So I'm thinking about finally branching out and making a char on a different realm.

I'm interested in making a cab, and did some searching but did not find very definitive answers to the questions that I had.

Question 1) Can anyone give a detailed explanation of the cabalists role in rvr? I will be tri-spec & I know the basics (NS, Disease, debuff, nuke etc) but I've never played one before and do not know what they usually do in 8man groups.

Assuming they're in the backfield. Do they primarily focus on diseasing tanks & NS casters or DPS on overextenders? What about rooting? Is snare ever used? Who are primary targets for my pet? Are cabs usually the caster MA or do we assist the sorc? Etc... Any more information you guys can add would be greatly appreciated.


Question 2) RA's - Again, never played a cab and it appears that there are many options on how to spec your cab for RVR. I have a few scenarios that I have thought of for 4L2, let me know what you think.(I don't know anything about juggernaut, I assume it would be pretty powerful with R5?)

A) Jug1 RP1 MCL1 MOF3 WP2 Ser1 LW1 ADex1
B) Jug1 RP1 MCL1 WP3 MOF2 Ser1 LW1 ADex1
C) RP1 PD4 MOF2 WP1 Ser1 LW1

I have heard that MOF is very important for cabs using the tri spec, and I'm not sure if I should get MOF3 (+17) or just stay with MOF2 (+9). MOF3 would really help Aoe disease, Body Debuff & NS resist rates but i'm not sure its worth the extra 6pts? Thoughts?


Question 3) Leveling

Which pet is best to use while focus pulling?

Also, are there any "must go to" areas for exping as a matter cab? I'll probably be trio'ing with a sorc and cleric while I level. Any tips would be appreciated.


Thanks for the help guys - if there is anything else you guys think I should know please don't hesitate.

Cabalists have to :
1. Be almost in front to NS the eld(s)/rm(s) who usually stay in the back of his own group.
2. Stay in the back to disease the melee
3. And deal, cause alb groups often lack of dps
And don't forget to single debuff dex or str.

Of course, you can't do all of this all the time. So if your group die, it will be because :
1. "WTF are you doing, the eld has ns me, why are you not putting ns on him !!!" say the theurg/sorc
2. "WTF are you doing, this melee are not diseased" say all the casters
3. "You ns and disease too much, DEAL !!!!" say all the group.

You have to priorize all this actions. It depends on your group set tup and the group you are fighting.
If you are in a group with minstrel and theurgist, it means that there's probably only one other dps, so you have to focus more on dps. Minstrel + theurgist should rupt enough to reduce the need of NS.
If you are in a group with 3 melee dps (no theu probably), then more disease / ns is better.

Of course, the sorc should always have a macro to assist you. You can assist a melee, but sorc assist you. When you start to dps, call (loudly) for assist (even if you assit yourself a merc), and sorc have to try to assist.

When i play my cab, i first try to "control" (ns, disease, debuff, root), and only when i see a good oppotunity to deal (overexetend, good interrupt on supports), i try to kill.You have to choose very wisely the right time to deal. Your spells use a lot of power, if you drain with no kill several times, you will be out of mana quickly.

For the pet, a free caster or your own target if you still have it with you and try to kill an overextended. Emerald pet can put disease and hit for about 100 per round.

RAs :
Imo, Purge 1 is a must have to purge ns.
Mana RA is according to how you can manage your power pool (i have sere 2, mcl 1, and with pots, it's ok).
MoF 3 works pretty well to reduce resists rate. Still too much resist, but it's same story for all casters. I won't respec this.
PD 3 is nice too. I still get amazing damage with it (sometimes 300 main hand from zerk, 400-480 from hero, without critic of course) when i forget to use a spec AF charge. Maybe i will respec to PD4 soon...
Dex 3
And then, you can take damage RA
Imo, jugg 1 is useless and jug 2 is too expensive. I have never tried.

Leveling
Sapphire simu is the best with his instant life drain.

To conclude, keep in mind that i'm just a 6L3 cabalist playing in a casual way, not a player from a team. There's several worlds in Uthgard, and maybe what i am saying is not true for cabalist playing exclusively in a team or perfect set-up.

