Couple of Questions from a L38 Noob

[tillerman35]

<div></div>Lately, I've been having trouble holding aggro.  From reading this forum and listening to other palladins in chat, I just thought it was a symptom of the class and did the best I could.  Every few fights, though, I've managed to hold on to mobs like glue.  So my supposition is that sometimes I'm doing something right and others I'm doing something wrong.  But for the life of me I can't figure out what.  Then lately, I've seen a few responses to the standard "my class is broken" threads where palladins are saying you <i>can </i>hold aggro if you know how to play your class.  So obviously, I must not know how to play my class.  In effect, I'm a L38 noob.  So I am appealing to those wiser than I who figured out how to make it work.  What do you do?  I understand every situation is different, but in general what techniques do you use for getting the aggro initially?  What do you do to get it back when you lose it?  Any tips for solo-ing?  I do ok, but I'd appreciate any advice folks have. Another question I had comes from a conversation I had with L36 palladin back when I was level 32-ish.  He told me about a spell or combat art that wasn't one that you get from the normal class progression.  It had to be purchased/made.  It was like Oath Strike in degree of dps but worked on multiple enemies in the same encounter.  He told me the name, but I forgot it and he seems to have left the game so I can't ask him.  Does anybody have any idea what he might have been referring to?  I think he said it was available around L35, if that helps. Anyway, TIA for any help.  If there's some "Ultimate Guide to Playing a Palladin" out there, I'd appreciate it.  I'm doing great solo-ing in Zek and EL, and loving it.  I'd like to be able to improve my group skills because I often duo or trio with guildies of similar level, and I don't want to appear to be a gimped tank. <div></div><p>Message Edited by tillerman35 on <span class=date_text>06-14-2005</span> <span class=time_text>06:35 AM</span>

[TheGreatStoney]

<DIV> <DIV>Well to start off we can go through your taunt spells. You have a AE taunt, and a single target taunt. Both are decent increases to hate and you should spam them whenever you have a chance. There are also a few other skills you have that will increase hate gain, but are a little less obvious than the taunts. You have a shield bash skill, which stuns the target, and increases your hate gain. Then there is a buff you have ... something along the line of Call of Glory (I use Theron's Call of Hope, specialization spell), which also increases your hate gain.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>We have one concentration spell that will transfer hate from the target you cast it on to you. Its called "Redemption". </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Heal spells & wards give you a great amount of aggro too, but spamming these can get you a little low on power real quick. If you do everything else i mentioned above this, you shouldnt really have to use wards or heals to keep aggro.  </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>If people are constantly still ripping aggro from you, check the logs and see if they are nuking.  If the same person is ripping off you time and time again, its probably their fault. Not much you can do if they use ice comet before you get a hold of aggro <img src="/smilies/3b63d1616c5dfcf29f8a7a031aaa7cad.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" />.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>The spell i think you speak of is called "Doom Judgement" Check the broker and you may be able to find it for sale. </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>I believe we are one of the best classes in the game.</DIV> <DIV>Your not going to learn to tank overnight, practice and gain experience, experiment with different things. No two encounters will be exactly the same. If something goes wrong, try to figure out what happened and try to avoid doing it next time. </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV> </DIV></DIV>

[SanJ]

