Help with an epic mob in The Living Tombs

[Captive2]

Last night I tried to take down the level 61 x4 epic mob in The Living Tombs. It’s that ghost tree – I can’t remember it’s name and I can’t look it up here at work. It’s in the Residence court, I believe – the third court of four as you move through The Living Tombs from the Sinking Sands.

My team is level 70 with about 130 AAs. They’re decked out in MC weapons and armor, with about a 50/50 mix of master and expert spells. I was VERY disappointed that I failed so spectacularly.

The first time I wiped from all the knock-back spreading out my team across half the zone – it was utter chaos. The second time went much better; I positioned my team up against a wall so they wouldn’t be moved by the knock-back. That time, I got the mob down to around 30% (health was in the orange). I thought I had everything under control, and then things just went downhill in a huge hurry. One of the healers died, and then everyone else went down shortly thereafter.

The third time, I positioned my team in the same way but must not have been exactly perpendicular to the wall as I ended up getting bounced around more and things went to pieces around 60% or so.

My team is a guardian, troubadour, conjuror, illusionist, warden, and mystic. I was playing my elemental-resistance song with the bard, giving up a concentration spot that I normally use on the hate-reduction spell. I seemed to be able to hold agro ok, so I decided it was worth the switch. I did this because the tiny bit of info on this mob I could find indicated it uses a lot of cold-based damage.

It spawns a couple of treants on initial pull; they’re triple-up arrow heroic 61s that die in a few seconds if I concentrate on them. But they keep spawning, and some of the info I found suggested leaving them alone as they eventually re-spawn as epic mobs if killed. By the time I died the second time (the most successful attempt of the three), there were probably 10 of those trees pounding on me. I simply couldn’t keep up with healing.

I’m not sure if it’s better to focus on them and kill them off first. That’s normally what I do, but like I said the info on EQ2 wikia suggested leaving them alone. I realize that’s just subjective opinion, but it’s generally based on experience, so I’m loathe to dismiss it out of hand. I tried killing the trees the first time, but because my team was so spread out it just didn’t work at all.

If I divert my attention to the constant stream of trees (they must spawn every 10 seconds or so), it doesn’t seem that I’ll ever be able to do any damage to the boss mob. He’s apparently got around 500,000 hp, so it’s going to take a while for me to whittle him down to toothpicks like he deserves. I tried AOEs, but these treants have enough HP that they don’t go down all that quickly, and I don’t have enough “blue” damage to take them out while staying focused on the epic mob. They aren’t grouped either, so things like encounter AOEs or encounter mezzes don’t seem too viable.

I can imagine trying to mez the heroic mobs would just be an exercise in rotating targets, as there get to be an awful lot of them eventually. It simply doesn’t seem viable to try to mez them all, as more spawn all the time. I think my best bet is to either somehow focus on the mob and just heal through the damage (which means I need more DPS to kill him before the adds become overwhelming) or kill off those adds as quickly as I can and then get back to the boss. Since my team is more survival-based than DPS-based, I think the latter approach is the only realistic one. I don’t think I can kill the boss fast enough to simply ignore the adds.

I’m just curious if others have experience with this miserable tree, or have some advice I haven’t thought of. Just for comparison, earlier in the evening I took down Lockjaw – a level 62 x4 epic mob – without any real trouble. I realize that mobs are often over or under-conned, but it seems odd I could handle a level 62 x4 epic boss easily and wipe so spectacularly on a level 61 x4. I guess different mobs require different tactics, and unfortunately my tactics to date have largely been tank-n-spank.

I’m concerned that this is a sign of things to come – that encounters like this one will be more frequent as I progress into later content. I was planning to try the Godking soon – he’s a level 65 x4 epic mob required for the last quest in the Peacock line in Maj’Dul. There are also a couple of 65 x4 dragons I need to kill for an access quest in the Shimmering Citadel. I really enjoy unlocking parts of the game and finishing storylines, so I HATE the idea of just walking away without finishing these. I suppose at 80, mentored down to level 75 these mobs will be simple. I just figured I should be able to take down a 61 epic boss when my team is 70. I think I’ll keep trying.

