Righteousness is one big **** . Saying that removing it would make certain someone too strong is really not convincing. Come on, everybody knows clerics in pvp are the most crippled class, and giving them 40% healing back wont change it much. I really have no idea what were devs thinking (because if they wanted ppl buy more healing pots, why do they introduced lillend? Clerics used less pots only till 16 lvl - after that you can take healing companion, what most ppl do).
Regen is garbage vs. raw damage mitigation when you can heal yourself to full in seconds, you merely have to live long enough for enemies to be killed.
So um. I don't know what you're smoking if you think a DC can heal himself back to full in "seconds". I can blow three encounter heals all with divinity and not get that. HW, BoH, Sunburst. You can't heal yourself 20k with it. Maybe if you got three crits with Perfect Vorpal or something. I don't even think we could heal 20k "in seconds" without Righteousness.
The only way I could see that is if you have a lot of Life Steal and hit a few targets back-to-back with Divine Glow, Daunting Light, and Divine Searing Light. With some luck on crits, you might heal yourself for 20k with two encounters, but man you'd be lucky. Of course anyone can get Life Steal, that has nothing to do with the DC.
I also don't know how we are supposed live long enough for enemies to be killed. Are were back to the old "we're just punching bags" routine? We have to play the game of being utterly useless except as bait, while our teammates kill our attackers?
@ asynchritus: for 51% you need ~3250 this requires enchants. Also there is a defense slot necklace that is class specific fyi.
Yeah, so 3250 Defense gives +33.2% Damage Resist. T2 DC armor adds another +6%. So that's 38.2%. Where is the other 12.8% coming from? Foresight isn't shown on the character sheet, but even feated, it only adds +11%. So I'm not sure where you're getting your numbers. It seems like you're just making this up out of thin air. I mean, I like to think I'm one of the best DC theorycrafters on the forums here at the moment.
I honestly feel like the only way your story is true is if your DC was using the DC dodge invulnerability bug that was only fixed with the last patch. Were they glowing yellow when they did this 30 second tanking vs. 3 player opponents? Because that's the only way I can see a DC being able to do it, both from experience and on paper. We don't have the defense, heals, or CC to be able to do that.
I'm just telling you righteousness isn't going anywhere for pvp at least, just so you know.
I feel like that's everyone else's loss as much or more than the DC's. Because I quit doing PvP, and I am hearing that many others have as well. It also makes those of us who DO decide to PvP slot powers that aren't heals, since they do so little to help us. Or we gear up defensively and end up having really weak heals. I used to try to heal some, but burst damage is several times higher than our healing capacity, so it's pointless. Any heals I give anyone in PvP are incidental. Repurpose Soul, Astral Seal (which I need to keep procs up), and maybe Sunburst or something. Occasionally I'll beam-heal myself, and if someone is nearby I'll hit them with it because crits proc Repurpose Soul on me to make it more effective. But that's about it.
Not that heals really make much of a difference. Buffing and debuffing is far more effective in PvP. My normal rotation debuffs an opponent's damage resist by 70%, and buffs your damage and defense by 30%. Honestly, that's way better than any healing I could provide.
"Because in early testing, clerics weren't using as many potions as the other classes", is essentially what it boils down to.
The fact that as a consequence, DCs usually chug far more pots than everyone else is....apparently irrelevant.
I personally call BS on that explanation, just leveled a CW, and I can count the amount of potions I used from level 1-60 on my left hand. The cleric companion heals more than sufficiently during the whole leveling process.
The fact a critting divine Healing word from a 13k GS DC with greater vorpal barely gives him back 100% of HP is apparently not relevant, when the party's TR will end up with 100% HP before HV is even of it's 3s CD. Yes, this is actually the situation at the moment.
@ whistlin: If you stand in AS, sunburst + healing word I heal 50%+ in a couple seconds with 9.1k GS. Add in P. vorpal 1k+ power 1k+ crit and that's easily 85%+ not to mention you're more survivable in the first place. + all of the righteous path survivability.
I put in rounded numbers b/c said cleric doesn't like spreading his build around. As these forums prove not too many people know the best PvP build for cleric and he wants to keep it that way sadly =/ He has 50. something % damage reduction, it's over .5 I believe so I put 51. He is simply not killable solo, and very hard with 2, 3+ CC chain would be the only way. When his soulforged goes off he's at ~20% and by the time it ends he and everyone around him has 100% HP, extra temp HP, and standing in AS, it's already ridiculous and so annoying to play against, even he says all the time that without Righteousness he would be completely unstoppable and so very OP.
That is all I'm going to say as everyone only looks at their own cleric and says nuh-uh I'm not OP w/o righteousness. If you want to play against an unkillable cleric just PM me on the forums, I am on beholder server.
Guild Master of <Enemy Team>
We are definitely dominating, and we are always about to win.
Not to diminish your friend's "secret" build (there are so many <font color="orange">HAMSTER</font> feats in DC trees that there aren't that many awesome combinations to choose from...), but what you describe is normal for highly geared DCs with support focus. Chain CC or huge burst damage are the only ways to quickly and reliably down a good DC.
Removing Righteousness probably wouldn't change that much except possibly to make it more difficult for rogues to use Shocking Execution as a finisher. It would certainly help the less-geared DCs survive a little better, though.
