Thread: Feedback: New Player Tips for Wardens

Over the next few weeks we will be focusing on the classes in our Tell the Community Team threads. In keeping with that theme, we want your help. If you could give one tip to a new player about playing the Warden class, what would it be?

Originally Posted by Frelorn

Over the next few weeks we will be focusing on the classes in our Tell the Community Team threads. In keeping with that theme, we want your help. If you could give one tip to a new player about playing the Warden class, what would it be?

Group up as much as possible while leveling. Many Warden's level to the cap solo and then don't know how to tank or function in a group setting. This makes for poorly played Warden's and a very frustrating time.

Originally Posted by Frelorn

Over the next few weeks we will be focusing on the classes in our Tell the Community Team threads. In keeping with that theme, we want your help. If you could give one tip to a new player about playing the Warden class, what would it be?

Only one eh? hm....

Get and learn to use your masteries. You won't have access to these traits until level 30-ish, but they are one of the most useful tools a warden has in his arsenal. They will save your power, help your DPS, and let you build gambits faster AND at range.

Don't use multiple target gambits when you only have a single target, and vice versa.

When grouping, worry about threat first and self-buffing, healing later. Your number 1 priority is to protect your healers, and you should learn to trust them to keep you alive while you gain control of a situation.

Originally Posted by Frelorn

Over the next few weeks we will be focusing on the classes in our Tell the Community Team threads. In keeping with that theme, we want your help. If you could give one tip to a new player about playing the Warden class, what would it be?

READ THE WARDEN FORUM!

Perhaps not as suitable for in-game as other tips, but I cannot count the number of times random perusing of the Warden forum led me to some new, effective or fun thing to do with my Warden.

(I wish other class forums had the same esprit d'corps.)

For in-game, I'd advise new Wardens to avoid rushing into combat: we have many good options to consider for starting an encounter besides acting like Champions.

do class deeds, do class deeds and then do them some more. there is no better way to memorize the gambits.

Heal over Time gambits stack with other HoT gambits, you can have multiple heals going at once, same for Damage over Time gambits.

Learn to love Precise Blow; it is your best single-target threat gambit.

One more.

Watch your power, it's easy to burn through power as a warden. Equipping In-Combat Power Regen items helps.

Originally Posted by Frelorn

Over the next few weeks we will be focusing on the classes in our Tell the Community Team threads. In keeping with that theme, we want your help. If you could give one tip to a new player about playing the Warden class, what would it be?

Try to curve any feeling of alt-itis while playing a warden! Or in other words, stick to it for a Long while.

One thing I've found, having been away from the game off and on since I created my warden, is the sheer volume of what to Remember in terms of Gambits. Unlike other classes (I also have an Rk that's only L32 but was created first day of MoM) there's a Lot more gambits than there are skills and they're not easily seen on your skill bar.

I would say learn to think of gambits in the big picture rather than trying to memorize each and every one.

Understanding that Fist-Shield and on does a certain type of effect, that Shield-Spear is going to be HoTs, that 3-1-2 leads you to leeches.. Yes, there are some specifics to know, but if you can figure out the intent of each "branch" vs each individual Gambit, you'll wind up learning 6-8 things versus 40+.

Practice, practice, practice. Use your masteries and learn many different ways to build the same gambit incorporating different masteries. This way if you have one of your key mastery skills on cool-down you can still build your needed gambit quickly.

Don't be too proud to let the guardian have the aggro ... sometimes.

(But more seriously, don't go around with a chip on your shoulder. Just learn to be awesome, and people will notice on their own.)

-The Gneech

Most of my would-be suggestions have been covered already, but....

Tanking is the hardest job in the game bar-none. Never let anyone tell you you suck or you are worthless because you don't have experience. Be patient, learn to pull mobs around corners and into safe zones, learn to turn mobs, and trust the capabilities of your other team-mates.

Oh, and let the champ have all the aggro he wants. It's his fault if he dies going "shing-shing" in fervour mode.

What a great thread! The warden community is the best, of that I've no doubt. They've helped me on more occasions than I can count. Anyhoo, here's the first tip that came to mind...

Get your gambit class deeds done as quickly as possible. Throw 3 to 4 of those deeds up on your quest tracker bar, and while you're questing and killing mobs make sure to specifically focus on those particular gambits. Once the blue deed bar turns yellow for the day, swap them out for some others. The sooner you get those done, the sooner you'll have access to some pretty cool class traits... and you don't want to be stuck in your 50s or even 60s trying to get them done.

