Shaman questions

[Curmudgen]

Hey guys it's me again, this time some questions on shaman.

Thinking about starting one and wondering to get opinions on why you chose the race you did. I am trying to flesh out main pick differences.

Barbarian- liked in cities, ok stats. Anyhing else?

Ogre- no frontal stun ( is that really super handy or not?), good starting stats, evil ( does it make travel and any good shaman quests difficult? Like paw or such?)

Troll- good stats, regeneration( does that make a huge difference with cana?), evil ( same questions as ogre), snare necklace ( is that in game?)

I know the prevailing and wisest answer is to play what you like but did anyone make a decision based on the exp penalties?

I do like the idea of NOT having to deal with research for spells.

[Curmudgen]

Oh I forgot to ask one big question. On some of the creation pages I have read confusing info. Inferences were made about what armor shaman can wear. I always thought it was chain, but one site off hand mentioned plate.

Shamans get plate? Or chain?

[Harrison]

Chain

[Harrison]

Troll, regeneration bonus, good hp, slam.

Best option you have until Iksar, and arguably comparable in every sort.

[Alawen Everywhere]

If you like to solo outrageous stuff, make an ogre. It pays off hugely in Kunark and Velious.

[Estu]

I went ogre. Better stats than trolls, no frontal stun is nice. Don't have the regen, but less exp penalty, and the regen isn't that big a deal. I don't know to what extent being evil affects quests since I don't know much about what quests are out there, but I've leveled my shaman to 25 solo without much trouble with travel and stuff.

[Harrison]

The mechanics last I checked, for the reasons ogres would make that somewhat marginally true...don't work.

[Noleafclover]

Troll's the best by far from the regen.

For pedantics sake, barbarians get a few race-specific armor and weps, the barb spiritist hammer is really good atm but will be upstaged in kunark.

The "no frontal stun" I don't think is that great, you can take hits but you essentially lose mana for them, so you won't want to.

I think it reduced chance melee hits would interrupt pre-melee-push patch, but does not anymore. I can't be certain on either point though, should get confirmation from a shammy.

[Estu]

Troll's the best by far from the regen.

For pedantics sake, barbarians get a few race-specific armor and weps, the barb spiritist hammer is really good atm but will be upstaged in kunark.

The "no frontal stun" I don't think is that great, you can take hits but you essentially lose mana for them, so you won't want to.

I think it reduced chance melee hits would interrupt pre-melee-push patch, but does not anymore. I can't be certain on either point though, should get confirmation from a shammy.

I'm having trouble parsing your last paragraph, but if it means what I think it means, here's my experience: with my ogre shaman pre-that patch (said patch was the server restart that changed the double exp to a 25% exp bonus, after the server got reverted 12 hours), I was never interrupted in my spellcasting by melees from the front; there wasn't even a 'you regain concentration' message. So I could have like three mobs (or however many) tooling on me from the front, and could cast no problem. Post-that patch, I now get interrupted from the front just like everyone else, but I'm still immune to stuns from bashing.

I'd also like to point out that shamen can make good meleers with their various buffs and debuffs and their chain armor and a nice weapon, so it's not always necessarily best to just sit back and let your dots and/or pet do all the work. (Although my untwinked level 25 shaman hasn't meleed since level 9 since it hasn't been worth it; his gear isn't good enough for melee dps to compensate for the lack of medding and the getting hit.) On that note, when and if you start meleeing, that stun immunity is gonna come in handy. Really, though, it's not that big a deal; the main reason I went ogre was the stats and the smaller EXP penalty.

[Noleafclover]

You read me correct, but...

Well for one, I thought melee push went in earlier? But I've been playing mage lately, so not sure...

Anyway, a cleric I was duoing with during double-exp-heaven saying he wasn't getting any interrupts --- I think that was a general bug at the time; maybe they'd been moving some of the scripts over for melee push but had not completed.

Really... not too sure, heh.

Do you have any experience as to whether or not you were getting interrupts a month or more ago? That would certainly answer the question. And yeah, this is just a vague remembrance of something an ogre shammy told me, so def. take it w/ a grain of salt.

