Intro
Rho, myself and a non-Avian, Durnik formed a group last night with the intent of taking down Ol' Sooty, a level 20 elite bear. This mission is available after completing two timed hunting missions.
Take One
In our first attempt, with just the three of us, Sooty gnawed on our bloody corpses while hardly taking a scratch himself. A part of this failure was because Sooty has a slightly larger-than-usual aggro range and we got just a liiitle too close, angering him before we had a chance to prepare or organize.
The Plan
Oops...no time.
The Result
Three dead bear hunters.
Take Two
We returned and maxed out our group (5 people) and while that definitely helped, I think a significant portion of our success is owed to the time taken for a bit of planning.
The Plan
We would clean out the area, avoiding Sooty, to ensure we didn't get any adds in the middle of the battle. Then Golig (me), as the warrior, was going to pull and hold aggo as best I could while our priest (Durnik) kept me healthy. Rho (Tobiasds) and the others were going to stay out of Sooty's melee range and nuke the brute.
The Result
One big, dead bear!
There were a few tense moments like when I heard Durnik yell, "OOM" but he recovered enough to keep me standing until the end of the fight. After an approximately 3-4 minute fight, Ol' Sooty finally fell victim to our little band's might.
The Summary
- Plan your attack. Wading into battle will almost certainly end in disaster unless you're dealing with a small number of lower-level enemies.
- Each person needs a job. Everyone should have a specific role. Do not accept "just step in and help out" as the directions your leader gives. If you are the leader, do not give those kinds of orders. Instead say, "Roran, you will melee the enemy and heal Rho if he drops below half health."
- Remain calm. Much easier said than done, but very important nonetheless. Focus on your job and if the battle turns against you, call for a heal, do not back away. I think I made that mistake last night when I didn't get the heal I thought was coming and that could have give Sooty the chance he needed to take out a mage or two. Thankfully, that didn't happen.
- Communicate. Whether it's via TeamSpeak (strongly preferred, obviously) or with single words during combat, you have to let your teammates know if something is going against you. At one point, I had to let the standard attacks suffice and type a "heal" message to the party (our healer was not on our TS server). Had I not invested that second or so to do that, I may have fallen. Communication, in any form, is vital in a tough fight.
There are likely more that I'm forgetting here so add them below or to Arindel's thread (this post could have gone in there but I wanted to tell the story of Sooty).
My thanks to my brother Avian, Rho as well as a new friend, Durnik who made the defeat of Sooty possible. The others in our group were there and gone so fast, I didn't really get a chance to talk to them but I appreciate their help.
