Hello Everyone, I am working on making a tri-box for myself and will have two silver accounts, one with a Bard the other with a Wizard. However for my third account which I plan on making gold and am trying to decide between my Beastlord or Shadow Knight. I figure with the Beastlord I will need to keep up a tank merc allowing me one tank, one healer, one melee dps, however with the SK I can use two melee dps and really utilize the bard songs better. Anyone have any thoughts on this? The BST is fun but button intensive, while the SK is much lower dps yet I know they get super awesome at higher levels with lots of work put into them. At this point all characters are in their mid-50's.
Between those two I'd probably say SK because a real tank will be better at higher levels than a merc tank, especially on named. SK aren't awful DPS these days either with the right AAs, I believe...so there's that, too. TBH, though, I'd almost be tempted to suggest you use a necro over the wizard (especially since they're only in their mid-50s atm)...though that's just me. *shrugs*
If I'm understanding this right, you are asking which would be better: 1. Gold BST, J5 tank merc, silver bard, J1 healer merc, silver wiz, and J1 melee merc OR 2. Gold SK, J5 healer merc, silver bard, J1 melee merc, silver wiz, J1 rogue merc Under 3k AA and less than the very best of group gear or better, IMO, #1 would be better (but, I am also thinking that a single J1 healer merc would often not be enough, or likely finding yourself stopping often to allow that merc to med). The first group would be better overall dps, and better tanking until the SK got quite a lot of AA and gear. Once an SK obtains very good gear, AA, and augs, they are better than tank mercs, and have 'reasonable' dps. Until then, not so much. Also, a BST's dps, especially with a bard, will be quite a bit more than a gold SK plus a J1 melee merc at the top levels. Ultimately though... this game is all about having fun. Play whatever is most fun for you, and just do the tasks/progression/mobs/camps you can handle, or find challenging. If what you want to do takes a bit more than that, make some friends, and get some help to accomplish your goals.
I might be confused, but with his silver accounts he will not be able to use J1 mercs. A5 will be the best he can get. If Im wrong please tell me how I can get J1's because Ive been using A5 with my 3 silver accounts. Back to your questions. I would think finding a suitable tank will be your problem later in the game. Im running a group close to what you have Bard, Wizzy, and Mage. Im up to the low 80s now (bard 83, wizzy and mage both 81). The problem I ran into was tanking. It did get better once I got my 81 air pet with EM5 focus. Pet as turned into a monster (kind of). Ive only started working in SoD, but pet is getting much stronger as mage only has about 300 AA so far. Sorry for rambling, but I think the SK would be the best, but as others have stated, getting your gear and AA up on him will be the deciding factor on how it goes. Plus you need to decide what you want from the game. Are you wanting to take on the hard hitting mobs in Underfoot and above? Or just have fun in all the other expansion.
I use 3 silver - nec, bst, brd, with one of each A5 mercs (dps is melee not wiz). It works pretty well, but it is true that I am on the BST screen the most often as it has the most buttons and what not to push. However, I get shm-type buffs along with the cleric ones from merc.
I currently use Enchanter, Wizard and Paladin (because that's what my best friend and wife play.) I think though it would be much easier to use enchanter, wizard, and mage. Yes, an sk or a paladin are nice. But they require a lot more effort than /pet attack. My 85 mage can pet tank most of the content of a group geared 90 paladin. You also get the utility of the mod rods, the call of hero to make pulling and moving around much faster, and another nuker. You could easily run bard, wizard, mage and do most of the group content (if not all) in the game.