Thanks for any advice or suggestions you can provide.

[Noxxy]

Urzyd the Undying

I just go for the straight dps burn - ignor the adds as they come back as epix - for me, this normally means having everyone close even though they take a hit with aoe (their ac and def should be high enough to take a few before they go feet first)

- select yourself a good looking corner to stand in
- clear the area to avoid anything nasty walking by (remember respawn times so don't be too slow)
- position your 5 guys/gals so they face into the corner within melee range (for me at least - ymmv)
- throw a group ward (mystic)
- tank body pulls, throws a few taunts, reverses into corner
- drop a turtle
- single target ward (mystic), Hot tank, full taunts
- full dps, ignor adds
- at this point I put everyone back on /follow in case they get thrown back they should auto race back into battle
- doesn't hurt to have a group HoT constantly running to stave off AOE dmg
- things go bad, drop a tree
- your warden will prob be spec'd for a chance to heal everytime it hits the mob so make sure it is in melee range
- keep at it till he's splinters

Your team will get knocked back as the mob has a 30s recast whereas turtle is a lot longer

Important to remember with Urzyd - Resistances:- Crushing (100%), Piercing (50%), Mental (100%)


Make sure your casters and have something pointy in their hands (every little bit helps if melee) instead of staves / clubs unless of course they are fantastic weapons and they are out of range - bard could be rendered to nothing more than a buff bot due to mental resists so give him some slashers

Make sure you have turtle up (or anything even close to a knockback protection) - if no turtle, see if you can grab some guild tokens if your guild is high enough from your town merchant

No turtle or knockback protection? Hmmm...
- have a good look around for a really confinded corner or something - it's the only advice I can give tbh
- or...you could always stick everyone in the corner with the tank..all facing the mob...

..as you can tell - always have some kind of turtle..I call him fred

[Captive2]

Important to remember with Urzyd - Resistances:- Crushing (100%), Piercing (50%), Mental (100%)

DOH

My guardian uses a club. My conjuror, illusionist, warden, and mystic use wands. I'm a woodworker so I make mastercrafted items for my team. Only one character - the troubadour - uses piercing/slashing weapons.

I really need to pay more attention to stuff like this.

Thanks for the excellent tips. The corner idea - to avoid knockback in either direction - is fantastic. I've just been trying to get exactly perpendicular to a wall so the knockback doesn't slide me along the wall - but of course that's tricky to start with and impossible to maintain.

I don't have the turtle ability, but maybe I need to look into it. I think I know what you're talking about - one of the warden AA abilities. I am specc'd to proc a group heal with my warden during melee, so I try to keep the whole team in melee range.

I'll give him another shot with these ideas. The adds are nuts, but I'll see if i can pull it off.

One thing that doesn't seem to be working for me; the warden/mystic death-prevention spells. I cast those when things are getting hairy, but they never seem to do anything. Maybe they're actually firing and it's just happening so fast I don't notice it. I'm expecting a big spike in health - but maybe it's more like a blip

I just get the overall sense that I don't understand the mechanics of this game correctly. What matters more - spell damage or crit chance? CA damage or strength/stamina? Are there haste caps (with both a troubadour and an illusionist, do the stacking haste buffs make sense)?

I'll put together a post on this stuff separately. I really think others may benefit from it - I know I would.

Thanks Noxxy for all you do in the EQ section of this board; I really appreciate it.

[Noxxy]

...been trying to get exactly perpendicular to a wall so the knockback doesn't slide me along the wall - but of course that's tricky to start with and impossible to maintain...

- exactly
- always grab a corner due to the fact that each knockback will slightly change your orientation and if you were perpendicular you'd need to constantly adjust for it - as if you didn't have enough to worry about already!

...I don't have the turtle ability...

- I know the fury and the templar have turtles - must have shield equipped
- can't comment re the warden as that's the only healer I don't have but worth a look on the eq2 wikia to find out

...I am specc'd to proc a group heal with my warden during melee, so I try to keep the whole team in melee range...

- if the warden had a wand...and was being 100% resisted...no group heals

...The adds are nuts, but I'll see if i can pull it off...

