Biggest class impact from Velious

[nuuki]

There are several threads from years ago that mention some changes that Velious brings to the class dynamic, but am curious what you guys believe the most impacted classes are from both a positive and negative angles?

Wizard - from bottom 3 to top 3? Is this true?
Ranger - from last to pretty useful in raids?

Are there any other major transformations caused by the Velious release? If so, what caused them?

[-Catherin-]

You will never have enough clerics on a raid.

[JayN]

Ranger imho; 2hander and skill buffs... CotP and Bowing becomes viable

[wormed]

Man I remember Rangers being fucking insane in PoP.

[Oleris]

necro get buffed with root/snare stacking 1 month in. That makes epic alot better and gives them another dot to throw on/survivability when root wears off.

[Cecily]

Ranger imho; 2hander and skill buffs... CotP and Bowing becomes viable

Rangers get no good 2 handers in Velious.

[dafier]

You will never have enough clerics on a raid.

Sums it up....

8 cleric CH rotation.....8 more doing other heals. I am talking a 40 man raid. In case you don't know math, that's 40% of the raid.

On a serious note:

About 20 to 30% of the raids were clerics on big targets.

Early Velious release. 32 characters 6 clerics and about 6 druids (all healers) on a Vindi raid. We never had issues with DPS.....it was always finding enough heals. WHY THAT MUCH ON VINDI!? I don't know.....

Soon after there was a 4 cleric CH for Vindi and almost no other heals needed.

Live and learn

First AoW raid I was in on live, there were about 70 of us. I believe we had about 12 clerics and a bunch of druids. AoW hits were retarded. I think we had 3 tanks, managing agro, and DPS Had to watch out while switching tank agro.....we had good management so we got him down the first try. (NOT the first to down him on the server)

[dafier]

Rangers get no good 2 handers in Velious.

Primals are the ABSOLUTE best for Rangers in Velious. :)

[Necabo]

I think the fact that wizards get Translocates truly sets them apart in the porting competition.

[ukaking]

Iksar warriors become plate wearing...thus making us the elite tanks! =)

[clellaen]

How is Bowing viable without AAs as a ranger? I thought rangers were pretty meh in Velious outside of CotP

[Cecily]

Primals are the ABSOLUTE best for Rangers in Velious. :)

Ehhh primals are 33/35. This (http://wiki.project1999.com/Clawed_Griffin_Sword) is the best 2 hand option in Velious for rangers. Not sold on that parsing better than the 1 hand options.

[Erydan Ouragan]

Ehhh primals are 33/35. This (http://wiki.project1999.com/Clawed_Griffin_Sword) is the best 2 hand option in Velious for rangers. Not sold on that parsing better than the 1 hand options.

Wrong.

Primals have Avatar proc. That's +100 STR/AGI/DEX/ATK.

So do the math. If you proc 10 times, that's +1000 STR/ATK.

That's a huge dps increase. Even better with dual wielding, since you get both procs and double avatar stacks.

Add in a celestial healing chain, you're practically invincible.

[Visual]

Do you become like Neo in matrix with 1000000 agi

[Erydan Ouragan]

Do you become like Neo in matrix with 1000000 agi

Irrelevant.

With a CCH nothing can kill you anyways.

[DevGrousis]

Do you become like Neo in matrix with 1000000 agi

haha could be one of my favorite posts in the last 6 years

[khandman]

I'm looking forward to when xp penalties are removed so my paladin can level up at a slightly faster pace :)

[Speedi]

Druids:

Spells - Protection of the Glades, Nature's Touch, Chloroblast, Ro's Fiery Sundering, Fixation of Ro
Patch Changes - Druid track is actually useful now. Gets bumped to same skill as bards. Root/snare stacking. With epic and bracer clicky, druids can basically kill anything as long as it don't summon and/or not high MR.

There are other things not class related like Warden Symbol of Tunare
( http://wiki.project1999.com/Warden_Symbol_of_Tunare ) with Epic+Bracer clicky+Root neck. Basically don't need any mana to kill.

Dru powa!

[Pint]

Wizard - from bottom 3 to top 3? Is this true?

Where did you hear this nonsense? Since when were wizards anything other than awesome...

