Team Play - Group Theory - Power Gaps and Assumptions

DPS and Support numbers in my Simplified Group Theory, SGT for short, must be changed to more accurately reflect power gaps when they occur.

When dealing with the power gap in Tiers 1-3, the differences in power are negligible. So, it's not necessary to modifiy the formula at all for those tiers. In Tier 4, the are varying degrees of 40. They are as follows.

New 40 - Tier 4 greens or Devastator/Redeye
Annihilator/Bloodlord
Conqueror/Sentinel
Darkpromise/Invader
Tyrant/Warlord
Sovereign
Doomflayer
Warpforged

Each tier from New 40 to Sovereign creates a 5% increase in stats (and weapon DPS). Therefore, a tier difference causes .05 points to be added to both DPS and Support per player.

For example, you are a fresh 40 with 6 friends, but you all managed to hit 40 able to wear Annihilator gear. You are a balanced group containing 6 DPS and 6 Support points. You come up against group in a scenario wearing full Sovereign also a balanced group containing 6 DPS and 6 Support. The Sovereign group gets 1.2 points added to the DPS and Support to account for the power gap. So it's a 6 DPS/6 Support group versus a 7.2 DPS/7.2 Support. The 1.2 DPS advantage makes the base TTK 8.3 seconds for the Sovereign wearing team in straight up fight with all parties involved in the fight.

Doomflayer and Warpforged not only add stats, the renown they require also add effective rank, causing level correction to come into play. Doomflayer has about 20% more stat points (729) on it than Sovereign (588). It also accomplishes this in 5 pieces instead of 8. This means per slot, Doomflayer has *DOUBLE* the stats per piece than Sovereign. Most will still use the same jewelry, belt, and cloak, so the effect isn't as bad. Not to mention it adds 3 effective ranks to a player, for a level correction difference of about 7.5%. For the Sovereign to Doomflayer leap, the appropriate correction is .3 points to each DPS and Support per player to account for the increased stats and level correction bonus. Level correction bonus was determined from this thread on WHA forums. Level difference causes a linear increase in effectiveness by the percentage of the difference. So if a full Sovereign group runs into a full Doomflayer group, both balanced, the matchup is 6 DPS/6 Support against 7.8 DPS/7.8 Support. The 1.8 DPS advantage makes base TTK in straight up fight 5.6 seconds.

Warpforged has 36% more stats (992) than Doomflayer. It also adds 3 more effective levels for another 7% correction. This makes the correction .42 to each per player for this tier gap. A full Warpforged Group versus a full Doomflayer group both balanced causes 2.52 point advantage making base TTK about 4 seconds.

SGT assumes that all players are playing "prudently" and there are no healing debuffs, CC, or morales in play and that all players have enough resources available to do whatever they want. (It does account for Guard and Challenge.) One side isn't wasting it's time beating on the regen tank when the glass cannon Sorc/BW is standing right next to him for example. It also assumes a single assist with most if not all DPS focused on a single target at a time. A group running a split assist would not allow for SGT to work.

SGT basically serves to give a target caller an internal clock, much like a quarterback has an internal clock against a pass rush. It tells him how long he should stay on a target, whether or not the DPS hitting his healers are a threat, and whether or not it's safe to push forward among other things. SGT gives an average TTK for a group. You may well be able to kill the BW/Sorc before SGT tells you you should. You may not be able to kill the regen tank before SGT says you should. But the balanced Warpforged group should be able to wipe the balanced Doomflayer group in about 24 seconds in a straight fight.

When you load into a scenario, you should always pull up the scoreboard, see who you are a facing, and make an estimation of the situation using SGT to set your internal clock for that opponent.

Next time, I'll start going into Advanced Group Theory which makes modifications to Simplified Group Theory to account for TTK for individual players, healing debuffs, CC, and resource management.

Team Play - Group Theory - Estimating TTK

To win a fight in WAR, you have to keep a couple statements true. First, your outgoing DPS must exceed your enemy's mitigation and healing. If this does not occur, you will never kill your opponent. Second, incoming DPS must be handled adequately by your mitigation and healing to allow your outgoing DPS enough time to score kills.

The ultimate resource in WAR, and life for that matter, is time. Having DPS and Support numbers to compare is useless unless you can convert this into time. Specifically, I'm referring to time to kill, or TTK. The two initial statements can be summarized with the following statement: Your TTK must be less than your enemy's TTK to win a fight.

TTK in WAR changes geometrically with the ratio of DPS to Support. Say for instance you are running around solo and you bump into a healer. For this example, say the healer won't attack you and will just heal himself to buy time for friends to show up. The healer is capable of healing himself for 700 hp/sec and you are capable of dealing 1200 hp/sec and the healer has 7500 health. Your DPS overcomes his healing at a rate of 500 hp/sec, meaning he will drop in 15 seconds. You get help from an ally, who can also deal 1200 hp/sec to this player. The healer is now taking 1700 hp/sec over his healing capacity, meaning he will drop in about 4.42 seconds instead. The DPS doubles while the TTK drops by a factor of about 3.4. Even a 25% increase in damage, 400 hp/sec more outgoing damage, would cut TTK in about half.

TTK is about how much DPS exceeds the available Support. I've been able to approximate TTK in small group encounters using the ratio of DPS to Support available at any given time. I determined this experimently through watching a lot of the raw scenario footage I have. Feel free to test it yourself.

Tarelther's Simplified Group Theory of TTK states that TTK is approximately equal to 10 seconds divided by the point difference of one group's DPS and the other's Support at any given moment. It assumes equal rank, gear and renown on each side. The formula can be modified to account for these differences, but that's another post. Also, this only gives a snapshot of any given moment. It changes constantly during the course of the battle.

The phrase at any given moment is important because the key to consistently winning even match-ups is to temporarily alter this ratio into your favor by various means.

Team Play - Group Theory

One of the things I love about WAR is the varied number of ways one can balance a group. I've given a few examples on this blog earlier. I've discovered that I can distill those specific groups into a very simple formula for balancing a group.