Outphaze wrote:So I'm thinking about finally branching out and making a char on a different realm.

I'm interested in making a cab, and did some searching but did not find very definitive answers to the questions that I had.

Question 1) Can anyone give a detailed explanation of the cabalists role in rvr?

Similar to an Eldritch/Enchanter combination. Instead of having Snare/DD Nuke, PBAoE, and Stun, you have Root, a Pet, and Resist-Debuffs.

Assuming they're in the backfield. Do they primarily focus on diseasing tanks & NS casters or DPS on overextenders?

I'd usually focus on Disease/Nearsight/Root utilities until it was time to focus nuke an over-extender. There is no reason to attempt nuking someone down unless you know you can kill it (Enemy support locked down etc.)

What about rooting? Is snare ever used?

Root Casters/Support, I don't recall if the Snare gave immunity here to determine if it's worth using.

Who are primary targets for my pet?

Casters/Support that are Free.

Are cabs usually the caster MA or do we assist the sorc?

Cabalists, Sorcerers are usually to busy focusing on CC/Demezz/Interrupts, sometimes they never even have time to assist. In the case of a Caster group, I sometimes had the Body Sorcerer call the MA shots to allow the Cabalist more freedom of focusing on utilities.

Question 2) RA's - Again, never played a cab and it appears that there are many options on how to spec your cab for RVR. I have a few scenarios that I have thought of for 4L2, let me know what you think.(I don't know anything about juggernaut, I assume it would be pretty powerful with R5?)

A) Jug1 RP1 MCL1 MOF3 WP2 Ser1 LW1 ADex1
B) Jug1 RP1 MCL1 WP3 MOF2 Ser1 LW1 ADex1
C) RP1 PD4 MOF2 WP1 Ser1 LW1

I have heard that MOF is very important for cabs using the tri spec, and I'm not sure if I should get MOF3 (+17) or just stay with MOF2 (+9). MOF3 would really help Aoe disease, Body Debuff & NS resist rates but i'm not sure its worth the extra 6pts? Thoughts?

None of the above mentioned specs sound worth using.
Requirements on a Cabalist:
- Long Wind I
- Purge I
- Serenity I +
- Augmented Dexterity II +
- Physical Defense II +
- Mastery of Focus II +
- Raging Power I

Once you get those basics, then you can build up on grabbing higher tiers of those basics and throw in some Wild Power.

"Juggernaut" in combination of Cabalist rr5. It's just not worth it for an RvR Spec unless you're high RR and can afford to dump extra points. A well-played group will recognize Cabalist rr5 and will either kill the Pet or kill the Cabalist itself as soon as possible.

"Mystic Crystal Lore" - as I had a guildmate say very often. If he is able to use this, he can Pet Recycle. Since most of the time you and/or the Pet have a target, very rarely will you have a chance to utilize this RA. The main issue, is when you're focusing someone down and need an instant replenishment mid-nuke - that's where Raging Power comes in.

"Mastery of Focus" - it's all preference here as to how much you invest here. I suggest obtaining at least the level II tier. I always found myself spamming AoE Disease on Trains anyway since there is always someone resisting. In the end, it doesn't matter how much you invest into MoF as a caster, you'll still get screwed over by the lousy 13%ish flat resist rate.


Question 3) Leveling

Which pet is best to use while focus pulling?

- Sapphire Pet, it has a Lifedrain proc. Thus giving your pet some healing potential for itself.

Also, are there any "must go to" areas for exping as a matter cab? I'll probably be trio'ing with a sorc and cleric while I level. Any tips would be appreciated.

Here is a nice Map I made for guildmates to level awhile back, hopefully this helps.

Other viable monsters to mass-full for XP are: Dunter , Peallaidh , Pygmy Goblin , Danaoin Fisherman . . . to name a few mobs.

Amazing posts guys, really appreciate the help and info!

some1 said me that snare and root share same immunity timer, this made me take snare out off my qbars

You can snare and then root. But root gives immunity to snare.

Aoe snare in tri-spec is worth keeping in there. Then u have 30 aoe snare and 34 aoe disease.

