I've decided to go Warden as my main in EQ2 and coming from other MMORPG's like EQ1 and FFXI, I'm noticing quite a difference in EQ2 for maintaining low agro as the group's main healer.
As I've hit 20 pluss I've noticed I'm pulling a lot of unwanted hate healing my tanks, I have a feeling this is less to do with the tanks abilitities in my group and more to do with my casting.
I've attempted to maintain my tanks with HoT and light heals, but this isn't always a wise tactic, especially when your tank is losing HP fast. Any suggestions as to maintaining low agro for healer-types in EQ2 would be greatly appreciated.
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I have a 20 Fury and a 25 Inquisitor. I always get tons of aggro on the Fury and hardly any on the Inquisitor. The only strategy I have found that helps on the Fury so far is to wait as long as feasible for the initial HoT. If you cast it too soon, it is very difficult for the tank to pull that aggro off of you. Also, since I duo with my husband, I ask him to use some type of high-aggro producing ability right off the bat so they really hate him before I cast that first HoT.
yep when possible try waitin for tank to use a HO b4 going, make use of wards w/e possible aswell(keep them wards upgraded) as wards seem to draw alot less hate than healing. and never never buff/heal/ward tank b4 he initalizes combat or he will have a hell of a time pullin hate off of you. if puller is gettin toasted when going out for pull, give him a rule to never pull till after u ward them. pre-ward the tank b4 battle that can cut you havin to cast a heal for a few precious seconds thus keepin no hate on yourself. if you do pull hate do not heal yourself, at most toss a ward up to cover your *** as stated above wards seem to generate alot less hate than healing does, thus makin it easier for the tank to pull it off of you. if you got an SK in the pt who's sharp hopefully they can toss some quick defense buffs on you to assist out while the MT is tryin to pull hate, aswell as assist with castin wards on you. trust others to keep you alive, and if you have a good group of people around you things will prolly work out well. start healin urself only as a last resort tho i know i really hate using fd on the healer cuz that can turn things ugly so sometimes we might wait too long on that front
Scholar
33 posts
No I would have to say you are only partly correct. The aggro thing is the bad to blast heals. And while Hots on single targets is a good way to keep you low on the hate list, I have noticed the group version (Sylvan Winds) for example has had some pretty bad effects :) . But I am going to defend priests here. Most tanks just don't use Taunt when they should or don't understand how to use it. I have spent many time telling the MT to shout, or taunt. Sometimes they say they missed it, and other times they try to say they did, of course not seeing the flame effects many times is a good indicator. In everquest one Taunt only works on the first pull, and then only when the mob turns away from the MT. At that point is when it is to be used. Many tanks do not understand at that one brief moment is the optimal time they should use it. Between the time the mob breaks from them before (if possible) they hit the healer.
Many times the problem ends up being that when you heal and become #1 on the hate list and the MT misses the taunt before the next action, you are done for unless you can shake em, or enough taunts can be used between your actions. But while this fiasco is going on, you many times build you own hate more cause you find that HOTs are not good in bad aggro moments and you need to blast heal yourself, effectively blowing away all chances that Taunts will work. Snowballing at its best.. er worst :)
Do yourself a favor, make sure the MT, and alt MT know when to use taunt, and even though you may not want to do it, give them extra time to get those taunts in before you heal yourself, just let everyone else cast, UNLESS you absolutely need the heal. Do not run cause if you are that low it is pointless. Make sure all has a rez stone/feather.
I always wait till they get at least about 10%of the mobs health down and for the MT to go orange before I blast heal. I try to heal as little as possible to let the MT get as much damage in.
p.s also as a note always make sure you leave yourself enough power when you know you are going to go down to get group regen off before you fall.
Dont forget this little diddy some of us get at 27 :)
*Wisp - Instant hate reduction for enemies in the casters immediate area. Briefly impairs movement rate of all enemies in that area and teleports the caster a short distance away
-E
Edited, Sat Feb 12 07:11:14 2005 by eclypsethreedemons
Many times the problem ends up being that when you heal and become #1 on the hate list and the MT misses the taunt before the next action, you are done for unless you can shake em, or enough taunts can be used between your actions. But while this fiasco is going on, you many times build you own hate more cause you find that HOTs are not good in bad aggro moments and you need to blast heal yourself, effectively blowing away all chances that Taunts will work. Snowballing at its best.. er worst :)
Do yourself a favor, make sure the MT, and alt MT know when to use taunt, and even though you may not want to do it, give them extra time to get those taunts in before you heal yourself, just let everyone else cast, UNLESS you absolutely need the heal. Do not run cause if you are that low it is pointless. Make sure all has a rez stone/feather.
I always wait till they get at least about 10%of the mobs health down and for the MT to go orange before I blast heal. I try to heal as little as possible to let the MT get as much damage in.
p.s also as a note always make sure you leave yourself enough power when you know you are going to go down to get group regen off before you fall.
