Question to epic dungeons runners - what kind of Cleric you do prefer ?

sigreg

Hello,

My Cleric some time ago got finally her lvl 60 so i was able to start epic dungeons runs. I wasnt impressed - mostly because i tried to run those dungeons in pugs so it was wipe after wipe, but also my cleric there was.. hmm... not too effective IMHO. Of course, there are two sides of the coin, one is "personal skill" of player, but theres also second - current build of toon.
As for now my cleric is some kind of hybrid (i follow this guide: http://nw-forum.perfectworld.com/showthread.php?188622-My-Cleric-Build ), but as this build is really old, maybe thats the case, or maybe... its just not how we do play in epic dungeons atm. Generally - im not pleased with it and im thinking about respec.

Now question - what kind of cleric do you prefer to see in your epic dungeons party ? We do have 3 options, actually i just made a pool. Other thing is also survivability of clerics of course.

Im asking here becase its a question to ALL classes, who play WITH clerics, and i suppose in "Library" i would get answers.. from clerics mostly.

morsitans

Everyone will expect 1. If you're queueing for a pug, come prepared to be a healer.

Having said that, for most dungeons that people pug, astral shield and astral seal will cover 90% of the necessary healing. Are you wiping in all epics, or just the nasty ones?

khimera906

My cleric hasn't reach level 60 yet, but from what I have seen so far, Clerics are not made for DPS and, like morsitans said, most people will expect you to focus on healing. But that's just from my limited experience.

fondlez

Everyone will expect 1.

Secondly, Cleric DPS is not viable in any context since Feywild for many reasons, some due to several broken class mechanics (Armor Penetration has no effect on almost all spells; Repurpose Soul not working the vast majority of the time; etc etc).

As for your build, yes, its ancient and you chose a difficult and unnecessary playstyle by having Healing Word as your mainstay, made even more difficult as a new 60. So, you will have more than the usual learn-to-play issues. As long as you or the tank are the last one to die, gear is not a huge issue, especially since Clerics are the least gear-dependent class in the game due to most of their output being mitigation (an output that does not scale with stats).

Unfortunately, there are no up-to-date Cleric PvE healing guides, yet many things have changed. Also, many of the veteran Clerics either all stopped playing the game or changed class a long time ago...

inthefade462

I voted "hybrid" though jack of all trades is not exactly what I mean. DPS isn't really an option for clerics, even going full attack with no healing your dps isn't comparable to a DPS class.

Being a pure healer is simple. Sun burst, astral shield, healing word. Astral Seal as your mainstay at-will (as in you put it on every mob). In very bad groups you can roll with this setup and have all the healing you'll ever need. Astral Seal and Astral Shield will cover about 75% of the healing you'll need. Sunburst will cover the remainder, and Healing word covers the touch up healing and 1 guy just taking a lot of damage/ran off on his own and got owned by mobs and needs heals, etc.

In non-bad groups Clerics aren't needed as much for healing, as Astral Shield and Astral Seal will cover 95-100% of all the healing (people stop standing around in red/taking huge hits from slow, wind up attacks, etc). In this case I switch to more buff/debuff role.

ie i switch out from miracle healer to high prophet set, and start using divine sunburst to either push or position mobs, use divine glow/hallowed ground combo's, etc.

yokihiro

The DPS of the healer is so low that even if you take the appropriate feats you won't see much difference in the speed of running the dungeons. The other classes will always do so much damage that they are the speeding factor, not you in any case. In T1s I often slot (for non boss fights) more damage abilities, but more for the fun side, I hardly see any difference in how fast we beat mobs.

In pugs you are the only healer, so healing is what the rest of the party needs, not someone that deals 2000 damage. Just run skirmishes with different builds and you will see that the rest will always top you when it comes to DPS. You can be good in killing easy trash mobs with your AOEs. In the last CTA I often was top in killcount.

Go for healing and buffing up your party, stuff that increases their defense. Then you can't do something wrong. Heck, I here and then place an astral shield in some easy fights, open my crafting window to collect an assignment and start a new one without any problems for the rest. My pure DPS would not have made any difference in the 5-7 seconds I am not hitting any mobs at all anyway and the team is still up to shield and seal that was put up before.

The only reason why you have to skill differently is PVP. You can build healers that basically are very hard to kill - but for what? For standing around and ppl around lose the fun in playing while you can't really keep up your own team because you are not specced for healing?

morsitans

Unkillable trolltank in PvP is still very viable, since (as fondlez points out) a ton of cleric powers give flat, non-stat scaling, mitigation. And mitigation is king just about anywhere. You can always drink a potion if you take damage, but taking 40-50% less damage in the first place? Priceless.

xunxan

Heal or DPS?
Not really the two options...
more like: DPS vs buff/debuff; as every DC should be providing adequate healing for a party, and likely won't need all 3 encounters to do so. A 'pure healbot' is going to be overkill in most parties; and would be better off doing... what else?
DPS or buff/debuff?

