I currently box a SK/shaman/enchanter and I'm considering switching the enchanter for a Bard. Any opinions? All LvL 51 ATM on the progression server and dps is already becoming a problem. Mainly focused on the CC vs DPS and what will be best for end game lvl 80-100 . I have very little experience playing a bard... 1. Are bards easy to box? How does /melody work? 2.Can bards keep multiple mobs mezed with ease? Will I need to switch targets constantly? 3. What songs will I be playing most likely? Hp/mana regen? Grp haste with rogue mercs? 4. Does bard grp haste stack with shaman/enchanter haste? Thanks for the replies!!! Someone suggested I switch the enchanter for a bard and have 2 rogue mercs + 1 cleric. I want to make sure it would be the right decision.
I play an enchanter as a main and always have. For boxing in your set up, I would go bard. There are some little things you will give up later ( MR auras are nice for hybrids ) and you won't be locking down tons of adds with the bard ( bard mez requires a bit more attention than chanter ). But in place of that, you will get hands down the best adps in the game. Shaman/chanter combos are just not optimal, as neither is a real dps class, though both can do respectable dps in certain circumstances ( namely root rotting and charming respectively ). Buffs and slows are what each bring to the table, shaman haste doesn't have quite the added bonus as chanter haste at higher levels, but it will bring you to the haste cap with average worn haste. Bard v3 over-haste songs will go above that. I am kind of undecided which would be better, bard singing caster dps songs + 2 wiz mercs, 1 cleric merc, shaman doing slows and group/spot heals OR bard singing melee dps songs + 2 rogue mercs, 1 cleric merc, shaman doing slows, group/spot heals, and lion. I think with the current state of the game, the 2 wiz mercs will still outdps the 2 rogues, but I could be wrong. I have played bards very little, but my understanding is melody is pretty straight forward and the bard can pretty much be afk at that point allowing you to focus on Sk/shaman ( unless you want to mez, that will take a bit of concentration ).
1. As ADPS support, yes. /melody is very simple- /melody 1 2 3 4 (or whatever) and it will chain the songs in your spellgems in that order. 2. Locking down multiple mobs will not be as easy as with the chanter, especially since you say you're on progression? Bards don't get their wave mez until level 85. Though, bards are very easy to pull singles with, too, so. 3. This thread has some good discussion on which songs in the current game to support what kind of group. 4. Regular hastes don't stack, the highest applies. Bards get a clicky from Plane of Time or Tacvi that is desirable still to melee, not because of the haste when shaman are around, but because it's more attack (no, it's not enormous, but every little bit helps). Likewise, current war march has damage mods and attack on it (And DS for your tank). Haste v3, AKA overhaste, naturally, stacks with shaman spell haste. Are you moving to regular servers? There are no mercs on the progression servers at this time, rendering your group setup considerably different.
I'll be staying on the progression server but I'm focused on level 80-100 groupable content (with mercs)
I 5 box and currently run SK, shaman, necro, mage and then a bard/ench on the 5th box. For the last 15 levels the bard has always been primary char with ench slowly leveled up after. The fact of the matter is there is just very little content where the ench is better - there are are exceptions where easy crowd control is helpful but generally speaking the melody and melee dps is far better from bard. I can lockdown if I have to but with sk/bard pulling team there is so little need even in very tough camps. My vote is bard and use the ench for buffs on an on-going basis.
Fact of the matter is, Bard tends to be more about speeding everything up, while Enchanters more specialize in slowing things down. Anyone who has had a bard puller in their group knows just how much they are into the chain pulling thing. Meanwhile enchanters fling mobs away from the group, lol. If faster killing is what you want, Bard beats enchanter easily, but for more control enchanter is pretty king. I would more recommend option C though, pick an ACTUAL dps class. All the Adps in the world won't help you if you don't got a dpser to benefit from it in the first place. For box setup I'd say go with Necro or Mage, both have good benefits without much work, Mage is better for getting set up, Necro is better for long run and wipe recovery (assuming no mercs here still, so necro convergence ftw).