Use solo time as a way to earn your class traits. You'll find that when you level up in groups things will die quickly, preventing you from making any serious progress on your traits, as most of your class traits require you to preform gambits.

When in a group:
"ASK" before using your Stealthed spear throwing abilities.
( or any ability that draws )
These skills can lead do some devastating party wipes.

Wardens are great help in a party, if the party leader is listened to.

So above all, before you set up any attacks, know what you are attacking, where your party is, and if anyone says "don't attack" listen to them, and back up and off your skills induction.

Originally Posted by qannadi

I would say learn to think of gambits in the big picture rather than trying to memorize each and every one.

Understanding that Fist-Shield and on does a certain type of effect, that Shield-Spear is going to be HoTs, that 3-1-2 leads you to leeches.. Yes, there are some specifics to know, but if you can figure out the intent of each "branch" vs each individual Gambit, you'll wind up learning 6-8 things versus 40+.

^^ that's a great one to know. Learn the basic patterns and it makes the gambit system so much easier.


Set up your keyboard for easy and fast gambit use. Find a layout that works for you and learn it.
For example I've bound two of my Masteries to my R and F keys (with shift variants), so I've got a nice easily reachable builder arc.

When fighting spell casters, and no one in your group is dedicated to interrupting, or the interrupter is busy, keep the Spear-Shield mastery empty so that if a mob starts an induction, you can drop your current gambit, pop Spear-Shield, give them The Boot, then carry on.
When you're tanking a spell caster like a Defiler, figure our their induction patterns. They're not likely to begin inducting another spell straight after you've interrupted one, so you can use a few aggro gambits. If it's been a while since they tried an induction, start building a Spear-Shield-Spear-Shield in anticipation.

Best advice I could give to the new Warden is to check out DocHoliday's Warden Guides on Lotro Reporter, starting with this one:

http://lotroreporter.com/2010/02/starting-a-warden/

Love seeing all new names appear just in this thread and no where else lol

One tip to a new Warden, Run Spear Traited, don't consider shield line till you have the pulse traits done. Spear will conserve the most power and end the fight the quickest to where self heals are not needed.

Precise blow is the best aggro tool you have, use it and use it often.

Shield mastery is your healers friend and lasts for 1 minute. Keep it up all the time.

Learn how long your HoTs and DoTs last, you can't stack the same bleeds and same heals.

You make the pulls to start fights, not your group.

By convention spear is Sp or 1, shield is Sh or 2 and Fist is Fi or 3. Onslaught for example might be written as 1-2-1 or sp-sh-sp.

Originally Posted by Big_H

Set up your keyboard for easy and fast gambit use. Find a layout that works for you and learn it.
For example I've bound two of my Masteries to my R and F keys (with shift variants), so I've got a nice easily reachable builder arc.

Definitely. What I've done is map all my builders and masteries to my numeric keypad:

Code:

1-3  2-3  3-2
1-2  2-1  3-1
 1    2    3

I can then fire the gambit with 0/insert.
Left hand handles movement and other actions. This means I'm not too mobile when tanking, but warden tanking's not very good at mobility anyway. My kin knows to bring things to me if they pull aggro.

Having my hands off the mouse means trouble with FMs, so I bind single-quote to targeting the FM target, and shift-arrow keys to the 4 directions.

Print this out and put it on your monitor...

The single most important thing you can do to improve your skill and enjoyment with the warden class is to read the Helpful Links & Threads STOP HERE FIRST -Sticky!!!!!!

Originally Posted by kermie-lee

What a great thread! The warden community is the best, of that I've no doubt. They've helped me on more occasions than I can count. Anyhoo, here's the first tip that came to mind...

Get your gambit class deeds done as quickly as possible. Throw 3 to 4 of those deeds up on your quest tracker bar, and while you're questing and killing mobs make sure to specifically focus on those particular gambits. Once the blue deed bar turns yellow for the day, swap them out for some others. The sooner you get those done, the sooner you'll have access to some pretty cool class traits... and you don't want to be stuck in your 50s or even 60s trying to get them done.

Let me state LISTEN to this advice.
If your a tad lazy (aye, like me) you don't need these gambit deeds for 30s, 40s, 50s, even early 60s...
Oh you'll get SOME by chance for sure... but by end game you'll want most all of them...
The Raids, L65 story line, soloing Classic Skirms, etc will demand them.

And going back at L65 to do this is one royal pain.
I even had to procure a ****** spear to drag the fights out long enough to get credit.

