Soloers: What are your tactics?

[TaleraRis]

Being almost an exclusively soloing ranger Gwyn's entire career, I've found that this update hasn't hit me quite as hard as others. I'm seeing many reports where rangers either near my level or slightly above it struggle with blues. Tonight I was killing groups of 3 three arrow down crocs in SS, 1 arrow down singles and groups of 2 or 3 two arrow down yellows solo and with relative ease. Even the groups of three only took me down into the yellow. My greatest difficulty came from the no arrows. Since they made those give bonus exp, they have definitely gotten a difficulty boost.I don't write this post to boast, but rather to try to figure out what's going on. What am I doing that is working and which others aren't? That's why I'd like to see some posts here of tactics that soloers use in solo fights. Do you try to stick mostly with ranged? Do you take advantage of HOs, and use your positional melee attacks to their best advantage? What poison(s) do you use? What sort of arrows?I don't need a run by run of actual fights. Just the general outline of what you do first, what you try next, etc.  I'd like to see why there's such a discrepancy between my experience and what others have reported.I won't post my specifics yet until I have a few tactical strategies to compare to.<div></div>

[Carna]

<div></div>A lot of Rangers simply wont be equipped suitably to fight after the change.... mind you, after playing around with a Ranger alt to get an idea of what all the fuss is about I'm amazed that Ranger mains can afford to buy any equipment at all. I knew Rangers burnt through money, but I never actually appreciated how <strong>much</strong> money Rangers burnt through.

[Tarryn]

<div></div><p>What we <em>can</em> solo isn't the problem--it's what we <em>can't.</em>  Go find yourself a sinister ghoul (a ^ solo mob) and try killing it as though you're in a tight space with no room to kite--that may illustrate the problem.</p><p>With plenty of room to kite, we can still solo ^ mobs--though when they have ranged attacks it's very questionable since it takes so bloody long to kite.</p><p>Without the 40 acres of kiting space, though, trying to solo ^ mobs or even some no-arrow mobs can be very frustrating.</p>

[TaleraRis]

I've been avoiding the ^ decrepit and sinister ghouls because I know I definitely can't solo those. But no arrows I haven't had to kite. They're tougher than any down arrow mobs, but unless I get an add, I can handle even no arrow yellow cons without having to kite.<div></div>

[Steezi]

<div></div><p>From what ive noticed, the people with the biggest problems soloing are the casual players... (im not talking about heroics, no... i dont think any classes should be able to solo comparable level heroics...) and they also seem to be the ones that solo more often than grouping. Of course there are exceptions in either direction, and im definately not putting that label on anybody in specific... The problem that seems to follow is the quality of gear. Casual players with adept 1's and treasured armor and weapons simply cannot compete, considering that SOE is trying to make us a blend of classes...(tanks/dps?) Rangers cannot take hits as well as other classes, and therefore cannot take hits toe to toe with mobs as well...this also forces us to use our secondary offensive options in close combat... and since they are our weaker attacks, and all of our attacks in general were changed for the worse, the dps of said casual players can also no longer compete with the mobs they are facing...</p><p>So if the ranger cant take a hit as well, and cant damage the mobs as well.... well there lies your problem. The upper tier rangers dont have the problems of dps and taking hits as well because, well... we have much higher mit, stats, and attack...</p><p>Also factoring in that one of the new problems we have is an inablility to hit mobs as often...</p><p>so heheh lemme list em again...</p><p>higher tier rangers hit more often, much harder while being hit much less often, to a much lesser degree of damage as well...And while it seems that this would also be the case with other classes, it seems to effect us exponentially...</p><p>Stylee Mc'Cutta 62 ranga (Nek)</p>

[KudLenka]

I started my ranger recently, after lu19 and now i am lvl 26. Pre LU20 it was unbelievable, down arrow mobs above my level didnt get achance to hit me, they were dead before they got to me - i only could do that withz backshot refreshed but it worked. after LU19, i have tu be more carufull but i still can take on same level no arrows mobs. i take a beating but after i upgraded my spells to appII with few adept I, i do not die. and i have fun sniping groups of mobs, killing one or two mobs, running away and then coming back to finish remaining creatures.on the other hand, i have great problems in splitpaw, with only one aoe combat art, i simply can not take on group of four casters two levels above me. this may be problem with many of the instanced zones.we whould get some boost in the ability to combat groups of mobs as they make big part of the solo oriented encounters. apart from that, overall boost to CA dmg would be welcome, the price i pay for arrows and poisons simply doesnt fit the dmg i get.

