Question - Looking for advice on a 4th box

[arcburn]

Id like to see if i could get some advice from all of you on adding a 4th box to my current group .

Currently i run Enc/Mag/Wiz all 3 lvl 101 and all 3 very close to max AA for their lvl , as well all 3 are all access accounts. I also have a 4th all access account with a lvl 100 monk with which i did use for awhile to pull for my group but after adding 2k or so AA to my Enchanter he pulls so much better then my monk that i never seem to use him anymore. I had even considered at first of just letting the monk DPS but he cant compete with just adding a J5 wiz merc even on balanced.

I would like to add a 4th toon mainly to help with named mobs so im not entirely sure if i should try adding more DPS like a rogue , ranger , wiz , mage or if i should just add a cleric , druid etc. for more healing and grp synergy buffs.
I have been looking into the AFNUKE but not sure if i add another wiz and do end up using that macro if my Mage pet is going to be able to hold aggro , right now i use 2 wiz mercs and if i swap to burn , the pet loses aggro quickl

Any advice will help , not sure which way to go as of now .

 

[Razkle]

Real Tank or Real Cleric would be my Advice

 

[gnomepuntz]

Swap that mage for an SK or pally and then add a cleric for the 4th. Losing mages DPS will be a small loss compared to gaining a real tank and healer plus you still have your Wiz and they blow everything up.

 

[toots]

If you want a pet focused group. I would consider a second Mage or bst for a backup pet tank. Or add a real healer, although cleric Mercs do a good job of healing pets.

 

[Chanticleer]

Add a bard in for the adps increase for mage and wizard.. this gives pet dps increase as well so will increase your over all sibstained dps with bard hell will even increase chanter dps as well and save iog for burns

 

[Warl0ck45]

I would lean towards a live tank. Fair warning though , it will take a LOT of effort to get the tank to a point he will be better then the pet. Takes a lot of gear+AA+disc usage set up.

Past that I find a live healer to be a huge boon, as the merc ones can go braindead for odd reasons... like parking ON a mob when they get aggro instead of moving. I find a shaman to be an awesome back up healer, as they of course will boost your pets tanking ability, plus can keep Heal over Time up on tough fights while your merc maintains direct heals, adds slow+heal procing buffs, and do a fair amount of damage in thier own right. The extra pet (with pet toys) will also help eat up mobs, especially if you maintain the shaman group damage procing melee buffs.

Bards would also be a good add, though they can be tricky to set up. They are just so damn versitile! need 20 more gems... they can be awesome pullers and back up mezz/charm, as well as enhancing the group nicely.

I eventually came up with a sub that manages my merc stances with RaidDruid. It may prove helpful to you or give you some ideas (or someone else) I just put a call for it in the main loop, and the "gained XP" event. Basically for DPS mercs it keeps them in balanced mode until the target is below 80% .. then puts them in burn mode. If the merc's aggro goes over 85%, it puts them back into balanced mode. (or the fight ends) This way I can keep the DPS up on my mercs, with out them dieing nearly so often. The percentages may need to be adjusted for your gameplay... I didn't make them easily adjustable...but then it is what works for me =)

Sub MercStance
	/if (!${RDPause} && ${DoMercStance} && ${Mercenary.State.Equal[ACTIVE]}) {
		/if (${Me.CombatState.NotEqual[COMBAT]} && ${Mercenary.Class.Name.NotEqual[Warrior]} && ${Mercenary.Stance.NotEqual[Balanced]}) /stance Balanced
		/if (${Mercenary.Stance.NotEqual[Balanced]} && (${Mercenary.Class.Name.Equal[Rogue]} || ${Mercenary.Class.Name.Equal[Wizard]}) && (${Spawn[${MATarget}].PctHPs}>80 || ${Group.Member[${Me.Mercenary.CleanName}].PctAggro}>85)) /stance Balanced
		/if ((${Target.Level}>=${Me.Level}+2 || ${Target.Named} || ${Me.XTarget}>1) && ${MATarget}!=999999 && ${Spawn[${MATarget}].Type.NotEqual[PC]} && ${Mercenary.Stance.NotEqual[Reactive]} && ${Mercenary.Class.Name.Equal[Cleric]}) /stance reactive
		/if (${Mercenary.Stance.NotEqual[Burn]} && (${Mercenary.Class.Name.Equal[Rogue]} || ${Mercenary.Class.Name.Equal[Wizard]}) && ${Spawn[${MATarget}].PctHPs}<80 && ${Group.Member[${Me.Mercenary.CleanName}].PctAggro}<85 && ${MATarget}!=999999 && ${Spawn[${MATarget}].Type.NotEqual[PC]}) /stance Burn
		/if (${Me.CombatState.Equal[COMBAT]} && ${Mercenary.Stance.NotEqual[Aggressive]} && ${Mercenary.Class.Name.Equal[Warrior]} && ${Spawn[${MATarget}].PctHPs}<98) /stance Aggressive
		}
	/return

