Something is out of whack *dons asbestos*

[Nanite]

OK know I'm gonna get flamed for this, but IMO, conjs are currently overpowered. Or to be more precise, a couple of our spells are overpowered. First and biggest is definately Vehement Rock. This spell is just waaay too good. If your playing right, you shouldnt need it in groups, and you shouldn't need it to solo. It allows us to take stuff that is way too strong. I can solo (as a 54 conj) a level 52 ^^^ mob with the air pet in offensive stance, due to vehement rock. That is just nuts, yes their tough fights and I might have to run away like a little girl, but still more often than not I can take them no prob. I played a fury to 60, and at 54 I couldn't take a green ^^^ mob, and furies are definately NOT underpowered, My gear is even pretty sucky, some of it's gray, I don't have the caduceus yet, and no legendary stuff, int is about 230. I shudder to think what I could take with the staff and all legendary gear.

 

I was soloing earlier in PoF, and watched a guardian trying to solo one of the wimpy named heroic harpies (One of the ^ named with two two down arrow flunkies) he finally ran away, almost killed the mob, but it was too much for him. Later I killed the same kind of mob with no problem, mob in question was level 55 (maybe 56 don't remember).

 

Instead of giving us three free hits, a compromise would be to up the amount of defense it buffs (put it at adept1 to the same amount you lose to the level 53 offensive stance, so that at ad3 it would give you a net boost in defense), and then lower it's recast time to 45 seconds. This would still help us to take blue con heroics, but not with the air pet in offensive stance.

 

I even managed to take a white con harpy (although this was a VERY tough fight, and I had about 2% health left ), with the earth pet in offensive stance (defensive stance he wasn't holding agro, and yes defensive stance is ad3, all my spells are ad3). Again to me that is just nuts, with my gear that mob should have wiped the floor with me. I have no problem with a class which has all fabled/masters being able to take an even con ^^^ mob, but my spells are all ad3, which is pretty average really, and as I said my gear is sucky, no legendary at all.

 

Lastly, I think that the changes to our dumbfire pets is stupid, these things were NOT overpowered in any way, it's the dang vehement rock (and maybe shattered land, 5 second stifle + lots of damage is a bit much, maybe increase the damager per second and lower it to 3 secs or something, but that's debateable) that is the problem.

 

Well, flame away .

[Xalmat]

I've been saying for awhile. Since the combat updates, well-geared PCs are too powerful relative to the mobs we fight. I'd personally rather see mobs in general get significantly harder than have us nerfed, though.You place a lot of value on Vehement Rock. I always consider it a hit or miss type of spell, much like Stoneskin. Either you block those three hits that will kill your pet, or you block those three hits that would do almost no damage (thus leaving your pet wide open to the big hits).

[Loral]

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Nanite77 wrote:

(and maybe shattered land, 5 second stifle + lots of damage is a bit much, maybe increase the damager per second and lower it to 3 secs or something, but that's debateable)

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The Shattered line already got a duration decrease. It was 12(?) seconds not too long ago. It now deals the same damage, but over the course of 5 seconds.

[Banditman]

When I first rolled my Conjurors it was a 7 second AE DoT I think . . . maybe Im thinking of something else.I also don't think that Conjurors have a problem.  We have some stuff that is powerful, surely, but rest assured that there are other classes with the same sorts of imbalances.Yes, Conjurors can solo some things that others cannot.  However, it is not always efficient to do so.  In fact, I'd say it's probably LESS efficient than simply going after the things we were intended to kill.

[Magu]

The lower level version was 7, but the T6 version was 12.now they're all 5

[Nanite]

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Banditman wrote:When I first rolled my Conjurors it was a 7 second AE DoT I think . . . maybe Im thinking of something else.I also don't think that Conjurors have a problem.  We have some stuff that is powerful, surely, but rest assured that there are other classes with the same sorts of imbalances.Yes, Conjurors can solo some things that others cannot.  However, it is not always efficient to do so.  In fact, I'd say it's probably LESS efficient than simply going after the things we were intended to kill.

