Soloing after patch?

[Greenie]

<DIV>Right now, as a level 44 necro I have trouble taking out some green con ^^^ named mobs.  Some people talk about taking out blue and even white con ^^^ named but I'd never consider trying, even pre LU24 nerf given my previous experiences.  </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Some greens are really easy but some get me every time.  I read that our dumbfire pets are being nerfed significantly and this has me worried since a lot of my damage appears to come from these spells.  My Adept 3 tank pet even with master 2 defensive stance just can't take the beating long enough for my spells to take down the mob.  </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Whats the secret?  I'd hope that even with the nerfs I'd still be able to take out green con named/heroics given the right style of play which I obviously haven't learned yet.  Do I need Adept 3 for all my spells?  Masters are near impossible for me to find on my server but since I'm also a sage I can get adept 3 fairly easy.  </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>I also noticed there was a change in the healing spells where they heal a lot faster, but at the same time they have a shorter duration.  I really don't see how this will help other than to draw aggro to us faster.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Any suggestions on tactics and such?</DIV>

[Za]

What tier are your pets, pet buff, etc at? Also pre-L 50 soloing is harder than post simply becasue lich bumps your damage and your power resource be a significant amount.

[FTL]

<DIV>Agreed on pre level 50 and soling, also at 53 u get a chance "if u can loot it" to use yeddahd's caduceus, which does make alot of diff (even though its a 15 min recast time on the pet heal)</DIV>

[Orthureon]

<P>Not sure about the soloing after the patch. The only real way I have found to take out 3up blues, is to root pull back your pet and resummon. This is dangerous unless you have an ad3 or M1 root, also you better hope your pet gets aggro or you could be pwned. Right now at level 48 I can do this. Though green named mobs can still eat me (Rul'Gax in RE is one I attempted to solo, had him down to about 10% then got aggro lol).</P> <P>Concept is like this: I send in my pet beat the hell out of the mob, when my pet is at about 50% health I pull my pet back and root the mob (make sure no DoTs are active!). Then I dismiss my pet and quickly resummon, since i have M1 chains of torment it lasts for I believe 45s. M1 seems to hold for the entire duration. I usually even have time to rebuff my pet, but I ALWAYS atleast put on the def stance for it. Then I may need to cast the others during battle. I also have AD3 def stance, M2 transfer life and AD3 necrotic mending (HoT). I have never seen anyone take a white con 3up solo, but it may be possible with all masters or ad3s with some masters and really nice gear.</P>

[Ralg]

I didn't think Sony wanted any class soloing heroics, especially 3 up's.

[PlageuReaver]

<DIV>and certainly not nameds =)</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>although NO necro can claim he never did/tried it.</DIV>

[Greenie]

<DIV>Right now my pet is Adept 3 tank with Master 2 defensive buff I got free at level 42 (I think?  maybe 44).  I typically start off using stun, send in my pet, then skinrot, then rats, then transfer life, then ghastly stench, then lifetap, then another transfer life, then stun again, then more DoTs and healing/lifetap as good as possible.  When it comes to groups I typically root the named ^^^ and take out the adds then rest.  </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>My main problem with trying the root and backup technique is that my DoTs are usually ticking away and break the root.  <img src="/smilies/9d71f0541cff0a302a0309c5079e8dee.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" /></DIV>

[Jal]

Easiest thing to do is Root, debuff, swarm pets, send in pet.Then hit your dots.Hopefully your swarm or tank will have taken agro then and you can safely apply dots and wittle it down. Use stun/fear only if you need breathing room.