<P>You will get a lot of suggestions from this forum on how to hold aggro and how to get it back when you loose aggro.</P> <P>I suggest you don't overwhelm yourself with all the information, but focus on basics first and advance from there.</P> <P>1. Make sure you have apprentice 4 versions of your taunts, wards, buffs.  Our spell upgrades come from Alchemists.  You don't have to be rich to get upgrades in adept 3 to be successful, but having apprentice 4 will help.  If you don't have the coin, work out a deal with an alchemist where you can harvest resources he/she needs etc.  If you have this already, go to 2 <img src="/smilies/3b63d1616c5dfcf29f8a7a031aaa7cad.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" /></P> <P>2. Take time to explain to your group that you gain initial aggro and hold it much better if they give you a few seconds alone with the mob before they engage.  I prefer to do a solo HO (heroic opportunity) before the rest of my group joins in the battle.  Have your group "camp" in a safe spot, and then move out towards a mob.  When you are within our ranged distance (a wrath attack or omen of battle), nuke the mob if its surroundings are clear, if it's in close proximity to other mobs, just taunt and run and then start the HO.  As soon as you nuke or taunt, start the HO as it advances towards your position.  When the HO combat wheel opens, close it out with a another ranged pull and taunt as you run towards the group.  If you get off a first solo HO you should 99.9 percent of the time, gain initial aggro.</P> <P>3. The next step is holding aggro throughout the battle.  Some Paladins utilize our nice dps line to help hold aggro.  Others rarely attack and focus on aggro management through taunts, buffs and wards.  Both methods can be successful, but since you're having trouble at the moment I suggest aggro management via an array of our tools focused primarily on hate generators.</P> <P>You have a single taunt (Noble Tone) that should be cast as quickly as it's reuse timer is up.  You have a single AOE taunt (Smite Prayer) that should be cast on the same rule.  If you are going two-handed at the moment, switch to a one handed weapon and shield and make sure you shield bash on the occasion.  Our shield does additional hate.  Outside our "3" taunts, we have wards, which reduce incoming damage for a period of time and we have buffs that increase player base stats.</P> <P>One of your best aggro management tools will be in the form of a new buff called "Call to Glory .. lvl 37 and orange to you .. upgrade it to apprentice 4 or adept 1".  I usually cast this group buff as quickly as I finish the pulling HO which drives mobs mad and then I do my single and AOE taunts repeatedly.  If someone peels off aggro from my HO, call to glory brings it back almost every time.  You can continue to cast Call to Glory and Prayer of Devotion throughout a battle even though the maintained spells show it's already up.  It does cost a lot of mana though, so experiment!</P> <P>Your next big group buff and aggro "grabber" is Prayer of Devotion (lvl 30) upgrade it and have it handy if you loose aggro.  We also have the very nice ward called Faithful Zeal (26.5) that will reduce a good deal of incoming damage on a group member that has stolen aggro.</P> <P>I would suggest this order when loosing aggro to say a mage class with few HP, 1. Faithful Zeal to ward/reduce their damage and possibly get back your aggro in one move, 2. Call to Glory if it's up or 3. Prayer of Devotion.  I cycle through them until all are cast if I don't have back aggro and I continue to taunt.</P> <P>I'm a personal advocate of HOs and feel they help me hold aggro very well, so you might want to learn the two and three man HO sequences listed all over the forums.  If I'm in a group the group HOs--end of story.  If someone isn't starting one rest assured I will.</P> <P>The best practice in my opinion is to work with a wizard/warlock on two man HOs where you start one, have them go next and then you finish.  Our finishing touch in that group combination is always a taunt (hate) or a shield bash (hate).  Win/win situation for us and aggro <img src="/smilies/3b63d1616c5dfcf29f8a7a031aaa7cad.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" /></P> <P>If you are in the middle of a battle and have "adds" that can NOT be mezzed, try using Call to Glory to pick them up, chase it with Prayer of Devotion and if you feel appropriate run off an AOE attack to damage everything around you to help pickup aggro.  The spell you asked about is from the first adventure pack called "Doom Judgement"  It's an AOE attack that does great damage to all mobs in your path.  Apprentice 4 versions should be all over your brokers, if not, request one on the crafting channels.</P> <P>I hope this helps.</P> <P>Thanks,<BR>Kalen</P>

[Jgok]

<P>I'll add to this... There is <STRONG>still</STRONG> an aggro bug in combat, that Moorgard even responded to some time ago, but I haven't seen anything on since... I'll give an example.</P> <P>Last night, I was in Nektulos Forest killing owlbears for the SBH quest. As is normal for me, I was 2-boxing a Mystic for wards/heals, and slows/debuffs when facing named. The best example of this bug is when I would pull a green-con group of 4 owlbears (something I can solo easily). This is the sequence of events...</P> <P>Precast Buffs Involved: Blessing of the Penitent, Blessed Weapon, Glorious Weapon, Redemption (Mystic), Vigor of Trust (self) + standard Mystic group conc buffs and pre-ward with Ancestral Ward.</P> <P>1.) Pull with training upgrade to Righteous Anger (Adept 2, nuke + adds hate)<BR>2.) On incoming, Blinding Light (Master 1, adds a lot of hate), turn mobs while BL is casting<BR>3.) Divine Wrath (Adept 1, AE damage + group heal)<BR>4.) Cry of Conviction (Adept 1, AE divine damage)<BR>5.) Blinding Bash (Adept 1, AE stun + adds hate)<BR>6.) Divine Inspiration (Adept 1, group offense buff + transfers hate)</P> <P>At this point, the first mob either dies, or is dead within seconds. At the exact moment that mob dies, more than half the time, the remaining 3 mobs turn to the Mystic and begin beating on her. I am at ZERO hate, when I should have more hate than the debbil himself. I can literally move out of aggro range of the mobs, let the mystic die, and the mobs will break and wander back to their spawn point. You may note that the <STRONG>only</STRONG> spell cast by the Mystic in this case is a ward cast before the pull. It takes almost my entire power pool to regain aggro, even using the Mystic's deaggro spell. This can even happen if I don't pre-ward, and the Mystic contributes to the fight in no way whatsoever.</P> <P>From what I've seen, this seems most common in T3 zones. In the high-end (LS, RV, PF, SE), it rarely (if ever) happens.</P>

