dteowner
Shoegazer
Perhaps this is where I'm screwing up. We don't generally do any kiting (trying to pull a couple at a time), so that leaves "Charge!" as the only real option. My approach at that point is to run forward, try to "chip" a few melee critters on the way thru the mob to get their attention so they follow me, and head for the enemy casters/bosses in the rear. Kill those uglys and then start working back toward the rest of the party in mop-up mode. The theory is that any stray melee critters can be dealt with by the squishies or they can chip in with area effect stuff depending on how well I attract the attention. I'm assuming, probably due to my solo orientation, that a couple axe hits (with great cleave, I can scratch lots of them at once) is sufficient to keep the mob more interested in killing me than running after the squishies. Maybe that's just not the case.I think it's best to take out the support enemies before going after the boss. The boss can usually stand for quite awhile and that means the support monsters can do a lot of damage. The exception is when the boss is a caster. Then he MUST be taken down asap. When I analyze the battlefield I target the enemy casters first, then the enemy healers, then the enemy melee characters unless some characters have special abilities that can wipe a party (like earth elemental grab). So my paladin usually bypasses the enemy melee characters to get to the casters. When they're down the battle is much easier. Sometimes you need to take out the enemy healers first because you're unable to take out the casters fast enough. That happens sometimes on elite when they have more hitpoints.
If the critters couldn't care less about the crazed loon slicing thru their midst, then I'm effectively leaving the squishies largely undefended with this approach.