How to survive in high level dungeons ?

sigreg · August 2013

hello,

After quite fun and challenging dungeons and skirmishes till current lvl 57, now i do have serious problems with my daily runs. Its my first so high lvl char, obviously is equipped with regular "green" gear and im running my dungeons/skirmishes in random partys (im more a casual player so theres no sense to join a guild i think).

At lvl 57 as skirmish i do have "Battle for the bridge", and as dungeon "Caverns of Karrundax". In both i do have the same problem - by every my action im getting LOTS of aggro of multiple mobs around. Its quite normal that melee mobs totally ignore our party tank, TR or high DPS wizard and go directly to me and only me. Also im taking fire from any archer/thrower around... First i was thinking that maybe im doing so many dmg with my silly attacks so "system" mark me as primary target, but no, even if i do use only healing skills result is the same. Single AS cast in Divine mode and thats it, instead healing im running like crazy trying to escape from 3-4 mobs under rain of arrows or axes, and those "fire archont" mobs are real pain in the HAMSTER, not only chasing me but jumping at me once after once quickly burning my HP so getting killed is only a matter of (very short) time. Also mobs level is some issue there, im lvl 57 fighting vs multiple enemies lvl 59.
At first i was thinking thats maybe a problem in skirmish only, so fine, i decided to leave it permanently after 4 or 5 runs (only once we managed finish it succesfully), dying again and again surrounded by mobs is not fun at all, i tried dungeon and...i do have exactly the same problem there. Even party members started to joke thats my own fault - my cleric char is attractive female elf, i should create female half-orc or male dwarf instead, so mobs surely wouldnt be so much interrested :P

And seriously... its a real problem for me as in such case i do see no sense to run skirm/dungeons, actually stopped it already, problem is that it was really fun part of this game (not mentioning AD). Well, not anymore.

How do you handle healing and buffing party members in high levels dungeons ? I dont know, maybe im doing something wrong... by the way, im following this build:

http://nw-forum.perfectworld.com/showthread.php?188622-My-Cleric-Build

maahkremuirsong · August 2013

hmmmm green gears.....

You might want to get some regen blue gears for the meantime. There are great blue gears with high def and high regen in fact a lot of lvl 60 clerics use these for various situations even for pvp. The only downside is the GS.

Next thing to consider is kiting...... when and were to dodge and being nimble will save you a lot specially in pvp.

hamji · August 2013

Get your damage mitigation up to a point where you never need to worry about healing yourself. If you make a mistake and take a big hit just drink potion. Heals on yourself are less effective and could be better spent cast on someone else also most of the time healing someone else will heal you up just fine anyway.

My Damage mitigation sits on around 39% with almost 10% Deflect to keep it company and I can assure you dying is no longer a problem for me.

Gear wise I've done nothing wierd except using Priest's rings instead of Slavemaster's and my highest Enchantments are Rank 7 so not all that expensive.

If you are shopping for blues the regen+defense Exemplar of Youth gear will certainly keep you alive but from my experimentations I found it to be a little excessive. Try out Rares with a focus on Power+Defense(unless you have a vorpal in which case crit+defense), they should give you both the survivability you need and big enough heals to get the job done(sprinkle a little Recovery into the mix to make sure everything goes a little smoother).

prettyboyseta · August 2013

Thanks for this thread. I'm leveling a DC myself, and my first dungeon (Throne of Idris at 42, I think) was frustrating knowing my char is not yet on optimal build.
in addition to what OP wants to know, is this aggro affected by a certain feat or passive? I follow this build: http://clericguide.com/post-balance-patch-healing-build-using-bastion-of-health/ I think sooth reduces threat while you're on full healbot mode. at mid-level since I don't have AS yet I find sunbursting for LS very challenging and when I mess up aka just cast regular sunburst I find my DC sliding for its life having aggroed most adds :P I think this happens when I sort of out-dps my party at the moment and if there's no GF with the party it's a pain getting the mob off of you

vorphied · August 2013

prettyboyseta wrote: »