[ADW123]

<div></div><div>I've found 2 ways to solo somewhat reasonably well after this catastrophe.</div><div> </div><div>1. Buy highest quality arrows you can afford (I use indium.) Load up a high dot poison. Pull with a high damage ca and unload what you can till mob gets to you. Snare the mob, hit focus fire and kite the mob around till it dies. Focus fire can be exchanged for honed reflex/instinct. With this setup you should hit 750-1250 damage per hit with melee and still proc at a reasonable speed, and the mob dies fairly quickly. You need some room to kite though.</div><div> </div><div>2. Pull with high damage ca and unload what you can till mob gets to you. Drop offensive disc and pop defensive disc. Melee mob to death using honed reflex/instinct buffs. Throw in stun/longshank/backstab or stun/culling combo, etc. as possible. Hope you don't die or get adds.</div><div> </div><div>Really soloing whatsoever is a huge undertaking now, but it is possible. They certainly need to do something to fix it our class though.</div><div> </div><div>Sacrifice</div><div>61 Ranger</div><div>Unrest</div>

[Steezi]

<div></div><p>i pretty much stick with #2 at all times... i'm notta big kiter</p><p>Stylee yo!!</p>

[klepp]

<div>yea its nice to hear guildies still talking about soloing heroics... HA im smart enough to not even try now....  our guild conjuror solo's 10% an hour on heroics, which isnt bad... or a bad thing.   But.. every class should be capable in their own way... currently.. we are not, nor will we be without alot of change.   Yellow solo mobs can force me to run at times..   before this NEVER happened..  </div>

[The_Wind]

Sony has always catered to the hardcore player more than any other.  The casual has always had to stagger just to remain in step. I believe that if it is a solo mob, trip down, double down, it shouldn't take you more than a single bubble of health to beat.  When groups of mobs are usually that way, a group of 3 trip down mobs is equivalent to 2 double down, or one single down.  It shouldn't take you more than 2 bubs of health to beat a single down arrow mob.  Just like an even con mob shouldn't take you below 50% health.  A single up arrow mob should however do around 75% damage to you, before you kill it.  they're the harder of the lot.  Now like Stylee said, the casual average player, cannot do this.  They are the ones who are usually in the solo crowd, yet because Sony tailors to the hardcore, the mobs are designed around the best gear, and the best abilities.  Its a fundamental flaw in Sony's thought process. You want to test a ranger Sony, try this.  Put them all in, non-legendary, crafted armor, a legendary crafted imbued bow, and treasured to legendary jewelry.  Use only makeshift arrows, and high damage low dot poisons.  Thats your causual player.  Bringing in a ranger with all fabled gear, the best that money can buy and making their abilities top notch is NOT a way to test content, as it applies only to the top 5% of gamers then.<div></div>

[BSbon]

<div></div><blockquote><hr>The_Wind wrote:Sony has always catered to the hardcore player more than any other.  The casual has always had to stagger just to remain in step. I believe that if it is a solo mob, trip down, double down, it shouldn't take you more than a single bubble of health to beat.  When groups of mobs are usually that way, a group of 3 trip down mobs is equivalent to 2 double down, or one single down.  It shouldn't take you more than 2 bubs of health to beat a single down arrow mob.  Just like an even con mob shouldn't take you below 50% health.  A single up arrow mob should however do around 75% damage to you, before you kill it.  they're the harder of the lot.  Now like Stylee said, the casual average player, cannot do this.  They are the ones who are usually in the solo crowd, yet because Sony tailors to the hardcore, the mobs are designed around the best gear, and the best abilities.  Its a fundamental flaw in Sony's thought process. You want to test a ranger Sony, try this.  Put them all in, non-legendary, crafted armor, a legendary crafted imbued bow, and treasured to legendary jewelry.  Use only makeshift arrows, and high damage low dot poisons.  Thats your causual player.  Bringing in a ranger with all fabled gear, the best that money can buy and making their abilities top notch is NOT a way to test content, as it applies only to the top 5% of gamers then.<div></div><hr></blockquote><p>I play more often than the casual player but i dont spend a lot on gear. i have an ebon chest and pants. i have a level 40 procing bow that's handcrafted (i forget the name. i'm horrible with names of stuff) and that is all the gear that i have bought. the rest of it is drops or quest items. i have only 1 master CA, 0 adept3 CAs and the rest are adept1 or app2 because i cant find any upgrades for the app2s. i solo 75% of the time. any mobs white and below with 1 down arrow dies and only has 0-2 hits on me. my health is still green. a yellow single down arrow might get 3-4 hits on me. health is yellow.</p><p>[[a group of 3 trip down mobs is equivalent to 2 double down, or one single down.]]</p><p>this statement is totally untrue. the fact that there are multiple targets makes them harder to kill and more likly to interrupt you, stun you and hit you more times. maybe this would be true if all your attacks were AOE but you'd still have a greater chance of stuns and interrupts.</p><p>bongo</p><p> </p>