EDIT - I personally go down the buff/debuff road.

pers3phone

I'm not taking the only healer class in the game to DPS. If you guys want to DPS, roll something else.

So I voted 1. I want my DC to keep me safe while I take care of the DPS part, thank you.

morsitans

Mind you, DCs generally still need to deal damage to build divinity and AP, which a lot of people don't seem to understand.

Plus "Stop attacking and HEAL" is a somewhat perplexing thing to hear when you're attacking...with astral seal.

adinosii

My primary is a DC, and pretty much heal-focused (with Sunburst, (divine) Astral Shield and (divine) Forgemaster's Flame) being my staple powers in groups .... I have two other configurations I use when soloing - one when dealing with multiple, small mobs and another for "mini-bosses" like Celadine.

However, recently I have been playing my lvl 50 GF a bit - and mostly with PUGs, as there are few people in my guild with alts around that level. In those pugs I have seen all kinds of DCs ... some using tactics similar to my own and others that seem to think that they are primarily a DPS, with healing completely secondary. I have seen clerics that do not use a single Astral Seal througout the fight - clerics that seem unable to handle a group that splits in two (for boss and adds), clerics that neglect their own well-being - stand still in those pesky red areas and such....and far too often those tactics contribute to a group wipe.....and guess what - I'm not the only one to hate those DCs.

Clerics are never going to match some of the other classes in DPS ... their primary role is healing, with buffing/debuffing taking a second place. Forget about DPS when in groups.

mctankypants

As long as a DC is willing to learn as he goes I'm ok with whatever. What I mean by that is if I see him casting AS and not using divinity I'll take a minute and ask him about it. I find most of them are quick to adapt or new 60's and unaware of some of their classes features. Being open minded to constructive criticism goes a long way.

aquillazx

TR here, I play with PUGS often and so far I'd say that I would prefer a jack of all trades that's able to help out the other party members with killing the trash that spawns while also being able to heal a bit when needed. I often find myself not taking that many damage in fights and unless I somehow get stunned the damage that I do get can usually be fixed by a potion, which I find to be the best thing to do as it gives the DC more room to focus on trash mobs / keeping the CW / GF / GFW their hp up.

chidy1776

U fortu etly op the fact of the matter is, if you bring one cleric and hes not healing then who is? It depends a lot on the group comp and individual builds, stats, playstyle ect. But i feel with 1 dc in a group his focus should be on healing and supporting as much as possible. I will say that i have run many times with a second dc that was mixed with a damage emphasis, and thiz worked very well. He was able to do surprisingly high aoe damage while also helping out with so.e healing, and all those runs went very well. The thing is we all knew each other and cordinated. It most situatio s this probably wont work as well.

diogene0

That reminds me of something.



And in this game it can be true.

zebular

. . . . . I actually made two clerics and my main one I have at level 60 now. She is speced for maximum healing and temporary hit points. She holds her own soloing content, she can stand in her circles and just pick down her enemies slowly. In a group she is most effective as all she does is Seal and Heal, with Sacred Flame as her primary attack, giving temp hp and healing to those tanking or nearby the mob. I have not once gotten any complaints over my healing and lack of damage output. She's also wearing the Miracle Healer set (with one more piece needed). I actually enjoy playing her more in a group than I do my lightening speced mage, the mage actually being my main. Now soloing, I prefer to play my mage.

. . . . . I only know one player in our guild that has a damaging cleric and while I would much prefer to play alongside a cleric speced fully into healing, the player plays his cleric very well and manages to not only keep players alive but also deal out decent damage. So, he is the exception in my preference to play alongside a healing speced cleric. The other clerics I regularly run with are speced for maximum healing as I am and are also wonderful healers, I have never had a complaint in regards to their healing, only praise and thankfulness.

. . . . . My other cleric I am slowly working on (at just around mid-30's now), I am specing to be more of a damaging cleric. He'll mostly be focusing on powers that not only deal damage, but provide either a slight heal, buff, or temporary hit points to the party. Once he gets to 60, I may have to revisit this thread and give you my feedback about him. As he is only in the mid 30's, he's still mostly a healer as the main powers I want on him won't be accessed until between levels 40-60.

knightfalz

So long as the other players are taking some responsibility for their survival by evading red and such, as they should, any type of cleric will do. You don't need a full heal spec cleric unless the majority on the team aren't doing their bit.

ladysylvia

DPS cleric in PvP = leave. They fail every time, don't heal good and just a wasted slot. Same in dungeon. You are the healer due you are have the alone healing skills. For damage all other do more and efficiency in all cases. Stupid mind if you think DPS clerics needed.

tang56

The cleric who can keep the party alive is fine. If they can do that, I don't care what else they do, buff, debuff, damage, eat pizza...whatever.

cbrowne0329

If I'm DPS, I just want clerics I run with to run dungeons the way I do with mine.