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Yeah I know some other classes would be able to do close to this, but I doubt many others with sucky gear could take an even con heroic and live (if barely ), maybe a couple, and if so they need some kind of nerf too, that's what the whole combat revamp was supposed to address, that toons aren't supposed to be able to take even con heroics. Especially when I see at level 55 I'm getting a spell (granted I have a master1 that's a souvenier of the days when masters were dropping like flies) that slows an ecnounter by 75%, jeez. Can you say kite city ? I'm about 50% into level 54, and I have a feeling I'm gonna be cheaper than a $1 prostitute once I get that sucker scribed.....

I think if I had a few masters, it actually might be more efficient in terms of experience to take the 51-52 blues. As it stands however, I do sometimes die, and about 1/3 of the time I gotta run away like a little girl, so it's more a matter of "I'm killing them because I can." than an efficient means of getting experience . If I had a master pet and some master damage spells it might be worthwhile, but not now.

It's more the fact that I could take these things with the dps pet in offensive stance that bothers me. In fact the dps pet seems to work better than the earth pet. I find with earth pet in defensive stance, if I go all out it loses agro, and if I don't go all out, pet runs out of hp before the mob does, so it's a catch 22. Yes, my earth pet and defensive stance are ad3. Personally I think the defensive stance is a bit underpowered, or at least the hate gain on it is. Conj's aren't *that* good a dps without our pets, so with that defensive stance on I should be able to unleash all I got and not worry about agro. I am 54 however, and we get a new defensive stance at 56 I think, so it could just be that my current one is showing it's age....

 

[Nanite]

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Xalmat wrote:I've been saying for awhile. Since the combat updates, well-geared PCs are too powerful relative to the mobs we fight. I'd personally rather see mobs in general get significantly harder than have us nerfed, though.You place a lot of value on Vehement Rock. I always consider it a hit or miss type of spell, much like Stoneskin. Either you block those three hits that will kill your pet, or you block those three hits that would do almost no damage (thus leaving your pet wide open to the big hits).

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Well I can see two problems with this (increasing the mobs). First of all, if you do that, the non well geared players will throw a hissy fit. Just like someone in another thread was using app2s. If you make the mobs tougher she'd be SOL, plus classes like guardians and templars would just be outclassed period (especially the ones with sucky gear). In fact just the other day I was grouped with a paladin with mainly treasured gear (some legendary but not much), and pet kept getting agro, he said "adept1 taunts are good enough". Had to bite my lip from saying "I have experience debt that says otherwise".

 

As to vehement rock, it IS kinda random, but still those three free hits can make all the difference with all of our stuns/stifles. Especially since mobs tend to open up with a big hit right off. I played a fury to 60, so I know a lot about the "tank goes from 100% to 66% health on pull" phenomenon. It's not that spell by itself that's the problem, it's all our stuns/stifles too, but they aren't imbalancing by themselves, but combine that with three free hits, and it gets kinda cheap....

[SilkenMaid]

It boils down to one simple equation Pet Classes = Many solo players = Money for SOE = Mess with them and SOE is the loser. They will simply go elsewhere. That's why they are very, very careful with the class.

* Silkwind - Runnyeye *

Suffering from...

[Signature-Clueless]

[Shardrael]

just a few things:

first all adept 3's is not sucky gear at worse its midrange, but I am willing to bet if you polled alot of conjurors out there that arent well equipped twinks of a high lvl char they wont have all adept 3's

second we are a mages dmg with a tank built in..... of course we can solo well, it doesnt mean we can solo too well it just means we set the bar and others fall under it

third although I love my vehement line it doesnt always end up working that great, I have been soloing or duoing in sinking sands numerous times and had the giants not only burn off the 3 absorbs of vehement but also take a 1/5th of my tank pets life away in one swing(tank pet adept 3 defensive adept 3) so although great unless I am bugged it is not always the wonder drug it may seem.

fourth and last as for being able to out solo a guardian.... yeah they have no longevity, unless something changed on me they cant heal themselves all they can do is sit there and dish out mediocre dmg while not taking too much untill they run out of life, with three mobs swinging at them its gonna be tough.  We on the other hand have a pet that tanks relatively as well as them but we have stifles roots stuns and dmg on top, the fact that we can out solo a mediocre dmg tank should never have been a surprise to you in the first place.