[The_Wind]

I'm a casual player.  I play alot, but I prefer not to group or raid all that much, so I'd say i'm a soloer.  I'm not hardcore, as i can really only play like 2-3 hours without getting the urge to do something different.  As far as the difficulty of mobs is concerned, 3x3 vs 2x2 or 1x1 mob is really the same amount of difficulty.  The damage combined from the three would be equal to the 1, and so would the HP.   The deal is, when facing an AE situation, you're doing damage to all at once using only one CA.  So the fact that each mob has fewer HP, they'd die faster if they were a 3x3 group.  Whereas using AE's on a 1x1 group isn't as effective as goin about it Melee.  It is a balance.  The fact is, that they're equal in strength even if you use different tactics on the two.  However, because we lack in our melee department, were not as effective to take down single's as easily as trips.  We're burst damage, if our burst doesn't kill the mobs then we get beat down waiting for them to refresh.  I dislike kiting, and even then its really not effective anymore.  <div></div>

[TaleraRis]

Okay, I can clarify at least one thing here.Go look up Gwyneth on EQ2 Players for Najena. I have a single Fabled item to my name, a ring I won last night in LS although I haven't equipped it yet. I'm still using the 30 imbued bow because I can't afford to upgrade to the 40 imbued bow. My gear is mostly a few pieces from the guild armorer, a couple things I got as drops and quested items. One or two might have come from the broker at a cheap price. I use my summoned or ripped arrows, and vendor bought Erosive Goo poison mostly, or player made when I have my alchie make some.Most of my skills are Adept 1. A couple right now are even App I because I just dinged a couple times last night and didn't get to upgrade them.  I have Crippling Arrow that I took at Master II, and Hidden Fire at Master II.  Triple Fire is still at App II because I can't afford to upgrade that one, either.For tactics, I am always in stealth. It's a reflex now. On down arrow single mobs, I open with Triple Fire or Crippling Arrow, whichever is up. Then I fire off Sharp Shot because it is a quick caster and is always guaranteed to land. That's still at App I too cause I just got it recently.By this point, a down arrow single yellow mob is down to yellow health. I hit auto attack when it arrives, immediately start an HO, and try to get Ringing Blow. Then I Cheap Shot it, run through it, Pouncing Attack, Crippling Blade, Surveil, Raven Embers and then open up for another HO.Yellow down arrows are usually dead after the Crippling Blade.For no arrows it takes a bit more. Same tactics, only I make sure to open with Hidden Fire. I have great luck with this and it end up doing like 1600 damage. Then Sharp Shot and it's probably down into the yellow as well. My melee skills aren't as effective because these are tougher, but I still get an HO off. Then do the Cheap Shot routine. I usually need another HO or two, then I Cheap Shot it again as soon as CS is up and either Pouncing Attack and Raven Embers again (reducing our recast on Crippling Blade would help here) or I back up if there's room and send off Crippling Arrow or Sharp Shot again. Crippling takes a little bit longer to cast than Sharp, but not much.For groups, similar tactics. Since they're usually down arrows, HOs are pretty effective there. And when I have a 3 group down to just 2 left, I can usually Cheap Shot, Pouncing Attack, Crippling Blade the one I'm on before they get me out of stealth.Basically, I utilize everything at my disposal. I realize this turns us into more glorified assassins, and hopefully the devs will see that if we have to get into melee this much, that this is where we need improvement. I would like to use my bow more, so roots and stuns and better snares on our ranged skills are necessary. We also need our ranged CAs upgraded damage wise.For now though, this is what works for me and this has been my tactic my entire soloing career. The only change I've seen is that against ^ I have more difficulty, but I never soloed ^ that weren't blue anyway. I won't even try the ghouls yet because they're still mostly even, but once they blue out I'll report back and see if I can do them yet. I used to take on withered odeums just fine in Zek when they were blue, although I always had to run when the fairies that were also ^ blue came.Bottom line is, we're not dead in the water yet. We may have to do things differently than we did before, but we can still do it. And while I do agree that the game caters in things a bit much to the hardcore crowd, I don't believe the baseline is set just yet on their gear and abilities. <div></div>

[The_Wind]