If Righteousness is also based on PVP then should the simplest solution be that of what World of Warcraft did with their pvp and give players abilities that can debuff healing? This can have effect of separating healing nerf from pvp and pve.
Not really, it is their way of forcing the DC to spend a lot more gold on potions.
I keep reading that, but it continues to make no sense. A lot of DCs were forced to hit the bottle frequently back when healing aggro was ridiculously out of whack, but it's hardly necessary now. Besides, gold is not difficult to come by if you actually need to buy potions.
In short, if potion use was ever the reason behind Righteousness, it was and is a stupid reason.
@ whistlin: If you stand in AS, sunburst + healing word I heal 50%+ in a couple seconds with 9.1k GS. Add in P. vorpal 1k+ power 1k+ crit and that's easily 85%+ not to mention you're more survivable in the first place. + all of the righteous path survivability.
I put in rounded numbers b/c said cleric doesn't like spreading his build around. As these forums prove not too many people know the best PvP build for cleric and he wants to keep it that way sadly =/ He has 50. something % damage reduction, it's over .5 I believe so I put 51. He is simply not killable solo, and very hard with 2, 3+ CC chain would be the only way. When his soulforged goes off he's at ~20% and by the time it ends he and everyone around him has 100% HP, extra temp HP, and standing in AS, it's already ridiculous and so annoying to play against, even he says all the time that without Righteousness he would be completely unstoppable and so very OP.
That is all I'm going to say as everyone only looks at their own cleric and says nuh-uh I'm not OP w/o righteousness. If you want to play against an unkillable cleric just PM me on the forums, I am on beholder server.
See that's the thing; the majority of players don't have that high of GS or those enchantments, either because they're still leveling or still working for that gear, so in the meantime righteousness hurts pretty bad for most of the rest of us. For you it's great and needs no changing, and I totally get that, but everyone is countering your argument because we're coming from a completely different standpoint on it.
I'm starting to think all balance problems can be traced back to the rare gear and super-rare enchantments / enhancements. There's not necessarily anything inherently wrong with them, but balancing might work better if we were actually comparing equal DCs -- e.g. two level 50 DCs both in blues / greens -- instead of comparing (e.g.) a level 60 DC in mixed T1 purple/blue/green gear no enchants and a 7.5 k GS (my DC) to a level 60 DC with vorpal / soulforged / etc. and a 9.1k GS. Of course nerfs are going to hurt disproportionately when you use the maxed-level top-geared top-performing characters to decide how to "balance" the whole entire class.
See that's the thing; the majority of players don't have that high of GS or those enchantments
Don't listen to him. He's making it up. There are no secret magic enchantments in the game. Everything you can get is on the wiki or you can look at it on the auction house. The diminishing returns on combat rating absolutely do not allow for the kind of claims he's making. As I explained in an earlier post, a DC can't get 50% Damage Resist. It's just not possible. A DC can't heal himself back to full, or even halfway, in "a few seconds". I know what a "geared up" DC plays like: I have one sitting at 13k, millions of AD, epic enchants, Lv25 stone, ancient weapon set, Miracle Healer, Grand Templar, Prophet Champion, High Prophet, Low Prophet, Middle Prophet -- everything. You name and I've probably got it. Mainly for the purpose sitting in Trade of Blades wailing on the dummies or at Mt. Hotenow letting Ashen Miners and Flamespikers wail away on me so I can have emperical evidence of what this stuff actually does. Combat logs, spreadsheet calculations, lists of what procs, what doesn't proc, what is and isn't broken how much DPS one power does over nothing, sitting with a stopwatch, counting AP generation, divinity generation... believe me, if there was some magic build, I would know about it. Heck, I am almost positive I've done more combat testing on the DC than the people at Cryptic. Heh.
Do you know what the difference in all Rank 6 Azure enchants and all Rank 9 Azure enchants is? I'll tell you: about 4%. That's it. That's how much extra Damage Resistance you get from having the top enchants. That 4% damage mitigation allows his cleric friend in his guild to tank 3 players at once in PvP while the rest of it just get tore down in a few hits, while CC'd the entire time? Absolutely not. If you believe his claims, I got a bridge to sell you.
The ONLY way a DC could do what he's claiming is through exploits.
There is no such thing a "secret build". The system is finite. There are only so many permutations. If you add one thing you have to subtract another. This idea that people who spend 15 mil AD on their gear have some remarkable advantage. Well, they don't. At best they have an edge. Some of the weapon enchants are potent if you get up to a Greater or Perfect. None of them are game-breaking. People talk about tenebrous enchants, but even if you have SIX greater Tenebrous with 25k HP, that's only 4.5k damage. Minus your Damage Resistance. Woo. And to get those, they have to give up ANY other offensive enchants. Armor Pen, Crit, Power -- nope, it's all for a Tenebrous proc once every 10 seconds.
If these people could do what they were claiming, it would be on YouTube. Until somebody is going to pony up some evidence (videos, builds, combat logs, screenshots, etc) and not just make wild, vague claims about some DC in their guild, then they're just blowing smoke. Please don't validate their fantasies like this. It only encourages them, and stifles the legitimate disadvantages the DC has versus the other classes.
