EQ2: Test Your Soloing Skills

I popped down to Qeynos this morning to buy some Alkali Loam, Pearls and Vanadium — my usual shopping list as a level 58 jeweler — from the cheaper Qeynos brokers.
I’d meet Arioma, my level 5 good-side ranger, who would get the items for me. I brought with me a bagful of new ranger spells, including an Adept 3 ranged opening move; and some nice jewelry to fill up the empty slots.
Business concluded, I ran her to Oakmyst to try out her new App4/Adp3 combat arts. There were some non-aggro badgers right there, waiting to die. I took out the three level 7/- badgers without problem, but the level 7 momma badger, well, it was a very close fight. I won, but didn’t feel good about it.
Rangers have great ranged attacks, especially flanking ranged, but once the fighting gets toe-to-toe, the battles turn into a long slogfest. Having great gear and abilities made it possible for her to solo critters two levels above her at all, but my necro would have mowed it down with lesser gear.
Everyone generally is aware that mages solo better than fighters, who solo better than scouts, who solo better than priests. But is there a standard test to see just how well each class measures up?
There is. It’s been in the game since the second adventure pack, and definitively measures your soloing skills.
It’s the Splitpaw solo arena event. Seven waves of opponents, one encounter with two at a time, one with three, and the final encounter is a one-up-arrow mob a level higher than you. The whole thing scales to your level. If you win – congratulations, you can solo acceptably well. If you lose… better work on it.
The devs say that any class can solo Splitpaw arena with average gear. That’s what they say, anyway.
Here’s how my characters rank.
Dorah – 38 necromancer – soloed all seven waves without needing to rest. It’s just a speed trial for her now.
Tipa – 38 monk – had trouble soloing it before I gave her feysteel weapons and engraved leather armor. Still has trouble with the multiple encounters, but she can kill one, feign death and rest. Heals and high burst damage were key against the last mob.
Nashuya – 44 shadow knight – kills easily. The last mob, a healer, requires extremely high dps at the end of the fight in order to defeat the chain warding — harm touch, lifetap, pet and gnoll master strike did the job.
And the not so good:
Dera – 55 Inquisitor – the last time I tried, I couldn’t kill the final boss. Cleric DPS was too low to get through the wards, and it came down to who had the most power. It wasn’t me. Dera did the best against groups — reactive heals, group debuffs, heretic’s fire, and the debuffs that cause damage when anyone hits or uses a spell or an art, all combine to help mobs kill themselves. But when they are just sitting there waiting for you to let their ward heal them, not much you can do. Just don’t have that kind of direct damage.
Verd – 36 Warden – rooting and nuking got him through to the last mob. But, as with Dera, it came down to a battle of who had the most power in the end.
I’ve never taken Dina (70 troubador) there. I already know how well a troubador soloes a level 71/+ mob. With lots of mezzing and heal song pumping out that 51 point heal every six seconds, I maybe could eventually kill him, but it isn’t what I’d call soloing. Now that I can stealth in combat, I have a lot more opportunities to mez, stealth, get behind him and let loose with my big backstab attack.
Here’s how I think the classes would stack up in the arena, and in the land.
Necromancer, Conjurer, Wizard, Warlock, Illusionist, Bruiser, Monk, Paladin, Coercer, Shadow Knight, Brigand, Swashbuckler, Assassin, Dirge, Fury, Troubador, Ranger, Inquisitor, Warden, Defiler, Templar, Mystic.
Mages generally best. Necromancers are clearly the best soloers. Conjurers don’t get the self heals or taps, so though they solo well, it’s second to the all-powerful necromancers.
I placed Coercer after the classes that can heal — against the last mob, there are no pets to charm, so the tactics are stun, mez, root, run and nuke, but without the nuke power of the wizard or warlock. Illusionists do get a pet to help them. Shadow Knights really rely on high dps to overcome their indifferent healing.
Brigands and swashbucklers have dps which is less dependent on positioning than the other scout classes, as well as a generally higher utility. An assassin can try to stunlock the mob to set up the good positional attacks. Dirges get heals and good melee buffs. Furies get heals and a wide range of nukes and dots, as well as root. Troubs get no real heals, but can keep one monster mezzed indefinitely, allowing them to set up positional attacks. I know little about rangers; experience with my level 6 suggests they’d be powerful with root, snare, and plenty of room, because they are crappy in toe-to-toe melee.
Inquisitors don’t do great nuke or melee damage, but their debuffs, reactive heals, and reverse damage shields let the monster kill itself. Wardens, Mystics, Templars and Defilers are the best healers, but give up soloability.
I could be wrong… take your toon to Splitpaw and let me know how well you do in the solo arena.

