Class selection advice, please (for the indecisive min-maxer)

[Lumah]

Thanks for reading. This thread is one part "What does the server need more of?" and one part "Which classes were totally overpowered in Velious content?"

I like pulling and tanking so I gravitate toward SKs for the whole FD thing. But I wonder if War and Pal are just better tank classes.

Despite that, I'll probably end up healing -- and that means cleric. How is sham, though? (Anybody want to suggest druid? Ha..)

And then there's DPS. This is just: what's OP, what's not. Nec? Rogue? Ranger?

[Danth]

The server doesn't necessarily "need" more of anything in the sense that there's no glaring weakness in the general population. It's an old game; by and large the community knows what's needed. That being said, I don't think I've ever seen a guild say it had too many Clerics so that's a fairly safe bet if you like the job it does and want to be in demand.

None of the tank classes in this game are ideal for all purposes. Warriors are THE go-to tank type for higher-end raiding because of their defensive discipline. However, their initial ("snap") hate generation is low, causing them to have some trouble in ordinary groups. Paladins and Shadow Knights are the opposite: Very good in ordinary groups, okay for lower-end raids, but they run out of steam as tanks after that and are not used for higher-end raid tanking.

Most of the community regards Paladins and Shadow Knights as almost equivalent for the tank job. I regard the Paladin as slightly better, because of having a more comprehensive tanking toolset, but the difference is not large. Either will tank any content the other can. The Shadow Knight does indeed double as a competent puller so if you want a plate-type tank class that tanks well for group content through lower-end raids and doubles as a puller, the Shadow Knight will give good service.

If you want to be a main healer, you want to be a Cleric. It's the only serious main-healer class, and the only priest type who can revive dead players. During the leveling phase, Shamans and Druids can often fill in for a Cleric when the latter isn't available, but both give up a lot of healing power relative to the Cleric. At level 60 a Shaman can heal any ordinary group content using Torpor but most melee types dislike that spell (it's a heal-over-time that slows its recipient), it still can't revive players who die, and can't keep up with main-healing raids.

At level 60, Enchanters are severely overpowered on Project 1999, followed closely by Shamans. Bards can level faster than any other character. Monks are usually regarded as overall the strongest melee type, particularly for the minority of players who obtain the highest-end equipment.

Danth

[Jimjam]

Pulling and tanking?

That's monk.

Healing? Cleric or shaman are more powerful in some circumstances, but a Druid can heal and fund your monk by whoring out its ports.

Monks are just broken in Velious; their constraints in unexpanded was weak itemisation, a deliberate design decision.

By the end of velious they can cap their worn AC (which coupled with their defence skills lets them avoid and mitigate hits better than a warrior), they have excellent ratio weapons, which capitalises on their improved damage tables (in unexpanded they were intended to use their fists or crappy ratio blunt weapons). They have incredible white damage aggro, but can also drop aggro at a whim. They can also self heal without mana which works around the thing that tends to make soloing difficult. Oh and they can self haste effectively, letting them operate at close to max dps unsupported.

Absolutely a min maxers class.

[Lumah]

Thanks a lot for the advice. More than anything, it's just confirmed to focus on the cleric but the rest of the tips and suggestions are really appreciated.

I also poked around and found some other threads about class balance and need, so those were helpful. What's wrong with WIZ in the current balance, btw? Not enough DPS, too likely to pull aggro I take it?

[jolanar]

Most high end group have an enchanter, or some kind of CC, so spending the time to FD single pull is a waste of time in the most instances. I also almost never see paladins or shadowknights actually pulling.

So if you want to be a tanky puller, monk is definitely your choice. Jimjam is spot on, defensively monks are OP in this era. There is a reason monks are so popular.

If you want to be a pure dps, go rogue. They are welcome in basically every group ever, even if there is already rogues in the group. Mages are also great for this role.

If you want to be a healer, be a cleric. There really isn't another choice. Shamans a support role most of the time. Yes they can heal, but most groups want a shaman for slows and buffs, and a cleric to heal.

Regarding wizards, their sustained dps is terrible. Nobody will ever want to group with you above 50 unless they just feel bad for you. On the plus side they can solo to 60 pretty easily.

[Troxx]

I also poked around and found some other threads about class balance and need, so those were helpful. What's wrong with WIZ in the current balance, btw? Not enough DPS, too likely to pull aggro I take it?

