Pet Mitigation: Parses and Discussion

Oh I know this is a moot point, since this thread is about pushing an agenda, class envy, jealousy and hate/discontent which is the status quo in the EQ player community There is no logic or even common sense to be served up here, even if there is data to suggest it.

About tanks in PoWar...

I do not wish to add another nail to the coffin, but since the mob there apparently bypass all block-dodge-parry on top of the aggro buff / debuff non tank/ tank get, I've had success tanking with a wizard... Shield of fate do wonders.

Yes, the wizard's gear is slightly above average ( missing CoTF chase shoulder for a full set of CoTF raid armor, and only missing naggy aug + grandmaster aug as far as aug goes).

other DPS'er in the group don't have to hold back since the wizard also have an aggro buff ( and since our arcane fusion aggro reducting proc don't work there).

Shield of fate smooth out the damage of the mob.

Work well... except on minotaur Fury ( and the flurry'ing kind of mob).

Typical setup is Wiz-wiz-cleric-bard + 2 merc... good enough to do field of strife faction grind.

In other games, the norm is that tank classes are the ones who have greater ability to solo than other classes. For example, in WoW, the best solo class is the Death Knight - an analogy to the EQ SK, with great personal healing to make up for slightly worse mitigation than Warriors. This comes about due to the tools given to tanks being easily translatable to solo ability.

WoW has an over abundance of tanks in the PvE game. In PvP, however, it balances out because DPS>tanks and healers in PvP.

EQ is different in that DPS classes were given the tools to solo in place of tanks. SKs and Paladins still solo pretty well but they are not at the level of the pet classes.

An off product of pet classes' ability to solo is their ability to combine with other ranged DPS to form ranged only groups.

These groups have produced the bulk of the complaints in this thread.

1. Please no. CoTF raids, even the achievements, are horribly easy as they are. I can single tank them all as it is. You'd have to significantly up damage if you decide to re-tune every event.

2. Most mobs don't strike-through defensives. In raids, the bosses that do are tuned appropriately given that fact. Even those that don't, we tank just fine. They'd have to significantly up damage speed or strength if they did this.

3. I don't want self-healing. I tank just fine. That's what clerics are for.

4. Flash of Anger or whatever other mitigation cooldowns you need. Projection of Anger will tank and let you step back. Plenty more examples. Again, no need.

5. Why? It isn't bad.

6. Warriors use Rest and can immediately dive back in without Endo problems. No need for anything else. Now you're just trying to give me things I don't need.

7. Self buffs. They feel meaningful to me.

8. It's called resists. If that doesn't work, it's called using AA's like Mark of the Mage Hunter when spells on a boss are going to be a problem.

9. Please god no. I love my holy-trinity model of gaming. I love my wizards. Let's not start character envy and ruin the game model here.

10. Don't really care on this one.

Love the name Pseudomonas. If I didn't already have a theme, I'd change all my dotters' names to bacterial names.

Let's fix warriors and then have a thread comparing what different pet users can do to Roon, our new standard for parsing.

Here's some more data from a Ranger, that came in via the eqresource in game channel.

Ranger magelo: http://eq.magelo.com/profile/1881076
If you don't want to click the link: 112khp, 9.5k displayed ac. A shield (310 AC) was used for this parse, and the only buff was certitude. I calculated rAC value to be 3212.

Anyway, here's the DI spread:


Here's the round-by-round graph:

Tanking summary for: Shang ---

Total damage: 9012752 ---

Avg hit: 13080 ---

Swings: 1216 ---

Defended: 376 (30.9%) ---

Hit: 689 (56.7%) ---

Missed: 151 (12.4%) ---

Accuracy: 82% ---

Dodged: 81 (8.8%) ---

Parried: 145 (12.1%) ---

Blocked: 17 (1.4%) ---

Riposted: 133 (12.6%) ---

Absorbed: 0 (0%)

I think that the reason that pets mitigate better than players currently can actually be found here on the forums.

https://forums.station.sony.com/eq/index.php?threads/ac-vs-acv2.210028/#post-3078126

Dzarn gave us the formulas and if you look here

It shows that pets and NPCs, like the Mercs get boosted AC that the real players don't get.

This boosted AC is what's forcing the DI down like I know Warriors used to be able to do.

What healing was necessary?

