Thread: What is your classes most useless skill?

Guardian: Yea summon tinker for sure.
but Parry stance is also useless after level 30...? maybe even earlier than that.

Champ - tie between Merciful Strike and Fight On.

Rk - uh... there's actually a lot of rk skills I don't use, none of them are useless really but the debuff skills (distracting winds, the ice aoe thing that reduces evade)... I guess I use them the least.

Cappie - Fighting Withdrawal. I finally did find a possible use for it though - techincally you could pass aggro to useone with it, a little, but... really, how much aggro does a cappie get, luls. :P

Originally Posted by Vhivi

The big IF you have someone there to mail it to, who agrees to waste time for you and happens to be near a mailbox. Mailboxes, incidentally, are usually close to stable masters. I still hold that its the most useless skill a guardian has.

Curious, I wasn't going to comment on this, but since you insist, in my case, I use it each play session.

And even when I'm in a group, the tank has the aggro anyway. The only time this might be useful is if the tank is defeated, but then that's usually the precursor to a wipe. I don't see the use of the skill.

Admittedly it IS a group focused skill, but the reason I'm commenting is the latter comment. Tank defeat should not be the precursor to a wipe, it's the time you use those skills to prevent a wipe!

If you don't see the use of the skill, I suppose you would expect a wipe. But if you learn the use of the skill (and perhaps practice implementing it), you can keep control of MOBs and prevent the defeat of the tank, and thereby prevent wipes.



"Sometimes survival comes down to not being hit. Actually, most times." -the chicken skill, Bob and Weave

Guardian
Guardian's Parry I never used it because I wanted a block based tank and when they brought in OP it became completely useless.
Tinker used to be handy I've probably used it twice since the Instance Finder was brought in.
Acorn is really handy when you want to help a friend out on the other side of the world.

LM
Feline Hunters is kind of useless the cat is not worth using.
Bane Flare is only useful as fluff maybe if it mezzed all types of nearby mobs for maybe 10 seconds it would be useful.
Warding except in rare circumstances isn't really useful.

Racial trait attacks like Stoop for a Stone and Headbutt are completely useless if they scaled properly they'd be useful.

Contact Pedlar. Instance Join panel pretty much killed it single handedly.

Originally Posted by Vhivi

Captain - Withdraw. This was a hard choice. All the rezzes and banners are a waste on my character since I'm most often solo. Even in groups I don't see the point of the banners. The heralds have the same buffs and provide DPS as well. But of all the useless garbage that captains have, Withdraw has to be the most useless.

Minstrel - Call to the Fellowship. Since I seldom group, I don't get fellowship maneuvers. Even in groups, most of the maneuvers come at random times, and by the time I remember I have this skill, the maneuver is already over.

Champion - Rising and Ebbing Ire. I seldom group so this is practically useless. But even in a group you're going to attempt to fiddle with aggro in a fluid situation. Seriously?

I wouldn't really comment on how useful a group oriented skill is in a group if I seldom grouped. Sure, those skills are useless to you since you seldom group, but especially Rising/Ebbing Ire and Withdraw are some of the most potent aggro control skills in the entire game.

To Minstrels who thing Song of Aid is a useless skill: Please examine the skill tooltip more closely. The buffs you are giving to other classes when using that skill are highly significant, particularly in adding DPS to the group. Do not discount this still as "useless."

Here, seriously, take a look!

RJFerret, Imp. Sting is useful for fights where you know that there are going to be future corruptions, especially more than one of them. Two examples I can think of are the Frost & Fire giant bosses in ToO, where corruption removal is totally necessary else the group will likely wipe, and Saruman, where keeping corruptions off the Saruman clones you're tanking (but that aren't current DPS focus targets) can keep the healing corruptions off of them, letting those clones take more AoE damage. Not as mandatory as Frost & Fire but still nice.

Vhivi, here is how ebbing ire works. Threat is just a quantity, with aggro changing to whoever is on top of the list (each mob in combat will have its own threat table). If everyone is generating aggro at roughly the same rate, through the tank's damage and threat skills, DPS classes' dps, and healers' healing threat, you might have a threat table that looks like this:

Guardian: 100.00000001 threat on the mob
Champ: 100 threat on the mob
Burg: 100 threat on the mob
Hunter: 100 threat on the mob
Captain: 100 threat on the mob (let's just pretend :P)
Mini: 100 threat on the mob

In this situation, the tiniest little imbalance will result in an aggro change. If any group member's threat manages to even just barely bump up a little bit more than the guard's does in the same time, he will pull aggro.

