Combat and Risk vs Reward

Boojum

First lets talk about soloing -- One thing I enjoy is a challenge.  Challenge to figure out correct tactics, and the need to use those tactics.  I will try to make the example below somewhat generic as I am not currently playing the Beta.

Consider the monster, what does it "con" / color -- let's say it cons under level.  I use my character's abilities, unless I get stupid or an additional mob I joins, will win.  Now repeat with a higher con -- I use all of my abilities, and unless I get very lucky I will lose.  For this discussion assume higher and lower are sufficiently higher/lower for those statements to be true.  Now for the test -- what happens when I take on something very close to my level.   If I use good tactics, get the right amount of luck, will I win?  When EQ2 launched with my Swashbuckler there were no single con mobs that were a challenge.  There was nothing from level 20 to 30 that I could solo that did not leave me with over half health; anything else I could attempt would kill me 95% of the time.

So, with apologies for the long drawn out first question, but it really comes down to an ask for people in Beta to describe combat, the tactical choices you are making, before and during where you use your best tactics in order to win a challenging fight.  Not a fight that you are guaranteed to lose / guaranteed to win.

I would also like to hear about group combat -- I have watched some recent movies of the game, because a lot of the UI was off I don't know what the relative levels/cons were.  What I want to know here though is the same thing -- what tactics to use for an encounter that is appropriately rewarding.  What importance do the decisions of the different team members make on the overall success of the group?  Do you need the different roles?  Are the rolls just, tank/heal/damage, or are they main tank, off tank, debuffer, healer, crowd control, positional damage, puller, buffer, etc.

Do the decisions matter, or is it just tank + heals + damage and the rest is automatic?  What is the appropriate risk vs reward balance?  Are groups challenged by the risk vs reward balance, or are they encouraged to kill easy stuff fast?  Also, details like, is it camp based, or is it more questing.  Are you fighting your way deeper into a dungeon or area, etc.

 

End_of_a_era

Atm i see risk but no reward lol.





I died past level 20 and lost like half a bar of XP

Karandor

If you get aggro this game is pretty unforgiving. Even con mobs can be challenging or easy depending on your class. As a bard I found it insanely easy (damage is INSANE) as a shaman it is much more difficult. The shaman is more fun for me though as I like to heal and buff. As I get more use to shaman abilities it's getting easier.

End_of_a_era

shaman are underpowered they were shite in PVP, just died everytime to anything :S Caster classes were all overpwoered, you just hide in a tree lol.