Raid group tactics explained.

Thechemicals · December 2014

I have noticed many guilds and players posting videos of themselves but give very little explanation of what is going on. Lately i have been seeing many players in raid groups who want to win but dont know how to counter highly organized enemy raid groups. I have been a member of these kind of guilds in the past under different accounts and am here to help out players who want to learn. You can find me under the DC banner on thornblade anytime and can communicate with me through ts or rc.

This is how an enemy raid group wipes another group:

The prep stage

The raid charges ultimates away from the battlefield before engaging its enemies. Resto staff is the common ultimate builder here via grand healing on your allies.

The holding stage
This is the critical stage and most difficult to maintain among a raid group. The raid group refrains from using its ultimates on anything but the main target. Most raid groups fail unkowingly at this point when they use ultimates on enemy npc's to capture resources/keeps then have an enemy force engage them once they are spent.

The first move
Despite whatever claims any skilled raid group might boast, the first move against an enemy raid is simple and anyone can do it, so long as they have a sorcerer. The very first *offensive action of every single competent raid group engaging another raid group is to Bolt streak center mass into the enemy and follow with a negate ultimate. This first move always wipes lesser raid groups whose healers and support do not have the counter tactic to stop the first move.

The finisher
All the offensive ultimates charged during the prep stage are released here. Most of us know the ultimates that kill us in this stage, the most popular being batswarm, dk standard, and solar prison. During the end of this stage another negate is casted for good measure. Most times, depending on the sorcerers count of the raid, each sorcerer has a number he is given so that the negates can land one after the other. This organization requires voice communication.

How to counter this attack

1. Your healers must have immovable for this encounter and pretty much every encounter in cyrodiil. The use of immovable will prevent any enemy negate or cc effect from stopping your healers from healing you during the first stage of a fight. immovable is a hard counter to negate. All dps and tanks will use breakout.
2. You must mimic the exact same routine as your enemy raid group by prepping ultimates, holding ultimates, and countering their first move. Most fledging enemy raid groups have a powerful finisher but fall apart quickly when they are countered. Good defensive counter ultimates are *barrier(precast),veil of blades, solar prison, and counter negates. Dragon leap and meteor are good for scattering an enemy raid group as well.
3. Use key skills for each class
a. Templar blinding light (pulsing morph) and blessed shards
b. NB drain power/fear
c. Sorcerer shattering prison / Daedric mines
d. Dk Cinder storm/frag shield
4. Use key skills from the weapon tree
a. 2h Cleave with carve
b. dual wield Whirling blades
c. Bow arrow spray with either morph
d. Destro staff impulse with pulsar morph/ Unstable wall of elements
e. Resto Grand Healing

By getting together with your people,you will come to realize that the professed highly skilled raid groups are actually nothing more than a negation battery with 3-4 immovable healers sustaining them until they can drop more ultimates, with some destro staff use inbetween. Hope this helps.

tedsini_ESO · December 2014

Very concise and helpful guide for anyone new to Cyrodiil. I wish I'd had this when I began to PvP. I re-spec'd my main's morphs yesterday and I was debating whether to use Pulsar or Elemental Ring for the Impulse skill. I chose Pulsar, as you did. There is a lot of debate in the forum on this. Can you share your thoughts on why you chose Pulsar?

DezIsDead · December 2014

pretty good advice but uh, you better have more than one negate, be ready for a negate war. seriously its not uncommon to wait for the group your hitting to drop their negate first just so you can instantly counter it and their down one negate. youd be surprised how many negates get dropped in one good fight. ive been in one where we dropped 6 counter negates.

Manoekin · December 2014

You post a lot of zerg killing abilities. All of those ground target abilities are gonna get you killed by another group.

Suru · December 2014

This pretty much how it goes, but players get better by making their individual survivability better, outsustaining the opponent and battle experience from fighting these groups over and over. Players still need to change their builds to fight these other raid groups at the end of the day. The list of abilities you listed are amazing abilities that players should look into more often

Roechacca · December 2014

Good summary .

