http://portalhost.servehttp.com/ever...hp/Mercenaries


I am thinking this will be pretty successful for EQ. Lots of people already running around with merc's in tow. I have only tried the highest teir merc that is open to all and at least with the healer mercs, I am happy enough with it's ability that I am thinking seriously about getting rid of my cleric account. I usually 6 box and have even tried 8 boxxing. I have a lvl81 rogue (main), 81 warrior, 80 shaman, 80 cleric, 80 druid, 80 mage and then I added another cleric (lvl70 I think) and bard (lvl71). Also have a 76 enchanter that has become nothing but a buff bot on my warrior account. I am now probably going to go down to 4 accounts only and will have 2 merc healers up for the last two spots in the "group". The merc's do a much better job then I can. One merc healer did an ok job keeping my warrior up fighting mobs that I have to spam heal with my own cleric. 2 made it trivial. I even accidently pulled 3 mobs, merc healer got agro from fast healing my warrior...merc ran around instead of standing there like my cleric would for 5 seconds before death, while the second merc healer healed that merc back up. The two merc's managed to heal and run around enough for me to grab and establish agro back with my warrior and rogue and then proceeded to heal as normal. I know on my own with my normal full bot group, I would have wiped on that...even on my home set-up where I am not confused at what I am looking at (I am playing 4 accounts on my laptop since I am working away from home and each screen split is very small, and I have a very hard time seeing details on it, plus I don't have my X-keys and so on). It was fun to forget about healing all the time. With two merc healers, my warrior's health bar was rarely below 50% and usually above 80% and the mercs were usually near full mana after the fight. I also feel somewhat...cheated, because building up my cleric bot took a bit of effort and now I can just hire a merc that comes well geared with spells and all. And the mercs I am using are not the best in the game. Those merc's will have to be unlocked by questing. The merc's take up a group slot as if they were real players, which means they also take up a share of the exp and they also level up. They buff the usual cleric hitpoint and armour class buffs as well as runes and spell casting haste.