T5 Tank Merc agro?

[Hulkling]

My agro has been pretty solid lately. But, the only agro annoyance I've had is keeping agro off a T5 Tank Merc set to assist. It was freaking annoying, those things must be putting out major DPS, because I didn't see any weapon procs going off. Either that or they are busted and are still taunting when set to assist.

Anyone else have this happening?

[Arslayn]

I personally notice them still using tanking tools even when set to assist, they still intercept a mob on inc and disc tank discs if you dont force them to passive.

[Hulkling]

hmm I wonder if they are using DPS discs when set to assist?

[Xelaszan]

They are still taunting on assist mode. I used my 85 necro to check, and sure enough, I pull agro off the T5 merc every time when I fully DoT a mob....with the merc on Aggressive. Every so often the merc will taunt it off me, but 1-2 ticks later I regain agro. So, I set the merc to assist...and wouldn't ya know, the merc would still taunt it off me, but 1-2 ticks later I would have pull agro again.

While the merc decided to tank/taunt might be due to not having an assigned tank in the group, it was definitely taunting while in assist mode.

[Joejo]

I tried a merc tank for a little added dps with my palli and cleric and the only way I could get him not to take aggro right away was to let the palli get a couple stuns in and a round of swings and then it went ok except that they dont seem to have much dps, so scrapped him, it seemed mobs died as fast and better xp without him. I have a cleric merc now, merc does most all the healing and my bot cleric just nukes, works pretty well.

[Hulkling]

[Bigcat Daddy-o]

I run 3 boxes right now, with a merc tank, merc cleric and added a second merc tank on assist mode this weekend. All J5 (Journeyman, tier 5)
I can confirm the following.

The merc tank on assist mode still intercepts mob off of the assigned puller REGARDLESS of who is marked as Main tank. I tried it with the other merc tank on aggressive marked as main tank. I tried it with a player character (druid) as main tank. I tried it with the Main assist marked as main tank (again druid), and the assist merc tank still went for the mob and fought for agro with the other merc tank every fight.

Wasn't a huge deal for the merc cleric to deal with and only set the assist tank to passive for named fights, as I thought there would be too much issue with her trying to split healing between them.

My guess if asked would be that they still need some work on the assist mode. I intend to /bug it tonight just to make sure they have the info. Also going to duplicate some of this info to the general merc post that I started way back.

Would like to see this fixed WAY over any dev working on a classic eq server. hehe.


Peace

[Occam]

Here's an idea...shroud down to like 20, grab some money from the bank, take the Jt5 merc to the old world, and see if you get that /say message from mobs like they used to do. For the life of me I can't remember what they said, but I know they always said it when you taunted. I remember specifically some of the bandits in the Karanas did it, but various other mobs around the old world did too.

[Hulkling]

ohh yeah I know what yer talking about. But, I posted this on the SOE board (and quoted Bigcat, ty btw for that info) and SKlug is going to look into it.

http://forums.station.sony.com/eq/posts ... _id=145181

[Ughbash]

Just from a non-paladin perspective.

The cleric I often group with has a tier 5 tank merc.
I have an 85 Monk (raid geared) and a 82 Warrior group geared other the epic 2.0.

Neither the monk or the warrior can keep aggro off of the merc even with the warrior burning his aggro discs.
The Monk buffs to over 4500 AC with just gallantry, may not seem like much on a paladin board but that is VERY high for a monk, also has avoidance 100+, Shielding 35+, improved dodge 5, improved parry 5. The merc is about the same to slightly easier to heal then the monk. Merc does between 600 and 700 dps.

[Bigcat Daddy-o]

I have that problem early on in a fight with monk too Ugh. Usually because monk pulls, so start off with first contact agro (or whatever that is called). Then I usually tap his Whorl of fists button early, so he will grab agro. I usually FD the monk then pop him back up, to clear agro. Your monk probably has a lot more offensive than mine though as my monk is just over 600 AA, so just finishing off his defensive skills before moving to offensive.

I found though, if monk isn't pulling he hasn't generated enough agro to pull off of J5 tank.

[Bigcat Daddy-o]

Any updated on this Hulkling? I am still running 2 merc tanks, with one in assist and they are still annoying.

[Hulkling]

I'll "inquire" *coughbumpcough" the post on the SOE boards, see if SKlug has any news.

[Bigcat Daddy-o]

Yah. I hopped over to that thread and read some of the commentary. The one of particular interest to me was the person who said they 3 boxed and used two merc tanks, with one on assist. They were describing exactly what I do, so I thought there might be some validity to there suggestion that it was due to the merc main tank being out of endurance.


So I monitored them on my 3 boxes. First fight in, agro was switching back and forth (was watching it on group target of target). Assist tank would take a little beating, then agro switch back.. It may be WORSE when the main tank is out of endurance, and they may shift because of that, but I still highly suspect that the assist tank is doing something to get agro. Definetely still rushes in ahead of main tank.
It strikes me as odd that someone with an almost identical set up to mine is having completley different results. Either they aren't noticing a tank switch, or there is some variant that is causing this that isn't jumping out at me.

Differences that I can think of.
I run the main tank merc owner and the assist tank merc owner on different boxes.
The only other difference between them is that the main tank is an ogre, and the assist tank is a Half elf....

I will play around with it a bit more and see if I can come up with any insight.