 

edit: one last thing never ever ask for nerfs, they come of their own free will often enough, always ask for fixes to what is broken.  That is where we should be drawing developer attention, if you are upset that some other classes arent performing up to snuff then complain about that

edit part 2: one last tidbit you cant expect SOE to situate a class based on how it performs with all legendary gear, although more common then in the initial release full ranges of legendary gear I.E. adept 3's (and a side note a full set of adept 3's is the mage version of full sets of pristine imbued ebon) are still not easily attainable for someone on their initial playthrough of the game.

Message Edited by Shardrael on 01-30-200603:52 PM

Message Edited by Shardrael on 01-30-200603:56 PM

[Nanite]

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Shardrael wrote:

just a few things:

first all adept 3's is not sucky gear at worse its midrange, but I am willing to bet if you polled alot of conjurors out there that arent well equipped twinks of a high lvl char they wont have all adept 3's

second we are a mages dmg with a tank built in..... of course we can solo well, it doesnt mean we can solo too well it just means we set the bar and others fall under it

third although I love my vehement line it doesnt always end up working that great, I have been soloing or duoing in sinking sands numerous times and had the giants not only burn off the 3 absorbs of vehement but also take a 1/5th of my tank pets life away in one swing(tank pet adept 3 defensive adept 3) so although great unless I am bugged it is not always the wonder drug it may seem.

fourth and last as for being able to out solo a guardian.... yeah they have no longevity, unless something changed on me they cant heal themselves all they can do is sit there and dish out mediocre dmg while not taking too much untill they run out of life, with three mobs swinging at them its gonna be tough.  We on the other hand have a pet that tanks relatively as well as them but we have stifles roots stuns and dmg on top, the fact that we can out solo a mediocre dmg tank should never have been a surprise to you in the first place.

 

edit: one last thing never ever ask for nerfs, they come of their own free will often enough, always ask for fixes to what is broken.  That is where we should be drawing developer attention, if you are upset that some other classes arent performing up to snuff then complain about that

edit part 2: one last tidbit you cant expect SOE to situate a class based on how it performs with all legendary gear, although more common then in the initial release full ranges of legendary gear I.E. adept 3's (and a side note a full set of adept 3's is the mage version of full sets of pristine imbued ebon) are still not easily attainable for someone on their initial playthrough of the game.

Message Edited by Shardrael on 01-30-200603:52 PM

Message Edited by Shardrael on 01-30-200603:56 PM

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Ok first of all, I said my gear was sucky, not my spells. To me gear is what your character is wearing. If this is the incorrect common usage I apologize. Some of my stuff was gray, so that was pretty sucky (I now only have one piece of gray stuff, finally got the guild tailor going ).

I understand we can solo well, but as I said, I was using my air pet on a heroic, I doubt that was what the devs had in mind. Besides, solo well, but not well enough to take on an even con heroic. This was why they did the combat revamp wasn't it? To prevent people from doing what I did.

You may be bugged then, because normally on a ^^^ two levels below me I can get off my aqueous swarm, my pyrotechnic, AND shatered land before the mob lands a hit on my air pet in offensive stance. So if your earth pet is taking damage in one hit in defensive stance, something is very wrong.

Of course I am going to be able to out solo a guardian, but he was 6 levels higher than me and 4 levels higher than the mob, and he couldn't do it. I can do it with ease, sometimes the pet barely takes a scratch (again air pet in offensive stance so he takes loads of damage easy). The guardian in question had all legendary gear so it was at least an even comparison (I had sucky equipment but good spells, he had good gear, maybe sucky spells I dunno). That the classes are that far out of whack is not good. Yes we should be better at solong than guardians by a good bit, but not quite that much.