Thanks for this thread. I'm leveling a DC myself, and my first dungeon (Throne of Idris at 42, I think) was frustrating knowing my char is not yet on optimal build.
in addition to what OP wants to know, is this aggro affected by a certain feat or passive? I follow this build: http://clericguide.com/post-balance-patch-healing-build-using-bastion-of-health/ I think sooth reduces threat while you're on full healbot mode. at mid-level since I don't have AS yet I find sunbursting for LS very challenging and when I mess up aka just cast regular sunburst I find my DC sliding for its life having aggroed most adds :P I think this happens when I sort of out-dps my party at the moment and if there's no GF with the party it's a pain getting the mob off of you

- Soothe passive isn't really worth investing in; there are more useful choices, so you will probably want to take those points out later. In 60 dungeons there may be times when you actually prefer to take on more aggro because you are far more resilient than most of your party (depending on your build and power selection).

- Linked Spirit can be great with the perfect setup (your party stays close together), but it's far from necessary, so don't feel that you must use it if it doesn't suit your playstyle or preferences.

- If you are playing well with the tools you currently have access to and are having inordinate difficulty with group content, the problem could very well be that your groups are awful. If you are a title collector, definitely hit all the dungeons and skirmishes, but if you don't care about a particular "achievement," then feel free to skip the lowbie dungeons. You can always experience them in Epic mode or even go back and solo them in normal mode as a level 60 :P

prettyboyseta · August 2013

vorphied wrote: »

- Soothe passive isn't really worth investing in; there are more useful choices, so you will probably want to take those points out later. In 60 dungeons there may be times when you actually prefer to take on more aggro because you are far more resilient than most of your party (depending on your build and power selection).

- Linked Spirit can be great with the perfect setup (your party stays close together), but it's far from necessary, so don't feel that you must use it if it doesn't suit your playstyle or preferences.

- If you are playing well with the tools you currently have access to and are having inordinate difficulty with group content, the problem could very well be that your groups are awful. If you are a title collector, definitely hit all the dungeons and skirmishes, but if you don't care about a particular "achievement," then feel free to skip the lowbie dungeons. You can always experience them in Epic mode or even go back and solo them in normal mode as a level 60 :P

hey thanks! I'll keep these points in mind!
so I guess the real question is, before 60, with only crafted blues and some greens equipped, which build and rotation is optimum for non-epic dungeons? I think my next target is pirate king.
I have experience in dungeons as a rene CW so it's very new to me to stand back most of the time, debuff w/o CC and focus on how to spam heal the party when possible. I tried the power set-up and tactics on the same link above and it seems to work well, except of course when the mob turns on me instead of the dps/tank.

sigreg · August 2013

Hello,

Thank you for all answers ! Actually in dungeons my health is burned so fast by mobs, that after using a pot usually im dead before CD allow me to use it again. Not because some red area AoE dmg, just by regular attacks of Tons of mobs and archers. At every dungeon run im using LOTS of pots, last try in Caverns of Karrundax costed me about 30 pots, and i was still dying. So definitelly something is wrong here..
Statwise im following advices in build (link in first post) and focusing right now at Recovery + Crit. In effect rest of stats are more like some kind of "extra" given by gear chosen to get needed Recovery. Right now i do have 2500 Recovery, 800 Def (17%) and only 300 Deflection (2%), if we couple that with rather cheap green gear - maybe thats indeed reason of my problems.

Edit: Update
Now my char hit lvl60, i did some changes accordig to your advices and... things are much better now

I managed to buy some not blue, but even purple items, that rised my GS a lot. Still have some greens but im checking AH for good blue/purple replacement.
I changed my gear/ench configuration so now i do have 1950 def (27%) for cost of lower recovery what dropped to 1500. Im going to pump def further till about 35-40%.
And last - i changed healer's lore passive to soothe to lower threat. Now finally mobs are aware that our party have also other members, so dmg what they deliver goes to 5 players instead onle me. Its matter of choice if 15% higher heal power is worth to keep or not, in my situation is not. Theres no use of cleric who has stronger heals, but dies in first minute of fight.
Again tried Caverns of Karrundax dungeon (normal), it was my 6th or 7th run there, unfortunatelly almost all dungeon we had to fight in party of only 4, but still we were doing much better than all my previous full parties. Maybe because we had two wizards, adds were much less annoying. We didnt managed to kill final dragon though, but her time will come :P

How to survive in high level dungeons ?

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