Bard or Ranger for a 4 man group?

[Mandalore93]

Now that's a kick ass group, especially once you reach the thirties and get solid equipment plus a lot of those classes will reach more of their potential.

[Tecmos Deception]

Originally Posted by Tenlaar [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

Bard/monk/chanter/shaman

Powerhouse group, for sure. Although all of those classes take quite a bit of practice to master!

[Cropec]

I play often with a 4 man that works quite well.

Bard (me), cleric, rogues, and shadow knight.

The only time things get ugly are when we get multiple mobs (4+) that all aggro the bard. This usually only happens with badluck repops, multiple resists, or a failed lull. Its just not easy to mez as a bard when you are getting the crap kicked out of you. Enchanters are definitely the better mezzer espe
ially when it cones to AoE.

Giveb that your friends chse druid, monk, and enchanter I would recommend you go one of two ways. Either mage for offtank + burst dps or paladin for spot heals, tanking, and res.

Without having a cleric nor a high hp tank your biggest challenge will be single target boss mobs - named mobs in camps. Youll find that your group has sustained dps but no burst dps and weak healing. That combo makes it more difficult to kill loot mobs (named). Hence, my proposal for the mag was primarily focused on giving you the burst dps necessary to burn them down before the druid goes oom. Or alternatively the Paladin route would give you added healing to potentially survive long enough to kill the named mob.

Sorry for spelling.. I wrote this on mobile.

[MikeXG]

Group has finally been finalized. Bard (me), Monk, Chanter, Shaman.

we are a 4 man group, but that doesn't mean we are against picking up one or two other for a group, the 4 of us just plan on playing these 4 together all the time, if a pally or cleric or whatever is LFG where we are hunting, the more the merrier.

We are torn between the Monk and Bard tanking. Both seem viable so I guess we could trade off or pick based off the situation. I am just curious which would be safer/easier/more efficient as a tank for that group, provided pick up any other players.

[Cropec]

If you're slowing / snaring on the bard the bard will always end up tanking. When I twist largos on my bard the SK has to work in order to hold aggro.

The monk will tank better than the bard. Given your group i would have the bard focus only on mana, health, haste, and DS. If you avoid offensive songs the monk should be able to hold aggro.

[Tecmos Deception]

Originally Posted by MikeXG [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

Group has finally been finalized. Bard (me), Monk, Chanter, Shaman.

we are a 4 man group, but that doesn't mean we are against picking up one or two other for a group, the 4 of us just plan on playing these 4 together all the time, if a pally or cleric or whatever is LFG where we are hunting, the more the merrier.

We are torn between the Monk and Bard tanking. Both seem viable so I guess we could trade off or pick based off the situation. I am just curious which would be safer/easier/more efficient as a tank for that group, provided pick up any other players.

I'm going to comment on what I think the weaknesses of your foursome are, incase it helps you deal with those weaknesses!

Basically your only weaknesses relate to healing. First off, you'll never have complete heal. That's saying something, even when you do have tons of passive regen going on plus shaman normal heals (and at 60, torpor).

While you will have almost no downtime because of low hp thanks to bard songs, clarity, regen spells, and shaman heals, again you still ONLY have a shaman healer. If the tank is getting spanked and the enchanter has a mez resist, the shaman needs to decide who gets a heal. Fortunately the redundancy of CC and slows in the group (and the chanter having plenty of mana usually to rune himself also) helps mitigate this problem. Just be mindful of it. A charm break while a big pull is inc and then the chanter gets a stun resist and bashed could be very ugly.

Finally, no cleric (or paladin, or druid, or even ranger) means no (good) hp buffs. Not a big deal for the tank cause he isn't getting CHs anyway, but it IS a pretty big deal for the other players because, when coupled with the points above, it means they are all the more squishy and all the harder for the shaman to keep up when things are going wrong.


Still, it's a VERY powerful group of four. It's just all about learning what each class can do (probably more importantly what each player realistically does with each class) and knowing what to expect based on that.

[Tecmos Deception]

Originally Posted by MikeXG [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

We are torn between the Monk and Bard tanking.

Imo you actually should have BOTH tank. When you don't have CH, and you do have a ton of passive regen going on, you're being more efficient if you put that regen to use all the time. You'd basically be wasting a ton of free HPs if your bard was always full hp while the monk took all the hits.

Also, sometimes you will want the monk to be pulling and sometimes you will want the bard to be pulling (and sometimes you might even want both, or even the chanter to get in on the action). That could affect who is tanking too if you want chain pulls, etc.

[Cropec]

Tecmos speaks the truth. In most cases you won't have a problem getting the bard to take a few hits so that you can max the value of passive regen.

I have thought of forming a very odd group on this principle.

5 monks with fungi and one bard. I believe the group would have enough passive regen to sustain just fine without a healer. Look at the math...

A 3k hp tank getting CH is 7.5hp/mana. A cleric regens 21 mana/tick. That means cleric healing maxes at a sustained 157.5 hp/tick.

Iksar monk + Fungi + Bard will easily hit 50hp a tick. If you can spread the damage amongst 5 monks via FD that's up to 250hp/tick.

I think it would work [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

[Tecmos Deception]

It'd work, but omfg xp penalties [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

[Asap]

Originally Posted by Tecmos Deception [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

It'd work, but omfg xp penalties [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

I think you may lose experience per kill