Good Duo

[Crypto]

Hey all.

My wife and I are planning to start p1999 and I'd like to have some feedback about what two classes to select for the strongest duo. We plan to group as well, but I'd say at least half of the time we'll probably duo.

We're leaning toward a Druid as one of the members just because of the utility and ports.

My skill level is pretty high with EQ and my wife has just a bit of experience with the game (few months on EQ Live).

Thanks!

[Waedawen]

druid and enchanter yo, especially if you're going for 1) strength and 2) ease of access to the world. double charm, damage shield, mind buffs, health buffs, speed buffs, snare, mez, unresistable outdoor paci, indoor paci. each class compliments the other to the T.

take the lead on the enchanter and have her play support on the druid

it's seriously fucking great up to and including level 60. you may very well never group with anyone else. you can hit any and all of the cash or xp camps. you can grab a melee or 2 and form a straight up group as well.

[Nimmanu]

There are a lot of factors involved in this decision.

Druids aren't that wanted at high levels. There are also tons of them.

Whichever of you makes the druid will end up being the achilles tendon of the duo. The enchanter (if you went that route) would be asked nonstop to go to groups, but the "I have a druid with me" will turn it into "Oh, never mind", especially since there are a LOT of enchanters on the server.

If you want to raid, that will become only more of a problem.

So while the druid seems great on the surface due to the great many benefits it has for the process of leveling up... you have to look at the long-term life of your characters. What is your high game plan?


Now, all of that babble being said... if you go with a warrior over an enchanter, you'll have the weight of necessity behind you, "You want me, you take druid" is a whole new value when you're playing a warrior. They are, at high levels, the hands-down premier tank. Tanks as an over-all, are hard to come by, as well. And people actually prefer a warrior over a hybrid because hybrids alter group exp in a negative fashion.

Unfortunately, if you went with, say, a warrior and cleric... this is a painful duo consisting of low DPS and little additional utility. However, the cleric later comes by the ability to rez, which in and of itself is a pretty magical quality (pun intended).

There's no cut-and-dried answer to your question, because so much of it relies upon multitudes of factors. There were servers in the past that used paladin tanks and just added another 5 clerics to the rotation because clerics were a dime a dozen and paladins allowed others to instantly go full-frontal DPS with no-holds-barred.

Ultimately, it's a combination of factors.


My bottom line advice? Find classes you will each ENJOY. Because if you play a warrior because you "should" in order to complete a "optimum duo", but hate it... you'll eventually quit playing due to sheer boredom or unhappiness.

The BEST classes are the ones you'll enjoy and stick with.

[maskedmelon]

If Druid is definitive, I would suggest:

Druid/Necro - Second most powerful companion for Druid, significantly easier to play effectively than chanter.
Duid/Chanter - most powerful companion for Druid, high skill required
Druid/Monk - best choice if you want a melee + Druid
Druid/Rogue - would rely on animal fear, not ideal.

Could also give Druid/Shaman a whirl. Shaman are very powerful soloers. I am not sure how synergistic the duo would be, but could sure be fun and offer stronger survivability with the second healer than the others above.

[Lyrith]

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

If Druid is definitive, I would suggest:

Druid/Necro - Second most powerful companion for Druid, significantly easier to play effectively than chanter.
Duid/Chanter - most powerful companion for Druid, high skill required
Druid/Monk - best choice if you want a melee + Druid
Druid/Rogue - would rely on animal fear, not ideal.

Great information here! For my first Duo on the server it was a Warrior/Cleric which worked out great for us, because we NEVER had a problem finding monks/rogues/etc for dps. Only hard to find an enchanter at times. Second Duo was a Monk/Shaman, same deal... DPS is almost always easy to find! If you play the Tank/Healer setup you will have an easy slow ride to 60. The good thing, is each level you get the faster it speeds up.

[Crypto]

Thanks for all the great feedback.

Having played a Druid in the Kunark era, I can understand the low grouping/raiding desirability; it's a problem I had on my main (druid at the time) a lot. I ended up soloing up the levels.

