Shaman Solo Strategy?

[Pope Hat]

Hallo,

I recently made an Ogre shaman and I've never played one before. I'm level 26 right now and been grouping so far. I'd like to solo a bit at the lower levels so that I can get a hang of the basics so that when I'm 51+ I won't just be jumping in the deep end. I have fungi but other than that my gear is pretty meh. Using smoldering brand and have 2x 5/55 rings. Nothing else on me is noteworthy and not a lot of cash to buy much else. Hoping on a PWC.

I'm wondering what the general strat for soloing is, again never played a shaman before. So far I am just pulling with drowsy and then using Envenomed Breath while meleeing. When they start to run I either root or finish with the ice dd. This seems really slow as my dps isn't that good (although I am comparing dps to an enchanter which has amazing dps w/ charmed pet doing everything).

Thanks for any advice!

[Man0warr]

If you have a fungi, that is pretty much the strategy until 50 when you can click your epic.

If you didn't have fungi there would be more root/dotting and pet jousting involved.

Once you can use epic, the strategy for exping turns in to keep 4-5 blue mobs rooted/epic dotted whilst keeping yourself buffed. Only mana you should use is for roots, malosi on tougher mobs, and buffs - otherwise you are casting Canni 2 while watching mobs die.

At the very high end, your strategy goes back to tanking mobs with Slow and Torpor.

[Pope Hat]

Thanks for the reply.

I also notice that sometimes my spells are getting interrupted from the front. I imagine this is due to push, but how do I stop this other than putting my back to a wall/corner? Because in some instances that is not possible/screws up the mouse wheel view.

Oh and another thing I forgot. I have a gobby earring for fast canni but is the only way this will work is if it is memmed in the first slot? If so what is the max recast delay this works for? Canni is 2.25 sec iirc. I know it doesn't work for theft of thought which has a 2 min cool down.

[mgellan]

Yeah 1st slot only refreshes on clicky, it works for nukes on my wiz with 4.5s and 6.3s cooldowns. On push you can always step forward a bit and hope you're in the same place, you must be in the same place at start and end of cast but you can move all you want in between -- Mg

[Malrubius]

In addition to the above, it's okay to also throw in your disease and/or poison dots when root-rotting mobs. :)

[blondeattk]

^^dull central ftw

isuck penguid d d d d rrrrry

[Pope Hat]

so far just a the lowest lvl slow (drowsy) and the poison dot + a nuke to get healers running has been working on. Damn treats in sk. Stupid druids :)

[RDawg816]

If the push is bad and you can't handle being in a corner you can also root yourself. That stops push also. Use that with caution, but it's an option.
Another option would be to keep the mob rooted so you can back up and cast as needed.

Keeping yourself rooted would be ideal for situations where you're fighting multiple mobs (either low blues/greens) whereas keeping the mob would be easiest against a solo mob.

I didn't have a fungi when I was leveling. I would root/rot up to 4 mobs and med while the dots did their thing. Usually I would forgo slowing them (unless they were tough) and pull with dots, then root (less chances for it to break.) This is great against casters if you have a corner to hide. Dot x2, root and go sit in peace while they die. When you need to reapply dots or roots just pop back around the corner.

Once you get your pet it changes. You have to decide what is more efficient: buffing/healing your pet while trying to out damage it or slow tanking it with your pet as a dot. Considering you have a fungi, I'd imagine you'd slow tank. Just know that your pet is a neat ally, but can only tank certain mobs without help, and if you're slowing/healing you'll need to keep it rooted until he gets aggro.

[Teppler]

Upgrade your weapon to pwc(only 500pp) and then a haste item. Slow and melee to 50 will be your fastest exp. Eventually you get more tools like canni and regen and root upgrades and your pet.

[Pope Hat]

Cool thanks. PWC is more expensive on red so I went with a Titan's Fist. My melee now vs. the smoldering brand is amazing. Even though my 2hb is only at like 35 and I'm lol 31 lol.

One thing no one tells you about being an ogre, skills level retard slow.

[RDawg816]

One thing no one tells you about being an ogre, skills level retard slow.
That depends on the skill. Most melee are str and most of the rest are wis/int. You should be Ok.

[jolanar]

That depends on the skill. Most melee are str and most of the rest are wis/int. You should be Ok.

Pretty sure it's dex for melee weapon skill ups, no?

[RDawg816]

http://wiki.project1999.com/Statistics

Assuming the wiki is accurate, str is melee skills and dex is weapon and rogue skills. Either way, shaman can buff these and it shouldn't be a problem. My shaman has max offense, defense, piercing, etc. It's not hard.