I'm pondering my play future and wanted to ask seasoned veterans: Can a decently skilled and geared necro solo named in PoP to drop patterns and molds? Or is this really the domain of a boxed enchanter? I know when we go into Beta I could go far with my Necro in Classic / Kunark, and even Velious Content but I wonder what I could do farm wise in PoP ... I'm thinking I'd like to avoid boxing for play, but maybe have a pocket druid for buffs/ports (maybe a pocket cleric too). Thoughts ?
I've never played a well geared necro, but killing named in BoT for molds would be quite the accomplishment, solo. I don't really see this as possible (MAYBE with Time gear, but even then...) Someone else can chime in, but I just don't think it's doable.
No, I don't recall any of the pattern mobs being soloable by a necro. In general, PoP was a nightmare to solo as a necro. Everything either summons and/or hits like a truck. The only places I enjoyed soloing were plane of tactics and HoH and that was mainly for exp/AAs.
So, in your opinion, is the POP Era Necro a Raid toon pretty much? for some additional Raid DPS and twitches ? I'm just trying to place myself endgame =0
Just because you can't solo very high end nameds does not mean your toon isn't a solid soloer. Necros are one of the most powerful classes in that respect throughout the game. Only a homicidal chanter really ever went at it as a true solo on something like that in BoT. I'm not saying it cant be done. But there is usually a few boxes in there somewhere, if just to clean up the mess of corpses. Interestingly, the names are often easier than the krigers that tend to serve as their placeholders (you'd see a non-kriger on rare occasions at the center of the tables for Ymir). Elif has no PH at all and he is not that tough. Biggest problem there was adds.
I am not telling you what to do, but it is an odd question to ask given that you don't want to box and generally grouping with people is the most efficient way to get geared and reach the endgame... in which case the answer is play whatever you want.
I never had much luck soloing PoP pattern dropping mobs until my necro on live was well Anguished geared. By then she was able to tap tank just about anything in PoP. But for the most part my necro was the best class I had for solo speed in getting aa. PoV, PoS, and then PoFire. In raids all I was suited for was burst dps at the end of kills when dps ment something as the raid was dropping to enrage and ramps. 90% of my raid job was a mana battery and the first to FD if the raid went south. Thereby saving the raid encounter Oh and constant tells for DMF, really need the group DMF to be of any use. Cuz no matter what happened. I was required to DMF on demand, which with single target cast all other jobs suffered.
I'm not entirely sure any class could solo the BoT named for patterns. Best I could do was duo with ranger/sham and both were extremely well geared. Play the class you like and push your own limits as to what you can do with it, gnostica did things with a wizard I never thought were possible - same for delorne with bards. You and your ability to improvise and utilize your classes toolset are the limitations. Not the toolset itself.
I was able to charm kill some named in tactics for patterns, but I wasn't able to solo BoT named. It was a blast playing a well geared necro on EQMac. The soloing power with non-summoning mobs was insane. I wasn't able to farm named in pop, but I was able to farm tradeskill drops in pofire and powater which was pretty cool. I was also able to tap tank named in cazic thule and managed to get some rare, valuable drops since no one ever went to CT. I was really really close to soloing Terror in pofear. DPS from stacked DoTs really adds up on raids, and the necro's utility spells make it a really fun class to play with a lot of versatility. I'm not a huge fan of boxing, but I always liked that I was never just pushing one or two buttons over and over again. Also, it's alway fun to make your raid shit their pants!
There are lots of things to solo and have fun with outside of PoP and even PoP does have some. Necros are super versatile on raids and in general from dps, mana-battery, FDing (saved countless corpse runs/raids with this), rezzes and corpse summons. One of my personal favorites, getting deep into locations because you have 2 versions of harmshield along with FD. I've made the run to PoM solo and is one my most memorable journeys. You can also use this and get creative and drag a mag corpse with you to kick-start a raid.
Necro will always be my first love. I like the way this thread is going. On PC, in my off raid time which was not often, I did some pretty crazy crap. But then I started playing chanter a bit more and they can be pretty crazy too if geared and played right. Tho I loved the Necro/Chanter/Bard trio I boxed on AK for a bit. I never had as much fun as I did soloing a necro. Rrio you just rock
You know you're a true bard boxer when the said bard is wearing nothing but resist gear/ragefire armor, and only shows up to mash elemental chorus, rhythms, haste, manasong, and if he's ballsy fufils diminishing dirge, as one big sparkly /afk bot.
And she loved every minute of it! Ahh I miss Hijinx. Totally agree with you Speedz. I've played plenty of other classes on other servers but necro's always been what I've come back to and what I enjoy playing the most.
Necromancer could solo using a charmed wraith in PoTactics pit possibly? Dunno if those were too high for Word of Terris or not. They may be now that I think about it. I didn't do too much on my necromancer. 20% of why he existed was tinkering, 60% for AMA in PoAir (where I think I camped him when the server came down), and 20% a mana feed bot for PoTime (never got him the Coirnav piece I believe). So to say I was a high-end necro, would be extremely inaccurate . But their capability to solo summoning mobs is extremely weak in PoP especially since mobs are outliving the fear cap. Kunark/Velious summoners you could still fear kite given the space. He was a fantastic box though. A hotkey to cast BoT / Pyre / Saryrn's Kiss / FD. Or set him up to cast 5 mana feeds.
Charming a weaponized frenzied gladiator in Tactics was game over. Dual wielding, 85% hasted (with muzzle), mob that flurried... It was ridiculous. You could kill mobs in <20s with that pet. Broke like hell without a Malosinia though.
I never really thought of using Charm as a necro - I might have to consider that ! Based on the discussion though ,I really think I'll have to play it out =) Thanks for all the feedback and input =)
Breaks were easily manageable with Ensnare + Bard Automez. The Stampede wasn't too bad unless you already had a few mobs on you.
