Shadowknights pulling in raids?

Discussion in 'General Discussion' started by Vasuki, Jan 5, 2017.

  1. Vasuki

    Vasuki Member

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    I am trying to decide whether to roll a Monk or a SK. I REALLY like the idea of playing a SK this time around, but its somewhat important to me that I would have the chance at pulling big targets in Luclin/PoP.

    Any input appreciated :)
     
  2. Haynar

    Haynar Administrator

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    U want to be a puller. Go monk. U want to be best puller come PoP, go bard.
     
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  3. Pithy

    Pithy I Feel Loved

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    SKs and monks are mostly interchangeable as raid pullers, in my (biased) opinion. SKs are a bit better in some situations; snare, pets, and DA are handy tools. Monks are a bit better in other situations, particularly when standing/flopping over and over to split mobs via geometry and pathing. I find SK FD a bit too mana intensive for that, at least in the current era.

    Bards handily beat SKs and monks in some zones, even now in the pre-Fading-Memories era. That's mostly wide-open spaces with tons of room to wibble around. As Haynar mentioned, in PoP bards get Fading Memories, a 100% reliable hate list wipe. Fade, combined with the bard's bottomless toolbox (selo, mez, snare, DA, lull, track, bellow, resist songs, and on and on), makes bards extremely effective pullers in PoP.
     
    Last edited: Jan 5, 2017
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  4. Vasuki

    Vasuki Member

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    Good to know... Although I am not really interested in playing a bard. If SKs have the opportunity to pull in raids that is good enough for me. I was hoping to make a trio of all gnomes SK, Cleric(evil), and Enc. Seemed like a fun thing to do if boxing a trio is whats optimal.
     
  5. Haynar

    Haynar Administrator

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    OMG. Gnome SK?!!?!!

    No!!!!!!!

    Meh. Best class in game still. But Gnome? Ick.

    A well played SK will be a puller often.
     
  6. Vasuki

    Vasuki Member

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    Haha im glad you are happy with my choice.

    Are SKs really good in PoP? They kinda suck in in Velious AFAIK. Its been a really long time since I have raided lol.
     
  7. Ransom

    Ransom Well-Known Member

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    Knights really shine in POP. While SKs arguably got even better all the way through Omens, they are still a fantastic tank and puller in POP.

    I would say at 60 with death peace, an SK and monk team can do some insane pulling techniques together. In groups, monks are better dealing with casters and fast flop scenarios. SKs get better with more room and the ability to snare and FD on mobs who reset to a spawn point.

    Plenty of opportunities to pull on either.
     
  8. Bum

    Bum I Feel Loved

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    Bards get fade now

    #pocketmage
     
  9. surron

    surron People Like Me

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    SK worst class in PoP unless they implement MC bug... but they are definitely needed in pulling, especially with snare/DA/FD
     
  10. Darchon

    Darchon I Feel Loved

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    Bards in PoP are your specialized pullers.

    To split out difficult named mobs in groups or single out raid minis in PoFire or Water.

    But for your generic PoEarthB clear or Fennin Ro trash clear, monks remain the pullers and splitters for this content.

    Bards are generally limited to about 4-6 fades depending on mana pool and FT. If you can't isolate a named mob in 2~ fades you need to figure out a better approach. Otherwise the raids going to be waiting on your mana all night if you're using an entire mana bar each time trying to split out a raid boss.

    SKs have their benefits to pulling, but monk I think is still superior when you are clearing a large amount of trash and need to split often. SK is similar to bard, you don't want to rely on them entirely or you're going to be waiting around all night.
     
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  11. Mokli

    Mokli I Feel Loved

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    I remember SK's mainly for offtank/kiting in PoP raiding. Pulling was situational.
     
  12. Pithy

    Pithy I Feel Loved

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    Yeah, SK pulling has never been mainstream. I think that's mostly a cultural thing, and not the product of any particular class deficiencies. It's also likely influenced by the fact that SK pulling comes at a higher opportunity cost than monk pulling. Raids can generally afford to lose a monk's DPS more than they can afford to lose a knight's split-tanking.

    As for raid tanking balance, knights peaked (relative to warriors) in Kunark, are worse in Velious, will get a bit worse in Luclin with AAs, and will get even worse in PoP. That's for a couple of reasons -- tanking Kunark bosses didn't require discs, but tanking most Velious or PoP bosses does (Luclin has more knight-tankable bosses); warriors get better DPS and tanking AAs than knights; Velious/Luclin weapon itemization mostly solves warriors' aggro problems; and in PoP the gap increases between knights' and warriors' returns on AC over the softcap (it's 17% vs. 20% now, but will be 25% vs. 33% in PoP).

