Just a couple ideas that came to my mind. How about an activated AA that gives us a long timer buff (2 hours) with a chance for our warder to shield us for a couple ticks from time to time? During this short shielding we can step in and melee a mob, and if we're tanking it, the warder will recieve the damage during that time. Less healing and more dps for the soloing bst since we can heal the warder easier. It could function like Companion's Sacrifice AA, but with a shorter lasting timer, since it'd be passive but abit random when it kicks in. Maybe similar chance that rangers sheltering thunder has, as a ballpark? Preferably not long..1-2 tick duration imo. Call it Guarding Companion. Also how about a passive AA that lets our warder do more damage when we cast our heal spell on it? Reasoning is, when our warder takes damage, likely it's when it's tanking and we're not meleeing. This means we're losing dps not meleeing and healing the warder, losing more dps cuz not nuking either. So, to become more efficient at killing mobs but still staying alive, how about giving the pet some sort of damage, preferably not a proc (we got too many pet procs as it is), but instead perhaps a crit modifier buff of some sort, or just give us a recourse buff that adds damage to the next nuke cast (as compensation for the lost dps for time spent casting heals) Call it Warder's Synergy.
Our warders already shield for us automatically, I get the message popping up in my logs from time to time.
There are also activated spells and AA's that will do this. If you are hurting for mitigation you aren't doing it right. We have many ways to stay in even in the most vicious of rampage damage.
I know all of this, but how does that matter? Try soloing on your beastlord (no merc) and never cast any heals...then come here and tell me what you're doing wrong My point is, you're too busy healing you don't get to dps. And no, I'm not talking about raids..we have a group healer then. I think it'd be nice to get some sort of combo effect, like perhaps give our next nuke a twincast when we cast a heal spell etc. Or a nuke spell that also casts a heal...things like that. Maybe even a nuke spell that does more damage when we're low on HPs...kinda like shamans got their emergency heal....we could have an emergency nuke instead. These are more spell-like ideas now though. Things like this could make it interesting imo.
You clearly don't understand what would inhibit that due to how the engine functions so I'm going to give you a mulligan. The only thing that is even possible out of anything you mentioned is twincast.
How about an AA version of Growl - 1min duration. 500 mana cost. Instant cast. 1min recast timer. Just on self...the pet already has this effect baked into the current haste buff. This is without the HPs and regen of growl spell line, which imo have stagnated alot anyways.
I've seen the AA's that we are(n't) getting. Nothing game breaking and STILL no RF timer reduction and ZERO help on the mana bleeding front.
Personally I would love it if both rangers and beast lords were given a strong DD that reflected a heal on the targets target. To stay balanced it would either need a long recast time or be appropriately expensive enough to not make it a staple nuke - but IMO it would need to be comparable in raw damage output to make it worthwhile to weave into the mix. My opinion? It would be good for the individual for tanking and soloing purposes while giving both of these classes a bit more group/raid friendly utility - especially for groups facing cotent that is challenging relative to their own power. A well timed patch heal is worth it's weight in gold. The ability to do this without having to stop dpsing? That's the 'land of milk and honey' type of thing. My only gripe with healing and dps hybrids is the need to swap targets. I sometimes wish eq had a targeting system where you could designate an offensive and defensive target. If you cast a beneficial spell (heal cure etc) - it would divert to your defensive target or yourself if no defensive target was specified. Warhammer online (my favorite pvp mmo) had a similar setup. Under that sort of circumstance the effective power curve for hybrids is palpably higher than in EQ. Imagine if rangers or beast lords (paladins too) could more fully utilize that healing without the unnecessary swaps.
I agree what was said about the AA line of Cheetah Pounce, it is a tela warp and not a pounce at all. I think it would be much useful and realistic to the class to change it like the berserkers battle leap w/o the dmg. Same with Focused Paragon of Spirits, it is great but lacking sufficient mana gain per tick-IMO (To current lvl100 mana casters who have 120k+mana pool). On raids with a recently resurrected brethren the Focused comes in handy but I also agree beastys need to help with endurance regen. The combat ability reflective rending(if recall right) is nice but the CD is very long. just quick 2cents here cuz dbl exp is running- The idea of a mana/hp/end return on aa sha's reprisal is a worthwhile thought.
Focused paragon is OK, but it's more like an addiction than anything. You click it because you're used to clicking it, and get a tiny fix from it. Nothing like how it was originally. Mirrored Focused Paragon would be much cooler though, Your focus on the spirits allows you to bless your target and yourself with a regeneration buff equal to the current level of paragon (whatever it may be atm), by casting focused paragon on anyone but yourself, the spirits grant the beastlord the same buff for his selflessness and/or alignment with the spirits etc. So the trick would be in order for the Beast to have that sustained paragon you have to actually find a target to use it on that isn't you. Normal paragon should remain unchanged.
What Zahrym said. is annoying to click after all these years still to see a couple % mana jump when its all said and done. I'd much rather they increased the cooldown on focused paragon and just upped the return values. Paragon is like 10 mins maxed out right? Make Focused Paragon 5 mins maxed out and tack on the mirrored thing. Less staring at my hotbar is always better.
What is sad is that Miniature Horn of Unity now have a mana regen of 200, endu regen 200, reuse 5 min, and top FPoS has at top 388 mana 0 endurance and and reuse of 1 min 24 sec. Also paragon of spirit has 197 endurance regen, which is less than Horn Another thing is that in theory FPoS should be at least as effective as normal PoS, as it is focused. Personally I would not mind if it was changed to 5 min reuse as Recnarp suggest, but then me a LOT more effective.
Horn knocks off both of your worn mana regen clickies however, soothing breath and knowledge of the past. Focused Paragon could definitely use a boost, I don't know that the timer needs to be upped really but the mana regen portion could use a boost hard.
I don't really understand after only picking the class up recently how it isn't the same as Paragon. It's the same ability...it has the same name. It also has 1/10th the effectiveness at the 1/10th the cooldown. It would make sense if it was group-wide or something, but it's not...it's single target. Just feels really lack luster for a class defining ability like Paragon to have fallen so far from grace.
I'd be fine with them trashing FPoS altogether and just boosting the mana regen and especially the endurance regen of regular PoS significantly.