Now, the champ hits Ebbing Ire. The threat table now looks like this:


Guardian: 125.00000001 threat on the mob
Champ: 75 threat on the mob
Burg: 100 threat on the mob
Hunter: 100 threat on the mob
Captain: 100 threat on the mob (let's just pretend :P)
Mini: 100 threat on the mob

The champ is now heinously behind the guard on the threat table, and the guard has a huge threat lead over everyone else, too. The burg, hunter, and cappy can do 25% more damage without pulling aggro and the mini can put out 25% more heals. And that's just one champ ebbing once! This example is really basic, but it the usefulness is just nuts. You can pull a big pile of mobs and a single one peels off to go after the healer. Sure, you *could* have the tank run after it, have the champ stop dps and run after it and taunt it, have the cappy stop what he's doing and grab it, etc. *Or*, the champ could just hit ebbing ire on the guard and the mob will go right back to him. It's also completely essential at endgame where DPS classes are throwing out so much damage that there's no way a tank could keep aggro using standard methods. Things like proper timing of taunts, engages and ebbing ires can keep a tank on top of the aggro list even when he's only generating half as much threat as the best DPSer in the group.

In short, Ebbing Ire is the most powerful threat management tool in the game outside of the tank's own abilities and can totally change the flow (and success) of combat.

Ebbing Ire is truly an important skill, agreed. Without Ebbing Ire, how else are you supposed to rocket that lorebreaking Runekeeper to the top of the threat table, then laugh menacingly as he's torn apart by a half-dozen Orcs while the Guardian scratches his head in confusion?

For RK's I would say Essay of Fire, the 6 second induction takes forever. Plus I never really play traited for fire anyway.

Originally Posted by RJFerret

Perhaps associate it with a key you can use readily? (Shift 8 for me) I use Safe Fall in Fangorn's Edge every run, to more quickly get to the MOBs on that final tree. I also use it for it's more mundane purpose. Think of Safe Fall like a speed boost.

An interesting perspective, but from experience, the times I could get a speed boost by falling off a cliff, that's usually not the way I'm going and there's usually a bridge to cross that's quicker. If I need a speed boost, I ride a horse. This skill? Not worth remembering.

Originally Posted by RJFerret

Curious, I wasn't going to comment on this, but since you insist, in my case, I use it each play session.

And I've never used it. Do you send all your friends off to wait at places you might happen to go so that when you're ready, they'll be there for you? Just wondering.

Originally Posted by RJFerret

Admittedly it IS a group focused skill, but the reason I'm commenting is the latter comment. Tank defeat should not be the precursor to a wipe, it's the time you use those skills to prevent a wipe!

I'm sorry, but that's just pure rhetoric. Everyone of your "reasons" has been a rare instance that a skill sort of came in useful. In day to day wear, there are skills that are far more useful. Those are the most useful skills. The skills used in rare instances, are the least useful. By definition, the most useless. That's just semantics.

So far, I haven't seen your arguments support anything but rare instances for a skill. Or, in other words, you're supporting my choices. Thank you.

Hunter -
All the skills after level 65. "Improved versions" are just lazy design.

Originally Posted by Tennoca

Guardian - Summon Tinker >.> Really useless, would be better if you could summon on a Hunter's campfire but alas you can't....

You know, I think the only time I ever used that skill was once years ago in the Rift.

It's the 'might be useful on rare occasions' spells that I forget I have.

Who said safe fall should be a burglar passive? Yes!

as guardian...

Summon tinker = useless as said before by so many.
Shield Wall = it's a good skill but it never happened that i really needed to use it in a raid/instance, any other guard did?.

Originally Posted by Gylve

In short, Ebbing Ire is the most powerful threat management tool in the game outside of the tank's own abilities and can totally change the flow (and success) of combat.

Thanks for the explanation. That's about what I saw the effect would be from the description. Your example, by the way, is likely only going to occur at the start of a fight. In normal fights, the tank is going to get heads and shoulders above the rest in aggro. The rest will be pouring their Damage into the target at max rate. Adjusting the aggro won't affect that.

About the only times I've seen the above not be true is in groups that aren't working together. Then, no skills help the situation until the group figures out their problems and work to fix them. In the end having ebbing or rising ire didn't change anything. It's an ace in the hole. Not saying it's a useless skill. More like an oh shhhhh-- skill One that is rarely used, and occasionally saves the day when it is used.

Note, just because you always use the skill doesn't mean that it is always needed. You might find that nothing changes if you stop using it.

I still say it's the least useful skill for a champion. Especially MY champion I've used all the other skills at one time or another. Even in groups I've never had a use for ebbing or rising ire. Never. I've watched situations and tried it, but it never changed anything.

