1 Blue Circle repeatable quests in war camps
Ah now realize that most of these quests ah complete anyways automatically
during scenarios and zone defense. Some of the blue circle quests rotate
around to a reward of 3 Officer Medals which adds up quickly. They always
drop coins that adds up and at least can help pay for flights and some pots
here and there. On the surface it may not seem worth the extra effort, but in
the long run it can make the difference between a dwindling bank account
and prosperity.
2 Ask what others in your class are doing and read up on it
Swordmasters, for example, can be awesome once they master their class,
but doing so can take a lot of learnin'. The result is a broad range of sms that
range from "I hate my class we are so nerfed" to everyone is rockin to get a
particular proven swordmaster as one of their tanks. You will have a lot more
trouble learning the tricks of yer class if yeh don't ask fer help. You will find
there's often a lot more to yer class than immediately meets the eye.
3 Get yer groove on and use your environment
Situational awareness and positioning are critical to survival and imo enjoyment!
Learn to move and position yourself relative to your enemies and environment
for maximum advantage. Using trees to cut-off the view of you to 1/2 the enemy
in front of you, having your back to a wall when useful, making quick movements
to disengage with the enemy but not take time traveling too much unless AOE
is the primary threat, moving to stay in range of healers or those you are guarding,
turning and backing out to avoid rear and side envelopment are all good examples.
4 Stay within healer/rez range and los
If yer not within line-of-sight or too far from healers, you are not going to be as
effective usually. There are times when doing without healing makes strategic
sense like making surgical strike against backline support or control of a flag
during a pivotal moment in a scenario. Often it is to everyone's advantage to
advance with heal support.
As a healer in scenarios with situational defensive skills I do try to venture out
and keep our allies within enemy lines healthy or at least alive longer with
hot (heal over time) stacking, but I may prioritize another heal target if I see that
if going far in to cover someone will deny the same to four people in need at the
time perhaps due to low healer count.
To be honest, though, if ah see 1-2 people going after healers way back there
and we are fine for healers overall, ah often may go to support them primarily,
especially if we are far from enemy spawn point and so it's gunna severely hurt
our healer killing capability for sometime if they are killed. Ah like the commando
aspect of it, too. Can't always do that depending on what mah group is doing.
Yet ah often see folks 1-2 at a time rushing lines of HEAVY enemy forces without
healer support. Not WH's stealthfully making tactical advances encircling the
enemy, but classes that need healing and/or tank guard for team effectiveness
whenever possible. Such charging of the light brigade would be brave, but if not
for strategic value, tactically silly. Empire and Elven life insurance will not cover
you in these circumstances, and if Dwarves could get insurance I bet it would
be the same.
5 Plan on the best place to fall down
If you are certain it's curtains for you, try to get to a spot where you stand
any chance to get rezzed. Battles otherwise fairly well-balanced are often
won by the better battle rezzin'.
Some examples:
If you are about to die on their Howling Gorge ramp you might run back up to
mid. If you charged too far ahead in Caledor Woods and suddenly see masses
of new enemy previously unknown heading your way, hightail it back to as close
to the flag as possible or you are just enemy reknown on legs.
Try to collapse near your own keep wall but not so close to the wall that
healers can't get a bead on you. If yeh coming to the front, come to the door
from an angle so yeh don't die under a ram where healers can't see yeh.
If on inner door of an enemy keep and harasser teams come out to lure you
around a corner out of los of healers, don't fall into the trap.
6 If yeh collapse in a strange place, note yer location to healers
This is especially important in keep battles. Yeh don't want yer healers
runnin' around like crazy people tryin' to find you instead of healing and
rezzin' those easy to find. Be brief and specific like "down around corner
from inner, west postern," "down just right of outer gate, only mah staff
shows", you get the idea. If yer critical, like the only healer going outside
keep with ram attackers, or the guy at oil, or the healer keeping the guy
at oil alive :), let folks know quickly, "rez at oil please".
7 Group make-up flexibility
Ever lost a team member during a big instance evening and thought, well,
we can't do this with one healer, or a particular tank type, etc. You might
be surprised what you can do while you are looking for a replacement.
Ah have been in LV teams of only 5 and still advanced through many of
the early bosses. Ah have seen many cases where you can give up 1 tank
fer a dps without issue, as long as you have one good tank. Of course,
sometimes you really must have 1 offtank in addition to the mt (main tank)
due to the mechanics of a boss event.
This is for good reason, it's not always a matter of luck. For example, in the
above example, yer enemies die faster with more great dps so there is less
stress on tankage and healin'.
Probably the most prevalent form of this is demanding a particular tank
class. Ah have seen top bosses tanked by every tank class, ah assure
you that with knowledge, equipment, proper specs/tactics, and skill, all
tanks can rock much.
8 With PvE Encounters (LV, crypts, etc.), Experience Rules
Group members familiar with tactics for a particular instance can make up
for group make-up imperfections and greatly benefit any team. This is
especially important for the spidie in LV, the final boss in crypts, all the
top ToVL ecounters, etc.
9 Use your scenario spawn point exit alternatives
It is sad to see entire scenario populations pinned down at their spawn
when perfectly good back doors are available to harass the enemy and
score game points. There are exceptions such as Serpent's Passage
where it is pretty easy to trap the enemy if you can dominate them.