[Rousso]

<DIV><FONT color=#ffff00>Easiest thing to do is <BR><BR>Root, debuff, swarm pets, send in pet.<BR><BR>Then hit your dots.<BR><BR>Hopefully your swarm or tank will have taken agro then and you can safely apply dots and wittle it down. Use stun/fear only if you need breathing room. </FONT></DIV> <DIV><FONT color=#ffff00></FONT> </DIV> <DIV>That strategy works GREAT against blue and green no arrow solo mobs. Even works against white and yellow down arrow solo mobs. If you try to fight anything tougher than those you need a different strategy. </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>What I have found that works the best against the big mobs is when your pet is close to death you cast your grasping bones spell - cancel all your dots - cast root and when it is about to land you backoff your pet. This takes a bit of practice to get right and you have to be ready with the fear if you get resisted. If you keep your pet alive it has a chance of regaining aggro. If your pet dies the next pet you cast starts at 0 aggro and has absolutely no chance. Once you have your pet out and the mob rooted - start healing your pet back up to full. Wait for the grasping bones stunn to cycle back up and then lifetap the rooted mob - ready to re-root if it breaks. Once you have lifetap/healed your pet (and you) back to full health - stun the mob and reapply your pet. Pray that your pet regains aggro and DO NOT recast dots right away bacause it will almost always pull aggro. If and when you do decide to dot the mob up - be ready with the FD.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>An alternative strat is after you have healed your pet back up to full - keep it on standby while you finish the mob off with root/lifetap. If the mob gets on you at any point - send the pet in to attack and FD.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Yet another strat is to root the mob and use your caster pet and lifetap to blast the mob down. Once your caster pet has fired off a nuke - hit backoff to prevent it from running in to mele. recast root when it breaks and be ready with the fear if the mob gets to you. This is a slower strat because you cant use DoTs or dumbfires at all. But it can work in some circumstances.</DIV>

[Greenie]

Hmm, never thought to cancel DoTs.  Is there an easy way to do this?

[Rousso]

<P>Not really easy but with practice not much problem. Depending on how your screen is arranged your DoTs show up as maintained spells in the window on the left side. You can right click on them and chose to cancel them. Play around with a low level mob, watch how your dots are displayed and practice cancelling them. Usually by the time my pet is dying I only have one or two dots still up and that is easy enough to do in 6 seconds. I also keep my pet attack/backoff buttons on my hotbar in the number 1&2 slots. That way i dont have to grab the mouse or scroll anywhere to back my pet off. Grasping bones - mouse to cancel dots - mouse to root & hit #2 key.</P> <P>(Keeping pet attack on the #1 key also allows me to instantly shift attack to follow the tank in groups even while I am casting.)</P> <P>Good luck with it!</P> <P> </P>

[pyrotechn]

<P>I soloed white, yellow, and orange con ^^^  Since 80% of my strategy has been posted already by rousou, i'll post the rest.   As you know, orange con ^^^ will basically kill your pet in 2-3 hits.   So just go into lich mode, chain casting root to keep your life up (cause lich really eats it up, unless your procing lich for health), then every time stun refreshes, send pet in (fighter is usually safest, cause other pets have dots which continue to breaks root after your stun wears off).  Make sure to cast consumption before sending pet in whenever its up.  Lifetap the mob once during stun duration (to keep your life up while liching and add damage).  Then as soon as stun is about to finish, pull pet out, or let him stay a sec longer if he's at full health, but have to back him out; while simultaneously casting your re-root.  </P> <P>To keep mana up for chain rooting keep tapping your pet.  Also AA animist transference on yourself helps keep your life up while liching.   </P> <P>A slightly safer method is not to chain cast root, but only cast when necessary to refresh the root, and send pet in only during stuns.  If you agro buff the pet in defensive stance, this will keep agro on the pet, not you.  Thus if root or something breaks unexpectedly, this will usually by you time to get off some spells (root recycle, fear, dooming, etc) while the mob goes after your pet.  Tell pet to back off, cause if fear, dooming, or your re-root lands, you don't want pet to break it....</P> <P>Most difficult mob for this strategy are caster mobs.  basically same strategy, but instead of casting/recasting root, land it once, then go find a rock or wall to hide behind while you and pet heal up.   Powerful casters are  probably going to beat you...the heals you get from your lifetap, and AA transference aren't going to heal you up enough to repeat the strategy before you end up dead; unless you can emerge from cover and cast a stun before the mob can get his first spell off.  In some cases i been able to this where i find a rock and can jump to see behind the rock and beging casting my spell...thus preventing the mob nuking me before i stun him.  </P> <P>So basically you can use this to beat any melee based or weak caster type mobs that you can land spells on; and situationally on powerful caster types.  Resists are a bane, so plus +casting items are good.  </P> <P> </P> <P> </P>

