So is this it, or is there more to the whole pet thing?

[standupwookie]

Maybe I am just not doing it right.  So far, I am level 22.  I have adept III root, pet, and nuke spells and the rest are AP, my equipment is so-so mostly crafted rare stuff.Here is basically what I do so far....I find a pet and charm it, then try to kill other mobs.  The pet is not any good though.  A ^^^ is not a ^^^ but a regular con mob.  I dont understand this.  The whole down side of a enchanter pet is that they can break charm at any time, but what is the upside?  They are not very powerful (so far) and the other mage pets seem stronger and more reliable.I started this toon to be a group toon but also a pet solo toon.  I know the group thing, mez is actually a very useful thing when taking on more difficult encounters, and charm can also work in that aspect too.  But in the solo game?My subjugation skill is about 15 from being maxed, and I find root breaking early and often.  The pet cannot taunt, and I try to find specific mobs with that ability (the fighter type Orcs and such).  I have seen one actually AE and train me with a few seeps in WC.But I keep going back to the pet thing.  If a pet cannot taunt or keep aggro, then that means I must use root.  I have a 57 wizard, and I can tell you that character has about 6 huge nukes and AE nukes and encouter nukes, while my poor little Coercer has one adept III nuke for 150 damage at level 22 and some very minor DOTs.  Root nuking is not a real option, after leveling a wizard I just laugh at the enchanter nukes.I want that pet to be able to tank and taunt and me to be able to cast one spell without it coming after me.  Unless I get some different type of spells in a few levels I dont see how I am supposed to be able to just stand there and tank a mob....that is not the reason I started to play this Coercer.So what am I doing wrong?  I like the mez and the AE mezzes that will come, and I dont mind if charm is risky....but I want a little bit for that risk.  I think a ^^^ should be a ^^^, or if that is too powerful then we should have spells and abilities that GREATLY enhance our pets.  Maybe we do and I am just not at the level.  Maybe Coercers dont start to get that good feeling until later in level.I dont wanna play a Necro or Summoner or Illusionist, I like the evil charming class...but I find myself running from encounters that my wizard could mow through and I find myself passing on encouters that my swashy could handle (like blue /con ^^^).  So are we a DPS class, or a DPS support class that adds DPS but just not to us.  Does charm need to be tweaked a bit, or am I just not doing something right.  I really wanna figure this class out but I just keep going back to that one adetp III nuke for 150 and a root spell and a pet that cannot even get aggro much less keep it.

[Melodar]

Adept 3 Charm just doesnt give the power of the pet you need master level to really see the power. I had AD3 pet hit for max 390 found a master for lower level same pet jumped to 1300. Put 5 points in the coercer AA charm, you wont regret it. I've found root to be very unreliable and dont rely on it alot. Pets vary greatly you have to try many diff ones to find the right pet few melee taunt you have to find one that does. Bloodthorn Hunters in Steamfont do for one type. Most of us use caster pets soloing but as I said Master is all the difference in this. You can give up on a ^^^ being a ^^^ despise the absurdity of a pet being dumbed down when charmed Sony won't be changing this. I found that the coercer didn't really get better until level 30 try to stick it out. I'm not some 70 all decked out either coming on stating this I've just gotten to 52 and I really enjoy this class its fun charming a pet 8 levels higher than you. And I know people in this game are greedy as heck but you can find some who put masters up at decent prices. I got my beguile master for 50G. Dominate master was 24P. What is  the difference? Beguile is 15 min durations and Dominate is 20 min duration that is it. At your level you will have to pay attention to the level of mob you can charm with the spell. While I have used tank pets I have had much more success with healer types to tank they hit with nukes can heal self and can take decent dmge. I have yet to find a healer type with a buff or anything for us but hey can't have it all. Search and find a pet you like and if you see a mob all over the place chances are it wont be a very good pet at least that is what I have seen.Hang in there if you like charming mobs. Our reactives do some serious dmge use them alot and they also produce the stone you need for AE mezz. Good luck.<div></div>

[Dagator]

<P>My first suggestion to you would be to read some of the stickied posts.  </P> <P>After that, here is what you do and don't do.  You are getting the wrong pets.  Don't get tank pets to taunt, get caster pets to cast.  Also, don't use your dots.  Dots have a chance to break any mez or root.  So you get a good caster pet, then you find a target.  Keep with single non-heroic types until you are proficient at this.  Root/mez the target, do both, either root first or mez first.  Apply your magic debuff.  Make sure pet is rooted and mezzed, then tell your pet to attack.  As the pets is casting, get ready with your return command for your pet.  Once the pets spell lands on target, command the pet to back off, then immediately re mez the target.  Rinse and repeat until target is dead.  No dots.  Dots break mez and roots.</P>

[DwarvesR]

