Question about sustain…

Gozno

Mid or high level Shadow Knights: did you feel your vamp aura was enough to sustain while solo? White cons? Yellow with Life drain?

Would love to hear about your experiences!

jdbertsch

Once you hit circa 45 you are not doing yellow cons solo with any efficiency. Heck, post 50, dark blue cons will take most of your resources to sustain and come out on top solo - and you are not doing that repeatedly and efficiently. Some of the dark blue cons post 50 will hit harder than you can sustain well.

That said, with decent gear, you can take dark blue mobs up until 45 pretty well, though better with buffs. After 45 it just gets increasingly difficult, and you must fear kite to keep it going. With a partner however, you can do most content in the game, just not efficiently as a group of 4 or more.

Mesh

Shadow Knights have zero mana sustain, their spells are expensive and they lean into 2H weapons but have no 2H tanking mechanics to improve mitigation.

They're also touted as the "DPS tank" but Fighters, who have significantly higher mitigation, currently do more DPS and that gap will increase when the the undead pet is removed.

Their saving grace and what attracts me to the class is that their kit allows them to act as both tank and puller which I like for my small group.

Waiting and hoping that the rework will address these issues.

Raybane

Mesh The main advantage of the Knights over Fighters solo is the ability to extend their life using their mana. Mana also recovers faster then health further improving that ability.

Mesh

Raybane
That might be true solo but in a group you're depending on your healer to sustain your health more than your own mana.

Fighters consistent mitigation saves healer mana much more than Shadow Knights limited ability to cast a few life drains before they OOM.

Since the Fighter rework I'm not even sure Shadow Knight still has the best self-healing. At level 20, Second Wind heals for 100 health over 10s every 30s. That's more than 3 free Life Saps or 105 mana worth of healing for zero mana cost and it scales with level and stamina.

Over a typical camp session, Fighters probably outheal Shadow Knights.

Raybane

Mesh Yes, Fighter is probably the best group tank. The Knight classes do have some bonus utility in groups and are better solo or in a duo. I find it to be decently fair.

Mesh

Raybane
Not really interested in solo since M&M Is a group game.

I don't think there should be any class that's just objectively the best at its role.

Every class should have strengths and weaknesses IMO but so far the Knights have all of the weaknesses and Fighter has almost all of the strengths.

Raybane

Mesh Even if you personally don't care about it so does it still have value to some others. And looking at Shadow Knight specifically so does FD make for a decent puller, even better against undead. Fighter is basically limited to tanking and some dps. But if all you care about is being the best tank in a group and noting else, then maybe Fighter is what you should play?

Velthorian

By mid 30's as a solo SK, i long gave up vamp aura, I find the haste + regen to be more consistent, yielding both more damage and more life over time. The proc rate is ridiculously low. Would like a parse instead of guessing, but my hunch is haste aura is better. At 34 I could still kill white's at a fair clip, via fear kiting, but I was pretty well geared, with a level 50 2HB at .65 ratio. So, no life tap proc aura does not even remotely close to keeping up with incoming damage, fear kiting is required. Solo SK Sustain = not getting hit. Mana sustain is a problem, as is channeling. It's shockingly difficult to get off a life tap against 2-3 green targets. They really need to bump up the effectiveness of channeling. The class has little to no utility as compared to an EQ shadow knight. (Invis, IVU, levitate, enduring breath, mana regen via life conversion, mana regen via proc steals, see invis, infravision buff, cure diesease, all part of the EQ SK wheel house, instant cast high damage DD's on cool down, AE taunt, riposte, triple attack, not so here) Your not living that power fantasy in this world. If you enjoyed SK in EQ and are fond of that experience -- frankly, look elsewhere. Not saying you can't have a great time enjoying it for what it is, but it aint EQ. EQ was peak MMO for me, none better before or since. I'd still be playing it if was not owned by Douchebag Daybreak. Hell a level 65 Sk in EQ with his Epic.. oh boy.. 1500(crit! 2405)/1500/1500/Spear DD 1800 (Crit! 4200) (one round of combat) and get an equal amount of healing back from the epic lol, then go ahead and hit them with a 30k harm touch. yeeah boy. Finish out the raid parse in top 5 DPS. That aint happening here, ever. Nothing i said was Hyperbole, I played a BIS raid geared shadow knight (max aa) last year on a TLP. I do miss Nick, dev's would be wise to remember their roots.

Mesh

Velthorian
Pretty much agree.

Shadow Knight sustain sounds great on paper. A plate tank with life taps seems like it'd be strong but in reality mob damage easily outpaces your taps and you'll be OOM after a few casts. In groups the life taps just don't translate well compared to the flat mitigation of a Fighter.

People always mention the life taps but it's the abilities that allow you to pull and kite (snare, FD, fear, invuln) that make the class IMO.

Aura of Vampirism is pretty trivial outside of some trickle healing for your group. The Shadow Knight gets very little from it if you're using a slow 2H. I wouldn't mind if they just removed it, buff Aura of the Unholy and give us an improved personal life tap proc similar to Shroud of Death that scales better.

The class page does mention improving drains and debuffs as well as increasing the cast speed of our combat spells so hopefully channeling will be less of an issue. Would be nice to get a meaningful drain that isn't a hard cast that costs a ton of mana.

Drains, transfers, and debilitating effects
Fast-casting, short-range abilities
https://monstersandmemories.com/class-shadow-knight

Gozno

Thanks! I was hoping to hear otherwise about the auras and life steal. Maybe they get dual-weild to proc it more... I am looking more for a stand-your-ground tank so maybe fear kiting (and the rework.) is where I can find the value.

Bruskie

Gozno

NO, Vamp aura is pretty much meh, soloing with sk is Life taps and pet tanking, then taunting off your pet to save your pet from dieing. with the new dot and the manna rgn i think it will be much better to solo. but i lvled to 60 when the mobs were easier then they are now. so who knows?