[J7critter]

<DIV>I second that. All this time I thought it was just me. I used to duo with a inquisitor friend and the same situation would happen. I would pull a 2 mob group and as soon as the first mob died, the second went straight for the inquisitor and was a battle to get aggro back. I tried everything to keep that from happening, at one point I even dragged out the fight with the initial mob to pack on extra taunts for the second. I remember using 15 taunts on the second mob and after killing the first, it was the same thing - mob straight to inquis. I'm glad this bug has been acknowledged and i hope there is a fix for it soon. Makes us look bad.</DIV>

[Coho1]

<P>If you're in a duo shouldn't "rescue" work? Have you tried that? It should bump you one higher on the hate list. I don't use it much so its broken for all I know..  :smileysurprised:</P> <P>I know you still have a bug tho.</P>

[Jgok]

<BR> <BLOCKQUOTE> <HR> Coho1 wrote:<BR> <P>If you're in a duo shouldn't "rescue" work? Have you tried that? It should bump you one higher on the hate list. I don't use it much so its broken for all I know..  :smileysurprised:</P> <P>I know you still have a bug tho.<BR></P> <HR> </BLOCKQUOTE><BR> <DIV>Theoretically, yes, Rescue <STRONG>should</STRONG> work. In fact, though... it does not do the trick alone. I've tried taking aggro back in these situations. I'll go through every standard aggro increaser or hate transfer I have...</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Inflame, Blinding Light, Blinding Bash, Divine Inspiration, whatever the upgrade for Demonstration of Faith is, level 20 training nuke/taunt, remove and reapply Redemption, Rescue, Lay on Hands, single-target heal, self heal, every DPS and/or AE skill I can lay on the mobs... no one thing will get aggro back. I can pull two single-arrow mobs, kill one, and blow 50%-60% of my power just in getting aggro back from the Mystic... <STRONG>even </STRONG>when she uses Quelling Spirit (PBAE deaggro and self heal).</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>From the wording of Rescue, it should instantly shift aggro to me when I'm duoing... but it doesn't. I believe Rescue to be almost completely broken... It does increase hate, but only about as much as a standard taunt.</DIV>

[tillerman35]

<span><blockquote><hr>Jgok wrote:<div></div> <p>I'll add to this... There is <strong>still</strong> an aggro bug in combat, that Moorgard even responded to some time ago, but I haven't seen anything on since... I'll give an example.</p>[snip!]<p>From what I've seen, this seems most common in T3 zones. In the high-end (LS, RV, PF, SE), it rarely (if ever) happens.</p><hr></blockquote>I've seen it in Zek too, most recently last night.  As far as I can tell it has nothing to do with whether the others in the group are higher level than I am or not. One thing that tried as an experiment was to ask my group to stop fighting (no specials, no nukes, no heals, turn off melee combat) when the first mob drops to just a smidge left in the red zone of its life bar.  It seems as though if I get the kill and have a chance to get in first whack at another mob, I have better chance of keeping the aggro.  I only tried this a couple of times, though.  Maybe a couple other palladins could give it a try and see if this was just coincidence or a valid method of managing aggro? The only question on my mind is:  If you find a way to take advantage of a bug in order to have a workaround for another bug, is it still an exploit?  <span>:smileyvery-happy:</span></span><div></div>

[SanJ]

<DIV>Guys keep in mind when you duo hate is only available too two characters.  There's going to be a constant flux of hate rising and dropping for both characters.  If you get resisted, miss a swing, lag on a taunt, have a buddy drop a higher dps in between, etc. it's going to drop you on the hate list and push up your buddy.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>I still believe there are mobs that have "bugs."  I've been in a duo with a swashy buddy where I solo'd a mob to the orange before he joined the fight--probably 20 taunts, and 20 other hate based tools, lots of dps, etc.  He's entered in melee only with redemption on him and still pulled aggro before we killed the mob (Clay Golems in Cazic Thule).  Some mobs seem to be more troublesome while others offer no problem at all.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Aggro management is the hardest in my opinion with just two in a group.  There's more hate to distribute in larger groups thus making aggro easier to manage.  You may be doing everything correct so don't get down as it could be a "bug" or game design that's catching up in these situations.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>I know it's frustrating to use everything in our arsenal for aggro and have 0 chance of getting back, but it happens sometimes.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Thanks,<BR>Kalen</DIV>