I've been playing without the traits which give Cracked Earth its root effect at the expense of 50% damage. I know that Insult to Injury from a Cracked Earth cast is more important than the Cracked Earth damage itself but I still end up using it when I can't generate the Insult to Injury buff for the bonus damage. I miss the root, still used to it from years of Lore-master play pre-u41; just can't stomach that 50% damage penalty. Of course it doesn't matter at all for pure raid support, but it matters everywhere else. Do you have your pets set to Assist, or do you command them to attack one target and leave Assist mode off so you can gather others while the pet stays put on its chosen target?
@@JohnMHammer I use Assist mode, maybe only because I'm used to having it. If I need all the aggro on me, I can just use the Spirit, or I can run to my pet if it has aggro so I can maximize my AoEs. Having to command the pet to attack every time would get tiresome, I feel. I seldom used Cracked Earth pre-U41 because of the root auto-stopping pets from attacking, and I used to just do small fights instead of large pulls so the AoE - which wasn't that strong anyway - wasn't worth it. But with the new Insult To Injury, I'm enjoying doing AoEs more. The AoE root is also helpful for keeping melee mobs away from me when I need it, which is a situation that rarely arose back when I fought more single-target.
I've been playing without the traits which give Cracked Earth its root effect at the expense of 50% damage. I know that Insult to Injury from a Cracked Earth cast is more important than the Cracked Earth damage itself but I still end up using it when I can't generate the Insult to Injury buff for the bonus damage. I miss the root, still used to it from years of Lore-master play pre-u41; just can't stomach that 50% damage penalty. Of course it doesn't matter at all for pure raid support, but it matters everywhere else.
Do you have your pets set to Assist, or do you command them to attack one target and leave Assist mode off so you can gather others while the pet stays put on its chosen target?
@@JohnMHammer I use Assist mode, maybe only because I'm used to having it. If I need all the aggro on me, I can just use the Spirit, or I can run to my pet if it has aggro so I can maximize my AoEs. Having to command the pet to attack every time would get tiresome, I feel.
I seldom used Cracked Earth pre-U41 because of the root auto-stopping pets from attacking, and I used to just do small fights instead of large pulls so the AoE - which wasn't that strong anyway - wasn't worth it. But with the new Insult To Injury, I'm enjoying doing AoEs more. The AoE root is also helpful for keeping melee mobs away from me when I need it, which is a situation that rarely arose back when I fought more single-target.