Hello, I have a coercer. She was my main since T6 until middle KA. I'm planning to play her as alt, but now I have some doubts. I think Illy has better offensive group buffs and temps than coercer. I have my epic 2.0 spells in Ancient, but watching the Illy's epic... well... What do you think? Should I betray to illusionist? What is now the chanters dps? (Spells + Ascensions or only Ascensions?). I was sweating blood in the past to have a decent dps as a coercer, but as I said, I left coercer after half KA expansion. Also coercer's mana regen was better (much better), but with the changes I don't know how important is now the chanter class for that. Any advice? Thank you all!
This expansion? Illy all the way. A coercer can power feed OTHER groups better than an illy. A coercer can help a struggling tank with aggro better than an illy. Aside from those 2 things, an illy does everything else better this expac.
There is no contest. Illy>Coercer The question is really do you want to be desired in groups/raid/content (Illy) or do you want to be the last choice (coercer)? Coercers cross group power regen really doesn't matter at the moment. Their buffs are trash vs. illy's. Their hate abilities are useless unless you just have a really bad tank, in which case it's not going to be enough to matter. I really miss playing my coercer but the fact is they've been pretty lackluster for awhile now.
I CRUSH Illy parses on HOF on my Coercer! Yes, their epic ability is nice, but the Coercer one, group 50 fervor/50 fervor overcap for 8.4 seconds (that can be reset with brews), is insanely good for group burst damage! There are only two of us Coercers in our raid, but they're way better in a raid group with a tank, especially main tank group. Main tank groups will never take an Illy over a Coercer. I bring a rediculous amount of CB to my group as well, and peaceful link was tremendously buffed for this XPAC. So what if I can't reset somebody like an Illy, that's what a Recapture is for! Plus a lot of raids are using Berserkers for their tanks because they bring a lot of good DPS buffs to their group. Being a Coercer will get you in that tank group to get the really good buffs (seen my CB spike over 6,200 in raid fights). An Illy will never see any of this being stuck in the caster group. Also, raids are extremely scout heavy (hello Assassin flavor of the month! LOL) this XPAC, so there's fewer casters in raid to benefit from Illy buffs. Everything else that I can do greatly out weighs the ability reset and Illy epic spell IMHO. Crushing Illy parses since TSO baby!
So Gregore what are your thoughts on Intellectual Remedy....i notice you didn't mention that as a great Coercer buff.?
I'm specced for it, but after reading some discussion about it on here, am thinking about speccing out of it. While it may not be as useful as in the past, it's still a raid-wide buff that stays up for 40sec, so may be worth keeping. I'm kinda' on the fence. I need to re-look at my AA's and figure out what I would spec into with those points, and which would give me the most bang for the buck.
I specced out of IR, and was able to pump 10AA's into the spell Daydream, which is a fast casting DOT. It's at the top of the WIS tree in the Enchanter tab. I also pumped 10AA's into Spellbinder's Mastery in the Dragon tab, which took my master strike ability casting speed from 1sec down to .16 sec if I remember right. It was a huge difference, which eats up less time from my Feedback Loop, Allowing me to cast 4 spells in the time it used to take me to just cast master strike. So I should be parsing higher on Feedback Loop now, but haven't checked ACT. By speccing the way I did in the Enchanter tree, I gained 4 really good fast casting (.25) abilities to greatly boost my total number of fast casters to put in my macro to spam after I click Feedback Loop. Each of those spells/CA's also does something extra as well. Spell counters, interrupts, debuffs, and a DOT. The DOT isn't as useful for solo and heroic content, as it just dies to fast, but is very efficient for raid bosses that live longer. The main thing about them is that they quickly proc FL. I also had to take the 1PT out of Force of Force of Intellect in the Prestige tab. I pumped that 1PT into Mental Trauma, which now causes both Stupefy & Mindbend to do damage. The extra PT there was kinda' wasted, but there wasn't anything any better to put it in IMHO. Stupefy doing damage is great, cause I'm always hitting it to try to reset Shockwave (at ancient level), and it insta-casts when POM is going. I only use the 3 (4 counting Stupefy) stuns and stifles in heroic content when the tank dies on a named pull, which doesn't happen a lot. It's nice to have all of them on one macro that I can just spam when the tank dies. My groups are almost always able to rez the tank and keep going W/O anymore deaths after I spam these Stuns/stifles. Pure Awe, your encounter mez, is also a nice group saver when a tank grabs too many trash mobs and the group is about to be overwhelmed. Hitting Pure Awe will buy your group a few more seconds to DPS/heal usually. I also took the 10PTS out of Emphatic Breeze in the Enchanter tab STA tree. I felt like these points weren't being used to their full potential there, as our hate transfer, the 3 or 4 peaceful links I always have out, and the Coercive shout are more than enough to control agro. I'm not missing IR or the Emphatic breeze in raid or coin run groups, so feel good about the changes and am going to keep them.
I'm glad coercers are doing well as of late. But this statement is laughable... Good job on the testing and changes you made. Looks like a nice set up.
Maybe laughable to you, but since I made my Coercer and started raiding with him during the TSO XPAC, only two Illy's that I've run across could outparse me on a regular basis, and that was so long ago that I forgot their names. I'm the exception though. Most Illy's do outparse Coercers on a regular basis. I just put a lot of work into my Coercer and have raided on it every XPAC since TSO, so I know it inside and out. Ascensions help out a lot as well. I'm at ancient or celestial on all of my ascensions. Almost all other Coercers I've run across on the HOF server haven't parsed well in heroic groups. The only other good Coercer that I'm aware of on our server is our raid force's Illy's Coercer alt. She plays that Coercer very well.
