EQDiva

Hello all, I played EQ for many years before finally taking a break in 2005. I had a raid level enchanter with more aa than he knew what to do with. I wasn't really planning on going back to EQ, but the new progression server has intrigued me. I am interested in playing a bard on this new server, and have two friends who want to play with me as well. They are choosing two of the following: wizard, enchanter, or druid. We figured it would be a good idea to form a kiting group since we expect most of the dungeons will be overpopulated on the server. Will the three of us make an efficient kiting group? Do bards/wizards/druids/enchanters complement each other well in this regard? Thanks in advance for any advice!

Bard and Druid is an awesome duo. Root/Dot all day long :) I don't know that the enchanter would do much more than cast buffs in a kite group, but maybe since he is boxed (I'm guessing. 2 friends. 3 characters) that is acceptable. When you add the wizard the Root/Dot method goes away but no reason you can't still dot/manasong for them. You just won't get to stand still and give your fingers a rest. Sometimes when I wanted a break from running around in circles. I would autofollow the druid whilie he kited and I just twisted songs, That seemed to keep me in range much better than me trying to manually follow the same pattern. If you are talking about AE kiting... I dont think it will work. Sony seriously nerfed Bards AE kiting ability and if the mob WANTS to run (even tho the enchanter is stunning him and he can't run) the mob will not take damage from your AE songs. The only way to get the mobs to take damage is if they are standing still beating on you (or some other character nearby). Back when the top level was 60 and sebilis was the place to be... AE groups liked having a bard around...

thanks for the help!

wizard/bard, you can either kite (and the wizzy can snare even), or if you guys work well together, bard can time mez to land JUST after the nuke lands. Mob is mezzed, nuked, mezzed again, hopefully with minimal to no damage taken, and mana song is a bonus. A chanter is an excellent partner for fear kiting. Fear kiting as a bard can be a little annoying due to short duration fear and high resists. Chanter has a much longer lasting spell fear, freeing up the bard to snare, dot, melee, etc. If the chanter does the pull, or at least gets aggro, there's an extra pet to throw after the mob too. Another strat with a chanter is charming. Charm dps is awesome until oow. There are a lot of ways you can play around with charm, bards have charm too, so if you're a charming chaos freak like me, it's a lot of fun. Against really dangerous mobs, the bard can backup cc on a charm break, and help keep everyone alive for round 2. Druid ds stacks, they have a heal, but for duoing you guys will probably kite a lot. Also, charm animal can be fun, it's just more limited for your hunting options. Same with Fear. All three can root / dot. Works great. I don't think you can go wrong with any of them, they're all going to be fun. If you want him to be able to charm, encourage him to go for a chanter or a druid. If you want him to be able to port, go for a druid or a wiz. Or just tell him to make up his mind.

Not exactly an experienced bard here, but a chanter/bard duo is looking good for me and a friend (who will also be boxing a cleric). I'm only level 12 on my "try-it-out" character atm, but quite enjoying the class. (I also have a 30 bard, but wanted to do this one "old world" style.) We've been running around on the SolRo server (now Bristlebane) looking at all of the overland camps and making sure everything is where we remember it to be, and we've found that we can duo white/yellow mobs with no downtime at all. Typically, the chanter (experienced chanter player) will pull and let the pet get aggro. Then I (newbie bard) will alternate between dots with instruments and buffed melee, usually twisting Bellow,. Chords, Anthem, and Warsong, and throwing in Rhythyms when we get a caster mob. Of course, if we get too many adds, I have to drop Chords so the chanter can mez. We use Ventrilo to coordinate our casting/singing. When I get some chant songs, we're going to try chant kiting while the enchanter dots, and see how that works.

thanks for the replies - looks like i will have three friends playing with me, and they will be going druid, wizard, and enchanter. so it seems we will have many options for grouping :P