What root should I be using

[dude]

I must be very lucky with my roots. always used the best I had.

[fash]

Any root has a % chance to break when the mob receives direct damage. If the mob will be receiving direct damage and thus be prone to breaking root, use a low mana root if you need to save mana. If you're parking mobs for cc, use the long duration root line: enstill, paralyzing earth, fetter. If you know you're going to need to quickly root mobs, use the fast cast line: immobilize, fetter.

[skarlorn]

My friend Nibblewitz put it in a way that really made it clear.

The effect of Root is Root, no matter how much mana you spend on it.

Enstill sucks, PE is good, use Root until PE.

[botrainer]

Even the 56 shaman root brakes more often than I would have liked in sol B, im 56 and have issues finding a decent place to exp due to the crappy root system on this server.

[Baler]

Originally Posted by fash [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

Any root has a % chance to break when the mob receives direct damage.

I forgot to mention this one detail but it does not invalidate my post. [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

[Borak]

Originally Posted by fash [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

Any root has a % chance to break when the mob receives direct damage. If the mob will be receiving direct damage and thus be prone to breaking root, use a low mana root if you need to save mana. If you're parking mobs for cc, use the long duration root line: enstill, paralyzing earth, fetter. If you know you're going to need to quickly root mobs, use the fast cast line: immobilize, fetter.

This makes sense to me. As a paladin, I only ever got Root and Enstill. Because I root to CC, and not to damage the mob, Enstill is ABSOLUTELY better than Root.

If you intend to damage the mob, listen to the others. But strictly from a CC perspective, Enstill > Root.

[Jimjam]

Sometimes I'll have a couple of roots loaded. There are a few reasons for this, but the primary one is short roots are good to give the tank a 30 sec grace period to taunt and piggyback off tash/slow/whatever aggro, whereas longer duration roots can work better for cc.

[Tecmos Deception]

As a chanter, I've used root all the time until PE and then still most of the time until fetter.

My thoughts are that the faster cast time is a big deal when trying to root something that's hitting you, or trying to root something that is charging towards you before it reaches you, etc. That's reason enough for me to like root over the other ones as a chanter, though I can see why tougher classes wouldn't be as concerned about .5 seconds more cast time.

Concerning the duration? Well... as a chanter at least, I often don't want something parked for 2-3 minutes or having to monkey around with dispel to be able to reposition a mob. Furthermore, that longer duration is sometimes wasted like if you reroot something that is just dead in 4-5 ticks anyway.

Concerning efficiency/mana cost? Root and enstill have the same mana:max duration ratio. But it is more likely root will go 8 ticks without an early break than enstill will go 16 ticks without an early break, even if you aren't dealing any DD that can break early on its own. Root casts so fast that you can easily avoid missing med ticks if you want to micromanage that, or even if you don't care to pay attention to it you'll still only miss 1 in 3 root casts on average anyway.

For pure CC use, or for dot-heavy classes... especially when casting on a mob that is tashed or malod or whatever... I could see enstill having use. But short of that I would never use anything but root until PE, and for the two classes that get fetter even PE is kinda meh in most situations IMO.

[brightlights]

I personally go with whatever root will last the longest. Like you say Tecmos, being beat on sucks.. but I prefer a stun/root that I know will last long enough for me to handle whatever else is fucked up at the moment, like a charm break etc..

It's true, it's a big deal trying to root something that's hitting you, but its a WAY bigger deal when you have a bad pull, and you're about to get it all locked down, but then roots start breaking and... well.. "ITS GAME OVER MAN GAME OVER"

[Troxx]

Originally Posted by skarlorn [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

My friend Nibblewitz put it in a way that really made it clear.

The effect of Root is Root, no matter how much mana you spend on it.

Enstill sucks, PE is good, use Root until PE.

This. Low level root has superior balance of duration, cast time, and mana cost of all shaman roots until PE. If the middle ground roots had a negative resist mod on then they might be worth casting.