What 3 classes would you pick out of these: SK, Druid, Cleric, Mage, Enchanter, Bard, and Ranger. Looking for a trio that excels in Luclin/PoP and is easy to box. Due to having a sporadic schedule, I'm usually left playing solo and would prefer to be as self-reliant as possible while being able to tackle group content. I should note, having a powerful trio that can handle arduous content is more important to me than convenience (ports, SoW, etc...). Ideally, I'd like to play a trio that has a good balance of strength and ease to box. My gut tells me Enchanter/Cleric/anything is the way to go, but I'm not sure this trio is easy to box as I've never played this setup before. I'm also open to other classes being incorporated if necessary. Any advice is greatly appreciated. Thank you.
Yup! If you want one of your boxes to be a melee class, SK or Ranger make the best addition to a cleric / enchanter IMO. Benefit of SK over ranger: -FD -Better tanking ability Benefit of Ranger over SK: -More DPS -Sow!! -Long lasting snare (good for charming) Either trio will be somewhat challenging to box at first, especially when you add charm to the mix, but eventually it becomes second nature.
yeah, cleric/enc/ranger is a good combo. Actually cleric/enc/anything is good, but I love rangers. It's cliche though. Be daring and do like 3 necros or something.
Very true! Everquest is a game of endless flexibility and audacious invention, so literally any three classes will create beautiful synergy together so long as two of them are cleric and enchanter.
enc/enc/clr ftw rule the world of trophy trios! If you want an offbeat combo of classes from your list that's still fun and flexible, how about bard/mage/cleric? Gear up the bard tanky style, DS the hell outta the bard with a mage buff and bard songs, sic the magepet and go to town! The bard can crank out tons of mana to keep med times short, and of course brings endless utility: selo, pac, mez, resists, slow, snare, resist debuffs, charm, haste, etc. Bards tank quite well and are amazing pullers in groups. They pull very well in outdoor raids, too, especially with the mage ready to CoH 'em.
Mage is EZ mode right now. Enchanters are king and clerics are just too powerful to not have. Firepet will take u to 50 easy
Concur on Bard-Mage-Cleric. Mage pet is ridiculous (and CoH so nice), cleric is pretty much a must-have if you are playing solo frequently, and bard utility can't be beat (run speed, manasong, resists, pacify, charm/mez, highsun, locate corpse...)
Thanks for the feedback everyone. Appreciate it! I'm leaning towards Enchanter/Cleric/*, with the 3rd spot up for grabs. How do mage pets fare in PoP? Having mage or ranger /autofire low maintenance DPS would be a welcome addition. Although I'm worried not having a tank may cause problems down the road. Bard/Mage/Cleric seems like a fun trio to play. Is a bard tanking viable for PoP content? How would this trio do in Umbral Plains right now? Sorry for all the questions. I never got a chance to play Luclin or PoP expansions back in the day and I want to settle on a trio that is future-proof.
You could always go with a Beastlord. Easy to play, moderate tankiness at least for exping, a powerful pet and pet heal, you can get agro reliably with the use of blind, and a relatively easy epic. I first had a druid, beastlord, mage combo. I liked this combo, but life without single pulls in anything but outdoor zones was sometimes a nightmare. I am now leveling up an enchanter, and I think I will play bst, dru, ench as my main combo with the mage being an occasional alt. On that note, mages are also a great box but I just prefer beastlord because I played one on live and I think it is a fun class.
With pet toys, big nukes, still a sick ass epic pet that can tank, or a 62 air pet that can tank, or the 64 water pet that dps. Also the charm spell, the fact you can make your pets flurry - lenas don't even know.
Mages are just really good in the current meta of the server. They're fantastic for leveling and pets are super strong. The fact that they're a super easy boxable class that provides decent utility and synergy is why they're so great right now. Mage chanter cleric is close to being the most powerful trio to level and play by yourself. Unless you want to play a melee, then most people use a SK or bard as they can bring a lot of utility. Things will change again once druids and shammies get their ghetto CH. And more experienced tech savvy people will have a more informed opinion but don't let the lack of /autofire scare you away from rangers, I think people have found reasonable alternatives.
