Why do Wizards get so much hate?

[ko37qtl]

A well played wizard is a boon to a dungeon group, particularly when casters are involved, even with an enchanter. They're less valuable in steady pulling outdoor groups but those verge on dull for me. A poorly played wizard is a hassle for everyone out of proportion with the potential upsides, so it's easy to see why they might not be the most welcome until you know what kind of wizard is in the group and that the group is doing things where a wizard really shines.

[Gregor]

I guess my point/question is the only time Wizard dps isn't good is if the group is chain pulling with no downtime at all and infinite mobs to pull, which seems pretty rare to me.

Even if your group is amazing chances are you'll be sitting a lot waiting for stuff to spawn in places like CoM or waiting for placeholders in seb, etc. On the other hand if you get unlucky with resists your dps gets even worse but even that backstab misses and rolls low often also.

[Bristlebard]

How high level does a mage need to be for his pet to do more sustained DPS than a 60 wizard? Like 44? [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

[ghost182]

When you need a tank CC puller and healer every group... Only leaves 2 spots. Most people want a shaman for one and a rogue for the other

[Tuljin]

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

I think the folks who play Wizards are a big part of the problem with that class. Most of the Wizards I grouped with while leveling would blow their mana bar on one or two monsters then go AFK for upwards of 10 minutes (often with unsolicited mention of how high/stoned they were). Rinse and repeat.

This is really the chief problem with Wizard players. Most people roll a Wizard with the expressed interest of wanting to AFK, and having a misconception of how to play from the beginning. Comically enough the majority of Clerics have this same mindset and have a very similar playstyle, however CH is OP and they can get away with it, despite how much you'll bitch when the tank doesn't get his heal till he is under 10% health.

Adding to the depth of the Wizard hate dilemma is the Chardok AOE phenomenon. Not only do you have people who roll a class just to AFK, you now have a class that rolls just to AFK and get easy XP in Chardok only. There is a mass proliferation of players who don't see any dungeon time, and when they crank out to 60 they just portbot or park their toon for raids.

Really its just a bunch of hot air being blown around and the P99 hivemind regurgitating buzzhate. Wizard really is only "weak" in dungeons against Kunark mobs. Up to level 50 Wizard actually deals huge damage relative to total mob HP, and the stun/snare/root CC (along with Evac) is very helpful in the notoriously tricky 30s-40s dungeons.

Even in your 50s against mobs which have relatively high HP, you can still do fine contributing to a group by keeping up the chain pull by pulling with Flux Staff, dispelling, chain interrupting key spells from caster mobs (Seb in particular), utility CC (Snare is very important in dungeons) and dispels (who the hell is is gonna do it lol), stunning and getting agro off of people who shouldn't have it (charm breaks esp) and root parking (LOS for casters) and if you pace yourself your DPS really isn't for nothing. Fetter is really the best CC tool for Howling Stones, and if you are 58+, you can contribute to pulling the 3 and 4 split rooms very effectively. There are very few bona fide caster mobs there, reducing the need for mesmerize as CC. Wizard is also excellent for pulling on a Hole dungeon crawl with Flux Staff.

Really the point is Wizard is only as boring as you make it. EQ is a fun game and its the dungeon crawls and mob behavior that make the game exciting. I have a lot of fun playing Wizard and I played one way before it was cool, and got him XP to 60 in dungeons without Chardok AOE and without the help of a tiny guild where everybody was already 60. It requires a serious paradigm shift in your playstyle, however. With stun/snare/root/concussion you really shouldn't have anything to fear when it comes to tagging a mob with Flux staff and parking it somewhere, or tossing a stun out to get some agro off someone who shouldn't have it. Just make sure you have a stack of Jaspers and keep casting Steelskin =)

At level 60 its a different story - not only are you very effective CC and utility in planes/dungeons, your mana bar also becomes a devastating weapon against all the odd level 60+ mobs around Norrath that need muscle to be killed. Last nite I was part of a Paladin/Wiz duo that showed up to save the day on a very serious mob - - the two "shittiest" classes BTW.

TL;DR - If you can pull your own weight on Wiz and you learn how to play the game you can make friends and they will have no problems playing with you

[Gregor]

All that said don't things get much worse for Wizard in Velious where raid mobs go from 50k hp's to 1million? Combined with dungeon mob health going up, making it harder to burn stuff down on a bad pull.

[Fishbait]

This is prefaced by talking about full groups in the 20-40 range:

It's basically a double edged sword. If you are in a situation where a wizard is useful, it means your group is ineffective. The amount of xp your group is earning on average is probably awful compared to the group that is chain pulling and that is what a group should strive to do.

Any CC they can do, can be covered by another class, any dps they can do, another class can do better. Wizards are simply terrible group mates in the 20-40 range, so maybe this stigma carries on into the later content.

[Raev]

IMHO the biggest problem Wizards have is the horrible, miserable, unforgiveably bad itemization of Classic EQ. A L55 wizard is still casting the same spells he would have 2 months after Kunark came out, while the Rogue has upgraded from a Crystalline Spear or maybe a Rapier of Orinn and a RBG or even a FBSS to Ragebringer.

[Tuljin]

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

All that said don't things get much worse for Wizard in Velious where raid mobs go from 50k hp's to 1million? Combined with dungeon mob health going up, making it harder to burn stuff down on a bad pull.

Wizard gets a better regular elemental nuke that is a little more efficient than Sunkstrike but still the answer to a bad pull for a Wizard is flux tag/stun then fetter park and after turn the heat up if your mana bar can handle it. Its way better to help with CC and catch unwanted agro from other party members on a bad pull as first priority rather than just burn.

As far as high HP raid targets are concerned, it depends on how you look at it. 9 Lure of Ices on a 100k target is about 7% of total damage. You have a 40 man raid - 7% out of 40 people total is really not bad. Now picture 3-4 (or more) wizards. The thing is, Wizards deal this damage quickly, in good chunks at a time with each volley.

Take the uber dragon/uber giant nukes that do 2k damage each but have limited targets. On high HP uber mobs a Wizard can deal a similar percentage of total damage with these spells. Then we get multiple wizards and you see team Wizard again doing a large chunk of total damage.

Lets not forget about Translocate, either - a dramatic upgrade to the current port spells.

[DrKvothe]

Is it correct to assume that wizards need less support than melee dps? They'll need fewer heals and be less likely to die early in the encounter? I suspect a ranger's 60-70 'sustained' dps is more like <10 if he's a corpse for most of the encounter.