    Knights will always be great tanks in groups, and their snap aggro will always be useful for tanking trash on raids.
     
    Last edited: Jan 5, 2017
  13. Loraen

    Loraen Well-Known Member

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    I don't see why Shadowknights would be massively worse than Monks as pullers. Monks get instant FD which is huge, but the SK can get two attempts in 2.5s. The SK has more HP/AC and DA; the Monk has Stonestance and Voiddance.

    If I were a raid monk I'd be trying to use SKs here and there to help split really dangerous rooms by parking pets close and engaging from safety. With two FDs and starting out of casting LOS it seems like they could do it much more safely.
     
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  14. thucydides

    thucydides I Feel Loved

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    I dunno if Elroz will chime in here, but he went from monk on live to SK here and still pulls like a champ. Definitely true that there are pulls to which sk (or necro) is better suited. And as expansions progress i think there are expanded roles for lots of classes. example: druid can pull a train, snare something and insta-evac for a very clean pull (granted you can't do it repeatedly on the same druid, but still). rogues can get in way close to a boss and pull a train before escaping to get a boss into FD split territory without a huge clear before hand. If any guild ever bothered to farm FD rings for their shamans i'm sure there are some cool things there. How much will those things get used? Probably not that much, but i think it comes down to what you are willing to try on your character much more than the pure limitations of your class. Play what you think is fun.
     
  15. Pithy

    Pithy I Feel Loved

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    Yeah, the durability difference is also more pronounced here than on P99. TAKP has nerfed monk mitigation (as did AK and early-PoP live). See this thread or this one.
     
  16. Pithy

    Pithy I Feel Loved

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    Also, TAKP doesn't have P99's age-old knight defense skill bug, ezmode sneak pulling, or abundant Abashi rods. When Vulak is implemented here, he'll be the revamped Luclin-era ring event, which is very challenging even in VT+ gear. Dispel sticks will be rare.

    Just some food for thought!
     
    Last edited: Jan 5, 2017
  17. Mokli

    Mokli I Feel Loved

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    Don't Monks get lulls too? Or is that in expansions in the future?
     
  18. Pithy

    Pithy I Feel Loved

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    Monk lull was GoD era, I think. Also warrior incite, /drool
     
  19. Loraen

    Loraen Well-Known Member

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    Well, Monks are simply far too good on Project 1999, which will stop at the absolute peak of Monkliness where Monks dps as well as Rogues, tank as well as non-defensive Warriors (Raev-P99 has 1400 AC and can solo Siren's Grotto sirens), and pull much better than anyone with broken sneak/fd mechanics. I did want to make sure I wasn't going to get flattened here on TAKP and assuming I am reading the code correctly it's not totally game over for monks.

    Combat Stability in the client seems to be a flat addition to the AC softcap rather than a multiplier, so Monks can catch up a bit there (I guesstimated +100 total). The extra 6% to totally evade is very nice. AC only works on damage intervals, not bonuses. The sperglord spreadsheet I wrote suggests that for a mob that hits for 100-400 damage:
    • Planes Monk: 700 item AC, 415 softcap (max AA/bonuses), 475 real AC, 0.24 block rate, 245 average swing
    • Planes Bard: 1000 item AC, 503 softcap, 659 real AC, 0.14 block rate, 235 average swign
    • Planes Paladin: 1000 item AC, 503 softcap, 737 real AC, 0.16 block rate, 210 average swing (a shield could probably reduce this a bit)
    • Planes Warrior: 1000 item AC, 530 softcap, 833 real AC, 0.18 block rate, 185 average swing
    1000 item AC feels conservative (BIS for warriors in Velious is like 600) but I'm not really familiar with PoP itemization. So Verant clearly overdid it a bit, but +33% damage isn't the end of the world. 75% slow makes everything better anyway.

    Maybe this just reflects my lack of experience playing PoP though!
     
  20. Pithy

    Pithy I Feel Loved

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    1k worn AC is a bit high for endgame PoP tanks. Tip-top PoTime gear in every slot gives you about 900 worn AC. Endgame Luclin warriors are going to wear about 700 AC. Warriors in a mix of VT and Elemental Planes stuff will have 800ish. (If you're interested, you can find a bunch of old Al'Kabor magelos, sortable by AC, on AllaKabor here. You might need to log in to view 'em.)

