Necro/Mage Duo

[Naerron]

I vote mage/necro for a few reasons. Not all of them are meant to directly contras the shammy/monk combo tho.
1) Much easier to start from scratch with, mostly because they are much easier to gear and offer less downtime
2) Can tackle higher lvl mobs. A) becuase you can bounce pets, and also don't have to worry about the tank dieing. B) Have more burn potential, C) Fear kiting on overcon blues like fog golems vs Haze golem in CoM, both are blue at 43-46 but the fog golem is much harder to tackle.
3) A necro imo can pull eaiser with dots and CoS + FD than a monk. You use less manna on two single pulls than 1 2 mob pull.
4) Necros get snare spells which has become very important especially in old world dungeons
5) You can both bind and gate, making escaping a train and coordination easier. Say one of u is in EC selling shit and the other logs on to xp, but is at some camp u guys were doing, u can both just gate to your XP spot and start.
7) are less mages/necros on server than monks/shammys meaning lower gear prices and easier to obtain planar armor/raid loots and epic MQs.
8) Necros can rez and FD, and corpse summon which make it a great CR class
9) Necro can heal very effectively with shadowbond and dispell
10) Fear kiting will get you both to 60 from paw to KC easily.
11) Less downtime imo. THis could be debatable though, but if anyone was around during classic u remember that a full group of non twinks was needed to keep the XP flowing, and if u took a traditional style group and often needed 2 healers to do that. That's why in classic if u remember there were tons of mage only groups, and would let the necros in if no one could find another mage.
12) Once u can coth the mage becomes much more powerful with getting to camps, a necro can DA in and train it all away, mage coths u back and ur good to go.
13) this is kind of a culmination of points but i honestly believe it is a way better cash farming duo, which is important if it's your first char. Necros espeically shine in HS.
14) The mage/necro duo open up better XP choices. Example. SolA u NEED a snarer to do that camp. SolA has one of the highest ZEMs and is vastly underused these days. It has some good drops too, especially for INT casters. (Yes i know shammys canb root, but not taking dmg for 20% of the mob is very nice) Also zones like kedge, where u both can cast or sumnmon EB items and have a good way to pull and lose roamer agro via coth.
15) you never have to buy food/water, seems silly but really helps when saving for spells during those first lvls where ur scraping buy for spells you need.

Some other things i saw posted which i i feel the need to correct:
1) Mages get the malo debuff spell line

[Vladesch]

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

The chanter charms a pet, gives it two weapons and hastes it and just tears through mobs, the cleric just needs to CH the pet occasionally, and most importantly help the chanter stay alive and recharm during charm breaks.

Druid enchanter can do this better. Druid has plenty of healing for the pet especially with mind buff, plus you have snare, sow and ports.

[Splorf22]

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

Druid enchanter can do this better. Druid has plenty of healing for the pet especially with mind buff, plus you have snare, sow and ports.

CH on an 8k hp pet is 20 hp/mana. Druids can't do that. Personally I think Druids are a very underrated class; they are great at low levels and decent at high levels. But anything that Druid/Enc can duo, Enc/Enc, Enc/Clr, Enc/Shm/ and Enc/Mag can do better.

[A1551]

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

Druid enchanter can do this better. Druid has plenty of healing for the pet especially with mind buff, plus you have snare, sow and ports.

Druid and Enchanter are plenty powerful but druid is probably the least desirable partner for a chanter of the three (shaman/cleric/druid). Complete heal is pretty ridiculous on charmed mobs -- you basically have an entire group of functionality in 2 people, the pet tanks and does massive dps with an incredibly deep HP pool, chanter can slow/cc/stun and pull very well, haste pet, clarity, etc. Cleric gives you the CH and massive HP buffs and quick heals needed to survive charm breaks (plus occasional rezzes). You do also have the core of a great group as chanter/cleric but said group is entirely unnecessary to level up if you guys just want to duo. Shaman chanter is also amazing but others have discussed why.