I keep reading that, but it continues to make no sense. A lot of DCs were forced to hit the bottle frequently back when healing aggro was ridiculously out of whack, but it's hardly necessary now. Besides, gold is not difficult to come by if you actually need to buy potions.
In short, if potion use was ever the reason behind Righteousness, it was and is a stupid reason.
Wrong reason. Righteousness exists because without it, DCs would play in god mode all the time. And this class feature makes tanks useful.
Wrong reason. Righteousness exists because without it, DCs would play in god mode all the time.
Then, explain why we use a tank and not a second DC.. 1 DC without Righteousness would give 100% selfheal, 2 with can still heal both for 1.6x that amount...
Then, explain why we use a tank and not a second DC.. 1 DC without Righteousness would give 100% selfheal, 2 with can still heal both for 1.6x that amount...
I've been in parties that use two DCs when there's no tank handy. I take the dps / support role while the other strictly heals. It works but often not as well because DC defense is lol compared to the GF's.
I've been in parties that use two DCs when there's no tank handy. I take the dps / support role while the other strictly heals. It works but often not as well because DC defense is lol compared to the GF's.
Fair point, tho haven't done a duo-healer run myself after AS fix (somewhere around 10.5.k+ GS another TR or CW is better imo.) except for a gimmick run or two..
My point was simply that a DC without Righteousness wouldn't be even close to unkillable, especially since most build them as glasscannons. Which kind of makes sense since the threat fix.
And said threatfix makes the DC as valid a tank as your stone, it can't get any aggro? Well, ever tried peeling adds off your 12.5k GS TR who wants to hit the pits in SP alone? I can promise you that if he don't stealth, you won't be able to override the threat he generates by just being close to the enemies, not to mention from hitting the pit..
No the DC is far from a valid tank, the shared threat from your heals and low DPS is more than suffice to ensure that...
The CW on the other hand.. They have CC, means to maintain threat (mainly through dmg), a skill that gives them DR.. No, if any class threatens the tanks usefulness, it's the CW, not DC..
Oh yeah, my point was just that you can substitute an extra DC for a tank in some situations, but it doesn't work as well -- and still they're not unkillable, because then you've got two squishy DCs to watch out for, and you only get so many encounters to spam between the two of you for group heals, plus you sacrifice damage relative to what you'd get if you were a GF instead of a DC. I don't think the DC is an equally viable alternative for the tank.
My CW does draw a ton of aggro, but her ping-ponging of enemies and three dodges make up for it whereas my DC hasn't got much going for her in comparison. I think the problem with CWs, though, isn't so much that they're overpowered as that everyone else is underpowered, some to higher degrees than others.
The diminishing returns on combat rating absolutely do not allow for the kind of claims he's making. As I explained in an earlier post, a DC can't get 50% Damage Resist. It's just not possible. A DC can't heal himself back to full, or even halfway, in "a few seconds".
Lol do you have R9-10 azures in defense slots? Do you have P. vorpal and P. soulforged? Are you even specced full heroic and paragon survivability? How about 19 constitution?
If you are on beholder I will show you first hand, if you're on another server I will try and get a video to post. Yes cleric all by himself can only tank 3 players and not damage, but with even 1-2 people to support you can steamroll 3-4 opponents easily.
No one spends that much time and effort on cleric, that's why it isn't all over the internet lol. He is easily best DC on server, probably on most servers...
I will share my survivability build on DC thread since so many hate DC in PvP, I know it is quite close to if not the same one he uses.
Guild Master of <Enemy Team>
We are definitely dominating, and we are always about to win.
First of all, I know this question isn't directed to me, but I'm curious over the build, and quite interested in theory crafting, so I'll answer it anyway, I hope you and whistlingdixie can forgive me.
Rank 6 to 10 Azure is an increase of ~5% effective HP (given 3 enchantments are used, for 5 enchantments it's about 6.7%), if you don't trust me, do the math yourself:
Effective HP= (BaseHP)/(1-total DR) where DR from AC is 6% and from armor it's DR = 49.99*(totalArmor)/(1643.6+totalArmor)
Notice that T2 armor and purple pants gives 1044 armor w/o any enchants.
So I doubt the usage of rank 10 instead of my rank 8 would make it differ that much, the rank 8's which I found a lot more cost effective, after all, I payed 1/16th the price for over 96% of the effect.
Do you have P. vorpal and P. soulforged?
No, I run Greater Vorpal and lesser soulforged, this might be the make or break point in why the tanking is possible, not the Vorpal, the vorpal isn't that important in this but, to be fair, any form of build can do 5 seconds of tanking as long they are lucky enough to have the Soulforged proc, thanks again Cryptic for making this armor enchantment extremely unreliable, (tbh. I'm not sure if it has a procchance, it's bugged, or I lagg, but kind of offtopic..).
How about 19 constitution?
This could also be a major make or break, personally I only run 14 Con, since I'm a PvE based DC, and the DC tanking anything in PvE is not really needed anymore.
19 Con would be +18% HP, and with the feat it's another 9%, I'm not sure how these stack, and how they work with enchantments, as I don't have access to the game at the moment, I can't test it either, but if someone could I'd be ever grateful.
