Thread: A few observations along the way

Recently I finished lvling my LM. I absolutely love the class and i cannot believe how complicated its role can be at times. Im still lacking on gear pretty bad but that will come when i have more time to play on him. A couple of things ive noticed about the LM that irk me slightly

1. Stun Immunity skill needs to be an AoE for the group. I have it traited to last one minute and im working on getting the legacy for it to last longer, but it feels so redundant putting that up on everyone constantly. I usually just stick to keeping it on the tank, healer, and myself.

2. the LM pets are a major part of the class for me. I like having a buddy following me around. The pets seem a little weak for a pet keeping class though. The new healing pet specifically feels a tad weak. It does its job and when utilized well it can be a real lifesaver, but it feels very limited. Im not sure what exactly I would like to see on it, but id like to see it make the LM capable of being a very efficient main healer for small group content. On my warden ive had LMs main heal 3 mans for me but i didnt feel as safe as when a cappy covered me.

3. Blinding Flash duration in MoNF is pretty short. I know its teh dps spec and isnt focused on CC, but it would have been nice on many occasions to be able to keep a mob locked down in dps traits when lvling. Very minor issue though once your at lvl cap and grouping.

I cant think of anything else off the top of my head, and overall i think the LM as a class is in a good spot. The first issue is the one that really irks me the most. I REALLY wish it was an AoE skill.

SI AoE would make life so much easier. Especially in the moors when you're the only LM out. Totally agree this should happen, but i doubt it will. And definetly get that Leg up to make it 1min 30 seconds..Makes a huge differance in any situation

You can get +30s duration and -2s cd to SI with the trait, and another +30s duration with the legacy maxed. Making SI an AoE skill would be extremely overpowered for both pve and pvp. We're lucky that the skill is on such a short spammable cooldown anyway, they probably would've nerfed it and upped the cooldown to ~30 seconds a long time ago.

1) AoE stun immunity: bad for two reasons, IMHO:
a: it would be very, very powerful in 6-mans. Right now, it is a strategic decision: do I use it on every fellow, or is it good enough to keep it on tank and myself and maybe the healer? answer depends on the fight, obviously.
b: it would be a massive nerv in raids: going by previous AoEivications, AoE would likely be limited to fellowship, meaning you can no longer provide stun immunity to the tank of the other group. This is, btw, the major reason why slotting the trait for AoE wound removal is usually a bad idea.


2) pets are too weak: completely agree. they basically did not scale at all since level 65, and in my opinion were already slightly on the weak side scaling from 60 to 65...

3) no long mez in MoNF: here I disagree again. I see it as a tradeoff: melt mobs, or have your full lock-down potential, but not both at the same time.
Btw: you still have all your roots and stuns. the roots are AoE, just like your DPS, and have a fair chance not to break on damage. Don't forget to use them!

1) Stun protection isn't a permanent group-buff... that would make stuns irrelevant when there's a LM around and most players in a group shouldn't get stunned in the first place. Use it strategically. Also don't buy into the 'always put stun protection on the tank no matter what'... if there's nothing around that can stun it's a waste of time.

2) Yeah, some pet abilities are great, but overall they can sometimes be a bit lacklustre. Most of them are scaling issues though. The new Spirit of Nature has been specifically introduced because a lot of LMs wanted a pet in groups they can just forget about... which is exactly what the Spirit is. For efficient, active healing take the Improved Flanking trait with a high-flanking pet like the Eagle or melee Boglurker.

3) In solo I always take 3 MoNF traits... it'll give you enough firepower and you still keep 20s Blinding Flash with 15s cd, allowing you to lock one mob. It's a very flexible choice, but if you do go full DPS you're supposed to blow up mobs before they hit you, just like the other DPS classes.

If SI affected the whole group that would be very convenient. But I agree with the others who think it is more than fair the way it is.

Agree with the comments about pets. Haven't reached the level required for the spirit of nature, but if the other pets could just get better damage output I'd be happy.

Regarding MoNF, I think the BF duration is fair as I think an advanced LM should be able to manage very well with roots & stuns.

I have a lvl 58 and still learning to use roots more effectively, especially cracked earth. For me, it is going to take some focused time and practice.

In general, it is too easy to get by without having to use roots at all (or just to pop herb lore in emergency situations) and cracked earth ends up being used simply as a damaging skill rather than being used more strategically for the root.

To get better skilled at it, I'll need to purposely get into more challenging multiple-mob situations.