[Noleafclover]

Also, got to admit, 2x shrunk ogres are pretty badass.

[Alawen Everywhere]

Ogre shamans can solo a lot of higher end mobs that other shamans simply cannot.

You can step back forward to regain concentration.

[Tokum-6n0m3]

Trolls can get the Dark Elf clinging darkness necklace tho if they worship inny~

[Estu]

Noleaf: I only made the shaman relatively soon before the double exp weekend, so I couldn't tell you; it's totally possible that it was just a temporary bug and not something that had been in there for a long time.

Alawen: What is it about ogre shamen that lets them solo higher end stuff better? I'm assuming it's some kind of ogre-specific gear?

[Curmudgen]

So doesn't sound like barbarian shamans are in demand unless you really want to be good or really don't want an exp penalty.

I am curious if that snare necklace for troll is a game changer or not.

[Estu]

So doesn't sound like barbarian shamans are in demand unless you really want to be good or really don't want an exp penalty.

I am curious if that snare necklace for troll is a game changer or not.

Barbarians have an EXP penalty, but a smaller one than ogres:

From the FAQ:
What are the experience penalties/bonuses?
By Race:
Troll -20%
Iksar -20%
Ogre -15%
Barbarian -5%
Halfling +5%

[purist]

I played my Troll Shaman to mid-20s before I re-rolled as Ogre and I can say that unlike on my Troll, my Ogre always got Root when tanking a mob. I never failed once and that saved my ass countless times. My Troll on the other hand would constant interrupts. I can't explain exactly how the no stun mechanic works on this server, that's just my personal anecdote if it helps you any.

And the snare necklace is wayyyyy overrated and definitely shouldn't be the basis for your Shaman's race choice. The snare % on it isn't even that good.

Go Ogre or go home.

[quellren]

Barb Shaman are fine. play what you like. I rolled troll because well, my last shaman was barb and I wanted something different. True, troll regen is legendary up to about lvl 9-10 beyond that its less important as youre hp pool gets bigger. at 50 its a drop in the bucket. I'd have gone Ogre but plain and simple, I dislike the way an ogre looks in chain, and I hate Oggok.
Just for my own satisfaction, I PLed a troll shaman and a barb shaman to 35 on PEQ, measured how long it took to regen from under 10hp to full each wearing +5 regen gear (more than is possible on P99) in bearform, with regrowth on. the difference was, IMO, not that big. Certainly not game-breaking. Maybe not even enough to counterbalance the hassle of banking in Neriak, and the exp penalty. Stun immune is quite a benefit though. I wont lie. Pretty often I wish I was stun immune. I wonder if at 50+ as an ogre I'd ever wish for better regen?

As for more concrete differences: Barbs have more starting mana from a higher base wis. Canni makes maxing wisdom less important than other priest classes, so once you get a solid number (I'm gonna stop stacking at 190-200ish -maybe less as I get a better feel for it) then you can make your HP pool into a defacto mana pool. so we stack stam. Ogre is clearly gonna win this contest, but the troll has a large hp pool, and the regen+regrowth+bearform regen will go a long way to negating Canni especially until Canni IV, which takes some huge chunks of life. Barb will just have to cannibalize less, via bigger mana, or gear differently to stack stam.
In the end, playing the min/max game is much much less important than comparing say, warrior races.
Thats my 2 cents.

[Noleafclover]

TBH, the fact that you're asking this question makes me think you want to min-max race, so disregard anyone telling you to play barbarian. The wisdom the race has is a non-factor, considering how many wis items are prevalent, and how much that statement is going to hit home in kunark and velious even harder. You'll be soft-capped there, even focusing more on hp/mana, etc.

Ogre to do harder things (stun immunity for particular encounters) and be more survivable when beat on

Troll to kill faster, stay afloat on mana more.

[Noselacri]

All the races can do the same things. There's no "only ogres can do this". Frontal stun immunity is very strong, but don't go telling people it's a requirment for anything. It's as stupid as that other thread where people claimed only ogres could be raid tanks.