As for never asking for nerfs, baloney. If something is overpowered, call a spade a spade. Better to have the thing that is *actually* overpowered nerfed than to have a bunch of people saying conjs are overpowered! They can solo too easy! Then have the devs over react and nerf blazing presence or something into uselessness. If it's overpowered it needs to be fixed, it's bad for the game to have classes that out of balance. With all of our stuns stifles and roots, giving us three free hits on the pet is just the straw that breaks the camels back and pushes us out of the gray area and into cheapness .

Lastly, I played a fury on my first go round, and I was on the exchange, and I bought a total of 5p. All of which was long gone by the time I hit 40 let alone 50, but I still managed to get almost every spell ad3 (Every even semi important spell was ad3), so it isn't THAT hard to get all ad3's especially now that rares have come down in price. I can make almost 50gp an hour with a little luck, thats an ad3 every 2 hours.

[supersupervisor]

i dotn think vehement rock is overpowered....what about blazing pressence - if an aery pet (the stalker i use ATM) uses his 5 hit combo (blades of fury it was - not sure what it is now)  it can deal a fine (5x400 from Blazing + 1400 of the combo) is 3400 dmg - which is pwetty sick for a pet - IMO - count up elemental vestement (and fire seed) in a while with some sucky spells (cure arcane - dispell arcane - all what casts fast) its a frickin dmg machine - (btw does this dmg trigger on all mobs in enc when fire pet AEs?) no. i dont think vehement reock is overpowered. blazing pressence all the more....

[Wucked]

I cant really comment on whether Conj are over powered at that level or not, mine is still only a lowly lvl 33 alt. But after reading your Fury comments, I think you might be better served concentrating on your solo technique with that character, you obviously need to if you struggle with green ^^^ :smileytongue:

[Jeradim]

IMO the fact that the air pet is more effective at times against heroics than the tank pet, does not mean that vehement rock is overpowered or even that the air pet dps is overpowered (it's a dps pet, that's what it does).  Rather, it points to a deficiency in the tank pet.  The tank pet has kind of been my whipping boy since LU13.  At first it didn't seem like it tanked that well (which it didn't compared to how it was before), but I don't really think that anymore.  I think it tanks quite well now, especially when you put it up against player tanks of a comparable lvl and see how well it does. 

 

The problem is that it is such horrible DPS now due to the defensive penalties on the defensive stance (which increase with greater ranks of the spell and with higher lvl versions in the spell line).  Now, I fully realize it is a tank pet and is not meant to be dps.  In offensive stance I feel it's dps is about right, but it can't hold aggro worth a darn.  In defensive stance it holds aggro much better, so it is still useful to use this pet in this stance when taking on groups of mobs because then you can lay in with the AoE's and just burn them down.  Against single target ^^^ heroics however, it just seems to be much more effective to slap BP on the air pet and go all out DPS.  Even if the mob is waaaay too tough for the air pet -and vehement rock will not save the pet if this is the case- you can still use it as a kamikaze pet, send it in with BP (there's no way the pet is losing aggro now), use a short duration DoT (shattered line is perfect), throw in a stun, the pet will bite it shortly after you've cycled through all your dmg mitigation spells at which point you just root the mob, recast pet, rinse and repeat until it's dead.  Against a mob like that the tank pet won't be able to stand toe to toe with the mob anyway, and would be completely pointless for the above strategy. 

 

So what is overpowered about us?  You could put all our spells in a hat, draw one out and probably make a good case that it is overpowered.  That is a credit to the diversity of our spell lineup and our class.  If I had to pick a spell that is overpowered, it might be Frigid Winds with it's 75% snare, it might be our root that lasts for almost a full minute, it might be Blazing Presence which has insane dmg potential, but it most certainly would not be Vehement Rock.EDIT:  Oh yeah...while I agree your gear may be comparatively "sucky", I don't consider having all adept III's average by any stretch of the imagination.  Spells are to a caster as gear is to a melee, and having all adept III's makes you VERY powerful.  I'm the same way, my gear is not so hot (my alts have better) but my spells are all adept III as well.  I noticed a HUGE increase in power when I upgraded them.  I did them all at once too so that makes it easy to see the discrepancy going from all adept I's (except pets of course) to all adept III's.  It took ALOT of farming to get all those rares (did my templar too), and if I had to actually pay for them....well...I would'nt have been able to come anywhere close to affording them.  Now it's a different story as I have much more cash, but for mains working their way up in the game from scratch it's a good deal of effort to get to a point where they can make those upgrades.  The fact that you can kill what you can kill -being a conjuror, a class most suited to soloing- does not surprise me in the least, nor do I think it is necessarily imbalanced relatively speaking.