Group gear and focus.
I just did Shoon with no problem solo, no merc. You need to rotate in swarm pets by recalling and mem bluring the main pet with summon companion. Once the rotation is established all you need to do it cast runes on the pet and patch heal from time to time between swarm pets. Summon main pet to clear agro once 2nd pet has establish agro. Easy as pie for simple named. Ended with 40% mana but i did not use mana gather, just rods.
Someone decided to help me around 20% but they backed off and effected nothing as the pet was max health for most of the fight.
Its clear that bsts have much better heals, but mages have much better swarm pets. For a named with no Adds this strategy should work for many named

Since you brought it up, yes. Says right there on the Sony EQ Class page: https://www.everquest.com/classes

"Elements [sic] pets are at the heart of a magician's offensive strategy, and typically accompany a magician in all his adventures. This pet provides protection for its master, along with powerful attacks and special abilities. Magicians have a large selection of fire- and magic-based damage spells, allowing them to mount a damaging magical assault in support of their elemental pet."

Seems to me the pet is supposed to step up to the mob in a limited tanking role while we help assault it. Yeah, so we can do more than a warrior by ourself. We lack the ability to protect others in our group, though. We also can't survive all mechanics. If your warrior is benched for a pet, the issue isn't with the warrior class....

I've said for years that this is the underlying problem. As people leave those games and try EQ, they are unhappy with the model. They expect EQ to be designed like those games. The more people that sub to EQ seems nearly proportional to the frequency of posts/threads like this one.

Yea we are getting a bit off topic, but this is a "real world" example of the viability of pet tanking and utility against named. Lets get back to the main topic tho =)

Why are we using Roon? Other than for our game of Smoke & Mirrors. Where are the parses against mobs with special abilities? Mobs that cast spells, gfluxes, gravity wells, push backs, those that let you only get so close, that FD the most hated, that riposte, that have heavy ds's, etc? I bet not one single warrior will parse that; if they did, I'm willing to bet they'll skew it. Maybe a parse or two on those mobs from warriors who know what they're doing and say everything is fine. Lay it out how you did it. Apparently, that's what's needed since this is all about "raw data" and "information."

Roon is a pathetic example since he's nothing special but hard hitting. A mob, clearly, intended to be a soft target. He is nowhere near a representation of the actual game. He's an outlier and people act like it's the norm.

I would actually say Roon is more common an archetype then the named with gravity wells and other anti- pet like abilities. Named with those abilities are outliers if anything. Sure most named have some AOE DOT or DD but thats about it and in those cases a Pet owners ability to heal is invaluable. Where the tank must rely on the merc in many cases to be smart....

1. Why? If they a horribly easy how is horribly easier bad. Further, if you haven't noticed the existing CoF content is just about all done. Adjustments can be made to future content.

2. If most don't strike through defenses then there is no reason for any of them to. Hehe - you said tuned..you said it after saying the content was way too easy. Which is it? Is the content tuned or not tuned?

3. Then you'd advocate removing combat self-healing/pet healing from Paladins, SK's, and the Not A Tank pet classes? I see. If it's the Cleric's job sir, then it's the Cleric's job.

4. Please consult the duration and refresh of Flash of Anger. I think restricting pet-owners to similar timing for casting and having swarm pets up might impact them. There's plenty of precedent for the capability I suggested.

5. You do realize Resurrection sickness impacts the use of Endurance restoration measures as well as capability right? You'd extend summoning sickness to pets? I see.

6. See above. One does not simply click Rest and dive back in (if I may make use of an internet meme).

7. The issue is how long it takes to prepare to perform a role. The NOT EVEN TANKS are not entitled to significant advantages up and down the line.

8. a. Aye - make resists effective. b. How long does Mark of the Mage Hunter last? The Not Even Tanks are not entitled to a pass on NPC effects that beset actual tanks. Such things are parts of the reason for their use instead of players in a player role. Are Magicians a tank class? Game, set, match.

9. Excuse me, the Not Even Tank classes who are co-opting the role of TANKS have no grounds for pointing at real tanks and saying class envy. Let's keep in mind exactly who is infringing the heck out of who here.

10 I'm indifferent to your agreement or disagreement.

I listed several measures that would erode pet tanking advantage by elevating actual tanks. Nearly every one of those suggestions considered a pet advantage and offered up a player equivalent. If these are OP for a tank, IMO many of them are unbelievably OP for a Not Even A Tank.

There are two method of making adjustment:
1. Eliminate the advantages of the so envious of tanks pet classes that they purloin our role (pet can have a DPS role without infringing on us) by elevating tanks. Not symbolic throw tanks a 5% mitigation bonus bone that doesn't do a darned thing. Instead get right to the heart of the matter and take out pet advantage.