[fiveeauxfour]

Paladins are going to have a great time in velious. Their stuns are going to be so invaluable in grouping situations to mitigate dmg. Heals and such. Ramp tank. Man, paladins rock

[webrunner5]

You are GOING to have to have a Warrior, Cleric and probably a Monk and a Rogue in a group in Velious. DPS, DPS, DPS. So that does not leave a hell of a lot more classes open. Slows will get resisted a LOT from both a Shaman and a Enchanter. Epic Bard would be a hell of a good addition.

So pick your last slot. Wizard good for Evac, and short bust DPS, and ports. That would be my pick even over a Druid. Mage for DPS maybe and COTH.

I still play Live and the Sleeper. So I know a bit about how Velious works, and have played EQ since early 2000 pretty much non stop since. The Monk, Rogue ought to have their Epic's so they have haste weapons, and the Warrior should have a haste belt, CoF by then so they, the DPS in the group, does not need Haste from a Shaman or Enchanter, I know Bard and others stack Haste, but I think they are more of a liability than what they bring to the table. Sucks rezzing the Enchanter 10 times, and Bards are Swishy as hell, in a group for the hours you have time to play. They do, and WILL, die a lot. And all should have J Boots by then so don't need SoW. And the Cleric with CH will never come across a DPS they can not heal totally with CH. No one will EVER have 7,500 HP in Velious I don't care how much they are Twinked or Buffed.

You can 4 box on the Sleeper and I run a Warrior, Cleric, Mage and Wizard. Just about the best you can do DPS wise with 4 people. I throw a Bard in there at times, but hard to do even with Melody because of dropped songs. But on here a Bard can work if they can twist 3 to 4 songs. But not many people can for hours at a time. You sure as hell don't need a one song wonder in Velious.

Outdoor zones a Ranger or a Druid are pretty killer with Harmony and Druid with charm animal. Enchanter sucks in Velious with a Charmed pet because when it breaks, and it will, the damn pet is so powerful it kills all the casters in the group. I am NOT into Enchanters, to many resists, sorry, in Velious. They die too often.

People are going to have to totally re think groups when it comes out. Fights will last for 4 to 5 minutes instead of 30 seconds like Kunark mobs. It will be plan B trust me. And it will take hours to set up a Raid, not minutes like now, even with Bat Phones, and a hell of a lot of people to do it.

[pharmakos]

Wrong.

Primals have Avatar proc. That's +100 STR/AGI/DEX/ATK.

So do the math. If you proc 10 times, that's +1000 STR/ATK.

That's a huge dps increase. Even better with dual wielding, since you get both procs and double avatar stacks.

Add in a celestial healing chain, you're practically invincible.

lol

[Rayzor84]

Anyone else able to chime in on how an enchanter changes in velious? Are they basically unwanted in groups due to charm being less viable? Soloing out of the question?

[Ohno]

Anyone else able to chime in on how an enchanter changes in velious? Are they basically unwanted in groups due to charm being less viable? Soloing out of the question?

Played a friend's enchanter for her raid group... afterwards I got bothered for groups.

So maybe?

[Master Roshi]

enchanter boon buff is leet, the werewolf with 100dex +lifetap proc is beast for rogues and monks

edit: charm dps is also very viable for enc, so I dont see them dropping down the ranks very much at all.

[Erydan Ouragan]

Anyone else able to chime in on how an enchanter changes in velious? Are they basically unwanted in groups due to charm being less viable? Soloing out of the question?

No.

It's true that Velious mobs are more magic resistant, that's a fact. Charm will drop more, slows from enc/shm/brd will get resisted more often.

That being said, charm still remains god-mode, all the way through PoP iirc. I don't remember when exactly, but i remember a nerf do charmed mob damage at some point.

The truth is, kunark is easy compared to Velious and we've been in it for 4 years now. Dragons dying in 16 seconds, level 1 epic rogues, epic monks with tstaffs, weaponized+hasted charmed mobs. Stuff dies really fast, effortlessly.

So yes, some people will act as if the sky is falling and cry that enchanters are garbage now, but the reality is that enchanters, despite the increased MR on mobs, will remain extremely powerful and desirable in pretty much every aspect of the game.