The place where it matters the most is when soloing really tough mobs, something that doesn't become much of a factor until Kunark and especially Velious. Shamans were legendary for soloing guardian wurms, and once you get your rare high-end spells and good equipment, anything that doesn't out-damage your healing while slowed is soloable. Being an ogre made this a fair bit safer since you might occasionally end up in a situation where getting interrupted meant dying, but it wasn't what determined whether or not you could. Race alone will never determine whether you can or cannot do something in this game (other than do certain quests and use certain items, of course).

The thing about stun immunity is that it doesn't always help. It's a great ability when it lets you get off a spell that makes the difference between failure and success, but it's not as if that happens all the time. Unless for some reason you made your shaman to solo exclusively, the vast majority of your time will be spent in scenarios where the stun immunity doesn't matter at all: when you're not being attacked. Bonus regeneration generally has a more constant value in that shamans should almost never stay at full health unless they're also at full mana. This means that the troll/iksar racial helps even when you're sitting on your ass healing a tank where ogres and barbarians otherwise have nothing. Well, barbarians always have nothing.

Troll regen essentially translates into a bit of flowing thought, not a whole lot but certainly a noticeable amount. It's very valuable until you get torpor and the big canni, at which point it sort of stops mattering since you won't be relying on actual regen anymore. Then ogre becomes the only race choice that makes a difference. Up until then, it's just a matter of preference: trolls have more staying power and ogres have more reliable spellcasts. All things considered, across all three eras, ogre has an advantage because their racial ability never becomes obsolete. It's nowhere near game-changing, though. People seem to think you spend half the time stunned when tanking.

[Tokum-6n0m3]

All the races can do the same things. There's no "only ogres can do this". Frontal stun immunity is very strong, but don't go telling people it's a requirment for anything. It's as stupid as that other thread where people claimed only ogres could be raid tanks


100% agree, gnOme warriors pwn~

Tokum- 14 gnOme Cleric

[Reiker]

Barbarian- liked in cities, ok stats. Anyhing else?
I wouldn't make a Barbarian. Worst stats and not many benefits.

Ogre- no frontal stun ( is that really super handy or not?), good starting stats, evil ( does it make travel and any good shaman quests difficult? Like paw or such?)
Ogre is the best shaman race. They have the best stats and stun immunity is the single most OP race advantage in EverQuest. I'm not 100% sure how well it works here, but this was definitely the case on live.

Troll- good stats, regeneration( does that make a huge difference with cana?), evil ( same questions as ogre), snare necklace ( is that in game?)
Trolls are better than Barbarians but a bit overrated. The snare necklace was much better on live when the snare effect actually allowed you to kite a bit. Here it's practically useless and on both versions of EQ gets less useful as you gain levels. Regeneration is the same way, great early on, hardly noticeable later on. Trolls are a bit better than Ogres in the early levels, but I'm assuming you'll want to play until 50 and beyond. Highest racial penalty in the game is bad as well.

About being evil: it's a minor inconvenience and at times a convenience. The majority of high end dungeons in classic are situated closest to evil cities (Guk, Solb). There's really not many important quests you won't be able to complete. Honestly the worst thing you'll miss out on are the level 1-12 Qeynos newbie quests that can net the best exp in the game. Past that, not a big deal. You could complete the Paw quest even, although that's not a great shaman item.

Shamans get plate? Or chain?
Shaman are technically a chain class. However they are unique in that most of their high end armor is plate. When it comes to tradeskilled armor, banded is as far as you can go. However, Totemic, Rune Etched, and Jaundiced Bone are plate. There are some "in between" chain/plate pieces such as Rubicite and the Vindi Breastplate/Boots which shaman can use.

[Estu]

When it comes to tradeskilled armor, banded is as far as you can go.

What? What about ornate? What about cultural?

[Skope]

Barbarian's don't necessarily have the worst stats...