But, based on how other stats work it's probably something like TotalHP=BaseHP*(1+featBonus)*(1+ConBonus)
Based on this
I personally don't find it that impossible for a solo cleric to tank 3 players for about 8-10 seconds, given he has daily.
I posted the build in the temple. DC should be able to tank 3 players for 10-15 seconds easily, 30+ with daily with this build. Yes perfect soulforged is super expensive and pretty much doubles his alive time. With 6 seconds of taking 0 damage you can easily be back to full HP, have extra temp HP, and be standing in a new AS so enemy team has to start all over again killing you.
Anyway I posted the build so you guys can check it out if you want. Again while I am fully specced for PvP I still have no problem running T2's, haven't tried CN as I don't even have the GS to enter yet haha.
Guild Master of <Enemy Team>
We are definitely dominating, and we are always about to win.
Lol do you have R9-10 azures in defense slots? Do you have P. vorpal and P. soulforged? Are you even specced full heroic and paragon survivability? How about 19 constitution?
I just looked up how difficult it is to get just one of the enchants you mention.
Do I seriously need to repeat what I just said about the fallacy of comparing wildly unequal DCs to determine how to balance the entire class?
I just looked up how difficult it is to get just one of the enchants you mention.
Do I seriously need to repeat what I just said about the fallacy of comparing wildly unequal DCs to determine how to balance the entire class?
As a moderately unequal DC, I agree. I truly believe that the majority of other players are not running around with Greater/Perfect enchants, much less complete T2 set bonuses or CN weapon sets. You tend to see the same people in PvP frequently, and they are not representative of the majority.
A good build and some skill does make a huge difference, as with any class, but a DC almost requires a combination of skill and high-quality gear to perform its class function arguably as intended. Aside from Astral Shield, there aren't a lot of near-no-brainer skills that "just work." To be very blunt, without good gear your heals suck, you die easily, and your damage drops from moderate to LOL.
Comparing the experience of geared DCs to the rest is definitely an apples vs. oranges situation. It should say something that the class needs BiS just to exemplify what is supposed to be its essential function.
The change from rank 6 to 10 is neglectable when it comes to justify Righteousness tho.
Um a R6 is 150 defense while a R10 is 300, how is double the effectiveness neglectable lol? You can have 6 defense slots thats 900 more defense, far from neglectable. Not to mention with R10's you could have less defense and slot a couple radiants for HP.
I realize that the difference is vast between geared and non geared DC's. You should check out the survivable PvP build I posted in the Temple, even with only R6 enchants and lesser vorpal/soulforged you will be amazingly more tanky and very strong in PvP.
Guild Master of <Enemy Team>
We are definitely dominating, and we are always about to win.
As a moderately unequal DC, I agree. I truly believe that the majority of other players are not running around with Greater/Perfect enchants, much less complete T2 set bonuses or CN weapon sets. You tend to see the same people in PvP frequently, and they are not representative of the majority.
A good build and some skill does make a huge difference, as with any class, but a DC almost requires a combination of skill and high-quality gear to perform its class function arguably as intended. Aside from Astral Shield, there aren't a lot of near-no-brainer skills that "just work." To be very blunt, without good gear your heals suck, you die easily, and your damage drops from moderate to LOL.
Comparing the experience of geared DCs to the rest is definitely an apples vs. oranges situation. It should say something that the class needs BiS just to exemplify what is supposed to be its essential function.
I am not comparing geared to ungeared though, the build I linked is the build of best PvP cleric on server. However my build (same feats/powers etc) currently only has 9.2k GS b/c I'm still working on my T2. I have all blue armor and accessories, and the cheapest epic weapon/offhand I could buy. R5 enchants that I fused myself and no weapon or armor enchant, yet I still do extremely well in PvP. Why? B/c the build itself is extremely survivable. Throw in great gear and **** I can tank 3-4 players.
However Add in 40% boost to self heals and it's just too strong, I'm sorry that PvE geared and specced players can't see that. If you really want to see it, follow my build on the temple, get at least regular vorpal/soulforged and R7 enchants and tell me you aren't an absolutely unstoppable force in PvP. With even 1-2 decent pugs on your team you could probably win vs. a premade.
Guild Master of <Enemy Team>
We are definitely dominating, and we are always about to win.
Um a R6 is 150 defense while a R10 is 300, how is double the effectiveness neglectable lol? You can have 6 defense slots thats 900 more defense, far from neglectable. Not to mention with R10's you could have less defense and slot a couple radiants for HP.
I realize that the difference is vast between geared and non geared DC's. You should check out the survivable PvP build I posted in the Temple, even with only R6 enchants and lesser vorpal/soulforged you will be amazingly more tanky and very strong in PvP.
People seems to forget how extremely hard the diminishing returns hit, assuming 6 rank 10 instead of rank 6, you would have 7,41% more effective HP, of course, now I can see it all clearly, the 40% less selfheal is of course there for balancing the extreme differences.
Seriously now, this shows just how huge 40% is in this context.. It's almost 6 times more than the difference from 6 rank 6 to and 10 Azure ones..