Necro is also better for DPS in that scenario too. IT's a good potential option and personally one I would recommend. On the other hand I would push for just adding a 4th box and running both the necro and the bard. I used to 4 box prior to VOA and the bard with the necro really made my group kill quickly. The mage addition just made me work like a normal group.
The SK gets some neat pull tools, the shammy's got some decent benefits, for pure dps and considering you're going to be boxing and want things fairly simple, perhaps a mage? Send in pet, have a cast swarm pet, pause, swarm pet, and by the time you've got it slowed on the shammy, mob will be close to splatting. Bards rock (no, really!), but to get the full benefit in a boxed group will be tricky. What do you prefer playing as the main toon? The SK casting all the dots and pulling? or just using it to tag and then jumping on the shammy? For that 3rd toon, simplicity perhaps the best. Plus, a Bard is plate too, the Mage being silk as the rep for the chanter might be easier to gear up (though dunno how pet focus availability is like on the prog server).
You have clearly never grouped with a good ench pulling. I usually have groups crying for mercy. Bard chain pulling is a) kind of silly as the group loses most of the adps they provide and b) very rare in my experience, they tend to "over monk" to pull singles. But, to be honest, it has been a long time since I let a monk or bard pull in one of my xp groups so maybe they all got over that. I would still vote bard as the 3rd boxed toon as with melody they don't require much upkeep. Maxing the ench requires a lot of attention.
I came back to the game when it went F2P for my old Druid account and immediately picked up 2 more so I could 3box. The druid was already level 75 and my original character - no way I would leave her out of the box setup. So that left me two spots, one of which went to a Shadow Knight as my box tank. I never really liked playing EQ's version of Paladins, but I loved the aggro management of the SK's, even if they can be a bit more fragile (as far as tanks go). Same boat you are, been trying to decide how to best utilize the 3rd slot. I started an Enchanter on my third account for the box slot - I have to admit I like the help permitted with the slows and the party mana regen, having played a healing Druid for years. But the bard could do the mana/health/haste buffs too, and would be a lot less work if I made it more or less an ADPS/Jukebox toon to just stand there and be awesome, collecting AA's. I pull with the SK anyway. I wouldn't have the slows given by the ENC though, or the CC (I doubt I would be able to focus on the bard long enough to do crowd control while boxing 3+). What I would like to know is this; 1 - In the long run at 90-100, which boxing setup would offer better performance doing group content for my friends and I? Dru/Shd/Brd or Dru/Shd/Enc? 2 - I could actually just add a 4th box to my setup without too much difficulty, so would I be at a disadvantage in keeping the chanter, dropping a merc, and adding a bard for songs + ADPS?
I can tell you with all 3 level 100's a warrior (4700AA's missing 1 CA, 3 CS and 3 whatever the AC raise AA is all t1 AC augs with no AC aug under 30 from prior expansions), shaman 3500+AA's and enc 2500AA's that that you'll have no issues with even at level 98ish doing the T1 RoF content getting all T1 vis/nonvis items you might need. T2 on the other hand you might be disappointed. I have 1 t2 vis and like 4 t2 nonvis (neck, arms, 1hs, and something else I'm not home) and I'll be honest I have a rough time with the named. Last weekend I think I downed 3 named (they didn't drop any vis armor items which was disheartening, 1 t2 hate mask which which I already had a different one from a different t2 zone and ooced that it was rotting and it rotted and whatever the 3rd item that I can't remember). I think I got 1 spell turn in item which was a lesser. I was probably killed by the named 25 times? and I walked away from at least 3 named or told someone else just to kill it and put me out of my misery. I've tried combo's of 2 wiz mercs + 1 healer merc, 2 dps melee mercs +1 healer, 2 healers + wiz or melee merc, 1 tank merc + 1 healer + 1 wiz merc, 1 tank merc + 2 healer mercs. You name it I've tried it. Either I have decent dps but not enough healing, or I have enough healing but not enough DPS. This