Besides the glory trait, exchange of blows, and even with the fervour trait, merciful blow is weak sauce.

Originally Posted by Saelyth

Shield Wall = it's a good skill but it never happened that i really needed to use it in a raid/instance, any other guard did?.

I think Shield Wall is underrated myself. In the Ettenmoors, if you're playing defense in a raid group, it's pretty standard to shield-wall the healers (since they'll be targeted first). But even in normal 3-6 mans it can be useful: it can pull a squishy through one of those really nasty poisons in Roots, for example.

Of course, to make it at all useful, you must have the +20m range legacy on your belt (5 meter range just isn't useful at all, while 25 meter range means you can use it without a problem at almost any time).

Originally Posted by Vhivi

Your example, by the way, is likely only going to occur at the start of a fight. In normal fights, the tank is going to get heads and shoulders above the rest in aggro. The rest will be pouring their Damage into the target at max rate. Adjusting the aggro won't affect that.

Even this isn't really true. In some of the big DPS race fights (like Lightning T2 in Orthanc), there's so much damage output that even in the later stages of a fight the extra aggro can help. A tank's got to use every trick in the book to stay ahead of the nukers: he definitely won't run away with aggro at any point.

I use Ebbing Ire in every single fight or I will absolutely pull aggro. It's not an "oh #$%" button, it's a "press this button on every single pull or you will die" button. The only time it's *not* useful is if you have an amazing tank, healers that are really good at managing their threat and every single DPS player in the group is absolutely terrible.

Burglar: confound. Im almost never in mischief and even in mischief I hardly ever use this skill.
Guardian: summon tinker. never use it, he is too expensive and repairing in Galtrev takes just as long anyway
Minstrel: call of the fellowship. never use it
Loremaster: bane flare, too small range, only works on dead. I hardly use it
Runekeeper: distracting winds
Captain: fighting withdrawal, aggro drop on a heavy armour class, seriously?
Hunter: hunters art is not that great
Warden: hmm theres a few gambits I hardly use. Cant really remember the names though lol
Champion: Still ardour I think, though they did a very good job improving it its still a highly situational skill

Not counting the funny skills like command respect etc. I actually love using those lol

On my Hunter an elf Sylvan Shadows CD is ridiculous and track the dead is never used no wights in the Moors also all the traps a hunter can use I just use the default and triple traps

Originally Posted by Vhivi

Read the thread question again. MOST useless. You even admitted that it is the most useless after you told me to revisit the class. *boggle*

youre boggled? you said, "But of all the useless garbage that captains have" implying, no SAYING, that we have useless skills. and many, at that.

Capns have none. yes, i understand relativity and that is MY point. relativly, withdrawl is, but its is NOT useless, in general.


you clearly said, "But of all the useless garbage that captains have"

garbage. your choice of word. seriously, youre flipping this back on me?


you need to revisit the class.

No mention of Time of Need? I never ever _needed_ that skill.

Originally Posted by Saelyth

as guardian...

Shield Wall = it's a good skill but it never happened that i really needed to use it in a raid/instance, any other guard did?.

Just wanted to say that as a Mini who plays in the moors, the Guardians who shield wall my squishy self are beloved by me.

The skills I find useless, are Fire and Frost stance or whatever it is called, because really who is going to give up the Vit/Resistance, or the Fate/Will, or even the Armor/Hope. Pretty much all the other options are better than the Frost and Fire option. The other skill I don't really care for is Song of soothing.

Originally Posted by Vulcan583

Hunter- Scourging blow, I never even bought it from the class trainer, I might pick it up when I hit the improved version.

Originally Posted by Dotlbeme

Actually, used in conjunction or after Barbed Arrow, you get big (for hunters!) melee damage. If mob is going to close to melee, they get this rude welcome on arrival.

I agree with Dotl, it became useful after they upped the damage. My issue with it - with a lot of Hunter skills - is the need to be in melee range to use it. I'd like to see a shift back to range being the primary focus for Hunters, with a trait line for melee for those Hunters who want to melee.

My choices for useless skills are:

Campfire
Split Shot
Hunter's Art
untraited Agile Rejoinder

All are nice ideas, but in reality they don't add enough value to be worth bothering with.

Regarding Desperate Flight, for me it's relegated to a simple port to a res circle. I can count the number of times it's actually saved me, over 5+ years of play, on the fingers of one hand. On the other hand, I can't even begin to count the numbers of times I've had over 1/3 health left, DF'd and still ended up dead in the circle. I can survive better just by running away.

