Thread: Draigoth with no burglars, just OP Guardians !

Monday night, our kin had scheduled a raid for draigoth. No burglars were present and there were 3 guards. So we decided instead of forgetting the raid, to try it. The conjunctions would be our responsibility. I must admit I was a little pessimistic at first, but grabbed my OP gear, some scrolls of OP tactics, got some buffs for critical and started the raid.
Now the outcome was surprisingly good.
One of the guards got the tanking job while the other two were in the "conjunction group" in Overpower. At phase 1 we restrained the DPS of the rest of the team in the body (auto attacks only). The OP guards spammed FtE and TTK.
We got 1 and sometimes 2 conj. each time the dragon was down. The raid went really smooth and took us just little more time than usual to complete. But we were also 11 people, not 12.
Anyway with gear and scrolls and buffs, critical chance is over 20%, so it is quite doable!
No need for burgs anymore
Btw loot in draigoth is more awesome than ToO. (with the exception of clasp)

On a side-note, this kind of gameplay could be nice addition for the GRD class as secondary role, not a clear DPS role, but a nice DPS with supportive skills like FM openings, stuns, etc. A decent DPS with something of value to offer to the group.

Gratz on the achievement. I would like to try that sometimes, sounds interesting

Just couple of things:

1. Frey the Edge has nothing to do with CJ opening on To the King. TTK always opens CJ on crit. FtE doesn't increase crit chance of TTK. It just increases chance to randomly open cj with any attack. So it's not a good idea to spam FtE when just the guards are using TTK, while the rest of the fs is just auto-atacking. The more they attack, more chance there is to open cj when FtE buff is on the target.

2. How is loot in Draigoch more awesome than ToO? Is there anything I have missed? I have been doing Draigoch for months and the only useful thing I have seen there is the scales for cloak. And even in ToO there is a cloak for tanks better than the Draigoch one. Unfortunately I haven't seen it drop yet.

Originally Posted by Gomar_Eldar

Gratz on the achievement. I would like to try that sometimes, sounds interesting

Just couple of things:

1. Frey the Edge has nothing to do with CJ opening on To the King. TTK always opens CJ on crit. FtE doesn't increase crit chance of TTK. It just increases chance to randomly open cj with any attack. So it's not a good idea to spam FtE when just the guards are using TTK, while the rest of the fs is just auto-atacking. The more they attack, more chance there is to open cj when FtE buff is on the target.

2. How is loot in Draigoch more awesome than ToO? Is there anything I have missed? I have been doing Draigoch for months and the only useful thing I have seen there is the scales for cloak. And even in ToO there is a cloak for tanks better than the Draigoch one. Unfortunately I haven't seen it drop yet.

1. We spammed FtE exactly for the random chance to open conjunctions with auto attacks. Nothing to do with TTK.
It was a double bet, the target was to open the conj. One way was TTK and another was FtE.
2. 2 crystals, 2 recipes, 2 symbols, lots of runes and relics, 4 scales, 2 helmets and 2 shoulders, some nice jewelery for minies. I know there is some great stuff in ToO loot (although I disagree about the cloak, if we have the same cloak in mind), but seems to me much fewer things allover and not so good usually. Anyway might be just my (wrong) impression, or I was unlucky in ToO raids. But looting Draigoth seems more like "wooow woot" and ToO more like "uh-huh, hmm", if there is no clasp

P.S. About auto-attacks: In retrospect, it is quite possible that it was needless to "hold back" DPS. Our leader was afraid that we would enter phase 2 too soon with only a few conj. completed, so he said from the beginning to hold back the DPS.
We actually entered phase 2 with ~8/12 conj. completed if I remember correctly, so...

Only the people from the non-cj group need to hold back dps. The cj group people should go full dps. I often see them opening random cj even without Frey the Edge buff. It is safe to go in phase 2 with 6 cjs completed. Then 2-4 cjs in phase 2 and the rest (2-4) in phase 3.

