Question for 6 box veteran's about having a tank in the setup

Discussion in 'Time Locked Progression Servers' started by Hinastorm86, May 4, 2020.

  1. Hinastorm86 Augur

    I'm planning on maining monk, maybe ranger, and am more concerned about including one of them in the setup, than having a perfect setup. My only hard requirements other than that are including a cleric/chanter and a porter. I can live without sow/snare.

    I'm probably looking at monk/clr/enc/druid/magx2, or Rng/clr/enc/wiz/magx2.

    My goals are to level myself and farm with this setup. Maybe down the road try to do some older raid stuff for profit once we're in velious/luclin+, but thats kind of a side project. I'd be willing to make changes to the group down the road, this does not have to last me forever.

    I'll be charming with the enchanter, and the sheer dps of the charm will make that my defacto tank. I'm not a huge fan of charm tanking while boxing, but it is what it is. Not really willing to leave that much dps on the table.

    If I were to go with the monk, would my lack of a "real" tank bite me in the butt hard at some point? And when would that be? I'm aware a raid geared monk will have decent to good mitigation, but obviously pretty poor aggro. Of course I could maybe drop a mage do and an SK or something, but thats another melee to box, and his gear would just be basic group gear.

    I could even drop the cleric and do Pal/mnk/dru/enc/magx2. Seems like everytime I think i've decided on my setup I think of 2 more =/
  2. Skuz I am become Wrath, the Destroyer of Worlds.

    I usually think for the sake of synergies & getting the best bang for your buck you either build out a melee group or a caster group.

    Caster:
    ENC/MAG/MAG/MAG/CLR/DRU or ENC/ENC/MAG/MAG/CLR/DRU if you can manage the workload

    Melee:
    SHD/MNK/MNK/MNK/SHM/BRD
  3. HoodenShuklak Augur

    When warriors get defensive they enter their own tier of tanking. It will allow you to do harder content you just couldn't before, all things being equal.

    But if you're willing to change later then I would skip a warrior for now. Nothing in classic is that hard and with the charm let you'll be mowing things down if you're just looking to exp and farm.

    A glaring thing I see in your future though is farming old raid content without a bard and or shm is a mistake. Debuffs to help Slows and resists from a bard are a big changer. I was 3 boxing classic dragons in luclin all day long and a bit in late velious but I'm not sure extra dps would have offset spells landing so much more.

    Resists play a really big role up through pop. Plus a bard makes everyone better, so it's no question to me that dropping th second mage for a bard is a good move. Even outside of farming old raids the bard helps groups a lot too.
  4. CartoTLP Journeyman

    I have six-boxed caster comps on Coirnav and Selos, so I speak from personal experience. To accomplish your stated goals you will want Enchanter/Cleric/Bard/Mage/Wizard/[Main Monk/Ranger]. From an efficiency stand point, going with a second mage would be better, but having a monk/ranger in there is not the end of the world. Some additional thoughts are as follows:

    - The lack of a "real tank" will not hurt you at all until Gates of Discord, but even there you will still be able to exp very efficiently in the zones where you can charm (Tipt for example).

    - Having a bard is absolutely huge for quality of life. Selos is addicting and once you have it you will not be able to go without it. You can invis song to break charm. You can invis song to afk safely without fear of coming back dead due to a buff fading. You can afk and keep your charm pet while playing mez song on the bard. And last but not least, mana song in an all-caster (or in your case, five caster) group is crazy good.

    - Wizard is better than a druid for boxing purposes. Mage has a better damage shield, bard has a better movement speed buff, and you won't need the other utility that druids bring to the table. I actually started with a druid in my box crew on Coirnav and replaced him with a wizard. It was night and day from a damage standpoint.

    Hope this helps.
  5. Spayce Augur

    If you have a tank it pretty much needs to be raid geared. Otherwise just stick with the charm pet tanking. So if you are going to "main" the Monk, the tank won't be very useful.
  6. Hinastorm86 Augur

    Thanks for the very specific tips and thoughts.

    I'm really not sold on bard though. Other than ports and rez, I don't really care about other out of combat benefits, like selo. Yes, i'm sure it's nice to have, but it comes at a cost of a character slot.

    All a bard is really providing to me pre-luclin is some mana regen and some minor stats/DS buffs, which won't even hit my charm pet, which will be 50%+ of my damage. The resist stuff wont really be needed for a while. While those are nice, it comes at the cost of another mage, basically.
  7. Accipiter Old Timer


    I beg to differ. I don't raid anymore (haven't for 10 years). I'm currently level 105, playing on Phinny. I'll admit that the named in Arx Mentis etc. can be spikey but my SK handles the top tier zones just fine for the most part. Yeah, I die now and then but who doesn't?