Having innate high wisdom, at least come kunark, will mean you get the luxury of slapping AC/hp/dex/managear on in certain places without the worry of achieving that "175" wisdom magical number. Strength is unnecessary for a shaman and the return on +stamina isn't as high as a pure tank so you're almost always better off with +hp gear than you are with stamina. Basically, stuff all your points into wisdom, you won't regret that decision when you realize just how much more HP you will have and how much easier it is to get around 170-180wis, even as an evil race.

In terms of gear, iksar shamans are the one race that gets shafted. They can't wear rune-etched and they can't equip JBB, or any jaundiced, actually. The +regen is the same as trolls but iksars get an AC boost, which is great, but unfortunately you'll likely be wearing lower AC gear anyway because of the armor restrictions (at least until they throw iksar armor into the planes).

Trolls have the natural regen which means you have a higher mana regen, and ogres frontal stun immunity (when it comes into play) will be incredible. The troll snare necklace is an overrated item that shouldn't determine the race you pick.

Barbs get the barb hammer, which is basically a JBB for summoning mobs. It doesn't get worse during kunark, it actually gets better. With the dex buffs and dex gear (230dex) I can proc an incredible amount of times per battle and have actually melee solo'd hate/fear trash on my shaman, backing up only to heal. When torpor comes along the need for backing off to heal is negated unless you really grabbed something that you can't handle. But the hammer is just like the snare necklace, something to consider as a bonus and not a reason to pick the race. Barb shamans don't really have any bonuses going for them other than the wisdom boost and not being evil, but imo they look the best and that's quite frankly what matters the most =P

Above all shammies are incredibly gear dependent, so the troll regen and even the ogre stun immunity is trumped by the amount of platinum in your bank, the spells in your spell book and the amount of raid loot you have on you. If you think you can start a shaman, get him to 60 during velious and just start soloing dragons you're sadly mistaken :P

[Alawen Everywhere]

It's not ogre-specific gear I'm talking about, it's the stun immunity. It will be ogre shamans soloing guardian wurms and Lodizal, not trolls, not barbarians. The stun immunity is literally a tipping point. Shamans become the most badass soloers in Kunark and remain so in Velious. If you don't care about that, be a barbarian or a troll. That barbarian hammer is very nice for adding melee dps in classic if you're most interested in short term advantages.

But make no mistake: ogre shamans can do things trolls and barbarians can never do. You will also need to master the ability to step back into original position after knockback in order to channel your spells.

[Reiker]

Skope gives bad advice. There's no magic 175 wis number. In a top raid guild I don't think I broke 200 wisdom as a Barb until PoP, cause come Kunark wisdom is pretty useless and stamina is the single best numerical stat for a shaman. Ogres get the most stamina, and Barbarians the least, hence Ogre > Troll > Barbarian in regards to starting stats.

Barbarians can solo guardian wurms and shit if they're badasses but it's definitely easier as an ogre.

[Skope]

Skope gives bad advice. There's no magic 175 wis number. In a top raid guild I don't think I broke 200 wisdom as a Barb until PoP, cause come Kunark wisdom is pretty useless and stamina is the single best numerical stat for a shaman. Ogres get the most stamina, and Barbarians the least, hence Ogre > Troll > Barbarian in regards to starting stats.

Barbarians can solo guardian wurms and shit if they're badasses but it's definitely easier as an ogre.

Just to clarify, i played an iksar shaman on live and during velious, even as an iksar shaman i was able to solo some of the velious dragons and even lodi (this was without a JBB). Ogre stun immunity is nice, but it is most definitely not required. The "175" number i'm referring to is the number that was thrown around in the shaman boards during kunark/velious and even PoP as an optimal number for your wisdom. With ~175 wis you had enough to malo/slow and toss DoTs/torpors accordingly while still giving you enough room to focus on your ac/hp/melee stats and resists. During kunark reaching that number wasn't difficult and allowed for gear choices (dumping your eboots for tribals, for example).

