Shaman duo partner questions...

[Fishbait]

So, i'm currently a 54 shaman and my buddy I duo with is currently a 53 monk.

The end game plan is to get to 57+ then start hitting higher value cash camps duo to start making money to buy Epic MQ's/etc.

But...the monk for him is getting quite stale, the upside is that he also already has a 55 Necro which I recently found to be an amazing duo partner for xp with that is nearly as good or equal to then a monk.

I guess my question basically boils down to, will a Shm/Nec duo be able to do all the cash camps(or most of them) that a Shm/Mnk could do?

*Note: I know he should play what he likes more...but with his monk at 53, he'd tough it out to 57+ just as a cash camp toon then switch to necro. But if the necro can do the camps with the shaman anyways, then he'd just switch now.

Edit: Also any information on duo'ing in Velious for easier dragons and the like would be great too!

[RDawg816]

Necro is a great partner for a shaman. They can kill a lot easily. The part you have to think about is what camps you want to duo. Monk can pull, tank and dps better. If you want to do thinks like Velks, Guk, HS, etc a necro would be great. If you're wanting something that would require a monk though.... [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

[Vexenu]

If you really just want to duo cash camps the Necro might actually be a better choice than the Monk if you stick to Seb/HS. Undead charm puts Necro ahead of a Monk when you can use it. Monk comes out ahead otherwise. So basically...it's a question of what camps you want to go after. If he really enjoys the Necro that much more than the Monk then screw it, just have him play the Necro. Shm/Nec is hardly a weak duo by any means, it just thrives in a more limited niche than Shm/Monk.

[Darkatar]

Nec/Sham is super strong for sure, the biggest thing you're going to "Lose" next to a monk partner, is that a monk is by far superior when it comes to splitting and tanking mobs.

You're going to gain a significant amount of DPS if the necro is charming, (malosini helps, bonus!) otherwise, it will still probably be par for the course with a sham tank/rogue pet.

Something the necro brings that the monk lacks however, is necro heals. Necro healing pre-torpor is huge. and it can stack with torpor too. Having a snare available for fleeing mobs can be super important in some locations as well.

As a shaman, you can also regen the necro, which just pumps up their already lightning fast mana regen, since they'll need to lifetap less.

The only thing you wont be able to do/have a much harder time with as necro/sham that you can with a monk/sham, is tackling unslowable/magic immune mobs. Which is a very rare thing to encounter outside of super unique mobs (stone spider, solb) or raidlike mobs, which is a super minor impact, if any.

[Raev]

With the junk gear that you probably have, the Necro will be considerably stronger. At the HOT/epic/Sky level of gear the Monk is mildly better. With NTOV gear and a primal the Monk is much better.

[Fishbait]

Thanks for the info all, considering everything we went with the shm/nec and it's definitely been great and faster/more synergy all around so far.

End game raiding isn't really on our radar anytime soon so definitely seems like the necro will offer more power immediately as a duo, just need to get keyed for hs/seb and start poking around.

[EdTuBrutus]

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

Thanks for the info all, considering everything we went with the shm/nec and it's definitely been great and faster/more synergy all around so far.

End game raiding isn't really on our radar anytime soon so definitely seems like the necro will offer more power immediately as a duo, just need to get keyed for hs/seb and start poking around.

The only time NEC/SHM offers more power than MNK/SHM is when there is absolutely no access, at all, to decent gear. And the thing is, for a MNK in this era, decent gear is very, very cheap. There is lots of very very good AC gear for a MNK costs 50pp to 100pp a piece, with a haste item only costing 2k and decent weapons well under 1k a piece, there is just no way that a NEC can complete.

I wonder if the Monk has loads of stats on their gear instead of AC/HP and he's feeling stale because his gearing choices are making him weak. Always remember, stats do not work in any meaningful way in EQ.

[Vexenu]

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

The only time NEC/SHM offers more power than MNK/SHM is when there is absolutely no access, at all, to decent gear. And the thing is, for a MNK in this era, decent gear is very, very cheap. There is lots of very very good AC gear for a MNK costs 50pp to 100pp a piece, with a haste item only costing 2k and decent weapons well under 1k a piece, there is just no way that a NEC can complete.

