EZ Server

Hey guys,

I'm to the point where I can kill Warlord with little risk of death in about 8-10 minutes. I want to pop my T5 cherry. Can you please recommend a 6th class perhaps, or the general strategy you'd use?

Current:

War UC 4.0 full T4
Pal UC 4.0 full T3
Monk Sorc 30+ 4.0s NS5's
Rogue 4.0s NS3s useless charms
Mage 4.0

I think my tank+heal combo is good to go, but perhaps another paladin is needed?

DPS definitely needs upgrades, but I'm thinking it might be more efficient to farm higher strikes and charms than to create a new char. I've been mainly focusing on improving the rogue strikes. Is that what you'd do if you were me?

Thanks,

Mike

I would say cleric for heals, but that is a personal opinion. They will not hit as hard, nor can they tank but they aren't pushovers with T5 spells. I suggest cleric because you will want another form of heals in case the paladin eats it to rampage. Yes, you could use another paladin instead of cleric. I just advise against.


In terms of DPS, get monk to 41+ Sorc, get sorc 41+ on rogue, and get mage 41+. I would suggest getting charms up before upgrading strikes (or alternate between the two). Without high charms, even high strikes feels kind of weak.

Shylo's Bolt of Doom IS your DPS spell for mage. Get that and the mage should start showing the damage a bit more. Look for the monk clicky buff too.


-Hate

Just my opinion, but I'd definitely add a cleric, and I'd probably park the mage and add a zerk. At about 3.0 the zerk will begin to match or surpass 4.0 mage dps, in my experience....more than, if you cluster pull.

Ditto on the Cleric.  You are coming to a must have point.  Plus... I HIGHLY recommend a Shaman that you drag along behind your 6 man.  Kraken alone will add great damage, and Dots on boss fights will be a very nice addition.  Also, having your Mage (Shaman if you make one) cast Malo during engagement will make the mob more susceptible to damage.

Shaman epics (currently 5.0 and above, 3.0 - 4.5 when latest batch goes live) procs a debuff that REDUCES damage done by the mob. They also get a group heal with that same batch.


-Hate

On topic: go with a cleric. I run a similar setup for one of my groups and I would rather have one paladin and one cleric, than two paladins in same group.
Off topic: Hate, will the group heal be a proc or a trigger by spellcast?

Thanks for the replies guys. I'll definitely work on charms and gearing up a cleric. And forget that mage, he's getting to be pretty useless. I'd rather have another auto attack beast like a 2nd monk or a zerker as one person suggested.

Fortunately, the account I was considering creating a new character on already has a cleric in the casters guild with 2.0, so I wouldn't be starting from absolute scratch. In fact, 2.0-4.0 is the FUN part imo.

When boxing a cleric, how much of a distraction is it? Are you able to still spend a lot of time tabbed over to the dps or is the cleric window in focus most of the time?

There is really no autopilot when using a cleric to heal your group, unless you use a program like Isboxer. The cleric has an AOE heal spell that needs to be cast to keep the groups health up. The amount of time you need to switch and heal depends on your other characters gear/survivability.

Cool, I better start practicing then. Can't wait to see how much progress I've made a month down the road, especially with my monk. He's about halfway to UC.

Pfft. Using MQ2 and the options in it Hunter allows on EZ you can make the cleric cast group heal non stop, just as fast as it can refresh, by typing /twist <spell gem number> from the cleric. However, I find that to be far less effective and alot more wasteful in terms of mana than just using EQBCS to add a dedicated hotbutton macro to the cleric and making it cast from the controlling character. I do this by tying all my special attacks (pet attack, epic clicks, monk quick refresh abilities, etc) to ONE macro on themain box. Just make the macro in the same hotkey number across all your boxes, then its a simple /bcaa //keypress # on the macro for the main character. Works like a charm.

Oh, and Hate......thanks for the work on the shammy!! Looks as if I will need to shuffle my group again.

That's some good stuff, should be sticky. Thanks.

Last time I checked, MQ2 is a program, like Isboxer, not the same, but a program outside the EQ client nontheless.

Twist is still allowed none the less.

Personally I would say drop the mage and add a cleric AND a paladin. I roll with 2 pallys and a cleric in my group always. When I break into a new zone, as long as I have completed the zone before it is always a pretty smooth transition.

I prefer cleric/pally/druid. Druid has the group heal proc too, plus regen. All personal preference in the end