Feedback: New Player Tips for Burglars

[ANewMachine]

Even though you can stealth, stealth is not always the proper solution to a group of mobs. Always make sure, if you're deciding to bypass a mob with stealth, that the item you're picking up is well outside their aggro range. Though it may take longer, it can be far easier to survive if you systematically clear an area, rather than run in, grab an item/assassinate the target, and perhaps get caught while picking it up/killing him by a patrolling mob or nearby group. This was the big realization for my Burg - I used to just stealth by everything, grab objectives, and go. And I died a lot. Being a bit more systematic - maybe using stealth to get past the outer defenses on an area, then killing a nice wide path to the objective once inside - made me a lot more survivable.

[olagaton]

Take your time engaging the enemy in PvP. You are a stealth class, and, sometimes, you have the choice of picking which fights you want to get involved in. You are under no obligation to engage an enemy just because the masses do. Be disciplined while having fun. And if you don't find the situation your group, raid or team is engaging in to be in the best interest of the group, raid or team, stay in stealth, toss Reveal Weakness up on the focus fire target. You'll still be helping the raid, but you will not be taking the same unnecessary risks as the rest of the raid. It's a perk of the class. Oh, and don't care what other people think of your playstyle -- you pay to play the game, so you can play however you want.

[Lupini]

While you are able to stealth past a lot of stuff, remember that skills cost coin. It won't mean a darn thing that you didn't have to fight anyone to finish that quest if you can't purchase that next really good skill.

[ANewMachine]

While you are able to stealth past a lot of stuff, remember that skills cost coin. It won't mean a darn thing that you didn't have to fight anyone to finish that quest if you can't purchase that next really good skill.

That and a lot of the progression presumes that you actually kill people on the way to things. It took the Moria level adjustment to get my Burg un-stuck from around lvl 38, because I actually *ran out* of quests near my level, and needed to grind at least half a level just to get more to open up. I just refused... until I magically became lvl 40 or so, and was able to rework my leveling strategy.

[Amonceleb]

These are great, keep them coming please! I've rolled a few burgs in the past 3 years, but haven't gotten any of them past 30 yet. These tips are a goldmine! I've already subscribed to the thread. Looking forward to more!

[KrisXerxes]

If you didn't roll a Hobbit, you're doing it wrong!

Just to be clear since this is a "new player" thread, this is not true. Both races have good racials for Burg. Man gets a 2% sword bonus which makes swords a competitive option to daggers, a nice emergency heal once an hour, and a +20 will bonus. Hobbits get a ranged pull attack, an emergency feign death once an hour, and a +20 might bonus.

Ultimately, you should choose based on aesthetics. These racials are so minor that it's ultimately more important that you play a character you will enjoy looking at for hundreds of hours of gameplay.

[Smiling_Bandit]

Just to be clear since this is a "new player" thread, this is not true. Both races have good racials for Burg. Man gets a 2% sword bonus which makes swords a competitive option to daggers, a nice emergency heal once an hour, and a +20 will bonus. Hobbits get a ranged pull attack, an emergency feign death once an hour, and a +20 might bonus.

Ultimately, you should choose based on aesthetics. These racials are so minor that it's ultimately more important that you play a character you will enjoy looking at for hundreds of hours of gameplay.

Exactly, so if you didn't roll a hobbit you are doing it wrong! lol j/k (kind of)

Something to keep in mind is that almost ALL your skills do dmg and not terrible dmg either (well, terrible to the mobs maybe). Some are expensive power-wise if you are trying to use them as dps*. But, in a pinch and especially early on when you don't have your full on-response chain** sometimes you need a couple more hits to finish off the mob before the ugly baddie finishes you off.

Having said that, keep in mind that your skills work off of each other. So if you use a trick (even for dps*) be sure to use you Mischievous Glee or other trick-required-response skill before you move on or it runs out.

When you get a new skill, be sure to look at all the ways it works with all you other skills. You get a total of 4 tricks to use with 3 other skills. Maybe Enrage is the skill you want to use to make them switch agrro and then use Startling Twist to stun the mob, remove the Trick and give the new recipient of the aggro a chance to build more aggro on a stunned mob.

And when you get a new skill, use them as often as possible when they are up. You want to be in the habit of using all the skills you can with a burg. It is easy to specialize or ignore skills when they start to be used less, which is a shame, because all the burg skills are usable in many different scenarios.