I am not comparing geared to ungeared though, the build I linked is the build of best PvP cleric on server. However my build (same feats/powers etc) currently only has 9.2k GS b/c I'm still working on my T2. I have all blue armor and accessories, and the cheapest epic weapon/offhand I could buy. R5 enchants that I fused myself and no weapon or armor enchant, yet I still do extremely well in PvP. Why? B/c the build itself is extremely survivable. Throw in great gear and **** I can tank 3-4 players.
However Add in 40% boost to self heals and it's just too strong, I'm sorry that PvE geared and specced players can't see that. If you really want to see it, follow my build on the temple, get at least regular vorpal/soulforged and R7 enchants and tell me you aren't an absolutely unstoppable force in PvP. With even 1-2 decent pugs on your team you could probably win vs. a premade.
I use Perfect and Greater Enchants and mostly Rank 8s. Please don't make assumptions about my gear or experience in the game.
I actually wasn't directly addressing you, but commenting on the notion of comparing geared DCs to less geared DCs, which I stand by. I'm sure you do very well with what you have if you are a skilled player, but there is no way you are truly competitive with top PvPers if you aren't even using an armor or weapon enchant. The reason I don't talk about being able to tank most of an enemy team in PvP on DC is because I don't consider it much of an accomplishment when my enemy team appears to be in the 9k GS range and/or simply has no idea how to kill me.
I use Perfect and Greater Enchants and mostly Rank 8s. Please don't make assumptions about my gear or experience in the game.
I actually wasn't directly addressing you, but commenting on the notion of comparing geared DCs to less geared DCs, which I stand by. I'm sure you do very well with what you have if you are a skilled player, but there is no way you are truly competitive with top PvPers if you aren't even using an armor or weapon enchant. The reason I don't talk about being able to tank most of an enemy team in PvP on DC is because I don't consider it much of an accomplishment when my enemy team appears to be in the 9k GS range and/or simply has no idea how to kill me.
Correct, my 9.2k GS pretty much does all pugs, I would not expect my guild to bring him along vs another guild lol. But even in a pug at 9.2k I am generally average to below average as GS goes. There a few 8-9k people, once in a while some guy with like 6k lol, and then a lot of 10-12k people. So vs. those of equal gear score or even slightly higher I do very well. Imagine if I had better gear than my opponents with this same build...
Throw in +40% heals to self and I'm sorry but it's just too strong =(
Guild Master of <Enemy Team>
We are definitely dominating, and we are always about to win.
Correct, my 9.2k GS pretty much does all pugs, I would not expect my guild to bring him along vs another guild lol. But even in a pug at 9.2k I am generally average to below average as GS goes. There a few 8-9k people, once in a while some guy with like 6k lol, and then a lot of 10-12k people. So vs. those of equal gear score or even slightly higher I do very well. Imagine if I had better gear than my opponents with this same build...
Throw in +40% heals to self and I'm sorry but it's just too strong =(
It wouldn't be +40% self-healing, it would be +66% self-healing if Righteousness were removed.
If you have 6 rank 6 Azure enchants, and upgrade them all to Rank 10 Azure enchants, you are only going to get about 5% more Damage Resistance. It's not that big of a deal, and it's certainly not worth the millions of AD you'd have to spend on it.
You complain about your GS, but in actuality, that's a reasonable GS for a defense-based PvP build, since you're having to use blue items. There is no 12-13k GS gear you could wear that would be viable for a defense build. Glass cannon, yes. But not defense.
Having a Perfect Vorpal or Soulforged would help, but those don't add to your GS.
You have still never answered how you face multiple opponents at once without being CC-locked. Your healing capacity is mostly irrelevant since you'll be dazed/prone/stunned/etc. until you are dead.
But you're already un-killable. So who cares if you're more unkillable, right? The amount of self-healing is irrelevant for you.
Comments
So um. I don't know what you're smoking if you think a DC can heal himself back to full in "seconds". I can blow three encounter heals all with divinity and not get that. HW, BoH, Sunburst. You can't heal yourself 20k with it. Maybe if you got three crits with Perfect Vorpal or something. I don't even think we could heal 20k "in seconds" without Righteousness.
The only way I could see that is if you have a lot of Life Steal and hit a few targets back-to-back with Divine Glow, Daunting Light, and Divine Searing Light. With some luck on crits, you might heal yourself for 20k with two encounters, but man you'd be lucky. Of course anyone can get Life Steal, that has nothing to do with the DC.
I also don't know how we are supposed live long enough for enemies to be killed. Are were back to the old "we're just punching bags" routine? We have to play the game of being utterly useless except as bait, while our teammates kill our attackers?
Yeah, so 3250 Defense gives +33.2% Damage Resist. T2 DC armor adds another +6%. So that's 38.2%. Where is the other 12.8% coming from? Foresight isn't shown on the character sheet, but even feated, it only adds +11%. So I'm not sure where you're getting your numbers. It seems like you're just making this up out of thin air. I mean, I like to think I'm one of the best DC theorycrafters on the forums here at the moment.
I honestly feel like the only way your story is true is if your DC was using the DC dodge invulnerability bug that was only fixed with the last patch. Were they glowing yellow when they did this 30 second tanking vs. 3 player opponents? Because that's the only way I can see a DC being able to do it, both from experience and on paper. We don't have the defense, heals, or CC to be able to do that.