Subtomik · December 2014

Nice list and cool of ya to help beginners understand some of the mechanics of groups.

sometimes i think so much is happening newer players dont get a chance to understand how or why they were wiped, or why said group is "unkillable"

that being said I would like to add: SIEGE. I dont care if you are a lvl 20 tyro who doesnt have a clue. If you can drop a meatbag or oil cata, or heck even a fire ballista on a group it can be devastating, especially with purge working the way it is right now.

on negates: I do not think they are necessary as you say, one of the times I got close to 500 kills without a death my group of 9 consisted of 4dk's 2 NB's 3 temps. If you have people reacting to negates accordingly, and the enemy doesnt have an obscene amount you can simply bait the negate in. its that "hold phase" that might last most of the fight.

as for healers running immovable I do not believe that to be necessary at all, especially considering immovable loves to not work properly. 2 very good AD healers have posted in this thread(1 i consider to be possibly the best support temp in the game) and im sure they have some imput to give.

as for the DPS question of whether fire ring or pulsar, when I use a destro staff I use the ring for the ulti gen, but thats my personal preference. I can say someone pulsaring a group is great at making the healers life that much harder.

Im also here to talk to healers whenever about tips or tricks of healing. There really arent enough of us, and it can be very, very tedious in ESO, so most the community is pretty cool at talking and helping each other DC side anyway

Talcyndl · December 2014

Subtomik wrote: »

that being said I would like to add: SIEGE. I dont care if you are a lvl 20 tyro who doesnt have a clue. If you can drop a meatbag or oil cata, or heck even a fire ballista on a group it can be devastating, especially with purge working the way it is right now.

I generally try not to agree with No Mercy

but...

This is VERY true. It's also one of the harder things for a lot of players to do. People spend so much time and effort building their character. Leveling, gearing up, learning and leveling skills and rotations. To then throw all that aside to man a ballista is tough for some people.

But it works. Not to mention that with practice you can hop off siege while it's reloading and heal, dps, etc. using all those fancy skills you have on your bars.

Da Sandman · December 2014

I can't emphasize voice coms enough. I can't tell you how many siege lines my group will wipe where 75% of them die still on their siege, because no one warned them they are about 10 seconds away from getting run over.

Manoekin · December 2014

Subtomik wrote: »

as for healers running immovable I do not believe that to be necessary at all, especially considering immovable loves to not work properly. 2 very good AD healers have posted in this thread(1 i consider to be possibly the best support temp in the game) and im sure they have some imput to give.

Ya immovable is definitely weird sometimes. Works well countering negate, but like Sub says not necessary. Radiant Aura though and you can keep it up plus break or dodge roll for days. And tri pots! Don't go into Cyrodil without a few stacks of tri pots!

Subtomik · December 2014

Arena as well if you know how to juggle resources but takes a bit of practice

Muizer · December 2014

Thanks for explaining why PvP sucks!

bravoalpharomeo · December 2014

This is literally a guide to being a pulse group.

***.

Sanct16 · December 2014

Immovable is no hard counter to negate. It only saves you from having to break cc.

Imdrefan · December 2014

bravoalpharomeo wrote: »

This is literally a guide to being a pulse group.

***.

This is the meta. Adapt or complain.

Roechacca · December 2014

Sanct16 wrote: »

Immovable is no hard counter to negate. It only saves you from having to break cc.

This ^ Yes . It only stops cc but not all cc .

Nijjion · December 2014

Zerg group tactics explained* FTFY

Roechacca · December 2014

Who cares if it is or isn't a zerg group tactic , the OP was just trying to help I'm sure . An knowing any tactic is better then none .

On another note , when entering keep inners . If the keep is well maned and You see Jiffy Lube Oil droppers on the wall , Please go upstairs first an clear them before hitting the flags .

Also if you see caltrops and Mage ruins protecting the entrance, be sure your stamina is up and double tap roll past those obstacles .

-Thnx in advance

saintmurray · December 2014

For healing I find immovable doesn't work properly, a good dodge roll/CC break is just as good at the moment. Until they fix the purge/walls problem I stick away from it and use the temp purify. Just means your group has to pay attention and use those synergies! Infact add using synergies to your list so many people forget they are there if and ignore them!