how to make SK more useful

[Dragowulf]

i thought about this when i heard about the little revamp of the coercers.  i think you should give sk's a permanent pet (like in eq1) and have different effects/uses.  they wouldnt have to be godly or as powerful as summoner classes.it could be a ca.  i dunno just thought about it and wanted to post.

[Shiverr]

<cite>Dragowulf2 wrote:</cite><blockquote>i thought about this when i heard about the little revamp of the coercers.  i think you should give sk's a permanent pet (like in eq1) and have different effects/uses.  they wouldnt have to be godly or as powerful as summoner classes.it could be a ca.  i dunno just thought about it and wanted to post.</blockquote><p>I appreciate your recognizing that obviously there is a problem and Sk's need some loving.  Undoubtedly.</p><p>However, I couldnt disagree more with this suggestion.  And thats with having an 80 Sk alt.  We do not need to be changed to a pet class.  There are plenty of those already.  Our little CA temporary "pet" is mostly useless already and I use it infrequently, for certain needs.</p><p>For starters, the defensive stance needs to be +Agi instead of an almost useless +Wis so that we have some avoidance as tanking - if you're in defensive stance...then you better be tanking something worthwhile.  Sk's are gimped from the start in the HP/agi pool with tradeoffs in other areas that arent doing much good outside of soloing situations.</p><p>Could easily follow up with upgrading "Death Touch" to where it is more fitting of its name, as it seemed to have been in the past.  A more appropriate title of the ability in the current state would be "Inconvieneint  Pain Touch With a Long Reuse."  Something named "Death Touch darned well better have an outcome like a brawlers "Devastation Fist"  which is appropriately named.</p><p>And, why would someone use an Sk even as an OT, let alone a MT, when a Pally can rez, spot heal, and OT just as well with amends to boot?  The Sk heals himself quite well, but that does a MT no good when hes up should an Sk be OT'ing.  Maybe a disease situation here or there at best?</p><p>To solve this point above:  Bring back multiple mob encounters.  Sk's were born for multiple mobs, its what they "do."  Plenty of AE's to grab, and siphon life from mobs.  Make situations where an Sk or a Berserker would be the choice tank for certain encounters. </p><p>See:  <a href="http://forums.station.sony.com/eq2/posts/list.m?topic_id=414827" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">http://forums.station.sony.com/eq2/...topic_id=414827</a></p>

[Windowlicker]

Nope, I don't think the Shadowknight needs to be turned into a Beastlord.

[pawnipt]

While SK's do have decent aoe damage it is still second rate to zerker and paladin. There is nothing that i can think of that a SK can do better compaired to these other plate tanks except solo and thats where brawlers usually have us beat, so as far as i can tell SK is second rate all around and needs some helpPaladins have more aoe's and plus amends can go on a warlock making them far superior for aoe agro.Here are a few things i see that need some adjustments:1. Why does the Paladin raid buff give more then the SK raid buff?<img src="http://i181.photobucket.com/albums/x240/pawnipt/crusadercontrasts.jpg" border="0" alt="" />2.  The shadowknight defensive stance still exactly like the Paladin defensive stance wisdom does more for a paladin then a SK therefor we get the short end of the stick on this buff too.3. Devouring Mist doesn't do what it says it does anylonger, since LU44 (i'm sure this will either get fixed or adjusted eventually but it just adds to the BS right now)4. Contagion, if this spell is resisted the timer will not reset like every other spell in the game does.  It will act as if the spell landed and you will have to wait on the recast timer (not to mention the casting time on this is pretty long and its uses are almost nil) I strongely feel that it should be changed so it will only spread once and when it does it casts a full blown direct damage 8 Max target AOE, Just like the "Vile of Coil Spawn" ring does (except 100% chance instead of 15%)Like.... You cast it on one mob, it puts a dot on them and when it dies BOOM direct damage AOE.5. Death March is a great spell for agro and buffing temp dps for the group.  The only problem i've seen with it is when getting stunned or stifled while in mid cast, On The March does not trigger and yet the buff still goes up with the recast timer in effect and this completely blocks the agro that was supposed to be generated by this buff and of course the lovely damage modifiers and immunity's.

[pawnipt]

oops hit quote on accident <img src="/eq2/images/smilies/1cfd6e2a9a2c0cf8e74b49b35e2e46c7.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" width="15" height="15" />

[zaun2]

The SK pet in EQ1 was pretty much a walking DoT, or something to chuck at a mob when attempting a gnarly pull.  I don't see making that a permanent pet to play with the shammy dogs will help class DPS much.  Instead, if pets are a focus, perhaps allow more than one dumbfire pet out at a time.Some ideas that come to mind for me, although are implemented with some other classes:1:  Taps.  A big generic, "I'm sucking a chunk of your life, power, AC, strength, DPS, and every single stat you even dream you have" debuff, one single target, one AoE.2:  A way to "suck agro" from another player, where you can target the player and x% of his total agro transfers to you over a certain time period, so it would allow a SK to keep agro even when a DPS class pops a major spike.3:  Itemization changes:  For example, crusader only 1h weapons with superb DPS that are not meant to be dual wielded.  I remember these in EQ1, such as the Massive Dragonclaw Shard which at the time provided SKs and pallies with excellent DPS.  To make things fair, perhaps have a NPC that can trade a normal weapon reward for one that is specially made for a crusader that doesn't dual wield.