Necro is way, way better than Mage Solo

Discussion in 'The Veterans' Lounge' started by Pentasol, Oct 27, 2022.

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  1. Pentasol Journeyman

    I created a L85 Mage and attacked a spider in The Dream. These spiders hit hard. I couldn't keep earth pet healed quick enough it was dying so fast. Pet died then I died. I barely scratched the mob.

    I then created L85 Necro who soloed one spider after another without breaking a sweat. He didn't even use a pet. It was REALLY boring though, rooting and dotting. There was a lot of prancing back and forth when kiting. Not exactly elegant or brave.

    Created SK who was a bit hit and miss, sometimes he would win and sometimes lose depending on lifetap procs. He either killed the mob or died when the mob was at roughly 25%~. Sometimes he would kill the mob and was still full HP. Very impressive for a melee to go toe to toe with such a powerful mob solo and win or come very close to winning. The passive self heal procs are powerful and less work.

    Created Beastlord who did better than Mage by a large margn, got mob to 45%~ before dying. Pet died first. Slow helped a lot. Beastlord didn't heal, just meleed, so maybe with pet heals he could have saved pet and won the fight. Too much buffing with Beastlord though.

    Created Monk who died fast to spider.

    I was gonna try Ranger but then I came to my senses.

    This is solo not molo.
    Waitwhat likes this.
  2. Ssworidss Journeyman

    Necros have always soloed better than mages, though. I don't understand the issue, especially since you aren't comparing pets in this case. SKs managing to solo almost as well as a necro when the SK has zero AC augs and the aggressively mediocre heroic gear is darn impressive for the SK. Add a merc and all of the classes can probably molo just fine.
  3. Pentasol Journeyman

    Necro = solo, molo. With pet, without pet.
    Mage = molo with pet (far less versatility + 50% EXP penalty).

    SK is powerful because they are part Necro. Necro is an evil class, Mage isn't.

    This is the conclusion of my field study.
    Waitwhat and Rizzin like this.
  4. Tatanka Joe Schmo

    You sure about that?
  5. Ssworidss Journeyman

    XP per kill is irrelevant compared to xp per time, though. If moloing means a 25% exp penalty but killing twice as fast, you're coming out ahead, for example, using made up numbers.
    minimind and Vumad like this.
  6. demi Augur

    there is no EXP penalty as long as mage does some dmg to mob .. even if mage hits mob for 1 dmg .. swarm pets count also ( which you should be using on every mob) ..
  7. Raltar Augur


    Air pet is better at tanking. Necro is still better, but you'll have an easier time soloing as a mage using air pet.
    eqgamer likes this.
  8. Pentasol Journeyman

    Let's stick to real numbers instead of made up numbers.

    Mage has to share XP with Merc, Necro doesn't need to so Mage has an EXP penatly.
    Necro has much higher mana regen rate so faster kill rate.
    Necro has FD to avoid XP loss from death/zoning/gating.
    Mage has merc upkeep, Necro doesn't.

    What does Mage get in exchange to compensate for the monumental lack of versatility, slower exp rate and extra invoices?

    Are they being punished for being good instead of evil?
  9. Raltar Augur


    Not all classes are created equal, but mages also get mod rods, CotH and summoned gear.
  10. Treiln Augur

    Lack of experience is what this came out to be. No offense.

    Mage buffs + summoned pet gear + air pet (superior to earth pet 90% if the time) only requires a heal here and there about every 3rd or 4th nuke you throw out.

    Heroic Mage should be killing single mobs quite a bit faster than a heroic Necro. The Necro’s strength comes in the form of slower killing, but being able to kill multiple at a time.

    In the long run, a Necro will solo better than a mage due to not needing heals on their pets. But at the heroic level, a Mage isn’t needing outside heals either. So there’s no need to get a merc to split experience with.
    zleski likes this.
  11. Pentasol Journeyman

    Understatement of the century.

    Evil's are obviously buffed on purpose to outshine good classes (just like RL).

    It's so obvious when you compare Necro versatility to Mage.

    Necro is evil, Mage is good.

    Necro is a a swiss army knife, mage is a pez dispenser.

    You would have to be blind or living in denial to not see it...or a cheat.

    It's even worse on P99, they're stuck in a time when the super evil Iksar race made the best Necro AND monk (lol?) making all other races obsolete. How the heck does evil have zen?? That's a good trait, not evil. They're also calling themselves 'classic' while using a Wiki which tells them what to do.

    Breadcrumbs and you know it.
  12. Ssworidss Journeyman

    Mages are neither inherently good nor inherently evil. Most classes, in fact, are the same way. I will grant you that necros (and shadowknights) are (on live) currently more powerful in terms of their archetype than others of the same archetype, but that's irrelevant to this topic.

    I'm not sure you're arguing in good faith, but, to engage anyhow, mages haven't been able to solo for a long time. Mages with a healer, mercenary or otherwise, have been very strong for a long time. Necros are one of the original soloing classes, though. If you're comparing a necro root rotting to a mage with a pet tanking, you're comparing apples and oranges. Try seeing how the necro's pet lasts compared to the mage at 85. Mages with maxed AAs and gear and raid focus effects, including a pet focus, still need a healer of some kind in most eras, but they're also providing excellent dps in the meantime while also providing a tank and a bunch of other utility.

    Trying to spin necros being better at soloing than mages into a "because Daybreak favors evil" or something is just nonsense.
    Stymie and Treiln like this.
  13. kizant Augur

    Are you just trolling? You can solo mobs in that zone by just spamming the mage swarm pet.
    Tatanka likes this.
  14. Vumad Cape Wearer


    The thing you are mistaken on is that different circumstances has different results. Many mobs in the game summon. You happened to fight a mob that did not summon. Snare / Rot worked because of that. Fight a mob that summons and your necro would have died almost immediately. Of the 3 pet classes, the NEC pet is the worst. If you needed a pet tank, NEC would have been the worst choice for the fight of the 3. LOTS of mobs summon later in the game.