Make sure to have Foresight and the feats that go with it, so we are not running to pick you up. Forgemaster's Flame on boss, and Hallowed Ground. What you use after that is okay with me, as long as on the way to boss you use Astral Shield when we are fighting trash mobs.

I run my with:
Hammer of Fate (or FlameStrike), Hallowed Ground
Sunburst, ForgeMaster's Flame, Astral Shield
Sacred Flame, Seal
Foresight, Holy Fervor

Now depending on the group... I may switch out Healing Word for Sunburst, and consequently Divine Fortune for Holy Fervor. But using Bastion of Heal or Divinity spot healing in mid-fight will make me want to punch a cleric in the mouth.

aquillazx

ladysylvia wrote: »

DPS cleric in PvP = leave. They fail every time, don't heal good and just a wasted slot. Same in dungeon. You are the healer due you are have the alone healing skills. For damage all other do more and efficiency in all cases. Stupid mind if you think DPS clerics needed.

While that may be true for PvP it's completely different in PvE where you can easily dodge most if not all hits that would put you at risk of getting killed. You might need to rely heavily on a 100% healing cleric if you're not familiar with the boss / mini boss's attacks but I can tell you from experience that once you know what animation signals for which attack you'll find yourself not taking as much damage during the fight = less need for a cleric babysitter.

yokihiro

cbrowne0329 wrote: »

But using Bastion of Heal or Divinity spot healing in mid-fight will make me want to punch a cleric in the mouth.

I wonder why ppl dislike Bastion of Health so much. I use it regularly and it works perfectly fine. Also it is one of the best choices to place Linked Spirit on every party member. Since most of the time they will stand inside your Astral shield you can easily use Divine Bastion of Health to apply linked spirit to everyone immediately. Since the healing of Divinve Astral shield does not apply it and you don't want to use Divine Sunburst to knock every mob around and Divine Forgemaster's Flame pulses its heals and only affects those standing near the mob Divine Bastion of Health is perfect for this.

I favor it over Forgemaster's Flame in PVE. The little damage it does will speed up a fight with many mobs maybe like 1-5 seconds? The slow in a pve fight is most of the time useless since you you hardly run around a lot in circles and need to slow down one mob anyway and the pulsing radiant healing only heals those that stand near the target and you won't get any spike heal with it anyway. I like to use it in PVP though for the slow, here it really shows its potential.

zebular

. . . . I absolutely LOVE bastion of health and have had zero complaints on how I use it. I use it tactically and when it will provide not only the best healing for my targets but also to gain AP on the fly, target or no. Additionally, since I am speced into healing targets with temp HP, I generally try and use it when a player or players have temp hp in effect, maximizing the already beloved spell. Which is quite often since I am also speced to give temp hp to players. It's not the spell, but how one uses it that matters. No, I am not talking PvP here, just PvE.

ambisinisterr

zebular wrote: »

. . . . I only know one player in our guild that has a damaging cleric and while I would much prefer to play alongside a cleric speced fully into healing, the player plays his cleric very well and manages to not only keep players alive but also deal out decent damage. So, he is the exception in my preference to play alongside a healing speced cleric. The other clerics I regularly run with are speced for maximum healing as I am and are also wonderful healers, I have never had a complaint in regards to their healing, only praise and thankfulness.

*whistles innocently*

I actually supplied the first vote for preferring a hybrid. Contrary to popular opinion I'm not actually specc'ed into damage, I just don't fight the powers that were given to me like the rest of the clerics. I actually think my spec is very, very, very similar to yours and everybody else we know.

I like Astral Shield and Sunburst. Both do me very well.
Bastian Sucks unless somebody named Zebular uses it. Healing Word is a pain in my rear end. I don't like FF and use it as a situational. I could keep going but what it comes down to is I simply don't find any spell anywhere near as good as having Daunting Light as a third encounter and that is where a lot of my damage comes from.

Most of the rest is just bluster. I have fun saying I am a tank and a rogue and do damage and take damage but healing is my first priority even though I joke that it's not.

I'm specc'ed to heal but I simply hate every other healing option. So instead I rely on Crit and Percent Heals to make up the difference while also mowing down mobs much faster and only bring in a third healing spell when absolutely necessary.


