“The philosophy of the captain”
Every war has its leaders and its soldiers. A leader is a man who commands other man into battle and leading by example. It is this role that captain fills in the best. As character our captains inspire the soldiers into great deeds. We maintain the flow of the battle, keeping up the momentum while dealing with anything that doesn’t follow the standards of combat. We are the oil of the warmachine. We are not the most important asset in a war, but we do make the motor run smoothly.
As captain you can expect to fill in the last spot of a group. This is mainly because we are a support class and do not fit a specific role. This basically sums up our gameplay. Our style of play is vastly different than most classes. We are a warrior class with a lot of group buff abilities. We can do a good amount of dps but we will never surpass the hunter or champion. We can tank properly but we are not a guardian. We can heal or fellowship to a decent amount but we will never be a minstrel.
Fellowship gameplay: It is all about decisions
Action and reaction is our gameplay. This starts before combat. In the “buff phase” we need to decide what commands we give our fellowship. A minstrel has not much use for relentless attack and surprisingly a guardian doesn’t really want on guard command. A good captain will know what command is best.
Also at this point we need to decide what herald we want to summon. We have the option to summon one herald out of 3, namely a DPS, a Morale boast or a Power boast herald. When the fight is about to start we need to decide what mark to use. Based on experience you will learn what mark is best. When the fight has started it is than that our decision making really starts. At this point it is for us to make the fight run smoothly. Some skills are only useable when an opponent dies or when we use a certain attack. These skill allow for faster attacks, group heal or aoe damage. As a captain you will need to decide on the spot which skill to use. Normally you got about 3 seconds to decide. Is the group low on health use group heal, if there are many mobs and everyone has good health use AoE damage.
If the last mob dies and the group moves to the next mob use the attack speed buff. Our decision making doesn’t end here. Usually it is for the captain to call for retreat when things go wrong. But before we call for retreat we need to look at the situation more closely. If the minstrel dies for example we might call retreat or we can resurrect our healer with our combat resurrection skill. Apart from skill based decisions we also need to watch the fight closer than most. Were the roles of a minstrel, a guardian or a champion are relatively fixed, we don’t have one. When a fight starts we need to keep a close look at the health of our fellowship aswell. If multiple members are being hit and drop in morale we need to assist or minstrel for a moment and put a heal + heal over time on those players damaged. When the guardian is busy keeping mobs together its usually the minstrel that pulls agro from additional spawning monsters or archers. It’s the job of a captain to keep the minstrel alive so he can assist the fellowship without distraction. This usually means gaining agro from a monster and pulling him towards the guardian. When low level normal mobs are in a fight along with an elite we can opt to kill that monster so that we can use our abilities requiring a dead of an enemy.
As you can see the captain fellowship gameplay is a chaotic one. Getting a compliment after an hectic fight really means something. It means that you reacted properly to the problems and managed to save the party of a whipe. Something not many classes let alone players can do.
Solo gameplay: The captain without an army
Unlike other classes a captain is fairly good in solo gameplay. We cant solo fellowship quests and sometimes find it hard to fight elites of the same level but we can manage to fight 3 normal mobs of the same level or even a signature mob 3 levels above without much problems. It is usually power that is our short coming but it has been announced that in the upcoming expansion this will be addressed. Solo gameplay for a captain is pretty boring for a lot of our skills are not usefull in solo gameplay. Solo gameplay is mainly to get experience and to get the next fellowship quest available. If you want to play solo most of the time a captain is valid class, but you will not be able to use most your abilities.
Traits
Although there are a lot of traits slots that a captain needs to fill in I will not go into detail with all of them. Most class based traits are based on your personal experience and preference. No single skill is really needed for a specific build and trait is totally useless. Same goes with virtues and race skills.
Virtues:
Virtues are probably the hardest to pick. As we look at our abilities it is already good to note down that fear reduction is not really something we need. As we increase in level you will notice that power is something that is pretty hard to keep high. Also as we fill multiple roles its good to take in account how flexible you want to be. For example a good boast to morale is justice but with all our morale boasting skills it might not be the best. Below is the list of virtues I would pick based on the most flexible style of play:
Determination: Max morale, morale regeneration in combat and agility
Determination: Max morale, morale regeneration in combat and agility
Loyalty: Max power, vitality and armour
Valour: Max morale, morale regeneration out of combat and might
Wisdom: Power regeneration out of combat, wound resistance and will
Fortitude: Morale regeneration out of combat, disease resistance and might
Racial traits:
I will briefly comment all the racial traits to show there usefulness.