Bad sustained dps. They can burn hard but they are ham-strung otherwise for any routine content.

Compared to another caster dps (mages in particular) wizards just can’t keep up. Mages nuke almost efficiently with spells that hit plenty hard but have a pet that, by itself, can consistently sustain a dps level 300-400% or what a wizard can sustain over time without mind buffs. Toss mage DS and mage nukes into the equation ...

It’s not the wizard’s fault it’s just poor class design. Later expansions balanced wizards nicely and they became a very viable dps powerhouse in more or less all scenarios.

[Swish2]

What's wrong with WIZ in the current balance, btw? Not enough DPS, too likely to pull aggro I take it?

They're good situational dps, but low dps versus..

- Rogues
- Rangers
- Monks
- Mages
- Enchanters (with charmed pet)
- Necros (if/when they can charm a pet)

...which doesn't give them a lot of hope. What's sadly worse is they're very prone to burn mana, overnuke things and then justify themselves a 5 minute afk where they're just absent from the group's dps at all.

The occasions I've had wizards in groups in CoM/KC/etc this seems to be the case, like that's a feature of the class.

I had a wizard on live during Kunark and loved it, but on P99 they're just not as sought after ^^

[Jimjam]

Basically things were around even in vanilla. Along came Kunark and melees replaced their 6/24 weapons with things like 9/18 jade maces. Wizards basically didn't get a real upgrade to their nukes and were stuck in vanilla mode dps through Kunark and Velious.

This classic problem is exacerbated on this server where 7 years of Kunark means melees are probably using 1:2 ratio weapons from selling a couple of centi belts at level 10.

[Troxx]

They're good situational dps, but low dps versus..

- Rogues
- Rangers
- Monks
- Mages
- Enchanters (with charmed pet)
- Necros (if/when they can charm a pet)

Add to that list:

-necros using summon pet
-enchanters with summon animation (must take a hit to have them engage)
-warriors
-shadowknights
-paladins
-bards (using dots)
-druids evocation spec (hugely efficient DS buff + nukes that aren’t that bad)
-shamans with it without pet

Basically wizards can sustain dps above clerics and that’s about it.

The most efficient single target wizard nukes factoring in evocation spec and excluding the very restrictive bane nukes clock in at 4.5 dmg per mana. From there it’s just math.

No mind buffs at all: 21 mana per tick = 94.5 = 15.75 dps
With c2 = 148.5 = 24.75dps
Add bard = 202.5 = 33.75dps
Add potg = 229.5 = 38.25dps
Can scale up a bit more for any FT or epic click that has some regen.

This makes the assumption that you hit every single meditate tick which is unreasonable but keeps the math clean. It also assumes you are already level 60 with the most efficient spells and also assumes you never get a partial or full resist.

My 60 paladin (a class known for generally poor dps) hovers in the 55-60 dps range on average for standard group mobs; 45-55 for high end groups. My 59 mage pet will bounce around in 70-80 dps range and has a 3.4 nuke efficiency with conjuration nukes. Mage DS if the recipient gets hit only 10x per minute over the 7 minute duration clocks in at 15.4 damage per mana doing 2310 damage. A wizard without mind buffs would have to meditate 2 and a half minutes just to nuke enough to keep up with the damage from that one spell. If the tank is being hit 20x a minute on average ... double that number. Druids? The good ones are alteration spec but even then the evocation nuke (not their specialty) for 3.25 dmg per mana and have a DS they can contribute which will do which is also around 15.4 dmg per mana (slightly cheaper cast and 1 less dmg per hit) rivaling mage. If hit on average just 10x per minute (a low estimate for routine hunting) a 60 wiz with only meditate has to spend 2.4 minutes just to make up the 2,240 damage difference.

Druid no buffs just wildfire nuking and refreshing DS (tank hit 10x a minute) medding over 7 mins can put out a dmg potential of 6530 dmg. If tank is getting hit more than 10x a minute in average the potential goes up. Wizard? 6615. Almost dead even. If the fights last long enough for Druid to use the much more efficient 1 minute magic dots - check another box for the Druid.

Wizards burn hard. The above only factors in sustained (0 down time) potential. For burns they do very well. With a 3k mana pool that translates to 13500 dmg before you fall back on sustained only.