    Now, if your intent is to faceroll stuff then having a raid geared tank would be key.
  8. Accipiter Old Timer


    I have two different 5-box setups. The constants? The SK and the bard. I wouldn't want to be without the bard.
  9. Hinastorm86 Augur

    (For Rizlona)
    I'm also quickly realizing that I probably won't even get to raid as melee unless I pre-join a guild soon. Even the one's i've looked at so far are essentially already full on melee, tanks especially.

    Carto's suggested setup but adding another mage instead of the melee is looking interesting.
  10. Hinastorm86 Augur

    Even pre-luclin? As I said, im willing to switch the group around later, but bards just seem to provide so little pre-luclin.
  11. Machen New Member


    I almost never play without a bard in group. But, that said, you can definitely get by without the bard with either of your proposed groups. They are caster heavy groups, bard won't provide much that you don't already have other than run speed and extra mana regen. It's not til much later that they start providing additional synergy for casters.
  12. CartoTLP Journeyman

    Hinastorm, I was in the same boat as you when it comes to bards. I felt they were a wasted slot and why would I ever have one compared to another pure dps. Trust me, you will be happy you have one.

    If you think about it,You really are answering the question yourself when you ponder whether the bard is worth a character slot at the expense of a mage. The charm pet does the vast majority of your dps, so adding another mage is not going to make or break the group. What a bard does help out with greatly is ensuring your enchanter mana stays high enough to chain pull even when you get a string of bad RNG with charm.

    Also, the ability to "set it and forget it" with the bard /melody command is very nice. I played on truebox servers where I had six separate computers so perhaps the benefit was greater for me than it will be for you on Rizlona, but still something to consider.
  13. Hinastorm86 Augur

    Hmm a good point on the dps thing. I was planning on switching to one eventually anyway, may as well start with one. And another plus is if im willing to bring it to raids as a box, any guild would probably be pretty grateful.
  14. Uumdano Augur

    Currently rolling War/Enc/Clr/Shm/Brd/Wiz. I am not worried about max dps as opposed to controlling situation and I find having taunt/etc invaluable. The only problem rolling w/ a tank is you want it to be your main as the better geared it is, the harder the content you can tackle. I like the Bard for utility, tracking and unlock doors are very nice in the set up I am running. Sure there is some overlap w/ enc/shm/brd but again I am not concerned about maxing out dps, I am concerned about maxing survivability and maxing content.

    Having a tank will allow you to do minor raid bosses and virtually every epic encounter.
  15. Hinastorm86 Augur

    Only issue with that will be getting into a guild as a tank from the look of things, lol. At least on Rizlona, where I suspect there are a TON of boxers thinking the exact same thing about having a geared tank.
  16. Uumdano Augur

    No doubt however guilds will carry plenty of tanks and if you join a dkp type guild, you can dictate how and when you get geared based on your participation. If you are dead set on a monk, vs my set up I would trade out the wiz, dps for dps w/ a net loss of ports.

    The tank really does not have to be raid geared to conquer mini raid bosses and epic encounters, I never had my tank as a main. I always found myself gearing him first in my solo group endeavors. Before I stopped playing on LJ, I was able to box the M'shas in Qvic w/ my warrior not being a raid char. This included doing all the Ikkinz group trials as well as the majority of the breakdown in communication quest line.
  17. Foaming I Drank Bleach IRL Once

    Warriors and Shadowknights will be over populated. Paladins will not. Consider than if you're worried about guild slots.
  18. Hinastorm86 Augur

    Well I settled on X/Clr/Enc/Mag/Brd/Wiz, X being monk or ranger.

    I'm really having a hard time picking. I think I would rather raid on the monk overall, but the allure of having a tanky character capable of both good snap aggro and mitigation (the ranger) is tempting.

    I did a similar setup 4 box on selo with an SK, and even though the charm pet ended up doing most of the tanking, I recall it being pretty useful having the sk's initial aggro, mostly for charm and Mez breaks.

    The thought of playing a ranger for 3 months in classic is not exciting, but I can't really make the decision on just that.

    I'd love to hear from someone who had a raid geared monk in their early box setup, and how it worked out.
  19. Accipiter Old Timer


    I guess it depends on whether you are in it for the long haul. I like having a bard in my group. /shrug
  20. Accipiter Old Timer


    The bard can even help mez on charm breaks if needed. Need to go afk? No problem, bard mez the pet.