I wish like crazy I had heeded this advice growing up my warden.

Jammer

Originally Posted by Big_H

^^ that's a great one to know. Learn the basic patterns and it makes the gambit system so much easier.


Set up your keyboard for easy and fast gambit use. Find a layout that works for you and learn it.
For example I've bound two of my Masteries to my R and F keys (with shift variants), so I've got a nice easily reachable builder arc.

I am new to the warden class and I have been reading the forums about binding gambits to the keyboard could someone go into details about what that is all about and how and why to do it? I currently have a level 37 warden.

Originally Posted by Lasticus

I am new to the warden class and I have been reading the forums about binding gambits to the keyboard could someone go into details about what that is all about and how and why to do it? I currently have a level 37 warden.

You can't bind specific gambits unless you use some external program/hardware set up (maybe with the Lua scripts now too, I don't know). There are a few programs I've heard people mention which allow custom Macros, however, I'm not sure how legal those are under the Turbine ToS. Then there are things like the G15 (?) keyboard from Logitech that have some macro functionality built in.
I don't use any of that stuff though.

What I was specifically talking about in my post is remapping the keyboard through the Key Mapping pane of the Options Menu. [Esc>Options>Key Mapping]
So for example I have my 5th Quickslot bar completely remapped and loaded with my Masteries* and Gambit Reset buttons. Then under the Key Mapping window I remap the slots to be things like 'R' and 'F', and 'Shift R' and 'Shift F' etc. I use the 5th Quickslot for this because the Key Mapping config is account wide, so if I just remapped my main Quickslot bar it would mess up all my other classes, as it is all my other classes had to modify their Quickslots a little to fit my Warden's setup.

When I log in the game here shortly, I'll see if I can get some screenshots to make this clearer.

Edit:
*Regarding Masteries: You won't start the Class Deeds for these until level 45-ish (Spear) and 50-ish (Shield and Fist), so you don't have these skills yet. But basically they add two Gambit Builders to the window with one button click.

So here's my current set up, it's a little weird, which is why I said find one that works for you

Pink are my movement keys.

The very top most bar is Quickslot Bar #5 and is shoved at the top of my screen above my map.
Slot #1 is my Gambit Execute and is bound to my side mouse button.
Slot #2 is my Clear Gambit and is bound to my 2nd side mouse button.
Slots #5-9 are my Masteries and are bound to my Shift-5 (Spear+Fist), R (Shield Mastery), and F (Fist Mastery).

On my Default Quickslot Bar #2, 3, 4 are my Gambit Builders.
I still have my Gambit Execute and my Masteries on my number line though, both to monitor cool downs and in case I'm feeling lazy and just want to mouse click stuff

Most people tend to used the Alt and Ctrl keys to access the various quickslot bars, and so build upwards (1=Spear, Shift+1=Spear+Shield Mastery, etc), but this "arc" makes more sense to me.
As for your question of 'why', it's mostly for speed. Binding skills to the keyboard makes things faster than if you have to click things with the mouse. Plus with a class like the Warden, where most everything is dependent on memory, I've found it easier to remember gambits when they're key strokes rather than mouse clicks, muscle memory or what have you.

Did that answer your questions?

This should be required reading for anyone who wants to properly fulfill their role in a group:
http://lorebook.lotro.com/wiki/A_Bas...or_Fellowships

Originally Posted by Big_H

You can't bind specific gambits unless you use some external program/hardware set up (maybe with the Lua scripts now too, I don't know). There are a few programs I've heard people mention which allow custom Macros, however, I'm not sure how legal those are under the Turbine ToS. Then there are things like the G15 (?) keyboard from Logitech that have some macro functionality built in.
I don't use any of that stuff though.

What I was specifically talking about in my post is remapping the keyboard through the Key Mapping pane of the Options Menu. [Esc>Options>Key Mapping]
So for example I have my 5th Quickslot bar completely remapped and loaded with my Masteries* and Gambit Reset buttons. Then under the Key Mapping window I remap the slots to be things like 'R' and 'F', and 'Shift R' and 'Shift F' etc. I use the 5th Quickslot for this because the Key Mapping config is account wide, so if I just remapped my main Quickslot bar it would mess up all my other classes, as it is all my other classes had to modify their Quickslots a little to fit my Warden's setup.

When I log in the game here shortly, I'll see if I can get some screenshots to make this clearer.

Edit:
*Regarding Masteries: You won't start the Class Deeds for these until level 45-ish (Spear) and 50-ish (Shield and Fist), so you don't have these skills yet. But basically they add two Gambit Builders to the window with one button click.