7 thoughts on “EQ2: Test Your Soloing Skills”

  1. I find it slightly amusing that you placed the coercer after a paladin (since I play a coercer / warden / necro / templar / mainly into the 60+’s and then uh prolly everything else after that LoL.
    I did splitpaw with the coercer, just to see what it was like. No mez’ing required at all, and the illusionist “pet” is not really a pet. I mean, yes, it’s an extra thing they can control, but it’s more like a speed bump. My order? Necromancer, Coercer, Warden, Templar. Necro for obvious reasons, coercer becuase she has a whole lot of attacks that go off when the mob casts / attacks. For some huge dmg. It was easy to root / stun and then dps them down at range. Warden after that because the dps is lacking, even though the dmg shield was going off nicely and she was 55+ so had her dps doggies helping in the fight and her heal tree going off. Templar.. could not even beat the final mob. It was just that sad. She even has some pretty good gear.
    I’d have put them in this order, but again, it’s all opinion hehe.
    Necromancer, Conjurer, Wizard, Warlock, Shadowknight, Coercer, Illusionist, Paladin, Monk, Bruiser, Assassin, Swashbuckler, Brigand, Ranger, Defiler, Warden, Fury, Mystic, Dirge, Troub, inquisitor, Templar
    Mystics / Defilers get some *great* de-buffs and also get that little doggy who has some pretty nice aa’s if you’ve gotten any.. fury’s get a lot of dps spells, wardens get the heals, etc etc. Again, just a matter of opinion. 🙂

  2. You missed Guardian 🙂 My level 48 Guardian rarely has any problems with the solo arena, except if she has a run of bad luck.

  3. I missed Berserker, too! Just goes to show how blind I can be to classes I don’t play. I would estimate the pure tanks would be somewhere around the brigand/swashes.
    Ricotta, you really must hate bards 😛 My main is a troub and I don’t think we’re THAT bad solo, and I know dirges would be better. I also think I might win the the arena with my Inq if I were just more clever.
    The devs said the arena would be different for your class so that each would have an equal chance of winning. I don’t see that. It’s always exactly the same whichever class I bring to the arena.

  4. Meh I don’t *hate* bards lol I have a dirge (level 35) so I just haven’t experienced all they have to offer as a class quite yet *grins* the rest I’ve played to a fairly high level and know them inside and out, so I blame ignorance on my part, lol. It’s really hard to judge how well someone / class would do in an arena situation if I’ve no idea what they’re like to play at particular levels or when they get their “good” stuff, what sorta gear they’re wearing etc (ie: my necro is M1’d up the wazoo with rare gear… vs. my dirge who’s slacking slightly since she’s the end of the line of alts.. )

  5. I’ve done the splitpaw arena with all my toons. I’ve found that it is harder to do in the early 20s. Around 29 and 35 it gets easier though. I’ve also found that cures, dispells and raising your resist can be handy for the last fight. As you say, it is rediculously easy for Necros.

  6. I found the splitpaw arena amazingly easy to complete with a Illusionist.
    Lol, my “speed bump” lasted all the fights and kept me from being hit once.
    I’ve done it with a warden as well and it seemed easy but it was twinked pretty heavily.

  7. I took my SK through the solo Arena this morning — it went faster than before; I had very little downtime.
    I noticed that Nashuya does most of her DPS through spells; very rarely, when she is in full “burn” mode, does she swing her sword. So I put away her Electrified Bone Bladed Claymore and took out the Shiny Brass Shield and Ghoulbane – the shield stun was invaluable, especially when combined with the kick stun. Even the two group encounters went well. I remembered to use my hex dolls on incoming, and remembered to wait for the Champion to enter his heal mode to use harm touch.
    At no time did I feel close to losing. My SK did better in this event than my monk, and it’s probably time to reorder the list.

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