EQDiva

K thanks myst. I already have my Solstice ear for the FT1 but didn't realize doesn't work till 51 (smack). I am only 2 yellow from 51 atm so will just work on getting that asap.

Myst??? Whats with this? "Minimum of 51, as thats when the earring of the soltace starts to give you extra mana. " It just ain't so, Joe. I got my earring of the solstice at level 45. The mana cost of the the 39 charm was unbearable without it. It was a HUGE benefit. It'll work for you at 39 I believe. I am CERTAIN it works at 45. Now as to level of swarming, for PoD: Yeah I think 51 if you are REALLY aggressive and know how to swarm, and are impatient. But Potameids and Raptors are probably beter bets then. Wait til 53 or 54 if you have a hint of sanity, and like Myst said, 55 is ideal Now to swarming at lower levels: I would disagree that you have to wait for the second chant. It is definately slower with fewer chants but the mobs down there have fewer HPs. In fact you CAN start swarming at 27-29 range, I did. When you pet gets low, instead of chant, chant, chant, chant, you can bellow, bellow, bellow, bellow. Its DOG slow taking off that last bubble, or portion there of, but combined with the swarm damage it is the fastest damage per minute method available at that level. At 30 fufils is a big add to that. Fufils is not as bad as everyone seem to label it. Yes its the bottom of the heap among chants, but it doesn't suck. Fufil's, Bellow, Bellow knocks of the last bubble of a level 25-30 mob fairly well. It even worked OK for me at level 37 swarming spectres (level 33-37 range). But yeah level 38 changed things, 2 chants felt giddy. and the fact that I get another at 42andthenat46andthenat50OMGthisisGREAT We need the greater DPS from plural chants as what we are fighting gets more and more HPs, but I think learning to charm and swarm while young, makes a better bard. Provided you also group along the way. One thing I WILL say, 2 chant, 3 chant, 4 chant swarming are less frustrating than chant/bellow swarming. But there are lessons in the frustration. Reys

Myst, a few comments or clarifications: Earring of Solstice FT works at any level. Well, when I got mine at level 16 and tested it regening mana after a death (yeah no spending mana at that level, and yeah it was kinda twinking, oh well), found that I regened mana about 33% faster by my calculations. This was a while ago as I'm 56 now, but just wanted to clear that up. As for swarming in PoD, I started at 52. Worked ok, took me to 56 where I have stagnated to work on alts and guild epics. I do highly recomment some flute (unless you want to blow mana on charm resists), but considering there are only two or three lutes in game that are 2.4 or better, I don't think having the pre-luclin best flute in the game or better is a must. I got next to no resists with the 2.2 minotaur horn. I just recently got the Darkwood Piccolo and I'm excited to try it out, though I expect it to work the same as the mino horn, ie. no resists. At 57, I hope to move to Nightstalkers in PoN, if I can get in. Sinfonian

