Will I be able to use my BL as tank in high end group game?

Discussion in 'Hybrid' started by Treesong, May 17, 2013.

  1. Treesong Elder

    Hello everyone, been thinking of re-vitalizing my old box-group again and playing them to higher levels. My main is a BL, 72 and I am really attached to it. I always used him to tank for my group (varying classes, mostly a Mage, Bard, Wiz) but off course I have not hit the hard-hitting expansions with this group yet: Dragonscale hills is what I did last and that was pretty comfortable with only 280 AA and gear mostly from when they temporarily revamped Blackburrow + bazaar stuff.

    Can you get a BL up to a level where he could tank RoF T2 named or is that just silly thinking? Mind you, I like getting close with a mob with my main so I do not see myself going the route of Mage pet tanking. Just want to hear if BL are in the least viable (well geared and AA-ed) for the high end group game. If not I may consider an SK but would have to start from scratch.
    Thanks for any insights!
    NB: the BL would go gold and very likely 1 other char also
  2. ssadab New Member

    simply put no you wont be able to.
  3. Gearz Journeyman

    Very unlikely (note I dont play a BST). RoF seems to be tuned so that tanks are again required in groups again. Im not hearing of Monks and Rangers being group MTs anymore - tho this may change as more T3 gear is equipped. My suspicion is that you would need to be near 4k AAXP and possibly raid geared to do it - but as I said, Im not a BST.

    Mages can really do well moloing T2 namers with the pet, but I dont think BL can. Hopefully a BST can report their experience.
  4. Gearz Journeyman

    Just an addition, if you are starting fresh, the trend now is Paladin for group tankage. They seem to be the flavor of the week ATM (just something to consider). Eithe way, welcome back and have fun experimenting!
  5. Treesong Elder

    Thanks so far for the answers, was not really expecting they could but good to know. And indeed the BL would not be raid-geared, just group gear that I can get myself with the group.

    Thanks, Gearz, the experimenting is always half the fun. :) A Paladin sounds interesting because I have never had a paladin beyond level 5 in my EQ career. I did have an SK up till 66 but I transferred him to FV. :( Paladin uh, that would be new.....
  6. silku Augur

    You could use your pet to tank in a caster group if you wanted.
  7. Terraa New Member

    If you stack AC and hDex, and use a PC cleric, yes. I regularly heal monks, zerkers, bards and myself (cleric) tanking anything in RoF t1-3. Even healed a wizard through the Successful Mistwielder in Chelsith, but I wouldn't really say that was plan A. I do none of this slowed, which is an advantage you'll have along with your low-refresh mitigation discipline.

    ~Terraa
  8. Malbro Augur

    ummm, when you reach level 2012 :p
  9. Terroz New Member

    As I was reading the above post about a cleric healing a wizard tank on an unslowed T3 namer, I was thinking to myself: "I know someone who could pull that off."

    /wave Terraa

    As far as a beastlord tanking, there's quite a few ways to keep yourself alive. It's possible without raid gear, but you may find it terribly inefficient and frustrating.

    However, WITH raid gear, I prefer to use my beast as the tank 99% of the time.
    Stubar likes this.
  10. Apex Elder

    Well look who it is and you even said something right for once! j/k ily Terroz <3
    Stubar likes this.
  11. Romance Augur

    Your mage's pet would likely tank better than the beastlord.

    Terraa has the right of it, stacking hdex>hagi would help you quite a bit with mitigation.

    You'd def need gold to get all the ac augs you'd need, and raid gear would make things significantly easier on you.

    It's possible but like Terroz said likely inefficient w/o raid gear and a very strong knowledge of how to play your class.
  12. Laronk Augur

    Depends on the named really. It is going to be possible but not with merc healers, you'll need a real healer who is good. If you really want to tank though I'd make a tank and if you want to dps I'd make a dps. You can always be sure that war/pal/sk will be able to tank group content or changes will be made so they can. You cannot be sure that any other class in group gear will be able to tank next expansion not even pets.

