The role of group wizards while levelling up

[Jimjam]

Am I being a dick if I think a group wizard's job is to root and stun rather than limply attempt to dps with their ticklenukes?

Does this ever change, or are they stuck being a second rate enchanter, helping warriors keep aggro and interrupting the spells of enemy casters with the occasional burn? If it does change, what level does that occur?

[bloodmuffin]

They will always be more effective soloing.

I leveled my wizard solo/grouping from 1-52ish. From 10-30 I spent the majority of my times in groups. My initial job is to just Root CC and finish off a mob so people don't have to snare/chase the mobs.

With Breeze or mana song you should have enough to root/nuke each mob. The downside is resists, you can get super unlucky and have just about every spell resisted on a even/yellow con in the early levels which dumps your manapool leaving you pretty useless. If I get resisted I usually give it another shot then give up and med that back until the next mob comes.

This will remain the same forever. You'll root CC only when needed, wait for the tank to establish agro, the dps put in some work, and then nuke out the final HP preventing running mobs. Occasional stuns for healing/wiz merbs.

[ridiculousmoose]

Thing is most 'group' wizards just do the lame one nuke per mob shit... makes it easier for them to get back to their tv show while getting free xp.

[Gvelz Underfoot]

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

Thing is most 'group' wizards just do the lame one nuke per mob shit... makes it easier for them to get back to their tv show while getting free xp.

1 nuke per mob is fine if conserving mana for a boss / healer / nuker mob or in case of evac needed. Furthermore I recall mana regen / mana pool being a bit more difficult in early grouping and sometimes 1 nuke is all there is mana for due to chain pulling. If the wizard is low on mana no one really cares, so we have to wait until the cleric is low for a group to take a short break.

If someone in the group is snaring, and the mob is gonna get 1 nuke, do it so that the mob goes into "flee" mode faster which a) allows the full damage of the nuke to impact the target and b) the melee can finish it off without getting beat on. Waiting until the mob is already in flee mode is typically a waste of mana, especially of it only takes half the nuke to finish it off. The only exceptions are if there is no snare possible, and it's gonna run and agro other stuff.

A good wizard will know when to nuke once, and when to dump nukes at a target. Especially once we have concussion and can tightly control our aggro. Stunning and rooting are great to have but very situational at higher levels, since 2 or 3 hits from a mob will wreck a wizard making the healers job more difficult. I only attempt to stun if the mob is tough and has a Complete Heal, and I only root if the chanter or bard is AFK or dead.

One problem is that many of our stuns and interrupts have a greater chance of getting resisted, resulting in a waste of mana. Another problem is that the casting time on the stun and interrupt spells make it tricky. Thunderstrike at level 29 has a 3.6 second cast time, for example, and Force Strike with a whopping 5.5 second timer. Attempting to time that so that it interrupts a heal is tenuous at best and even if timed right some other class could end up getting it interrupted wasting mana that could have been used for a straight and lower agro nuke. And on top of all of this, the recast timer for these spells is fairly long, anywhere from 12 to 24 seconds for many of our nukes with interrupt / Tishan's & Markar's lineup. So potentially would need 2 spell slots to effectively keep a caster interrupted. Again, great to have but only if there's no one else in the party that can perform these tasks.

[Decad]

Root Snare stun is a wizard job in a group and this is more important then DPS.

[JackFlash]

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

Root Snare stun is a wizard job in a group and this is more important then DPS.

[Jimjam]

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

I only root if the chanter or bard is AFK or dead.

Why not root in a group with an active enc?

[Sage Truthbearer]

Have evac memmed and know when to use it. I've had Wizards save the entire group when a bad pull went south and a full group wipe was imminent.

[Gvelz Underfoot]

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

Why not root in a group with an active enc?

There are some situations where that becomes needed, for example mobs that can be rooted but are immune to mez. I find that with a competent enchanter that is concentrating on the role of crowd control, the wizard should not need to use root very often which allows more concentration for well timed nukes.

I definitely see the wizards role as a secondary crowd control when paired with an Enchanter in a group and being aware of when to help and when to stay out of the way and just nuke is important. After all, we both get Fetter which is the best root spell in the game. One trick I learned is I can hit concussion on a mob I root and that helps it to not come right after me.

[Ivory]

A good player uses all of their classes abilities.

Paladins should root / heal to control mobs.

Rangers should snare / root / heal.

SKs should have their pets up for extra dps and snare.

So many people just sit down and don't use their full class (like all of the clerics that just sit around...most don't even know they have a lull AND mem blur spell!!).