I am considering duoing a pally SK with my wife. I figured I'd tank on the SK and she would "dps" and "heal" on the pally. I know its not optimal, but I was thinking it'd be great for AOE encounters. My question is, in the later stages of the game, how much of a pain is it to have one evil character and one good character? Is there anything to make this easier? What about questing? Are we going to continually be running to different zones? Thank you!
only really one is the starter quests you will start in different place's and it you want to do your epic 2 quests then all the city quests must be done. if you intend to just run solo's and lower level heroic zones then sk has its own heals you would be better of with one of you playing a tank and the other either a healer or a dps class as you could use merc healers to keep you both alive. also if you join a guild then it doesnt matter if good or evil you can both zone from there to were ever you want to go
Wouldn't it be better for the pally to tank and the SK to dps ? And only and low levels u can't play together. The higher u are in level the less alignment matters. Especially if you're in a guild, u'll have most stuff in GH. Only thing u certainly won't be able to do together is city timeline. And for endgame if u wanna group together with other people, won't be optimal. But there are some great healers that can do nice dps so u can switch pally to inqui (the closest to pally, mellee healer) and if u wanna aoe damage furies are great. Though sk dps is great, 2 tanks may not be the optimal duo setup
I am in a similare situation. I am playing with a Pally in a duo since more than a decade. Only difference is the second toon. My wife plays a wizzard and that is for sure a better combination than Pally with SK. In any content what you can play in a duo with two tanks, both with a possibility to heal themself, will stay like a rock. You will not die were often, but fights will take endless time. If you want to stay with your combination, I agree with Earar. Pally should tank and heal, SK should dps. Pally has in the moment a good agro managment and better self healing than SK. SK is doing better damage. Ok, you can use ofensive stance for the Pally, but that is not the best way for Pallys. They are devensive tanks, that is just their advantage. To have a evil and a good toon together is not very relevant in endgame. Cityquestline needs a day maximum. Endgame means today Kunark Ascending. Every combination of toons is able to do the important sig-lines in KA and ToT. It is more a question of good gear than best combination. Sooner or later you reach the solo and advanced solo dungeons in KA. You have to run them for quests, but mainly for ascension spells, many, many, many times! To do this is today a kind of obligation, because only these dungeons are giving enough ascension xp. With your combination it will take endless time. I am afraid you will start to hate it. With a combination tank and mage it is simply quicker. A good geared mage is killing the endboss usually with the first hit. On the first view for Epic 2 weapon your combination seems to be an advantage, because Pally and SK have the same questline and these quests are really long difficult and full of very hard fights, but to duo them is simply impossible. The advantage is changing in a disadvantage. You will need a full group for sure and two tanks in one group is a bad group.
Also about good gear. You'll both compete on the same type of gear. Mitigation plate. Crusader/brawler would allow u to play 2 tanks but not same gear. Crusader/cleric are both plate but crusader will look for str/mit gear while cleric wis/reuse gear. Crusader/druid -> no gear competition Crusader/scout -> no gear competition Crusader/mage -> no gear competition If u really both want to play that you'll be fine, just think about how u play it. Early game you'll blow everything as offensive sk. But the higher in lvl u go, the more you'll see u get behind in dps compared to other dps classes. And as said if u find great piece of fabled gear, one of u will be shafted. Early on it's not really an issue but can be later. And if u want to group later (u never know), having 2 tanks, and especially 2 crusaders, isn't optimal. So just think wisely
My wife and I play SK/Inquisitor. Gives us tanking, DPS, and heals. And Verdict! Whenever we want to form a group for heroics we have the tank and heals, just need DPS/util and good to go.
but what's fun now may not be fun later. I love my warden and I enjoy playing her .. normally .. it's just I almost don't play her anymore coz ... I can't group and it made me bitter. Levelling and endgame are quite different nowadays, just saying
My suggestions: If you are going to stick to your plan, SK DPS! This is a must, set your Pally up in full defensive and heals, the DPS of an SK automagically heals and will absolutely crush Pally dps in any stance. The issue is that so many fights later in the expansions require fast burns or you are stuck with strats to contend with. This could be fun for you But I would suggest the following: I would highly consider a Pally and any dps class that looks fun, depending on what style you like to play. You can challenge more content this way at any level, especially higher levels. IN EQ2, all players plateau at a certain tier. For example, a well played Paladin can solo any Thalumbra heroic zone right now, slowly, but still solo it. There are many Paladins who have better gear, who can not. There is a super high dps duo, Troub/Defiler I know that can duo most stuff that groups of 6 still struggle with. If you are going to play every day, it won't matter what you choose, but the rate of play may be too slow for you on the SK/Pally duo. I do suggest one of you plays a paladin, the other, pick any dps class, (Wizard, Warlock, Conjuror, Necro, Ranger, Assassin, Troubador, Dirge, Brigan Swashbuckler). Honestly, you can't go wrong. Any duo you choose will do well. You just increase your rate of play with a dps class as one of your duo, if not both. Any tank is also going to do well as a duo.
Oh, and to the above comments on who fits well with others based on damage type is now a non issue. You can change your damage type with fusion tools
My wife and I duo pally/sk and have for years! We didn't do any of the epic stuff together, but lots of dungeons together and had a blast! She is on defensive (pally) and my SK on dps - it's just so much fun to take stuff down this way. True, you both get/need the same gear but we always outfit one before the other so she goes first and then me. Mostly because well "happy wife happy life" but also I solo a lot more than she does and can usually get my own gear. This is one of my favorite duos in many MMO's - we did the EXACT same in Vanguard (Pally/DK) it was a great pairing then as well - we usually outlast many in our groups since we both just whack away and heal eachother! Lots of fun this pair
I would recommend pally and swashbuckler. Swashy has respectable single target dps, amazing aoe damage, and a hate transfer that will work along with amends to make tanking a breeze.
Thanks so much for all the input guys. Im def playing SK. My wife is toying with a dirge right now and really enjoying that. Im using an inquis merc and she's using a brigand merc. So far so good! I am wondering if a troub would be better
Sks are about (was anyways) 1/3 spell casting, 1/3 AA and combat arts and 1/3 weapon damage, so either would do okay for you, but you might consider what mercs you run with and go from there. Much of your AoE as a SK is spell based and those are also your area agro spells too, something to consider.
Once you get reaver AA SK are aoe spell-based slaughter machines. Troub is better than dirge for this. Play what you enjoy. That beats the perfect combo IMO.
switch out to the druid merc (keyrin in kelethin). keep the brig untill the both of you can switch out to the gardning goblin merc when yeh finish the tradeskill questline. merc dps is autoattack based, so picking a caster, or ranged healer merc WILL end in disappointment as even telling them to melee sadly doesn't work. - which is why the gardening goblin is so good.. its a brig. that heals.. A+++ definitely switch from dirge to troub for a sk / bard deuo.
I agree with choosing the troub over the dirge. They are very versatile, and I've found I can duo KA heroics with my wizzie friend with no troubles at all.
Could you please elaborate on why a troub would be better? I realize that SK's get alot of thier damage from spells, but if you could be more specific as to why troubs are outshining dirges with SK's right now, that would help us greatly!
If you look at the spells available to a troub, you will see that they buff casters very nicely, increasing stats related to spell casting, and add extra damage to each spell cast. Dirges do the same sort of thing except focused on melee damage instead of spell damage. Both have choices of buffs but in general troubs do more for casters.