So here's my current set up, it's a little weird, which is why I said find one that works for you

Pink are my movement keys.

The very top most bar is Quickslot Bar #5 and is shoved at the top of my screen above my map.
Slot #1 is my Gambit Execute and is bound to my side mouse button.
Slot #2 is my Clear Gambit and is bound to my 2nd side mouse button.
Slots #5-9 are my Masteries and are bound to my Shift-5 (Spear+Fist), R (Shield Mastery), and F (Fist Mastery).

On my Default Quickslot Bar #2, 3, 4 are my Gambit Builders.
I still have my Gambit Execute and my Masteries on my number line though, both to monitor cool downs and in case I'm feeling lazy and just want to mouse click stuff

Most people tend to used the Alt and Ctrl keys to access the various quickslot bars, and so build upwards (1=Spear, Shift+1=Spear+Shield Mastery, etc), but this "arc" makes more sense to me.
As for your question of 'why', it's mostly for speed. Binding skills to the keyboard makes things faster than if you have to click things with the mouse. Plus with a class like the Warden, where most everything is dependent on memory, I've found it easier to remember gambits when they're key strokes rather than mouse clicks, muscle memory or what have you.

Did that answer your questions?

Yes, it does thank you!

Learn to group well early on, it may take while to get the hang of how the warden is such an effective tank. Explain to your mates; you build aggro over time, and ask them to let you pull off a move or two before they jump in, guns blazing. You will chronically suffer from champs and hunters PEW PEWing away, making life harder for you and the group, but don't get discouraged.

You can Kank if need be (Kite and Tank) with your warden as well. A few crippling javelin strikes, self-heal then run until they are back up. Rinse-Wash-Repeat. I love the javelin skills, they can do a solid job softening up enemies before they even get near you.

All classes have power issues. I like chasing Willpower with my armour and bling. Virtues can help a lot too. Those extra 100 moral points won't seem as cool when you are out of power and a pot is on cool down. There's nothing worse than losing aggro and watching your group wipe cause you wanted your warden's numbers to look impressive.

I can say a lot of things about the warden class, but the best is, without us, there wouldnt be too many free player controlled areas, and if we all stick together, we cant die. And always keep an eye on ur power, very easy to burn out if ur killing mobs.

Anyone can stick we with a javelin later, but know what what strength and number of mobs you can handle. There is nothing worse then going into a room saying you can handle it and failing. You will find you can handle a lot with decent RK or LM.

Second make sure your fellowship understands how you work for agro. I have been in several parties where the healer will begin spamming heals as soon as you start or a hunter will spam DPS after your first attack.

And as has been said before. power power power. without it you are dead.

you should be an elf

When playing instances where you have a daily like 'don't kill <insert here foe you must not kill>', remember that some leeches and fist gambits have AoE DoT... using them may cause the fail of the daily. Ex.: Ivar's banner wights can't be killed.

Originally Posted by TarjaTeer

you should be an elf

Elf is worst class, do Man

Originally Posted by Frelorn

Over the next few weeks we will be focusing on the classes in our Tell the Community Team threads. In keeping with that theme, we want your help. If you could give one tip to a new player about playing the Warden class, what would it be?

whell the warden is tank he dun´t do so mutch demits beckos he is all the time wering a shild witch mein he can all the time block dusen´t mater what you skild on read blue or yellow so I play him on blu backos i lake the defans there and the self healing gambits are over time so he is lake tank for multey aney me it easey for you to kip 10 on you with out deing but you have to do this coragte lake using wor cray and exultation of battle to hold and gate you agro and ofcors you can use convicton to lover your frand agro and then use resolution to heal you self to healp the healer.

but for singel target use wages of fear in bagning and the precise blow and surty of death and some healing and block skild and convicton maney big hits worke good.

but if you dead in the boss fheit and gate battel rest it no cheins for you to gate agro on your ovne dusen´t worke lake that evre 1 in the grp have to give you the agro lake the burgler can give you all his agro waffi can give you some agro but jäger onle give agro to the grp and if healer gate the agro he shut fake death.

Originally Posted by GoldKoron

Elf is worst class, do Man

Man is most boring, do Hobbit

The number one thing I wish I had been told is be a MAN. I went for a Hobbit and didn't realize until lvl 55 that I would be missing out on an extra 5% incoming healing (which goes above the level cap). I read lots of posts about how at end game the differences between classes were negligible but trust me - they aren't for Wardens!