Don't neglect wisdom. You're a shaman, not a necromancer or druid. Your fights will be prolonged and if you melee you won't have the luxury of sitting down and watching it die. Expect to burn 50-100% mana depending on what you're taking down and if it has lots of HP you'd better believe having enough mana to torpor yourself back up is critical.

As for the barbarian spiritist's hammer...

It's a great weapon. It allows you to put out decent DPS while melee'ing (i've been known to proc 7-8x in a row and frequently steal aggro from tanks =P ). But it brings up a point that hasn't been made: your melee damage sucks. Nearly all of your melee DPS should come from procs. Your melee is there essentially to keep the DoT's working at 100% -- as opposed to the reduced dot damage from a moving or unrooted mob. Weapons like howling harpoon (stun), icewurm fang (~120DD iirc), barb spiritist's hammer (264dd), and blight (procs DoT scourge, 500dmg) allow you to toss in some DPS/stuns without the need to burn mana, allowing you to focus on debuffs/dots and torpor.

[Bossco]

Barbarians are clearly the best choice... Ogres and Trolls look really bad in all of our gear, imo.

[Sckrilla]

If you're not a Barbarian Shaman, you're wrong!

[Reiker]

Don't take advice from anyone who thinks sitting down would be a "luxury" for a shaman.

[baub]

It's not ogre-specific gear I'm talking about, it's the stun immunity. It will be ogre shamans soloing guardian wurms and Lodizal, not trolls, not barbarians.

But make no mistake: ogre shamans can do things trolls and barbarians can never do.

These made me lol.

You overrate the crutch that is stun immunity good sir~

[Slashurr]

dear god.. just hit 9. this level is amazing. I am soloing reds and yellows with ease by kiting. If you can trade a sow for clarity do it. I'm getting nearly a blue bub a kill as a troll. easily make this level in an hour or two.

[quellren]

Kiting a red is fun, but its far more time effecient to dot tank blues. I you can probably kill 3-4 blues for 1.5+ blue in the same time as your 1 red. The price of resists and added aggro is much lower too.

[skorge]

The troll snare necklace is an overrated item that shouldn't determine the race you pick.

It's the exact opposite, and it's the reason why trolls make the best shamans in the game. Thanks to natural regen, ability to wear the JBB and snare necklace, troll shamans can solo mobs that any other race of shaman can't solo.

Try soloing the imps in solb without that snare necklace. The only option you have is to root 'em so they don't run...if you root them then they continue to attack costing your shaman extra mana, mana that you probably don't have. Imps for example may run at 15-20% health...imagine having their backs turned to you, and all you do is let your pet attack and melee 'em down instead and not take any damage. If you would have rooted the mob you probably would have had to cast extra heals, your slow might have worn off, and you might be able to last another couple rounds of melee because they hit so hard!

I have played several shaman in the classic days of EQ including a barb to level 50+, troll (two times) to 50+, and iksar to 50+...I rank shaman like this:

1. Trolls
2. Iksar (they end up having over 100 extra AC which makes them better than ogre despite not having the JBB)
3. Ogre
4. Barb

[korrowan]

What Troll Necklace is this and how do you get it!

[Excision Rottun]

What Troll Necklace is this and how do you get it!

Regent Symbol of Innoruuk (http://everquest.allakhazam.com/db/item.html?item=1254)

[Messianic]

All I know is I NEVER get spell interrupts on an ogre shaman. Ever. I cast through bashes constantly.

I don't see how innate regen on a troll or iksar compares to that, especially once Torpor is available.

[Curmudgen]

Ok so I made a troll, but at server select I messed up and hit cazic Thule.

Level five now. Is that necklace good enough that I should re-roll?

[Noselacri]

At level five, sure. It's an item that has occasional uses, and it essentially gives your class an ability that it doesn't inherently have. It's not what I'd call important in any way, and the snare is especially poor on this server due to the artificially fast movement speed of mobs (Clinging Darkness basically reduces them to the actual classic run speed) but it's a neat little thing to have. If you were level 30, I'd say forget about it and just keep leveling; you'll probably never run into a situation where you think "if only I had...", it's really more of a toy than a tool. But at such a low level, there's no reason not to sacrifice the couple of hours you've spent and start over.

