A brief guide to charm groups in Torden, the Bastion of Thunder.

65 Mages can get the spell "Call of the Arch Mage" which allows the caster to make elementals his pet. An essential compantion spell is "Elemental Silence" which is a 30 second elemental mez. The pet spell can last from seconds to more than 20 minutes; its duration is aided by lowering the el's magic resistance (Malosina) and raising the caster's Charisma.

The level 63 (plus or minus) elemantals in BoT -- the jord kjal (not his weaker cousin lesser jord kjal, which can be DCed, and has much lower DPS) from the earth quadrant is an example -- are absolute high speed DPS mills when petted, particularly when equipped with two mage-summoned kedge blades. These mobs are big and fast and WILL kill the mage once the Call wears off, so Snare is a requirement.

Based on the foregoing and significant experience doing this type of group, here's the basic plan.

You need: mage, snarer (I prefer ranger), tank (the elemantal is tought, but not tough enough to tank unless your healer concentrates on him), healer, puller and a DPS (optional) or chanter (my preference, to maintain buffs, particularly the CHA buff; interestingly, I use MUCH less mana than in a conventional group where I have to be nuking all the time, but I like VOQ on anyway as the boost to INT helps the charm length). It is possible to combine the snare/pull postions, but, as this group drops giants so fast that chain pulling is in order, I prefer that the snarer have NOTHING to do except keep his eyes on the pet and fingers on the snare buitton.

Procedure: snarer snare pulls an el, hopefully a single. Mage malos and mezzes. (At this point I switch equipment to max my CHA.) Mage casts Call, arms pet with pre-summoned gear. Do NOT have anyone slow the el, wrecks his DPS. Puller pulls a mob; by this time the mez has worn off and mage attacks with pet, who quads for 471. He looks like a combine harvesting grain, he drops giants so fast. The mage MUST keep his distance as the el immediately aggros him once the charm breaks. That is why the snarer must keep the el targetted (not healing the group or adding his DPS). He has to recast snare and kite the el until the mage can recast Call. I also keep the el mez spell, which takes precious fewer seconds to cast than Call, loaded so I can re-mez if the snarer is daydreaming. Also, if snare drops while charm is in place, and it will, sometimes, the mage can, from a safe diatance, invis to break the charm to allow the snare to be recast. Ditto for when malo goes down.

These groups do AT LEAST twice the DPS of any non-charm group I've seen in BoT. If done properly, you can rock along indefinitely. If not done right, you get your mage killed and a lot of general wipes. All in all, an excellent XP grinding approach for a disciplined group.