Players have one of three roles in a group in WAR. A player can deal damage to an enemy, deal with incoming damage to the group, or a little of both. I like to refer to these as DPS, Support, or DPS Support.

Any pure DPS class in offensive spec and gear is DPS. Any defensive tank or full healer is Support. Hybrids are DPS Support. Defensive DPS are classified here because they do not require nearly the support of an offensive DPS freeing up support classes to support others.

I use a very simple point system for building a group. A DPS is worth 2 points of DPS. A Support is worth 2 points of support. A DPS Support is worth 1 point DPS and 1 point Support. In order to be a viable group, the group requires 5 points of DPS and 5 points of Support. An exception is a group containing any full DPS needs a full healer to be viable. I'm sure there's more exceptions, but this is meant to be a general overview.

This makes for 3 viable totals. 5 DPS and 7 Support is what I classify as a defensive group. 6 DPS and 6 Support is a balanced group. 7 DPS and 5 Support is an aggressive group. I like the aggressive group personally, but sometimes defensive play is the best idea.

This idea forms the basis of my target priority selection. Basically, I'll use this to figure out how I can shift the balance of damage into my favor and approximate how long it should take me (or the enemy) to drop a target provided no intervening cause comes into play. By intervening cause I mean using a CC or potion or pocket item or something to cover for a temporary loss of DPS or Support or both.

But I'll get to that later. I've got some 50% bonus renown to get.

The Eternal Citadel 1.4.0

I played defensively on the SM just to show it can be done and be somewhat effective. I'm not a big fan of most modern music, so I set this to the 1812 Overture performed by the New York Philharmonic. I'm by no means perfect, but this is what I mean by basic tanking skills. Enjoy!

The video looks best in 1080p since it was recorded in it.

Spike Damage - Recognizing and Countering

So you notice the enemy is attempting to spike to one of your group members. You have 5 to 10 seconds to react before the enemy kills your teammates. Here's how to counter a spike attempt.

1. If you can detaunt your attacker, do so. You might be knocked down or silenced and unable to do so. Call it out in vent ASAP if you get hard CC'd. Do not attack until you can get a Guard. If you are Guarded, detaunt is not needed.

2. If you are a tank, get a Guard on the spiked target if you can get in range, even if that's another tank.

3. If you see backloaded DoTs like Burn Away Lies or Word of Pain, cleanse them if possible. Cleansing Wind is big help, especially if you have it maxed.

4. If you are a healer, get heals on the spiked target. Absorb -> HoTs -> Hard healing.

5. If you have a melee train on you, either an AoE stagger or knockback can handle the train.

6. Use your potions and morales if needed. You can fire absorb + crafted heal + RvR heal potions all at once.

7. Kite if you notice before it starts. Try to kite towards your DPS if you are not already with them.

This game is about spike and counter spike. Master managing incoming and outgoing spike damage and you will be nearly unstoppable.

Spike Damage - 5s and 10s Spike

One of my very first posts dealt with the coordination of CC. I did not mention in that post with what CC was coordinated. CC is coordinated with spike damage.

There are two types of CC in this game. You have offensive CC which disables an opponent while allowing you to attack him. These are knockdowns, silences, and disarms. These are typically 3 or 4 seconds long. Then you have defensive CC, stagger, which disables the opponent, but breaks if you attack him. This is typically 9 seconds long. A group heal from a WP or DoK takes 1s to cast. This gives you a 5s window to attack with offensive CC and a 10s window to attack with stagger. You'll know which spike to use by the type of CC being called.

I'll use my SM as an example.

For my 5s spike, I will try to use Ensorcelled Blow, Quick Incision, Sudden Shift, Wrath of Hoeth, Taunt, Ether Dance. If I am doing the CC with Whispering Wind, this becomes Sudden Shift, Quick Incision/Wrath of Hoeth, Taunt, Ether Dance.

For my 10s spike, I go Ensorcelled Blow, Quick Incision, Blurring Shock, Ensorcelled Blow, Wrath of Hoeth, Taunt, Ether Dance.

I also have a WL, so I can give those too.

For 5s spike, I use Pounce + Force Opportunity, Blindside/Shattering Blow, Pack Assault, Cull the Weak/Coordinated Strike/Lion's Fury.

For 10s spike, I use Pounce + FO, Blindside, LF, SB, PA, CS, CtW/LF. My tanks should be snaring the target for me. The highest spike occurs when Coordinated Strike is activated. Blindside + Shattering Blow + Pack Assault + 4 hits from Coordinated Strike + autoattack + procs all hit at once. Pack Assault helps put more damage at once if everyone is coordinating spike correctly.

The basic idea is that you need to put as much damage into a single second as possible to make damage more difficult to heal. Should you disable all healing that your opponent has, you can remove all the DoTs and just hit them with everything you have.

Spike Damage - Tank Damage in Perspective

There's been a bit of talk lately about DPS tanks being able to put out the damage of a real DPS class. I'd like to put those concerns to rest by talking about spike damage. Spike damage is the ability to cause a massive amount of damage to hit at one specific time stamp. While creating spike damage results in less overall damage than going for sustained damage, the idea to overload damage on a target so that he cannot possibly be healed through it. You cannot rely on a healer running out of resources eventually in WAR. AP regenerates very quickly.

Night before last I was running some scenarios with my guild. The setup was the 3T group. Specifically it was Knight, 2 Swordmasters, Shadow Warrior, Wrath Warrior Priest, Salvation Warrior Priest. The pops were kinda slow, so the Knight decided since scenarios weren't popping, he'd get things popping with the wife. I can't say I blame the guy. A couple minutes after he left, we got a Highpass Cemetery. The scenario had 4 Sorcs in it. Ever been blasted by Sorcs without a resist buff? Let me show you some of my combat log.