In defense of wizards:
-Realistic groups do not have 100% up time. Med happens which allows for some upward adjustment. This means that when the group is not actively fighting (monks/rogues now doing 0 dps) wizards and other casters are still building that dmg potential between fights)
-mind buffs of one type or another are common. Having all is uncommon.
-mana free clicky nukes exist, which help.
-lures though less efficient keep wiz nuke dmg relevant on resistant targets
-bane nukes on velious raid targets

But for a group situation over where dps throughput is limited to the rate of mana regeneration they fall behind unfortunately. Druids would fare much worse were it not for DS (frequently overlooked). Mages stay highly competitive even when Oom thanks to a powerful pet.

Anyways that’s the full breakdown on why wizards often have a hard time finding xp groups. If you’re looking strictly for dps they’re unfortunately just not competitive over time.

[kjs86z]

Stick to warrior, rogue, monk, enchanter, cleric, and shaman if you don't want to feel inferior to other classes.

The others can shine in certain situations, but the ones I listed shine in every scenario.

[Danth]

Stick to warrior, rogue, monk, enchanter, cleric, and shaman if you don't want to feel inferior to other classes.

The others can shine in certain situations, but the ones I listed shine in every scenario.

Warriors, Clerics, and Rogues most certainly don't shine when they're trying to solo. Monks and Shamans don't fare too well without expensive spells and/or equipment. Enchanters have a boring and rather modest raid role. Even the strong classes in this game have their weaknesses.


Danth

[Jimjam]

What? Buy a monk a wu's quivering staff for 40pp and you are set for level 40!

[Troxx]

If wizards had a fairly fast casting nuke (being a blue to cast and then sit again to hit Med ticks) that was hugely efficient mana wise but for relatively light damage ...

... that would have helped them out immensely. Such a nuke would be less than ideal for a hard burn but would have allowed them to sustain solid damage over time.

[Crede]

If wizards had a fairly fast casting nuke (being a blue to cast and then sit again to hit Med ticks) that was hugely efficient mana wise but for relatively light damage ...

... that would have helped them out immensely. Such a nuke would be less than ideal for a hard burn but would have allowed them to sustain solid damage over time.

Wizards getting the C line alone would have made them extremely desired in groups. For velious raid content - bane rains and group rains that are more efficient and reliable would have been a nice sustained dps increase.

[Tecmos Deception]

My 59 mage pet will bounce around in 70-80 dps range

Err... really?

[Troxx]

Err... really?

Yes really. It’s pretty stupid too when you think about it. The pet puts out more damage than most actual player melee classes can manage aside from well geared 55+ rogues or exceptionally geared monks with stacked buffs. The lower 50s pets (ie max summon 54 water) properly tended with haste and buffs floats in the 55-65 dps range.

If you haven’t bothered to actually parse a max summon 57- 59 mage pet (earth and air) with summon haste mask, mage spell haste buff and any available strength buffs the group has to offer ... they’re depressingly powerful. 60 water pet properly positioned is an absolute beast. Epic mage pet approaches Demi-god status.

I run a real time parser in most all groups. My epic monk was 58 before I created my mage (now 59 alongside my 59 monk). The catalyst for deciding to roll my mage was parsing a max summon 57 earth pet (quads 70 fast and hard) in KC when my monk was 55. The earth pet consistently trounced my epic monk’s dps. What I couldn’t parse was the additional DS and nukes. I was impressed. In seb groups with c2 I can generally hoverbutt in the 90-110 combined pet/nuke dps range unless we’re chain pulling with no down time at all. Add more for the DS which is harder to clearly quantify. The lion’s share of that damage comes from the pet.

Mage dps potential is one of this server’s best kept secrets. They’re powerhouses.

Anywho if you’d like some parses I can dig some out tomorrow if I get home from work at a reasonable hour.

[Tethler]

Mage dps potential is one of this server’s best kept secrets. They’re powerhouses.

Anywho if you’d like some parses I can dig some out tomorrow if I get home from work at a reasonable hour.

I'd be interested to see them if it isn't too much trouble for you.

[sacman08]

Reading about wiz woes makes me recall the story about how they were much stronger in beta but the developers saw that a 6 man group of wizards could take down raid bosses so they got nerfed before release which is the reason for their state in early live and P99.

[Jimjam]

I heard the wave spells used to be really powerful and without limits to how many mobs they would hit per wave but they got reigned in.