Message Edited by Jeradim on 01-31-200603:31 PM

[Jeradim]

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Xalmat wrote:I've been saying for awhile. Since the combat updates, well-geared PCs are too powerful relative to the mobs we fight. I'd personally rather see mobs in general get significantly harder than have us nerfed, though.*snip*

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I just wanted to comment on this too.  I don't think this is the answer, because -as another poster mentioned- this would greatly alienate the population of casual** players.  The game should be tuned somewhere in the middle.  That used to be appIV spells and handcrafted gear, but I'd say now it's adept I spells and treasured gear.  If you play a lot and work hard to upgrade your character in both spells and gear, then mobs should seem somewhat easy for you.  That's your reward for everything you put into your character.  If things seem too easy for your liking, then the answer is not to make mobs harder, which is pretty much giving the shaft to everyone else with lesser spells and gear than you.  If you want a challenge then fight nekkid or something :smileytongue:

 

** By "casual" I don't mean non-raiders, rather those with limited playtime (i.e. they can't invest 30+ hours a week like the more addicted among us can).  I raid a bit (once or twice a week) thus I don't consider myself a "raider".  However, I also don't consider myself a "casual player" by any stretch of the imagination since I play about 60 hours a week (and that's with a full-time job lol).

[Nanite]

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Jeradim wrote:

IMO the fact that the air pet is more effective at times against heroics than the tank pet, does not mean that vehement rock is overpowered or even that the air pet dps is overpowered (it's a dps pet, that's what it does).  Rather, it points to a deficiency in the tank pet.  The tank pet has kind of been my whipping boy since LU13.  At first it didn't seem like it tanked that well (which it didn't compared to how it was before), but I don't really think that anymore.  I think it tanks quite well now, especially when you put it up against player tanks of a comparable lvl and see how well it does. 

 

The problem is that it is such horrible DPS now due to the defensive penalties on the defensive stance (which increase with greater ranks of the spell and with higher lvl versions in the spell line).  Now, I fully realize it is a tank pet and is not meant to be dps.  In offensive stance I feel it's dps is about right, but it can't hold aggro worth a darn.  In defensive stance it holds aggro much better, so it is still useful to use this pet in this stance when taking on groups of mobs because then you can lay in with the AoE's and just burn them down.  Against single target ^^^ heroics however, it just seems to be much more effective to slap BP on the air pet and go all out DPS.  Even if the mob is waaaay too tough for the air pet -and vehement rock will not save the pet if this is the case- you can still use it as a kamikaze pet, send it in with BP (there's no way the pet is losing aggro now), use a short duration DoT (shattered line is perfect), throw in a stun, the pet will bite it shortly after you've cycled through all your dmg mitigation spells at which point you just root the mob, recast pet, rinse and repeat until it's dead.  Against a mob like that the tank pet won't be able to stand toe to toe with the mob anyway, and would be completely pointless for the above strategy. 

