I was surprised that the animation is completely dismissed by so many enchanters now, even with the negatives there are a few positive uses that is enough for me to keep one summoned and suspended and to buy a few mage pet weapons if I can't trade buffs for some. For one thing it keeps the familiar that I cast for the buffs from popping up every time I zone. More seriously there are several advantages to keeping one handy. It can be viewed as a dot that can be controlled. It's not going to tank, but then again we lost the pet-tanking ability a long long time ago on charmed pets. I think that was one of the things that pushed so many people into charm solo or find other options in groups. It was, and still is, to convince people to stay off the hate list if you need one to hold aggro and tank as a method of CC. As far as I know that hasn't changed considerably. It gets beaten down, break mez, kill it and charm the target. On occasion that's still a viable method that doesn't mean you have to run around rooting mobs and dragging a pet over to be buzz-sawed. On occasion I've broken charm, summoned the suspended animation and let it finish off the mobs (the type that walks away at low health). It's not much good for anything over dark blue, but it's worth it as a longish lasting dot that doesn't have to be cast for every mob. If you give it weapons (any weapons) it will do more damage, if you give it summoned mage pet weapons it can do more with some of the melee buffs that are current. I use it to pull at times. It's useful when you can't "see" the mob to get a spell on it but you can send the animation in. It doesn't always work on mobs that have gotten stuck in a rock or something, but has on occasion. I have always used it as a distraction to give me a few seconds to deal with a mob that is being pulled, or with mez'd targets or just long enough to cast some aa. It comes down to making the most of what I have, and as long as I have it I may as well find ways of using it. I went back to using it a lot more when I started boxing and using mercs or grouping with peope with mercs. It's tricky getting the role settings right where the tank or caster won't "assist" on a mob that I have targeted for mez rather than the incoming. That results in some back and forth that I can avoid all together by sending the pet out to attack the target. The merc tank follows and assist, even when it's not set on roles, leaving me free to mez whatever needs to be mez'd. Mobs that can be charmed are not always available, the animation is. It's also just plain fun to use a one of the clickie pet illusions and Preserved Chokidai Vocal cords. We should definitely have a no component, or at least a single component, version. It should also come dual equipped out of the box. We should also be on the pet earrings even if the buffs won't work on ours just for the clickie shrink that doesn't take up an extra inventory slot. Nothing ever came of the requests some time ago for stackable, summoned weapons. We're still dragging around tiny daggers when even rangers only need one arrow.
I agree 100% with this. I don't use my pet at all now. In the case of finishing off a mob, I won't take the time to pop a pet, I'll just nuke it down. If there is nothing to charm? I just nuke and pull. Is he alittle more damage? sure. but when your group is doing 60k dps, 500 dps isn't going to add up to more than a second of difference in a kill. Most zones are depopulated by the time that will make a difference. If he were worth casting though.. I'd definitely use him.
It's convenient when boxing. Free dps with little maintenance. I don't want to deal with charms while running four chars. The AA to control it gave it actual value. Unless you're in situations where you'll be charming, why not have one summoned? Gives you some options with little negative. Does help to have a pet mage to summon toys. The only time I used it in the old days was when camping my jboots in Ocean of Tears. Otherwise, it only created trouble by attacking mobs I wanted to mez and breaking mez once locked on. Charm was also such a great tool, the useless animation was a waste.
It's weird, when I have a charmed pet, I never fail to send it in on a mob but when I have bob out I can never remember to click attack, so to me he's just taking up valuable screen space.
Its simple the pets damage over its expected life cycle is less than just casting a normal nuke, or dot. Also because trying to keep the dammed thing up and doing something takes more time and yields less overall damage than just casting in that time.
While I don't disagree with this, with Tiny Daggers costing 1s and stacking to 100, and giant bags, it's not nearly a big enough deal for me to complain about. I have Mages summon me piles of stuff and sell it to me from the Bazaar for 1c. I purchase it and have it sent to my mailbox where it doesn't rot when I log. Worst case, there are people on Bertoxulous Server who sell them in the Bazaar regularly for a profit. They're reasonably priced, and I can have them sent directly to my inventory wherever I am. Having Enchanters on the pet earring would be nice for those few of us who read the forums, but the majority would be confused that it didn't work on their pets. Actually having it work on our pets would be nice though.
The chanter animation has always had one major important role: to easily identify terrible enchanters so you can avoid them.
It was pretty useful some time ago, when i did the "kill hundreds of obsolete things" quest... And honestly - ever since the massive charm nerf the difference between charmed mobs and shiny bob is... not as it used to be.
I dunno about that, i can regularly walk into a zone were i can charm and find a charmable that hits for 5-10k a swing. Shiny bob on the other hand at BEST I've seen hit for 1k, that was full gear, buffs and other stuff. Is it a smaller gap? ya, but its still a dammed big gap.
We can't pretend that charm mobs aren't still massively better dps wise than shiny bob. Sure shiny bob can tank about the same as a charm pet, but a charm pet can't really 'tank'. That was the massive part of the nerf. But shiny bob doesn't hold aggro nor dps anywhere near a charm pet.