[10/10/28][22:59:45] Rhiell's Doombolt critically hits you for 2266 damage. (1431 mitigated)
[10/10/28][22:59:45] Rhiell's Frozen Touch hits you for 109 damage. (43 mitigated)
[10/10/28][22:59:45] Moidah's Right in Da Jibblies hits you for 201 damage. (300 mitigated)
[10/10/28][22:59:45] Moidah's You Got Nuffin' heals Moidah for 70 points.
[10/10/28][22:59:45] Moidah's You Got Nuffin' heals Astpios for 0 points. (70 overhealed)
[10/10/28][22:59:45] Moidah's You Got Nuffin' heals Rhiell for 70 points.
[10/10/28][22:59:46] Moidah's attack hits you for 147 damage. (226 mitigated)
[10/10/28][22:59:46] Overdeth's Blessing of Isha heals Selan for 273 points. (1203 overhealed)
[10/10/28][22:59:46] Overdeth's Blessing of Isha heals Overdeth for 1476 points.
[10/10/28][22:59:46] Overdeth's Blessing of Isha heals Yaguara for 0 points. (1476 overhealed)
[10/10/28][22:59:46] Overdeth's Blessing of Isha heals Chillbill for 0 points. (1623 overhealed)
[10/10/28][22:59:46] Overdeth's Blessing of Isha heals you for 1476 points.
[10/10/28][22:59:46] Maxximillian's Chillwind critically hits you for 542 damage. (301 mitigated)
[10/10/28][22:59:46] Your Ensorcelled Agony hits Rhiell for 76 damage. (92 mitigated)
[10/10/28][22:59:46] Rosarius's Touch of the Divine critically heals Lolife for 0 points. (1776 overhealed)
[10/10/28][22:59:46] Rosarius's Touch of the Divine heals Cerealkilla for 0 points. (1357 overhealed)
[10/10/28][22:59:46] Rosarius's Touch of the Divine heals Arayu for 63 points. (1294 overhealed)
[10/10/28][22:59:46] Rosarius's Touch of the Divine heals Rosarius for 0 points. (1357 overhealed)
[10/10/28][22:59:46] Rosarius's Touch of the Divine heals Eldemari for 0 points. (1357 overhealed)
[10/10/28][22:59:46] Not enough Action Points
[10/10/28][22:59:46] Not enough Action Points
[10/10/28][22:59:46] Your attack hits Rhiell for 301 damage. (361 mitigated)
[10/10/28][22:59:46] Selan's Touch of the Divine heals Selan for 91 points. (1291 overhealed)
[10/10/28][22:59:46] Selan's Touch of the Divine heals Overdeth for 1382 points.
[10/10/28][22:59:46] Selan's Touch of the Divine critically heals Yaguara for 0 points. (1948 overhealed)
[10/10/28][22:59:46] Selan's Touch of the Divine heals Chillbill for 0 points. (1520 overhealed)
[10/10/28][22:59:46] Selan's Touch of the Divine heals you for 1382 points.

[10/10/28][22:59:46] Rhiell's Doombolt hits you for 965 damage. (597 mitigated)
[10/10/28][22:59:46] Maxximillian's Vision of Torment critically hits you for 1459 damage. (426 mitigated)
[10/10/28][22:59:46] Your Blurring Shock hits Rhiell for 293 damage. (338 mitigated)
[10/10/28][22:59:47] Moidah's T'ree Hit Combo hits you for 226 damage. (273 mitigated)
[10/10/28][22:59:47] Your Ensorcelled Agony hits Rhiell for 76 damage. (92 mitigated)
[10/10/28][22:59:47] Flamer's attack hits you for 60 damage. (140 mitigated)
[10/10/28][22:59:47] Durid's Flash of Chaos heals Cheesus for 588 points.
[10/10/28][22:59:47] Maxximillian's Gloomburst hits you for 686 damage. (177 mitigated)
[10/10/28][22:59:47] Maxximillian's Frozen Touch hits you for 179 damage. (71 mitigated)
[10/10/28][22:59:48] Maxximillian's Swell of Gloom hits you for 686 damage. (177 mitigated)
[10/10/28][22:59:48] Moidah's You Got Nuffin' heals Moidah for 70 points.
[10/10/28][22:59:48] Moidah's You Got Nuffin' heals Astpios for 70 points.
[10/10/28][22:59:48] Moidah's You Got Nuffin' heals Rhiell for 70 points.
[10/10/28][22:59:48] Moidah's T'ree Hit Combo critically hits you for 339 damage. (408 mitigated)
[10/10/28][22:59:48] Rhiell parried your Ensorcelled Blow.
[10/10/28][22:59:48] Durid's Tzeentch's Cordial heals Rhiell for 255 points.
[10/10/28][22:59:48] Maxximillian's Word of Pain critically hits you for 2356 damage. (505 mitigated)
[10/10/28][22:59:48] Tarelther has been annihilated by Maxximillian's Word of Pain in High Pass Cemetary. Maxximillian is on a Rampage!

In 3 seconds, The 2 sorcs managed to put 9248 damage on me. I only received 2858 in healing. You can see I could return 746 damage in that amount of time. I did not have a resist buff because it was shattered before this occurred. This wasn't a one off thing. They did this consistently.

Don't get me wrong, I can put up some sick numbers when all the stars align. I did get a 1233 Ether Dance and 1638 Dazzling Strike earlier today. They don't count because they were on a solo, berserk, 35 choppa.

Those two sorcs have a very effective 5 second spike. They had a Chosen with them to stagger healers if needed, but they didn't need it without our Knight around. They would have likely used a 10 second spike if they needed the stagger to get kills.

Had we had the Knight with us, his Gather Your Resolve would have been good for 378 resists, or 21.8% damage reduction. (He's full Glory with Solar Flare.) Without the Knight, I had a deficit of 6390 health. (The remaining damage to kill me was removed by the Black Orc.) With the Knight, the 9248 damage drops to 7231 damage, leaving a new deficit of 4373 health. Gather Your Resolve would have reduced the effective damage output by 31.6%. Most importantly, I would have lived long enough to get the next set of heals. This is where they would have needed a 10 second spike with a stagger.