    But yeah you're right: the monk mitigation nerf is a bit harsh here, but their evasion is top notch and they're still fantastic DPS and pullers.

    edit: buff AC also gets nerfed over the softcap. Budget 350ish raw AC from spells with PoP raid buffs.
     
    Last edited: Jan 5, 2017
  21. Lenas

    Lenas I Feel Loved

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    33% damage is yuuuuuge... and in POP, many things mitigate/ignore/reverse(! bugs obv) that 75% slow.
     
  22. Ravenwing

    Ravenwing I Feel Loved

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    I play an SK here on TAKP, but played a monk on Al'Kabor, where I did most of the pulling for my raiding guild.

    I mostly agree with Pithy that monk and SK pullers are fairly interchangeable. There are situations where the instantaneity of monk feign is a tremendous advantage, just as there are situations where harmshield, snare, and so forth are very nice to have. Probably my favorite aspect of the SK is actually the ability to hard-aggro a single mob out of a pack when working with another puller, which is harder to do as a monk.

    I'll second the sentiment above that bards are the pullers of choice for many PoP situations (notably Water and Fire minis), although there are still plenty of trash clears that'll favor monk or SK pullers (Air rings, Fennin event, most of Earth A and B, virtually all pre-elemental crawls). There are also times when you'll want FD pullers and bards working together (PoTime, Dust ring in Air, Coirnav).

    Of incidental interest is that SKs (and necros, who can also pull) have a slight edge over monks when it comes to FD refresh, especially if they load both FDs, and that that slight edge is currently gigantic because monks don't get the rapid feign AA until Luclin.

    As far as SKs go more generally, they do a knight's primary job - split tanking and fast aggro - well enough, but it's true that outside of the SK's ability to pull, paladins bring a better set of "perks" to the table, simply because stuns and group heals are better than the SK's spell set (although the group mana regen boost from Zevfeer's Bite is nice to have).
     
    Last edited: Jan 5, 2017
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  23. Delorne

    Delorne People Like Me

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    Raven and Darch said it pretty eloquently, but I'll just echo the sentiment that Bards are not the be-all-end-all puller in PoP. FD splitting is undeniably the best pulling tool in the game. Mana limitations, spell immunities, high resists, and (if the devs stick with Hobart's implementation) the severe hampering of Bellow all play a role in making an SK/Monk more appealing.

    A good guild will use all three classes, as needed, for pulling situations. As a player, I would pick SK or monk if my intention was to pull.
     
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  24. Darchon

    Darchon I Feel Loved

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    A well funded monk can gain the advantage that SKs have (pulling a mob out of a train).

    Midnight Mallet (5 charge, lore, 420pp)
    Slowstone Amber (3 charge, lore, 250pp)
    Puppet Strings (10 charge, lore, 420pp)
    Wooly Spider Silk Net (3 charge, 21pp)

    With those in your bags and a recharge mule to recharge them, each one of those slow/charm/root clicks should be enough aggro (400 with the cap?) to rip out a singular mob from a train with body aggro.

    Though of course, an SK can do it for free an unlimited number of times without visiting a vendor!

    Harmshield and Pet though, are also invaluable!
     
  25. Bum

    Bum I Feel Loved

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    Wait, did Temerity raid on AK?? I only saw them standing around the cave portals afk
     
  26. Loraen

    Loraen Well-Known Member

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    Ahh, I'm used to P99/Velious where if you have a good cleric/shaman combination anyone can tank. Sounds like PoP is a fun expansion!
     
  27. Mokli

    Mokli I Feel Loved

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    My favorite expansion by far and I played on PC live for over 10 years afterwards.
     
  28. Faults

    Faults I Feel Loved

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    Fungusbeast glands will help level the snare game out. Plus monks end up with rapid feign, a tremendously useful add-on to FD.
     
  29. Darchon

    Darchon I Feel Loved

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    Reverse Slow is probably one of my favorite mechanics from PoP that they added in and then removed.

    Hate how trivial some Kunark/Velious content becomes once Turgurs lands. The ultimate treatment of this was making a select few mobs in PoP treat Slow as a haste without it providing any message/indication that this is happening.
     
  30. robregen

    robregen Administrator Staff Member

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    We already have this implemented as a preparaton to put in. Probably will need a list of NPC that had that ability.