 

So what is overpowered about us?  You could put all our spells in a hat, draw one out and probably make a good case that it is overpowered.  That is a credit to the diversity of our spell lineup and our class.  If I had to pick a spell that is overpowered, it might be Frigid Winds with it's 75% snare, it might be our root that lasts for almost a full minute, it might be Blazing Presence which has insane dmg potential, but it most certainly would not be Vehement Rock.EDIT:  Oh yeah...while I agree your gear may be comparatively "sucky", I don't consider having all adept III's average by any stretch of the imagination.  Spells are to a caster as gear is to a melee, and having all adept III's makes you VERY powerful.  I'm the same way, my gear is not so hot (my alts have better) but my spells are all adept III as well.  I noticed a HUGE increase in power when I upgraded them.  I did them all at once too so that makes it easy to see the discrepancy going from all adept I's (except pets of course) to all adept III's.  It took ALOT of farming to get all those rares (did my templar too), and if I had to actually pay for them....well...I would'nt have been able to come anywhere close to affording them.  Now it's a different story as I have much more cash, but for mains working their way up in the game from scratch it's a good deal of effort to get to a point where they can make those upgrades.  The fact that you can kill what you can kill -being a conjuror, a class most suited to soloing- does not surprise me in the least, nor do I think it is necessarily imbalanced relatively speaking.

Message Edited by Jeradim on 01-31-200603:31 PM

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Yeah I agree, in my experience tank pet is kinda useless (although I did have to use him with offensive stance to take down the even con heroic), your strategy is pretty much what I do, except I use vehement rock to buy me enough time to put on the dots and get shattered land going. IMO that strategy you detail (with the kamikaze pet) is while not quite, really almost an exploit. They need to come up with a way to make it so that pets can't be cast during a normal encounter but that allow one to be recast in a raid (Losing our pet for the duration of the fight would make us about as useful as chanters in raids probably). So your right, it's not just vehement rock, this needs to be addressed as well (In the mean time I'm gonna try the root the mob thing and recast, at least a couple times use it while ya got it.....).

However *if* the above gets fixed, than vehement rock should be next on the list, because it can save the air pet long enough for you to throw out your dots and get shattered land going, which is way too long, air pet should *not* be able to last that long. As for blazing presence, yes it is powerful and a bit sick, but we *are* a dps class, and air pet is a risky thing to be using, so it should put out a pretty sick amount of damage, just as a wizard is always in danger of his root breaking, so he should be able to put out a sick amount of damage. Earth pet with Blazing presence is nice, but nowhere near as nice as air pet, and that's as it should be. Shattered land is another matter, as I said it's debateable as to whether or not it's overpowered. Especially the combo of shattered lands and blazing presence, I find it makes it quite easy to take multiple groups of wimpy mobs with the air pet, as if I throw BP on him, send him in, let all the mobs in the encounter whack it once (thus taking a large amount of damage and generating hate toward the pet), I can safely cast shattered land without having all of them but the one the pet is killing coming after me. Sometimes one will, but by then it's almost dead , and has been stifled a few seconds to boot. This is a combo that is *almost* over powered, but not quite really, it's allowing us to take wimpy stuff quickly, which is what we are supposed to be able to do.

Granted frigid winds is probably also overpowered. Does the 75% scale down with quality, or is it always 75%? If its always 75% than it is DEFINATELY overpowered, and needs a nerf, preferably one that scales with spell level. 66% at master1 would be plenty. My problem with vehement rock is that it's sort of like the last little nudge that pushes all of our abilities from being very good, to being too good (except for the above kamikaze pet tactic, that really needs to be fixed somehow, that makes summoners way too powerful IMO). Without VR, air pet would not last long enough to take down the mob. Try it yourself, throw on VR & BP, and take a ^^^ 2-3 levels lower than you, with the air pet. It doesn't always work and sometimes I have to run away, but it does work about 2/3-3/4 of the time, and is an almost guarenteed no risk kill on anything 4 or more levels below you.

Without VR (or the kamikaze pet trick), having the air pet take any blue ^^^ would be pretty much impossible. Sure you could try and root it, but then you can't use the pet and have to be very very careful about the amount of damage you throw at it, and no way can you use the dumbfires, so if you can pull it off in that situation you deserve to. But the air pet should *not* be able to take heroics nearly as well as it currently can, it should be for grouping, and soloing normal stuff, not taking down heroics, That's what the tank pet is for, and with the tank pet in defensive stance even with BP I find I have to watch my hate generation as I've had it lose agro many times, so if you wanna take blue ^^^ with the tank pet, you gotta be very careful.