See my post above for quick tips 1-20. I enjoy kill tasks with my pet because all u need to do is find a mob, dot it or nuke it twice, sick pet on it, and then head back to your quest giver. Cuts way down on time to do kill tasks.

I would not go beyond mof 2.

Outphaze wrote:Question 1) Can anyone give a detailed explanation of the cabalists role in rvr? I will be tri-spec & I know the basics (NS, Disease, debuff, nuke etc) but I've never played one before and do not know what they usually do in 8man groups.

Yes, cabies are in the back, BUT: as hulkgris and others already mentioned, you need good timing...always staying in the back is a bad idea, otherwise the enemy eld or rm might nearsight all the others before you land NS on him...not a good thing...to be honest, i myself rarely nearsight, as i'm usually only the second cab in grp (spirit spec), but nonetheless i got quite some caby-experience from uth as well as live...

trispec - main tasks: disease targets, disease enemy tanks, nearsight, debuff and announce it (no use debuffing, when the others don't know about it) and deal dmg...

for spirit spec on rare occasions it makes sense to use the ae-snare...snare shares the same timer as root, BUT if the snare is still active it can be overwritten by root (not so if snare was broken or wore off, then the snare-immunity prevents root)...dunno how good the snare is for trispec

targets for pet are: bard, shamy, druid, healer, casters...it all depends on enemy setup...if enemies run caster-setup and your grp has 3 pet-classes (2 of them cabies) it is a good idea to send one pet for each caster, two with rr5...this way they can't clear pets easily

usually the caby is MA due to debuff, but in tank grps there might either be two MAs (melee and caster) or the caby assists the tank-MA if possible...in caster-grps main-targets are overextenders

Question 2) RA's - Again, never played a cab and it appears that there are many options on how to spec your cab for RVR. I have a few scenarios that I have thought of for 4L2, let me know what you think.(I don't know anything about juggernaut, I assume it would be pretty powerful with R5?)

i've never really seen anyone using jugger in grp rvr, except on rare occasions and then not really successful...it might make sense, but not for general purpose 8v8...even I, spirit cab with pretty good buffs on pet, don't use jugger, as it's just too situative and even with rr5 pets have too few impact ...besides with rr5 and jugger out you drop pretty much all you have until higher 6LX on inc, so you'll waste lots of points for that...

currently i got solo RAs, but for cabies things like PD and MoF are important...Mof2 sounds like a good choice, maybe even Mof3 once you're higher...otherwise RAs were covered already...though i gotta throw in: McL makes pefect sense as caby...it often happens that my pet is dead and i run out of mana still, so i can just use mcl to start pet-recycling...or after being ressed it is also nice to have an initial mana-boost...however, if you rely on using pots a lot then you might skip mcl and go for other Ras (lw1, sere, aug-dex etc.)

Question 3) Leveling

Which pet is best to use while focus pulling?

Also, are there any "must go to" areas for exping as a matter cab? I'll probably be trio'ing with a sorc and cleric while I level. Any tips would be appreciated.

problem with focus pulling: there's hardly enough spots for focus pulling...spots are too slow in spawntime and there's not like 5 spots you can run around one by one...only makes sense at higher levels with pygmies, but even they are not, what they used to be...if you trio with sorc and cleric that might be different as you'll also be able to take out higher level mobs, which enables a wider range of mobs to kill (like two yellow spots and three spots with orange mobs, which are right beside oneanother)...


hope that helped...i'm not trispec and even on live i never played trispec but i had 3 cabies with one being fullspecced in one of each lines on live, so i still know what i'm talking about...

good luck with levelling and feel free to hit me with any question that comes up

Concerning jugger, it really is not worth taking it. The only thing it does, is putting a big "Kill me now"-Sign on the pet as it grows quite big while still dieing very easy (3-4 nukes). However if you send your pet with rr5 on someone it often gets ignored for half a fight.

About MoF i am not so sure, i used it until rr9, but after getting rid of it, i did not really notice a difference in resists. But might be, because of my rr, i don't know.

In fight it really depends on the situation, what is best to do, but generally you should start with pre-kiting and avoiding damage as much as you can. And most times i do not even try to ns the eld/rm, because i would have to push too much. I focus more on bard/druid and pac/shaman. Also it is very powerfull to ns+root and calling that out to your grp.

