I would like to publicly admit that I was completely wrong in the beastlords need help tanking or have issues doing it. I have been proven incorrect in my beliefs, and shown the light by one heckuva amazing player. If he wants to post, then great, but other wise I am humbled in a video game and wanted to publicly admit it. I was just flat out wrong!
You don't say! Now if you would only admit you are wrong about a lot of other things. I do praise your admission of a mistake as most people these days continue to try and spin why they were wrong on someone else or come up with continued excuses.
I admit Beastlords can tank group content just fine. I obviously don't know how on earth to do it, but it has been proven to me in gear similar to mine that is very possible (frankly amazing). I haven't been proven wrong on other things yet ;P.
I told you so, but Stubar saved me from having to respond again. Of course, if you're talking about a Beastlord that hasn't bought his defensive AA's, that's another story. I've seen many that focused on dps abilities and then wondered why they died so easily.
My beastlord is only 81...but she really is a beast. Great melee...extra dps from the pet...very substancial class. And does it with leather armor to boot.
I don't know how to do it, still, but its definately possible and amazing. I am only missing some planar stats and random stuff like subtlety, so its simply me :>
For comparably geared and with pretty much full AA, I don't see how many variables there can be involved here. Stubar has always been really helpful on these forums so I do find it strange he would just give a demonstration without discussing what he's doing (or could you read some tips from a parse?). In any case, I can take a stab at a few things as I can tank most things fine in group gear: 1. You're not prepared to patch heal yourself using Tab to swap targets. You will get a feel for when this is necessary. It's only the odd one but you need to anticipate it between the ping-pong in hp bar. 2. He's an ogre, maybe you aren't dealing with stuns appropriately to be reactive with self-heals e.g. not making it a priority to follow through immediately after stun breaks. 3. You're relying too heavily on Protective Spirit. The disc is dropping and you're unprepared for the inevitable damage spike that the merc will not be reacting appropriately to.You're slowly being worn down to 60% health and the merc is responding slowly, just for you to suddenly go back to taking full damage with an inappropriate heal inc. Protective spirit should be stored and timed, not cycled as standard. 4. You're not making use of the other pet-linked defensive AA whose names escape me in the office. 5. You don't always have Feralgia and almost always have FPoS running on yourself? That's cumulative healing and more HP. 6. Are you making use of Invigorating Warder? It's unreliable but will help. 7. Back up very briefly to let pet take a few hits until merc heal lands? It will absorb the first 2 incoming hits anyway. You could also try the near-instant cast rune just before backing up so that the merc isn't distracted by the pet taking hits. 8. Have you tried swapping from bite of the asp for raven's claw, and swapping Spirit of Nak for Withering bite to try tone down incoming dmg? Stun from Nak won't be landing. 9. You're not using clickies to boost mitigation - dodge/AC etc. Really it's clutching at straws for the odd thing to try because I don't see what could be missing. It's just a case of being attentive to your own hp. He could be using potions to balance it even better and limit self-heals, but they are not a necessity to make it work.
Using defensives up front fools merc healers into using a slower healing strat, because it doesn't see you getting hurt. You want the merc to kick into highest gear asap, so take normal damage at first and THEN save yourself if needed. A well-developed beast has a fair number of oh-**** buttons if you think about it. Protective Spirit. Monkeys Spirit Discipline, Companions Sacrifice, Warders Gift, Protective Warder, and of course Feign Death (just until merc heal lands). Stepping back and letting the pet or merc take a couple hits should be a well practiced technique. Heck, you should even know how to kite if that's what it takes to stay alive long enough to be healed (also needed for surviving feign death failures in other situations).
Oh hey, when are you going to racechange into a wood elf, Stubar? Their warder is bigger which obviously means its better.
Sadly I was pressed for time so I didn't really get to discuss what I was doing in detail. This is what I did with group gear. 1. Have growl up at all times for fights. (those xtra HP are nice as well as the 20 pct damage mod) 2. Pull with incapacitate (I only use slow on the 2 pull) pulling with slow will actually hurt dps. 3. Hit one disc (savage rage/bestial alignment/frenzy spirit) it will shorten fight times significantly, however save bloodlust for "emergencies, we have a few skills to spread out over time for better sustained dps. 4. Keep protective spirit ready, if you are really spiking badly and hit around 40 pct health, that's the time to hit it--if you use that and the fight isn't over hit monkey and keep warder's gift ready. 5. Be an Ogre---I can not stress this enough. I've been an Iksar, Vah shir and even a barbarian, however I always go back to being an Ogre. It makes tanking soooooo much easier (Edrick...I F-ing hate you for suggesting wood elf...not really! <3). I have my crown clicky for that. 6. If you've hit all your defensive discs and you're still "in trouble" have a bandolier with weapons that have a life tap on them, hit that with bloodlust and you'll be good for another 20 seconds. 7. Ac is king, get AC augs with dex (a few agi wouldn't hurt, however I only use one) on them, you will be blown away at how much better you handle tanking. Don't be a baddie and use stamina augs with no AC on them. That's for magelo padding. 8. Powersources---I use Ethereal all the time now. It has a pretty good amount of AC, and a whack of mana and maxes all of my stats. Saying that, as long as the one being used has AC, it should help quite a bit.
Glad my stabs in the dark were pretty close then since I didn't see any of what you guys were doing! I'm on GMT but if you ever get free time to go back to Test (now you are set up) and run your dps rotation in group gear then I would very much appreciate the demonstration/comparison!
Fcseven, you shouldn't but thanks for caring. Stubar is just amazing, I parsed everything he showed me and he gave me a huge list of hints to get me going properly
