Thinking of coming back; when I quit I duo'd a 100 paladin, 99 bard. Thinking of Playing a mage main and possibly a bot with it (maybe even double mage). How do their pet's fair tanking? What about HA leveling up, can the pet do it? Group wise they do okay at 105?
Mages are wonderful. The solo/molo capabilities, group game, and raid dps is all substantial. Pets tank very, very well - to the point we had 100+ page threads arguing they are better than real tanks. Its a solid class in terms of versatility. Its a solid bet. With that said, I would highly encourage you to try it out and play the class you *enjoy.* Even if they weren't relatively strong in the current state of the game, its important to find the playstyle you enjoy. For me, that happens to be the Warrior. The wifey plays a RoV raid mage, and that's the perfect fit for her. We all pay to play this game and use our valuable spare time to do so - make sure you have the most fun you can.
To me it's the strongest class in the game right now, and one of the most fun to boot. It fits well in just about every scenario - the only real drawback is a bit of lacking utility, which can easily be made up for with a useful bot (cough enchanter cough)
^This. There was just a thread on the forums about what classes to box with an Enchanter (with the general consensus being Mage): https://forums.station.sony.com/eq/index.php?threads/what-to-box-with-an-enchanter.218634/ Mage pets can tank TDS T3 named with a merc healer and a lil bit of backup from you. You'll be able to do almost all content, especially if you box another caster (Mage/Clr merc/Caster/Caster Merc). I love my lil Magebot
Magicians are in a pretty good spot right now, in group gear you should be able to molo basically anything in the new expansion, maybe a few nameds might cause you some grief. As for a box with your Mage, I'd consider Enchanter or Bards, maybe even a Druid depending on your play style.
Don't forget Shaman. Mage/Shaman is an exceptionally strong setup with buffs, debuffs, cures, slows, crowd control via AAs like VP and more. I always found the combo invaluable and low maintenance to run on the second monitor and really invaluable with AE/DoT mobs that divert your merc to more than a single heal target (Defense mission in EWK, for example.) Just a thought!
powerful, but a bit simplistic and boring for me to play, as they have always felt. Really shines when boxed, imo
We are useless and can be out dps'd by a zerker. Our pets are durable as a wet paper towel. Our servant pet is mostly for show. No need to draw attention to us mages. Nothing to nerf here just move along. Go ask the necros lol
The ability to molo the vast majority of the group game is a pretty good reason, imo. Same goes for Nec. Coupled with top notch raid deeps. The question right now would be why *not* play at mage at 105?
