Boxing Partner

[Ferromancer]

Hi all,

I'm new to boxing, am going to try it out (one computer) starting soon. My main is a 68 magician on Test, but I feel like leveling up two guys starting out rather than using the mage to powerlevel one other guy.

I was thinking of boxing a troll shaman and a troll warrior, but wasn't sure. How does playing this combo compare to, say, a warrior and cleric, or a shadowknight/paladin and shaman?

Also, in your experience, is most of the time spent while boxing a healer and a tank used controlling the tank or controlling the hero? Which spends most of its time on "autopilot"?

Thanks,
Ferromancer Steelword, 68 magician of Test Server

[Tempur]

I am slightly biased, but I think at this stage if I were to start over with a duo it would be an iksar SK/Shaman combo. SK brings solid tanking and pulling abilities along with snare and a panther target in its pet. Warriors and paladins will have headaches with pulling and stopping running mobs. I think with SK/Shaman you will be able to deal with a bigger variety of camps based on those two factors alone.

Another interesting combo is bst/druid. The trade off is weaker tanking for higher dps and the druid's lull ability is situational.

As for who is on "autopilot", I tend to work both toons pretty equally when 2-boxing. As you may have guessed, I box SK/shaman. I generally get an aggro spell or two in on the pull, so my initial focus is on the shaman getting the mob slowed and then a HoT and Panther on the tank. Then focus shifts back for any specific positioning, snares, nukes, etc. I would say that everyone develops their own patterns though and I will depend on what you are comfortable with.

[Sam DeathWalker]

1st toon: Warrior
2nd Toon: Cleric
3rd Toon: Shaman (possible Chanter)
4th and 5th Toon: DPS/Utility (Wizard or Mage) and Pulling if you don't want to warrior pull (Bard).
Rest: More DPS (wizard, more wizards, go wizards).

Never get a SK as yur tank ...

[Rigeld]

Never get a SK as yur tank ...
O.o

I box SK/Cleric all the time. Sure, its low DPS, but meh. No runners.

[Catamander]

Assuming you will have just these 2 toons and plan to box them as a duo with no one else, I think SK/Shaman is a very solid combo. If you were looking at 3+ toons, I would say War instead of SK, but with just 2, go SK.

Warrior will get you heftier tanking and extend the top end of what you can do, but SK will have some key utility functions that will really help you out. Snare, for starters, is really hard to do without and relying on procs is not a good solution. Some self-buffs, tap heals, and FD will also be nice. DPS is not so great but some of the dots and taps will help compensate. Aggro is very solid and scales well by level without having to always focus weapon choices on hate generation.

Shaman over cleric for a couple reasons. First is slowing. Unless mobs are immune to slow, a shaman with slow + heals will be just as good healing as a cleric without any slows. Second is dps. Shamen put out some decent duoing dps, which will be important. Finally, they have some good solid buffs.

[Yakk]

However, if you are hard-core, a Warrior/Cleric duo will let you get higher.

Pick a cleric of Inny, and you can get a snare-clicky.

For hard content, all you need now is a slower, and you are golden. You have the core of a group that can, using less gear, take on the hardest single-group content in the game.

On the other hand, a Shaman+SK will be able to do medium-hard content without aid easier than the Warrior+Cleric.

[Khabok]

If you do decide on a Troll war and shaman, be sure to make the shaman a worshiper of Innoruk and doing the quest for the snare click neck. That will help a lot at lower levels I would imagine. At higher levels snare isnt as much of a problem anymore, either bandolier a snaring weapon in or using the War AA to make mobs not flee, although that does mean they keep fighting back that last 20% instead of standing their letting you beat on them.

[daw4888]

IMO is generally easier to find a slower to add to your group, then it is a cleric. So my second toon was a cleric, if you have CH, your really dont need slow on most mobs. Also being able to res yourself is a nice bonus to the cleric/war combo. You can always buy a snare weapon until you get high enough level for CoC.

[Jugerrnaut]

War/Cle was my choice and I have been boxing them for over 30 levels (40ish to 75) now. I have the ability with these 2 classes to basically be an instant group just about anywhere I'm flagged to enter. No downtime spent LFG'ing for a few years now.

