EQDiva

After getting bored yet again with my bard and kitting i decided to find something new to do with him, my new fun with my bard has been tanking. For the past month ive been cruising around finding things to tank that would normally be left to a real tank for taunt or hp purposes. I have found this to be one of the most enjoyable things to do with my bard. The exp usually sucks as my melee dps is low but the sheer exhiliration is worth it. I do not recommend this for everyone as the prep work has taken me some time and i have resources most dont, but if you are looking for something new to try this might be it. Goal of my game: Maintain aggro and mitigate damage as if i were a tank. The lack of a defensive disc makes this hard at times but very well worth the pat on the back if succesful. Rules of my game: No root! If i need to maintain aggro and prevent a mob from destroying other chars with root then i have failed the goal. Even though there are situations where a mob gets rooted even with a true tank it defeats my goal. Bard Melees! It is too easy to maintain aggro standing with my drum and twisting chants. Tanks dont twist dots do neither will i. I attempt to use my melee songs never incorporating a dot. My lineup for my game: What i use: I tribox so i have the advantage of having access at all times the classes i need to play my game. However my goal is not to see how well i can control 3 characters, it is to see what i can melee tank. Account 1 - 62 Bard Account 2 - 56 Shaman Account 3 - 63 Chanter or 52 Cleric depending on situation Occiasional 62 cleric which is my wifes char depending on what im trying to kill I use my cleric if my wife is not around, otherwise i use my chanter which makes everything so much easier not having to worry about healing myself. Lineup Ervaj's Lost Composition Warsong of Zek Battlecry of the Vahshir Wind of Marr Largo's Absonent Binding (until slowed then it is 2-4 or 1-4 if mana mob) Elemental Chorus Solon's Bewitching Brava Silent Song of Queillous And voice of serpent of a bit of a song boost. Weapons: Primary: Snowchipper or Pebble Crusher for proc aggro Secondary: alterenate my Flaming dirk or Longsword of Freedom A few succesful targets to date! Gantru Dralkenr Umbral Plains w/ cleric chanter shaman (0 deaths) Hard fast hits until slowed, after which it becomes an endurance test to keep the aggro and kill him before cleric goes oom. This kill is what started it all for me. Kael Arena + 5 PoZ + Kallis w/ cleric shaman (0 deaths) The arena was a huge endurance test. I had to make kills fast enough that i wouldnt be respawned of. My shaman made holding aggro until i just stopped sitting her down. Adding non-stop cani dance to the twisting was quiet an effort an a huge learning experience. Aggro tank slow pet dot was the process. Adjutants were easy enough with the mana drain, eventually the stopped casting and had nothing to even attempt a CH with. Veterans were resistant to slows, 4 back to back CH's before slow ever landed was painful. 1 and a half hours later arena + poz were downed with 0 deaths. After all that only silk leggings dropped =( PoJ High Gaurdians of Justine w/ cleric cleric shaman (1 death) Absolute riot! CHs back to back until slowed as they can double for 500+ a hit and do! Single pulled to exit, slowed at 90 and aggro was easy to maintain with pebble crusher + snowchipper. However i only had my boxed cleric for heals and mana went faster then mobs hp. First and only death so far. Got my wife on and tried again. CH looped until slowed, maintained aggro and slowly took his health down. Enraged at end was all but an easier fight then i though it would be. Cleared the rest of the room. My next target is looking to be Lord Rak'Ashiir in CoM for my shaman's epic. I do need some more prep work but hopefully i will have him down in the next month with my chars + wife + a random rogue. Hitpoints are key to playing this game, i have 2300 unbuffed/4100 buffed. If you can match that, best, or come close then try! I am definetly interested to know if anyone else is doing anything similiar and if so what other things should i take a look at as targets. Have fun with your bard and try new things! We are truly masters. All we need is the right support and not even a whole lot at that to be tanks. I will be redoing a few of my kills as i dont have complete logs of the arena.

BAH, I'm at 1700 unbuffed and 3300ish buffed to the gills so no, I haven't tried this, though I have been trying to 2 box a cleric and shaman up to help me on kills. I am quite impressed at your three-boxing. Good choice of toons, though bard is a hard one with any other two classes. Bravo! Color me impressed. Sounds like loads of fun doing what you do. Sinfonian

2300 unbuffed?? Gah, and you are tanking man?? I have 2545 unbuffed and I am few levels lower than you...got 1250 or so AC as well. I find the level 27 charm to work great as a taunt....wont land, but resisted it still adds nice aggro, lol. I have also found out that 3 dots and melee works well for gaining aggro, then after about 4 or 5 rounds of dots, drop them, and go blender mode with haste, buffs, and DS. I duo all the time with my wifes druid, and I run a 70+ point DS depending on the song, which helps a lot in getting mobs dead. I tank all the time with only bard slow, lol, and druid heals, hehe. However, what you lack in your toons is evac. Evac is your friend, lol. Something going bad? Mez and evac, all is well. Cant mez? Root and highsun, then evac fast before the train arrives.

Hooray for mystaviant! He is a few levels lower then me and has more hp!! Cant use the dots. There is no room in my lineup to have any memmed. Why dont i mez and just mem new songs? Because the mobs i am fighting now cant be mezzed. As for figting with bard slow...it is hardly an option. The mobs that i am taking down are mostly unsnarable so slow will never land. Would be interesting for me to try and take down named in Umbral with bard slow alone wouldnt it, o wait no it wouldnt i would be dead. I dont have a druid or mage account so stacking for high DS isnt an option. Nor do i have a wizard so evac is more then likely never going to happen. There are few cases that evac would ever be needed and all of them resulting in a failure on my behalf. Trains disapear with lull. Why ever pull an add to begin with?

