On Mon, 27 Mar 2000, Bill Costlow wrote:
>
> 2. I have seen many a fighter type go into battle with
> 80% health and live thru the fight. This isn't true
> for casters (and in many cases, stunned bards)
>
> 3. Taking one step back is possible, usually though,
> by the time you take that second step back, you are
> dead.
>
> 4. Trust is a hard time to come by in EQ. The new
> "play nice policy (gag) doesn't cover clerics who use
> all their mana on Spirit Strike thinking that they are
> wizards. Until a party inspires that trust in it's
> members, casters will run.
I don't think anyone was scolding casters who ran for the
zone. I was referring to casters who ran back and forth or in
circles expecting you to get the mob off him. If the caster
wants the mob off him, and he's not SoWed/mob is not snared,
he'll take just as much damage running around as he would
standing still. Once you realize that, then it becomes a
simple problem of maximizing the ability of the other party
members to get the mob off you; and the best way to do that is
to stand still and back off in small increments.
Last night we took on the Maestro with 36 people. When he
first got to us, somehow all the casters simultaneously
decided to nuke, and he was ping-ponged for about 1 minute.
He took virtually no melee damage during that time, and
basically healed up all spell damage he took by using his AE
lifetap on the melee folks trying to chase him. The battle
took an excessively long time (about 5-6 minutes). Clerics
who had gone OOM were shouting requests for heals for group
members. Towards the end a spite golem joined in, and it with
the Maestro wiped us out as all the clerics were OOM. Only 2
people managed to camp.
Take two. 30 minutes later, down to 32 people. This time we
asked the casters to hold off for a minute to prevent the ping
ponging. We pulled the Maestro, the melee folks started
whacking, a minute later the casters nuked (and the Maestro
didn't budge), and about 3 minutes later the Maestro was dead.
Zero casualties, not a single shouted request for heals from
OOM clerics, and the clerics in my group finished at 60% and
80% mana. It was obscene how much better we did by simply
letting the tanks hit the target.
--
John H. Kim
kim@...