As with any class, bard tanking is gonna depend on gear. A bard without raid gear probably won't tank much better than a mage pet. Raid geared, bards can take a beating almost as well as knights. They have good defensive skills, high AC softcaps, good returns on AC over the cap, and can wear plate and use shields. A bard's main difficulty as a tank is holding aggro, since they generate very little hate from procs and debuff songs. But with a taunting mage pet in the mix, all you'd have to do is make sure the mage's nukes and cleric's heals stay under the pet's hate. I think bard/mage/cleric would handle UP just fine. Lotta good options to pair with an enc and clr. Another enc is the most powerful, as two charm pets rock basically any non-raid content (and some raid content), and recharms become trivial with a second chanter in the mix. Mage is a bit less powerful but a helluva lot easier and, erm, less wipe-prone? Any tank will do fine; paladins probably fit the best because pet stuns. Druids bring pet snares and dru/wiz ports let you bind your trio outside whatever dungeon you're exploring at the moment. Shammies SoW, slow, malo pets and tank in a pinch. BLs bring solid tanking, DPS and kitty crack. Rangers snare, tank and DPS. Bards are bards, plus they can roll mez on your pet to take almost all the risk out of charming. Basically the only square peg is a rogue, heh.
One other quick plug for going SK is corpse summon. If you want to go hard in the paint, you'll eventually die. And if your playtime is as limited as it sounds like it might be, nothing is easier or better than summoning those lifeless reminders of defeat to the zoneline three days later when you get the chance to play again. Had I remembered how much I used summons on AK when I rolled here I would have made Stanton an SK.
I say a mage, cleric, + any other class to essentially powerlevel them. Then you powerlevel any other classes you want on the second round that might be better in PoP. I know someone with two mages in their box group. Its pretty insane what he can accomplish and I'm actually jealous a bit. Downside is wanting(needing) to do mage epic twice, let a lone once.
Two epic pets, for sure, would rock. but what about the levelling process? Does replacing 1 mage with a necro or bst alleviate ANY of the process to low 50s? I will try and answer: necro: snare, undead lull, corpse summon. bst: sow, slow.
Is snare really needed if you are using an earth pet on at least one of the mages? How often would you use corpse summon? I run an SK and have only used it a handful of times all the way up to my current level, 59. Most uses were for others to be honest. I think more important than undead lull would be IVU.
After reading through all the solid suggestions, I decided to go Enchanter/Cleric/Druid. I considered using a mage in the last spot, but I'm sure I'll never get close to sniffing the mage epic, although that isn't an issue come PoP. I actually settled on SK originally but with a charmed pet tanking and the majority of my time on the enchanter, I think I'd be better off with another enchanter cheerleader. Thanks again for all the help. I hope you guys approve of my trio decision
Mage/chanter/cleric is great for luclin PoP If you want a little more versatility swap the Mage out for a necro. I currently box necro/chanter/cleric as I did on ak. With necro/chanter/cleric I was able to take mini bosses in BoT and some of the mini named in luclin.
Can't remember when necros get the 1k pet heal but I believe you can cast that on any undead pet not just your own so that would be interesting!
Necro/Mage/cleric is a good set up as well imo. Easy box set up to play, and Mage pets make good tanks. Mostly be on the necro for pulls and running your dots just use Mage as a nuke bot and cleric as a heal bot. Great utility and power with limited key strokes Would be a little limited because of no slow though
Bard is the only alternative for crowd control mezzer -- that's if you really realy want to mez. But with proper placement adds affecting your pets shouldn't be an issue. Also, adds, like one or two could probably just be nuked down by the two mages and your alternative 3rd (Wiz, Shm). Or, a cleric could heal up the pet while rooting the adds. Root and snare stack in this era, so for single pulls, once you break a camp in, you won't have to worry about nuking down the mob. This enables the lazy playstyle of just sicking the pets. +1 for ranger/druid/necro/shd-not-so-much/brd can snare. Ench is just not bringing much to mage+mage. Mobs will be dying, use the 3rd to up your QoL with a snare class.
