Artega,Feb 22 2005, 10:08 AM Wrote:Unfortunately, damage is the way to hold aggro right now. Defensive Stance sacrifices damage output, and that means you're MUCH more reliant on skills to contain aggro, rather than sheer damage output.
Obviously, this is fine if your party wants to wait thirty seconds or so for you to get a Sunder or two on every mob in the pull, but that just takes too long.
My party frequently has two mages. A pull works like this: I use Charge, and use the rage generated for a quick Whirlwind, then a Dem-snare combo. The mages charge in and spam IAE and/or Blizzard interspersed with Frost Novas and Blinks. The mobs die, the Priest has about 80% MP left, the Mages have about 35% MP left. I start a new pull, and the Shaman and I proceed to kill the mobs while the mages drink. The mages get up after they're done drinking, nuke whatever's left, and rinse and repeat.
I honestly think that using a heater and beater isn't productive. Some swear by it, but it is MUCH easier to hold aggro with a standard 2H setup. The way my group clears the instances might not be the "correct" way, but it's DAMN sure faster than the "correct" way.
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When a warrior is taking almost all the group's damage and only dealing a small fraction of the groups damage it makes a ton of sense to maximize mitigation via defensive stance and shield in exchange for reduced damage output. And I for one can't understand how battle stance makes for better tanking.
When I duo with my brother's shaman I usually go with 2hander and battle stance, and he holds aggro the whole time, not even using earthshock or rockbiter. But when I go defensive with sword and shield I can out aggro him with no difficulty at all.
I'm not saying that defensive stance is the best in every situation and that it should always be kept to. Stance switching for overpowers, whirlwinds, intercepts and charges are very important, but in general defensive stance is the win for aggro and saving your healers mana.
But that's just for my mundane kill once monster at a time strategy. I can't really comment on your AOE style of play, suffice it to say I've never been in a group with 2 mages, I consider myself lucky if my groups have either a priest or a mage to complement the usual 2 shamans and a rogue or 2 rogues and a shaman.
Edit: paragraphed for readability.