By the time you hit 52, grouped down arrow mobs become somewhat easier to control.  Easiest thing to do is to go steal, lay down your trap.  Then use your Spring line(natural selection at higher levels) to pull with, assuming all mobs are close enough.  If not, run in front of your tap and wait till they're bunched, then run over your trap to hit them.  Back up a ways, and then let off with Storm.  Usually this will have them in yellow to red health if not dead already. for single mobs, lay down your trap, fire off Stealthy(hidden) fire and smack em hard.  If you have time BEFORE they hit the trap launch off Sharp Shot line(2 arrow CA).  If you have a Strength Imbued hex doll, stand back and use it on them to reduce their attack speed(true it only lasts 1.5 minutes, but when is that not enough time, and its only a just in case measure).  Then launch off your dibilitating arrow to reduce their parry.  If they're still rooted, use your triple fire, and that will usually break them.  By this time its time to melee, so just go all out.<div></div>

[TaleraRis]

<div>Yeah, the Spring line (I just dinged 47 and got NS finally) is great and I do use that sometimes, but more often than not the mobs I want are near other groups of mobs and then I get them *all* and that's very much not fun.</div><div> </div><div>That line is great in Splitpaw though, when you find groups that aren't too close to each other.  I was fighting the croc cave when I was doing yellow groups and there were groups near groups so it was more prudent for me to take one out right away and then only have to deal with 2.</div><div> </div><div>I'm looking forward to Thorny Trap and seeing how that changes/improves my tactics. I really feel the bite of not having a root or at least a reliable snare. I only had a baby 17 ranger in EQ1, but I had a 54 druid and loved her snare and root to death.</div>

[macte]

<div></div><div></div><p>Well,  first of all, I will say that the down arrow mobs in ss seem to be easier than similar conned mobs I've found elsewhere, and I'd be interested to see how you fare elsewhere.</p><p>As to my tactics.</p><p>I have 1 Master, leg shot.  The most successful run I've had was opening with that, then hitting with triple fire and crippling arrow(debilitating arrow is still app level, and crippling is master ii) about 50 50 I'll get a sharp shot in as well.  If all those landed, and the mob is under about 40 percent, I start meleeing, hammering ho's as much as possible, but I nearly always win at that point. </p><p>I've varied poisons, used every combination and order of CA's I could come up with, tried kiting, not kiting, cheap shot --> back shots or cheap shot -->back up and another ranged ca, and all the other things I've seen people post about, and my results just haven't been promising.</p><p>1 Note.  Last night before logging I dinged my 6th ach point and got point blank shot.  With that I may be able to do much better.  I didn't test it much, but on the mobs I was fighting at the time, I could hit them with that and backup and get probably 2 more ca's off before he caught back up with me.  That really changes everything, but since not everyone has ach points available, I'm not sure that's the answer.</p><p> </p><p>Edited:  This forum system hates letting me actually type my message :smileyhappy:</p><p>Message Edited by mactell on <span class="date_text">02-27-2006</span><span class="time_text">07:54 AM</span></p>

[Deml]

<div></div><p>I've been able to solo yellow ^, and blue ^^ mobs so far, haven't tried anything harder.  Currently, I'm lvl 65, 13aa's, up to level 4 Point Blank Shot.  I'm in mostly fabled and have all adept 3's and M1's, at least in my up to 60 skills.  Nothing higher than AD1 of the new skills we get, but Master 2 Devitalizing Arrow.  I honestly think it's my gear and spells/skills level that lets me solo yellow ^ mobs.  My equipment is designed for raids.  I look for stats, not mitigation.  I still have the philosophy of killing the mob before it hits me, or with the least amount of hits taken.</p><p>Excluding my gear from the discussion, the tactics I use are that I kite a little, but usually not too much, all depends on where I'm at.  I'll try to pull with Culling, then to snaring shot to triple arrow or devit arrow.  If I don't use culling I'll use stealthy fire then immediately to snaring shot, if I can get it off before the mob gets to me.  When the mob gets into melee range I'll pop cheap shot first then our 3 frontal melee aa's.  From there it's PBS to stun the mob.  That gives me enough time to longblade while moving behind, dire blade then I try to improved surveil to emberstrike.  At that point it's autoattack and start HO chains if the mob isn't dead yet. </p><p>If I get 2 mobs I'll focus on one, when the second gets to me I'll PBS it to knock it down and hope I can rip through the first in the 4 seconds that buys me.  Soloing is still possible but we're no where near the ability we were previously, nor are we anywhere near other classes.  Again though, take my gear into account on my comments about soloing.</p><p>I have to agree though, it's really sickening knowing that I basically pull out all the skills I have to take down a ^ or ^^ mob, and then I hear a wizard/coercer duo combo in my guild, at level 63/64, duoing level 70 named mobs without getting touched.  Coercer mez's, they debuff, coercer chain stuns while the wizard burns the mob down.  I'm not saying I want to solo named mobs, but it does feel like a bit of a slap in the face knowing what it takes for rangers to solo white/yellow ^ mobs and these two numbskulls are duoing reds without taking any damage.</p>