I tried swarming and charming when I got my first charm at 27....it was "Dog slow" as it was put earlier. I got MUCH better exp in groups, and grouping was safer as well. The point of swarming is to get max exp. Chanting of bellowing an exp pet for 3 or 4 minutes is not good exp, so why bother?? That is my point. For good solo exp for 27-mid 30's.....charm a wolf in DSP, and have it tear thru 5 or 6 zelniaks, then charm something else, and have it finish off your wolf, then get another wolf. I found charm-kiting more efficient than swarm kiting at those levels, and it carried me thru till I had 2 chants in a short amount of time. Also, I found groups to be faster exp than soloing, and more enjoyable. And on the earring....if the FT works lower than 51, great, lol, will twink the wife's bard with one. I read on the eqtraders site that the FT doesnt work below 51, and thats the only place I ever read info on it at. Gonna find where I read it, and let them know its wrong. I am just writing this from my own experiances. I am a grouping bard whenever I can, and grouping is sooo much more enjoyable, as you arent twisting no-stop. Time to relax....ahh. I went to the flys in PoD at 49....too many resists, blew whole mana-bar in 3 minutes. Went back at 51, less resists, mana still went bye-bye way too fast. Got solstace earring at 52, went back again, with it and a few upgrades to gear, including a signifigantly larger manapool, and FT1, things went great. Mix of swarming and chanting left me at 75m or so all the time, exp flew. Went from 52-56 in a few days. Been doing AA there now, holding off from 58 till I get dream of Ayonae....seems to not exist on my server. Seen one copy in the bazaar, been on sale for a long time, guy is asking 13k, lol, not gonna pay more than 1k. Would rather get 1 AA per hour or 2 till I find it for that price, than continue to level, and either go without my new songs, or pay that price for them. Mebbe a raid on Ssra and akheva is in my guild's future, lol. As for having a 2.4 mod or better flute, they recently changed the drop tables for the darkwood piccolo, and it now drops off much easier mobs, I picked mine up in the bazaar for 350p, tho I got lucky on that one...the person selling it was bugged, and not visable (not invis, bugged), so I petitioned, and a guide moved her a bit to the side, and she appeared, otherwise it wouldnt have been on sale for more than a minute or two, and I wouldnt have got it. And having 2.4 or better was the 'ideal' circumstance. Sure, you can swarm in PoD lower than 55, with no flute, and no FT, but I was stating the ideal instance for grinding AA there. If you are like me, and want to get a title before you get flagged, then flies in PoD at level 55 is ideal, and any level 55 toon should be able to get FT1 and a good flute. Better flute=better exp, tho only very very marginally better. Combine or Mino would work fine, a better flute will let you have less resists especially at lower levels.

K I know it is prob mentioned somewhere on the board but what lvl would you recommend swarming flies in PoD? I am currently 50 and found that travel in TD is TDious (sorry bad pun) so not really interested in raptors. I have a bard friend show me swarming but that was on the werewolf things in PoN. Think PoN is a bit outside my skills atm.

First, do you mean taking the boat to TD?? Gosh I hope not, as its a 5 minute jaunt to the island....take the book to Kaladim(BB) and run to the docks, and hail the translocator, then say "Travel to Timorous Deep" and you are immediately ported to TD, no boat. You end up on the elven island, so go buy a bit of booze, and click your singing steel boots, and selos, and run out to the raptor islands. Should take no more than a few minutes to get from PoK to raptor islands. Secondly, have you tried BW?? The giants and undead there are prime chant-kiting forte at 50. I did a lot of 49, 50, and 51 there, and I think I dinged 50, 51 and 52 there actually, slows a TON after 52 tho. Swarming the giant fort is also fun, as long as there isnt too many druids there.

Well as I rarely see the translocators up I have to wait for the boats to zone into TD. I have found this is fastest at the barge in Oasis. Have not tried BW will do that tonight after work thanks for the tip.

They changed the loot table on the Darkwood Piccolo!!!!! OMG, no wonder I found it for 2k a few weeks ago. Ah well, I still feel I got a decent deal. Doesn't matter, I have it now and am happy. I totally agree with you Myst, well said!

Yea, used to drop of Cazic or something, now it drops off lesser things like fright and such, much easier and more common, thus the lower price. Its great to have every instrument be nearly-un-upgradeable....makes you kinda feel 'whole'. I finally got some good armor for my bard, and have great instruments for all types...nice to not log in and think "how am I ever gonna get me a xxxxxxx" and such, just go and have fun and tradeskill and exp and whatnot. The flute was the last thing I got that was at least a 2.4 mod....dont see upgrading anything less my drums ever, nice. And for the translocators, try tracking them, and looking under the docks and in the water and such, they are often misplaced on my server, but always there.