[Troxx]

I'd be interested to see them if it isn't too much trouble for you.

Not too much trouble at all. I keep her parked in seb and only play her when there’s a group to be had so should just be a matter of going back to collect data from the last 20-50 fights.

When I’m on my shaman I’m the weird guy that stacks maniacal strength and focus on all the group’s/raid’s pets. It doesn’t make their max hit go up higher than the spell and level of pet dictates but it wildly deflects their average hit consistently to max or near max and they quad fast with mask + spell buff haste. Works exceptionally well for enchanter charm pets also but increases the risk for the charming ench considerably.

[eunomios]

Mage dps potential is one of this server’s best kept secrets. They’re powerhouses.


I'm a starting fresh and thought about mage. Before settling on that decision, I was doing some /whos to get an idea of the representation.

I noticed barely any mages in raid zones (1 per guild usually), or even in the 40-60 range. Maybe they were anon?

I might still choose mage, but I would like to know if they are valued at all in a raid setting?

[Troxx]

I'd be interested to see them if it isn't too much trouble for you.

Combined: Froglok krup knight on 4/13/2019 in 479sec

Total
--- DMG: 114994 @ 240 sdps (240 dps in 479s) [100%]
------ Total: 114994 -- Pierce: 44560 -- Slash: 29082 -- Hit: 16150 -- Crush: 11849 -- Backstab: 9421 -- Kick: 3299 -- Bash: 633
------ Normal rate: 98.8% (98.7% of DMG) -- Critical rate: 1.2% (1.3% of DMG)
------ Attempts: 2237 -- Hits: 2237 -- Misses: 0 -- Defended: 0 -- Accuracy: 100%
--- DMG to PC: 6618 @14dps

Zasarn (Mage pet)
--- DMG: 32117 @ 67 sdps (67 dps in 476s) [27.93%]
------ Total: 32117 -- Slash: 20046 -- Pierce: 9409 -- Kick: 2662
------ Normal rate: 100% (100% of DMG)
------ Attempts: 571 -- Hits: 571 -- Misses: 0 -- Defended: 0 -- Accuracy: 100%
--- DMG to PC: 207 @4dps

Koalala (Rogue)
--- DMG: 30874 @ 64 sdps (65 dps in 474s) [26.85%]
------ Total: 30874 -- Pierce: 21453 -- Backstab: 9421
------ Normal rate: 100% (100% of DMG)
------ Attempts: 590 -- Hits: 590 -- Misses: 0 -- Defended: 0 -- Accuracy: 100%
--- DMG to PC: 156 @1dps

Froglok dar knight (Ench pet)
--- DMG: 23117 @ 48 sdps (49 dps in 476s) [20.1%]
------ Total: 23117 -- Crush: 11770 -- Hit: 10456 -- Bash: 633 -- Kick: 258
------ Normal rate: 100% (100% of DMG)
------ Attempts: 302 -- Hits: 302 -- Misses: 0 -- Defended: 0 -- Accuracy: 100%
--- DMG to PC: 1976 @5dps

Tunawiggle (Warrior)
--- DMG: 23113 @ 48 sdps (48 dps in 479s) [20.1%]
------ Total: 23113 -- Pierce: 13698 -- Slash: 9036 -- Kick: 379
------ Normal rate: 96.5% (93.4% of DMG) -- Critical rate: 3.5% (6.6% of DMG)
------ Attempts: 749 -- Hits: 749 -- Misses: 0 -- Defended: 0 -- Accuracy: 100%
--- DMG to PC: 2971 @6dps

Ailowen (Me being lazy)
--- DMG: 5703 @ 12 sdps (14 dps in 404s) [4.96%]
------ Total: 5703 -- Hit: 5694 -- Crush: 9
------ Normal rate: 100% (100% of DMG)
------ Attempts: 22 -- Hits: 22 -- Misses: 0 -- Defended: 0 -- Accuracy: 100%
--- DMG to PC: 216 @216dps

Sidion (Cleric)
--- DMG: 70 @ 0 sdps (3 dps in 22s) [0.06%]
------ Total: 70 -- Crush: 70
------ Normal rate: 100% (100% of DMG)
------ Attempts: 3 -- Hits: 3 -- Misses: 0 -- Defended: 0 -- Accuracy: 100%
--- DMG to PC: 487 @1dps

Araxes (Ench)
--- DMG to PC: 287 @32dps

Lochnessdonster (Sham)
--- DMG to PC: 318 @2dps

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Produced by GamParse v1.6.1.7

59 Air pet max summon

Last 15 fights from my last xp session. Everyone's DPS values are slightly deflated because I had a few moments out of melee range (adds to the time to kill clock and the missed rounds of melee drags all melee dps down estimated 5-8% estimated).