Bandolier takes care of snares and slows when I need them, relying on a proc can take a few rounds, but you'll adjust your timing based on the mob's health soon enough.

Having cheal and rez far outweighs the utility of other classes IMO. Cle Pacifiy line can ease splitting headaches, there's several snare proc weapons to choose from, and having 50% slow (Truncheon of Doom) was they key weapon for eliminating the need for a slower class.

[Mophios]

i bot War and cleric combo, it is good but i think if i was to start over from scratch i would do the SK and cleric or shaman either would be nice, i would do cleric over shaman cause like people have said slow isn't that big of a deal when boxing and you have weapons that proc some decent slows. and the SK has FD and snare for pulls and runners, i am about to add a druid to my combo for the snares, gates, and extra DPS but if i had a SK i would probly just add a wiz instead of a dru.

[bombayxev]

i'd say a shaman makes for the best tank partner. i've been duoing with a warrior/shaman combo and it works pretty well. however, i think an SK/shaman combo would be the best because of the extra utility the SK brings (snare, FD/split).

[Cowboyatheart]

I box a war/clr and am quite happy with it. With the current OOC regen the cleric can add ok dps (not as good as a shammy) between marks/nukes/ect.
Their low aggro heals are also nice (HoT, promised renewal) in that if I pull 2 I don't have to worry as much about maintaining aggro on multiple mobs.

I'm thinking about swapping the cleric out for my druid for normal duoing though. (getting lazy, I hate running since I tend to duo for very short periods while waiting for groupmates to log on)

[werdara]

Here's some + and - of a few of your options.

Cleric
+ Best HP buff
+ Most healing power
+ Take hits better than other priests
+ Lull
+ Rez
- no snare
- no slow / hastes
- no invis (but can IVU)
- no SoW line

One solution, mentioned by others is the Regent Symbol of Innoruuk
http://everquest.allakhazam.com/db/item.html?item=1254

And don't forget Jboots to remedy the SoW line lack

Shaman
+ slows / hastes
+ invis
+ potions for IVU/DS
+ Moderate HP buff
+ SoW line
- Buff the least HP of the 3 priests at most levels (unsure about Dire vs Direfoc + Stam
- Attention sensitive for their DPS, esp if you use canni, be prepared to switch back and forth between toons a lot
- Least mana regen by buffs (i.e. unattended)
- no snares
- no rezzes

Druid
+ Midline HP buffing, goes great with Pallies
+ Snares
+ Ports
+ SoW line
+ Good damage shields
+ ATK and AC debuffs
+ Decent mix of dots/nukes for DPS (fire and forget nukes)
+ Invis
+ Ports / evac
- no slows / hastes
- no IVU
- less healing than a cleric, may be a factor vs some unslowed content (esp mid 50s)


Warrior
+ Highest base HP
+ Highest base mitigation
+ Highest DPS
+ Good unattended aggro (since primarilly swing/proc based)
+ Anti-run AA ability
- Weakest pulling
- No haste (potions / certain clickies fix this)
- No self HP buffs
- No self healing
- No IVU / Invis

Can get clickies /procs for:
Snares (Several snare proc weaps)
Slows (Best slow proc is Truncheon of Doom, 50%, War only)
Symbol line (Orb of the Duskmold, 700 HP symbol)
Shielding (Ornate PoP BP)
Invis (Incarnadine BP, Cobalt Greaves, and a few raid items)

Pally
+ Best self HP buffing (Note pallies have a Shielding/Armor line that doesn't stack with 9/Focus, but does stack with Virtue line)
+ Brells HP buff
+ Rezzes for healer
+ Stun versatility
+ Good self healing / patching / crosshealing cleric by tank
+ Self haste (25% around lvl 40, potions make this a small concern at best)
+ IVU
- Weak DPS / long kills
- no innate slow
- no innate snare
- little splitting ability, but can offroot
- no invis
- attention sensitive aggro

Can get clickies /procs for:
Slows (20% I think is best Pally useable, not worth the time to proc it)
No snare procs
No invis clicks except rare raid drops

Shadowknights
+ Great snares
+ Invis and IVU, but self only
+ Feign Death, great splitting ability
+ Tap tanking for patches or harder content. Later the innate rune proc spell
+ Group mana taps always good
+ Mob debuffs
+ Good AE aggro on multipulls
+ Self DS spells
+/- Midline unattended aggro (dots, aggro over times)
- no innate slows / haste
- Almost no HP buffing ability (there's a shielding click on Blood Ember BP, not aware of any others
- Weak DPS / long kills

Can get clickies /procs for:
Slows (20%ish, same as pallies, not worth it)
Symbol line (Duskmold again)

I'm sure I've missed some stuff, but that's what comes to mind right now. Also remember that many of the -'s can be remedied with potions. Just shaman can make rather than buy.

