Need some advice...Wall of Rage/Suppressed Rage..

[Larsenex]

<DIV><FONT face="Comic Sans MS" size=4>Hi all. I have played Cacophonix on Antonia Bayle server since the day it opened. I know my class and I know tanking. Now for some info. I play casually and I will do raids but my guild is not big enough to do them 'all the time'. I am very near to 62! All my gear is mastercrafted or better. All my arts from 53 on are adpt 3. I have one exception. I never bothered with Wall of Rage or Suppressed Rage. Why? Because they seemed useless to me, in that even with offensive stance+shield+chaos and a full group I would never need 'extra' mitigation at the expense of offensive stats. Now Ill go Defensive stance when group asks me to but the hit to my hate seems not worth it.</FONT></DIV> <DIV><FONT face="Comic Sans MS" size=4></FONT> </DIV> <DIV><FONT face="Comic Sans MS" size=4>Anyway here is my story. </FONT></DIV> <DIV><FONT face="Comic Sans MS" size=4></FONT> </DIV> <DIV><FONT face="Comic Sans MS" size=4>I am at breeding grounds and I am pretty good at body pulling to get one enraged lizzard thingy (they are so darn close thats all you can do at times). Anyway, I miss-pulled and got THREE! You know the ones all heroic lvl 62^^^.  Our group had me as tank, a brigand lvl 61, a lvl 70 mystic (healing outta group) and another Zerk who was one lvl lower than me. After I pulled these three he shouted to me 'Wall of Rage man!! use it!!. Well I never.... Hell I dont even have it in my book. So here I am for guidance. I have rares to make an adpt 3 if needed. Is this line  of arts used alot by all of you out there? Should I be popping it as soon as I get mob back to camp? Is this simply just a situational art where it could have saved my group (we did wipe but was fun to watch us all go down slowly)?</FONT></DIV> <DIV><FONT face="Comic Sans MS" size=4></FONT> </DIV> <DIV><FONT face="Comic Sans MS" size=4>So is wall of rage and Suppressed Rage worth it?</FONT></DIV> <DIV><FONT face="Comic Sans MS" size=4></FONT> </DIV> <DIV><FONT face="Comic Sans MS" size=4>Sorry for long post. I am rambling as usual.</FONT></DIV> <DIV><FONT face="Comic Sans MS" size=4></FONT> </DIV> <DIV><FONT face="Comic Sans MS" size=4>Thanks again for your opinions.</FONT></DIV> <DIV><FONT face="Comic Sans MS" size=4></FONT> </DIV> <DIV><FONT face="Comic Sans MS" size=4>Cacophonix Songcrusher</FONT></DIV> <P>Message Edited by Larsenex on <SPAN class=date_text>08-24-2006</SPAN> <SPAN class=time_text>08:00 PM</SPAN></P><p>Message Edited by Larsenex on <span class=date_text>08-24-2006</span> <span class=time_text>08:01 PM</span>

[Gambrellin]

<P>I use it often, and especially for those named creatures that hit really hard, the extra mitigation is nice to give your healer a little breathing room and time to get those heals off.  You just got to get in the habit of using it.  Remember that your mitigation is based off an even con mob.  Fighting anything higher than white, you are going to have a lower mitiagion against so every little bit helps IMO.</P> <P>I play on a PvP server and at the beginning of an engagement use Wall of Ferocity and Supressed Rage and it helps tremendously in mitigating/avoiding spike damage.  Pop them and concentrate on keeping aggo and a full group of opposing players will have a tough time killing you or gettting to any of your groupmates.  In PvP fights almost all people try to dish out as much damage as they can as fast as they can, so the spike is the greatest at the beginning of the fight.  The snare of the Wall line is a bonus in PvP where people have a tendancy to run when they are losing, unfortuantely it slows us down as well, but at least my group mates can finish them off.</P> <P> </P> <P>Kravenn</P> <P>70 Berserker</P> <P>Venekor</P> <P> </P> <P> </P>

[Larsenex]

<FONT face="Comic Sans MS" size=4>Thanks much. Is the last in the Wis line worth the trade off of 8 AA?</FONT>

[Xita]

i call these two my OS buffs, i pop them up normally when something has gone wrong, it just gives my group a little time to get their bearings and refocus, and i can pretend i am a turtle. They are low priority to upgrade but i would always keep them on my hotbars. Also on a long fight they are good to pop when chaos runs out.

