OK, the NDA has been lifted, and I really want to know what this class can do (other than tame beasts). So those with the knowledge... spill. Thanks. Also, mods, the BL will need it's own section here in the scout forums soon.
The beastlord class is a very stripped down combination of a scout and a brawler. They wear chain, use AGI, and can use either scout daggers or brawler crushing weapons. They have a few flanking and stealth attacks, but not nearly as many as say an assassin. Where the real difference comes from is the Warder. When the Warder is attacking, it will proc a weakness (similar to the Preditor heroic endline proc) that allows you to use a special type of CA called Advantages which are where most of the flanking attacks are. Warder and beastlord attacks also build up Savagery (a second type of mana pool essentially) and when that has been built up, it allows the use of Primal abilities. Both Advantages and Primals are set in a new, special hotbar and restricted by the slot and by the stance the beastlord is in. Feral stance brings the beastlords DPS close to T1 (not sure if it's on par with ranger/assassin DPS but it's defintely more than bards). Their Spiritual stance is a utility stance with small heals and group buffs, and keeps their DPS close to that of bards. To maximize their DPS or utility, the player must use the Advantages and Primals over the regular CAs and be able to adapt to their situation. The biggest thing is know where your pet is and when to send them in and when to pull them back to you. The survivability of the warder is lower than summoner pets (at least as far as I got with them) but this could be just the low level of teh warders that were around. The warder actually levels as you use it (sorry for those who want to PL, it's not going to work very well for the warder) from apprentice when you tame it to GM along the same line that spells go. Each of the 16 Warder families comes with 4 of their own spells and gain more as they level. At GM they give you an ability that requires the Warder to be alive. This is where more of the flanking and stealth CAs are. The beastlord is a very powerful class, some may say OP for soloing, but I believe that the pet survivability issue will balance them out in groups and raids.
Could anyone give some info on how the warder AAs work? Would you have to respec every time to change to a different type of warder?
Skyefall@Splitpaw wrote: Each family has it's own AA page with 35 points that you gain as you level with 5 additional points from specific quests, these are seperate from your AAs. The page is set up similar to the heroic tree. Each family has two endlines that you can only choose one of and four endlines after that for the beastlord, and I believe (this may be off because I did not finish and get all 40 points) you can get more than two of them. These endlines are Primals that use savagery, two for Feral stance and two for Spiritual stance.
Ferk@Butcherblock wrote: Can I check, so these are not normal AAs (i.e. your normal 300/320)? These are points you accrue outside of AAs?
Here are some links with great info on the beastlord class taken from flames: Beastlord basics Pet Survivability
The warder gains an AA every 2 levels above 22 and then another 5 from quests. **EDIT** Because I know this will pop up I will post it now. All warders have the same AAs. They are set up like the Heroic tree. First tier enchances their CA/Spells by 1%, second tier boosts CA damage, Potency, or CA Crit. Third tier grants a new spell/CA to the WARDER. Either Moderate damage + Resist debuff or heavy damage nuke. Final tier is for the Beastlord bar, two Feral tactics and two Spiritual tactics. They are the same across all warders. Personally I prefer the Spiritual because in Beta we were all soloing as everyone was afraid to group for an unknown reason. First Spiritual is a decent group heal and the other is Moderate damage + Potancy or Crit Bonus I believe. As I recall the second Feral was Damage + Teleport to the mob, so Meh on that.
I think it's pretty awesome that there isn't a Beastlord forum in the Class-specific area. Not that I'm surprised, mind you...
is there a list of what the bst aa's are?? been looking but cant find anything. looking for something to do while servers are down (and waiting on job interviews sucks).
The NDA being lifted did not allow posting of screenshots so no complete AA lists have been posted but as soon as the expac is live there should be posts here, eq2flames, and/or eq2wire with the AAs and I'm guessing beetny will be updated shortly after to add beastlords.
Someone posted how they spent aa in BL tree over at flames, but others have replied saying they spent theirs differently, so don't believe you'll find a be-all-end-all version
Skyefall@Splitpaw wrote: Yeah, the Beastlord class is so versitial that you wont find many people who are going to spec theirs the 100% same way as any other person. A great example happens to be the way I plan to play mine and hte way my girlfriend will be playing her's. I plan to go full T1 DPS with mine and my spec will reflect that. I hope to get him into raids at some point in the future so I will be getting some of the health and mitigation AAs they have as well. She plans to go more of a buff/DPS beastlord. They can provide a ton of help to groups through temp buffs that can be cycled constantly (almost spell spinning from EQ1 bards) while still doing decent DPS and getting survivability for her spec. There are people who will be soloing and people who will only be grouping and those will look completely different for AAs. Even within each type of spec, they can vary widely as to how you want to spec.
Ferk@Butcherblock wrote: Yeah exactly. I'm thinking, over time, I'll develop both options - one pure DPS setup, one buff/dps setup (using mirror spec), so that I can offer versatility to my raid with this BL alt depending on what's needed. Think I'll focus on GMing one exotic (for dps) and one defensive to start with. Choices choices!!
yeah thats what got me asking when i saw that on flames, started looking all over for any description to each tree but couldnt find one.
I have a huge question....what is the point in giving each character a beastlord warder pet as a claimable item if you have to be a beastlord to use it?
