Nerf the Drizzt looking dude in Epic LoD

[Chai]

Usual protocol in quite a few of the pugs ive ran this quest in amounts to melee go hide in the hallway after the rakshasha and the caster will dot/kite the drow around til he's dead. That's pretty epic game design when you are basically a piece of trash who gets in the way.

What ever happened to the good old dnd when you couldnt run backwards full speed lobbing spells endlessly while stupid mobs just got kited around waiting to die. Early turned based dnd games from 20 years ago had better ai then ddo does.

Its ok, turbine has a solution, all they need to do is inflate mob hp more and everything will work out...

In the good ol D&D a caster needs to lob ONE spell - no need for the kiting, perching, etc.

If more than one spell is needed, the caster is improved invis, flying, and stoneskinned, nuking from orbit. a melee would have to pick the right cube area (out of ALOT of cubes) to attack into then even if they did pick the right one theyd still have to roll a 50% miss chance + hit much higher AC, then get through DR 10 or 20 depending on the variety of stoneskin that was used.

The balance was that enemy casters could do the same. Not that melee was anywhere near in power to a caster.

[Cardoor]

Usual protocol in quite a few of the pugs ive ran this quest in amounts to melee go hide in the hallway after the rakshasha and the caster will dot/kite the drow around til he's dead.

I prefer the melees to stay in the room. When I DOT the drow he is on me very quickly and he sticks like glue. Having people I can jump over to get in his way and attack him brings him down much faster. IMO that is teamwork and one of the rare instances that I am "pseudo-tanking" as a wiz (it is rare).

I have also soloed the quest. I have no idea where the perch spot is, so I had to do it the hard way. The drow was on my back, and I mean right behind me almost every second of our fight. He nearly killed me several times. I didn't find it easy at all.

The difference between solo and with a group is pretty substantial. I have never been in a group that has the melees stand in the hall, but if I do, I will probably just go stand there with them until we decide to evaluate the situation and use our best strategy.

[sirgog]

He does hit hard, but like the other posts said, a caster tears right through him. Although I have noticed his AC mustnt be too high... The rakshasa Gnomon is a little harder to hit, but the drow guy is just so easy to swing at him, even on epic.

Yeah he's all DPS, no defence at all. He dies fast too, I'd be surprised if he even has 70000hp.

Honestly I've not had trouble in there on my Stalwart tanking him, and my Stalwart isn't one of those max HP builds. That includes running with single healers that have never run that encounter before and aren't used to epics in general, although you do have to warn them 'This is a short but intense fight, you might need to use other spells between Heal cooldowns and you won't have time to DOT until you really know this well'

If they want to undermine DOT kiting on him, giving him 30% Cold absorb and 30% Electric absorb would be the way to go, but this IMO is not a fight where DOT kiting is an overly efficient or powerful tactic. It only works if you make no mistakes, and if you are good enough to make no mistakes DOT kiting Karas, you are good enough to heal a melee tank through his attacks.

[Cardoor]

...
Honestly I've not had trouble in there on my Stalwart tanking him, and my Stalwart isn't one of those max HP builds.
...

Stalwart-a-tanking, Healer-a-healing, Arcane-a-dotting, DPS-a-thwacking, 5 epic tokens... sounds like either the 12 days of Christmas or a good plan.

[HatsuharuZ]

So... who wants to go back to the system where the number of spell slots you have per level equals the number of spells of that level that you can cast per day, if you happen to be a wizard, cleric or artificer? And while we're at it, lets get rid of the enhancements, too. Turbine would lower the hp of the mobs then!

*hides*

[McFlay]

In the good ol D&D a caster needs to lob ONE spell - no need for the kiting, perching, etc.

If more than one spell is needed, the caster is improved invis, flying, and stoneskinned, nuking from orbit. a melee would have to pick the right cube area (out of ALOT of cubes) to attack into then even if they did pick the right one theyd still have to roll a 50% miss chance + hit much higher AC, then get through DR 10 or 20 depending on the variety of stoneskin that was used.

The balance was that enemy casters could do the same. Not that melee was anywhere near in power to a caster.

The balance was that casters were extremeley limited. Sure, you could be improved invis, flying, and stoneskinned, but those just used up 3 of your sparse high level spells.

Balance was also in the fact that you had friendly fire. You couldn't just plop down aoe's and kite **** through them...becuase you would kill yourself. You actually had to think before shooting off a fb or lightning bolt so you didnt fry your team mates.

It was also balanced because casters often had less then half of the hp of a melee, and you never had enough heal pots/scrolls or spells to full heal some guy 1000 times over if necesary, so you actually had more of a threat of dieing as a caster...not more survivability becuase you can heal yourself more efficiently.

Now lets go play some ddo, where casters have near infinite resources with sp pots/conc op/torc and don't have to worry at all about friendly fire, or any real drawbacks for that matter, and claim its balanced because casters are supposed to be gods in comparison to melees.

[Vellrad]

I love when people call mana pots infinite ressource.

[sweez]

The balance was that casters were extremeley limited.

Riiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiight.

[Jaid314]

I love when people call mana pots infinite ressource.

i hope i get to find the bottomless pit that spits them out some day. it would certainly be nice.

edit: that being said, i wouldn't be opposed to something that potentially checks for perched enemies and then busts out a manyshot bow for 20 seconds... provided it wasn't insanely buggy, that is.

[Kmnh]

Don't nerf him, give him manyshot and an earthgrab bow to deal with the kiters

[Kysean]

If you are dieing too fast in this fight, I'll give you a hint: he does NOT have true seeing. Ask for a displace.

[Missing_Minds]

The balance was that enemy casters could do the same. Not that melee was anywhere near in power to a caster.

Against a singular foe, oh yes melee was. Very easily so.

Against a group, melee has never been strong.... Well... combat reflexes and AoO.

[LOOON375]

The game is too hard, the game is too easy.........the game is too hard, the game is too easy.

Give it a rest already..

I guess it's just that time of the year.........

[Ralmeth]

Please don't nerf him. I like tanking that drow on my Pally DoS. It's a fun, challenging fight

[Monkey-Boy]

I love when people call mana pots infinite ressource.

I'm mediocre at best on my caster and I've solo'd this no pots.

[Bowser_Koopa]

Man is everyone on this forums a shareholder in Hasbro? With all the cries for nerf going on here sometimes I wonder. Wait....this just in, Hasbro owns Wizards of the Coast who makes DnD who lets Turbine play in their shiny world.......Man who knew Hasbro was actually in the super-villain business this plan is diabolical now if only I could use it to get rid of Mario.



In other news, leave the poor drow alone, so he maxed out str and not so much in con let him enjoy the feeling of actually killing some pc's from time to time god knows a lot of the raid bosses can't do it anymore. You nerf boys already won your victory in Servants of the Overlord can't you just stop there and be happy leave some challenge in the game besides just Epic Lord of Blades and Epic Master Artificer. Go ask for that DQ lady in Elite In the Demon's Den to get nerfed there aren't even named items in that quest.

Bowser,
Today is villain appreciation day, go wipe in the Shroud and make Arraetrikos day haven't we killed him enough to let him have one day of victory?