We did end up rallying back and getting a total for 46 kills to their 61 kills. We had 15 deaths as a team. 3 to 1 team kill/death on a lost scenario isn't bad at all. We got beat, but we didn't go down without a fight. We ended up splitting their forces up between the two objective points and taking them down that way.



The time frame of 5 second spike and 10 second spike are no accident. I'll explain it next time.

Team Play - Warband Play - Live on the PTS Tuesday!

I'm going to be running a tightly organized warband for the PTS event on Tuesday, October 12th 2010 at 8:00 PM EDT/02.00 CET. Rather than just ramble on my blog about it, I thought I would just show you how my warband strategy works.

The original post is here.

I will have one of each type of warband group I talked about here, and I need you to fill the spots. I need you to leave a comment on my blog giving me the character name, class, and group type you want. Players in the PK alliance get priority. These are first come, first served after that. If you are late, I reserve the right to give your spot to someone else. I'll form the warband at about 7:30 PM EDT/01:30 AM CET.

If you impress me I might just have other opportunities for you. ;)

All tanks will be using Distracting Bellow as their morale. No exceptions.

Anvil group - The tanks in this group will be responsible for using Challenge and Hold the Line to protect the rest of the warband. This group will draw the battle lines for the fight.

Glory Knight - Auras are Gather Your Resolve, Now's Our Chance, and Stay Focused. Take Heaven's Fury, Now's Our Chance, and Focused Mending. Tactics are Rugged, Focused Mending, and Emperor's Ward. This will be played by me on Tarelsun. It's not that I don't trust anyone else with the stagger...Ok actually, yeah, that's why I'm doing it. I am also going to be rotating Challenge and Distracting Bellow.

Stone Ironbreaker - Take Oathbound and Oathstone. You'll mainly be Guarding and Oathfriending a Slayer that will be our bait. You'll need to make him tough as nails to kill. You will also rotate Challenge and Bellow. Tactics are Rugged and 2 others .

Khaine Swordmaster - Take Phoenix Wing and one other with 13 points in Khaine. Run Nature's Blade. Get those debuffs on the enemy as quick as you can. Tactics are Rugged and 2 others. Stay alive as best you can. I will likely be cross-guarding you.


Skavenslayer Slayer - Take Shatter Limbs and Inevitable Doom. Tactics will be Brute Force, Ancestral Inheritance and Riposte. You're mainly around for Shatter Limbs and to be a distraction.

Salvation Warrior Priest - Take Martyr's Blessing and Cleansing Power. Tactics are Cleansing Power, Discipline, and Emperor's Ward.

Grimnir Rune Priest - Take Ancestor's Echo and Master Rune of Adamant. Tactics are Discipline, Ancestor's Echo, and a wild card.

Hammer group - The melee assist train. This group will make their way to the back line and rip them apart one by one. Everyone will assist one person in this group.

Conquest/Vigilance Knight - Auras are Press the Attack, To Glory, To Victory. Take Encouraged Aim, To Glory and To Victory. Encouraged Aim affects everyone in the warband, so that is why it's used over Dirty Tricks. Tactics are Encouraged Aim and 2 others. Mainly try to stay alive.

Judgment Witch Hunter - Burn Away Lies and Fanatical Cleaning. Not like there's any other spec for a Witch Hunter at 30 anyway. ;) Brute Force, Fanatical Cleansing, Flanking.


Troll/Giant Slayer - Just kill single targets dead fast. Don't care how you do it.

Hunter White Lion - Pounce, Force Opportunity. Tactics: Brute Force, Flanking, Pack Synergy. Take as much advantage of the crit from the Nature's Blade debuff and Encouraged Aim as you can.

Warrior Priest - Don't care as long as you can heal the group well.

Isha Archmage - Take Mistress of the Marsh and whatever else you want from Isha. You make sure you can keep healing.

Bomb Group - This group will apply AoE pressure damage to negate group heals.

Brotherhood IB - The important thing is Earthshatter. Don't want those enemies getting away from the bomb do we? You will also buff the slayer in the group.

Conflag BW - AoE, AoE and more AoE. Don't really care how you do it.

Skaven Slayer - Shatter Limbs and Inevitable Doom. Go full out AoE DPS.

Engineer - As much AoE damage as you can dish out, be that Tinkerer or Napalm or w/e.

Warrior Priest - Again, just keep these guys alive.

Rune Priest - See Warrior Priest above.

Cannon group - Single target ranged DPS group. Blows up the front lines good. You'll all assist the same person.

Hoeth SM - Whispering Wind and one other thing from Hoeth. WW is used to help the DPS get their spike moves down.

Engineer - Single target - whatever you gotta do, but remember you'll be at range.

Bright Wizard - Immolation can take more advantage of WW, especially with Boiling Blood and the tactic to increase it's damage and drop it's delay to 5s. Withering Heat is nice for it too. Ignite, Boiling Blood, Withering Heat, rinse/repeat.

Shadow Warrior - Festerbomb away. WW removes the recast on Festering Arrow, so bomb to your heart's content.

Archmage and Rune Priest - Keep these guys alive. Add dps when you can, but heals first.

Team Play and The Elite Mindset - A Video Example

I found this little gem (ok 1GB isn't little, but still) on the RDPS forums and it fits perfectly with two of the topics, so I had to share this. They're speaking French, but it's not hard to tell what they're saying even if you don't know the language.

http://www.megaupload.com/?d=B2UDT95P

Everything I've talked about in both those series is contained in this video in some form.

Note: avast! says it's clean, and my system is fine so far, but still use your own due diligence before downloading and watching the video. I didn't make it, so I'm not gonna vouch for it.

Original forum post 

Nice job gentlemen. I hope to see more ass-kicking in the future.

Team Play - The 1.3.6. Melee Pain Train

Now that some of the changes for 1.3.6. are being revealed, I have an idea for another group. So without further adieu, here's the group.