I feel like that's everyone else's loss as much or more than the DC's. Because I quit doing PvP, and I am hearing that many others have as well. It also makes those of us who DO decide to PvP slot powers that aren't heals, since they do so little to help us. Or we gear up defensively and end up having really weak heals. I used to try to heal some, but burst damage is several times higher than our healing capacity, so it's pointless. Any heals I give anyone in PvP are incidental. Repurpose Soul, Astral Seal (which I need to keep procs up), and maybe Sunburst or something. Occasionally I'll beam-heal myself, and if someone is nearby I'll hit them with it because crits proc Repurpose Soul on me to make it more effective. But that's about it.
Not that heals really make much of a difference. Buffing and debuffing is far more effective in PvP. My normal rotation debuffs an opponent's damage resist by 70%, and buffs your damage and defense by 30%. Honestly, that's way better than any healing I could provide.
Its cryptics way of balancing the DC.
The fact a critting divine Healing word from a 13k GS DC with greater vorpal barely gives him back 100% of HP is apparently not relevant, when the party's TR will end up with 100% HP before HV is even of it's 3s CD. Yes, this is actually the situation at the moment.
I put in rounded numbers b/c said cleric doesn't like spreading his build around. As these forums prove not too many people know the best PvP build for cleric and he wants to keep it that way sadly =/ He has 50. something % damage reduction, it's over .5 I believe so I put 51. He is simply not killable solo, and very hard with 2, 3+ CC chain would be the only way. When his soulforged goes off he's at ~20% and by the time it ends he and everyone around him has 100% HP, extra temp HP, and standing in AS, it's already ridiculous and so annoying to play against, even he says all the time that without Righteousness he would be completely unstoppable and so very OP.
That is all I'm going to say as everyone only looks at their own cleric and says nuh-uh I'm not OP w/o righteousness. If you want to play against an unkillable cleric just PM me on the forums, I am on beholder server.
We are definitely dominating, and we are always about to win.
Removing Righteousness probably wouldn't change that much except possibly to make it more difficult for rogues to use Shocking Execution as a finisher. It would certainly help the less-geared DCs survive a little better, though.
Contagion - Cleric
Testament - Wizard
Pestilence - Ranger
Dominion - Paladin
NIGHTSWATCH
Not really, it is their way of forcing the DC to spend a lot more gold on potions.
I keep reading that, but it continues to make no sense. A lot of DCs were forced to hit the bottle frequently back when healing aggro was ridiculously out of whack, but it's hardly necessary now. Besides, gold is not difficult to come by if you actually need to buy potions.
In short, if potion use was ever the reason behind Righteousness, it was and is a stupid reason.
Contagion - Cleric
Testament - Wizard
Pestilence - Ranger
Dominion - Paladin
NIGHTSWATCH
See that's the thing; the majority of players don't have that high of GS or those enchantments, either because they're still leveling or still working for that gear, so in the meantime righteousness hurts pretty bad for most of the rest of us. For you it's great and needs no changing, and I totally get that, but everyone is countering your argument because we're coming from a completely different standpoint on it.
I'm starting to think all balance problems can be traced back to the rare gear and super-rare enchantments / enhancements. There's not necessarily anything inherently wrong with them, but balancing might work better if we were actually comparing equal DCs -- e.g. two level 50 DCs both in blues / greens -- instead of comparing (e.g.) a level 60 DC in mixed T1 purple/blue/green gear no enchants and a 7.5 k GS (my DC) to a level 60 DC with vorpal / soulforged / etc. and a 9.1k GS. Of course nerfs are going to hurt disproportionately when you use the maxed-level top-geared top-performing characters to decide how to "balance" the whole entire class.
Kaylee Krankenwagen, level 60 GF | Tavandruil Wayfinder, level 49 GWF | Aldith Langley, level 51 HR
Don't listen to him. He's making it up. There are no secret magic enchantments in the game. Everything you can get is on the wiki or you can look at it on the auction house. The diminishing returns on combat rating absolutely do not allow for the kind of claims he's making. As I explained in an earlier post, a DC can't get 50% Damage Resist. It's just not possible. A DC can't heal himself back to full, or even halfway, in "a few seconds". I know what a "geared up" DC plays like: I have one sitting at 13k, millions of AD, epic enchants, Lv25 stone, ancient weapon set, Miracle Healer, Grand Templar, Prophet Champion, High Prophet, Low Prophet, Middle Prophet -- everything. You name and I've probably got it. Mainly for the purpose sitting in Trade of Blades wailing on the dummies or at Mt. Hotenow letting Ashen Miners and Flamespikers wail away on me so I can have emperical evidence of what this stuff actually does. Combat logs, spreadsheet calculations, lists of what procs, what doesn't proc, what is and isn't broken how much DPS one power does over nothing, sitting with a stopwatch, counting AP generation, divinity generation... believe me, if there was some magic build, I would know about it. Heck, I am almost positive I've done more combat testing on the DC than the people at Cryptic. Heh.
