Bard kiting - newbie questions

[Pringles]

So I just rolled a bard, got her to level 7 so far. I know I dont have enough ae songs yet to successfully kite (at least with any sort of speed), but figured i'd try it out since i have selos now.

I have read the threads about kiting here (thanks for shedding light on it!), and have been sure to avoid getting hit using the techniques listed there.... my problem is getting close enough to land my AE song without getting hit though.

The range seems very short, and maybe 1 in 4 I can land my song successfully while trying to avoid being hit. Usually I end up getting too close and get smacked.

Is this just a level thing? Try again when Im higher level? Or am I completely missing the boat with my turning etc while trying to avoid getting hit?

Have there been any updates or responses from the devs here about the long reach of mobs when you're running straight away from them? Hopefully that changes soon :cool:


Thanks in advance.

[knottyb0y]

I did not do much kiting (atleast successfully) with my bard until around level 30 when I actually sat down for a good session and just ran around South Karana kiting the crap out of blues and light blues. Yes Kiting, even multi kiting can be done at much earlier levels (I had limited success around level 10, and 20 but I wasn't that good so I died a lot, that and always had a good group waiting). My greatest suggestion is to just get experience at it, you will get the feel for distance by mob type, and zone etc by just practicing.

As previously stated I was pretty bad at kiting with my bard for a VERY long time. What I did when I finally figured it out was find a good camp (SK centaurs anyone?) and started just kiting 1 creature at a time using my DD song and AOE dots. Eventually I got really good to the point where I could land a dot or two and take very few hits in melee (you are still going to get hit its really hard to do it and take no damage). After being really comfortable I started adding a creature and kiting till I was comfortable eventually I was taking an average of 3-6 creatures at once without any deaths.

Another factor that helped my success was being able to swap weapons while kiting, it took a while to get the right hot key set up but I highly suggest having your instrument bag ALWAYS open, and having primary and secondary slots a part of your primary hotkey bar. And of course each song on a hotbutton that's something like

/stop song
/cast 1

So you don't have to do too much double tapping for songs, saves a lot of wrist strain.

When Kiting I always have a few songs memorized. First of course is Selo's Accelerando this will get you out of trouble and of course keep a good space between you and the mobs. Second is Hymn of Restoration, because sometimes when kiting multiple monsters you'll get hit and its worth taking a tick or two of healing to get those HP back (btw BASH SUCKS, stun and stopping is the toughest thing to handle). Third is of course Chords of Dissonance, this is really your bread and butter till you get Denon's Dissonance. If you are high enough level to have brusco's boastful bellow its really nice to filling in the gaps between dots. As you get more dots (denons and Curtailing Chant you'll find kiting gets easier. If you have mez keep it memmed for those "oh crap" moments, and you should be good.

Example Kiting
1. Kick off Selo's
2. pull a few mobs with dd or single target dot
3. Run to a clear area still pulsing selo's
4. bunch the mobs together with big circles
5. when ready swing around hit the aoe dot (I usually run in an oval like shape or take a sharp turn just before the dot finishes casting). hope it lands
6. Pulse Brusco's or another DOT
7. HIt selo's again
8. rinse and repeat (I am on the safer side of kiting so I do Selos, Dot1, DD/DOt2, Selos, Dot3, DD/dot1, Selos, Dot 2; and so on and so forth.)

If you get smacked and go below 50% health (sometimes 1 or 2 rounds of combat do this if you have enough mobs). Just selo's Heal, DD/long range Dot. Don't be afraid to use single target damage in the mix, you might not kill them all at once but it is faster and it gets EASIER with each death. In the end you get the same xp.

It can take a long time to kite multiple creatures especially if they keep smacking you. Just play around with a kiting path you like and that works with the creatures you are kiting. Sometimes I just switch directions, do figure 8s, do ovals, or do rectangles depending on how effective each pattern seems at the time. I also always kite from as far a view as I can, maybe some people kite in other views, but it helps me a lot to be able to see as much terrain and mobs as possible.

I hope this was somewhat helpful to your kiting adventures. Good Luck!