also assumes that druid dps is about what my shaman can do. Also assumes the dps/tanking is about what my warrior can do. 1) I pondered if I had changed out the enchanter for a bard if that would of up my chances, but I'm not about to spend the effort. I'm also hoping that with the last 5 or so AA's I know I'm missing defense wise that I can take the hits to the point I can stand up and not fall down with 2 merc wiz's. 2) Your 4th box? I'm not sure about bard and enchanter, my gut says too much overlap, but really? There isn't that much overlap. It might actually ly work pretty well. What I would consider is a mage. Heck even a Beastlord. With the right AA's (At lot less than 4700) they can tank better than I can. Heck I would guess even at 1500AA's it would stand toe-to-toe with what I have doing more DPS and taking the hits easier. One of the named (burntbark or whatever his name is) that I walked away from and let someone else kill, was taken down by 1 Beastlord that was blue to 100 (he was anonymous) and his box which honestly looked like he was just sitting there throwing daggers and 2 healer mercs. Tanked him with the BL pet and even though it took him 15+ minutes and I ended up helping him to speed it up without ksing the guy, he killed him (50% is when I started to help him). Something that was putting my warrior in the purple gosh 3-4 times and I was shocked I kept popping up until I died and I wiped with the name at about 80% left. I didn't have a chance to switch from the shaman, because he was busy healing also. Granted he's also the named mob I did end up killing with the warrior dead with about 5% left and the enchanter and shaman finished him off and his mask rotted. I have no idea why the second try was so painful.
Well, I have a ways to go before I'm prepared for that level and difficulty of content. My 87 druid has just about 1k AA's, the 85 SK has 820, the 80 ENC has about 200. I'm mixed on whether I want to level the ENC to 85 and then AA parallel to the SK or to make a bard instead. Right now I'm at the point where I can 3box in HoT yard/grounds with my little trio successfully albeit rather slowly. Haven't tried named's yet though, kind of scared to!
The names started to hit hard in Voa and they have a ton of HP's which means it takes 3 things to bring them down as a box group, tanking, healing and great dps. A mag is both a tank and a healer, which is why pet box groups can get away with 3 toons to bring down names. But a box group with a real tank needs 4 toons to bring down the names in the last two expansions, at least the T2 names if you are not wearing raid level gear. If I was you I would replace that enchanter with a real dps class either a mag or a necro, and start a bard on a silver account.
That is pretty helpful, thanks for the input. I was leaning towards creating a new silver account for a Bard anyway, just remained unsure about what to do with the enchanter. I suppose it will still be present on the account for buffs and the like, which helps my other characters. What to run as the replacement DPS? I could try Necromancer, and DoT with both it and the Dru, but concerned about efficiency after reading this on the [Unmentioned 3rd Party Software] forums: "It's much easier to set up cascading combat chains for nukes than it is to stack 3 or 4 x DoTs on 3 or 4 or 5 characters - X number of Necros and a Druid. A burst DPS mage group will have the mob dead before the Necros and Druids got 1/4 of the way through their DoT macro."
I'd drop the shaman and put in a mage box Then you could do sk, cleric, wiz, wiz, mage, enchanter. Much easier to box. Backup tank, etc etc.
Thank you all- very good responses, helps alot!!!! So far I'm leaning twards the bard. I think I would progress faster over all, at any level. I do want to keep my enchanter high level as well but it sounds like bard might be more efficient. I love the idea of C3+ bard regen for the shaman
Yeppers. Based on the advice above I actually just made two more silver accounts. So instead of 3-boxing I'll be 5-boxing, lol. Adding a bard account and then a mage, with a healer mercenary and the druid to keep things alive. Might drop the enchanter and 4-box instead of 5 with a DPS merc, depending on my comfort level.
If u drop the enchanter who will slow? Drop Druid imo for a shaman... Unless Druid is too progressed to drop. People say shaman epic + SK epic with rogue mercs=OP