Burgs have the most different ways to help a group, they are the play makers. When a burg tells a mob to turn around and ignore them as they take a shiny out of their pockets, they do. When the Burg tells them to stop fighting and ponder the meaning of life, they do and when a burg tells a mob to bleed out, they certainly do.

Since it is for new burgs and plausibly new players with new burgs...
*DPS - Damage Per Second
**on-response chain - Skills that are only available in response to another skill or event taking place.

SB

[Keene]

Exploit Opening is not just for starting FMs. When playing solo it is also a useful stun to let you get behind your target for a couple seconds.

You reminded me of something! Exploit opening should be a "If I absolutely need a cj" move. Normally, your exposed throat should serve as trash mob cjs and random ones. Trip is if something goes wrong: HIPS then trip. This was probably already said, sorry.

[Amonceleb]

You reminded me of something! Exploit opening should be a "If I absolutely need a cj" move. Normally, your exposed throat should serve as trash mob cjs and random ones. Trip is if something goes wrong: HIPS then trip. This was probably already said, sorry.

Good tips! I just picked up Trip last night (DING 28! ), and should have Hide in Plain Sight at 30. As my "main" is a LM, I like the subtlety and complexity of the class. There's so many options, and learning to use them to their peak effectiveness makes the class quite attractive.

[cicdle]

Good tips! I just picked up Trip last night (DING 28! ), and should have Hide in Plain Sight at 30. As my "main" is a LM, I like the subtlety and complexity of the class. There's so many options, and learning to use them to their peak effectiveness makes the class quite attractive.

What is also interesting is there is not a set way to build and play for a burg. We have a lot of great players on this forum and most them build differently and remain equally effective at what they want to do. Even in raids we can argue for pages and pages about the merits of each of the trait lines.

[scrubmonkey]

Even from the earliest levels, you can stack a from stealth Cunning Attack with regular Cunning Attack. This is immensely useful in your early teens since you have a "strike from stealth" deed, a "strike from stealth with a crit" deed, and a "use cunning attack" deed. Open with cunning attack from stealth, and with a crit you'll be advancing 3 deeds at once!

Get used to weaving Subtle Stab in between every other attack that you do (i.e. stealth opener > Subtle > Trick > Subtle > Cunning attack > Subtle > Suprise Strike > Subtle > Cunning > Subtle...). Even at 65 with much longer attack rotations, those rotations will still basically be built around Subtle Stab.

[SerowLOTRO]

Even from the earliest levels, you can stack a from stealth Cunning Attack with regular Cunning Attack. This is immensely useful in your early teens since you have a "strike from stealth" deed, a "strike from stealth with a crit" deed, and a "use cunning attack" deed. Open with cunning attack from stealth, and with a crit you'll be advancing 3 deeds at once!

Nice tip!

[Nefarym]

This game does not have collision physics enabled, so as someone previous mentioned if [trait]Exposed Throat[/trait] pops a stun walk directly through the mob to begin using your positional damage bonus.

Don't forget your extended tricks, like marbles, caltrops, and stun dust. I never see these utilized as much as they should.

If you can last until level 25 on your burg, you'll eventually make it to 65, just hang in there.

[LavenderFire]

Don't be disheartened at the earlier levels when playing a burg. Burgs definitely blossom the further you progress with them and as you obtain more of their skills. A skilled burg is nasty to deal with should you ever spar one and can more than hold their own during regular questing.

Get into the habit of learning your game mechanics/skills early. If you see a red/green circle underneath a mob, interrupt the skill induction with Addle (this will become really important later in the game!!). Use the terrain to help your stealth become more effective (hide behind buildings, rocks, trees etc. before stealth attacking or avoiding mobs; use diversion if they're facing your direction, etc.). Sometimes you can combine the two following points: if a ranged mob is doing a skill induction, hide behind a tree and out of LoS until the induction has passed. Sometimes you can coax them over to your position without having to rely on a traited Enrage which is available midway through the game.

Stuns and Mezzes are a burg's friend. We have such a wide variety of both so as the saying goes...use every trick in the book!! Stuns will come through skills/tools like Startling Twist, Stun Dust, Bag of Marbles, Exploit Opening, Trip. Mezzes will come through Riddle, Confound, TG Glee, Leafwalker Provoke in stealth (most effective in 5QK with IFA). Stuns will give you time to deal some extra positional damage, especially when soloing and mezzes will help keep other mobs off your back.