- drop the odd tank aoe to make sure they focus their attn on the MT not the healers et al

...death-prevention spells...

- personally, rarely use - If things do get nasty however I do blow the 15 min refresh heals - they are death spam savers
- but if I did use the death saves- generally, they give a temporary buff to the target's mit plus, give a small-ish heal - so not like your going to see a huge hp increase as if the target had a lay on hands or something
- you could always make a macro of joinging the two if you preferred - i.e., /clearallqueuedabilities, /cancel_spellcast, 15 min panic heal, death save

Just had a few more thoughts:
- if you run ACT you can check to see if spells had fired and how many resists you are getting
- I always make sure that all my healers heal spells and any other classes 'important' spells are in macros of which the first two lines are always - /clearallqueuedabilities, /cancel_spellcast, then the heal/spell of your choice

[Lokked]

Druids have a turtle at the end of the AGI line - Tortoise Shell, 30 sec duration, 5 min recast, all chars must be touching the druid.

Shaman do not get a turtle.

[Captive2]

I gave Urzyd another try this past weekend. I re-specc'd my whole team, since I'd just recently hit level 70 and could therefore allocate 70 points per area instead of 50. I didn't make any huge changes, but did correct a few mistakes I'd made along the way. I read some suggestions on EQ Flames for each class, and I think those suggestions were very helpful.

I set up in a spot where I thought I wouldn't get bounced around by the knockback. I was wrong. I stil got bounced around a bit, and by the end of the fight I was spread all over. But I did manage to win. I lost the illusionist, and by the end both healers were no longer in line-of-sight due to all the knockback (but their heals somehow continued to work).

I ignored the adds per the suggestion above. My guardian is specc'd with the Agility line that gives some AOE auto-attack potential, and I tried to use my "blue" AOE damage on the guardian whenever it was available. The adds are not grouped with the epic mob, so only AOE damage hurts them. By the end, there were probably 10 adds still alive, plus a few grey mobs that I'd accidentally tagged.

I think the big difference is I focused more on keeping wards up - in addition to the HOTs from my warden. I've gotten more into the habit of using single-target wards even when my health is still full; I need to look at those as the preventative device they are. With non-epic mobs I rarely even need to heal, so I've gotten a bit lazy and inefficient in my healing practices. With an almost-constant flow of HOT ticks and wards, my tank rarely dipped below 50%. I would use group heals when necessary to pick up the other team members and pets.

Overall, it went pretty well and was VERY satisfying.

I still need to refine my tactics, and figure out how to better use the special abilities like "turtle". A good example of where that might be handy is the Lockjaw fight. He's a 62 x4 mob, and has some kind of horrible AOE attack when the battle starts. I've killed him twice, and both times on my initial try that AOE virtually wiped out everyone except my guardian ( a few deaths immediately; everyone else's health in the red). When I rez and try again, he doesn't use that ability - so it must be on some sort of timer. After that initial wipe, he's fairly easy.

Last night, I ran through a raid zone in the Pillars of Flame. It's that one that uses the same zone layout as Shimmering Citadel. I killed three of the four tower bosses, and all but 4 of the named mobs total. The toughest was a 65 x4 - he took a LONG time to kill but wasn't all that difficult. I got stuck when I ran into a double-pull kind of mob that requires some coordination to immediately pick up 3 runners while tanking the main epic mob. I couldn't pull that off, and it was getting late so after I wiped I just logged.

Still, it was very satisfying and enjoyable to get that far into the toughest zone I've tried. I think the re-spec of my AAs helped, as did focusing on keeping my wards up in addition to HOTs.

Once I hit level 72 and can wear the next level of MC gear, I'm going to convert 100% of experience to AAs and enjoy the Kingdom of Sky expansion. I'll also try to periodically hit reasonable raid zones. This will help me build up some financial reserves to pay the ghastly cost of expert level-70+ spells (masters are outrageously expensive), while also moving toward 200 AAs.

I'm hoping to enjoy every expansion with this team, but may skip one if I'm already maxxed at level 80 with 200 AAs by the time I hit it. I definitely want to do a Kunark-based team, so I'm going to leave some of that content for that team.

Thanks for all the good advice here. I really appreciate it.