I wonder if the Monk has loads of stats on their gear instead of AC/HP and he's feeling stale because his gearing choices are making him weak. Always remember, stats do not work in any meaningful way in EQ.

Most of the highly available and cheap Monk gear is Kunark or Classic era (or equivalent, i.e. SCHW). The stuff that really puts Monks on a rocket is all high-end Velious stuff, most of which requires full groups or outright raids. OP said he and his friend aren't interested in raiding so most of the nice Velious gear isn't in the picture.

So the question is mid-50's average geared Necro vs. mid 50's average geared Monk. If I wanted to cash camp duo Seb or HS (two of the best spots for such an endeavor) I'd take the Necro every time. A Necro charm pet is going to blow away an average mid-50s Monk in both tanking and DPS. And that's not even factoring in the plethora of other tricks the Necro brings to the table. Anywhere the Necro can charm, Necro/Shaman becomes just a moderately downgraded version of Enchanter/Shaman, which is pretty much the most powerful duo in in the game.

Monk/Shaman is the generically correct answer to this question, but given the OP's specific parameters he made the correct call to go with the Necro.

[Raev]

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

The only time NEC/SHM offers more power than MNK/SHM is when there is absolutely no access, at all, to decent gear. And the thing is, for a MNK in this era, decent gear is very, very cheap. There is lots of very very good AC gear for a MNK costs 50pp to 100pp a piece, with a haste item only costing 2k and decent weapons well under 1k a piece, there is just no way that a NEC can complete.

I think you are underestimating Necromancers quite a bit here. A Necromancer in rags can stack three low resist dots for 350 hp/tick. Add in a pet and some poison/disease dots or lifetaps here and there and they can easily sustain 100+ dps for several minutes. Defensively, don't underestimate 125 hp/tick heals forever, which will make up a large part of the level difference between the monk and the spectre. The only loss will be in pulling, where sneak, instant FD, and improved durability will always give the monk an edge. But Necromancers can hack it decently there as well with a bag full of stalking probes.

Sure, a raid monk is going to smoke any Necromancer regardless of gear. Defensively such monks with 5000HP/1400AC are as tough as Warriors, and offensively they put out ~100 dps in Sebilis with NTOV weapons and Avatar. But a leveling monk with cheap EC gear that gives them 3500 HP and 1K AC raid buffed? And maybe 50 dps? I'm just not seeing it.

[Fishbait]

Just to throw some information out there, the shm(me), is only wearing a fungi as my only notable item, most other pieces are Jaundiced for the flat AC and +4 to +6 wis pieces filling in other slots. The monk is basic EC geared, fbss, AC/SS dual combo, Black Panther filling in most slots, along with other ac/str items(Spider fur cloak, etc).

One immediate bonus I can tell is in the shm/nec duo is, not having my epic isn't hurting us as it doesn't stack with splurt, according to my wiki research, so i'm taking that with a grain of salt.

That free missing epic DPS on every single pull with a monk/shm duo seemed like a pretty heavy weight to me and with the reaaaaally high cost of the Child's Tear MQ now(wish I bought it when it was 28k or whatever) means i'm saving all funds for an immediate Torpor instead which realistically isn't too far off, with fungi as collateral and current funds and 5 levels to go, should be memorizing Torpor into the spell book as soon as I ding 60.

The biggest boon to me so far, as Raev pointed out, has been Shadowbond's 125 hp/tick, it's basically Torpor light and the Nec can keep it running which leaves me free for slow pulling and rolling buffs/regrowth without ever having mana issues, which to be fair, when the monk pulled I didn't really have mana issues either as I was basically med'ing the entire time and canni dancing(which I despise, why won't server ticks synchronize properly!!!!! /endrant).

All in all, glad we went with the Nec/shm duo and we are killing at a noticeably quicker rate. And if we ever do enter the raid scene won't be hard to catch the monk up to par, at least right now the nec is upfront'ing more power and synergy for the duo.