[Estu]

Fair warning about Innoruuk-worshipping Troll shamen: you'll be dubious in Oggok. Fine in Neriak, though.

[Noselacri]

2. Iksar (they end up having over 100 extra AC which makes them better than ogre despite not having the JBB)

It's not over 100 extra AC, it maxes at 42. Also, there has been strong speculation and evidence to suggest that this bonus AC was always bugged or not working optimally, being worth less than normal AC in some way. Whatever the case, it's a fairly minor amount, especially on a non-tank who doesn't benefit from it in every aspect of gameplay. I don't see how you could possibly claim that this small amount of bonus AC makes iksar better than ogre, the latter having probably the most powerful racial ability in the game, and with iksar being unable to wear a number of items, one of which is among the most valuable shaman items in the game at that time.

[Bagzan]

It's not ogre-specific gear I'm talking about, it's the stun immunity. It will be ogre shamans soloing guardian wurms and Lodizal, not trolls, not barbarians. The stun immunity is literally a tipping point. Shamans become the most badass soloers in Kunark and remain so in Velious. If you don't care about that, be a barbarian or a troll. That barbarian hammer is very nice for adding melee dps in classic if you're most interested in short term advantages.

But make no mistake: ogre shamans can do things trolls and barbarians can never do. You will also need to master the ability to step back into original position after knockback in order to channel your spells.

You're hilariously wrong. It makes it a bit easier - it doesn't come remotely close to tipping the scales from impossible to possible.

Also, unless you worded that oddly, you seem to believe that only ogre shamans have the ability to move back to where they were after a knockback to channel spells? Wrong again.

[Noselacri]

Actually that's possible for anyone. If you begin and finish casting at the exact same /loc, the spell succesfully resolves even if you moved during the cast. It's almost impossible to do in any kind of ordinary environment, but try standing in a corner and begin casting, then run forward and back into the corner before it's finished. There's pretty much no way anyone could do that with any degree of consistency when getting knocked around in actual combat, of course, and either way it has nothing to do with being an ogre. Trying to counter melee push by moving will just get your spells interrupted for sure.

[skorge]

It's not over 100 extra AC, it maxes at 42. Also, there has been strong speculation and evidence to suggest that this bonus AC was always bugged or not working optimally, being worth less than normal AC in some way. Whatever the case, it's a fairly minor amount, especially on a non-tank who doesn't benefit from it in every aspect of gameplay. I don't see how you could possibly claim that this small amount of bonus AC makes iksar better than ogre, the latter having probably the most powerful racial ability in the game, and with iksar being unable to wear a number of items, one of which is among the most valuable shaman items in the game at that time.

It is, I had three different race shaman up to level 50+ on Live classic (1999-2000). The Iksar had equivalent level armor (most from kunark (seb armor, cant really remember but it had high AC and iksar could wear) and plane of hate iksar only armor). By the time I was level 53 or so my iksar had over 100 extra total AC...for example my troll had 950 AC and my Iksar had 1050 AC. This isn't raw AC it's total. If played right, that 100 extra AC becomes important. It essentially creates more mana for the iksar as he takes less damage and therefore needs to be healed less often than an ogre, troll, or barb.

I would like to add in that it would be a good debate to see who is the second best shaman: iksar or ogre. It's extremely close, and although I did say iksar earlier I can understand how some will say ogre being the second best shaman (the JBB = free damage).

[Messianic]

My ogre doesn't have to move at all, even while being hit, to channel spells. I've never been interrupted by a mob. I haven't been hit by pushback or stun spells while casting yet though, so maybe those affect it...

But I know that my troll characters are interrupted by puny 1 dmg hits and such, although they definitely channel better than pure caster types.

[Estu]

I'd like to point out that Reiker, or whatever his name is, posted a nice analysis of JBBs a while ago that basically successfully makes the argument that it's often more efficient to spend mana to do damage and then to cannibalize than to use a JBB. He was essentially saying that the item, while useful, is not quite as much of a godsend as people think, particularly as you get higher level. If anyone could dig up the post and post a link here, that would be cool.