Traited 4 red/ 3 yellow, put sticky tar down -> pop CE at max range (there is a CE +range legacy if we really wanted to add to the effectiveness of this) -> we can keep a bunch of melees CC'd effectively before they could reach us. And we have a chance to chain root with CE as well. This, along with the stuns (including AOE stuns) and gimped BF, seems to be "good enough" if not "excellent" CC for a MoNF traited LM.

If a situation absolutely requires us to keep one or more of ranged mobs, or mobs that conjure/summon other mobs, or healer mobs, etc., locked down then, yeah, we'd have to trait differently.

OK, I'll stop rambling here.

1) AOE SI is a no-no. It would absolutely be convenient to have it that way, but unnecessary. You can cover everyone that's absolutely necessary with no problem whatsoever if properly geared/traited (SOP durations legacy+Dunadan Learning). And yes, if it were made AOE like wound removal, that would be terrible.

2) Pets are weak. They're slightly useful on occasion for various buffs etc but overall haven't scaled very well... Just take a look at the rest of the LM forums for more on this one.

3) Yep, longer BF duration with such a huge boost in DPS is OP. Roots are awesome.

Yes, LMs are awesome and in need of very few improvements as far as I'm concerned.

1. Stun Immunity skill needs to be an AoE for the group. I have it traited to last one minute and im working on getting the legacy for it to last longer, but it feels so redundant putting that up on everyone constantly. I usually just stick to keeping it on the tank, healer, and myself.

I don't find the cooldown to be very long. I think AoE would be nice, but a little too overpowered. I feel the same struggle you do too though. Just learn to manage what you've got and remember that the tank and healer need those things first.

2. the LM pets are a major part of the class for me. I like having a buddy following me around. The pets seem a little weak for a pet keeping class though. The new healing pet specifically feels a tad weak. It does its job and when utilized well it can be a real lifesaver, but it feels very limited. Im not sure what exactly I would like to see on it, but id like to see it make the LM capable of being a very efficient main healer for small group content. On my warden ive had LMs main heal 3 mans for me but i didnt feel as safe as when a cappy covered me.

You clearly haven't tried the Captain pets. Man they're so weak! lol

I do agree it feels like less. The real solution would be to add more pet skills! (or maybe I'm just greedy lol)

3. Blinding Flash duration in MoNF is pretty short. I know its teh dps spec and isnt focused on CC, but it would have been nice on many occasions to be able to keep a mob locked down in dps traits when lvling. Very minor issue though once your at lvl cap and grouping.

If you want the most out of a particular skill, don't use a trait line or gear set that makes it suffer.

Originally Posted by Erasluindor

1. Stun Immunity skill needs to be an AoE for the group. I have it traited to last one minute and im working on getting the legacy for it to last longer, but it feels so redundant putting that up on everyone constantly. I usually just stick to keeping it on the tank, healer, and myself.

know the fight if you can. not all fights stun. Also most of the time only the MT needs stun immunity. In skirmraids it's often good enough to apply it after the tank has been stunned. Ignore non-tank non-healers. It tends to be only hunters that whine about it, since burglars and champs can both stun-break. And frankly LM's can contribute more when they're not trying to SI every person in the group.

Originally Posted by Erasluindor

id like to see it make the LM capable of being a very efficient main healer for small group content. On my warden ive had LMs main heal 3 mans for me but i didnt feel as safe as when a cappy covered me.

I agree. If traited blue, with the right setup.

Originally Posted by Erasluindor

3. Blinding Flash duration in MoNF is pretty short. I know its teh dps spec and isnt focused on CC, but it would have been nice on many occasions to be able to keep a mob locked down in dps traits when lvling. Very minor issue though once your at lvl cap and grouping.

I don't really see why this is so... Burglars don't have this issue. In my opinion it should be 15s duration 15s cd while in redline. Or perhaps just 10s / 15s cd if they're assuming LM's will want to farm up the armor set.
For raiding LM's are probably going to trait yellow anyway. May's well let them use red for 6mans. And blue is currently pretty useless.

Thanks for all the feedback guys. Esp those of you who commented no to SI being AoE. I had not thought about the impact that would have on raiding and how it could only effect your group. Tho being able to trait for it in 6mans would still be awesome. Foundry is the perfect example. I have tanked it without a LM a million times and we still beat it no problem. The stuns are more of a very large annoyance. It would be nice to remove that annoyance from existence though.
Again thanks for all the feedback.