Do you know what the difference in all Rank 6 Azure enchants and all Rank 9 Azure enchants is? I'll tell you: about 4%. That's it. That's how much extra Damage Resistance you get from having the top enchants. That 4% damage mitigation allows his cleric friend in his guild to tank 3 players at once in PvP while the rest of it just get tore down in a few hits, while CC'd the entire time? Absolutely not. If you believe his claims, I got a bridge to sell you.
The ONLY way a DC could do what he's claiming is through exploits.
There is no such thing a "secret build". The system is finite. There are only so many permutations. If you add one thing you have to subtract another. This idea that people who spend 15 mil AD on their gear have some remarkable advantage. Well, they don't. At best they have an edge. Some of the weapon enchants are potent if you get up to a Greater or Perfect. None of them are game-breaking. People talk about tenebrous enchants, but even if you have SIX greater Tenebrous with 25k HP, that's only 4.5k damage. Minus your Damage Resistance. Woo. And to get those, they have to give up ANY other offensive enchants. Armor Pen, Crit, Power -- nope, it's all for a Tenebrous proc once every 10 seconds.
Really, look this stuff up:
http://neverwinter.gamepedia.com/Enchants#Enchantments
If these people could do what they were claiming, it would be on YouTube. Until somebody is going to pony up some evidence (videos, builds, combat logs, screenshots, etc) and not just make wild, vague claims about some DC in their guild, then they're just blowing smoke. Please don't validate their fantasies like this. It only encourages them, and stifles the legitimate disadvantages the DC has versus the other classes.
I would and do agree.
It goes back to the beta weekends.
Wrong reason. Righteousness exists because without it, DCs would play in god mode all the time. And this class feature makes tanks useful.
I've been in parties that use two DCs when there's no tank handy. I take the dps / support role while the other strictly heals. It works but often not as well because DC defense is lol compared to the GF's.
Kaylee Krankenwagen, level 60 GF | Tavandruil Wayfinder, level 49 GWF | Aldith Langley, level 51 HR
Fair point, tho haven't done a duo-healer run myself after AS fix (somewhere around 10.5.k+ GS another TR or CW is better imo.) except for a gimmick run or two..
My point was simply that a DC without Righteousness wouldn't be even close to unkillable, especially since most build them as glasscannons. Which kind of makes sense since the threat fix.
And said threatfix makes the DC as valid a tank as your stone, it can't get any aggro? Well, ever tried peeling adds off your 12.5k GS TR who wants to hit the pits in SP alone? I can promise you that if he don't stealth, you won't be able to override the threat he generates by just being close to the enemies, not to mention from hitting the pit..
No the DC is far from a valid tank, the shared threat from your heals and low DPS is more than suffice to ensure that...
The CW on the other hand.. They have CC, means to maintain threat (mainly through dmg), a skill that gives them DR.. No, if any class threatens the tanks usefulness, it's the CW, not DC..
My CW does draw a ton of aggro, but her ping-ponging of enemies and three dodges make up for it whereas my DC hasn't got much going for her in comparison. I think the problem with CWs, though, isn't so much that they're overpowered as that everyone else is underpowered, some to higher degrees than others.
Kaylee Krankenwagen, level 60 GF | Tavandruil Wayfinder, level 49 GWF | Aldith Langley, level 51 HR
Lol do you have R9-10 azures in defense slots? Do you have P. vorpal and P. soulforged? Are you even specced full heroic and paragon survivability? How about 19 constitution?
If you are on beholder I will show you first hand, if you're on another server I will try and get a video to post. Yes cleric all by himself can only tank 3 players and not damage, but with even 1-2 people to support you can steamroll 3-4 opponents easily.
No one spends that much time and effort on cleric, that's why it isn't all over the internet lol. He is easily best DC on server, probably on most servers...
I will share my survivability build on DC thread since so many hate DC in PvP, I know it is quite close to if not the same one he uses.
We are definitely dominating, and we are always about to win.
Effective HP= (BaseHP)/(1-total DR) where DR from AC is 6% and from armor it's DR = 49.99*(totalArmor)/(1643.6+totalArmor)
Notice that T2 armor and purple pants gives 1044 armor w/o any enchants.
So I doubt the usage of rank 10 instead of my rank 8 would make it differ that much, the rank 8's which I found a lot more cost effective, after all, I payed 1/16th the price for over 96% of the effect.
No, I run Greater Vorpal and lesser soulforged, this might be the make or break point in why the tanking is possible, not the Vorpal, the vorpal isn't that important in this but, to be fair, any form of build can do 5 seconds of tanking as long they are lucky enough to have the Soulforged proc, thanks again Cryptic for making this armor enchantment extremely unreliable, (tbh. I'm not sure if it has a procchance, it's bugged, or I lagg, but kind of offtopic..).
This could also be a major make or break, personally I only run 14 Con, since I'm a PvE based DC, and the DC tanking anything in PvE is not really needed anymore.
19 Con would be +18% HP, and with the feat it's another 9%, I'm not sure how these stack, and how they work with enchantments, as I don't have access to the game at the moment, I can't test it either, but if someone could I'd be ever grateful.
But, based on how other stats work it's probably something like TotalHP=BaseHP*(1+featBonus)*(1+ConBonus)
Based on this
I personally don't find it that impossible for a solo cleric to tank 3 players for about 8-10 seconds, given he has daily.