Else your tanks will be burning a lot of stuff trying to hold aggro on a DPS merc in burn mode all the time. They can do it... for a while. It just aint pretty... eventually =)

Personally I like having a live tank plus a pet, Right now the pet pulls aggro off the live tanks 60-75% of the time, but with the damage intake bouncing between pet and tank... the damage intake spikes are mitigated between them... and a group heal solves it (go go shaman AE healing waves!)

 

[Sum1]

Enc/Mage/wiz/shaman is the exact group I recently made with heroic toons. I originally just wanted to level some buff bots and a wizard (for my main group), but I'm enjoying that combo. Fair warning ... Adding a decently geared and AA'd SK to the abovementioned group REALLY allowed them to shine. I couldn't get KA to play nicely with the pet tanking and mez breaks and stuff, but with a real tank it was very smooth sailing. I like the inclusion of the shaman, but I might suggest you also not discount Druids. They can heal for you, dot/nuke dps (doubt you're wanting for dps, but yea), and have strong debuffs they can throw on more difficult mobs.

 

[Vexxan]

I would lean towards a live tank. Fair warning though , it will take a LOT of effort to get the tank to a point he will be better then the pet. Takes a lot of gear+AA+disc usage set up.

Past that I find a live healer to be a huge boon, as the merc ones can go braindead for odd reasons... like parking ON a mob when they get aggro instead of moving. I find a shaman to be an awesome back up healer, as they of course will boost your pets tanking ability, plus can keep Heal over Time up on tough fights while your merc maintains direct heals, adds slow+heal procing buffs, and do a fair amount of damage in thier own right. The extra pet (with pet toys) will also help eat up mobs, especially if you maintain the shaman group damage procing melee buffs.

Bards would also be a good add, though they can be tricky to set up. They are just so damn versitile! need 20 more gems... they can be awesome pullers and back up mezz/charm, as well as enhancing the group nicely.

I eventually came up with a sub that manages my macro stances with RaidDruid. It may prove helpful to you or give you some ideas (or someone else) I just put a call for it in the main loop, and the "gained XP" event. Basically for DPS mercs it keeps them in balanced mode until the target is below 80% .. then puts them in burn mode. If the merc's aggro goes over 85%, it puts them back into balanced mode. (or the fight ends) This way I can keep the DPS up on my mercs, with out them dieing nearly so often. The percentages may need to be adjusted for your gameplay... I didn't make them easily adjustable...but then it is what works for me =)

Sub MercStance
	/if (!${RDPause} && ${DoMercStance} && ${Mercenary.State.Equal[ACTIVE]}) {
		/if (${Me.CombatState.NotEqual[COMBAT]} && ${Mercenary.Class.Name.NotEqual[Warrior]} && ${Mercenary.Stance.NotEqual[Balanced]}) /stance Balanced
		/if (${Mercenary.Stance.NotEqual[Balanced]} && (${Mercenary.Class.Name.Equal[Rogue]} || ${Mercenary.Class.Name.Equal[Wizard]}) && (${Spawn[${MATarget}].PctHPs}>80 || ${Group.Member[${Me.Mercenary.CleanName}].PctAggro}>85)) /stance Balanced
		/if ((${Target.Level}>=${Me.Level}+2 || ${Target.Named} || ${Me.XTarget}>1) && ${MATarget}!=999999 && ${Spawn[${MATarget}].Type.NotEqual[PC]} && ${Mercenary.Stance.NotEqual[Reactive]} && ${Mercenary.Class.Name.Equal[Cleric]}) /stance reactive
		/if (${Mercenary.Stance.NotEqual[Burn]} && (${Mercenary.Class.Name.Equal[Rogue]} || ${Mercenary.Class.Name.Equal[Wizard]}) && ${Spawn[${MATarget}].PctHPs}<80 && ${Group.Member[${Me.Mercenary.CleanName}].PctAggro}<85 && ${MATarget}!=999999 && ${Spawn[${MATarget}].Type.NotEqual[PC]}) /stance Burn
		/if (${Me.CombatState.Equal[COMBAT]} && ${Mercenary.Stance.NotEqual[Aggressive]} && ${Mercenary.Class.Name.Equal[Warrior]} && ${Spawn[${MATarget}].PctHPs}<98) /stance Aggressive
		}
	/return