For LM:

Its hard to pick something as being completely useless as so many skills are situational or have been improved over the years. Bane flare sucks until you need a get out of jail free against lots of undead. Air lore is pointless unless you are traited right for healing (and are healing someone else).

The only two skills that have fallen off my toolbar due to lack of situations where they shine are the Sabretooth and Back from the brink, and the rez is only in that category because I don't group enough to use it often.

As a champion I'd say Ardour, but it's not a skill, it's a stance. Which makes it worse. Or better, because I don't stance dance, which actually is a blessing.

Restricting myself to skills: merciful strike. It's a supposed finisher, but I have many more other options that do more damage for the pip, so I never use it.

Originally Posted by Vhivi

Thanks for the explanation. That's about what I saw the effect would be from the description. Your example, by the way, is likely only going to occur at the start of a fight. In normal fights, the tank is going to get heads and shoulders above the rest in aggro. The rest will be pouring their Damage into the target at max rate. Adjusting the aggro won't affect that.

About the only times I've seen the above not be true is in groups that aren't working together. Then, no skills help the situation until the group figures out their problems and work to fix them. In the end having ebbing or rising ire didn't change anything. It's an ace in the hole. Not saying it's a useless skill. More like an oh shhhhh-- skill One that is rarely used, and occasionally saves the day when it is used.

Note, just because you always use the skill doesn't mean that it is always needed. You might find that nothing changes if you stop using it.

I still say it's the least useful skill for a champion. Especially MY champion I've used all the other skills at one time or another. Even in groups I've never had a use for ebbing or rising ire. Never. I've watched situations and tried it, but it never changed anything.

What about those that do t2 Orthanc and have to use it not to pull aggro and to increase group dps throughout the figh? But then again, you said it's useless so I suppose there's nogroup that does that either since the skill is totally useless.

For a champ, the worst skill hands down is fight on simply because of the debuff you get.

Lore-master: Inner Flame. Channel time is too long and I can pop a heal to my pet with beacon of hope and cycle its CD faster.

re: Bane Flare. It's not great, not got a lot of range but it can be useful. Other classes have better Dead-Management but this one gives the LM a few seconds to back away, toss the tar, hit some debuffs and maybe even get Ents off on a the lot. If you get the Warding circle down and throw some Sticky Gourd too you get Flambed Zombies.

e.g. See multiple Dead mobs, throw down the tar, warding circle, grab the lot with some debuffs, hit them with BE and WF. Toss up bane flare, smash the sticky gourd and anything still wiggling gets the Incoming Tree.

re: Guardians Acorn. Its great. Send via mailbox. Give your friends their own pocket guardian to summon you where ever - never rots. Used it to pull a lower level guardian to every stable that needed discovery in higher level areas.

Champion - Fight On. +25% DPS bonus, but only for half a minute, followed by a debuff which will reduce your DPS by a huge percentage for a much longer time. Seriously, this is supposed to be a legendary skill.

That said, IMO, best legendary trait is Controlled Burn

Hrm... most useless skill on my minstrel would have to be Enlivening Grace. I spend most of my time solo (or in a skirmish with my soldier - on whom it does NOT work) but when I do group, if group members die it's either because I died... or I ran out of power and the tank died quickly followed by me... or our current Leroy Jenkins died, in which case he usually clicks release/revive because he can't wait 8 seconds for me to fire off my rez... or the captain/rk beats me to the rez... so I'd say it's my most useless skill, yeah. I get more use out of Irresistable Melody and it doesn't have a friggin deed attached to it! -.-

As for SapienChavez saying "Capns have none"... what about Command Respect? XD

Originally Posted by Vhivi

Champion - Rising and Ebbing Ire. I seldom group so this is practically useless. But even in a group you're going to attempt to fiddle with aggro in a fluid situation. Seriously?

wow.... i dont even know what to say. Yes, you have to "fiddle with aggro" otherwise you will be up the creek without a paddle. Maybe you cant do enough dps as a champ to have aggro issues in a group, but a lot of us do. Yes, as a solo player these skills are useless, but in a group they shine.

ebbing ire is an amazing skill - it dumps my aggro onto the person that needs aggro!. Its allowing the group to heal/dps more! If I pop controlled burn I can, and will pull aggro off my tank no matter the situation. by using ebbing ire, i keep the tank ahead on the aggro table, and I can go nuts with total confidence that I wont pull aggro, and that includes using improved seeking blades. Sometimes i pull aggro by using my normal brutal/clobber rotation..... thats my NORMAL dps rotation, im not doing anything special or trying to pull aggro but it sometimes happens. Ebbing ire means this does NOT happen. Ever. and thats a great thing.

