So I recently started playing again and am kind of wondering what to do. I had a bunch of characters in the late 80s area, I bought the current expacs and have been progressing a bit more into the very early 90s. (91-92) It's going okay but I keep seeing all these posts about HA's taking 20-30mins or 10-15 with a level 100 and I can't seem to get anywhere close to that fast. My current setup is a 92 SK, 91 Bard, 87 Wizard, and a friend playing an 87 Magician. Everyone but bard is subbed with autogrant AA, bard has 1100 AA. My issue is that it seems my SK gets destroyed by mobs, I can only tank 2 mobs max and that's with some scary moments, 3 is death and nameds are out of the question. My SK currently has the 1h weap/shield and 2h from HA 90 vendor and Abstruse armor. Do I just need to rough it out in HAs? Is there an armor set that isn't too bad to farm/get/buy besides this HA gear? Am I dumb for even having SK and not using a tank merc? I feel like HA's are hard and taking too long, but I feel like I need to do them to get gear and not suck.
I responded on Reddit as well, but that Abstruse is horribly out of date. He needs Lucid at the very minimum or Boreal if possible. Also, remember that the vaunted shadowknight ability to tank multiple mobs at once only applies in general to light blues.
Search the bazaar. 90 and especially 92, lots of gear opens up. If I had known what Fear Touched stuff was (Boreal), I'd probably have gone for that. But the stuff I got is pretty much same AC, little less HP and not as good for effects, but on my server I was able to find this stuff for 3k to 15k a slot. The Fear Touched "quest" piece were going for a bit more, but not too bad. You should search with your class, lvl90 to lvl95 in every slot. AC is all over the place for what slot, but most of the stuff will be @2k hitpoints. Of course go for the best AC you can. I've just been banking my marks of valor for lvl100, mainly because the lvl90-95 merchant stuff can be had (and I already got em) for very little plats. I did get some augs and am 35+ac in all slots with four or five being 40+ac. My warrior was a lvl85 heroic and I've been tanking the HA's fine since 85. Currently 95.99 waiting on my enchanter to catch up on levels before I ding him to 96. Which might be part of your problem. I box a warrior, shaman and enchanter +healer merc and 2x melee merc (about to change that to 2x caster mercs). What I notice is a good number of the mobs are all lvl with my warrior. They don't round down for tuning the difficulties here. Having lower level's than your highest level doesn't give you an easier HA. It seems to me you get the HA based on your highest level character. Bringing in lower levels just means you have subpar DPS. Now that my enchanter is only 1 level behind, I've been killing mobs a lot faster....mainly because of his DPS merc. I tank these fine at 8200ish AC and 83kish HP (lvl95) guild lobby buffed out or a bit less AC/HP with just my box buffs. And I am always using my stalwart defense /disc when engaged, which pushes my AC to over/@ 9k. Fighting two at once (without using an actual defensive disc) is no problem except for when the merc healer decides to buff armor of vie on my shaman (that doesn't even need it!!) instead of healing my warrior during a fight or she just stands there and doesn't heal. Full mana bar, just standing around. 95% of deaths on my warrior is because the merc healer didn't behave correctly. Which is one of the reasons why I like using 2x melee mercs, because once the healer merc lets my warrior die, she is all about healing the melee mercs and usually they can take the mob down. I can tank 3 or 4, but that's with an actual defensive disc going. Usually though I will root park adds or now that my chanter is high enough, I just AoE mez. The nameds, I can take the non-mosquito ones pretty easy now, but Bloodsucker is a no-go. I killed him once, at lvl91 or 92 I think. Since leveling past that, it seems I just don't have the DPS for it. But the other two, I have on lock down. It's not a cake walk, but I beat those nameds pretty solidly. Although once disc drops, I switch my shaman to healing along with merc healer, otherwise it's very iffy if the merc healer will keep my warrior up. Takes a little longer, but it seems the surest path to me. If you're not already, always have combat stability and combat agility maxed for your level. The sooner the better. As well as shield block. I usually have enough AA's banked before leveling to max them all out right when I level.
You need better armor. I suggest using marks to buy the visible lvl 90 lucid pieces and then using the Baz to buy some rof non vis. You don't need a full set, but you do need maybe 10 to 12 pieces of the 2k hp armor/non vis. Let me know if you have any more questions. How many heal mercs are you running? i suggest hsing two until you get better armor. Make sure to put one on reactove and one on balanced. Don't be afraid to use mantle and carapace as necesary.
I also responded on reddit: Augs. AC augs. Lots of them. Sounds like the SK needs a general armour overhaul, but I'd bet that he's mostly lacking in the aug department.
If I recall, the cultural gear was very good from 91+, even without raid augs. So that's another viable option. At 92, you should be aiming for about 2k HP per armor slot. Non-visibles are cheap in the bazaar. Farm some AC augs in HoT progression missions. (You missed a good chance at some nice ones with the anniversary tasks expiring.)