Translocators on my server are there one day, completely gone the next, depending if the boats work or not. They are considered to be bug fixes for the boats while they fix the boats. Then they are no longer needed. Shame as they are so very useful. Sinfonian

Aye same on my server. Have seen them maybe 3 times myself. I am sure they are there more often but most places I travel are short runs from the PoK books or if no PoK book access (CS for example) I get a GG/TL. Went to BW for a short while until guild started an xp/fun group in Torg mines but was only there long enough to kill one sarnak caster and the 2 giants that pop at fort ent. Will have to read up on it some more.

kk. just cause we on the subject, Im going to share my tactics of swarming. A) hot keys. i really only have a few that i use while swarming. number one is my /pet attack. a nifty trick i learned was the /pet target command. if you tie the two commands together, you have one key that will do most of the work for you. example. /pet attack /em 's pet is attacking %t /em pet target this one hot key will attack, let you know what you are attacking (and others), and re target your charmed mob so you can keep an eye on its health. not to mention you have the one mob you want to chant down first targeted so you dont have that one anoying mob chasing you in circles while you watch your new charmed mob fight one less. not much of a big deal after the 39 song since you have to break the charm anyway, but a life saver for swarming pre 39. number 2 is my singing steel boots. i NEVER swarm anymore without a lev. i learned my lesson with raptors and water. its hard to swarm and swim at the same time :P number 3 is my /pet back off X4. gets your pet off the mob that is about to die, giving you a chance to gain full exp. 4 is my camp check. its hard to type /ooc camping flies (or whatever) while in the middle of a nasty swarm. you can save yourself alot of trouble this way. 5-7 auto replies. /reply, /gu, /ooc i cant talk right now, im kiting, but i can hear ya type stuff. most peeps think bards ignore em. well, its hard to type while twisting :) 8 track 9 loc 10 walk/run good for when selos just gets too darn fast. switch to walk when kiting if you are getting too far ahead and start to lap your mobs. it sucks when they change direction. B) songs (i use, its all preference) 1 selos 2 CoP 3 CoF 4 CoD 5 CoF 6 charm 7 invis (still no boots or tiny cloak /sigh) 8 hymn hymn is good if you get hit alot while pulling your mobs. if you are below 20 or so they will not agro your pet, they will just chase you around. the flies in PoD hit REALLY hard and they stun, so it very easy to get knocked down from 100% to 20% in a matter of seconds if you mess up. just run around and heal till you at 40% or so, and have fun. C) swarming i pull with range aggro. i dont want to give mobs any reason to not hit on my pet. its not fun to see only 2 mobs fighting and 10 on your tail. if in PoD for the insane exp, remember to switch in your flute when charming. they resist alot, and you can use all the help you can get cause a wasted charm is wasted mana. after i charm, i keep my flute equipped, watch the health, redo lev, and wait till the mob is at about 25% to start to break with invis. DO NOT use hide to break. it almost never works when you want it to, and that 2 seconds can result in a loss of exp if you pet is killed by the swarm. once its broken, kite it down. if you have the 49 selos, you can use all 4 chants and kill em quick. things to remember in PoD. most rats are too high for charm. not all, but most. dont waste mana trying. just keep em around as your brute squad and when you need a break, zone if more that 3, or just chant em down. they offer great exp. swarm at the rock, CLOCKWISE. if you try on the small beach to the right of the rock, you will get weird pathing, and maybe a mob under the world. it has happend to me..... also, counter clockwise around the rock is dangerous, since there is a ledge you can get stuck on, and beat to death (trust me.....). that ogre guy is scary looking, but he is non kos. just ignore him... :) and last, but not least, get a solstice earring! they rock. also, get mana and int gear. its not that hard, or expensive, and the more mana you have, the longer you can kite :) have fun, swarming got me from 30 to 55 no prob, and quickly too. Grouping exp is sooooooo slow if you have been swarming for a while. i really dont see how other classes do it. if i had to group for all my exp, i would have quit a long time ago out of bordom...... and the /g sing mana song plz.......grrr. anyway, have fun!

hymn is good if you get hit alot while pulling your mobs. if you are below 20 or so they will not agro your pet, they will just chase you around. the flies in PoD hit REALLY hard and they stun, so it very easy to get knocked down from 100% to 20% in a matter of seconds if you mess up. just run around and heal till you at 40% or so, and have fun.