[Curmudgen]

I am just wondering as the server goes on and grows, am I going to be one of 50 million shaman competing for a group.

I have never played a shaman and so wanted to try it out for group and solo ability, but after doing some /who all I am starting to think grouping may be a lot more difficult than I imagined.

[mgellan]

Kiting a red is fun, but its far more time effecient to dot tank blues. I you can probably kill 3-4 blues for 1.5+ blue in the same time as your 1 red. The price of resists and added aggro is much lower too.

Not to mention skillups in dodge, etc. DOT/meleeing blues lets you keep these skills close to max and helps out later on IMHO...

Regards,
Mg

[Regnon]

I don't care what is considered the BEST....when Kunark comes out, i WILL be playing an Ikky Shaman. Just want I want to.

[Fearghus]

I love playing a barb shammy. Fearghus is only level13 (maybe 14?) but I've had a blast. I plan on leveling him all the way up. I'm not a min-maxer, though I do want to be as bad ass as I can be.

I like helping people. I like buffing noobs, PLing guildies, assisting folks in transfers and that kinda thing. I also like the crafting and trading game and making plat. So for me playing a barb makes doing the things I like doing a bit easier. Having access to the good cities for their banks, merchants and crafting stations is really nice. I know I could do all of this as an evil character, but it is so much easier to run to Freeport for items or cash in the bank then it is to run to Neriak.

Come POK, shared banking and the bazaar, this point is pretty much moot, but as it is now playing a barb is much more enjoyable for me then any other race.

[Reiker]

I'd like to point out that Reiker, or whatever his name is, posted a nice analysis of JBBs a while ago that basically successfully makes the argument that it's often more efficient to spend mana to do damage and then to cannibalize than to use a JBB. He was essentially saying that the item, while useful, is not quite as much of a godsend as people think, particularly as you get higher level. If anyone could dig up the post and post a link here, that would be cool.

There was a "discussion" about the usefulness of JBB awhile ago on this forums. My stance is fairly anti-JBB. I'm also curious why you need to root the mob, you'll never lose aggro over your pet (which is good, shaman pet is a horrible tank compared to the shaman).

Anyways, regarding JBB. This item is very good when you can first use it (45) but after awhile it actually becomes detrimental to use. I see you mentioned Pox, which would assume you were JBBing in PoP, which I don't recommend.

As I mentioned before, the strength of a shaman is no downtime. Any time you're not casting a spell you're wasting time. Every action a shaman takes can be represented in "time efficiency" instead of "mana efficiency." The JBB does 263 damage after an 8 second cast time, or 32.875 dps. The benefit of the JBB is that it's mana free. If there's any class that doesn't care about the mana cost of something, it's shaman. If you weren't clicking JBB above, you could afford to cast spells such as Blood of Saryrn. Blood of Saryrn takes 3 seconds to cast and costs 535 mana. To regain that mana it'll take about 6 cannis, or 30 seconds. Blood of Saryrn cost you 33 total seconds. That may seem like a lot until you consider that focuses, Flowing Thought, AAs, and mana regen buffs will make this even more efficient (but won't affect JBB). Blood of Saryrn does 2324 total damage, or 70.42 dps when considering the time lost to canni back mana. Again note that the time decreases with focuses, etc, increasing the potential dps by a lot.

Basically, the JBB would be an amazing and potentially overpowering item in the hands of any other class besides a shaman. Many use one early and get attached to it, not understanding that it's actually hindering them.