Use the lvl 20 AE slow (35 percent at 60) if they are unsnare-able, and if they can't be mez'ed mischief will do until Requiem of Time at 64. Zek or Rondo + psalm + clicky bracer or similar == a decent DS that will outparse your silly melee damage hehe. some thoughts, Astuce Subterfuge

Slow is no problem for me, i have a chanter or a shaman. I would be a complete idiot to try and use my slowing skills over theirs. Any mob that is doubling fast for 500 (High Gaurdians in PoJ) are going to destroy me faster then i can heal. If the mobs cant be mezzed then they cant be mezzed. I am having no trouble with Dreams of Thule. However the mobs i am fighting simply cannot be mezzed, yes these mobs do exist. My first tawro attempt failed so miserably only because i could not build my aggro fast enough to slow and he cant be mezzed. Summoned corpses and camped after that huge timesink.

Group Rune Song, when i tank.......kael, CT, seblis etc i toss about 3-4 pulses of it right off then go into my regular twist keeping it in the rotation....toss it in a few more times if u start to loss agro again, i find its a good way to hold agro

I havent found that SoS is any appreciable aggro. Angstlich's Assonance is nice aggro however, and will slow unsnareable mobs. I usually avoid mobs that cannot be mezzed, as that means that my healer/slower is toast if they pull aggro off me. Also, on bard-slow...lots and lots of mobs, especially in pop have innate haste, or like in seb have haste spells cast on them, when you slow these types of mobs, you not only slow them 35%-52% but you also remove the effects of their haste as well, so it affects the rate at which they swing a rather large amount. Example: Seb, random high level frog, hasted by a shammy frog...w/o I need 3 druid c-heals to win the fight, with slow, even 20% slow, I need 0-1 cheal, and take well less damage than a simple 4/5 of normal. Bard slow aint all that bad, on hasted mobs, tho I would much rather have a chanter there for 70% haste and slow, and to CC for me.

Oh, and you dont need a rogue to get to Lord Rak....Chanters have G-Flux... Heres what you do: Stand to the side of the temple with the reaver, directly under the lowest section of the sky-walk, and g-flux the chars up there, then walk down the skywalk and into the main room. To get out, just have the chanter gate, and have the shammy heal over time you while on the sky-walk, and gate the shammy, then you jump down and get hurt, but the HoT will get ya, then train the zo.

Why not use your gate hammer and "duel" the shammy until it procs you out of there. Very useful tool, I've recouped my 3pp it cost me for the jade about a hundred fold compared to the cost of my now dormant Thurg potion. if you don't have a OT Gate hammer, there is a great guide here on this site. Good idea on the way to get up there with Grav Flux though! Sinfonian

i've used SoS alot for keeping agro, works best with a full group, 80pt rune on 6 people 4times off the bat after i've slowed makes for a very annoyed mob, toss in some dots for straight damage and unless your casters are going nuts you'll hold agro just fine.....shoot the shm i play with can slow almost right off with no agro vs having to wait till about 90-95 with a warrior and still gettin agro sometimes also i think they nerfed Gflux againts PCs, to stop the expliot that you were just talking of, tossing PCs up and over locked doors, i.e CoM

Heya Anulien!! Do me a favor and tell our mutual bud Tolk that it's possible ;) I keep telling him that a skilled bard CAN tank given proper circumstances and I can't tell you the mocking I've gotten for it. Where's the faith I tell you?!! (Granted, *I* might not be the skilled bard one would cite as an example lol) Bards are the most undervalued class if you ask my opinion. The difference that we made in ToV with one bard versus two bards versus three bards has caused many of my guildmates to see the error of their bard mocking ways! And where other melee's might be the victim of horrible carnage, the bard has methods of survival that he/she keeps tucked away for a rainy day :D Let me know if you need a backup bard for Lord Rak'Ashiir. I'd love to see that battle!

I heard recently that they nerfed gflux and it doesn't bounce you as high anymore. I haven't had the chance to go to SG and find out, but if it's true I'm gonna be so bummed gflux is like an amusement ride in EQ :) WEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!

I dont care what anyone says, a bard is BY FAR the best tank with any NON-SLOWING preist class. At 64 bards get a 52% slow, this effectively doubles your HP. With Amibidexterity and HA5 and 85-90 Self haste, plus item haste, you are gonna do more melee damage than a warrir/sk/pally. Not to mention you add 20 mana and health to you and your partner, more health depending on epic/lute. Good (not best) warriors run about 4.5-5k unbuffed hp, pallies/sks run about 3-4khp, good bards run about 3k unbuffed. When you double the bards HP due to the mob being 52% slowed (which is what slow sorta does, halves damage taken/doubles hp, same effect when getting a CH at 40% health), this leaves bards having (in effect) 6khp unbuffed, hehe. Now you replace your cleric/druid healer with a shammy, eliminating the haste and slow benifits of the bard, and sk makes best tank (due to snare) with warrior next and pallies in third, and bards in last.

Haha, even with all that, a real tank still out does a bard. A bard with good gear and all those AA's still can't bear a warrior with good gear and AA's. We can become better than highly equipt lvl 60 Velious tanks with no AA :p . I'm not saying we can't tank pretty well in the later game, just saying it's no where near effecient as a real tank.