And here's my opinion on certain combos.

Best DPS
War + Druid or War + Sham (hard to say)

Most HP buffing
Pal + Druid

Most versatility
SK + Sham

Least attention sensitive
War + Cleric

Survivability / Endurance
War + Cleric

[Grayhelm]

War + Shaman because Trolls can't be clerics.

Oh, wrong thread. Sorry.

[Missa]

When I created Missa (WAR), I started a box Druid. Snare and healing were great early on and ports as they came in were big bonus (laziness).

This combo worked very well for me until about lvl 55, where the good xp mobs took a long time to kill and hit hard without being slowed, meaning I lost the DPS from the DRU as she had to concentrate on heals (cant remember what level she got her first 10 sec heal).
I find myself often wishing I had done a shammy instead for the slows and better buffs. However now, with the Truncheon of Doom, I can proc slow, and with Dru heals until slow lands, then dps. While it is slow going, at 65 I can handle most of the mobs in Infected Paw (I usually just stay near the entrance) and the AA XP was good (before the HZ changes). Was also able to box, again very slowly, the murks in WoS (never managed to clear back to the queen before repops tho).

The biggest problem with using the truncheon of doom trying to slow the mobs however, is heal aggro when that first CHeal lands. If you can't get it slowed and bando back to hate weapons, you will spend a good bit of end trying to get the mob off your healer.

I have a friend who boxes a pair of kitties, BER and SHM, but he didn't bring them up together, at 75 and 70 respectively he can box most of the common camps in MPG with no problem for decent AA XP.

[Accelerator]

I box several, however, for a 2 box I suggest Tank (Up to U) and shammy. I currently 2 box Vald with great success and working into AG. Key is Mana on the shammy. Got to have enough for dot's, panther, resists and tank heals all in 1 encounter. A warrior yields some good disc's and survivability, however, it's a tank decision!
Add's are the SK "plus". Pally is something I have considered.

[Kudedor]

You've already received some great advice, but allow me to chime in.

Any of the plate tanks will do. The two knights give you more tools and flexibility, the warrior gives you more potential. FD alone might be the biggest difference maker, as it will let you single out mobs to kill that you would never get with the warrior. All the same, I wouldn't trade my warrior for an SK. When I need something pulled I have friends with me to pull or I get help (Or I kill a friend's druid a half-dozen times and get the mob out!)

A druid or cleric will be easiest at lower levels. At 60+ it will get harder with those combos unless you are overgeared. To me, this is a major factor in the decision. I think that the casual tank will be more powerful with the shaman than the other two priests simply because he won't have the massive mitigation to tank unslowed mobs in areas where he needs to hunt for upgrades.

A druid brings a DS that adds up fast on unslowed mobs, a decent buff, an escape route, transportation, snare, decent DPS, some pulling, and tracking. Tracking is underrated these days but I find it immensely powerful. At 68 the druid can get Reptile, which is an incredible tool. At 70 they can non-xp res. It is pretty easy to non-xp res five or six times before worrying about getting the xp back.

A cleric brings lots of HP/AC, res, some pulling, massive healing, scalability for when you do tougher things with help, and the best foundation for building groups. Clerics actually do decent melee DPS and get a major boon from VoV at 71.

A shaman brings the highest DPS while healing, great group healing tools at higher levels, an AA root at 65 that is good for some CC, super mana regen, lots of buffs, and slow. The combination of canni, slow, HoTs, and blast heals is more powerful than CH on a lot of xp content and even a lot of named. Shaman also do the most to boost melee DPS. At 70 shaman can non-xp res. The nature of shaman healing also favors high-ac tanks, where limiting incoming damage has a huge synergistic effect. With a warrior, the innate mitigation advantage helps, SKs have lifetaps and innate lifetap AAs that stack wonderfully with HoTs, and paladins can help spot heal themselves. To me, all those traits stack with shaman HoT- focused healing better than druid or cleric healing.