[FightGame]

<DIV>last in wisdom line is not worth 8 points.  Even in defensive stance, my skills are still over what they should be, because of group buffs, and armor with + to melee skills.  They only help you actually hit the mob, not hit it harder.  So, go defensive stance to be safe, and check your logs.  If you aren't missing too many shots, no sense in raising melee skills.  Once you have your taunts at adept3 and master, and your damage to adept3 or master, and you know your class well, the zerkers are pretty [expletive haxx0red by Raijinn] good at getting and holding aggro.  Once you reach mitigation cap, and/or have great healer(s), then you can go offensive stance for the little more damage output.  Until then, imo, you're a tank, and tanks should be defensive first.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>The temporary defensive buffs are great until you reach mitigation and/or defense cap.  After that, they're only good when fighting really high level mobs, and/or when you get debuffed.  And lots of stuff debuff mitigation now, so the more the better.</DIV>

[infernus006]

When you start tanking in places like HoF, Nek Castle 3, Nizara, and/or any T7 raid zones, you will want to be using Wall of Rage and Mayhem a lot (although not at the same time), and it would be wise to have them both at Ad3 or better quality.  Trust me, you will see why (the extra mitigation helps to counter the Debilitate spells the mobs hit you with).  I only use Suppressed Rage when I'm soloing in offensive stance and using a 2h and get into some trouble but it is very useful in that situation.  As for the last option in the Wis line that removes the penalties from our stances, a lot of people think it's useless but I beg to differ.  I have it and I absolutely love it.  I will never go back to having penalties on my stances ever again.  The extra melee skills it allows for when in defensive stance is well worth it, especially when tanking mobs that con white and above, and the absense of an avoidance penalty while using your offensive stance is equally awesome for soloing IMO. <div></div>

[yettii]

I was once in your same position.I made my Zerker purely for DPS originally.  I did my job well, but then the winds of change came, as well as DoF.  Gone were the days where I could swing my Royal Great Flail with devastating effectiveness.  Now I was expected to tank here and there, and having ignored most Defensive necessities other than good armor, I had to adjust for a while.  I've now been long lv70.  Keep in mind that I'm still absolutely tailored to DPS, but to today's Warrior standards.  Most vital skills & important attacks, and all my defensive skills are M1.  I utilize skills and items that maximize my DPS & Haste.  I've seen no single AA line to the end, instead I'm 4-4-8-0-0 into Str, Wis & Int, obviously showing the skills that shines.  This grants me +22.4% Crit chance, +19.2% DPS, +17.6% Haste & another +29-30% Haste most of the time when a Sword is equipped.  All that <b>before</b> our Primary Berserk Skills (all M1), Juggernaut, Open Wounds, the DT bracelet, MoA & the UL.With these in mind, I recognized the need to become more Defensive long ago.  I've had our Defensive stance at M1 for a long while, but that alone isn't enough.  Chaos (Mayhem at lv6<img src="/smilies/b2eb59423fbf5fa39342041237025880.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" /> is a great help, but since we can only keep it up a third of the time, I needed more.  Then came a point where I started paying attention to Wall of Rage (Wall of Ferocity at lv69).  At the time, it was still Adept 1, and I didn't use it much at all until I noticed that the Mitigation payoff scaled very well with upgrades, and I could keep it up half the time on top of Chaos.  Discovering this, I got the M1 fast, started using it routinely and found that it worked very well in Offensive stance.  My previous efforts of boosting my haste helped nullify the significance of the Wall's attack speed penalty, and it became a regular staple alongside the Anarchy line in my adventures, in either stance.I didn't even really give Subdued Rage (Suppressed Rage at 64, I think) a chance got a long @$$ time, until recently.  I only ever got it Adept 3 simply cause it was my last T6 skill that wasn't.  I'd say I used it maybe .41% of the time, ever.  Then there came a time when I started giving it some thought.  With my DPS & Haste high enough, I could consider sacrificing some more in the name of higher avoidance (this effect may be significantly magnified by those who got the Wis AA Endline).  I found that I hadn't even gotten Suppressed Rage Ad1 before I saw Suppressed Rage M1 for sale, and boy was it there for some time.  Its not hard to see why that doesn't sell, but for me, it was a signifcant upgrade over Subdued Rage Ad3, from +23 Def to +33 Def!  I could also keep it up as much as the Wall, maybe even more so.  So I bought it, and just to be sure, also added it into usual lineup to be sure of its use.  It boosted my Avoidance quite nicely, and even though I can't really see its effectiveness too well by paying attention to the hits I'm taking, I can be sure its working.Its a lot to say Mayhem/Wall of Ferocity/Suppressed Rage, so I just call them the 3 Defs.  When in Defensive or Offensive, I try to throw all three on at once and keep them in constant rotation, using them again as soon as I can.  Mayhem & WoF is a HUGE AC boost when both are on at once, and they keep your AC balanced at a high rate when using one after the other.  It helps that the Walls & Suppressed line have fast cast timers.  Suppressed's Avoidance certainly doesn't hurt, but the big point is to keep me strong while sacrificing myself further to boost DPS.  UL, for instance, is crucial in keeping my damage high, but since I've long outleveled it, equipping it it almost a 5% soak drop in mitigation, bringing the pain significantly, and how can anyone forget the wrath of Juggernaut?  Hit 65, take one look at it and you'll see what I mean.  I was the first on Najena to get it Adept 3 simply because no one dared use it.  Keeping the 3 Defs up constantly ease the AC loss from UL well, and combined, Mayhem and Wall more than negates Juggernaut's physical penalty, making Juggernaut ideal for throwing in just after turning the 3 Defs on.  M1 grants +27% Crit chance on Auto-Attacks and about a 30% damage boost to all CAs for its 30 second duration (Bind Wound & Destruction turned on before fight + 3 Defs/Juggernaut/Open Wounds once fight starts upon multiple opponents + Fabled 2 Hander = PAYN).  The penalty is -1300 AC & Resists though, so beware.I'd have to say that the only skill I routinely ignore these days now is the Press line, since me using a shield is quite the rarity (2 handers fo' life!).  I only really pull it out if the extra resists are vital, or if someone in my group REALLY wants me to have it out.  I'll seriously only do it if we've got strong DPS to compensate for losing mine, but this also becomes a problem because my DPS is the main factor in holding my aggro, and reverting to a 1 hander without having touched the AGI line means it just got a lot harder to keep hate off the scouts & mages.<div></div>