Once you get situated with your lvl92 gear, I'd work on getting Castaway armor. On my server, a lot of the Castaway can be expensive. But sometimes there are good deals. Start buying now so you can wait till you see good deals. I've been able to buy 4 full sets for an average price of a little over 100k per set, when a lot of the sellers are trying to get 100k+ per piece. Unless you raid, that line of armor will be your best bet. I think Cultural is slightly better, but on my server cultural is much more expensive and that is assuming someone of your race even makes it....which they don't on my server, so not even an option. Unless I make it myself, which is not happening. However, Castaway is needed to make Tideworn and Tideworn is needed to make Highwater armor. I see Tideworn and Highwater being called out as rot a lot for some slots, so . This is TDS armor and can also be vendor purchased with Pieces of Eight if you don't get lucky with drops or rot. Whatever you do, don't have a few pieces of cultural and a few pieces of class specific or you'll end up with a weaker charm item, if your charm item "grows stronger.." depending on your gear. My understanding though is CoTF HA's are easier to level up with. I think at lvl100 or 102, I'll start working the TDS HA's, even if it's slower exp., just so I can start getting Pieces of Eight.
TDS HAs aren't worth bothering with until you can do Thulisaur or Dredge, the payout for the lower tier ones is a waste of time.
Correct. Also, if a higher level character is added to the group and zones in, all mobs will be automatically bumped up to the new person's level. Oh, and if you level up in an HA and request a new one, the /con values may be temporarily messed, but the actual mob level will match the level of the highest person in the group.
A few thoughts: 1. In many cases chatting, especially chatting in between fights, slows things down. There is nothing wrong with chatting, it's just a tradeoff. 2. Your highest level character is 92, so you always get the 92 version of each HA that you do. Since your DPS characters (Wiz/Mage) are 87, your DPS is relatively low, in part because their spells do less damage and in part because they are fighting red con mobs. Also, do you use a wizzie merc? 3. Some HAs take longer than others. If you get the quest item from the first mob in Scouting Ahead, it's one thing, but you have to pull everything from the ruins, it takes much longer. Also, practice makes perfect. 4. You have a Bard, so you should be able to single pull everything. Why fight 2 when you can fight them 1 at a time?
Do the trash mobs in CoTF HA's go over level 100? Or will everything turn blue (except for named and placeholder if no named) and start getting easier once I ding lvl101+?
Yes, the trash mobs will match the highest level character's level (up to 105). I had a bad experience last week when my druid leveled to 104 and my enchanter was still only 103. Using the level 100 targeted AE mez "stare" was resisted by all 3 mobs, and splat went the tank merc.
Been trying to do HA's where I can get two hails per Lesson of the Devoted burn. For me, the only chance is to do "Into the Hills" or "Rituals" first, rebuff right before hail, get all ready, /cast Lessons, hail, drop task from all my box, get out and get "Scouting Ahead" and go right at it asap. Not loot anything unless I need to. Have my loot set to not confirm looting no-drop, so I can loot quest items faster, pull 2 mobs at a time, conserve endurance and mana on my shaman/enchanter where I can so I don't have to stop to regen anything. I got down to @20-30 minutes depending on the last quest drop. If I get those on the first or second kill, it's low 20 minutes for that HA, so that's only for the "Scouting Ahead" mission. I can normally clear the last area fast (I think), but if the quest drop is on the last 2 or 3 mobs, I am usually too late for a Lessons hail, anything before that I can usually make it. On regular, I am done @30 to 35 minutes without trying too hard for all of them and can only get to low 20's on one of them. I think guys that are getting 20's for all of them are pulling 3+ mobs at a time. I can do that, but not reliably. Maybe with more AA's. Just dinged 105 and the HA's have been getting easier, as when I was low 90's to 96 or so, tanking a couple unslowed mobs was iffy, now it's not a big deal. I don't do anything extra. I'll try mixing in AoE slow with shaman to cast when I pull 2+ and see if I can go faster.
Just FYI, you don't need Castaway to make Tideworn, and you don't need Tideworn to make Highwater. I went straight to Highwater from Manifested.
Just like in previous years, certain gear and a certain level of skill/aa's will trivialize the Dead Hills heroic adventures. Does your group *always* have a mob in camp? Are you DPSing with the others to the point where your mana is getting depleted? I find that even with my box team who is led by a cotf t1 raid geared necro, if I am not asserting myself and pulling intelligently/ killing systematically, I can run above 30 minutes at times on these. I agree with the others who say that you need to gear up in RoF equipment. Just yesterday I searched my servers bazaar and easily had 5 pieces of RoF non vis (lvl 92 req) for around 3-5k a piece. Not bad considering my wizard has no gear and each piece netted him 2000+ mana.
A group of all live players will be faster then boxes and mercs who will be faster then all box groups in HAs. As one member of a group of high aa guys 10 minutes has been reasonable...group of low aa guys 15 min, a boxer with mercs 30 minutes is reasonable, boxer no mercs no [Unmentioned 3rd Party Software] 35-40 minutes is reasonable. Not sure what boxer with [Unmentioned 3rd Party Software] would finish an HA in... maybe 20-30 min? All that assuming similar skill levels. Raid gear can help speed things up a bit too. Have toons with and without raid gear and it makes a significant difference too.
That's a pretty accurate breakdown. Results will vary mainly on skill level, experience, and motivation on that particular day.
