Mage is slightly behind pull spot, bard is standing at pull spot, with aura and /melody of ADPS songs (from a list I stole on another page) Pull and tank with the SK and position in front of bard - mash Repel / Wounding Blade / Vicious Bite / Spear / Dicho to gain aggro Switch over to Mag - press Macro 1 - Send Pet / AA Malo / Remorseless Servant While the mage is casting...I switch over to Bard - press Macro 1 - Assist SK / Boastful Bellow Switch back to mage - press macro 2 - Force of Elements / Chaotic / Spear / Fickle / Spear Switch back to SK - I have about 6 seconds before I need to get back to mage - so I'll fire off a couple dots or AC taps (refute / torrent) Switch back to mage and just mash nukes If the fight is longer, like a golem, I will re-mash the SK buttons, but I get the best DPS when I really focus on the mage during the fight. The SK has a pretty limited ceiling on DPS with only a handful of mash buttons. The bard has even less really. I will note that I have SK burn macros and I have a hotbar of Bard ADPS AAs that I constantly mash. With the mage, I can really get great DPS by squeezing nukes together fast, using force of elements during spell refresh, popping companion of elements and hitting "volley of many" nukes. TLDR; You might want to grab a real tank, make him your main geared player and then focus on your mage for DPS. The benefit of actually "playing" the bard over just using him as an ADPS melody bot, as far as I can tell, really comes with crowd control...but your SK should be able to tank at least 2 or 3.
I read it as his Bard is his main character and that any other characters he will be using to further his Bard. Not that he will be focusing on playing his bard while boxing. Just like how my Berserker is my main, and the rest if them are there to help him along, however, the SK is the screen I stay on the most.
I second getting a tank. I have had some experience with 3 mages, bard, enchanter, and while I can carefully work my way around some group content (with wipes etc), I would go with a warrior or a knight if I was to build a group anew. I have not had experience with the paladin, would a pally be able to keep a group healed? Ditching a merc accellerates xp . Having said that, a healer merc is always attentive, which is quite nice.
I took off from CoTF through 3 months before RoS. I run SK, Shm, Bard as main crew. Was able to get through all of EoK np. Didn't even upgrade my SKs CoTF raid gear and whatever max AA was back then. 13kish? Earning as I went. Except Skyfire mission I boxed everything in RoS too, though by that point I had acquired current raid gear for SK. I always suggest that same combo to folks cuz I personally know it knocks things over reliably without a lot of frustration.
re: bard main with a plate tank. In my six box crew the character I focus the most on is my warrior, but a near second is my bard. He's like the batman of my justice league and brings everything together with his pulling, tracking, buffing and attacks. If someone were wanting to main a bard, they shouldn't feel any hesitation in adding a plate tank due to fear they would cast a shadow over the bard. That's not true for a lot of classes though, especially pet classes.
I'll second throwing in a plate tank toon. I'd suggest Shadow Knight due to their ease of getting/holding aggro. Makes them extremely easy to box with. Especially if you're wanting to main the Bard. 1) Pull with Bard 2) Swap to SK and fire off aggro generators (Torrent / Power line [aggro over time]), a DoT or 2 (can put all these on a macro if you'd like), and a defensive to hold you over for a second 3) Swap to Mage and hit macro (Malo / pet swarm attack / remorseless / force) 4) Swap back to bard and do your thing real quick 5) Swap back to Mage and hit macro #2 (just more or less all your boom boom spells) 6) Check back in with SK to hit defensives / taps / etc etc I run SK/Warrior (depending on what i feel like playing for the day) / Mage / Enchanter. Main the tanks and have the other 2 set up on macro's more or less. Depending on the content, I'll main the Enchanter to optimize DPS output (if things are dying quickly I'll skip the DoTs or use only 1 and focus on firing off the 3-4 DDs I have memmed).
