Additional Boxed for Mage & Bard

Discussion in 'The Newbie Zone' started by Claudea, Jan 30, 2018.

  1. Claudea Journeyman

    Hello all,

    My friend and I are slowly working are way through the levels, and we're thinking of adding at least one boxed character to help us along. I, the mage, would be controlling the box to start (my friend may get one eventually, but just one to begin with). Is there a good recommended box to go with a mage and a bard? Currently we're running with a healer and tank merc, but can switch it up. Any thoughts are greatly appreciated :D
  2. Gatts Journeyman

    Lot you could do, depends what you want. Best I would say is druid. Adds heals, tons of damage from both dots and dd, lotta survival abilities to help tanks, and ports. You got pet to tank and bard can cc, adding druid would mean you can take just about everything groupwise. Not sure how pets are doing on all the RoS named in veeshan though, but think they easily handle the rest. Mage pet with pet focus tanks better than lotta players and way better than merc (at least at end game). I'd use pet to tank over merc and either use 1 healer and rest dps merc, 2 healer 1 dps, or 1 healer and nothing else (this is at end game, never really used mercs at lower levels).

    Though with that setup and if you add druid, should be able to handle stuff ez w/o mercs since you got everything covered already. Though suppose at lower levels mercs still do alright, by higher levels clermercs aren't very great and dps from mercs is lame. Decent players do at least 3x merc dps and druid/mage/bard combo would def put out some high dps.

    Alternatively, add another mage and you can use alliance ability once in the 100s. But only comes with pet heals and no ports.
  3. Aurastrider Augur

    I think a lot depends on your skill or amount of work you want to put into your box toon. Adding a tank such as an SK is never a bad idea but ideally you would be on your sk as your main and your mage would become your box. You guys are already playing the two easiest box classes imo so either would be easy to make into the box toons. You could also go the mage/mage route and since you already understand your mage doing the setup, hotkeys, spell rotations and such should be a copy/paste for the most part from your main. Wizards and necros are also easy to box (not to their full potential usually but simple to setup) and wizards will give you evac for those oh crap moments and ports for fast travel paired with your mages coth this is a good combo for boxing. A ranger with autofire and a spell casting macro is ok plus will provide you with tracking and good buffs for your pet. You are probably trading dps vs the other caster classes though for their tracking and said buffs. Again a lot will depend on your skill and how much work you want to put into it but all of these classes are fairly strait forward as box toons from my experience.
  4. IblisTheMage Augur

    My box started as mage/bard, I would today not have started the bard, I see the core as mage/enchanter, which gives me the required CC, as well as runes, dps, and an extra pet. I did not feel that the bard gave enough CC. I do love the other benefits my bard bring, but bard/mage was not enough for EoK progression for me.

    So. Either you live with bard CC, you add CC in form of a chanter, or you add multimob tanking capability in the form of a warrior or SK.

    A) live with bard cc -> add dps. Another mage will give a lot of pets, and enable you to use of Many for nukes, as well as increase multi mob capability. A druid will give dps, ports, and Alliance to help healer merc heal. Given A) I would consider one of these

    B) means enchanter

    C) means war or SK, sk would probably require you to main it, but add more in the department of versatility, pulling, and surviving wipes.
  5. Kyzvs Augur

    I box mage / chanty / sk.

    I first played a mage in ~2001 and always as a main. Have gone over to the dark side now and main the SK - we fill up with cleric / wiz / rogue mercs. I miss track a lot, so may add a 4th at some point (ranger for easy hotkey /assist), but the playability drops off the more you add without resorting to software and I don't like the idea of that, never have.
    IblisTheMage likes this.
  6. Tucoh Augur

    Adding a warrior/sk will give your group the most power. Once geared the tank will be able to easily handle multiple mobs in ways that your bard/mage will always struggle with. With a bard as ADPS, your warrior will out damage your mage in dual wield mode.

    SKs have more utility and capability to tank without healing, but warriors are easier to box.
  7. Gio-Cefalu Augur

    I have been asking a lot of boxing questions myself, and I currently run 106 SK, 106 Shm, and 95 mage (still playing some catch up). I have also done some other weird boxes like monk/BL. I will say that having more than one melee character is a pain, and it is significantly easier to use the SK to tank and then use hotkeys on my Shm and Mage to send in pets, nuke/DoT, etc.

    If you add a player tank, it will take a lot of work on stat augs, AC augs, gear, AA, etc, but it will ultimately out-perform the mage pet. Or, you can use the mage pet to tank as long as you have a decent EM earring.

    Regarding specific classes, I think the druid would be easy to set up for a few nukes/DoTs, heals, tracking, and convenient ports.

    If your friend is playing bard, I would not recommend another melee class, so I'd maybe use chanter, but at that point, you really don't need the bard anymore anyway. The chanter has awesome CC and crack, and doesn't need to be in melee position.

    So, I'm guessing add either a tank as your "main" for the mage, or keep the mage the main and add a druid. For your friend, maybe add a chanter or switch to the chanter as their "main" and then use a wizzie box.

    Remember that my opinion and $2 will net you....$2.
  8. IblisTheMage Augur

    However, keeping the bard on as a /melody-bard (Not being positioned for melee, etc) still adds a lot to the group, at least that is my motivation for keeping my bard. Having him on a horse allows for a good long Lesson with bard dicho running.

    I have keyed it so that the bard attempts to take aggro for a tic on pull (30 sec cooldown AA, can’t remember the name right now), that actually will often mean that the bards get to melee a bit sometimes, but what more is, it helps pets build aggro, since I am an impatient nuker.
    Yruc likes this.
  9. Cone head Augur

    Necros will add sustained dps, they also get another pet. Another Mage or Wiz will work as well. If you go dps caster just make sure you get scs aa maxed or it will be agro city.
  10. tnot Elder

    Another Mage. Simplest box class, good DPS and gives you an extra tank for adds, too.

    I play 3 X 110 Mages and I wouldn't have it any other way.
  11. I_Love_My_Bandwidth Mercslayer


    Alliance, much? :)

    3 Mages with a single healer merc pretty much destroys anything. Add another healer merc and you've reached unstoppable in the group game.

    Then you have an open slot for PLing or whatever.
  12. GoatMonkey New Member

    I box(ed) bard mage with healer and wiz mercs and it was very good. Add another mage and another wiz merc and you will be able to destroy stuff quite well i think :)
  13. Tucoh Augur

    3x mages is a really interesting group. I'd love to see some parses of what clearing T2 RoS content looks like for your group.
  14. slayerofbats Augur

    Are the high levels really that easy? I boxed 6 mages and it sucked after a certain point. It went from killing every mob in 2 seconds for the first 60 ish levels, to getting regularly wiped around level 80 when you can't pull singles and the pets can no longer tank well, and can't hold aggro well enough to nuke regularly either. I figured it might improve with a better pet focus on the tank but I never would have guessed it would get easy at high levels.

    For now I run 3 other classes and have merc tank which does ok but not great.
  15. I_Love_My_Bandwidth Mercslayer



    The 80ish range is an unbalanced time between AA and mob difficulty. Get to end game and get those AA. Things get a lot better for mages after lvl 100.
    Eggolas likes this.
  16. slayerofbats Augur

    Hmm thanks! Maybe I need to try again.
  17. Eggolas Augur

    Agreed, although the dividing line may well be the level 94 earth pet. That is when pet tanking really begins IMO.
  18. Fohpo Augur

    I feel like 6 mages is significantly weaker than say 3 with mercs... may not kill as fast but you have heals and other things.

    On a side note, if you guys are playing on FV - hit up Jimmydiesel in game.
  19. Pistols4Pandas Elder