Dont forget this little diddy some of us get at 27 :)
*Wisp - Instant hate reduction for enemies in the casters immediate area. Briefly impairs movement rate of all enemies in that area and teleports the caster a short distance away
-E
Edited, Sat Feb 12 07:11:14 2005 by eclypsethreedemons
yah, but sometimes nothing is gonna pull that hate off for whatever reason tho. i've pop'd rescue, taunt, shout, HT, an other moves an never able to pull hate back, sometimes that baddie is jus a stubborn sob an wont change who he is attacking
Sorry but HoT does not put you low on the hate list, it puts you rather high. That is why you must not cast it before the tank builds up enough hate with the mob. Unfortunately, in my opinion that is one reason why a druid is not as effective a healer as a cleric. With my Inquisitor I can BoV/SS before the pull. You can not HoT before the pull unless you like to be beat upon. I don't know about tanks not knowing when to taunt as I group with my husband and he does. I just know that in comparison to my inquisitor, my Fury is an aggro magnet.
2 posts
Thanks for the words of wisdom all. Since creating this thread I've decided to take a break from my warden to lvl up a tank-type. For me this will be bruiser I'm thinking.. Still need to do some more research into monk vs bruiser, but seems as though bruiser is more DMG oriented, which I'm into. I think maybe after playing a tank-type role I'll have a better idea just what it takes for a group's tank to establish and maintain himself number 1 on the mob/mobs hate list. Also what he/she is doing(or what they should be doing)to build hate during those first critical seconds of each fight. This experience may help me on the healing side as I'll know first hand what my tanks are doing to build hate and what I need to do or not do before I start unloading my agro spells.. Again, thank you all for you words of advice. I will be taking this all into consideration before picking up my warden again.
Ps. On a side note I must add, coming from other MMO's(EQ,FFXI,Lineage2) the healing agro I've experienced in EQ2 is above all the worst EVER. Perhaps it's a Warden thing?
Ps. On a side note I must add, coming from other MMO's(EQ,FFXI,Lineage2) the healing agro I've experienced in EQ2 is above all the worst EVER. Perhaps it's a Warden thing?
I too like trying different classes for just the reason -- to get the feel of what each class is suppose to do. So far have leveled up an inquisitor, fury and defiler (cleric, druid, shaman) and enchanter (to 18 right now). My husband has a rogue and SK so I have also gotten a feel for how they work. The only other game I have played is EQ1. I can say that as far as a cleric goes, my inquisitor gets alot LESS aggro as a healer than my EQ1 cleric did. Because inquisitors use reactive heals for the most part, they get almost no aggro. The way the reactive heal works is that the hate gets transferred to the person getting healed. By contrast the druid HoT gives hate to the healer for each tick it is active. Of course if the inquisitor casts the reactive heal right on the pull, they will get aggro. Also they will get aggro from their direct heals. So it is all a matter of knowing how and when to cast. Good luck on your toons.
As a defiler it is obviously a bit different tactics since we pretty much get direct heals and wards. No regens in there. From my experience using your largest direct heal is much better then using 3 casts of a lower heal to do the same job. First, it gives the tank a longer amount of time inbetween heals to build hate. Second, it seems like every heal generates about the same amount of hate. At least the one's I have. So if I cast 1 heal vs. 3 I am effectively reducing my hate by 2/3s. Since my casting cycle usually goes ward, pause, heal, ward, pause...for as long as the fight rages on I am usually only cutting out 1 cast on the tank. Still, every little bit helps.
15 posts
and use Subterfuge for saving your bacon if you have it.
2 posts
hi,
maybe this is a bit late but i have a templar, lvl30, and a fury, lvl24 and run into the same problems. as it has been explained to me, and you can see this if you watch the heal messages, when a templar casts a reactive heal on the MT the message, and what the mob sees, is " <MT> heals himself for 135 hp". same when a shammy casts wards, the mob sees it as if the MT heals himself. but when a druid casts regen the message you see says "<joedruid> heals MT for x-amount of hp" and this is why druis go to the top of the hate list. i understand they intend to fix this, hehe, by making clerics and shammies appear as healer and increase the agro for them, rather than make it easier for druids.
this is what i have been told and i hope it helps to explain the problem a bit.
clerissette
30 templar on befallen
chanya
24 fury on befallen
maybe this is a bit late but i have a templar, lvl30, and a fury, lvl24 and run into the same problems. as it has been explained to me, and you can see this if you watch the heal messages, when a templar casts a reactive heal on the MT the message, and what the mob sees, is " <MT> heals himself for 135 hp". same when a shammy casts wards, the mob sees it as if the MT heals himself. but when a druid casts regen the message you see says "<joedruid> heals MT for x-amount of hp" and this is why druis go to the top of the hate list. i understand they intend to fix this, hehe, by making clerics and shammies appear as healer and increase the agro for them, rather than make it easier for druids.
this is what i have been told and i hope it helps to explain the problem a bit.
clerissette
30 templar on befallen
chanya
24 fury on befallen
15 posts
This is not a solution but...
Wisp - Lowers hate with targeted group by 250, roots all opponents and teleports the warden a short distance away.
It's as sweet as it sounds :)
Wisp - Lowers hate with targeted group by 250, roots all opponents and teleports the warden a short distance away.
It's as sweet as it sounds :)
27 posts
i have noticed that fury\druid's get mutch aggro... myself as a 34 inquisitor cast larger heals than the druid... but the druid still gets the aggro sometimes
I agree with Wezon. How does increasing the aggro for clerics and shamans make druids better healers? I don't get the logic in that one. (By the way I play all three, so no bias here).
Oops that's not what Wezon said... I am still asleep, time change and all. But anyway, I still don't see how adding aggro to clerics and shamans helps druids!
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