This is why I recommend getting as much AA regen/item regen as possible. If you use Hymn/Cantana you will cause aggro on the mobs, as it you pulled them with dispell or so. Not much aggro, but more than proximity aggro, and some/all will continue to follow you from my experiance. I dont use cantana unless under 50% health, anything above that, I let natural and item regen heal. When you click on Hymn, it makes things that are mad at you, even more mad at you. In PoD, when I have a bad pull, I run around with Cantana or Replinsihment, then I run from one side of the rock to the other, and sit and demem cantana, and load up song of dawn. Then I hit selos, charm, /pet attack, train my pet, and then hit target nearest npc-key to target one of the ones that are following me, as every time I heal, I alway get some that refuse to attack my pet till I mem-blur them a bit. Usually by the 3rd or 4th pet I have mem-blurred all the ones that follow me, and things are going smothly again.

I feel pretty lame.  Last night was my first attempt at swarm kiting, I picked up a gnoll outside of paw in SK, then ran around the towers a bit to pick up a train.  I charmed one of the gnolls, turned him on another and just started running the train over them, no one else ever aggro'd!  It took me like 30 minutes to finish my pack, but that was because I held all the aggro.

 

Any tricks I'm missing?  I'm lvl 30 and using Solon's Song of the Sirens to charm, using the toggle target trick to set my charmed mob attacking, then switching back to recharm.  I use selo's to keep me running, and if i get in a rhythm i chant the target down while they're fighting. Once my target's at 10% or so, I break charm and chant away.

 I twist in Hymn when I screw up my running and get clobbered, but I've yet to be able to get the "swarm" to get off my back.  :(

If you have more than 5 or 6 or so they will tend to stay aggro on you instead of running to your pet. Also, you want to generate as little aggro on the mobs as possible, so you aren't competing for hate. But the number one difference will probably be a trick that takes a little practice, but not much. When you have two fighting each other, run so that the train is forced to path over your pet. However, that is not enough with large numbers of mobs (that alone works great on up to 4 or so mobs). If you stand close to the dueling mobs, I'd say no more than about 15 feet, as well as make the swarm path over your pet, they will stop and aggro the pet instead of continuing on after you. It's a little counter-intuitive, but it works. The other solution with a large swarm is to run really really far away, and they will give up and go after your pet, but the distance isn't always practical. You should definitely get the hang of how to position near the duelers to get them aggroed on it. Also, sometimes right after you charm it can take awhile for your pet to catch up to the mob you tell it to attack (if ever). To make it go faster, you can snare the one you have it attack, guaranteeing that it will catch up to it quickly, then maneuver to drop the swarm on him. Good luck.

As FF said... any more than about 5 or 6 and on the first pass you will have only your pet and 1 mob fighting.  You will have to path the pack directly overtop of those 2 (or very close) in order to get the rest of the mobs to stay.

Things that might help:

1. Only pull 1 mob to gain aggro - snare, slow, DD, or vicinity aggro are all good (I prefer Bellow DD)

2. Drag that mob by other mobs that will assist it to get aggro on them, if they do not assist you do not want them for they will not assist their friends on your pet.  If you know for a fact they will assist from previous pulls go ahead and get vicinity aggro by standing near them to get them moving.

3. Instead of snaring the mob you wish your pet to attack (un-necessary aggro you really don't want) you can tell your pet to sit, then circle around toward your pet with the mobs.  Tell your pet to attack and he will run directly into the pack and never have to chase to catch up.

4. Do no damage to the rest of the pack, not even the one your pet is attacking.  The point is for your pet to die... not his target.  By creating aggro on your pets target, it will make it very likely that on the next round it will totally ignore your next pet and go only for you.  I would not constantly play your heal/mana song as that will also build up aggro.  Get a few heal pots and use them if you need to.  Once you get it down pat, you will only use 1 or 2 each time you play.

5. If you have more than 5-6 mobs they will pass up your pet and chase you.  Just make a tight circle and path them right back.  It might take 1 or 2 passes but they will eventually stick if you have gotten no aggro besides assist and vicinity aggro from them.  If you get hit quite frequently, I would even remove your damage shield. 

 

I usually pull 8-12 mobs depending on where I am and how fast they kill each other.   Though usually if they catch me, I'm dead before all the mobs finish their first swing on me.  Pretty much just have fun and experiment, there is no 1 set way to do anything in EQ.