As for the loot:
- Crystals also drop in Orthanc, often 2 from T2 challenges.
- 2nd age symbols are useless these days, everyone is using 1st LIs. We had accumulated about 60 2nd age symbols in our kin chest, just because nobody wanted them. We had to give them away to everyone in the kin last week for our 5th anniversary.
- Recipes that drop from Draigoch are almost useless, nobody wants them and usually they are vendored, cause nobody would buy them from ah either. Recipes that drop in Orthanc are far better. First that comes in mind is the shield recipe. Also the cuff recipe is sought by some people.
- Runes and relics also drop in Orthanc, but I have to agree that Draigoch has some nice 300k+ IXP runes.
- Helm and shoulders coins are usually left in chest, as everyone is going for the Orthanc set. Only new lv 75 chars, who have never been to Orthanc, get the helm and shoulders from Draigoch.
- Jewels were nice when Draigoch came out, but since then we have had Orthanc and Roots of Fangorn, which drop better jewels.
- The random armour drops in Draigoch are annoying since that stuff is useless, but there are some nice pieces in Orthanc T2 which many people use, since only 5 Orthanc pieces are needed for the set bonus.
- Cloak: http://lorebook.lotro.com/wiki/Armour:Celchol I have this in mind, drops from Shadow T2. Vitality is almost the same, would lose some morale and block rating (which I have over cap anyway), but would gain lot of tactical mitigation. I don't know which cloak you had in mind.

To be honest, the only reason we run Draigoch these days is the good amount seals from it. About 60 seals for 30 minutes. No other instance/raid in the game gives that amount. And also we get cloaks for our 3rd or 4th alts

some kins are still working on Orthanc, and as such the Draigoch loot is great. Sadly were not all members of super duper raid kins

on topic: thats a great achievment, something to know when we are short on burgs in kin as we usually are, yet over subbed on tanks

Yeah back when i was still playin we killed Draigoth with just me and a lm bog lurker for fm's , we never had any burgs at the time as ROI was just out and we only had lvl'd mains at 75 .

Originally Posted by Ellemere

some kins are still working on Orthanc, and as such the Draigoch loot is great. Sadly were not all members of super duper raid kins

Indeed true! I spent some DKP y-day to buy my first crystal and a symbol for the 2nd age of my 2nd char. :P . I don't even have a 1st ager yet :P With ToO we have not done whole in T2...
All I said was that the relation between time spent and difficulty per loot awarded is not the same for draigoch and ToO.
But there are whole threads about that...

I posted this just to say that draigoch can be done nicely with guards provoking the FM instead of burgs.
And it was a nice feeling having an important role in the raid other than tanking
I have not felt that with my guard for...(hmmm)... ever !!




P.S. That cloak is not what I had in mind, I agree it is intriguing

I've been telling people on Arkenstone this for months. I see groups posting "11/12 Draigoch need burg" all the time and tell them you don't need a burg. I've successfully 6-manned Draigoch with no burg several months ago. And we only had 1 guardian, me.

Traited FtE, and stacked it every chance I got. Also Captain had traited kick, and we had a hunter and champ that could crit like no other. Also we had an LM with his pet popping FMs.

Once you learn it, the Guard can easily drop down from tanking the head and join in the FMs on the body, and then get back up to the head after the 2nd FM and before Draigoch stands up again.

Once in a pug raid where I was leading the DPS group on a guardian, we only had one burglar. We completed all maneuvers, with the burglar opening 8 and me opening 4. All in all, it worked quite well.

Still, when I tried to get my kinnies (elf-only kin) to try it (we have a lot of guardians), I received a skeptic big no-no from the raiders.

Just wanted to add that from my experience both TtK and Overwhelm have a hidden crit chance. My crit chance sits at about 20% with OP gear. After long night where I've been Overpower I take a look at the crit chances of skills, overwhelm (with no extra crit from legacy) and To The King both usually sit at 50% crit (some % dev, don't really remember though). A solo guard doing cjs in draigoch (especially with the moors 3-set having the parry chain flying by) is totally viable, and I've even done it fairly consistently when the burg died/lagged out.