Personally I recommend a shaman + whatever tank floats your boat. Speaking from experience, once you have your tank in the best groupable gear and augs you can do some amazing stuff with that combo.

Also, I have found it easier to find a competent cleric to help when needed than to find a shaman that can do what I expect of him. I think shaman has a much larger range in potential based off of skill, so if you learn the class and can get the most from it, you will be able to go further with a pick-up healer than you would with your own druid/cleric and a less skilled pick-up shaman.

So can you tell I am biased? =D

These magelo's are a little out of date, but here are my primary two toons.

http://eq.magelo.com/profile/562686
http://eq.magelo.com/profile/766076

The warrior has a couple of raid items, but they are not much different from their group counterparts.

[daw4888]

ok Kuded i didnt want to quote your whole post... but

Clerics get DS, and reverse ds, which adds up nicely on alot of mobs.

It has always been easier to find a frnd with a slow spell, then it is to find a cleric to add to your group. And a competent cleric is really hard to find these days. Most clerics fall in love with the gd fast casting heal spells that spend a fuggload of mana, when they should just be useing ch in "most" all group envirotments. This leads to more downtime. All you have to do when you group a sham is say "keep me panthered, and keep mobs slowed" and they become a compentant sham.

[Kinadam]

Dwarf cleric + Dwarf warrior = win.

But in all seriousness, with Haste potions, reverse DD, VoV, and the zek hammer my combo pumps out some serious dps. If an area is so hard that it warrents a slow or fd puller, then I just bring a group. Forming groups with a cleric and warrior is so mind boggling trivial, yeah druzzil's lfg pool kind of blows but I just do /who all 75 puller or /who all 75 slower, and send random tells. You're always bound to find people who are too lazy to put up lfg.

Also the ease factor of boxxing a cleric should be considered, especially once you get divine arbitration, and an epic 1.5. I have tried boxxing shamans before and they're just too much of a headache, watching for resists, dealing with aggroe on pull while trying to keep aggroe with warrior is not what I'm looking for out of EQ.

As for boxxing a tank other than warrior, this is the warrior website, off with the heads of the heretics.

[Kudedor]

That's just the problem I see, really. Most shaman are only good for panther and slow. I don't see that as competent for a boxed shaman, much less a main. When I have my shaman in the group, instead, he can main heal, group heal, cure if needed, DPS like crazy, debuff, and generally wreak havoc. Too many shaman out there don't even have/use sloth, or know to use VP for off-rooting. It's a pretty complex class if you want to get the most from it.

IMO a good shaman really never stops casting. Heck, my shaman is even clicking items or AAs in between casts most of the time, it seems. They have an incredible range of action and can go oom many times in a fight and recover.

A cleric has a lot to do to, and there is certainly a range of skill levels out there, but in circumstances where I actually NEED a cleric, the cleric is primarily going to be healing me. On any content where the cleric isn't pressed to heal me, the shaman could probably take his place. Simply keeping me up is a lot simpler than what I expect from the shaman, who can spot heal to help, anyway. Perhaps for duoing it comes down to what class you are best at.

I agree that clerics can do more DPS that I didn't mention. I don't know of an actual DS that they can cast on others, but the DS that hurts the mob when it attacks and the one that adds to attacks on the mob it definitely add some DPS, while MoK type marks add some healing and kill the mobs own DS. However, I still don't clerics really shine for duo unless the warrior is raid-geared/over-geared.

[Mendler]

war + cleric enough said

[Sam DeathWalker]

Ya forgot about VoV ... lol.

Look don't think about just today. Don't go short term and sacrifice long term. Sure you think NOW 2 toons is enough, but no matter how many you have NOW you will want more later!

You start with a tank and healer, and the best at those is Warrior/Cleric. What class is the Main Tank for top guilds - Warrior duh. What classes are the main healers for top guilds Cleric - duh. Ok so there is no other choice for your first two. Then you need slowing - well again who is the main slower for the top guilds - Shaman.

Its just as clear as clear can be. Start with Warrior/Cleric as your base and work from there.