Else your tanks will be burning a lot of stuff trying to hold aggro on a DPS merc in burn mode all the time. They can do it... for a while. It just aint pretty... eventually =)

Personally I like having a live tank plus a pet, Right now the pet pulls aggro off the live tanks 60-75% of the time, but with the damage intake bouncing between pet and tank... the damage intake spikes are mitigated between them... and a group heal solves it (go go shaman AE healing waves!)

Hi mate

where would you put that code?

 

[Warl0ck45]

Vexxan , that code is written to work with a macro not offered on this site. It would require editing to be used with which ever macro you are using. For instance ${RDPause} is a toggled variable allowing someone to pause certain parts of the macro, while allowing other parts to stay active. or the ${DoMercStance} is a toggled variable that allows folks using my version of RD to toggle the automatic switching of merc stance on and off (for when the mercs are acting funny, you just flat need them in X stance with out adjustment)

My post was not ment for a "plug and play" action into any other macro, but rather to show it could be done and to give an idea on how, for those folks who either wanted to add it to thier own macros, or wanted to ask their favorite macro writers for the feature. (sometimes folks get inspired from other folks' ideas)

Arcburn's issue with his mercs is the one of the reasons I worked on that script. My main issue was wanting the cleric merc to be in balanced mode most of the time, but to switch to reactive during a named/hard fight. Basically for clerics... if the target level is more then 1 level over toonlevel... or if target is named... or is Xtarget shows 2+ in the fight (and the main assist target is active and not a PC) then it switches the cleric merc to reactive. Else, it switched it back to balanced. Conserving the mana of the cleric (and keeping the DPS alive) ment longer stretching of XP coming in, and more survivability of my group.

Sorry, didn't mean to derail/take over the thread....I get gabby sometimes =)

 

[underdog]

Wizzy more dps the less the tank gets hit

 

[macroquester]

All good ideas, but I would listen to Raz.

Tank is good (I have a Warr, but am thinking I may swap him out for an SK when the time's right (better in groups)), Cleric with autocleric.mac is awesome.

Or drop in a f2p Herioic toon and go for a five box with both Tank/Clr. A 100 f2p Clr would be better than a 105 merc (except buffs).

 

[Inkie]

+1 for tank,
War's level fast and work well with KA setup and going smoothly
SK's make good group tanks and have good AE aggro tools
but I would encourage a long look at a pally, your current group doesn't have a PC with a heal, while merc healers are ok, mercs can't go in all places and having at least some limited healing may be beneficial in doing some older content or in setting up a farm group, i.e. why pay for a merc healer to cast the occasional heal when you're afk buring through light blues?

 

[arcburn]

I personally ended up taking Raz's advice and went with adding a cleric .

Using MQ2heals , with a now lvl 105 cleric makes a huge diff over what any 2 healer mercs could do in group content.
This now frees me up to use 2 wiz mercs set to burn , which increases my dps , also giving me a full time healer for those situations where mercs are not allowed.

I am still not sold on the fact that a full time warrior/tank is needed anymore due to the fact that i am deep into the TBM expansion now and have yet to find any group content or named that my mage pet can not tank.
Now i could see you needing a tank full time if you were on say progression servers , level locking yourself pre-100 and even to some extent if you go FTP . But while using an all-access account , with max pet AA's - I have yet
to see any content that this mage pet can't curb-stomp easily.