The good chanters that play with skilled people will thrive. You know a group works well together when the charm breaks and the cleric stuns the mob, the bard mezzes it and the wiz is spamming his flux staff to gain agro, all at the same time.

Good teamwork will always prevail, take care of your chanter and everything will be fine.

Edit: Like webrunner said, fights will last a couple minutes instead of a couple seconds, so it'll be worth it to tash/malo/occlusion every mob. This will help reduce some of the increased resistances.

[Fanguru]

Why would a ranger go 2-hander and lose swiftwind buff? :/
Bowing becomes viable for 2 minutes every 72 minutes, and puts weaponshield on CD.
I love trueshot as a toy, and I am trying to use it outside of AoE range on some fights, but it's no game changer.
Velious is not bad for rangers and I love the class, but in raids we are mostly a buff bot for melee groups with a bit of dps.

[Nebi]

Wrong.

Primals have Avatar proc. That's +100 STR/AGI/DEX/ATK.

So do the math. If you proc 10 times, that's +1000 STR/ATK.

That's a huge dps increase. Even better with dual wielding, since you get both procs and double avatar stacks.

Add in a celestial healing chain, you're practically invincible.

quick someone cast 10 damage shields on me.

[fadetree]

Ranger imho; 2hander and skill buffs... CotP and Bowing becomes viable

No. 'Bowing' does not become viable. We get a nice buff and a semi-useful raid discipline. We get the hybrid penalty lifted eventually. That's about it.

[Dabeach]

No.
The good chanters that play with skilled people will thrive. You know a group works well together when the charm breaks and the cleric stuns the mob, the bard mezzes it and the wiz is spamming his flux staff to gain agro, all at the same time.

Good teamwork will always prevail, take care of your chanter and everything will be fine.


Whut, Cleric stun on a break?, whut. bard mez?, wow a wiz helping out on a break!!,..

Where are these ppl?? PST.

59 DE Ench.

[Daldaen]

Every class gains a decent bit by the end of Velious:

Warriors - Mobs hit so hard that defensive is require for tanking and ramp tanking
Paladins - Defensive skill cap 10 months in, New Heals/Spells 2 months in, New HP buff
SK - Defensive skill cap 10 months in, New Lifetaps/Spells 2 months in, New fast cast FD spell
Rangers - Offensive skill cap increase 10 months in, New spells 2 months in, New group ATK buff
Monks - Pulling becomes more crucial, also sone skill cap increases that they really shouldn't have gotten, monks stay OP
Rogues - Sort of stagnate in Velious. May get some skill cap increases I forget
Bards - Puretone disc + Occlussion ends up bringing more to barding on raids. Epic Trakanon becomes Triggerable late I think, so epic is more attainable. Also Deftdance is vastly underappreciated on a class that can mez, snare, and lull. Deftdance + CoTH allows you to do some incredible pulls.

Wizards - 4-5 Months in Bane nukes are added. On a select few targets, a 2k unresistable nuke is incredible. They become top DPS more reliably when these come out. Wizard Epic is made easier after 4 months VS staff drops every time and on a 3 day respawn.
Enchanters - Gift of Brilliance for more mana regen, a second mana tap. Less content is soloable on a chanter but they can still make most zones their playground. Raids have very little mezables content... So find a charmed pet or get used to buff botting.
Magicians - Epic becomes more doable in Velious when magi has the earth staff. Beyond that though, you're just summoning mod rods and CotHing
Necromancers - Really get the shaft. New Lich blows. Most other spells blow. You get access to some Regen items/clickies to allow for easier Demi Lich and you can maybe get Holgresh Elder Beads to Lifetap for continual demi Lich. Other than that, enjoy soloing in Cobalt Scar and certain areas of PoMischief. On raids you pet Attack and twitch