    In short, you had a good test using too small of a sample.

    On mobs that are easy to pull singles and summon, the mage will perform the best. Earth and air both have value. Air pet is weaker than the earth pet, but air stuns, so on mobs that can be stunned, air is the best tank, but on mobs that can not be stun, earth is the best tank. The mage water pet will probably also tank as well as the NEC pet while doing much higher DPS.

    On mobs that do not summon and can be snared, NEC will perform the best, because of kiting.

    On multiple mobs, it is very situational. NEC and BST can FD split if needed getting singles. Mage can not split and relies on swarm pets to off tank. Also since the BST itself can tank, on 2 mobs, the BST itself can offtank, so a well geared BST can perform exceptional against 2.

    Against undead, NEC is hands down the best, since NEC can pacify, mez, slow, etc. NEC are the enchanters of the undead and absolutely crush it in ToV where everything was undead. However, when the mob is not undead and can not be slowed, the NEC pet suffers harshly, as it is the weakest pet and no slow when not undead.

    BST holds it down solid against mage in tanking because the BST can slow and the MAG can not. However, some mobs will ignore pets when melee is in range. In these cases, MAG and BST will have similar tanking, but the MAG will out DPS the BST because the BST looses all of its melee DPS if it can't be in range of the mob.

    Those are not all of the situations, but covers a lot of the most common.

    I would agree that as a general rule that NEC is the superior pet class at soloing, but the way you solo'ed will not work in many situations (snare immune, summon, etc, which get very common). But if you go where the class performs the best, NEC will outshine the others in the optimal situations.

    Edit: SHD is probably the best solo class, but is VERY gear dependent. A NEC / MAG with bad gear will out perform a BST and SHD with bad gear. NEC / MAG are better than SHD up front but plateau lower, where SHD will do exceptional solo because of great tanking and DPS, but takes a huge gear investment to be able to surpass a MAG pet, and you will not get that gear soloing.
    menown likes this.
  15. Pentasol Journeyman

    How else would you explain Necro being far more versatile than Mages?

    Necro is all about death, disease, undead, leeching, stealing, etc (evil stuff) and Mage isn't.

    Necro has FD (a super OP ability which removes you from danger without having to gate or zone), fear, root AND snare. Then there's undead slow, mez, charm, and insane mana regen and a really nice pet. A Necro can root rot, kite, fear kite, charm, pet tank, solo, molo. Necro can give mana, summon corpses, resurrect and sacrifice too. The list goes on.

    Mage is a pez dispenser with a tanking pet which can't tank..

    Even the Mage epic pet is garbage, it becomes more obsolete the more you level until it becomes completely useless. A lot of work for a few levels of pet power.

    It's obvious there is a bias for evil. I suppose its to be expected in an evil world.

    That's why Rangers were a laughing stock and Druids taxi's. Because they are good too.
  16. Treiln Augur

    Thought this may have been a genuine thread, but trolling. Time to /thread
  17. Alnitak Augur

    Yes, yes he is.
    kizant likes this.
  18. Act of Valor The Newest Member

    Necromancers have always been solo kings. That doesn't mean they're a better class, its just one of their strengths.
  19. Pentasol Journeyman

    Ah, here it comes.

    The usual 'troll' accusation when somebody speaks truth and the call for thread lock/deletion.

    There's that bias for evil again.

    Censorship is evil and proof of wrongdoing which means I'm right.
  20. Vumad Cape Wearer


    Most epics become worthless. Only a few classes still have value in their epics. BRD is not evil, but they use theirs. I believe SHM does too. CLR is definitely not an evil class and their Epic 2.0 is exceptional.

    NEC being more versatile than a MAG has nothing to do with being evil preferences. When EQ was new, the fact that mages could summon food, water, armor, arrows and the like was hugely valuable. Those skills have become obsolete because they have been neglected. There's not a good reason why mages do not have spells to summon stat food, valuable throwing items, etc. That is a spell design oversight, not because they don't like the "good" classes.

    NEC abilities simply stay more relevant, well, at least snare and their undead abilities.

    For the rest, what NEC is fear kiting? Risks of adds is usually too high. I can't even fathom the last time I saw a NEC charm. In the old game (P99...) where you didn't get 1-rounded, sure, but back then, mages summons matter, but that's not the game anymore. Saying NEC can charm is like saying MAG can summon bread. Sure, they can, but what value does it actually have?

    NEC get undead banes. MAG get elemental (summoned) banes.
    NEC gets snare. MAG get AE.
    NEC summons corpses. MAG summon live players.
    NEC bums MAG armor to make their pet relevant. Mages pets are still stronger.
    NEC get FD. MAG get RS pets to offtank.
    NEC gets fear and charm. MAG and everyone else doesn't care.
    NEC gets undead slow. MAG pet can tank without slow.

    NEC is versatile solo by its lore of being a loaner and an outcast, yes, but NEC is not better than MAG. MAG can not only hold down a solid comparison to NEC in many solo situations, but MAG often brings more total to a group than a NEC does. You might turn your nose up to mod rods, but throw a NEC and a MAG into a group with a DRU, RNG, BST, etc and the mage will make everyone stronger. The NEC may in some situations out DPS a mage, but often the MAG pulls the higher (and more useful) burst DPS, while keeping the other classes DPSing longer. Mod rods are not to be scoffed at. NEC is a wonderful class, but they don't have the right to turn their noses up at mages.
    Roxas MM likes this.
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