    Stuff changes.

    It's also going to take a fair time investment to get your bst to the best tank you can get it to. Also it kind of depends on your actual goal are we tanking it in a full group or are you wanting to know if you can go in with a bst and your druid friend to get stuff done.

    Also what server do you play on?
    Elricvonclief likes this.
  13. Stubar Augur

    Couldn't agree more. If things go badly I usually end up dying before I let my pet tank...mainly due to stubbornness.
  14. Qest T. Silverclaw Augur

    An Enchanter will be a sufficient crutch as well.
  15. savrin Augur

    BST can only tank high end group content with raid gear. Also healer merc seem to not heal them enough (even with raid gear) to keep them up. Any max level healer with reasonable AA should be able to do it though. Any healer that can keep casting heals should have no problem if bst is raid geared. For some reson mercs will stop casting for extended periods of time and because of that it will not be possible to use them.

    Group gear is not good enough in the AC department to help a BST be able to tank high end named. Also HP will be lower with group gear and its possible to not have avoidance and shielding maxed which is needed to tank group content. Raid gear on the other hand has the most hp and ac and will max all mod2 just by wearing more than 5 or 6 pieces of it.
  16. Treesong Elder

    Thanks for all the answers, really appreciate it. I am on the Rathe server, and currently my boxgroup consists of 72 BL, 72 Mage, 71 Bard, 71 Wizard, a healer merc (apprentice 5) and a wizard merc (apprentice 5). Been doing some minotaurs in Dragonscale HIlls, I still need to refamiliarize myself with boxing a group. It will be a long time before I get to the high end, but it seems clear that tanking high end with my BL will be tough, and I am not the best of boxers anyway. I just have so much fun tinkering with the group, decking them out, picking AA's and such. :) Not really a hardcore, efficient leveler.

    I could field a level 70 Cleric which I had leveled up with my group before the advent of mercs, but I must say that mercs are *really* convenient when it comes to healing. I can totally see how they would fail to keep up with healing my BL in the high end though.

    Unfortunately I am not sure if I would ever play my Cleric to its full potential, for instance I always forget to rebuff my main with Panoply of Vie and such, or use that spell with the inversed DS. So a merc healer actually does a better job at some things then I would.... I think I would get more use of 2nd wizard or mage maybe.

    After all the comments i am now leaning towards leveling up an SK or Pally(I still love to do the low-level 1-65 stuff so no problem there) and then maybe add a shaman or some and just ditch the BL (/cry). I did enjoy playing an Sk to level 66 (that I moved to FV) so I could easily attach myself to a new Main. And a Shaman is one of the classes that I have never leveled up before so that sounds fun too. Thanks!
  17. Obiwon Elder

    I see more sk's then anything on my server. Warriors are having somewhat of a resurgence, but pally's are doing ok. I would say population wise SK's comprise about ~60%-65%+ of the tanks on the server I play on most and close to that on the server I play on part time. In rough numbers it appears then that warriors and paladins comprise ~ 20-25% and 15-20%, respectively. Actually, there are very few Paladins I see around compared to others, particularly SK's. I think part of this is due to SK's ability to swarm, part dps (pallies do well vs. undead, but not much vs. live mobs), and part because pallies are more of a passive tank class. I.e, they don't put out much damage ,but they can stun some and help heal themselves so they mitigate well. SK's self heal through taps and and transferring heal from the mob they are fighting to themselves.
  18. Obiwon Elder

    Did want to mention, I have seen a raid geared beast tanking in shards, but nameds were not being pulled.
  19. Apex Elder

    That's called being bad (or they don't wanna kill it? /boggle, I'd bet bad though), I've done alot of hunter work with just a cleric merc
  20. Xicon Journeyman

    Beast Group Tank Just fine, Zerkers are not bad either hell either one is better then the want to be newspaper ranger Raid Gear or not!