Shaman slow Tagar vs Torgor vs Turgur

[daxchunjae1912]

Hello I am currently lvl 49 and have been using Tagar's insect for many many levels. I have 2 questions:
1) Is the slow % difference significant enough to use Togor's or should I continue to save mana and use Tagars?
2) Does using the lower version of slow have any increase in resistance because it's against a higher lvl mob or does it not matter?

I know I should malo and then slow but for the sake of simplicity just focus on the different versions of slow, thanks in advance and if this question has been beaten to death before I apologize!

[loramin]

I have no idea what the min/max answer is, but I've always just used my highest level slow and never had a problem. As for the malo line, it's largely pointless until you actually get Malo itself at 60, because all the other spells in that line have the same chance of landing as slow does (so you're better off just making two slow attempts instead of say a malosini and a slow).

[Yuuvy The Destroyer]

Use a down ranked slow on everything except raid mobs.

[Danth]

If you want to play it easy, use top rank slow and don't give it any thought. I prefer not overthinking things so that's the approach that works for me. If you prefer to min-max, use the lowest-rank slow that keeps damage intake low enough that whoever's on heals isn't running out of mana. I don't particularly like the level 29 slow. If downranking beyond the 39 slow, I typically favor going all the way down to Walking Sleep. The 29 slow costs a lot of mana for its relative effect.

You don't really need to malo before slowing until level 60. Prior to then, none of the malo-line spells have resist modifiers, which means if you can land a malo, you can land slow. The level 60 malo is different since it's unresistable. As for spell level....I've never noticed it to have any difference.

Danth

[loramin]

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

Use a down ranked slow on everything except raid mobs.

Interesting: that sounded like bad advice to me, so I stopped being lazy and did the math. It turns out you have an excellent point: from 51-60 the difference between Togor's and Turgur's is always exactly 5% slow and 75 mana (and I suspect the ratio is similar for the lower level spells).

At 51 Togor's gets you 61% (vs. Turgur's 66%), which means that you're paying 175 mana for 61% slow, or 0.34% slow per mana spent. In other words, you get 0.34%/mana for Torpor's, and only 0.06% slow per mana spent for the extra mana spent on Turgur's. Definitely less efficient.

Now compare that to Superior Healing (which you also get at 51), which heals 583 for 250 mana, or 2.3 HP/mana. This means that for a Togor's to be better than a Superior Heal it has to prevent at least 409 HP of damage, which (at 61% slow) means whoever is getting hit would have to take at least 671 damage (pre-slow) to justify it. Comparatively Turgur's would need to prevent 575 damage, or 872 damage pre-slow.

In other words ... efficiency-wise it's pretty clear Togor's is better: a mob would have to deal A LOT (I'm too lazy to calculate how much) of damage for the extra 5% from Turgur's to justify its extra 75 mana.

But here's the other thing to consider: efficiency isn't necessarily the most important consideration. If you're soloing, or running out of mana in a group, then you should absolutely use Togor's. But in a group I often found that I had extra mana, if the group had a cleric at least. Given how inefficient Shaman group DPS is (whether you DoT or DD), it's not like you have a lot of great options for that extra mana (and with a cleric you likely won't need it for healing either).

So, if you're in a group with a cleric, using Turgur's to slow mobs an extra 5% ... which might be really helpful if you get some adds ... still might be the best use of your mana, even if it is less efficient. But it does seem like most of the rest of the time Togor's is the smarter choice.

[Troxx]

Tagars 125 mana for > 50% slow standard duration, shorter cast time
Togors 175 mana for 70% slow standard duration, longer cast time
Turgurs 250 mana for 75% slow long duration, shorter cast time.

It’s a mistake to always use Turgurs once you get it. Mobs die fast enough that the duration difference is meaningless. 75% vs 70% is a wash on most content. Prior to Torpor at 60 mana is always a balancing act and Turgurs just isn’t worth it.

Until you have unlimited mana with torpor best to save Turgurs for the exceptional fight. I used Togors 80-90% of the time until I got torpor. I even used Tagars a lot more than Turgurs.

[Jimjam]

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

Again, a mob slowed 70%, is doing 20% more DPS to your tank, than a mob slowed 75%. That's how broken slow is in EQ...

You need to account for the standing regen of the tank.

A slowed mob might do 20dps at 60, or 17 if superslowed.

With a fungi iksar tank under the effect of regrowth that translates to 13 or 10 net hp loss persecond. Once you include time spent establishing aggro, waiting for pulls, or moving between spawns (which is going to happen because in this instance you'll probably be somewhere like CE and not focusing on xp) the tank is taking very little damage from slowed mobs at all.

The real damage seems to come in if the tank manages to establish aggro before slow lands, or to the dps as they fail to evade/fd/die like a good ranger/wizard.

[Troxx]

I’m not sure how a well played shaman 51-59 has a lot of extra mana lying around in a busy group. In general you have:

-2-4 melee to keep stat buffed
-standard stam/hp +/- sow to all
-2-4 hastes to keep up
-1-4 regens to potentially maintain

All of that is background noise on top of

-125-250 mana per mob per slow attempt
-rooting to assist with cc if you’re worth your salt
-possible main healing, realistically (and hopefully) assisting with patch heals
-last ditch if still rolling in mana, contributing dps.

51-59 as a troll with ikky bp and later fungi, it was very rare that I had down time. It was always a canni-dance weaving rhythm of activity. If I found myself with extra mana, it was applied to a fresh round of hastes/regens so I never found myself having to play catch up.

Mana was always a balancing act until I figured out using turgurs as primary slow was idiotic. Togors was always my work horse. I kept Turgurs loaded for Cc’d Mobs and chaotic moments, but Togors was the go to.

The functional difference between the two is minimal. 75 less mana per cast, however, is huge. A chain pulling group (averaging 1 a minute) works out to 4500 less mana per hour simply by settling for 5% less slow. That’s 20.5 minutes worth of meditating hitting every med tick.

Super fast killing? Tagars vs don’t bother slowing.
Steady killing? Togors > Turgurs
Hard group named? Alternate Togors/Turgurs casts until one sticks
Long fights or lots of mobs in camp? Turgurs > Togors for duration

[Kaera]

What about tigur? Group slow and reduce hate counter built in.

[Danth]

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

What about tigur? Group slow and reduce hate counter built in.

Odds are you won't have it memorized when you need it; Shaman life means not having a lot of spare spell slots available. The group slow might occasionally see some use when you know in advance you'll be going into a situation with lots of opponents, like fearplane and hateplane breaks. As a general rule though it isn't great. It doesn't slow all that well, doesn't last very long, only hits four targets and if one (or more) resists you can't tell which. Mostly the single-target slows end up getting used anyway.

Danth