Coercer are in a terrible shape and as many said coercer are third choice in tank group behind illy and troub and only as mana regen Mana regen other group - Useless with the current constant mana drain on every fight Tank threat buff - for the last 3 extensions I have tested raid with and without buffing the tanks, and only a very bad tank would says that it makes any difference, if a tank could not hold agro it is not a coerced he will put in is group but real dps that could transfer agro Group buff - I’m still looking for one that makes any real difference (no, ab mod is not a real buff) Solo buff - anyone believing peaceful link is good should open their eyes and look other class passive damage buff and they will realize how pitiful it is Coercer dps - With the investment I put in my coercer I could also claim that I could beat almost any dps class on some fights ... as long as they did not put similarly investment, that does not make the coercer class great, only my character stats Playing multiple class and multiple coercer I could affirm that coercer are the worst mage class, barely at the level of some healer class at equivalent equipment/stats/abilities
Well you probably out parse me atm as I have been gone since KA. However, When I was raiding there was no way, I don't care about how good your ascensions were or are, a Coercer would never out parse me. I would like to see some of your Parse data going back in comparison to a raid Illy. I use that term pretty passively since raiding on an illy actually takes a bit of know how and skill to be done right. But I did know a few coercers who were really respectable players with that class and could hold their own for what it was. I am still learning a lot since my return like the fact that I don't want a wand but a freaking crossbow to increase dmg. Which to me is lame and broken. A mage should never be forced to use a cross bow. It just shows how lazy some of the itemization has really become. So, not only do fighters/Scouts/and certain healers have these huge advantages through melee dps in the way WDB is working (Broken) but we as mages can't really afford to look like mages. We are reduced to using weapons that should be in the hands of melee classes. Something else I see very little of is public grouping. It's almost as though if your not in a clique your not really going to be able to group with competent people anymore on a consistent basis. I mean PQ's are run constantly but your chances of getting something worth while is pretty low. While if more took to the heroics there would be more gear to be had by all. Right now it is "top shelf" only on challenge mode for groups. I have been in on some challenge modes but not nearly as much as I would like to be. I think I have seen 4 zones once and that's it. All I hear is how no one has the gear to do them. Pro tip, your never going to running PQ's all day and night. Game is in pretty bad shape for mages imo. I have re-speced into what has been suggested by many and still, if you were not here for the summer event last year, you will continue to struggle to keep up until the next event allows for better gear and the elusive extra fervor rune. You can only spend so many hours on a training dummy working your cast order. As a power feeder, once your in a challenge mode, there is very little time to DPS. Your cast order has to be in a way that allows for power feeding at least every 10-12 seconds. (Stop) My current tier spells are GM or better on the power feed. So it's not the lvl of my spells. The mobs have so many different types of interrupts that you have to carry four different runes around and no group wants to stop after every fight so everyone can change runes. These interrupts and power drains of entire groups instantly, without warning in some cases, are getting old already and we're just a couple weeks in. Here's to hoping the gated gear will help balance some of the BS I am seeing right now.
Coercers definitely need some DEV loving. I agree with you. They def. don't offer the buffs of a Troub. I feel like They're fairly close to the Illy though, close enough that I've never considered betraying anyways. Mana flow definitely needs some love to keep up with the constant power drains that you mentioned. A shorter recast for starters. Our buffs need to buff the stats that actually matter instead of almost useless stats that they currently buff. Probably any class not an Assassin or Ranger needs some love though to be honest. I still enjoy playing my Coercer. I guess that's all that matters for me. I get groups whenever I want them, and have been running Challenge modes almost nightly.
LOL, I'll not be posting any parses. My raid leader will kick my ****! As for grouping, I tried a PUG or two, but they were extremely painful, usually with my Coercer doing 40 to 60% of the group's damage on most fights. A couple of PUGs like that totally killed my desire to group outside of my guild. I'm doing challenge modes almost nightly with my guildies anyways. Power feeders are in huge demand for PUGs on HOF server for sure, but it's either guild groups or solo stuff for me. Most of our raid force is so far ahead of 95% of the rest of the server, that it's not even close.
Jrox, just ask some of your Sovin Naiz or Outlaws guildies if they've ever grouped with Gregore. They'll tell you all you need to know about my Coercer! LOL I'm pretty well known on the HOF server.
What spells are you using with Feedback Loop Gregore? Also I looked up your AA and was curious as to why you don't have a point in Convert Power in the heroic tree. 5 second stoneskin and something to pull you out of 0 power is probably one of the better AA abilities. Did you find a major difference in damage between 140k potency and 150k potency? -Alarra (a fellow HoFian)
I'm using the 4 fast casting combat arts/spells that I specced for in the Enchanter tree, Arcane Bewilderment, my master strike (W/shortened casting time via Dragon Tree), Unda, Blinding Shock, and several other Coercer spells with .25 to .50 casting times. At work, so can't see my Feedback Loop fast cast macro ATM. I put the longer recast abilities/DOTs towards the top of my macro. I don't need the convert power for regen purposes, plus it would cost an additional 30 AA's to get. I'm not giving up EV or Psychic Trauma to get it either, as I feel like they're both way better than it. The stone skin would be nice, but 5 seconds is a very short amount of time and seems very situational to me. I jumped from 140 to 150K POT so quickly that I didn't notice a difference. I've heard over and over from other good players that it does make a difference though. Once I crossed the 150K barrier, I found it much harder to make meaningful POT gains though. I won't come close to 160K until I get some more raid gear. I'm actually saving all my really good infusers for gear I plan on staying in for a while though. So far, I've just plat infused and used older infusers on my gear.