[kap]

This line also has one other feature that helps. It's proc hits in an area rather than an encounter. How much hate it generates, I have no clue. <div></div>

[danmurph3]

When soloing or duo/trioing do many of you try and combine your short term DEF buffs with Juggernaut?  Usually the negative effects of Juggernaut rear their ugly head quickly during a fight (especially solo) but i haven't fooled around too much with combining juggernaut and the short term def buffs together to offset the negatives of Juggernaut.  Anyone play around with this enough to offer some advice?<div></div>

[yettii]

   ^----------(see my last post)Yeah, I know, a bear to read, but its in there somewhere.<div></div>

[danmurph3]

yettii i had read your post, its what made me question what some good strategies might be.  Was just wondering if anyone else had some feedback on it, and i myself need to do some experimenting.I never stack Juggy and Open Wounds since the haste on Open wounds i like to make full use of and the criticals on Juggernaut i like to leave to my CAs.Was thinking casting WoF and then dishing out the CAs since it really only limits your auttoattack. So casting WoF and then Juggernaut and then doing the CAs seems like a smart option, just not sure i can stay alive on hard fights like that and afraid to experiment with it in a group situation.Yetti do you always stack WoF and Mayhem before Juggernaut or sometimes just 1 of them?  What aobut Suppressed Rage when do you throw that in as well?I've always heard using up all the short term DEF buffs at once wasn't the best way to utilize them unless your in a critical situation, but how much DEF buffs you need on to use Juggernaut when your tanking or soloing?<div></div>

[Analviper]

Wall of Rage/Suppressed Rage/Mayhem use all 3 in every fight the extra AC just makes things easier, its not as if their mana intensive... wall of rage is perfect if you gets adds and healers are asleep juts gives them time to get on top of things added with mayhems Mit and supprsed rage there is just no reason not to use them lol. Unless of course you're dps'ing... in which case JUGGERNAUGHT! lol hitting of destruction open wounds and juggernaught and just stand there auto attacking, bust off demolish and frenzied blows and watch thigns die =)<div></div>

[Trynnus1]

<BR> <BLOCKQUOTE> <HR> danmurph321 wrote:<BR>yettii i had read your post, its what made me question what some good strategies might be.  Was just wondering if anyone else had some feedback on it, and i myself need to do some experimenting.<BR><BR>I never stack Juggy and Open Wounds since the haste on Open wounds i like to make full use of and the criticals on Juggernaut i like to leave to my CAs.<BR><BR>Was thinking casting WoF and then dishing out the CAs since it really only limits your auttoattack. <BR><BR>So casting WoF and then Juggernaut and then doing the CAs seems like a smart option, just not sure i can stay alive on hard fights like that and afraid to experiment with it in a group situation.<BR><BR>Yetti do you always stack WoF and Mayhem before Juggernaut or sometimes just 1 of them?  What aobut Suppressed Rage when do you throw that in as well?<BR><BR>I've always heard using up all the short term DEF buffs at once wasn't the best way to utilize them unless your in a critical situation, but how much DEF buffs you need on to use Juggernaut when your tanking or soloing?<BR> <BR> <HR> </BLOCKQUOTE>Juggernaught also increases Crit hit on autoattacks and open wounds gives you more of them so they work well together.