OK here is how I tell my groups I will handle crowd control. First off, the
decision on when to use crowd control songs is totally dependent on if the
group has an enchanter or not. In groups with an enchanter, I let him know
that I have charm and pixie strike memmed for special situations. The
enchanter has primary crowd control duties and I focus on buffing the party
and damaging the mob. Pixie is memmed primarily for interrupting casters
and charm is memmed to get mobs off the enchanter or in case he is OOM. If
the group plays smart and the enchanter knows what he is doing, then I will
likely not have to use these songs very often for crowd control.

If the group doesn't have an enchanter, then I inform the party that I will
always be using charm and pixie strike if we get more than one mob. I also
inform them that in those situations I will not be using weapons in melee.
A lot of non-bards are not aware that we can inflict a lot of damage with
our DOT songs and a drum equipped. When we get multiple mobs, I fire up
Celerity to buff up the melee folks, target and charm the 2d mob and have it
attack mob #1, hit the mob 31 with FCC, and then start back over with
Celerity. If there is no lag and assuming the 2d mob doesn't resist charm,
I can weave all 3 songs and keep the 2d mob charmed the entire time. Now if
I wanted to I could pixie strike the 2d mob and keep him out of the fight
with that song. But because the charmed mob can inflict more melee damage
than I can, the 1st mob will die much faster if I use charm.

In pulls with 3 or more mobs, its often difficult to charm a mob and have it
attack the mob that the tanks are fighting. So I don't worry about it too
much. In fact, if I can get the charmed mob to attack the mob that isn't
engaged, then it works out for the best. Everyone else is engaging one mob,
my pet is taking care of the 3d. So what ends up happening is that even
though we pulled 3 mobs, only one is inflicting damage on the party. In
situations like this, you will want to try and get some distance between you
and the 2d & 3d mob so when charm wears off, you have time to get it back up
before two mobs start attacking you. Alternatively, you could pixie strike
the 2d and 3d mobs if you want. This would reduce the amount of damage the
mobs are inflicting but would increase the amount of time required to kill
all three since the 2d and 3d mobs aren't attacking one another.

In situations without an encahnter where you get 4 or more mobs, then the
best option depends on where you are at. In an outdoor zone, especially in
Kunark, then the best method for crowd control is to use the snare/fear
combo (chains if no ranger or druid in the group, also you can use engulfing
darkness if a SK or necro is in the group). In these situations, everyone
attacks the snared mob while you fear the others away. I've used this
strategy successfully on numerous occasions in the Overthere, Frontier Mtns,
and Dreadlands.

Lament pulling is an art. But since most groups want the bard to stay back
and sing mana song while someone else pulls, not many bards get a chance to
practice this a lot. I myself have only used it sparingly so everything
from here on out is either what I've personally done or read about on this
list. First off, if you are indoors and have a monk or outdoors and have a
ranger, then by all means let them pull. But if your group doesn't have one
of these two classes, then the bard can serve as a capable substitute.
First thing you want to do is max out your charisma stat as high as you can
get it. Then equip the lute. So lets say you find a room with 3 spawns in
it. First thing to do is figure out how close you need to be to get the
first mob within range of the target. You'll get a message if you are to
far away. Lull the closest mob (you get the message "a mob is sad"). Move
a little closer until you can target the next closest mob. Rinse and repeat
until you get all mobs Lulled. The back off and use a song to aggro the
first mob. I prefer chains since if it sticks, you can get back to the
party without taking any damage. Depending how long it takes you to kill
the first mob, the other mobs may still be Lulled when you go back to pull
them. Probably a good idea though to Lament them again.

Now here is something important to consider when using a bard to lament
pull. First off, if there is no monk or ranger in the group, then using a
bard can only have positive effects. Any other class who pulled would
automatically pull all three mobs. A bard has a chance of pulling singles.
So even if the mobs resist and all three aggro, then the situation is no
different had another class pulled. The biggest concern a bard should have
when lament pulling is surviving a bad pull. All three mobs will be aggro
on the bard in this situation. A cleric in the group is almost a
requirement. If no cleric then I would be wary being the primary puller.
If there is an enchanter in thr group, then the risk is reduced since he can
mez the extra mobs. One other thing you can do is make sure a tank who can
Taunt knows that all the extra mobs will be on you. He may need to peel off
the main mob everyone is attacking and taunt the extra mobs off of you.

One last thing to remember when lament pulling. Lament reduces the aggro
range of the mobs you Lull. But the aggro range is still there. So if you
successfully Lull all three mobs and pull the closest one, if it is standing
very close to the other two, it can cause the other mobs to aggro even
though you Lulled them.

I think that about covers it. If I left something out someone else please
cover it.

Galtin of E'ci
39 bard

-----Original Message-----
From: Ioshua [mailto:Ioshua@...]
Sent: Tuesday, June 27, 2000 7:02 AM
To: eqbards@egroups.com
Subject: RE: [eqbards] grouping thread on the Everquest boards

I've got 2 questions about Crowd control and lament pulling.

On crowd control, how do you get a group to let you do it? Every time
I try charm, mez or selective fear someone (often more than one) freaks
out. Last time I dared use charm (to pull a stoneleer off our
enchanter, help healer, add damage, list goes on) the monk in the party
took my head off for the audacity of not letting him tank 3 mobs at
once. Is it just me falling into groups who refuse to try new things
or what? I miss HK when people would be yelling at me if I didn't
charm/mez fast enough. Tho, I've noticed Pixie Strike having it's mez
portion resisted 7/10 times on any blue con mob or above, only slightly
better with instrument. Is this a function of my cha (136) or do the
rumors I hear of it sucking soon after you get it ring true? It's
scary that Solon's is more reliable than Pixie.

And on Lament, using it at all. It worked nicely when I first got it
and I loved it for a long time but haven't used it since the early
twenties. Every time I tried to use it I got a resist and the mob
(plus friends) aggroed on me and ground me into bardpaste. Even with
lute it's dangerous at best. I'd like any advice you folks have on
it's proper uses.

Ninev Rudeflute
34th and in need of a piercer
E'ci

--- "Reece, Tom CPT- 25IDL G4" <g4mntofcr@...>
wrote:
*crop*

> The bards who know how to handle crowd control, lament pull, and
> manage the mob's hate list are few and far between. The people on
> the thread who put bards on their dream group list have likely

grouped

> with those type of bards before and know how valuable we can be.
>
> Galtin of E'ci
>

__________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Get Yahoo! Mail - Free email you can access from anywhere!
http://mail.yahoo.com/

------------------------------------------------------------------------
Want to do something more exciting than fantasy sports? Make predictions
to earn cash & win prizes: the opportunities are endless at AllPredict.com!

Let's AllPredict the future at
http://click.egroups.com/1/5636/13/_/451022/_/962126611/
------------------------------------------------------------------------

Please send submissions for the eqbards newsletter to lol@...
with the subject submissions.