Knight - Press the Attack! w/ Encouraged Aim, To Glory!, Gather Your Resolve! Standard cookie cutter build here.
Swordmaster - Suicide Hybrid DPS - Full DPS Sovereign - Ether Dance, Whispering Winds, Great Weapon Mastery - Tactics are Focused Offense, Great Weapon Mastery, Ensorcelled Agony and Potent Enchantments. Use Nature's Blade for blade enchant.
White Lion - Take Primal Fury, Cull the Weak, Force Opportunity, Pounce, Lionheart, rest up Hunter. Tactics are Lionheart, Brute Force, Flanking/Pack Hunting, and Loner/Pack Synergy
Slayer - Take Deep Wound, Short Temper and Shatter Limbs. I don't play a Slayer, so I won't give all tactics, but use Short Temper in there.
Warrior Priest (dps) - I don't play a dps WP, so someone else will have to comment on that one.
Healer - any class

The Knight provides critical bonus to the group, some AP, resists, and CC. It is Knight's job to clear Guard off enemy targets.

The Swordmaster provides some burst DPS, Nature's Blade, and recast time reduction. The Knight is providing critical bonus, so Balanced Accuracy is not required. Nature's Blade is for the buffs and debuffs, especially initiative since that swings survivability and damage massively in your favor. Also Whispering Winds is there for the recast time reduction for Lion's Fury and Shatter Limbs (and Deep Wound if so inclined.) Also, the SM debuffs spirit for the White Lion's Lion's Fury.

The White Lion uses their new Force Opportunity to armor debuff opponents for the Slayer and Warrior Priest, but the White Lion himself will be using Lionheart for damage with the presence of the Swordmaster.

The Slayer is the heavy damage of the group, especially with the large armor debuff from the White Lion. He also uses Shatter Limbs to slow down the enemies' ability usage. With Short Temper and WW up, this has a 10s recast, equal to it's duration. Also with both up, Deep Wound can be spammed for 25 AP.

There are two tanks in the group, so one of the healers can be DPS. With the White Lion around, the best choice is a Warrior Priest, although an Archmage would not be bad either since the SM is debuffing spirit already.

I find a group only needs 3 support (tank/healer) to be effective. Using 4 support reduces the groups effectiveness too much for me unless some of them go DPS. This group has 4 support classes in it, so 2 are going for DPS to help balance the group. This is assuming this is a scenario party. Rules are very different in warband size engagements.

Let em know what you think.

Team Play - Multi-group and Warband Strategy

I promised dwarven weaponry in my last post. I've already discussed two of these and hinted at a third.

These are the 4 group types in PK warband strategy.

Hammer - The single target assist train. (Viable scenario group on it's own.)
Bomb - PBAoE group (Also a viable scenario group on it's own.)
Anvil - Tank/healer heavy group used to hold points and draw enemy fire/morales. (Not good on it's own normally. Not enough damage output unless all the tanks are suicide or at least DPS spec. With all the tanks putting out damage, this becomes the 3T group.)
Cannon - Ranged group used to deal damage from afar, outside the range of Challenge, Crippling Strikes, and other damage debuffs. (Not good on it's own. Too vulnerable to melee. Needs an anvil group to protect them. Very effective if you can double queue with an anvil.)


In the old city, PK always used 2 hammers and 2 anvils and held two of the three points that way. 1 anvil parked at apex. 1 anvil parked at temple. The 2 hammers moved to help whichever anvil the enemy was hitting.


Guards, Challenges, and Distracting Bellows are all used to reduce incoming damage. We're more reliant on Challenge and Distracting Bellow than Guard since those two abilities protect all our allies. We can have most groups with only one tank with an anvil group in warband because of this. Single target knockbacks are used against enemy tanks in the front line to move them out of Guard range.

Typically, the anvil groups will always engage first, followed a few seconds later by the other groups. This way we can get damage spread going to further protect our less sturdy groups. Usually only a hammer group will ever wander off on its own to work the flanks. Sometimes I'll send a bomb to do that, but it's rare. A cannon group needs to be with an anvil group to protect it, but it can deal damage only worrying about Guard and Bellow/ID reducing their damage. Tanks in the front line should be punting enemy tanks away to handle Guard anyway.

We'll talk how this works in practice next time using the new city as an example.

Team Play - The 3T Group - The 3T Bomb

In the last part, I introduced a very important concept. Grouping players within a party together into teams simplifies communication and helps define roles easily. This will be important before I introduce warband tactics.

Just an an example, I'll go over how you'd use the 3T group as a pseudo-bomb group. It's still technically an anvil group.

For the split assist group, I split the group into two teams. The teams themselves won't change, but their names will because the tactics are different.

Team 1, Bomb Team: 2 suicide tanks, AoE DD, Healer
Team 2, Focus Team: DPS Tank, DPS or DPS Healer

The idea is the same as the PK Bomb Group. The bomb team applies pressure using AoE damage and the focus team mops up.

It's risky, and I wouldn't do it. But the point was to show that you can. I also wanted to reinforce the idea of taking focus off individual players and grouping them as teams.

There's really only two viable strategies for scenario play when you only get to control one group of the two. Those are the bomb group and the assist train. There's tons of variations on these ideas. I've only gone over a few non-traditional ones. The other group types that I use require at least a second group in order to be viable.

So next time, we'll get into what dwarven weaponry and warbands have in common.

Team Play - The 3T Group - The Split Assist

This is a spin on the typical melee assist train group. Here's the template of the 3T Group again.

Suicide tank
Suicide tank
DPS tank
DPS
DPS Healer or another DPS
Healer

For the split assist, you are going to be in two teams.

Team 1: 2 suicide tanks, DPS, healer
Team 2: DPS tank and the DPS Healer or second DPS

Team 1's job to deal with the front line. Team 2's job is to push the back line and tie up the enemy healers or stay on the front line and simply hit a different target than Team 1.

The idea is that you want to force the single target healing of the enemy onto one target while the other team kills another target. Most POGs use a group healer (usually DoK/WP) and a single target healer (usually AM/RP/Shaman/Zealot). The PK bomb group sought to neutralize single target healing with AoE pressure damage by contrast.