Clerics - CH chain actually matters, so you go from needing 5~ on raids to needing 8-10. Aegolism is nice. Celestial Healing is nice also while it stacks with CE, and for leveling clerics.
Druids - Protection of Glades for 6 mana regen that stacks with all, new 900 point heal, new remedy style 400 point heal, new ATK/AC/Fire debuffs, new indoor casting stun, new bear pet that has multiple utility purposes... Useless for DPS or tanking though. Druids also get the most useful BP Clicky - free group regen - Snare and Root stack after 1 month. Tracking becomes useful 4 months into velious. 4 months in Fay and VS are Triggerable for the hard epic pieces. Makes the epic far easier, coupled with snare/root stacking it's far more useful as well. Egress is indoor castable 6 months in. Kunark Evacs are castable from any zone 6 months in. It's a great druid expansion.
Shamans - Don't even need anything in Velious, Slow/Malo alone could keep them relevant in groups even with 0 other spells. Velious adds Focus to limit number of buffs cast, Canni 4 comes in after 4-6 months. Primal Avatar for no reagent avatar after 8-9 months. Shamans will live in PoMischief, selling cards for ridiculous prices. Hope your DA Idols and Sky FD rings are prepped for the run!


Of everyone, Necromancer, Magicians and Rogues gain the least in Velious. Druids and Wizards gain a lot. Warriors and Clerics become a lot more valuable simply due to the type of content on raids. Knights become better group tanks but most things if consequence will crush them still due to no defensive. Rangers get some increases but are pretty meh.

[webrunner5]

Rangers get Fear Animals so with Snare they are pretty damned good at that part. It gets old quick, but it is a BIG gain for them. And no Hybrid XP penalty helps them a ton also. And people will need them to Track. Velious zones on average are HUGE. :eek:

[nuuki]

Thanks so much this is great. Have a few follow up questions hoping you can help with :)

Every class gains a decent bit by the end of Velious:

Warriors - Mobs hit so hard that defensive is require for tanking and ramp tanking


Are you referring to raid targets here or even group content? Also, can you clarify what "ramp tanking" is?


Paladins - Defensive skill cap 10 months in, New Heals/Spells 2 months in, New HP buff
SK - Defensive skill cap 10 months in, New Lifetaps/Spells 2 months in, New fast cast FD spell
Rangers - Offensive skill cap increase 10 months in, New spells 2 months in, New group ATK buff
Monks - Pulling becomes more crucial, also sone skill cap increases that they really shouldn't have gotten, monks stay OP

What makes pulling more crucial?


Rogues - Sort of stagnate in Velious. May get some skill cap increases I forget
Bards - Puretone disc + Occlussion ends up bringing more to barding on raids. Epic Trakanon becomes Triggerable late I think, so epic is more attainable. Also Deftdance is vastly underappreciated on a class that can mez, snare, and lull. Deftdance + CoTH allows you to do some incredible pulls.

Can you share some of these Deft+CoTH tricks you're referring to? Seems like Deft is just a parry discipline so I'm not sure how this would work.


Wizards - 4-5 Months in Bane nukes are added. On a select few targets, a 2k unresistable nuke is incredible. They become top DPS more reliably when these come out. Wizard Epic is made easier after 4 months VS staff drops every time and on a 3 day respawn.
Enchanters - Gift of Brilliance for more mana regen, a second mana tap. Less content is soloable on a chanter but they can still make most zones their playground. Raids have very little mezables content... So find a charmed pet or get used to buff botting.
Magicians - Epic becomes more doable in Velious when magi has the earth staff. Beyond that though, you're just summoning mod rods and CotHing
Necromancers - Really get the shaft. New Lich blows. Most other spells blow. You get access to some Regen items/clickies to allow for easier Demi Lich and you can maybe get Holgresh Elder Beads to Lifetap for continual demi Lich. Other than that, enjoy soloing in Cobalt Scar and certain areas of PoMischief. On raids you pet Attack and twitch

I'm guessing most people don't play necros so they can raid hehe.. so how exciting are these Cobalt Scar and PoM places to solo in?