I'm not 100% sure that we'll ever get to raiding status as we have pretty busy lives, but I'd like to raid if we do reach that level.

Having thought a great deal about this, I'm currently thinking of rolling a Druid to play mostly in the event that my wife doesn't want to play at a given time, as I get a little more into these things than she does. That would give me something to play when she's not around and eventually provide us a source of income (farming, ports, etc.). My thought is that starting from the ground up, we'll need a way to make money and gear up.

I think I like the idea of tank/Cleric + whatever pickups we can find. My wife wants to "heal and buff" so Cleric would be a pretty good fit. The class I've played most in my EQ history is SK, which is what I'd want to pick as a tank (over Warrior). I haven't really played SK though in classic/Kunark era (mainly POP era), so my knowledge there is weak. I do recall a lot of people saying that SK was a bad choice in the early days.

Thoughts?

[Waedawen]

Playing Everquest in a 'linear' fashion (like tank, spank, pull, repeat, or root rotting) is really boring. And you're going to be playing the game for a long time in order to get any adequate amount of money or experience.

Playing a double caster setup or more rounded classes in general really allows you to make fun out of any thing. In EQ, 'fun' is exploration, killing mobs, getting loot, gaining levels. Pigeon holing yourself into very narrow classes doesn't help that. Tank classes aren't pliable enough to adapt a given situation. Priest classes in general are all great, so if your wife wants to 'buff and heal' (although I'm of the opinion people never know what they truly want) any and all of them are great for doing just that and much more.

[maskedmelon]

If you want to go cleric + tank then I think SK is probably your best choice. They offer slightly higher DPS than a Paladin, with comparable aggro management and no spell overlap that you get with the Paladin. She can lull and root to help with splits/cc ^^

Paladin is also a great tank despite the spell overlap, though outside of battling undead, they probably excel more in a group setting than a duo due to their low dps. They are capable of some fantastic crowd control if played properly, are great pullers, decent back-up healers and can effectively double their dps for short burns if needed on undead.

Warrior is desirable for raids and there are many who love them just because, but they have terrible Afro management until they obtain some decent proc weapons at later levels and cannot single pull their way out of a wet paper bag ^^. On the upside, they offer superior dps ^^

Cleric/chanter is an excellent choice as well, but requires some cha gear to be effective (charm dependent) making things slow starting off, but very fast once that requirement has been satisfied.

[Nimmanu]

Well, honestly, given what you've said, I would personally suggest Warrior or SK and a shamaness. (EDIT: If you go shamaness, I'd lean towards the SK for single pulls to offset the decrease in healing capabilities. SK can pull singles, warrior can tank multiple targets but not pull singles for the life of us [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.] ).

You'll have enough healing. You'll have great buffs and utility such a invis and levi and the like.

If you don't think you'll raid all that much, then you don't need to worry about warrior tanking as much, and an SK can be an equitable choice for a secondary (off) tank.

On the other hand, you do have two classes that at least have viable things to bring to a raid. Shaman will be very wanted, and SK can offtank well enough to offer something worth having them for.

That being said, at the high end, there's nothing and no one who heals like a cleric. Shaman buffs, however, will be more popular on the low end, and if your wife is like me and just really loves to stop and throw a buff at nooblets as she passes... sow is the answer and that puts shaman at the top.



Just my personal opinion. I would MYSELF pick a cleric because I LOVE cleric, despite the lack of versatility. But your wife will have a lot more to offer to the group as a whole as far as travel and the like (levi, sow, invis, see invis). She has more to offer in the early levels as far as stopping to buff up a nooblet. And later on she gets regen which makes the nooblets unstoppable in its own right (comparison to cleric heroic bond, for example).


Anyway, hope that helps and doesn't confuse the issue more!

[Crypto]

All excellent feedback. Thanks again folks. I knew I had a ton to consider and all of this commentary just adds to it [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.] Good stuff.