Well, I'm going to disagree with you here, Jehmal. Shiny bob does not tank near as well as a charm pet does. His hit points and avoidance and AC totals are abysmal. If I had a choice between Shiny bob taking a hit or taking a hit myself. I'm going in for the beat down. I'm not the greatest choice for a tank, either, but I sure can handle damage better then he can. Your also misinformed about Charm pet agro. It is entirely possible for a charm pet to tank. But there are rules. 1. NPCs will ignore a charm pet if there are more then three players on that NPCs hate list. And, well yea that's pretty much it. That means an enchanter plus 2 friends can safely use a charm pet as a tank. And that's really all you can ask for. You wouldn't want to rely on a charm pet tanking in a party of 4-6, because of the potential to break, ect. Shiny bob, as we all love to call him, kind of slowly became a tool to spot a bad Enchanter, rather then a viable tool in the aresonal. Sure, if your farming greys or greens, go ahead, but really, that should be the last tool in your tool belt your reaching for
I am not saying it's NOT possible to tank anything with a charm pet. I'm saying that a charm pet is not a good tank. Sure you can muscle through a few mobs, but guess what.. apparently you haven't tried to tank with shiny bob in a long time either. Shiny Bob can tank mobs in zones like Crystal Caverns etc. You'll have to use silent casting to get him to do it because his dps(aggro) is abysmal. You can disagree with me, but that doesn't make you right or more informed. I do know how charm pets work and how the rule of 3 works. My point is that a charm pet doesn't tank anywhere near what it should be able to. It requires a cleric merc casting heals constantly or me stunning all the time not to have it's health deteriorating. Sure you can do it, but you can also have a rogue tank in missions.. that doesn't make a rogue a 'tank'.
The question isn't what you can or can't do, the question is, what is sustainable? Shiny bob tanking -- requires Silent casting 30 minute ish cooldown Charm pet tanking -- requires chain stun or chain heal. -- very small cooldown. Tanking is defined by two things, the ability to mitigate damage, and the ability to hold threat Enchanters have tools that allow our pet/charmed mob to do either of these things, so your correct in a sense that you could hypothetically help Shiny Bob tank by reducing your threat. But the question is, can you maintain this for a long period? The easy answer to that is no. You cannot. You don't have the option to keep silent casting on yourself every mob, and even if you managed your fades, I give you 3-5 mobs in Crystal Caverns before your out of tricks. Charming, on the other hand, you can maintain much longer, and you can maintain a higher DPS contribution from your pet. This means more mobs/minute which equals more XP per hour. And we are simply talking about solo/molo play right now. Is shiny bob going to tank for a group? nope. If your expecting 3-6 players to maintain almost 0 agro on a NPC so shiny bob can tank, well... /AFK I'm going to watch netflix. I'm not saying it doesn't work In a pinch, with Cooldowns on, terrifying rune, and Mage agro weapons, My statement is simply that it is not sustainable over any length of time. This is why any Enchanter who knows their class, simply doesn't use him at all. It's much better to charm if you want a pet, or if your solo, Hence the above statement
then arn't you two in almost total agreement? for older/underpowered content shiny bob tanks about as well as a charmed pet. a charmed pet tanks under the rule of three about even accross all zones (where charm avilable). Point be said Shiny bob is a piss poor tank in all regards. can he work? Yes, but the amount of stupidity is well. . . stupid. Charmed pets are not as bad as Shinky Bob, they can take a few hits and do better DPS, but dont hold agro past the rule of three. what it amounts to is if your in a group enviroment as a boxed enchanter why not have shiny bob. if your maining an enchanter you realy should be charming.
I don't solo or box a lot. I prefer groups where the pet dot is useful. The damage you get with the pet anad group dps buffs that are available from the other classes can be astounding, and shows just how out of the main stream our buffs and class is. Last night I did A Ranger's Tale with a group that included a bard, had there been a bard and a shaman the dps would have been even higher. The pet was group buffed, no weapons. None of my castable dots do this much damage and I can tell it to stop. Pet commands made a nice change from early on when we had to rune up to run in and get the mob to try and hit us, hopefully without connecting. Nothing new about "Enchanter Rune Tanking" at least we don't have to do it to get the pet to attack any more. [Sun Jun 08 22:44:04 2014] Fylgja tells you, 'Attacking a dragon whelp Master.' [Sun Jun 08 22:44:04 2014] Fylgja slashes a dragon whelp for 891 points of damage. [Sun Jun 08 22:44:04 2014] Fylgja slashes a dragon whelp for 891 points of damage. [Sun Jun 08 22:44:05 2014] Fylgja slashes a dragon whelp for 1030 points of damage. [Sun Jun 08 22:44:08 2014] Fylgja bashes a dragon whelp for 286 points of damage. [Sun Jun 08 22:44:08 2014] Fylgja slashes a dragon whelp for 1030 points of damage. [Sun Jun 08 22:44:10 2014] Fylgja hit a dragon whelp for 7109 points of non-melee damage. [Sun Jun 08 22:44:10 2014] Fylgja slashes a dragon whelp for 1560 points of damage. [Sun Jun 08 22:44:10 2014] Fylgja slashes a dragon whelp for 1030 points of damage. [Sun Jun 08 22:44:10 2014] Fylgja slashes a dragon whelp for 1030 points of damage. [Sun Jun 08 22:44:10 2014] Fylgja executes a FLURRY of attacks on a dragon whelp! [Sun Jun 08 22:44:11 2014] Fylgja slashes a dragon whelp for 1030 points of damage. [Sun Jun 08 22:44:12 2014] Fylgja kicks a dragon whelp for 339 points of damage. [Sun Jun 08 22:44:14 2014] Fylgja slashes a dragon whelp for 1030 points of damage. [Sun Jun 08 22:44:16 2014] Fylgja slashes a dragon whelp for 1030 points of damage. [Sun Jun 08 22:44:16 2014] Fylgja hit a dragon whelp for 7109 points of non-melee damage. [Sun Jun 08 22:44:16 2014] Fylgja bashes a dragon whelp for 286 points of damage.
