3 box advice for OoW and beyond?

I was hoping to get some insight on 2 different options for a 3 box crew that I was considering for the upcoming omens launch on Rizlona that are very similar in composition. I want to either run a Mage/Shaman/Bard or a Beastlord/Shaman/Bard, (Pet tank setup as you can see) and I was wondering if anyone who has either played or has knowledge on these setups could tell me which synergizes better for group content in omens and beyond as the expansions roll in, and which setup is just better and why. I want my main focus for this to be able to handle group content and named in zones as well as functionality and ease of play. I would be raiding on the pet class in each scenario so they would be the most geared. All insights appreciated!

Pets are very poor tanks in the 70's era. Pet durability isn't much improved from PoP pets and no to scale with the NPC power increase. This gets worse in DoDh and PoR when the content stronger without any considerable increase to pet durability.
Pets improve considerable with TSS, and shock of the many makes mages sick in SoF.

OoW - PoR is Meleequest.

You are are better off with one of these combo
SK - Shamy - Bard
Monk, Pally and Warriors can work in place of the SK if the bard is snaring. (Almost everything flees in OoW)
Clerics can work in place of the shamy, if bard is able to handle slowing.

Raid geared SK in this era gain a stupid amount of passive self healing.

BST/SHM/Bard will synergize better. Drop in a tank and two melees and you are good to go, or even 3 melees and have the pet tank in a lot of content.

You generally want to go caster group or melee group post oow. Mage / Shm / Bard has all the best synergy for melees, and the mage is an anomaly.

BST/SHM/BRD
Raid gear on int casters don't bring as much bang as on a melee. But I would also make friends with people and run old raids to gear your guys. Get a couple friends and gear up your boxes with elemental/time/qvic gear.

Do beastlord pets eventually catch up to Mage pets in tankability? That would be a big factor for me considering it will be my tank when boxing. Thank you as well for the SK suggestion but I want to main a pet class and that would defeat the purpose of my box crew. I am only wondering whether to do mage or beastlord.

Beast are decent through VoA at least moloing in a mix of HoT T4 group and Rustic. It's not very fast, but it is doable besides for names and missions.

Overlap with shaman & beastlord is pointless imho

BST/DRU/ENC or MAG/DRU/ENC what I would go with.

If you want a SHM trio then SHD/SHM/BRD

I am getting a bard and sk up to go with the beast. I am really missing a healer. I am hoping in due time the SK properly geared and AA will make up for merc heals.

Just add 3 more to round out a full group

There may be some overlap btwn bst and shm abilities but there is also synnergy by virtue of the fact that bst is primarily a melee class and shaman has great melee buffs. Realistically, the only true overlap is that the slows dont stack and non-raid bst buffs would get overwritten.

If you absolutely want to do a pet class main, I'd suggest Bst Shm Bard. I also 3 box on Riz and I do war/shm/brd. Dps is naturally lower but I have no issues maintaining max aa every era and the dps has nowhere to go but up until i eventually add 3 rogue mercs.

Sk shm bard is the ultimate OP 3 box that should be considered. Basically any melee+shaman+bard is the best 3 box you will get though. If you dont want to use a tank, you can also consider ranger because there is some strong synergy with ranger shm bard because all buffs stack, unlike using bst. Reliable taunt becomes more important as time goes on and raid gear makes a ranger a pretty reliable tank for slowed mobs, even tougher nameds.

SK, Shaman, Bard.


You will not find a stronger 3 box then this. A raid geared SK, even on omens mobs, will almost not require heals on a slowed mob. Shaman for obvious reasons, slow, buffs, heals, canni. Bard is the best puller in the game for quite a while, not to mention songs. Also, geared bards, with offensive AA actually do pretty solid dps (like, it will outdps the SK).

I love how people keep insisting he's got to do sk/shm/bard after he makes it clear he wants a bst or mag for his main.

OP, if you intend to only 3 box, the concern about SHM/BST overlap is real. By itself, it's going to be a fairly low dps group. But, if you plan to group regularly with other people, it's the perfect foundation for adding maximum adps. Start with BST/SHM/Bard and drop in a ranger, monk, zerker and you have about as much dps as a single group can possibly do, especially if the dps toons are raid geared. Especially post oow when you start adding in all the new synergy that comes from bard/shaman epic 2.0, etc.

While mage pets can tank anything in the group game they are also dumb tanks that have to be told to do everything. I just finished on Phinny with a Ranger/Mage/Ench/Druid set and did fairly well but I found in quite a few of the higher level group missions lack of a real tank really made things difficult for me.

I would recommend putting a SK, Warrior or Paladin in your mix, I think you will find having a true tank will eventually make things go a lot easier.

Pet-tanking works fine, though as Numiko says, it will need a lot of attention and fast heals in some situations. It also really helps to have the latest cleric hp buff to go with your focus before heading out to adventure.

Not mentioned yet are the mage servant of ro and swarm pets which kick in during DoDH. You can really play with some aggro-swapping and burn down something that might be a challenge for beast/shm vs. mage/shm. Is a real tank going to be more efficient or easier...probably. But if you want to main mage...really do it!

There are quite a few missions where having a mage pet makes things quite a bit easier too, as they ignore some event mechanics.

This is true! That's why I'm keeping mage in my mix on Mischief and swapped out the ranger for a tank, I figure you can never have to much tankage and will try and avoid having to use a merc tank later on.

OOW and "beyond" is a lot of content. Mercs fundamentally change your groups in very real ways. The tank merc is quite decent when it's the upgraded version, and the healer can be ok as well. Something to think about for the future.

Ive found mage/shaman/bard to be a good trio. As others stated the level 70 block is going to be rough, but it is for anything thats caster based.

As it appears the OP wants to be a pet class, having to do some pet management shouldnt be an issue and once you get mercs, shaman/mage/bard is going to be great for the group content game.

I had considered that as an option if I decided against maining a pet class but I figured the dps would be only the SK basically so not good. I had no idea bards had decent dps like that.

Thank you to everyone for the awesome insights. I definitely want a mage now that I have thought of it more and came to the conclusion that I will either do Mage/Shaman/Bard or Mage/SK/Shaman. I am heavily leaning towards Mage/Shaman/Bard though since having an SK, even as a raid alt would mean it would be mostly group geared, and I don't know if he would be able to tank with any real effectiveness sporting mostly group gear. So that is where I am at with everything at this point. The sk/Shaman/bard gets an honorable mention though and I will definitely try this at some point I think. I didn't think bards could dps really and figured the dps would be severely lacking but I think with how powerful people are saying it is then it would be great with maybe 1 healer merc and 2 dps mercs down the line.