There is no question that splitting is extremely important, but like now in the zone I am in I just wait for the mobs to path out of range of each other and pull with warrior (I sit to regen endurence while waiting). I could do perfect splits with ranger/mage combo (3 X faster then FD splitting) but why bother, just as easy to wait for the mobs to move ...

[Yakk]

Because time is a finite resource. :)

[dethvegi1]

When I played,

It was always

War / Cleric or SK / Cleric.

If my SK was geared / aa like my war, he would have been used all of the time in a casual setting. They just have so much utility it's not even funny. Unless you are thinking of getting into raiding, I wouldn't give my war up for anything. I loved being the front line on every encounter.

A Shaman in my opinion, is a better box partner then a cleric. They also seem like more work. I liked the fact I could just cast a few spells on the cleric. Reverse DS, HoT, and Promised Renewal and called it good. If i wasn't feeling lazy I would melee with them and just window back to the tank.

Either choice is a great option though. Cleric just fit my box style better.

If I actually started over again, I'd do an SK / Shm as a 2 box. You can do some pretty nice things with those 2.

[Dukimin]

I box a 75 warrior, a 75 ranger and one of the following: 75 cleric or 68 shaman. In tough content I struggle with the Shaman but not with the cleric.

Withe the cleric in group, the ranger snares and slows with epic 1.0. The warrior does warrior-like stuff. With careful positioning, there is not much attention that the warrior needs, but the ranger needs attention since he does a lot of different things - the pull, snare, nukes, clickies, aggro management, and disc or aa activations.

The attention requirement of the cleric is much, much lower than the shaman. Between Promised Renewal and CH, a cleric these days can be a one-toon CH rotation. PR is a short cast, CH a long one, so it is easy to Hotbutton the chain and still have time for HoT's, fast heals, or DD spells. I can hot button a HOT/RDSon the pull, and can either melee or nuke when my attention permits.

I agree that if attention is not an issue (as would tend to be the case with a two box) then the Shaman has a lot of attraction. It is simple to hotbutton a pull sequence (safe for me since the ranger owns aggro on the pull between snare and Summer's Dew). Then it just a question of figuring out if I should dot first, panther second, or vice versa, and getting down to business.

However, if attention is an issue, the Shaman has huge overhead.


I need to watch resists, and perhaps throw PD or Malo on.
I need to watch the warrior's health
I need to watch my pet's health
I need to heal which ever needs it
I need to launch appropriate DoTs
I need to watch recasts on the shorter DoTs (5 - 7 ticks for the high dps dots is a pita), and recast when timely
I need to watch aggro, since I desire to keep the mob away from me.
I need to cast and recast jaguar/panther
Without a ranger, i would need to do cc: on overpulls.
I need to canni


When boxing, attention is the scarce resource. KISS is the name of the game.

[Kragnimus]

If I ever started over again I'd do an all froggy team hehe.

Can be any of the 3 tanks, cleric,shaman, and can throw in necros or wizzy for dps. Would probably run a Pal/cleric/shm/necro/necro/wiz. Between all the healing aa's from pally hand of piety to cleric divine arb and shaman ancestral guard line you'd only need to throw CH every now and then unless doing the hard group content. Necros are massive dps with pets and dot's as well as wracks for mana and throw in the wizzy for ports. The fact it can all be frogs would just be stellar. Saw a guy doin something similar on the rathe once was sweet looking he used all gnomes though and used a chanter vice shaman. He even had there names rhyming.

[Tempur]

just as easy to wait for the mobs to move
That only works in places where they move!

[Sam DeathWalker]

Ya of course a lot of times they don't move, then the ranger snare with mage coh is a perfect splitter.

Ya KISS is for sure in boxing, thats why all my guys are pure classes. If you can't do what you want with your toon (cept the warrior) in a single 5 line social its kinda not so good. Rangers is low overhead if they use bow, but dps is not good ...

[Elfwarrior]

War and Cleric

Thats what I use, healing potential is there, and greater tanking ability than the other two tanks. I like palys and sks though too, a cleric with them would be good as well. Nothing matches the healing power of the cleric. Mobs dont run away on me either with a war, call of the challenge works wonders. Duo'n in ashengate isnt hard, just gotta be careful.