Runes of Magic Parties and Raids Guide

Runes of Magic Parties and Raids Guide by Blakk78

Hello to all

Here I am going to give a short introduction on the Do’s & Donts’s of MMORPG’s raids/instances. Much of what I am going to right here is going to be in the logical sense-not much in Runes of Magic depth- but it can still be usefull for people who are new to MMORPG’s and are used to solo questing.

As for me, I am quite new to Runes of Magic and I am going to talk in a formal way (not much of the ‘abbreviation’ person to be honest). What I am going to say will be more of a general explanation for MMORPG’s and not as much detailed overview of how things go in Runes of Magic.

The thing they call an aggro/threat

Very basically put, the mobs in an instance will try to see who poses the most threat to them and will go and try to kill the player (the most threatening to them). The threat can come from a couple of sources:

• Damage: If you do alot of damage to a mob, it will try to kill you first (Logical right? take out the one that does most damage)

• [Healing:It might not sound right at first but if you look at it, it actually is. The general principle behind this is to take out the healer, then the rest will go down with ease because they have no one to give them health when they are in need.
• The last one is quite new to me but I have heard people in Runes of Magic and seen one in there as to have specific skills that generate more aggro/threat (For that I think it is with Knights?)

These 3 factors together determine which character the mobs in an instance will go for.

Roles in a party/raid

The Tank (a.k.a. Meatshield)

• This would typically be a chararacter which can wear the heaviest armor and has a lot of Hitpoints (HP). For Runes of Magic, this is the Knight (read on the Runes of Magic forums to find out which classes are good as a secondary class for a tank).

• As already mentioned before, your main role as a tank is to take a hits. Your job is not to do as much damage as you can, but to keep as many mobs on you as possible; preventing them to run off to other members.

• For your role is to take a many hits, your primary stat will be Stamina; in Runes of Magic: really strong armours to equip.

• Obviously you will step into a fight as the first person in the group (also known as “Pulling”). When the fight starts nobody has any aggro/threat yet, so all the mobs will run to the first person they see. So unless specifically agreed that someone else will do the pull, the tank pulls.

• When the fight starts (you pulled) your main focus is to generate as much aggro as you can and as quickly as you can. So start using those special skills that generate extra aggro. You will need to keep doing that and at the same time make sure that you can keep it up. Specifically for Runes of Magic that means that the Knight also has to manage his mana points (MP). If he runs out of MP, he can no longer do those extra aggro skills.

• If there is only one mob to tank, this all goes pretty straight forward. You enter the fight, keep hitting the same mob over and over again. If however, there are 2 or 3 mobs to tank at the same time, your job will become a bit more complex. Basically, before the start of the fight, you tell everybody which mob you will be hitting first and the most (if possible you can put a visual mark on that mob-do not know if that is possible in Runes of Magic-it happens in World of Warcraft) and which mob goes down as second. You then enter the fight, start hitting the first mob, from time to time do some AoE so you damage the second and third mob aswell. Once you got good aggro on the main target, you can occasionally switch to the second and/or 3rd mob to put a couple of those aggro generating skills on them so they will stay on you.

• As this was not enough to think about already, you will also need to keep an eye out on what is happening around you. Where are the other players in the room? Did they do alot of damage/healing that they pulled one of the secondary mobs off you and are now under attack? If that happens, (and you do not have an off-tank with you) you will need to pull that mob off your friends.

• There is a method people call as ‘kiting’. Kiting is a style of combat where a player stays out of combat range of an enemy while causing damage to it- meaning that if you fight a mob, run far so it can not get you because it is meant to be in its position to fight others BUT you still keep damaging it even though it can not get you. (Kind of harsh but, you want to win right?)

Healer

• As a healer, your job is to keep everybody alive. Do not bother on doing damage, just keep an eye on everybody’s health and heal. If you do not have to heal anybody for a couple of seconds or so, then still not do anything but let your MP regenerate.

• Primary stat is Stamina and secondary Wisdom.
• As you would only wear cloth armor you will die quickly. As such you will generally be in the back of the group on a safe distance from the mobs.

• Being in the back and not doing damage does not mean you are safe. As said before, if you heal too much, you will get the healer aggro. So what you need to do is get to know your healing: How long does it take to cast your heal? How much does it heal for? When the tank goes in, give him some time to get aggro. Do not heal right away- chances are you will get a big heal in and over aggro the tank. Your job is not (unless there is a special mechanic on that boss- see later) to keep the tank at full health all the time, your job is to keep him alive. So let him get a few hits, it will give him time to build some aggro. If it is a really hard hitting boss (in raids for example) chances are you will need to take turns between several healers, so each get a heal in inturn. That way, you divide the healing aggro over different healers.

DPS (Damage per second)

• Classes that are build to do as much damage as possible.

• Your job is to actually kill the mobs/bosses.

• Yes, your job is to do as much damage as possbile and get the mob/boss down as quickly as possible, but that does not mean you can just stand there and fire away.