[Zimike]

<DIV>As a level 38 Necro I was soloing the Vault with mobs level 27-28. Before the patch this was pretty easy and I could take down the grey mobs and the named boss without much problem. After patch I died once with the grey mob and about 8 times with the boss. Before I could kill the boss in about 35-40secs, Now it takes about 2-3mins and I have to be super lucking because the tank pet holds aggro even less now. I though at first wow these mobs have huge hitpoints.. then I realized our dps has been nerfed to hell. So as it stands now Necros are going to have a hard time soloing green ^^^ mobs while Brusiers can solo blue^^^ now. I use to think Necros one of the best solo classes and now they fall below this list by far. Solo was the only real thing Necros had going for them.</DIV>

[Suraklin]

<BR> <BLOCKQUOTE> <HR> Jalek wrote:<BR>Easiest thing to do is <BR><BR>Root, debuff, swarm pets, send in pet.<BR><BR>Then hit your dots.<BR><BR>Hopefully your swarm or tank will have taken agro then and you can safely apply dots and wittle it down. Use stun/fear only if you need breathing room.<BR> <HR> </BLOCKQUOTE><BR>I never send my swarms in first. They have very little HP and that's not good when they take aggro first. I always send pet and then the swarms.

[Jal]

My findings are that even after just a root that mob will come running direct for me when it breaks even if my pet has been set on it. Dumbfires going first should mean they will tank a bit while my pet builds up some hate and give me breathing room.

[Suraklin]

<BR> <BLOCKQUOTE> <HR> Jalek wrote:<BR>My findings are that even after just a root that mob will come running direct for me when it breaks even if my pet has been set on it. Dumbfires going first should mean they will tank a bit while my pet builds up some hate and give me breathing room.<BR> <HR> </BLOCKQUOTE><BR>I'll experiment your way see if works better for me too then.

[xsvhrs]

I solo white and blue con heroic named mobs all the time. Specifically, the Gatecaller in Clefts, and 2 of the 3 nameds in the War room. Pull with rot root send in pet heal pet exchange life wiht pet life tap stun pull back pet root Then I start a cycle until either my pet gets killed, or he wont go in to attack anymore. heal pet back to green stun send in pet heal pet exchange life with pet life tap orc master strike stun pull back pet root If at any time, the pet loses aggro, immediatly ... Fear Pull back pet Root If the pet dies, re-summon him, but do not send him back in, as he will probably not regain aggro, best to just use him to convert his health to your mana. Eventually, after 2 or 3 cycles of this, the pet will not longer attack the named, unless you take additional damage. If this happens, you just use the following cycle. Root lifetap lifetap lifetap lifetap Use Orc master Strike when available Root If the root breaks, watch to see if the fear portion of the root spell kicks in. If it does, you should have enough time to recast root. If not, the mob will run straight for you. Any time the mob runs straight for you, Fear it, then root it. A couple more quick pointers here. First, this process can take a really long time here. 10 minutes is not unusual for a heroic named. Second, I never have Lich on while casting a damage spell when the mob is rooted. The additional 150 or whatever damage isn't worth the chance of breaking root.  Sometimes I'll use Lich while the mob is rooted, when I just need to replentish my mana, but I turn it back off before casting a damage spell. Third, I will usually wait for Fear to be up again before casting a damage spell when the mob is rooted. This will prolong your encounter, but will give you a better chance of surviving. If the damage spell break root, and the mob runs straight for me, I cast Fear, re-root, and back up. Fourth, you really need alot of room. Some of the named mobs in tight quarters will run into walls, and are difficult to keep rooted without getting the dreaded 'Cannot See' message. <div></div>