Raising ire is ESSENTIAL for a champ tank (chank) to hold aggro. Its hard for us to hold aggro at the start of a fight, and raising ire on a hunter/champ/rk will REALLY help us stay ahead with aggro.

I guess it really depends on your play-style, but to be brutally honest its ignorant to say these skills are useless, because they are FAR from it.

/rant


champs most useless skill?
fight on: the debuff is too large to make it a viable skill IMO

Irresistible melody.

It needs to be removed from the game.

it's not quite entirely useless but also not really useful - the LM eagle pet's rez, the one that's only usable if the eagle's hovering right next to LM; has survived longer; gets in some good attacks after you've died; [etc] - good in theory but I've only used it successfully once or something.

the LM's own rez isn't a very great deal better.

Originally Posted by Vhivi

An interesting perspective, but from experience, the times I could get a speed boost by falling off a cliff, that's usually not the way I'm going and there's usually a bridge to cross that's quicker. If I need a speed boost, I ride a horse. This skill? Not worth remembering.

Safe fall is actually a very important tool in the burglars toolbox in the Ettenmoors. When you are fighting on the bridges surrounding TA, and the creeps suddenly make a push, you just pop safe fall, jump off the bridge and swim to safety. Creeps can follow you ofc, but they will end up with broken legs giving you a few valueable seconds to get more distance between you and the pursueing creeps. Saved my life on more than one occasion.

Originally Posted by DavadaOT

I think Shield Wall is underrated myself. In the Ettenmoors, if you're playing defense in a raid group, it's pretty standard to shield-wall the healers (since they'll be targeted first). But even in normal 3-6 mans it can be useful: it can pull a squishy through one of those really nasty poisons in Roots, for example.

Of course, to make it at all useful, you must have the +20m range legacy on your belt (5 meter range just isn't useful at all, while 25 meter range means you can use it without a problem at almost any time).

Makes sense, sometimes i forgot it exists a PvP in Lotro, i don't really like it so i don't go there since Feb 2010 when i was just curious about the pvp thing.

In the instances i usually never use it because if the other persons are getting damage or agro... there's something that i'm doing wrong as a tank. I'm not sure about RoF, never done it.

Originally Posted by Saelyth

as guardian...

Summon tinker = useless as said before by so many.
Shield Wall = it's a good skill but it never happened that i really needed to use it in a raid/instance, any other guard did?.

As others have pointed out Shield Wall can be great especially with the extended distance legacy. It's actually quite under used. Dunno why, perhaps doesn't fit many play-styles.

An under-used scenario:

Bears are good tanks and immune to many mob effects. Guard throws sheild wall on the bear and stands 20 feet away from Boss who has 10 ft fire damage aura which no longer damages the Guardian . Mini heals Guardian and Bear as needed. Champ tosses Aggro on to the bear (rising ire iirc) to keep the boss glued. LM uses bears single taunt to reinforce the aggro table with the bear at the top. Bear gives +damage bonus when attacking so the other players get a bit of extra during target practice.

Without shield wall and aggro dump - bear lasts negative seconds.

I dont want to hurt anybody, but most of those who left posts here, are kind of low skilled players. Sure some skills are used more, and some less, but none of skills are useless, since you can use part of them in pvp, part in pvp, and part just in sparrs. I'd suggest you to try new way of playing this game, and you'll get become more useful then before

Originally Posted by ISeeStars

I dont want to hurt anybody, but most of those who left posts here, are kind of low skilled players. Sure some skills are used more, and some less, but none of skills are useless, since you can use part of them in pvp, part in pvp, and part just in sparrs. I'd suggest you to try new way of playing this game, and you'll get become more useful then before

I guess the term 'useless' is harsh for you, perhaps, better stated the question should be: Which of your class skills is 'least useful to you'. Yes all skills have a 'use'. Even so, many skills are just not worth the trouble to use.

(I also disagree with Safe Fall being useless. I use it all the time, I love it. Yes it would be nicer as a passive, but I can see that being OP. I am surprised it is not disabled in the Moors quite frankly.)

*thinks* Where do I start?

This list is based on doing raids in level 75.

Hunter:
USELESS: Hunter's Art; Split Shot; Heartseeker unless fully red traited; Agile Rejoinder, especially the pitiful heal proc; 3 buttons needed to track; Merciful Shot; Bow of the Righteous.

You can DPS effectively as a fleetness hunter with 5 skills: QS, ISB, PenShot, Blood Arrow and Barbed Arrow. Add in Rain of Arrows for AOE, but know when to use it.

Burglar:
Confound; Enrage.

Minstrel:
Song of the Dead.

Warden:
No real useless skill, they all have a point.