There is no reason that at level 100 we should have to be buying them when every other summoning class has no component or one component spells, outside Intrinsic Efficiency. It's just another example of the petty little differences that add up. As far as I remember the only one component spells that I can think of right off are the new spell guards. I use the parcel delivery to bank mage pet weapons also. I started leveling up a mage not long ago because I'm tired of always looking around for weapons or having to buy them. I agree that the pet buffs should also be available to the enchanter animation. We do not need another aa buff that doesn't make any major difference.
Lv 96 summoned animation with mage weapons, lv 100 haste, and haste belt Vs Dummy Ozah Avg DPS @ 1300 DPS ran 10 of these for upwards of 30 min fight time all came to be within 1300 +- 50. Max hit = 808 Max critical hit = 1201 % hit rate = 75% (image of parse failed to post) i still say we try to get the animation pet spell usable on players
It seems to me that a good enchanter uses everything at his or her disposal. The reason that we got what pet AA we did get was because it was our only option most of the time on raids or groups where charm just wasn't possible. It could, and should be, much better than it is, but it is what it is. Just like any of our other spells there are times it's useful and times that it's not. Take a look at the short cut and paste from my log in a previous message. That was 12 seconds. 16711 points of damage, due in part to the bard song, but with other class buffs, or given weapons (any weapon even rusty swords), it'll do at least half that. So 2225 pts of damage per second. It cost me 400 mana and a couple of silver for a tiny dagger, and 3.5 seconds to cast it. It continued to do the same amount for the whole time we were on the mission, no recasts, heals other than when it benefited from group heals and regen. A friend helped me parse the animation, cast and buffed only with haste, against the guild hall Combat Dummies. I cast Confounding Constriction Rk. III. [Mon Jun 09 22:27:11 2014] Zmashu tells the group, 'Combat Dummy Beza in 49s, 50k @1021 | Jordis 42k @861 | Fylgja 8k @713' Mon Jun 09 22:26:48 2014] Zmashu tells the group, 'Combat Dummy Caza in 265s, 184k @693 | Fylgja 139k @530 | Jordis 44k @852' [Mon Jun 09 22:28:35 2014] Zmashu tells the group, '/tell Fylgja Fylgja -vs- Combat Dummy Beza: -- DMG: 7848 -- DPS: 713 -- Scaled: 160 -- Slash: 6958 -- Bash: 572 -- Kick: 318 -- Non-crit rate: 100&PCT; -- Attempts: 12 -- Hits: 12 -- Accuracy: 100&PCT; -- Avg Hit: 654 -- Max hit: 891 -- DMG to PC: 0' Not bad for a 400 mana spell. It's worth improving, but the pet buff they're proposing is ridiculous.
If you are in a group the group buffs and auras will keep it up. Moloing the cleric will heal it. Our AA to heal, buff, If it dies, 400 mana and 3 seconds and your "dot" is running again. I leave mine on GHold, send it in when dps is needed, suspend it when it's likely to evaporate in an aoe, use it and some of our other spells to manage aggro and have used it to pet mez.. Is it the most effective spell or pet? It depends entirely on the situation just like our other pets. I don't use Lurch often, but that doesn't mean I see it as useless. Charm isn't the answer to everything. There's a time and place where we can use most of what we do have to some advantage. The problem appears to be a matter of when it becomes efficient and actually useful that it gets attention rather than when it could be more useful.
It's not just a few seconds to cast and then forget about it. You're at least going to cast a couple haste spells on it, and pass it weapons so it dual-wields. Then it's a distraction for the healer. It's exceptionally bad with a healer merc who treats Shiny Bob's life like he's an important member of the group! While I can imagine ridiculous situations where I might pull him out (Group consists of only Enchanters and we have no other way of handling enemy pets due to complete lack of charmable mobs) I don't think he's actually a positive for a group anywhere near current content. That said, we all know Enchanters, more than any other class, play differently from each other.