Notes: For whatever reason I confused Pox of Bertoxxulous with Breath of Ultor so I wrote this in the context of PoP, where JBB is fairly bad for the reasons above. Although definitely more useful in Kunark and Velious, I look at it like this:

I generally camp my own JBBs. I love soloing the 4 crypt nameds in seb for the phats. If you can hold that camp, a JBB is most likely not going to help you much. You're better off just DPSing / canning / torporing as normal. Even if the dps is on par with JBB, a JBB interrupt is a lot worse than say a canni interrupt so it's still not as good of an option. One strategy to use with the JBB is to click it immediately after casting a normal spell, since you'll save a couple seconds (item clickies ignore global spell cooldown). Chain clicking defeats this advantage, though. If you're not a top tier shaman or aren't very good at the "shaman gameplay" (which is a lot different than any other caster in some ways) the JBB can seem pretty awesome and is a pretty awesome leveling tool at 45. I'd just much rather farm and sell them for 15k+ a pop.

In Velious they get even less useful, due to better spells (Canni4 is insane) and high cold resists.

[mgellan]

Come POK, shared banking and the bazaar, this point is pretty much moot, but as it is now playing a barb is much more enjoyable for me then any other race.

Since there will never be a POK, shared banking and the bazaar in this server your enjoyment will just go on and on :)

Regards,
Mg

PS Agree 100% on your philosophy BTW :) Barbs FTW!

[Noselacri]

It is, I had three different race shaman up to level 50+ on Live classic (1999-2000). The Iksar had equivalent level armor (most from kunark (seb armor, cant really remember but it had high AC and iksar could wear) and plane of hate iksar only armor). By the time I was level 53 or so my iksar had over 100 extra total AC...for example my troll had 950 AC and my Iksar had 1050 AC. This isn't raw AC it's total. If played right, that 100 extra AC becomes important. It essentially creates more mana for the iksar as he takes less damage and therefore needs to be healed less often than an ogre, troll, or barb.

No, it isn't. It's a widely known fact that iksar AC bonus maxes at 42 points of AC. To this very day on Live, iksar is the best tank races because of that tiny amount, but it's more because noone else gets much of anything now that stats are easily maxed and everything can be compensated for with AAs. The iksar AC bonus was never 100, and you must have been comparing two characters with different gear. You need to compare two naked characters with maxed defense and the exact same agility in order to see it, not just "two chars with similar sort of gear".

I would like to add in that it would be a good debate to see who is the second best shaman: iksar or ogre. It's extremely close, and although I did say iksar earlier I can understand how some will say ogre being the second best shaman (the JBB = free damage).

Come Kunark, ogre is the best. The innate regeneration becomes almost pointless once you have Torpor. Up until you get your high-level spells, it's pretty much a toss-up between ogre and troll, with iksar always coming in third because of their much lower stamina and the plate limitation which will restrict you from using a number of items that you otherwise would have upgraded to throughout your life. It matters less in the end game, but on the way there, a lot of shaman-specific gear counts as plate. Ogre is the only race whose innate abilities never become obsolete or decrease in value.

[Estu]

One strategy to use with the JBB is to click it immediately after casting a normal spell, since you'll save a couple seconds (item clickies ignore global spell cooldown). Chain clicking defeats this advantage, though.

What is chain clicking? Is it some way to bypass the global spell cooldown?

[Noselacri]

What he means is that after casting a spell, you can't cast anything again for like two seconds, but you can immediately click an item with a clicky ability. This effectively means that using JBB right after casting a spell shaves a couple of seconds off the cast time, making it an efficient use of time. Clicking it again then negates this advantage because you could have immediately cast a spell instead which is usually more worthwhile. So you could cast a DoT, click JBB, then cast another DoT without having to spend any time at all waiting, but clicking JBB twice in a row isn't efficient because the second time won't gain you anything as you could have cast a spell instead without waiting. JBB was useful for that kind of thing, but not for chain-clicking, because you would get the same (or more) DPS and efficiency out of just casting your spells and using canni/torpor to negate the mana cost.

[Reiker]

Item clickies used to completely clear GCD too. That was an awesome classic bug. You could chain cast anything as long as you clicked jboots inbetween.

[Reiker]

Honestly, the Iksar AC bonus is least beneficial to (high-end/raiding) Shaman than any other class. They miss out on Jaundiced Bone Breastplate clicky (Bramblecoat: +18 AC, +3 DS).