The 3T split assist is more efficient than the PK bomb group, but it is more difficult to execute. You now become subject to damage spread where that was not an issue for you in the PK bomb group. You want to hit everyone you can in the PK bomb group. That's not the case here.

In order to beat this group, you need to first realize that you are getting the 3T split assist done to you. Team 2 often works the flanks, so if that's what they are doing, you can CC Team 1 and take out Team 2 quickly. Also realize that the non-tanks are all guarded by tanks. Tanks that are likely to be running Focused Offense. You have to neutralize the tanks to beat this group. That's one reason this group is so effective. People have ingrained in their heads not to beat on tanks when that's exactly what you have to do to beat this group.

Also realize that this group only has one real healer. That healer is well protected, but you can completely stop their healing with a single stagger or silence. You'll still have to deal with 3 tanks reducing your outgoing damage a lot, but at least they won't be getting heals for a little while.

Next time, I'll go over another way to play the 3T group. It's a bit more risky, but it kills stuff fast.

Team Play - The PK Bomb Group - Positioning and Weaknesses

In part 3, I covered the use of the melee focus. This time, I'll go over ideal positioning of this group and it's weaknesses.

The bombers are the sword and shield of the group. They apply pressure damage to the enemy group. This pressure damage also serves to discourage melee from closing in on the group.

Everyone needs to stay within the PBAoE that the bombers are generating if possible. This allows the melee focus to easily hit and kill anyone foolish enough to try to close in melee with the help of the AoE damage. This also prevents Witch Elves from using stealth on someone. You also gain the benefit of damage spread. Damage spread is caused by the difficulty of picking out one target from a mass of players. Typically, you will prevent a focus fire on a key target with damage spread. This only negatively affects the melee focus in this group. Players by nature will hit the target nearest to them until they notice another target. This will buy you at least 2 seconds just from a typical person's reaction time plus whatever time you get from the difficulty of targeting.

Proper use of CC is the group's major weakness. The group will need to pay attention to any incoming staggers from a Chosen and either hit Resolute Defenses or spread out in a calculated manner to avoid it. If a Chosen hits both healers with a stagger, you're screwed. A zealot spec'd for the single target stagger or a Sorc or Magus with the morale 3 stagger on a healer in the back will also end up being bad for this group.
For this reason, healers should not be standing on top of each other. They should be on opposing flanks if at all possible. Ideally, they want to stagger the healers and silence/disarm/knockdown a DPS.

The PK bomb group is easy to defeat, but played properly, you will give your enemy precious little time to execute. Hesitate and you will be lost. Play fast, push hard, and be smart.

Next time, I'll talk about Tarelther's 3T group. It's unusual, but effective.

Team Play - The PK Bomb Group - The Melee Focus

In part 2, I covered the main tank's role in the PK bomb group. His job is to protect his group from incoming damage and increase the outgoing damage of the DPS in the group.

In part 3, I'm going to cover what I consider the key to this group working. This person's skill will make or break the group. He is the melee focus. He finishes the job, spiking down targets that the bombers have been softening up.

When the melee focus is going in for the kill, the target has already been taking a good amount of damage and has a few DoTs ticking on him from our bombers. He just gives the extra push to knock them over. The ideal candidate for this job has very high front loaded damage. He doesn't have to wait for a mechanic to build up to be 100% effective. You can take a DPS spec tank or an actual melee DPS for this role. The DPS spec tank won't do as much damage as the melee DPS, but the trade-off is the second guard and challenge for the group.

That leaves 2 classes standing in front of the rest, the White Lion (for the more aggressive group) and the Swordmaster (for the more defensive group). That isn't to say a Witch Hunter, Slayer, or Ironbreaker can't do the job. I'll take a good Witch Hunter, Slayer, or Ironbreaker over an average White Lion or Swordmaster for this role, but given equal skill, I'm taking the White Lion or Swordmaster first. The other 3 classes have to build up a mechanic to be 100% and the melee focus is just going in for quick kills.

The SM's burst tool is Ether Dance. The nice thing about Ether Dance is it's base damage is extremely high, on the level of a melee DPS's on each hit. It only gets half stat contribution, so it's damage is largely dependent on your weapon DPS. With 950 strength, 220 melee power, and a 79.8 DPS weapon, I've hit a taunted target for 1200 crits on Ether Dance. That would be almost 1500 with a royal insignia 101.5 DPS weapon. Without any crits, that's still 800 damage x 5 ticks for 4000 damage in 3 seconds. That's my suicide spec with a Knight around to buff and debuff for me though. I just wanted to show the potential damage without having to wait for a long build time. Granted, any true melee DPS class will do more damage, but the reason to take the SM over a melee DPS is for extra defensive abilities he brings the group.

I was the melee focus for this group. The BWs still got most of the damage, but I still put out respectable damage given all the AoE they were throwing around.

The White Lion is preferred since he has his damage mainly front loaded. His big hitting abilities are on a 5s or 10s recast instead of relying on a mechanic to build up. The White Lion is especially recommended if the main tank is a SM. The tactic the White Lion will want is Lionheart. It changes Lion's Fury by removing the Curse requirement, dropping it's AP cost to 20 instead of 35, and doubling it's base damage. Lion's Fury has a 5s recast and does spirit damage. So when the SM is using Heaven's Blade, Wrath of Hoeth, and Whispering Wind in group with a White Lion using Lionheart, the results are quite pleasing. I've had that ability critical for 2.1k before playing as a RR33 White Lion. Imagine spamming that for 20 AP a hit. I can only imagine what a high renown White Lion can do under those circumstances.

This small change to what most players consider to be the traditional bomb group makes it deadly. You've seen the groups that use staggers to take out the healers then assist train the front line down. This minor change to the bomb group uses bombers to cause the effect of neutralizing the healers much like a stagger would while still applying damage to help the melee focus kill targets much like an assist train does. It's the same proven, winning strategy as the stagger, assist train using different tools. Without the melee focus, it's just not the same. Try it out. I think you'll like the results.

Team Play - The PK Bomb Group - The Main Tank

In part 1, I gave the template for the PK bomb group. Here it is again.

Main Tank
Melee Focus
AoE DD 1
AoE DD 2
Healer
Healer

In this part, I'll go into the Main Tank's role.

The Main Tank has a couple roles in the PK bomb group. First and foremost, his job is to help keep the group alive through use of Guard, Challenge, and other tools. Go listen to my Low level SM guide for more information on that. Secondly, he weakens his enemies, making them more vulnerable to the group's attacks. Any of the 3 tanks can perform this role, depending on the DPS makeup. I will go over the Knight and SM roles for Main Tank. I do not have an Ironbreaker, so I will not comment on that class.

The first consideration for the SM in being Main Tank for this group is Whispering Wind. Which class of DPS do you have with you? Do you have DPS that is helped by WW or do you not? Consideration number two is what kind of damage are you dealing primarily? Are you dealing magical or physical damage? (Yes, you can do the PK bomb group with melee, although you'd typically use a ranged focus instead of a melee focus, but that will be covered in a later post.) Assuming you are using 2 BWs, BW and Engineer, or BW and SW, you have at least one DPS helped by WW and you are primarily doing magical damage. You will want WW and you will be using Heaven's Blade to reduce enemy resists. If the SM is not yet RR60, he will not be able to get both WW and Ether Dance, so he'd likely want to put on a shield and play support with debuffs. See the SM and group utility part 3 for different specs to use in this role. If the SM is RR60+, he still needs to consider that he's probably going to be taking massive guard damage in this group. I would not look down at a fellow SM who chooses to wear a shield in this case.

The Knight has a couple different options here as well. The classic commands used are Press the Attack! w/ Encouraged Aim, To Glory!, and Gather Your Resolve! If you are using magical damage and you are not capable of doing enough damage to kill someone quickly (very few Knights are, mine is not), I recommend taking a different approach. The approach I take is to use Stand Strong!, Gather Your Resolve!, and Now's Our Chance! I also take and slot Dirty Tricks.

Strength doesn't help your ranged DPS bombers do more damage. Press the Attack! would only decrease damage taken in melee and give the 10% critical chance w/ Encouraged Aim. Stand Strong! decreases damage taken from all sources as well as increases the damage enemies take from all sources. It does not have the critical bonus, but that can be made up for by using Dirty Tricks. Gather Your Resolve! obviously further improves magical damage done by the group. The reason behind using Now's Our Chance! goes back to the basic strategy of the PK bomb group. Force the enemy to rely solely on group heals with our bombers then use single target burst to pick off the enemy one by one. Now's Our Chance! furthers this by reducing the effectiveness of the enemy group heals making it even easier to pick off the enemy one by one. If the enemy healers are really bad or the enemy is short of healing, it might drop the group heals enough that just the bombing can overcome the enemy group.

Next time, I'll go over the melee focus and why it's the key to this group working properly.

Team Play - Group Composition - The PK Bomb Group

When you picture a bomb group, what's the first thing that comes to mind? 1 or 2 BWs guarded by 2 or 3 S/B tanks with a healer or 2? That's a recipe for a disaster against a competent POG.

Why you ask?

AoE damage by itself is easily group healed through. We've all seen the screenshots on the forums of healers getting 500k, 750k or even 1 million healing in a scenario. The reason that happens is because those healers were facing a poorly put together bomb group.

So how do we fix the problem? We shift our mindset slightly. AoE damage negates group healing and forces the enemy healers to use group heals primarily or lose their entire group. With AoE damage locking down the enemy healers, if another player with high single target damage goes after someone, the target should drop quickly since any healing being received is being negated by our bombers.

So, in Player Killers, my alliance on Volkmar, we add what we call a melee focus. The melee focus determines the kill order, so he would be the caller of the group. The melee focus will not be the highest damage dealer of the group, but he will be the one causing the kills. He is built for single target burst damage.

I ran one last night. This was the group.

Knight (Press the Attack! w/ Encouraged Aim, To Glory!, and Gather Your Resolve!)
2 BWs
WP
RP
SM (me)

I can hear it now. I thought you said 2 tanks, 2 BWs, and 2 healers was a fail bomb group. Well, it can be. Again, change the mindset here. The SM can put out sufficient damage, especially with the Knight around, to be the melee focus. The SM can also provide a second guard for the other BW and another Challenge. The spec used would be taking Whispering Wind, Ether Dance, and Great Weapon Mastery. Whispering Wind is taken because the DPS classes benefit from it. (Double Annihilate spam anyone?) I do NOT take Balanced Accuracy because the Knight is providing the critical bonus for me. I run Nature's Blade since the Knight is covering the resist needs. To be fair, the SM needs to be at least RR60 to use this build, RR70+ being ideal.

So here's the basic template for the PK Bomb Group.

Main Tank
Melee Focus
AoE DD 1
AoE DD 2
Healer
Healer

The SM can play either the Main Tank or Melee Focus role, depending on group make up and spec. The sub-RR60 SM cannot take both WW and ED, so I would recommend taking WW if playing Main Tank and ED if playing Melee Focus.

In my next post, I'll go into a much more detailed look how to fine-tune the PK bomb group.

Team Play - Communication - Need to Know Basis - Part 4

I'm going to go ahead and finish the communication series now in light of my playtime last night. My last 2 rules are the following: Keep communication on a need-to-know basis unless it's virtually impossible for you to lose, and save feedback on performance until after a battle is over.

I said I hate hearing silence more than anything on vent in a previous post. In second place is pointless crap that has nothing to do with what is happening. I was in a ToVL run last night, we kept wiping to boss 5 because we kept trivializing what we were doing. We didn't focus on what we were doing for awhile. Until we shut up and kept communication to what we were doing, we kept losing. This was a group of mostly veterans too. There was only one person who only had 2 or 3 runs under his belt. Pride always comes before a fall.

Save feedback on performance until after a battle is over. This means wait until after a wipe and while regrouping, or after the event is over. This is actually the most important form of communication in my opinion. This is what gets you better at the game. If you are going to get offended when someone points out something you did wrong or something you can get better at, then you best not play with me. Constructive criticism is the ONLY way you improve after a loss. If you're going to lose, at least learn something from it.

I can tell you, with my guild at least, that we aren't giving you that feedback because we hate you. If we hated you, we wouldn't care about your screw ups. (Oh god, I'm sounding like my parents.) We give feedback because we want you to improve. Likewise, you can give feedback about my play. I would like to improve my play all the time. I'll experiment with what you tell me. If it works, I use it. If not, I ignore it. School is never out for the pro.

I've got a low level SM guide I've almost finished. I'm still debating a few of the smaller points, but I have it mostly done. It goes through Tiers 1-3 and early Tier 4. I think Mykiel is coming out with a new video in his How to Survive WAR series later today. So definitely check it out.

Team Play - Communication - Basic Commands and Responses - Part 3

In part 2, I mentioned that vent can get pretty cluttered fast with everyone talking at the same time giving information. To reduce this possibility, you need to communication quickly and efficiently. I wanted to share my basic commands and responses that I use.

Basic commands for the Caller:

[enemy name] (enemy class) Everyone attack this target with intent to kill.

[player name] [enemy name] (enemy class) Specified player (and assigned guard/teammates) attack this player with intent to kill.

[player name] harass [enemy name] (enemy class) Specified player (team) attack this target, load him up with dots/debuffs/CC but do not attempt to kill. (It's fine if you do kill him, just don't blow all your AP to do so.)

Rally [location] Head to specific location once battle is over.

Move [location] Drop whatever you are doing and get to specific location ASAP.

Clean [player name] If the player name is a teammate, get the enemy away from that player by any means possible. If the player name is an enemy, separate that player from his teammates, especially his guard. Basically it means isolate that player from the enemy.

[player name] [command] Everybody (else) [command] Specified player complete this action while everyone else does this. Once player's task is complete rejoin the group. Specified player should acknowledge the command prior to completing his task if the task will separate him from the group. (For example to go capture an objective away from the group.)

Return / Come back. All players given a specific task stop all assigned tasks and return to the group's location immediately.

Wipe. Stop healing, die, and release ASAP.

Basic responses / information to give to caller.

Yes, sir / ma'am. Done. Back. "Yes, sir / ma'am" is used by a player to acknowledge a command when he / she is going to be separated from the group to complete the task. This lets the caller know to not worry about that player until the task is complete. The player will say "done" when the task is complete. If not given any new command, the player will locate the group and return ASAP. Once the player returns to the group, say "back" to inform the caller that you are back with the group.

Getting focused / spiked. Say this when you have enough players with enough DPS to kill you attacking you.

Getting worked. You have a couple players attacking you, but not enough to kill you unless they get more help.

Getting shutdown. You aren't going to die, but you are being snared, disoriented, AP drained, etc making it impossible for you to do anything. Usually only a healer would say this.

[number] (realm) [direction] This means you see this many players in a specific direction. It is presumed to enemy unless otherwise stated.

[number] (realm) from [direction/location] You see this many players charging at us from a specific direction or location. Again, presume enemy unless otherwise stated.

[number] (realm) towards [direction/location] You see this many players going this direction or you are reasonably sure they are going to a specific location. Again, presume enemy unless stated.

Staggered, punted, pulled, silenced, knocked down, snared, disoriented, AP drained, heal debuffed. You've just been hit by a specific type of CC. AP drained means you had a full or almost full bar and it's gone.

Staggering, punting, pulling, silencing, knocking down, snaring, disorienting, AP draining, heal debuffing [who you CC'ed]. You've just performed said CC against this target/group of targets. AP draining means a melee dps hit Force of Will to completely empty a certain enemy's AP bar. Don't call out snaring unless it's a morale (which cannot be broken).

I still expect players to make good judgment calls while I am calling. For example, if in going after the called target you expose yourself to focus fire, back off and say something. Or if you see a low target you can kill in 2 hits, kill him and then go to the called target. Or if you notice someone healing the called target, it's ok to jump on him and mess him up a little bit to make the kill easier.

More to come next time, which is whenever I get around it. Most of you know this by now though.

Team Play - Communication - Part 2

In part 2 of Team Play - Communication series, I want to go over the first of 4 rules my groups use in communication.

One person calls the shots. This person is referred to as the Caller. Everyone else follows. That doesn't mean everyone else is quiet though.

Simply put, the caller is the boss. The caller in my groups is usually a melee dps or tank. His primary job is to prioritize targets to be killed while making sure his own group stays alive. The caller is in the thick of the battle and cannot always see everything going on. This is where the rest of the group comes in. The rest of the group needs to keep the caller informed of important events that he likely cannot see.

If you're a healer, and you have someone on you shutting you down so you can't heal worth a crap, the caller needs to know that before pushing forward. The caller may well decide he can push forward without your healing or he may decide to send someone or everyone to clear you of enemies. Or if you are casting a rez, say something so that another healer doesn't try to rez also. If you have enemies chasing you, call it out so we can get a guard on you if possible. (A tank kiting with a healer he's guarding is quite a sight to behold if I say so myself.)

If you're a melee dps and the caller tells you to hit a target by yourself while everyone else hits a second target, but you are coming under focus fire for doing so, speak up. If you are aren't guarded, the group can try to give you a guard, but they have know you're in trouble.

If you have some kind of hard CC placed on you, call it out.

The one thing I hate to hear on vent is silence, especially if I am calling. So speak up. I would rather you communicate and tell you that I didn't need to know than hear nothing and push up and wonder why I have no heals. I needed to know you were staggered right when it happened. The caller needs all relevant information in order to have a chance at making the correct decision.

However, it's very easy for vent to get cluttered. So in the next part, I'll give you my solution for that.