But in my opinion the most important thing is calling targets on teamspeak and say when you root/ns someone.

All the important things have already been said in the posts above.

Very interesting thread

Could you please add the common tri-specs and explain why for those considering rolling a caby

Thanks

25 - Matter Destruction
33 - Spirit Animation
34 - Body Magic

By far, the most common Cabalist spec used. It grants the most utility a Cabalist can possibly have that is even effective at low RealmRank. 25 Matter Destruction grants blue tier (45%) Nearsight, just enough to silence most enemy spell-users. 33 Spirit Magic grants the yellow tier Body Resist (30%) Debuff, this is where most of your damage comes in - debuffing your own damage type, in conjunction of a Sorcerer or another Cabalist assisting for damage. The 34 Body Magic grants the yellow tier AoE Disease, thus should lead to less resists, and narrows the variance of your Baseline Body Lifetap (Improves your Damage).

I know some other Cabalists run 32 Matter Magic for the yellow tier (55%) Nearsight, dropping their Body Magic to 28. I'd only see this viable if you were a high RealmRank Cabalist. Even then, I personally would stick to the above 25/33/34 spec, I just don't see the extra 10% to Nearsight to be worth losing some damage.

_Oglop_ wrote:I know some other Cabalists run 32 Matter Magic for the yellow tier (55%) Nearsight, dropping their Body Magic to 28. I'd only see this viable if you were a high RealmRank Cabalist. Even then, I personally would stick to the above 25/33/34 spec, I just don't see the extra 10% to Nearsight to be worth losing some damage.

the 10% may not make a huge difference but i guess the spell-level does actually, cause resisted NS sucks pretty bad...never played trispec, but i only have 25+X body spec and dmg is fine even at low rr...usually caby is not the main-nuker but debuffs and diseases/NSes most of the time while calling targets for sorc...sure, caby and sorc nuke together, but usually sorc nukes more, as caby needs to throw in debuff now and then...however, both specs seem equally good...just with different focuses...and 10% can make a difference...and having 825 range or 675 range (45 / 55% ns of 1500) imho is a difference...one feels like just out of pbae-range while the other is pretty far...

Imho going for higher ns is only viable if u have two splitspec cabys in grp and even then I would prefer the normal spec.
That is maybe just because I focus more on dmg and it happens often enough, that I have to nuke my target down on my own, cause the sorc is busy

All what you need to do as Caby is focus NS if you have time and do disease, mostly root shouldn´t be your job,since in an Cabba-Setup your supposed to do dmg and not utility. That mean´s ofc you can root someone if all others are busy, but keep in mind your primary target is to kill someone, nothing else.

Lot of Cabbys forget about that and spam roots/ns/disease all time, helps ofc but will not win the fight for you.

Pyat wrote:That is maybe just because I focus more on dmg and it happens often enough, that I have to nuke my target down on my own, cause the sorc is busy

Exactly this. When I played Sorceress more I was usually busy focusing on DeMezzing, CCing, Interrupting, or being Interrupted. Very rarely did I ever have openings to assist nukes as the above mentioned reasons are imperative for success.

Xacrag wrote:All what you need to do as Caby is focus NS if you have time and do disease, mostly root shouldn´t be your job,since in an Cabba-Setup your supposed to do dmg and not utility. That mean´s ofc you can root someone if all others are busy, but keep in mind your primary target is to kill someone, nothing else.

Lot of Cabbys forget about that and spam roots/ns/disease all time, helps ofc but will not win the fight for you.

Don't exactly agree with this. You'll run outa mana extremely fast if you tend to just spam DPS and pay no attention to the enemies. Focus on Nearsight/Disease/Root/Interrupts as much as possible, then when you know you can nuke down someone then start the raining of DPS. There is absolutely no point in attempting to nuke someone down if the enemy support is free or the enemy is not extended enough etc.

If u run out of mana real quick your enemie´s are bad because cabby is free whole time , you can use pots/RP and recycle pet also, so different playstyles about a cabby role in an setup, í´m always happy if cabby don´t nuke and do other stuff in the less time he is free .