Original content created by community member: Mosby

Summary of tips from the beta forums, and other posts:

General

1. Official Lorebook Entry for Captains
2. Captains are a true hybrid class. We can pull, heal (both morale and power), buff, rez, tank, and taunt, although we do none of these as well as the specialized classes.
3. Many of our abilities can only be triggered when a mob dies. We can heal the whole fellowship a bit, stun the remaining mobs, or increase attack rates.

Heralds and Banners

1. Heralds give AoE buffs to might/agility, max morale & in-combat morale regen, or max power & in-combat power regen.
   1. Herald of War increases your might/agility. A trait can increase the amount.
   2. Herald of Hope increases your max morale and in-combat morale regeneration. A trait can increase the amount, and cause the herald/banner to cast +1 hope on the fellowship. (It doesn't stack with other hope-buffing effects, except for the ones you spend Destiny to gain.)
   3. Herald of Victory increases max power and in-combat power regeneration. A trait can increase the amount.
2. Our heralds are not nearly as hardy as the lore-master's bears, but their buffs can make an impact. We cannot summon our heralds if we are in combat.
3. Banners are an alternative to heralds; they provide the same buff to you as a herald of the same level as the minimum equip level of the banner (for those in range).
4. Banners can be placed in-combat, but we cannot have both a banner and a herald active. If our herald dies, we CAN swap to a banner in combat but it takes a few seconds.

Buffs

1. In addition to our heralds or banners, Captains can provide some very nice individual buffs (called tactics), which last for 30 minutes.
   1. Increased chance to Parry (level 6)
   2. Increased chance to Crit (level 28)
   3. Increased Power Regeneration (level 38)
2. You can only have 1 captains tactic on you at a time.
3. We have a fellowship-wide 30-minute buff that increases morale that we recieve at level 16.
4. Our level 45 Legendary buff, In Defense of Middle Earth (IDoME) adds 50 to every one of our fellowship's main stats.
   
   1. However, it can only be cast while standing still. If you are out of range when the Captain stops to cast it, you'll have to wait for reset before you can get the buff.
5. Unlike the herald/banner effects, we have to cast the buffs on each person, they don't affect the whole fellowship. Group leaders should stop and give your captain a moment to make sure everyone is buffed before starting the boss fight.
6. If some stranger buffs you when you ride by, it's a captain. You're welcome.

Marks

In addition to buff effects placed on the players, captains can provide additional group buffs by placing "marks" on targets. There are three marks available. Although each captain may only place one mark at a time, the marks from different captains may be placed on the same target (they stack). The effect of the mark will be returned to anyone hitting the marked target, whether they are in your fellowship, raid, or just a passerby.

1. Telling Mark (level 6): increases the amount of damage done to the marked target.
2. Noble Mark (level 12): increases threat over time and reduces other attacker's perceived threat.
   
3. Revealing Mark (level 30): Returns a percentage of the damage done to a marked target back to the player doing the damage.

Healing

1. We have a group heal that is an enemy defeat response (with a 45s cool-down) that will do a fair group heal with a morale over time buff. With slotted trait it will also restore some power.
2. We have a heal for individuals, but it is mostly morale over time, so don't expect us to keep you alive with multiple mobs or heavy hitters on you.
3. One of the captain's marks (which go on the target, see section above) provides a buff to return morale, so that anyone hitting it will gain some morale.
4. We have a healing melee skill for our selected shield-brother. This is also mostly a heal over time, but works well for helping cut down on the amount of attention that the healer needs to place on the tank.
5. Captains have no self heal unless the herald is up. The herald gives a captain a small heal-over-time with a 90-second cooldown. If your captain is taking a lot of damage, they need to be healed by someone else.

Shield-Brother/Sword-Brother/Song-Brother

A captain can place a 'brother' buff on a fellowship member (including pets) to give a variety of effects and enable some additional skills.  If we use trait for Fellowship Brother (Legendary), then the remained of the group will gain a lesser benefit as well.

Buffs:

• Shield-Brother gives a bonus to ICMR and Crit Defense (Level 64+)
• Blade-Brother gives a bunus to ICMR and Crit Chance. (Gains bonus from Master of War Capstone)
• Song-Brother gives a bonus to ICPR and a reduction to threat generation. (Gains bonus from Hands of Healing Capstone)

When we have a designated brother, several skills are enabled.

• Inspire: Melee attack that gives the brother morale or power (over time).
• To Arms: Increases defence, damage, or healing depending on the type of brother.
• Strength of Will: Increases Incoming Healing, Attack duration, or Outgoing healing.

Summon

1. At level 40, we can summon one person at a time to our side, at a cost (to the person being summoned) of 5 traveling rations.
2. We cannot summon into or out of instanced areas (housing areas, instanced battles, etc.)
3. We cannot summon if either we or the person we are summoning are in combat.
4. We cannot summon non-VIP subscribers to the Moors (as of update 6.1).
5. Summons have long inductions for the summonee and can be interrupted by combat or if the summonee moves, so be sure you are in a safe place before asking for a summon.
6. Often when a group is waiting for a captain to go back to the beginning of the instance to summon a new fellow, the rest of the group takes a break - group leaders, please remember to give the captain a moment for a break when he/she returns.

Miscellaneous

1. We can rez one person every 30 minutes (even in combat) with Escape from Darkness (level 20).
2. Cry of Vengeance (level 32) is a reactive, AOE rez, that is only available when a fellow is defeated. However, it has restrictions on its use:
   1. we only have 6 seconds after a fellow/raid member is defeated to use it
   2. we must be within 10 meters of the character you want to rez
   3. if multiple fellows have fallen in the AOE range, we cannot pick/target who will get rez'd by the skill
   4. it has a 30 minute cool-down
   5. The number of fellows revived by Cry of Vengeance may be increased to 2 players, if the captain equips the legendary trait "Defy Corruption." However, the other conditions must still be met, which means players need to both be in the AOE range.
3. We can cure fear, and increase resistance to it.
4. We can prevent a wipe, using a combination of skills (In Harms Way, Last Stand, Strength of Morale [Strength of Morale is a +2200-+3000 heal available to all Man characters]).
5. Tanking, with taunts. Using 2h halberd provides nice dps and generates additional threat/taunt, but we do not have a tank's ability to take agro from others who are hitting harder.
6. Crowd control via Shout which stuns all mobs for 3 seconds with a traited skill.

Power

All of our healing and support skills (shield brother, rez, last stand/in harm's way and also placing banners) have high power costs. If we are being depended upon to use these skills heavily for a long period of time, power may become an issue. LMs, please shoot us some power when you can, and group leaders, work with us to create a strategy that minimizes power wastage.