Never done a 2-box before, it's always been solo for me. I normally play a Wizard, but this time I thought I would try and 2-box my Mischief start, but I'm trying to figure out the best pairing for me. First, I mainly know Wizard, quite good at it, but lord almighty does Wiz suck at the soloing. I also know Mage pretty well, but mages are a dime a dozen, so I worry a mage won't be able to raid. Second, I don't want to run an enchanter. I suck at the mez/charm playstyle, it doesn't suit me. My thinking was Wiz + Bard, as Bard has selos, mana song, and some other decent songs. I could just throw him on autofollow with a song up. The downside to this is that bards don't have gate spell, which to be perfectly honest is my main reason for never playing a melee class before; also, it takes quite a while for a bard to come online, as it were. My next thought was Mage/Druid. Mages are almost like Wizards, with better sustain and more utility, but there's just so many of them. And any time a druid is in a group, they have to heal, which is not my forte. Right now I'm learning towards Bard/Wiz, and I'll just have to suck it up for the first 20-30 levels till Manasong is available. comments?
I like druid mage more but i never played the other pair. Track, ports, snare, both can gate, good pet dps, heals.. I think porting will be really useful in a server where there might be more normally uncamped nameds camped, so hopping around might be useful. Either way, good post
Shaman+Mage will be a good start; Druids will be plentiful and most will be offering ports. 3 weeks to go - try it out some non-twinked combo's on FV =) Bypass the tutorial stuffs and start out where you think you'd want to begin... Exp is still faster, but that might help you decide. Other fun combos: Mage + Bard Ench + Mage <- bandage-heals FTW... literally Ench + Druid <- highly versatile Ench + Wiz (nerfed AOE stun will require a bit of re-learning but doable). Wiz + Pal Rog + Rog (DON'T KNOCK IT - IT'S FUN! [just don't let your friends see you doing it]) Raids will be full of "run what ya brung" though MOTM might cause PUR's (PickUpRaids, if that's even a thing?) to limit pets (seemed to be any/all were welcome in PUR's on Phinni/LJ/RF/Mangler/Aradune). However, you'll see a full box group or 2x NEC's sitting at every named PH in Guk, Perma, SolB
Bards are great with wizards since their resist debuff + dot chants are super useful for helping land your own spells and finishing off mobs that are fleeing so you don't waste mana overnuking something at like 5-10% and snare-fleeing.
Best 2 box combos on a new TLP: 1. Chanter/Druid. Probably the best 2 box in the game, I've run this on multiple TLPs with great success. This duo has literally every base covered. Tank via charm, CC, mana regen, snare, ports, damage shields, heals. This is really the only 2 box in the game that has everything. 2. Mage/Druid. Run this as well, very good combo although not as easy as chanter due to having to use root for CC, a lot more running around and away on this combo. You also have to heal the mage pet much more than a charm, as with charm, you can just break the charm and charm a new pet, and kill the old one. More experience, easy kill, and no mana wasted on healing. No mana regen is the biggest drawback here, both classes need it pretty badly. 3. Monk/Druid. Very very good combo, snares, heals, damage shields, ports, great DPS, monk can tank well enough with druid debuffs, and if worst comes to worst, monk can flop, and druid can just kite. Don't use a bard with a pet class......bard songs don't work on pets until AAs. Your much better off with a chanter, the hard CC of a chanter is also much easier to use on a box team. Trying to keep multiple mobs mezzed on a bard is a huge pain in the butt. You also lack any real healing, which is a huge problem. Mage pets are pretty squishy, necro pets are paper bags. You can't really play a pet class very well in a duo without some kind of healer. It's impossible to beat Druid as a 2nd box character, almost regardless of what the other class is. No other class brings so much to a box team. Snare is incredibly important, especially in Classic and Kunark. Trying to do stuff in lower guk or seb without snare, is a death wish. Wizard tends to make a good 3rd or 4th box character, they aren't great in a duo, because they just don't bring a big enough toolkit, and their damage doesn't make up for it. It's possible to do something like wiz/bard if you just want to run around and kite everything in outdoor zones, but it's a very limited pairing in terms of what you can do. My advice would be to hop on the test server, /tesbuff 2 classes to level 25, and try out the various combos. You'll get a feel pretty quickly what works and what doesn't, and what the problems are.
If you know Wizard and like it, play a Wizard. Wizards will be in much shorter supply, and Bard is the best pair and also typically in high demand. Not having Gate sucks, but remember you get Origin on a reasonable cooldown, and eventually the Wizard's going to be handling all the transport anyway, rendering the whole issue moot. If you elect to pair anything with a priest, you're absolutely right that you'll be expected to heal, so if that's not something you want to be responsible for, I'd avoid it. Of course, on the other hand a bard will be expected to pull (yes, even before Fade and even when they'd be more valuable singing to the party), so if you're wanting something that will let you empty a mana bar and then chill for a few minutes, none of the options are good.
I love playing Ranger / Shaman the buff lines mostly stack so nothing really goes to waste other than SOW.. the shaman pet is a nice dot and is easily used to tank while shaman gets slow in. Its outside of the box but Ive played this combo on many servers and had a blast. Ill play a mage / chanter on the respective accounts as well which is a totally great combo but its nice to log in the chanter to pass out crack to the ranger / mage having them camped close by.
Noone cares that youre a mage. If you know and want to play Mage/Wizard the best, than do it. There will be plenty of raid slots.