If I remember correctly this was disco main stage and deep disco 2 for the most part. Pet had haste mask, spell haste buff from mage, and shaman str stack. I'm anal about keeping haste up (have on a timer). Anyways that's the numbers. Krups are resistant so a fair amount of my time was spent casting baby malo on mezzed adds and not focusing solely on nuking.

[Troxx]

I might still choose mage, but I would like to know if they are valued at all in a raid setting?

Pets can cause problems and they lack lure nukes. For the purpose of dps their value in a big raid boss fight is not so great.

But are they valued? Coth and mod rod making, while not glamorous, is a vital role. Having people willing to do that boring work is important. They are valued.

[kaizersoze]

plus in your offtime you can solo quite well as a mage.

[Troxx]

59 Air pet max summon

Last 15 fights from my last xp session. Everyone's DPS values are slightly deflated because I had a few moments out of melee range (adds to the time to kill clock and the missed rounds of melee drags all melee dps down estimated 5-8% estimated).

If I remember correctly this was disco main stage and deep disco 2 for the most part. Pet had haste mask, spell haste buff from mage, and shaman str stack. I'm anal about keeping haste up (have on a timer). Anyways that's the numbers. Krups are resistant so a fair amount of my time was spent casting baby malo on mezzed adds and not focusing solely on nuking.

With regards to the above string of fights, our NToV twink tank (or main I dunno) was hit 51 times for 33 dmg per hit ...

1683 damage dealt from damage shield which work out to another 3.51 dps from the dmg shield. There were likely more hits than that, but as I said earlier I acknowledge I missed out on some due to being out of melee range.

Mage + pet + DS came out to 39,503 damage (plus the melee i missed)
Rogue 30,874 damage (plus the melee i missed)
Warrior twink ToV weapons 23,113 (plus the melee i missed)

Ench pet I'm pretty sure was either not hasted or wasn't given stuff to quad. It did have a haste mask from me. It should have parsed higher than it did so it was definitely missing something. When grouped with a ballsy charming chanter my goal is to match or get close to a hasted quadding enchanter pet (nukes + my pet). Sometimes I can get close, but most of the time I'm either barely losing or getting completely trounced. High level charm pets are just insane. In places like velks with a backstabbing pet or SG vs pets that hit for 200+ a pop ... there's just no keeping up with a charmed chanter pet.

Despite the flaws in the parses (everything that was meleeing actually did more) it just goes to show just how powerful mage pets are. Functional up-time dps for the rogue is higher than the numbers above. Every missed backstab, delay on engage (normal with a warrior tank) and time spent evading equates to damage potential lost. Mage pet is neato that way. I can sent it in immediately on engage and it doesn't cause problems with the click of 1 assist button. Melee have to move, position, strategically wait to engage, and at times throttle back on their ACTUAL potential based on who is tanking etc.

With this particular group, the level of the mobs, and the string of fights and how they came in I didn't get to devote 100% of my time/mana to only refreshing pet haste, casting ds, and nuking. The damage potential of the mage from nuking with c2 while keeping DS up and dmg shield up works out to 16.67 spell cast dps potential (this potential continues to build while medding between fights). With the bits of down time between pulls a mage chain casting the best nukes could put up maybe 28-30 uptime dps from nukes? For this group factoring other stuff I was doing and partial resists I only pulled an average of 12dps for simply the up time captured by the log parser.

So yeah thats why wizards suffer. They are at level 60 about 20% more mana efficient using that most efficient level 60 nuke than mages are using the best conjuration nuke. 20% more than what my mage could have put up from nukes alone is decidedly *NOT GOOD*. It's less than a moderately geared level 60 warrior puts on board, much less this tank with some ToV weapons. The saving grace for mages and, to a lesser degree, necromancers is that they have a pet to fall back on that gives them a strong consistent backbone of pet dps. My 59 necro EoT pet puts out 10-15dps less than the 59 air pet.