As the title says. Part of me wants to say mage, cleric, and bard but there are so many options. What group could do the most of current group content, including T2 nameds? I'm hearing that most tanks are having difficulty with the content unless they are in raid gear? Is mage pet the way to go?
Probably depends on alot of things, like are you talking about boxing duo/trio, or actual people playing each character, because that changes alot. Like, I play a beastlord for instance, and I have a cleric to box, but I rarely want to, because it's very stressful to play a beastlord and also be in charge of healing. Both require constant button mashing on both characters. Moreso that the healer would force me to play the beastlord poorly, and that's not fun imo
I think the best three box that I can think of (though any 3 could be viable) is enchanter, druid, and mage. The druid gives you ports, movement, and a mana buff hp. The druid also gives you heals for when you decide to do old world content raids, like Anguish where mercs are not allowed. The mage is your pet and some more dps. The enchanter is really the one that I would concentrate on (though I'm biased). He pulls, crowd controls, and debuffs the mob. The mage box would simply send in pet, and nuke as needed. The CoH would allow you to move around easily without having to constantly /follow. The druid also provides simple nukes/dot in a macro button, snare, etc. Good well rounded group there. I also think that bard would fit in that group as well. Another solid choice might be bard, sk, and shaman. Very gear dependent there though, and would require a lot more effort to get the real benefits of the bard melee and sk melee going. I think for me though, anything more than two box starts to really suffer in how effective it truly is.
I like the idea of a mage or necro for my primary. I've heard that necro pets at 100 tank just as well as mage pets? That necros can do the same content but faster?
A necro pet tanked Deathglider in Beasts' Domain for my group this past week. Properly geared, AA'd and buffed (and the raid focus certainly helping), it was a cakewalk. The same could not be said for a 95 tank merc.
Shadowknight/Shaman/Mage used to be the best trio for named farming and just boxing in general. I don't know if that's changed. If you wan't the *easiest* trio to do group content (ie less AA farming and gear requirements) having a group where a mage pet main tanks will be the way to go. Mage/Chanter will be the core for that group.
Mage is the theme, and the core of any strong group. I would recommend a Mage/Beastlord/Bard. Two pets, bard overhaste aura affects swarm pets, slows, throw in 2 healer mercs and a rogue merc and you can take on any boss. Avoid tank mercs, beyond stupid and pretty much useless at the high end. I currently box a Mage/Ranger/Bard and nothing daunts me.
Well mate, I can't speak for everyone. In my experience the tank merc is quite problematic. Even when I set myself as puller, if he's set as main tank he'll run out as soon as mobs are within (50 or 100 feet) and try to get on top of their hate list. It's quite idiotic imo. And since I'm tri-boxing I find using the passive/aggressive hotkeys not too favorable. Most of the time, since I have to do so much, I forget to go aggressive if I'm in passive. If I set myself as main tank he'll try to get up to #2 on all the hate lists. I'm not too fond of him because I currently like to multipull. (Single pulls are boring tbh). And the mage pet and rogue mercs are really the only ones disciplined enough to stay put. Caster mercs not so great in my experience either. They forget to attack, or they over nuke and have to concussion. I simply dont' like mobs running all over my face. Besides, your mage pet will eventually > than tank merc after you get the levels and AAs and gear. Lookup enchanced minion focus items, they boost your pet's level, hp, hit power, etc.. And you can pocket a 2nd mage tank-pet with the suspend AA.
You said your running with a bard so I'm like 90% sure I know what your problem is. When the bard sings a new song during his melody and it get's applied to the puller, it transfers a tiny bit of aggro to the bard. This in turn sets off the tank merc because the bard is not set as puller. It's a shame you can't set multiple people to puller.
Most of the time bard aggro is not an issue. In dangerous places I turn him off and just have aura running, turn him invisible, no aggro there. It's the overhaste I'm addicted to. I had the same problem when I was just duoing ranger/mage, no bard. Tank mercs stand around looking at their toes, then yell, "Leeeerooy Jenkins!" and go charging out at the wrong time. Friends also confirm at post 70, tank mercs just not worth the headache. Only really useful if you need a rampage tank, but then you need to be smart, know the mechanics, and time the attacks. I never have bard singing on boss mob inc pulls.