2. The other option. The one we can't speak about.

If SOE does many of the things I've suggested pets taking the tanking role from actual tanks ends (except for boxers and not terribly social players) since we can assume a tank guided by human intelligence will perform better.

That, sir, is the very definition of an outlier. An outlier is "one not like the others" as Sesame Street says. If most have an AOE DOT/DD, or DoT/DD, or something similar, Roon, by definition, is an outlier.

Here is a graph (borrowed from http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikiped....svg/325px-Standard_deviation_diagram.svg.png), since people love them. The dark blue represent mobs with something more than just "I hit hard" or your mobs that have AoE's, DoT's, gfluxes, etc. The lightest blue are your "I hit hard" mobs or hard to damage/high HP mobs. Anything past the +/-1 sigma is called an outlier. The mobs that you see the most of represent those closest to mu. Additionally, a warrior and a mage doing what they have available and not maxing is closer to mu. What the OP originally parsed was closer to -3 sigma. What everyone is comparing that to is a mage at mu. Then they discuss mage dps at the 3sigma to show how zomg great mages are compared to warriors when solo'ing. Discussing mitigation, parsed under -3 sigma conditions absolutely can not logically be applied to the situation found at mu. Nor can a 3 sigma situation be applied to what mu is. So far, I have only seen sigma discussed and nothing shown to display what mu is for warriors; conversely, a ton of discussion of mu and 3 sigma has been used to discuss how mages compare.

That, sir, is the very definition of an outlier. An outlier is "one not like the others" as Sesame Street says. If most have an AOE DOT or DoT or something similar, Roon, by definition, is an outlier.

Here is a graph (borrowed from http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikiped....svg/325px-Standard_deviation_diagram.svg.png), since people love them. The dark blue represent mobs with something more than just "I hit hard" or your mobs that have AoE's, DoT's, gfluxes, etc. The lightest blue are your "I hit hard" mobs or hard to damage/high HP mobs. Anything past the +/-1 sigma is called an outlier. The mobs that you see the most of represent those closest to mu. Additionally, a warrior and a mage doing what they have available and not maxing is closer to mu. What the OP originally parsed was closer to -3 sigma. What everyone is comparing that to is a mage at mu. Then they discuss mage dps at the 3sigma to show how zomg great mages are compared to warriors when solo'ing. Discussing mitigation, parsed under -3 sigma conditions absolutely can not logically be applied to the situation found at mu. Nor can a 3 sigma situation be applied to what mu is. So far, I have only seen sigma discussed and nothing shown to display what mu is for warriors; conversely, a ton of discussion of mu and 3 sigma has been used to discuss how mages compare.


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If you are looking merely at a list of mechanics, then yes Roon is an Outlier. But in terms of DIFFICULTY Roon is MUCH less an outlier compared to the mobs with mechanics you mentioned. If Those gneral named with AOEs are a medium then Roon is much closer than a mob with gravity wells who is a RARE thing indeed.
This is not a case of If X then Y
This is a case of X about as hard as Y while Z (your example) is nearly non-existent by comparison.

Make a list of Named your pet CAN NOT tank, then realize that in comparison to the list the it CAN tank, Everything else, its statistically minor indeed.

And as i said in my last post pet owners have huge advantages in those average cases, which no one seems interested in actually refuting
It seems the picture at the end broke the quote.

I'll have tank yard trash, tank HA's, tank many named, sometimes save the day by providing recovery time in raids by tanking. Tank, tank, tank, eggs and tank. I like tank. Such things are funny when it's Monty Python, but less amusing when it's your class defining role and a member of Not Even a Tank class want to talk standard deviations and confidence factors (pushes the parses off the table).

I'm hoping SOE elevates actual tanks. True we have to gear for tanking and we occupy a group slot and aren't a 2 for 1 deal (caster DPS plus pet tank taking up one group slot). but tightening up the DPS hierarchy would lessen that disadvantage.

this tread is not about who solos what. warriros cant solo? ok? so ? i have known this sense forever im fine with beeing a wimp by myself in such a manner that i cant heal myself. But the fact for this trade off of being really bad at beeing on my own but when i do group up with ppl to do my one job to tank. I feel there should be NO better tank(class/pet/anythign player controlled) out there , no one should mitigate better then the warrior. if/when the warrior dies is cuz he dident get healed or failed some mechanic. He should be the one able to shoulder more inc dmg then anyone els anything els at any time, outside defesive included.

thats pretty much all most warriors want. anything els in this tread is null and void . pet classes will continue solo and so will many many other classes but not warriors and thats fine aslong as the above statement is true