Lastly as for adept3's being hard to get, a couple months ago this was true, really the only way for a main to afford all ad3's was to harvest them, and many people were not willing to do that. However at least on the bazaar, prices have come way down. I bought a bunch of pearls at 65-70gp a pop, it takes me about 1-1/2 hours of soloing to earn that much. So if you spend your whole time soloing, you should be earning more than enough to get all legendary gear AND spells by the time your 60. It's only people who spend all their time in groups that will have a problem affording the upgrades. Not that theres anything wrong with grouping a lot, but in my experience the somewhat more frequent chest drops from heroics are greatly offset by the coin and body loot you get to keep for yourself from soloing.

[Nanite]

OK I tried the kamikaze pet trick.... It didnt work very well.....  All attempts on a level 52 desert raptor, ^^^ mob, with me as a 54 conj.

My first attempt went like this: cast BP on air pet (air pet is in master2 offensive stance), send pet in to attack. I cast Shattered Land, pet dies, I take some damage before root lands (I started casting it as soon as the pet died, I was afraid if I cast it before, the pet would break the root), but I was ok, mob was about 60% health or so at this point. Now I resummon pet and put offensive stance back on (I have a macro on my bar that sets pet name, summons him, and puts on offensive stance so I just used that and let it cast the stance too, still had lots of time left on root). I send pet in to attack, and cast shattered land again, mob is at 40%, BUT it has now agroed me and not the pet. I manage to get away, and get myself resituated.

Attempt2: pretty much the same strat, except after I resummoned pet, I waited and put BP back on it before I had it attack, but I still got agro, again had to run for my life.

Attempt3: Same opening except no Shattered Earth, so pet dies pretty fast and mob is only at 80% health, but I am now at 45% health. I resummon pet, put BP back on, and again send it in, again it dies pretty quick, and I am now at 15% health, mob is at 60% health, I resummon pet, re apply BP, and send it in again, but this time I get agro again instead of the pet.

Has anyone gotten this strategy to work? I think the problem is that the hate that the pet gains is transfered to me when it dies, so if I do any damage to the mob, when I send the pet back in to attack, even with the tons of damage BP will let it do, it's still got all the hate the first pets BP did, plus anything I did to it while the first pet is alive, so the 2nd pet can't overcome all that hate, and I get agro. If I do nothing, two pets can get agro, but the third will be unable to as I now have 2 pets worth of hate on me, so the third again can't gain agro.

I can't help but wonder if someone thought this strategy up but never actually tried it, because it sounds really great on paper, but the reality is that it just doesn't seem to work, unless I'm doing something wrong?

[Banditman]

I have the same experience when I try to use the kamikaze pet strategy.  I've certainly read a lot from people who say it will work, but in my experience - at L60 with all Adept 3 and Master spells - once the first pet dies I am the prime target and there is NOTHING that will change it.Now, if you have a LOT of space - and no potential adds - you can kite it, but it's not all that handy in a dungeon.It's also not that good when you run up against mobs that are casters.  You have to be pretty close to get a root off, definitely within the cast range of the mob.Conjurors certainly can't do anything that Rangers cannot do twice as well.

[Sunrayn]

Please do not compare a conjurors ability to solo with a guardian's, no matter what the level spread is between them.

My main is a 56 guardian, I have a 48 conjuror alt.  I can tell you, the air pet in defensive stance does far more damage than my guard in offensive stance, dual wielding.

Are conjurors overpowered? Yes, when compared to a guard.  Are conjurors overpowered period?  No.  Can any conjuror kill an even con heroic? No.

EQ2 is making the mistake of balancing classes on the premise of everyone having adept3, legendary at a minimum.

I can flat out say, my conjuror can either pull off a win or get his [Removed for Content] handed to him by the heroic groups of pioneers/explorers in Everfrost depending on how the fates feel about me that day.

I am all for setting an average standard for class balancing. The same average that EQ2 started with, app4 arts and spells and handcrafted gear.  Then, let those who upgraded into God territory take out the mobs easier.  Let the rest of us be.