Anyway I posted the build so you guys can check it out if you want. Again while I am fully specced for PvP I still have no problem running T2's, haven't tried CN as I don't even have the GS to enter yet haha.
We are definitely dominating, and we are always about to win.
I just looked up how difficult it is to get just one of the enchants you mention.
Do I seriously need to repeat what I just said about the fallacy of comparing wildly unequal DCs to determine how to balance the entire class?
Kaylee Krankenwagen, level 60 GF | Tavandruil Wayfinder, level 49 GWF | Aldith Langley, level 51 HR
As a moderately unequal DC, I agree. I truly believe that the majority of other players are not running around with Greater/Perfect enchants, much less complete T2 set bonuses or CN weapon sets. You tend to see the same people in PvP frequently, and they are not representative of the majority.
A good build and some skill does make a huge difference, as with any class, but a DC almost requires a combination of skill and high-quality gear to perform its class function arguably as intended. Aside from Astral Shield, there aren't a lot of near-no-brainer skills that "just work." To be very blunt, without good gear your heals suck, you die easily, and your damage drops from moderate to LOL.
Comparing the experience of geared DCs to the rest is definitely an apples vs. oranges situation. It should say something that the class needs BiS just to exemplify what is supposed to be its essential function.
Contagion - Cleric
Testament - Wizard
Pestilence - Ranger
Dominion - Paladin
NIGHTSWATCH
Um a R6 is 150 defense while a R10 is 300, how is double the effectiveness neglectable lol? You can have 6 defense slots thats 900 more defense, far from neglectable. Not to mention with R10's you could have less defense and slot a couple radiants for HP.
I realize that the difference is vast between geared and non geared DC's. You should check out the survivable PvP build I posted in the Temple, even with only R6 enchants and lesser vorpal/soulforged you will be amazingly more tanky and very strong in PvP.
We are definitely dominating, and we are always about to win.
I am not comparing geared to ungeared though, the build I linked is the build of best PvP cleric on server. However my build (same feats/powers etc) currently only has 9.2k GS b/c I'm still working on my T2. I have all blue armor and accessories, and the cheapest epic weapon/offhand I could buy. R5 enchants that I fused myself and no weapon or armor enchant, yet I still do extremely well in PvP. Why? B/c the build itself is extremely survivable. Throw in great gear and **** I can tank 3-4 players.
However Add in 40% boost to self heals and it's just too strong, I'm sorry that PvE geared and specced players can't see that. If you really want to see it, follow my build on the temple, get at least regular vorpal/soulforged and R7 enchants and tell me you aren't an absolutely unstoppable force in PvP. With even 1-2 decent pugs on your team you could probably win vs. a premade.
We are definitely dominating, and we are always about to win.
People seems to forget how extremely hard the diminishing returns hit, assuming 6 rank 10 instead of rank 6, you would have 7,41% more effective HP, of course, now I can see it all clearly, the 40% less selfheal is of course there for balancing the extreme differences.
Seriously now, this shows just how huge 40% is in this context.. It's almost 6 times more than the difference from 6 rank 6 to and 10 Azure ones..
I use Perfect and Greater Enchants and mostly Rank 8s. Please don't make assumptions about my gear or experience in the game.
I actually wasn't directly addressing you, but commenting on the notion of comparing geared DCs to less geared DCs, which I stand by. I'm sure you do very well with what you have if you are a skilled player, but there is no way you are truly competitive with top PvPers if you aren't even using an armor or weapon enchant. The reason I don't talk about being able to tank most of an enemy team in PvP on DC is because I don't consider it much of an accomplishment when my enemy team appears to be in the 9k GS range and/or simply has no idea how to kill me.
Contagion - Cleric
Testament - Wizard
Pestilence - Ranger
Dominion - Paladin
NIGHTSWATCH
Correct, my 9.2k GS pretty much does all pugs, I would not expect my guild to bring him along vs another guild lol. But even in a pug at 9.2k I am generally average to below average as GS goes. There a few 8-9k people, once in a while some guy with like 6k lol, and then a lot of 10-12k people. So vs. those of equal gear score or even slightly higher I do very well. Imagine if I had better gear than my opponents with this same build...
Throw in +40% heals to self and I'm sorry but it's just too strong =(
We are definitely dominating, and we are always about to win.
It wouldn't be +40% self-healing, it would be +66% self-healing if Righteousness were removed.
If you have 6 rank 6 Azure enchants, and upgrade them all to Rank 10 Azure enchants, you are only going to get about 5% more Damage Resistance. It's not that big of a deal, and it's certainly not worth the millions of AD you'd have to spend on it.
You complain about your GS, but in actuality, that's a reasonable GS for a defense-based PvP build, since you're having to use blue items. There is no 12-13k GS gear you could wear that would be viable for a defense build. Glass cannon, yes. But not defense.
Having a Perfect Vorpal or Soulforged would help, but those don't add to your GS.
You have still never answered how you face multiple opponents at once without being CC-locked. Your healing capacity is mostly irrelevant since you'll be dazed/prone/stunned/etc. until you are dead.
But you're already un-killable. So who cares if you're more unkillable, right? The amount of self-healing is irrelevant for you.