After Startling Twist, learn to obtain positional while re-applying a trick on them at the same time. Use the Q + D or A + E keys to circle behind a mob and it becomes easier to do so since you're still facing them.

And if all else fails...HIPS!! Or use other skills while making your escape like Touch and Go to evade attacks, and DiTE or caltrops to slow mobs. Be sure to plan your escape route ahead of time so you don't aggro more mobs in the process. To quote another saying..."he who lives and runs away, lives to fight another day."

[demonGAEBRIL]

A few tips that have made my Burglar feel really strong in the early going (I'm level 20).

1. Low level crit crafted weapons are amazingly strong. If you have a higher level character or a friend in a Kinship, have them make you a set. They don't require very rare materials because they are low level, but they make a big difference in your damage.

2. Don't save cooldowns. This is similar to what other people mentioned about HiPS. You can go a long way toward advancing your deeds by using Aim on cooldown for every stealth opener. Using defensive cooldowns more liberally will also speed up the leveling process by reducing downtime. You can also probably take on multi-enemy pulls more often than you think by simply rotating through cooldowns. Examples of 2 mob pulls:

-Open with Aim->Surprise Attack on one mob for (at low levels) an instant kill. You can use the crit response on the second mob for a quick kill.

-The next double pull, open on one enemy while Riddling the second.

-The next, use your stun opener on one enemy and finish him off. Just before you finish the second enemy, use Mischievous Glee to heal the damage you took from the un-CC'd enemy.

-For the next double pull, use the Evasion cooldown.

-By the time you've done 4 pulls the shorter cooldowns like Aim, Riddle, and MG will be available again!

3. I have also found that Distract is great for shortening the time you take getting into position while steathed. You'd be surprised how much time you save by using Distract to force the mobs to face away from you while you approach in stealth. Doing this also helps you get the class trait more painlessly.

[scrubmonkey]

How did the thread get to THREE PAGES without anyone covering the HiPS Pull!!!

For quest target mobs like the [kill named siggie] quests with a group around them:

-For humanoid mobs, figure out the range where they drop combat and stop following you.

-Pull the entire group

-Run Away

-Riddle your target before they drop aggro

-HiPS

-Hit your target before riddle wears off

-profit.


There's a lot of variation to this, like using startling twist instead of riddle for non-humanoids and just running out of range instead of using HiPS before you have the skill, but they're all the same...

No burg "how to" manual would be complete without this tip.

[ZhorgeLOTR]

Have to agree with this.


My burg was 65 for months before I got Leaf Walker. Made my moors buddies awfully frustrated at me because I couldn't keep up.

I always saved it for those rare occasions when "you absolutely need it", and as such never finished the deed until long after I needed it.

1. lol.

2. Congratulations, maybe you're not as hard-headed as me... I've spent most of my role-playing/gaming career (I started playing DnD in 1978) "saving" my top abilities (spells, lay on hands, etc.) for "when I had to have them." Consequently, I wouldn't use them or develop the techniques to use them effectively or just never used them.

Fortunately, this game rewards you for working those "must save" abilities so I'm managing to not repeat that mistake. But it's a toughie to not fall back into that self-defeating habit.

[Calitechnician]

How did the thread get to THREE PAGES without anyone covering the HiPS Pull!!!

For quest target mobs like the [kill named siggie] quests with a group around them:

-For humanoid mobs, figure out the range where they drop combat and stop following you.

-Pull the entire group

-Run Away

-Riddle your target before they drop aggro

-HiPS

-Hit your target before riddle wears off

-profit.


There's a lot of variation to this, like using startling twist instead of riddle for non-humanoids and just running out of range instead of using HiPS before you have the skill, but they're all the same...

No burg "how to" manual would be complete without this tip.

Genius! :O
I think I've done this before, just never put two and two together I guess. Thx!

[IGolbezI]

Don't be afraid to sacrifice a little might/vit/agility for power or ICPR, might/agi don't provide much DPS/crits anymore.

[slack_n_hash]

Don't be afraid to sacrifice a little might/vit/agility for power or ICPR, might/agi don't provide much DPS/crits anymore.