And my experience with mages and tank mercs are very different. As a cleric, I do a lot of pulling (for my mage husband and I when we duo with or without 1 boxed char that I play - or for guild groups - or for pick up groups). When the tank merc is out, it's usually mine (a belikos) merc and I've never experienced the issue you said you had with your tank merc running out to engage. Is yours set to aggressive or assist? Mage hubby is set as assist, tank merc is set as main tank and I'm set as puller and I've never seen him run off like that with those settings.
Have you tried setting your merc to not auto assist and calling for assist instead? The merc will sit there and do nothing until you tell it to engage. Seems like it would solve all your problems. You pull, when the mob gets into the range you want, you call for assist and the merc engages the mob.
I also have never experienced what you are describing. If anything I have the opposite problem. The tank merc never chases anything outside a certain range of people not marked as puller.
2 mages and a bard with 2 healer mercs and 1 dps merc. You'll be able to kill/farm any group content up to level 100 save for an over-tuned named or two. One mage pet with all the pet AAs and a focus item (which is easily obtainable with this setup) can tank 3 unslowed RoF T2 mobs with little risk. A second pet is good backup in case the first does drop. But since you have the bard, you can single pull and split camps very quickly and easily... so shouldn't be fighting more then you want at a given time anyhow. I run this setup plus another mage (less a dps merc)- I've killed almost every T2 named (Xolok the Blind I haven't dare tried to box). If you want to play another class, I still recommend using this setup and then twinking another character later. Sub in another caster in place of a mage if you want, but having the backup pet is probably a better thing to have. Don't play a melee at all with this setup- it'll take proximity aggro over your tanking pets and need 10x as much healing as the pet would. I'm convinced a mage pet tanks better then all but the best raid-geared tanks.
hard to beat shm + mage + druid, mage ------> see above druid ------> fast aa snare , fast refresh , instant cheetah run speed and invis (aa ). instant fade + invis (3 min refresh ), you can pull 10 mobs if u want, and snare the one you dont want if you are pulling a named who is immune to run speed , tthen when named alone . fade a reagro (single pull ), or if chain pulling for xp, snare (15min +/-, lenght ) all after the other one , then fade or coh,,they stand all there looking nice and not moving due to the snare, and ready to be picked near camp. at casting range. druid ports . evac , aa teleport group to bind ( you can bind your druid at your killing area choice and gate all group there with one click ) , track $$ , skin buff if needed extra heal if needed .ect , ect ... shaman ----> very good overtime heal (many times that s the only heal u need to have ,combined with shammy slow (who add another HOT who stack ), , growth buff who add more hp than clr and druid buff combined , and stack. fatigue buff ( add slow proc to get pet more agro and add another overtime heal proc ),good dots , cheetah run speed as well (aa ), unity buff who add str, dex and avoidance and hp. Tiger buff line who add a melee proc to any pets or melee (over 1k damage and proc a lot ), best root in game (aa root ), and got a knockback, can send an add away from melee range, for 3 min, and the list goes on, back up heals if needed, not even need a healer merc, ( group HOT and counterbias slow hot proc is usually the only cast you need for the heals ) can get 3 dps mercs to the trio and they can do good dps at higher levels ( specially with druid casters proc aura )..... and the list goes on
Ok the best trio is shaman bard and enchanter , u pull with enchanter tash, slow , cripple and mezz add i would say its best to pull . The bard stay on auto follow with melody on doing 5 songs and btw my bard are never attacked due to the fact that tank merc take agro real quick.the shaman is only there to buff others with the focus line and all the talisman one. I use 2 merc tank and 1 healer the reason of tank merc is because i prefer a tank over melee to take agro on multiple add and the dmg is good doing quad hit at 180 dmg (lvl 63) the melee one do like 70 but add a rare 2 k dmg with poison but i still prefer 2 tank still
If you plan to have a bard or ench in the group for cc. then mage or necro works fine for pet tanking. If you don't plan on having a bard or ench and only one pet class go with necro. While with the same aa/em as each other a mages pet is stronger then a necros, mages just don't have the cc tools a necro will have. But I would say mage(or necro) bard and shammy. with at lest 1 healer merc and the other 2 slots being 2 wizard mercs or a second healer merc and 1 wizard merc.(personal I would have at lest one toon have merc slots with a wizard merc and a healer merc so you can change back and forth as needed) With this setup you have bard = single pulls/damage songs/snare/cc/adps songs shammy = slow/dots/pet damage/heals mage = best pet and some great dd damage spells/ds or necro = good pet for tank/snare/great damage for dots/cc/fd/slow/group heals(lifetaps/rb) then you got the mercs for heals/damage.