Win or lose, it's a lot more fun and interestin' than total enemy spawn
point domination. "Come out back door to mid, only one squiggie there!"
10 You probably don't know as much as you think you do
Examples..
Ah was once crushed in a battle with the LV spidie, leaving a single
healer to cover everyone. And she did it! Now spidie encounter is up
in the air even if yeh know lots of tricks, the idea that one healer could
do this is, well, unexpected. The trick was that the main tank knew
every trick in the book to reduce crit hits, plus we knew every other
LV spidie trick there was, and finally Selessca rocked and probably
got an unusual number of crit heals out since she is a crit machine.
A common refrain is "get the healers, ignore the freaking tank!" or
something to that effect. Nevermind that their healers outnumber
yours 4:1, nevermind that they are 95% level 40, and you are 70%
level 40, nevermind they are a phenominally coherant, perfectly
balanced, tactically thoughtful premade ... you know better cause
you are a genius and everyone else just doesn't get it. If yeh must
yell this out Napoleon, look carefully around you and determine if this
is really the situation before yeh embarass yerself further.
Ah healer once angrily yelled at mah bw patron in scenario chat for
running from a WE when he's takin' damage from a "if yeh run yeh
get damaged" type spell. The bw then said he didn't know about
that spell and the healer went ballistic, saying that he must be a
bought character cause "everyone" knows about it. It took about
5 mins of follow-on tell chat to work it out to a good place. The
healer's farmhouse in Barak Varr mysteriously burned down the
following week.
Ah once met a guild leader who didn't know that healers could rez
out of group (oops), and as a wb leader he made an ass outta
himself bah accident, armed to the teeth with misinformation. To
this day ah associate him with that incident, perhaps cause he
doesn't seem like a nice person in general.
Ah once met a guy who thought wps were all masters of dps! Ah
was surprised when ah was invited to a party with him as the 2nd
dps he needed. "Uhh, I thought we needed another dps" "No, lol,
Dwooid's not dps." "Heh, no, I'm not dps :)".
Ah myself once made healing a particular archmage a priority for
chain rezzing only to find out bah her that she built herself as an
elven bw essentially, and thus the real healers should probably
come first.
Ah once got to thinkin' that most female characters are probably
male, and now through vent ah now realize that there are lots and
lots more women playin' than ah realized.
So drop those assumptions about other classes, tactics, strategy,
etc., and ask the why's and the how's and yeh just might learn
somethin' ... and have fun!! Whatever the reason you are getting the
bleep kicked out of you this time, acquit yerself with honor in combat,
do yer best, and next time maybe you'll be on the dealing end.
11 Everyone should be a scout!
In scenarios
In lieu of uber-premades, some kind of gentle scenario leadership by
means of skilled scoutmanship can make or break.
"GET TO THE FREAKING FLAG!!" rarely works.
"KILL THE HEALERS YOU MORONS!!" though perhaps correct,
rarely works.
"INC! Suggest fighting on flag!" (and going there), often works. It's
a suggestion and it is simple. You brought value and news on the
disposition of enemy forces.
"mid!" (and heading there as folks often watchin' the your map dots),
that can work, too, sometimes, as folks will assume you've scouted
the disposition of enemy forces on the final leg of the salvage run in
Serpent's Passage, for example, and know it's a lost cause.
"This group way too powerful to pin at spawn, suggest fighting on mid
flag before we wipe and lose it," may be quite wordy but just may work.
Hope yeh can type/talk fast. This is good tactical thinking in Battle of
Praag for this circumstance.
Scenarios aren't like warbands on the prowl, people rarely thinking in
terms of taking orders for the good of all. Perhaps there should be
scenario leaders someday, like wb leaders. You might consider going
to scenarios with yer own premade full or partial group, too, which
often simplifies the whole command structure issues for at least
one group team.
Dwooid's suggestions for scenario leadership:
- Everyone should be a scout. If you are too new to translate to
suggested action, share enemy dispostion. "2 WE at spawn".
- Be very brief, everyone's in combat. If important, repeat to overcome
chat scroll.
- Explain why whenever reasonable, with the least # words possible.
In RvR
Zone locks are especially scout dependent. Knowing the disposition
of the enemy allows your optimal force positioning.
In one case ah spotted the enemy trying to sneak behind us in tm
heading to headwall ... okay so they ran me over ... ah announced
it and forces from Palik made it in time. In another case a fellow
named Graz sat on a tm PvE land bridge and spotted enemy forces
otw doomstriker, called it, and again we had forces there in a nick of
time.
When choosing next wb goal, realm and zone scouts can be critical
to making the right choices as tools like State of the Realm (SoR)
have their limitations. Nothing beats boots on the ground.
Be sure to thank yer scouts, purposeful or accidental. They can make
the difference between success and failure and they deserve private or
public credit for their efforts and often sacrifice. But remember, everyone
should be a scout :).
If yeh got any more ahdeas fer everyone, or have
any comments on the ahdeas above, contact me
anytime! Ah can be found via the "Contact Dwooid"
link in the sidebar.
- Dwooid of Caledor