Man of the fourth age: +20 will- A very good trait to have, more will means more power
Return to bree- Nice to have but not really useful in combat. This one is the last one you should pick apart from uppercut
Duty Bound: +~1% more morale- Not to good not to bad, this does add up if the whole party is human with this trait.
Upper-cut: attack- Most pointless spend silver if you equip this trait.
Tactics and might bonus: 5% bonus to green and red conjunctions- Ether extra heal or extra damage on a conjunction, nice to have but situational. Still worth taking
Man sword damge: 2% extra damage- Nice but if you don’t use a sword not all that good. Again situational, but if you got a good sword way not take the extra damage trait
Balance of man- Extra defense is very good for a captain. We cant heal ourselves so we can use every bit of defence we can get.
Strength of morale: heal ~3000 hp- The only real self heal we have as captain. Long cool down but this one is needed for a captain.
From all the above I would recommend : Man of the fourth age, balance of man and strength of morale. This leaves you 2 spots not filled... and is upto you:)
Builds:
Now that we know what kind of skills we have and what traits we can use, its time to start explaining what kind of builds there are for captains. As you have read above captains are all about versatility so it comes to do surprise that our builds should be based on that concept as well. But we can also put a captain in a specific role. The good thing about being versatile is that you can fill any role needed for a group. With these concepts in mind there are 4 main builds that we as captain can use. We can have a tank, DPS, heal or hybrid build.
Tank build:
This build is probably the easiest one to make but one of the hardest to play. You need to compete with champions for agro and its very hard to gain agro on multiple opponents if more monster appear. If you face two monsters get agro on one and let your herald attack the other one. This way you can manage agro reasonable well. If there are more mobs tell the group which you will be tanking, the remaining should focus on killing the others. Always communicate with your group. Use your halberd for agro gaining and your sword and shield for tanking. The best herald to use is the herald of hope.
Suggested traits:
Valor, Justice, Discipline, Determination, Charity
Man-sword bonus, Man of the forth age, Strength of morale, Duty bound, Balance of man
Captain’s hope, renewed voice, focused strikes, intimidating shout, turn the tide
Suggested stats on equipment: Agility, Might, Vitality, Dodge, block and parry, Increased threat
DPS build:
Being DPS means maximizing your damage out put. Even if we maximize our dps output we will not be able to out damage hunters or champions. The weapon of choice is the two-handed sword, the herald should be the herald of war.
Suggested traits:
Discipline, determination, Wisdom, Loyalty, Idealism
Man-sword bonus, Man of the forth age, Tactics and might bonus, Duty bound, and strength of morale
Captains Valour, Renewed voice, Expert attacks, Captain of war, Turn of the tide
Suggested stats on equipment: Agility, Might, Will, critical hit and max power.
Healer build:
Being a healer in a party brings a lot of responsibility but for a captain its fairly easy to do. Just spam word of courage until you run out of power. This will happen very often and its best to have loremaster with you in the fellowship. Weapons and possible a shield should be used based on stats not on damage. The herald to use is ether the herald of hope for short fights or the herald of victory for long fights.
Suggested traits:
Wisdom, Loyalty, Idealism, Empathy, MercyMan-sword bonus, Man of the forth age, Tactics and might bonus, Balance of man, and strength of morale
Captain's victory or Captain’s hope, Now for wrath, Subtle command, Fear no darkness, Blood of Númenor.
Suggested stats on equipment: Will, Power, power regeneration and +heal stats.
Hybrid build:
A captain is by nature a jack of all traits. The hybrid build is best suited for a captain. It is a mix of all the above builds. Your style of play will be based on reacting to various changes in combat. Traits are based on getting the best result in the various stats and every class and race traits should be based on strengthening your stats or increasing your critical skills. Since this is a very personalised build I will note down what I would take based on max traits. I currently wield a two handed sword, got a backup two handed axe that leeches power, a halberd and a one-handed sword and shield.
Suggested traits:
Determination, loyalty, Valour, Wisdom, FortitudeMan-sword bonus, Man of the forth age, Tactics and might bonus, Balance of man, and strength of morale
Captain’s hope, Now for wrath, Fear no darkness, Renewed voice, Expert attacks.
Suggested stats on equipment: Any armour that improves the basic stats and gives the most armour rating is what I chose.