Burgs are really easy to stat balance, because our skills don't depend on them, other than damage output. That applies to grouping skills and stealth.

That means we just stabilise survival first, then go mad on damage. Assuming a non-kamikaze strategy, here's my tip for stat focus:

1. First, if you die too often, increase morale/vit. Only add enough to stop dying.
2. Once you can live to the end of the fight, if you run out of power against 1-2 mobs, increase power/will. Only add enough so you almost run out. (Regen is for long fights only).
3. Then increase might to do more damage and finish the fight faster. This may allow reduction in power and/or morale.
4. Finally, increase agility to crit more often. Crits are rare at low levels and crit response skills come late.

Most likely, you'll pick up Agility anyway as you build Vitality and Might, so there is no need to focus on it.


If you're in a group, not dying is usually more important than maximising dps, unless you're always the last one alive. Equally, we shouldn't be needing extra healing/power as we're not tanks or main dps.


Another tip for new players that may have been stated already, but applies to all classes: don't save consumables - you'll out-grow them really fast.

[Feoktist]

For solo:
1. Always keep reveal weakness on one mob and a trick on every target.
2. Properly equipped Burg can always solo same level elite. Practice this often to feel the difference each new skill makes. Each skill is useful.
3. Always use your stuns and positional damage (startling twist, exploit opening, riddle if traited, stunning dust, bag of marbles, provoke if full quiet knife + leafwalker-spec'ed).
For groups:
1. Always keep reveal weakness on the assist target and a trick on every target.
2. Be ready to pop on a boss / mob if the things go south. Fellowship maneuvers can make a difference between wipe and victory.
3. Spec according to the group makeup – experiment with class traits a lot. You can output single-target dps as good as a champ, debuff / cc almost as good as a loremaster, or develop your unique playstyle.

[ShotgunStalker]

This thread really inspires me! I think im going to try to get my Man Burglar to level 65!

[Amonceleb]

After taking most of the Summer off, I dusted off my mid-level burg and started playing it again. As it turns out, skirmishes almost seem designed to help a burg develop strategies!

I invested in a Protector soldier; I didn't need high damage, but I needed a soldier that could take a few hits while keeping everyone's attention. If they're hitting him, their backs are to me. Are you seeing where I'm heading with this?

Not only do you earn decent XP (and eventually IXP) and coin, but you get to try out various techniques in a reasonably controlled environment, particularly with the offensive skirmishes. There are no re-spawns, and you usually have plenty of room to run and kite (if that becomes necessary, and that's not all that often unless you're waiting for a cooldown to expire.) Working through your rotations and engaging multiple targets becomes second nature while running skirmishes.

I typically run in Mischief mode, as it's really tough trying to sneak up on stuff with an eager but dumb-as-a-box-of-rocks solider unerringly following your stealthed self. It's doable stealthed, but takes a bit more time and set-up.

Good gear is critical! I don't necessarily mean you have to invest in every single level upgrade to armor and weapons when it becomes available, but I do typically make crit-crafted (not one-of's...yet) that will last me at least 5-6 levels before I need to think about upgrading again. This is a good rule of thumb for any class, but I've found it particularly true with burgs. I've had the chance to group with same level burgs who had "standard issue" (or in some rare cases, sub-par) gear, and your ability to take and dish-out significantly more damage with high quality gear is markedly apparent when compared side-by-side like this. I'm not a min-maxer by any means, but state-of-the-art equipment will allow you to not just survive but thrive where others fear to tread.

Use your tricks often! Not only do they debuff (and in some cases, radically debuff) your target, some of the juiciest burg abilities are chained off tricks, including your self-heal, a very substantial stun, and my personal favorite, "Clever Retort", which is sort of like a random, one-man Fellowship Maneuver. You never quite know what you're going to get with CR, but it's always good!

My burg is now in the mid-30's and I've really "turned the corner" with the toon. Every new skill is a tool in an ever-expanding arsenal, and learning how each tool interacts and can be used to fullest benefit is a reward all in itself!

[Daredent]

nice thread. I will be checking here regularly until I get my feet wet enough to give some tips myself

[BaruDwarf]

This should be required reading for anyone who wants to properly fulfill their role in a group:
http://lorebook.lotro.com/wiki/A_Bas...or_Fellowships