I replied to a post on the bug subforum about hate abilities not working correctly but that's not a high traffic area, has anyone else noticed terrors not providing as much aggro as they used to? I don't group with high aggro dps very often but I have noticed that my melee merc with max aggro reduction will pretty regularly pull aggro off of me unless I heavily frontload my damage (ht, thought leech, that sort of thing). I run Voice of Thule generally and I've tried terror spamming with and without VoT up and it doesn't appear to help. I'm pretty sure I've been holding aggro with mostly swing and proc aggro since ToV launched (explosion AAs seem to work though) I usually pull with terrors followed by refute line and I noticed that if the hate component of refute gets resisted, my bard gets whacked on the way by (I just leave him twisting 24/7) and in the past one terror was enough to heavily overshoot one or two song ticks worth of aggro so this suggests that something is broken
There is no bugs with terrors. Merc agro on melee mercs are insane. Also remember that most of the xpac is undead and they have special proximity agro rules on them.
I'm using old spell names because i haven't committed the new ones to memory yet. For melee dps mercs i load 2 terrors & try to put impose for power on every mob early. It means i do a bit less dps (I'd rather be chain nuking than ever casting a terror/impose) in exchange for the mercs DPS, but it works. Keep voice of thule or gift of hemofax on & wear a mask that has % aggro increase. Make sure bold attacks isn't toggled incorrectly. Keep harmonious on if someone or a merc is healing you. Include spear & dissident as priority aggro casts and throw in an aggro AA or two on initial aggro as well, such as; veil, hates attraction, explosion of spite, explosion of hatred, stream of hatred <-- deliberately left out taunt aa's & burn related abilities, as you shouldn't need to use them to keep aggro off a melee dps merc, you're free to use those when you actually want/need to use them instead. Make sure to set yourself as main assist, so the merc is DPS'ing the mob that you're doing the damage to. If 2+ mobs in camp, remember you can toss in some hateful bargain & insidious denial too, and if you're comfortable with your aggro on the first mob, you could switch target for a second to drop an impose cast on an add, which should build quite a bit of an aggro lead on it for ya while you get back to work on the first mob. When I group with people, If i'm opening with spear and/or dissident, i rarely have to cast a terror/impose, and can just chain nuke, and use aa aggro abilities if dps is creeping. If a dps jumps on aggro, can just taunt(or UA/ageless) and dump some aa aggro abilities on. I've grouped without even having terror or impose loaded occasionally with high dps players.
for pallies, generate a lot of aggro, but most importantly, keep marr's salvation on them. luckily, its a group buff now, block it on yourself.
These comments make me feel better because I was suffering the same issue. My melee mercs create huge aggro, and even with taunt or ageless acrimony, they take it right back. I thought I was doing something wrong, but this makes me feel a little better that it's not just me. I am curious how many people here use Terror in their lineup. I rarely use Voice of Thule (it didn't help much with the melee mercs anyway) and generally don't lose aggro often with other group geared players, except a monk who I think was burning heavy and engaging mobs immediately. I use Imposse of Power (the new version, can't remember the name) because it also gives you the AC boost, and it grows hate over time, but some SKs had convinced me a while back to ignore the terror line because there are so many Hate tools in the SK lineup that terror is unnecessary. I guess I could drop a lifetap for it, but that's one less lifetap I'd have available then. I'm wondering how many other SKs are using the terror line in the spell setup. Thoughts?
i absolute use terrors (typically just 1, but on rare occasions 2)... i also use VoT a lot and dont forget the hate mod/hp boost from Touch of Hemofax (forget the new one's name)
Thank you for this. I'm not sure I'm going to add Terrors back yet, but I never knew that line of spells had a Hate component to them. I'll play with that when I'm home from work.
That's originally why I was first using them, more for the rune than for the hate/aggro. I was actually using 2 different errors to keep the rune up more frequently, but I was talked out of it by other SKs in favor of adding more lifetaps for better survivability. I'm definitely adding in Touch of Hemofax line, and I might tinker with the Terrors again.
i wouldn't use touch of hemofax as part of you lifetap lineup but just for the buff... with focus AA it lasts for 16mins... cast it, get the buff.. put up something else
Anyone generating strong agro will take it right back after you taunt unless you immediately followup with something. After taunt, hit it with terror/spear/dissident/hateful bargain (which you should already be chain casting anyway if aggro is a problem) + one or more of the AA's i mentioned in my above post. If it didn't help much with the melee merc, then that tells me that there must be something else that you're not doing right, on top of neglecting the voice of thule buff. Without that agro buff you will struggle to hold aggro off raid geared players that know how to dps properly, and certainly your melee dps mercenary. A strong beastlord burning actually puts out more aggro than the melee dps merc does right now.
So, I was using Hemofax and didn't realize it. It was the last cast in my lifetap spam macro, so I think it wasn't firing off as often as the others, but now that I know that, I am casting it manually. I've also started using Voice of Thule again, and I just need to figure out what to drop in favor of a Terror. I think I'll drop my lower lifetap, but I'll have to play around some more with this.
The new version is Touch of Zlandicar, it offers the aggro boost but also an increase in HP - it decreases over time but it's simple to keep it topped up in your spell rotations - it doesn't stack with Voice of Thule. @Drogba what're you running in the group game these days: are you leaning towards taps, DoTs or a combo of both? And when are you getting more videos going, love watching what you can do!
I don’t find the melee dps mercs that hard to hold aggro over, I just think SKs haven’t really had to try that hard due to their rock aggro. That being said, I always try and put all I’ve got into my aggro as a good practice. Strictly my opinion.
Even better. That's good to know. I'll just use Touch of of Zlandicar (just dinged 115 last night and not have to worry about VoT any more.
