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When do you NOT target the minstrels first

A topic in high contention is if minstrels should be targetted first.  To analyze this, let's consider some of the pros and cons to going after minstrels first

Pros

  • Focussing healers prevents them from healing other freeps
  • Killing healers first prevents combat rezzes from them
  • A freep raid without minstrels has minimal healing capability with only RK's and Captains remaining and hence are far easier to destroy
  • Once all the minstrels are down, a freep raid will quickly turn and run

Cons

  • Minstrels are highly protected and attacks on them will frequently result in significant protection via defensive skills or DPS
  • Minstrels have several defensive skills, the most significant being feign death which can disrupt targetting and DPS for several seconds while other targets are re-acquired and the creep DPS shifts

A raid leader must judge whether or not it is worth putting significant DPS on minstrels and this largely revolves around the amount of healing they can put out.  1-2 minstrels is utterly inadequate in healing against a full creep raid and hence can be safely ignored as the creep raid DPS will be greater than the incoming healing and still kill the target.  Three minstrels per raid is somewhat adequate but with adequate creep lockdowns, they also will not be able to defend against the creep raid. 

The choice of targets, once free from being based on minstrels only, can move on to removing DPS/CC threats from the creep raid or quickly take down several freeps who are under 5,000 morale, greatly reducing freep morale and removing a significant amount of capability from the freep raid.

Another opportunity to fight without engaging minstrels first is where the minstrels, regardless of numbers, are significantly defended.  At this point line of sight becomes a powerful ally.  Any freeps who are out of range/LOS of their minstrels should be targetted and destroyed, gradually wearing down their numbers.  This will require some sort of terrain to facilitate such as a wall or trees.  Be very aware of the location of the minstrels because they can move up and set up healing on the target.  Consider the opportunity to strike as it's likely that the freep defenses haven't reformed around the minstrels (tar, champs, etc).

That said, minstrels at no time should be left alone.  If unmolested, they can ressurect defeated freeps and quickly return them to the fight.  Lockdowns can be done by both weavers and wargs with power drains/mezzes and stuns/silences respectively.  One good warg or weaver will be very effective in disrupting the minstrel and even further critically reduce their capability.  Because of the defenses around minstrels, typically the ranged weaver will be a better choice.

When it is time to hit minstrels, it's best to go after them in rapid succession and topple them like dominos.  Have another target assist finding the next minstrel while the raid concentrates and destroys one minstrel.  Give the other freep healers very little time to respond by maximum focus.  Beware of feigns and have the primary target assist ready to call that it's feigned and move straight onto the next minstrel with the primary target assist watching the feigned minstrel to finish the attack/redirect firepower.

Fri, 01/08/2010 - 18:55
#1
Thadius856
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Joined: 12/25/2009
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Other Situations Where Minstrels are not Primary Targets

I typically shy away from targetting Minstrels first under any of the following circumstances:

  • If there are more than two LMs in a full raid, I will target them first. They are by far the most damaging class, especially in small areas. Sticky Gourd accounts for a large potion of the enemy's damage when many are available. Letting the enemy burn rezes on LMs means that once you do topple Minstrel that they will not be ressurrected.
  • If there is less than one Minstrel per fellow and heals are still flowing decently, look for RKs in healing attunement. These targets typically go down much faster, and if the Minstrels attempt to keep them up, they will burn massive amounts of power with instant-cast skills or drain the RK's power completely in a matter of seconds with Gift of the Hammerhand. If combat cappy rezzes are burned on RKs instead of Minstrels or other Captains, the enemy's available combat rezes drop significantly.
  • If there is less than one Minstrel per fellow, and there are not RKs healing, any Creep Raid should be able to easily out-DPS the healing. In this situation, ignore the Minstrels until the end and focus on DPS (LMs/RKs first, followed by Hunters/Champions) instead. Without DPS output, heals only delay the inevitable.
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