<DIV>I hadn't played my coercer in a while, so I duted her off the other day.  Took her into Lesser Faydark to see about doing some quests and getting some exploration xp dings for some AA.  Since I was level 58, I started off near the Obelisk for mobs close to my level.  Had some good success there, especially with charming the shadowed invaders.  They'd nuke for about 1500 dmg pretty regularly, and did quite well, I thought.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>I then started running through the whole zone and ended up starting on the quests from the Nybright camp.  Mobs were green so there wasn't much xp or risk, so it actually worked pretty well for me as I was re-familiarizing myself with the class.  1st I charmed a "trickster" fairy.  It was a wizard, and was nuking for 1800-2200 quite regularly.  That was nice, since it would burn mobs down quickly.  I tend to go with the "root the mob, send in the pet, then help it with the reactives" school when going after solo mobs, so while this worked quite well, the pet would still take decent damage itself and so I had some downtime waiting for the pet to heal up.  </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Then I charmed a "prophet" mob -- warden type.  It nuked for about 1200 damage regularly, and if it got low on health it would heal itself.  It only did it if it got in orange or red, but it still always did it, so while it was always "yellow health" I was also able to simply chain through mobs with no downtime at all.  Made it so I could get the quests done fast, even though the xp was quite crappy.  Still. . . managed to get 4 aa's and level 59, so I can't really complain either.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>After I got tired of how slow the xp bar was moving though, I went in to the Loping Plains.  It took a bit of running around until I was near the GFay entrance where the mobs were "only" orange and yellow mix.  I charmed a "chaplain" templar mob.  It was 6 levels higher than me, but well. . . M1 Dominate + 5 AA's in charm resistance . . .   It was *very* nice too.  Nuking for about 1800 every few seconds and if it got low on health it had nice big self-heals.  Generally in the 2000-2200 range, but I saw it get itself for 2700 once too.  That was really nice.  It was killing ^ named mobs for me without me helping it while I would kill another mob or 2 at the same time.  Well. . . it was nice until the charm broke right as a root broke on a mob I was fighting, so I suddently had all 3 on me.  Sadly, it's been long enough that I'm rusty on the AE stuff so while I was able to get 1 mob locked down and my former pet actually started beating on its former target instead of me. . . I still ended up dead.  Ah well.  As I play more I know I'll get back in the swing of things.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>And the point of all this rambling?</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>It's to agree that you want a caster pet, not a tank pet.  Some scout pets do really nice damage too, but for the most part, the casters (and especially the healers, since they'll keep themselves up pretty well) are the way to go.</DIV>

[mwr]

<P>Melee pets can be handy in a pinch, if you can't find anything better, as fodder on which enemies trigger your reactives.</P> <P>If I come across a good pet, I'll try to stick with it, but if not... hey, no harm, no foul. Charm something disposable, toss it at a rooted enemy with a reactive on it, and you're golden.</P> <P>Also, it's possible to use DoTs to great effect in conjunction with root and stunlock. Yes, the root will break at some point, but its chance to do so is lower than most other roots. If it breaks, stun and reapply. And if things go really wrong, you can always cancel the DoTs you've put on something and mez it (though this is tricky and requires some speed).</P> <P>Now, for tough mobs (^^^s and the like), don't risk this. One resist can mean you end up dead. Far better to mez-nuke. What I generally do when I'm fighting named mobs is grab a caster pet, mez the beastie, debuff its mental resist, root it (this won't break mez, and it gives you a safety blanket). And then nuke with my pet and a Heroic Opportunitied Mind Splice/Jolt/whatever. Once the HO is done, root's virtually always still up, so I re-mez and do it again. If you're really risk averse, you can also stun them out of the mez so there's almost no chance of something going wrong.</P> <P>Soloing in this way takes pretty long, mind you, but it's safe.</P>

[standupwookie]

Ok, but hw do I make the pet nuke?  Dont they do what they feel like doing?

[Dagator]

<DIV>You have to send your pet in to attack, and if he starts to cast, then let him cast the spell, then pull him back immediately.  He will do what he has available, as pets have timers on their CA's just like we do.  So for instance if you get a pet that does some disease direct damage spell that is on a 30 sec timer, you will instruct pet to attack, he will cast spell, then you command him to back off, then the next time you command him to attack, if his timer isn't refreshed yet, he will try to run in and melee, which you have to tell him to back off.  You have to yo-yo the pet like this to get him to cast more often.  It takes time and patience.</DIV>

[Sydias]

<P>This has turned out to be a very informative thread.  :smileyhappy:</P> <P>In the lower levels the only other suggestion I have is to charm a pet... any pet really and use it with reactives until it's nearly dead.  Once your target is dead and your pet is in the red, break the charm and kill the pet in 1 or 2 hits.  You get the XP for the kill and for killing your already near dead pet.</P> <P>Once in a while though, you will break the charm and your pet will be full health.  In this instance you can re-charm the pet.</P>

[zorros]

So a master charm at lets say in the 20s is better than dps wise a adept 3 lvl 50 spell?

[Dagator]

Yes.  A master coerce or beguile is better than any adept dominate or domination.  The only difference is the duration and the charm break warning yellow screen. 

[Kardg]

<DIV>All pets are getting buffed real soon. You'll be able to set your pets melee or ranged which is absolutely fantastic. Not that after thousands of mobs you don't have the yo-yo down to a science but it'll be nice just to click the pet into offensive and just root and mez without a worry of it flying and at a lag spike and getting chewed up.</DIV>