As to druid / chanter it has some advantages and is undoubtedly powerful. Druid snare on pet makes it much easier to avoid damage on breaks (a big positive). Ports on tap are certainly convenient (but I'd rather have rez). Sow is a non issue once you get jboots but very nice before that. Druids can also charm animals which can be a very powerful combination in certain zones, and druid roots are amazing which can really help when things go south. The downside is druid heals are entirely inadequate for healing pets (superior heal barely moves my pets health bar, a big minus) and they can't slow to make up for it, druid HP buffs are fairly limited, druid dps is almost irrelevant in comparison to a pet, etc. Bottom line besides ports and snare (and maybe animal charming) they may as well be a shaman without the shamans most powerful abilities.

As to the original poster -- the cleric/chanter or necro/mage really don't need gear to excel. The chanter just needs +cha gear for charming / lulling etc and for the most part it is fairly inexpensive, certainly something a new player to the server could gear themselves with while leveling up. At least personally I'd be reticent to re-level the character I played on live -- half the fun of EQ is mastering a new class. A mage and a necro are gonna be a fun duo -- probably more balanced in terms of the fun for each player. The cleric in a cleric / chanter duo might find things a little boring (the chanter will be doing much of the work), but for a shaman / chanter duo this wouldn't be the case as the shamans also going to have to be pretty active to excel.

Finally, keep in mind thanks to a chanters CC and pulling abilities a chanter/(any healer) duo will basically be able to go anywhere and do anything.

-Propo Fol

[SupaflyIRL]

Necro/Sham or Necro/Mage is really good for anyone to play and will be fun to level pretty much anywhere. Cleric/Ench can get a group anywhere, but will level slower in a full group than a Necro/Sham or Necro/Mage duo. Cler/Ench duo can't really be played by a pair of retards and require at the very least a skilled enchanter and a cleric who isn't falling asleep. If the enchanter is bad, make sure the cleric has his epic.

e: Necro/Sham will be easier to LFG as a pair than Necro/Mage, Cler/Ench is more LFTank than LFGroup if the enchanter is not good enough for charm killing.

[Elements]

If you are seriously considering the cleric/chanter duo, know that with hasted charmed pets your kill rate will be much much faster than any other duo in the game. Also you can add pretty much any class to your duo and make it work, doesnt have to be a tank though your kill rate will be so high with charm that dot classes would probably be unatractive if maximizing your xp is your goal.

Further to this if you are seriously considering a charm based duo druid/chanter has many advantages, snare and ports primarily, as does shaman/chanter.

[HippoNipple]

Enchanter/Cleric is going to be best for clearing the toughest camps. If you are doing easier things Enchanter/Shaman would be better in my opinion.

Quantity of decent tough pulls, fast exp, still able to do really hard camps = enchanter/shaman

Toughest camps possible = Enchanter/Cleric

[Splorf22]

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

Enchanter/Cleric is going to be best for clearing the toughest camps. If you are doing easier things Enchanter/Shaman would be better in my opinion.

Quantity of decent tough pulls, fast exp, still able to do really hard camps = enchanter/shaman

Toughest camps possible = Enchanter/Cleric

I think you have this backwards. Which would you rather have at the spore king, enc/clr or enc/shm and why?

[Lexical]

ench/sham is the best duo in my opinion. Malaise + Tash stacking makes charming high cons way too easy as well as landing your spells.

[Lexical]

Honestly, the only thing I can see the Druid/Enchanter combo bringing to the table that makes it something to consider is the fact you can port. Shaman and Enchanter will be better in any fight due to shamans' slow, MR debuffs, and stellar buffs. The only thing I can find comparable would be monk and shaman but that would be more gear dependent than enchanter/shaman and it is arguably worse.

And can someone please explain to me the purpose of the cleric/enchanter combo? You shouldn't need CH if the shaman is slowing and the enchanter is CCing properly.