[Thandi]

wow this alot of good info ... I am gonna be rolling a conj tonight, gonna try lvl the crap outta him but not worried to much with LU19 coming ... I was thinking that keeping gear/spells even in lvls would be best, but from the sounds of it, focus on spells then gear?

[Jeradim]

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Thandial wrote:

wow this alot of good info ... I am gonna be rolling a conj tonight, gonna try lvl the crap outta him but not worried to much with LU19 coming ... I was thinking that keeping gear/spells even in lvls would be best, but from the sounds of it, focus on spells then gear?

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That's a matter of opinion I suppose.  There are those that will say to focus on good gear or certain stats or whatever.  Being a caster though it makes sense to upgrade spells first IMO since that's where all our power comes from.  Especially the pets and pet buffs at the very least, then you can upgrade gear or spells as you see fit.

As for the whole Kamikaze thing...it's certainly not easy that's for sure.  Alot of hate does transfer to you after the pet dies.  Add swarm-pet-death-hate-transfer to that (if you bothered to cast them - it can be tricky to cancel them sometimes when you get ready to reroot, I would avoid these) not to mention the hate from root and yeah...you're the mobs new best friend.  A fresh BP on the new pet is almost essential to help it get aggro.  Another very helpful thing to do is to stun the mob when root breaks.  If you stay a little distance away you can get a stun off as it's coming for you then send your pet in.  After a few free hits with BP on, the pet has a better chance of gaining hate back, and you prevent the mob from beating on you by stunning it.  Also, if you have hate reducing racial traditions such as gnomes and halflings get (perhaps other races too...not sure) then they can be quite effective as well (I'm an Erudite so I don't have any, but I know from my Illusionist and Fury that they work quite well to reduce hate).  Don't forget about Quake too, that can buy you a few seconds in a pinch as long as it's safe to cast it.  When all else fails and the poop really hits the fan....Stoneskin FTW!

Anyway, I just outlined that strat to illustrate the point that the air pet is more effective than earth in all but a few circumstances.  As I'm sure you've found out by now, it is certainly not the most effective means to grind XP by any stretch, or even to farm stuff simply because of the amount of time and effort involved in the kill.  As such I hardly ever have occasion to use it.  It -is- nice though when you have to kill a mob for a quest or something and no other help is available.  Sometimes I even find myself using the strat unintentionally in those cases where I underestimate my opponent (durn undercons).

Message Edited by Jeradim on 02-01-200607:07 PM

[Lader]

There was a post after the CU that said that it was not intended for people to take out heroics-just that it wouldn't be the most efficient way of gaining exp. If you want to do it, great, more power to you. But the person fighting 6 groups of regular con mobs in the same amount of time it takes you to take the one heroic will be getting more exp. It was also said that some classes would have an easier time taking certain mobs due to the nature of the class itself, nothing can be done about that.

 

Also, gear is not a great defining factor (at least imo) in winning a fight. conjurors are mages...mages are supposed to avoid going directly into battle, so the most important thing is your spells and intellect to get the spell damages higher. Plenty of opportunities to get your intellect high besides fabled gear. Other stats are important as well, but gear is not as vital for mages as it is tanks.

[Thandi]

Does gear effect the output of our pets? Like in EQ there where items with pet related focus' they dont have that type of junk in EQ2 do they? or are pets strength solly lie on the lvl of the spell?

[Exanth]

Conjurors are right where they're at. I could even go so far as to say were under powered. But i'll leave that for another time.

[Loral]

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Thandial wrote:

Does gear effect the output of our pets? Like in EQ there where items with pet related focus' they dont have that type of junk in EQ2 do they? or are pets strength solly lie on the lvl of the spell?

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Spell upgrade level only, along with the upgrade level of the spells affecting pet (stance, flameshield, blazing seed, conjuror insigna, Blazing Presence, Elemental Vestment, etc.)

[Thandi]

okay that is what I thought, but I was reminising (sp?) this morning over some EQ SS's and noticed some items .. so figured I would ask, since this is my first caster in EQ2 and never payed attention to that gear on my bard