How bad are mages solo in level-appropriate dungeons?

[enjchanter]

Your epic pet can solo jacker with no burnout, nukes or heals

Hope this helps

[svelto]

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

Getting to level 4 will be your biggest challenge
The willpower to level up Blacksmithing so you can make Banded Armor will be your second hurdle. Armor helps pets. Your fire pets will be king.
Damage shield damage is "neutral", you have a chance to outdamage your fire pet. or you can eat the 50% exp loss like a champ and soak up more cash
Use stamina/health gear because more often than naught you have to tank for your pet. RNG can still fuck a max level and max* geared fire pet. Phantom armors now makes more sense.
Your level 1 nuke is a good pulling tool

Level 4-16, blackburrow
16-20, crushbone castle, you can push it to 22-24 because the throne+tower will still give exp.
20-29, mistmoore. will be rough at first but at level 24 or so you will be king of the pond
29-34, highkeep goblins
34-39, unrest basement. 38/39 will be slow but steady
39-42ish, i turned my brain off and camped the ancient croc in uguk for like a week while i played other games 16 minutes at a time
42-49, gornit. 42-44 you might have to help your pet out with hit trading but 44 is a new pet.
49-55ish seafuries AND gornit. i stopped around there.

My mage is only 52ish but never really had good luck with the fire pet beyond low levels. I don't doubt you at all, because I've I've heard about the benefits of the fire pet for a long time. I haven't used any iteration since maybe 12, so your post makes me want to experiment again - only in certain scenarios of course. I must be the oddest mage on the server.

[Jimjam]

on the subject of fire pets, I was watching a mage use king DDD firepet in solb on bnb/ldc and it was amazing how consistently it was hitting for 42 (max).

The attached screenshot was pretty typical for its melee > 85% max hits.

I’ve heard plenty of people doss the ddd, but wow that is a high percentage of max hits.

[Troxx]

DDD has some good situational uses. It’s a warrior and has pretty huge hp, very strong DS and a nice short range aoe. Melee dmg output takes a hit but between the large hp, ds, and aoe it can be pretty good for use solo or in a duo situation where your pet is tanking.

[Snaggles]

For all intent and purposes DDD is a stop-gap between the 49 and 57 earth pet. Depending on course if you don’t need the control of the root. There is probably a black belt justifier here in the boards who will explain how it’s the dark horse…but I’m inclined not to believe it.

There is a serious lull between level 49 and 57. Keep pushing and pick easy single targets to chew up.

[Troxx]

You could make the case that the short range aoe it has (dd + 100 hate) is better for mage than the root effect.

[Jimjam]

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

You could make the case that the short range aoe it has (dd + 100 hate) is better for mage than the root effect.

The conversation previously considered mage to solo more like a melee than a caster. SolDungB is a popular spot for melees. e.g warriors reliably solo LDC by 57. A cycle of 3 solo LDC plus bnbs exists. Due to proximity to other camps no root is needed. DDD are shown to be very effective at DPSing LDC/bats/beetles (see chart for a small compile of SB/LB/LDC fights 'Lasagna').

Admittedly better spots for a magician must exist at 56. This does seem low risk viable though. It seems suited to a mage inclined to muck about with DDD.

[Snaggles]

DDD is less dps than a focused 49 earth; I recall it being not by much. The 57 is a different league.

The class has no control spells outside nukes and clickies. Soloing to 60, anecdotally I didn’t see a bump in kill speed and just went back to the 49 earth in most situations.

There is no reason to use it at all at 57. Some spells are just duds. At least it isn’t as bad as Rage of Zomm.

[Jimjam]

Ah, so the reliability of scoring max hits shown by the DDD is undermined by how low the max hit is compared to focused 49 earth? That is a bit of a shame! I think I got blinded by the how strong a peak the frequency of max hits was for DDD and overlooked it's mediocre max hit...

Is the 49 focused earth similarly effective at scoring max hits?

[Snaggles]

It must be. I basically killed one thing for 5 levels. Even max summons the difference in how much I had to help the pet was very close.