• Use a Threatmeter and always keep an eye on it. You are actually the biggest threat to the tank. 85% of the threat is caused by DPSers doing too much damage and as such over aggro the tank.

• If you over aggro IT IS YOUR FAULT. Do not start blaming the tank that he can not keep the aggro. He might be under geared, you might be overgeared… but no matter what, the tank is doing everything he can to build up as much aggro as he can. YOU as a DPS have to watch the Threatmeter and act accordingly. If you see that you are going to over aggro the tank, stop doing damage for a while. It might mean you would not end up on top of the DPS list, but who cares? It is all about getting the mobs/bosses down as a team, not a game of being first on the DPS list.(unless your a desperate fellar

• In order to not over aggro, you also need know your spells very well. Know which spell does what damage. That goes for direct damage spells, but even more for DoT’s (Damage over time). If you put a curse on a boss, you need to know if it does the same damage with every tick, or if the damage goes exponential or not. Knowing when to go full out nuke and when to hold back is the key to a good DPSer.

• About AoE: Standard rule: You NEVER use AoE abilities unless specifically asked to do so. When you use AoE you will have a big chance of pulling all mobs on you in a very short amount of time. As you are not made to take a hits (let alone a hits from multiple mobs) you will die very quickly; so when doing AoE you beter be sure you kill the mobs with it and within seconds. Do not go thinking that it is just you that will die and that it is your experience points debt. 90% chance when you are dead the mobs will go on a rampage through the group and pick the other weak defence characters. No way the tank will be able to grab all mobs again within a few seconds.

Things to remember:

• Getting to know your class and instances is not always easy. So be prepared for mistakes. That will be mistakes by partymembers, but sometimes by you. So do not start shouting “Noob, …”. Relax, try to learn from mistakes you and your partymembers made. (Being hot-headed is not a good thing: party members might kick or leave the group)
• If you do over aggro, STOP doing damage. Do not think you can finish the job quickly by doing a few extra spells. Most of the mobs will still have enough HP left to kill you. As you are built for damage dealing and not taking you will die within seconds. If you keep doing damage, your aggro with only keep on rising, and the tank will not be able to pull the mob off you.

• IF you do over aggro: RUN TOWARDS THE TANK, NOT AWAY FROM HIM. Countless times I have seen people run for the exit when they get aggro. This is not going help you. You want the tank to pull the mob off you and most of the time he will be on the oposite side of the exit. The tank runs as fast as you, so if you run for th exit he can not be able to catch you. He will have to leave his position and mess up the raid setup- leaving aggresive mobs in their original space. Even if you make it out alive, the mob that followed you, will go on a rampage through the party and kill the others. Again the tank is very unlikely to be in a place where he can pick that mob up again , and your team mates being angry at you that you caused them to die while you survived.

• Try to know the tactics on bosses you are going to meet. I do not know how things work in Runes of Magic, but in World of Warcraft each boss has its own tactic to take him down. Read up on forums so you know what to expect and what you are up against. If for intance a boss will reset his aggro when he hits 50% HP, it would be nice if the healers and DPSers know that in advance and know that they will have to hold back the damage when the boss hits 50%, so the tank can build up some aggro again. If you do not know it, you will keep on blasting at him and over aggro.

• Closely related with the point above: When you go into an instance for the first time, be prepared for wipeouts. Even if you read up on tactics, actually doing it is different, and you will need to learn how to do it, or need to learn how to work as a team with that specific group you are in with. So do not start whining if you get wiped out a couple of times the first time you try a new instance.

I hope that I was able to put it clearly enough and that at least some parts where new to some people and as such are usefull.

Glossary:

Aggro: The monster’s aggression level towards you.

Instance: A unique copy of a dungeon created when you and your group enter that dungeon. Only you and your group will be in your copy of the dungeon. Another group that enters the same area will enter their own copy of the dungeon.

Kiting: A style of combat in which a player continually stays out of combat range of an enemy, while simultaneously causing damage to it.

Mob: Any computer-controlled character in the game, whether hostile or not. An abbreviation of mobile.

Newbie: Any new player to the game. Sometimes abbreviated as newb or noob. Some players consider it an insulting term.

Pull: To draw a monster away from its current location and back to the party. Pulling is done so that the party can fight individual monsters and not groups of them.

Raid: A large-scale attack on an area by a group of parties and players.

Tank: A character that engages in melee with enemies and can withstand a lot of damage. Knights is an example of a tank. Also used as a verb to describe the act of engaging in melee with eneimes.

Threat: The amount of aggression, or aggro, a monster has built up against you. When a monster has more hate against you than any other surrounding players, it will attack you. Different actions, such as healing players or damaging the monster, will generate different levels of threat.

Acronyms:

AoE: Area of effect

DOT: Damage Over Time

DPS: Damge Per Second

HP: Hit Points or Health Points

MMORPG: Massively Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Game

NPC: Non-Player Character

Thanks for reading, Blakk.