Clerics - CH chain actually matters, so you go from needing 5~ on raids to needing 8-10. Aegolism is nice. Celestial Healing is nice also while it stacks with CE, and for leveling clerics.
Druids - Protection of Glades for 6 mana regen that stacks with all, new 900 point heal, new remedy style 400 point heal, new ATK/AC/Fire debuffs, new indoor casting stun, new bear pet that has multiple utility purposes... Useless for DPS or tanking though. Druids also get the most useful BP Clicky - free group regen - Snare and Root stack after 1 month. Tracking becomes useful 4 months into velious. 4 months in Fay and VS are Triggerable for the hard epic pieces. Makes the epic far easier, coupled with snare/root stacking it's far more useful as well. Egress is indoor castable 6 months in. Kunark Evacs are castable from any zone 6 months in. It's a great druid expansion.
Shamans - Don't even need anything in Velious, Slow/Malo alone could keep them relevant in groups even with 0 other spells. Velious adds Focus to limit number of buffs cast, Canni 4 comes in after 4-6 months. Primal Avatar for no reagent avatar after 8-9 months. Shamans will live in PoMischief, selling cards for ridiculous prices. Hope your DA Idols and Sky FD rings are prepped for the run!


Of everyone, Necromancer, Magicians and Rogues gain the least in Velious. Druids and Wizards gain a lot. Warriors and Clerics become a lot more valuable simply due to the type of content on raids. Knights become better group tanks but most things if consequence will crush them still due to no defensive. Rangers get some increases but are pretty meh.

[applesauce25r624]

rangers...

group atk buff on everybody before raid
trueshot discipline
then /q and log onto another class

[Daldaen]

Warriors on raid content. Knights tank all group content fine/better than warriors.

Rampage is a special Attack many raid mobs and Velious mobs get. Basically, whenever it triggers a successful roll on rampage, that mob will execute a set of attacks (1-4) on another target (not the main tank). The target is determined by the earliest on aggro list. So if a monk aggros a mob first, then the warrior attacks, then a shaman slows, then a cleric heals. The rampage list would be Monk->Warrior->Shaman->Cleric. So long as the mob is alive, it will continue hitting the monk as rampage unless the monk dies, FDs or runs far away. If one of those occurs, next comes the warrior, however if he is main tanking he is skipped on the rampage list and the shaman becomes the player taking rampage damage. Basically it requires you to heal two tanks, the rampage tank gets hit less often and will require fewer heals but having a defensive rampage tank is important on raid mobs.

Pulling is more crucial because mobs are harder and you can't as easily kite, CC, offtank, or burn out a boss before the adds kill you. Which is exactly what you can do in Kunark.

Deftdance is only a parry disc, but on a class with fast Runspeed, 2 tick DA, snares, mezzes, lulls, they can single pull some incredible things. It's just another tool to be used in a pinch. It was more useful with Fading Memories, but the same can be achieved with CotH to clear aggro.

CoS is extremely boring to solo on a Necro as. PoMischief is a bit more interesting... But they are somewhat limited in what they can do in PoM.

[webrunner5]

Warriors on raid content. Knights tank all group content fine/better than warriors.

You must not have played a healer class with that statement in Velious. :p

[eisley]

I think warriors gain the most, in that they gain abilities via weapon procs. Avatar, Ensnare (no vp on live), Slows (willsapper arguably most important weapon in game), Unresistable lifetaps, Blind, runes, dots, and just huge raw damage (scepter of destruction) or threat. Clickies are another factor, see: Dain hammer, Tunare belt, 10th ring, etc

If you are talking absolute endgame, best gear characters, warriors end up incredibly powerful. Shamans end up pretty ridiculous as well, with the ability to keep themselves avatared, and a few specific proc weapons made for them, as well as being able to achieve knight-level AC.

Hard to answer question because its a gear-oriented expansion, for the most part.

[Razdeline]

Everyone forgets hybrids get an accumulative spell haste buff every level after 50.

[Aaramis]

Why would a ranger go 2-hander and lose swiftwind buff? :/
Bowing becomes viable for 2 minutes every 72 minutes, and puts weaponshield on CD.
I love trueshot as a toy, and I am trying to use it outside of AoE range on some fights, but it's no game changer.
Velious is not bad for rangers and I love the class, but in raids we are mostly a buff bot for melee groups with a bit of dps.

2 minutes of absolute god-mode dps, best saved for a raid target (i.e. Tormax, Yelinak, etc.).

Make a group of Rangers together..... and suddenly you have a mafia.

[wormed]

I still facepalm that they're going to introduce shit like hybrid exp removal and (especially) combat table improvements to knights/rangers in some ridiculous timeframe.

Jeez.

[Clark]

Iksar warriors become plate wearing...thus making us the elite tanks! =)

:cool: