Tips and Tricks for Shaman Raid Leaders

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Tips and Tricks for Shaman Raid Leaders

Postby Gloriana » Sun Aug 07, 2005 4:27 pm

I love this post - I want it to live over here!

ribeye

I thought it would be good to get a thread going for shaman raid leaders and others who can give input as to how to best organize shaman activities during a raid, such as rebuffing, championing, debuffing, etc. If you have 4 shamans, what systems are there so that everyone is not duplicating?

I am currently shaman class leader and inktuta told me last night we are too lax on assigning roles. I was the solo raid shaman for many months so I got used to just doing everything, but now that we have a team I need to get things running smoothly.

What suggestions?

Chutoi

It's never really been an issue with my guild, Rib. I run raids for the most part, but I've not had any real problems with shaman stepping on each other, or if we do, it's usually in a good way. Due to some odd class numbers, we've been consistently fielding 5 shaman on our raids (yes 5!). Of course, I'm also blessed with having 4 other people that not only pay attention, but are also damn good at their jobs.

With that number of shaman, it's easy to form melee heavy groups and keep champion on them. Frankly, as you progress, you'll see the need to move away from specialty groups somewhat.

Typically, our groups tend to centralize around a couple of themes:

We have a MT group of bard, war, war, clr, clr, ench.

We frequently have shm, clr (if AE mob), and either 4 or 5 melee dps (as appropriate).

Drop your split tanks into cleric groups, or, if you don't have enough available, druid groups.

On mobs that hit hard (ie, even trash in raid zones), let your shaman overslow. Free targeting and let me go to town. Make a hotkey for your channel,
/assist
/pause 2
/channel# %t's target is slow!

Assuming your split tanks are doing their job (and every single tank in guild should be trying to split mobs so people don't die), that should be all the info you need for slows. You can get more specific if you think you need to, of course, but personally, I don't recommend assigning someone for malos, etc. on trash mobs. Don't over-organize unless you're in a zone with insanely resistant mobs. A good rule of thumb is that the more orders you give, the more you have to give. Encourage some initiative in your troops! It won't take long to learn each others' games. Further, having 2-3 people slowing on inc means one is likely to land. It also means you have the shaman on HoTT and you can watch each others' backs.

I generally don't champion out of our melee dps groups, partly as a mana savings, and partly due to the fact that when everything you fight is prismatic or chromatic resists, buff slots are at a premium. You don't want a mob AE overwriting your MT's symbol.

As for rebuffing, we just use MGBs as needed, and otherwise everyone buffs equally. It's too much work to ask the guild to remember who is doing what buff that day for every buffing class. I'm a bit luckier in that respect, as they take a lot of the load off of me for buffs so I can keep the raid running as smoothly as possible (ie, they carry my dead weight!).


7ekno

Due to the extensive flexibilty of Shaman, you will find most Shaman players are on the ball with respect to how to play and what to do ...

For rebuffs, depending on the number of Shaman we have online (and the targets we are about to face, ie will we need MGB AA), we either buff Group + 1 (your group and some other non-shaman group) or as class leader I just call for "Redo MGBs" ... and shaman call what they intent to MGB in the channel .... first to call a buff is the one that does it (to prevent 3 people MGBing Wunshi and nobody doing anything else) ..

Most shaman instinctly cover slows, heals and cures ...

We have a spam channel so we know if the mob we are about to slow has person X on HoTT and we don't see a spam heal incoming for that person, we can /assist and heal pre- or post- slow ....

For encounters that benefit from AE slows, we setup a quasi "VS rotation" ... it's nothing hard coded, just a general, X Y then Z do VS for this ....

Our shammies watch for dead cleric messages and instinctly jump in with spam heal MT / RT / OT ....

We use "free for all" on most of our trash and boss ... for trash, one shaman may be hitting his "Rotate NPC" key once, another twice, another thrice, etc ... so we are generally debuffing different mobs on multi trash pulls ....

As an example (without giving too many details away), 4 Clerics to start Ture in Anguish, 5 Shaman online .... 1 Cleric goes LD .... without being told, Shammies notice the tanks HPs dropping unevenly and prop MT up with spam heals thoughout fight ... we won the encounter without a death and only 3 clerics ...

The moral of the story is a Shaman is a versatile class, and most players instinctively know what needs doing .... so you don't have to really lead them too much at all (except maybe lay out the basics of the encounters you are about to face and assign any special roles needed) ..

Tek
Leader of a fantastic shammy team!!!!

Valsuvious

Can ask me any question you'd like Ribeye while raiding. I can tell you things that I do in CT and things that I don't like to do. For instance, I don't like to assign one person as the sole buff bitch, I'd rather let anyone who get asks for the buff to cast it if they can. I also do not assign one person as the sole malos or slow person, mostly cause then that person always has a huge job ahead of them, while the rest of the people twiddle their thumbs. Oh, I guess the last thing is that, I consider myself extremely fast at targeting, so for me it benefits not having to wait for that other shaman who might not notice the inc mob to cast malos.

During specific fights in raids, I always call out what I'd like each shaman to do and what to cure. I leave it up to the raid leaders to put us in some of the spots (for instance, where to put us in terms of group setups), but from there, I make sure that whoever is where knows what they have to do. For instance, during some of the heavy curing/healing mobs, I just make sure that the raid leaders have us in groups with melee heavy melees who might need slow cured or say in cleric heavy groups who need to get cured of a fizzle or mana drain AE fast.

sownow

Well we dont have an official Shaman class leader and who leads really depends on which one of us feels like it that night.

We as a guild do a lot of pretargeting with Eye of zomm on big fights so when there are multiple mobs we each take one. We also have a spamdebuff channel that we share with chanters.

As for buffs generally one takes Fort and Trib by group another takes sense and might and unless we will need all 4 MGB AA 1 will MGB Wunshi.

We also have a specific shaman spam/chat channel and that goes a long way to helping.

Try to get a feel for what your shamans like and assign them those roles if you can. I have known shaman that love being "buff bitch" and those that prefer to heal, those that are all about damage (dot nuke panther) and those that want nothing more than to land the debuffs then do what ever.

Ungkor

Over the last few months we went from 1-2 shaman to 4-5 shaman in guild, and now do this:

Each shaman is assigned a debuff.
Shaman 1: Slow
Shaman 2: Malos / Malo
Shaman 3: Cripple / Putrid
if more
Shaman 4: Slow
Shaman 5: Malos / Malo

If shaman one mems Balance, Nihli, (all have TA), and Vindictive, he can pretty much slow most pulls (3 mobs or so) in under 8 seconds. We rarely feel the need to have more than one shaman slowing. If we are pulling more than 3 mobs at once, then we may make shaman 3 (if only 3 online) do slow + cripple and skip putrid.

In terms of /assist, we rarely use it. Mobs are slowed asap whether I see a tank on them or not. Its the tanks job to pick them up. DPS assists, shaman do not. If its not on a tank, chances are its on a cleric. The cleric should be healing whoever is getting hit, and I'd rather have a shaman being hit and cleric healing him, than an unslowed mob hitting a cleric and nobody healing him. So far it works ok in MPG trials Txevu and Tacvi.

In terms of buffing, we finally formalized the system. We also assign buffs to each shaman on a raid, and have a separate buff channel. To make things easier on the raid, we allow them to ask any shaman for any buff, and that info is relayed to the buff channel.

For instance, I might be shaman 1. My job is slow and to cast wunshi. I have hotkeys for slow that go to our shaman channel if its trash, and /rs if it is a named. I also have hotkey pad 5 setup for buffs. Since I only need to cast wunshi for this particular raid, I normally keep it memmed right up to before we engage a named(or permanently if I expect rezzed folks during the raid). My 2 wunshi keys will either say "wun for %t" or "wun for %t - he is rezzed needs all buffs".

So far its worked really well. It allows almost zero overlap of buffing and debuffing, plus melee get their buffs faster. If a monk dies, and I see him rezzed, I target him, click my "wun for %t - he is rezzed" key, and instantly all the other shaman cast their 1 buff on him in response. He's buffed in about 3 seconds, and not one shaman has to sit down to mem anything (which can be very dangerous or impossible depending on your content or if pulls are inc, AE's going off, etc..)

Karshak_rn

This was the thing that I retired over. I went to a guild because my friends were there and the shaman team did buffs like this. They appointed one shaman as buff bitch for a week at a time. Strange as it sounds I hated this so much that within one month I went from major hardcore raider to quitting.

Thlayli of Xev

I never understood assigning people to do stuff. We generally have 4 or 5 shaman on raids, all in a shammy channel. If something needs to be done buff-wise we say so in channel (example: "Refreshing sense/sta" or "massing focus"). If a person dies we just take it upon ourselves to say "Buffing so and so" and hook them up.

Malos/slow/cripple etc is just done spam-style in a debuff channel. We never have mana issues and we can't overwrite each other, so I don't see why only one person should do each debuff.

On top of that malos has a long ass recast. If I were that person on a multiple pull I'd say F it and go make a sammich.

taraddar

We're rather disorganized on buffs because we don't consistantly have more than 1 or 2 shaman. We all just kind buff who ever bugs us.

One thing we do like to do when we have the shaman is to do a dps melee group. Usually something like shaman, bard and for dps melees like rogues rangers etc. Shaman does panther and champ on group and heals as needed. Bard does overhaste song and attack songs. Couple rogues in those groups with high end weapons can do some sick damage.

ribeye

Well, the buff bitch is ok. We used to do it with our past shaman leader and would alternate every day, and occasionally say in rsay ... tells for shaman buffs etc. And also watch for dead people and buff them.

For me this is nice because generally I have 2 main spellsets. The one I use in raids for debuffing/healing etc, then the one for single rebuffs. When we buff the raid I load up my group buff spellset. Well, we aren't raping EQ yet so in places like Txevu we have constant deaths. Maybe 1-2 every 5-10 minutes. It's ANNOYING as hell to have to unmem everything and memorize buffs. Champion goes away, and has a huge refresh, and panther falls off my dps group. And its annoying as hell when you buff someone, mem your other spellset, then immediately get asked for sense or soemthing. Damn i hate that.

Thats the point of the buff bitch. Preventing annoyances like memorizing and unmemming spellsets constantly and having multiple people wasting time and resources doing this on all raids...

Ungkor

I find it incredibly annoying and sometimes impossible to rebuff a monk with wunshi, fort, sense, tot, and might when pulls are inc and there are 5 mobs in camp.

Sure, I can just wait, OR, each shaman is assigned 1 buff to cast and I just say in the channel "so and so needs all buffs". He's buffed in 3 seconds and I don't have to sit to mem 5 spells.

Likewise with slow. With 5 shaman on, what normally happens is 3-5 mobs get pulled, all shaman would hit targest nearest mob, and 5 slow messages would spam on that one mob, while the other 4 mobs went unslowed for a few seconds.

Instead, with 1-2 shaman on slow, 1-2 on malos, 1 on cripple ae slow, and the second slower asked to target the 2nd mob inc, all mobs are malos, slowed, crippled much faster and with far less wasted mana on debuffs. Frees up time for healing and dps if each of those 5 shaman aren't redoing what everyone has done.

There is also the issue of 3-4 mobs with the same names in camp. Your shaman channel says "An Ikaav Ruiner is SLOWED". Ok, which one? So you'd have all 5 shaman each slow, malos, and cripple 4 mobs 5 different times?

Thats such a waste of time and mana.

At any rate, to each there own, but if you want to be the best in terms of speed and efficiency, assigning buffs and debuffs is the best way to do things when you get 3+ shaman online.


Slacethehard

I think the life of a shaman on raids is prolly always going to be the most demanding with the amount of rebuffing and debuffing we have to do, but it makes it so much easier if your fellow raiders follow a few simple rules

1. Don't ask for buffs as a mob is being pulled, despite having a 5 min med break just before!

2. Be in range of the shaman you ask to buff you.

3. Rogue drop sos before asking for buffs.

Rogue: wunshi plz

Shaman: inc

Shaman: your oor

Rogue: I'm stood next to you!

Shaman: are you invis or got sos up?

Rogue: oh yeah sorry

Shaman: /smack inc

4. Don't ask for buffs in Raid channel or Guild because 3 - 4 shamans will prolly be buffing the same person

We also post a general raid guide on our applicants section so they get upto speed on a few other things that can drive you mad when raiding see below..


RAID BASICS:

Consent~Auto consent raid, and auto consent guild should ALWAYS be switched on in the 2nd tab of your in-game options window.

Ability To Gate~Everyone MUST have an independant means of getting out of a raid zone, we don't always have the luxury of porters to get you out. If you are a non-caster, buy Gate Potions.

Max Melee~I've noticed several people ignore the instruction to do this on mobs. Max Melee means to stand at the furthest possible distance from the mob whilst still being able to hit it. This will be called for for two reasons, firstly some mobs have short range AoE effects such as DD/DoT/Rampage that can be avoided in this way, and secondly you generate much less push at a further distance allowing the tank better control. To find the max melee point, turn on attack and edge forward until you start hitting the mob.

Pay Attention~OC uses guild chat for the majority of raid instructions, please keep guild chat free of unecessary spam in raids, focus and read the instructions thoroughly.

AFK's~If you need to AFK let your group know and put /afk up, your group should inform the raid if a call to move or engage is announced. Some raids will have set times to complete sections, in that situation raid leaders will call the times you can AFK.

Call LD's~Let the raid know that someone is LD, if it would be lost in /gu spam, /tell an officer.

Don't Give Up~Things won't always run smoothly, try not to get frustrated and log, you only make it harder for the people trying to reorganise to go again.

Be Informed~Read strats if a raid is announced in advance, knowing what to expect can save you and your fellow raiders a lot of hassle.

Get Flagged~If you are missing flags and are always needing flag drags, try to make sure you can be there until the end of flagging raids, if for a good reason you can't be, speak to an officer about the possibility of being botted to earn the flag. Organising flag drags is a pain in the ass and can dramatically slow the start of a raid.

Be Prepared~Bring things with you that you need to do your job, get potions/ee's/whatever item's you need to perform your job. I would
recommend getting a stack of the Heal over Time potions, they are insta click, reusable every 2 mins and can save you. I've found them invaluable, particularly against AoE's.

Be Punctual~Try to get to the raids at the announced time, if you can't get on early try to get yourself parked at or near the targets zone to save time when you can get on.

Buffs~Be aware which buffs will benefit you most on the raid, use /tell to get fresh buffs from the relevant class, and ask politely. Be aware that sometimes the buffer may have a dozen requests so be patient. Be aware how many free slots you have, click off useless buffs, to leave room for mass heals etc. Make sure you are in range of the buff caster, and don't ask just before an engage.

Shrink~Have a shrink device or potion or whatever, you fattys can stop us short people from reaching the mob and in tight spaces can make it hard for Chanters etc to target mobs.
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Gloriana
 
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