[Zinz]

<div>Only level 21 here, been playing since after LU19 for about 2 weeks as a ranger. The big difference I see after LU20 is no more double procs on one arrow skill and in general I'd say fewer poison procs, but that seems sporadic. Been fighting bears and wolves in north-eastern antonica that are even cons...generally I'll pull with backshot(?) followed by the bow skill that fires off a pair of arrows (Don't remember the names) then when in melee range I'm looking at a half-health mob (assuming I got a proc off on the pull)...then it's HO, followed by cheapshot, circle for shrouded, then the heat-based attack(not sure of name) or if mob is higher on health I'll cheap-shot, shrouded, and backstab(again, don't know the skill name) if it's alive past that I just melee it down. Usually after a fight I'm at 75% or better health...pull next mob with pounce, same basic run after that...then back to backshot, etc...new skill at 20 that is similar in damage to backshot is nice, but hard to get a backshot and it off because of casting time, but it works nice to pull if mob is facing me.</div><div> </div><div>Got a quest in little village there in NE antonica for some basilisks and killed off 10 even-cons non-stop with this tactic. At this level I'm self-equipped, bought a dagger (4-11 dmg) and have a quested bow (bow of service or something). For now I'm happy with soloing ability which is what I plan to do for awhile. If I can keep up the current pace I'm on, I'm leveling 1-2 times in a 2-3 hour session I'm happy. I'm also running a bunch of quests and have gotten most of my gear that way (most of which is level 10-12 stuff). Not great, but holding my own i think....</div>

[Bayler_x]

By the way, folks: I started a thread here about the <a target="_blank" href="http://eqiiforums.station.sony.com/eq2/board/message?board.id=39&message.id=24593">7 styles of ranger soloing</a> that could use your input.  I basicly tried to categorize the different soloing situations, so that we'd have a common set of terms to discuss what we can and can't do.  I figured it could also help the devs figure out what things they need to look at.  There's often a big difference between what we can take down out in the open versus in tight quarters, for instance.(That's not meant to steel the thunder from this thread, of course.  In-depth stuff like this is good.)<div></div>

[Trollb]

<div>ranger tactics for soloing thus far have been so;</div><div> </div><div>1. the rangers who decided to take it below the belt, stopped moaning and gave it a go anyways.</div><div> </div><div>2. the rest continued moaning.</div><div> </div><div>lol.</div>

[Teksun]

RERAIL:I didn't so a lot of soloing this last week. My guild wouldn't let me. They still need me for my DPS, but here were my tacticsI would fight single yellow 1 down MOBs (READ: SOLO MOBs). Pull with culling, and get off triple shot before they closed. Start an HO, cheapshot, Longshank, and use a stealth attack to round it off. I usually had to get in one more HO before the MOB would die.My other MOB were yellow groups of 2-3 down (READ: SOLO MOBS). I would pull with Storm, try to get off a triple shot, and pretty much just spam HOs until I won (finishing off with method above).Can I solo Heroics? I don't know, I never tried. I'm sure I can solo blue ^. Why bother though when the rest offer more xp and just as good drops. I got 1 legendary chest off my yellow MoBs. I was shocked to see it. Duoing with a fury I could easily tank white/yellow heroics and got even better loot.<div></div>

[TaleraRis]

<div></div><blockquote><hr>mactell wrote:<div></div><div></div><p>Well,  first of all, I will say that the down arrow mobs in ss seem to be easier than similar conned mobs I've found elsewhere, and I'd be interested to see how you fare elsewhere.</p><hr></blockquote><p>I did pretty decently in the Ferrott. The only mobs I had trouble with there were the lizardmen groups of menders, warders and disciples simply because of the &*$(*&%$& healing. The animal mobs there I had no trouble with. Well I take that back. The group of 8 dregs that would come running up when I thought it was just a two-or-three-fer tended to send me for the bell <img src="/smilies/283a16da79f3aa23fe1025c96295f04f.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" /> Other than that, I had no difficulty.</p><p>Can't speak for LS. Haven't been there much and when I was the other night it was with a group. 1 arrow yellow and even mobs in EF I did fine with, although I haven't been too far in there. Was just killing ice wolves for a writ.</p><p>Zek was my playground in the 30s. The only groups of mobs I had trouble with (keeping in mind I don't try to solo heroic) were no arrows, but as I said, no arrows in general seem to have been beefed up since they added bonus experience for defeating them. Prior to that, any non-arrow mob went down just as fast for me as any other.</p>