The other thing is, as you know, I'm not afraid to get in the middle of everything. The devs certainly modeled the Cleric Companion after me but they forgot to program in the fact I dodge more than I cast healing spells. The majority of clerics try to hide in a corner thinking they're some sort of squishy character and don't accept that clerics are guardian fighters and rogues in disguise.

ambisinisterr

knightfalz wrote: »

So long as the other players are taking some responsibility for their survival by evading red and such, as they should, any type of cleric will do. You don't need a full heal spec cleric unless the majority on the team aren't doing their bit.

The only time I have ever had a problem with my spec was when myself and two guild members pugged Malabog's Castle.

One of the names of those pugs has become an unofficial catch phrase that I use when somebody doesn't get out of the red splats because they want to do damage.

This guy was a wizard and complained I didn't keep him alive while he tried to face tank every splat in the world. His goal seemed to be to kill things before he needed to be healed...and he couldn't grasp that only he had the damage output required to make that suicidal option work.

He literally complained that he died to the dragon's wing buffet while standing in my shield. The cleric in my guild keeps me alive. Why can't you!?"
I can't do much more than throw down a shield which wouldn't get any better than my current spec even if I was to go full healing...if you build for complete damage, absolutely no defense and don't take advantage of the wonderful shift key I can't help you.

So yeah...don't be a <No Naming and Shaming>!


P.S. We killed the dragon with absolutely no problem once he accepted he actually had to use his shift key. It was the end of the world for him...

morsitans

Daunting light is lovely, but it IS capped at 5 targets: if you're partying up with a group that's really good at bunching up monsters, ambisinister, take searing light instead. In divine mode the splash damage that puts out is insane.

I usually run dungeons as a healbot, using the generic loadout (seal, flame, foresight, HG and DA) with astral shield, sunburst (mostly for linked spirit proccing and AP gain), and then modify the third encounter based on group and situation:
Great group? Either daunting, searing or divine glow (if it's a melee-heavy group I tend to go DG, since "debuff bads and buff melee dudes" is more useful than 'score marginally higher on the deeps chart').
Bad or unknown group? Forgemasters. Given that the shield will usually be stuck on the tanky melee folks so they can just swing away with abandon, it's nice to have an encounter that can provide on the spot healing to stragglers who've bitten off more than they can chew: since these are always CWs or TRs, forgemasters works great. TRs will stay within the heal radius anyway, and CWs will either stay within the heal radius or teleport away, at which point they're not being smashed by melee monsters anymore anyway AND the monster that was smashing them has a DoT + slow effect on it. Plus if all is going well it's a cheap and cheerful way to generate a bit more DP/AP, and it can also serve as a stopgap spot-heal for the melee to cover AS downtime if needed.

I tend to use healing word fairly rarely, because the heal isn't that spectacular and the targeting is more hassle than I like (I am practicing, but still). Kitefights like Hrimnir, though: HW all the way.

esteena

Clerics can dish out very good damage, but it will never be as good as of a Thaum CW.

That's why you need to focus on healing and leave the damage for the wizards, you are more useful that way. That's what i do with my cleric.

esteena

morsitans wrote: »

Mind you, DCs generally still need to deal damage to build divinity and AP, which a lot of people don't seem to understand.

Plus "Stop attacking and HEAL" is a somewhat perplexing thing to hear when you're attacking...with astral seal.

Divine fortune.

Sun burst to five targets . Which heals allies and damages enemies at the same time. I have so much divinity that way.

About AP, that can be built from anything. I have a TR /DC as PvE characters right now, that's why i do understand how painful it is for my party members if i decide to help them with "damage" instead of spamming healing words/Astral shield / Sun burst.

ambisinisterr

esteena wrote: »

Clerics can dish out very good damage, but it will never be as good as of a Thaum CW.

That's why you need to focus on healing and leave the damage for the wizards, you are more useful that way. That's what i do with my cleric.

My view is that you can do both.

You don't need that third spell to be a healing spell. You don't need to sacrifice all damage to do well.
And all you really need, since sunburst is both a healing and damaging spell, is one damaging spell to be extremely effective at both.

Plus, here is a method to the madness in being a <Do Not Name and Shame> which I have always taken part in even in Alpha. There's less need to heal the more damage you do. As such there is a happy medium that you can do enough damage to help the party while also keeping them very safe.

Also there are various nuances that you will either do or not do no matter what. As I hinted earlier on I don't treat the cleric as a range character; I go right into the middle of the fray and often get yelled at for pulling mobs rather than remaining patient for the GF.

I think a lot of that came from playing a cleric exclusively until July and often in pugs, though. Sometimes I wish the devs would revert the healing aggro changes so clerics could learn this very basic rule.

After playing a cleric quite successfully from April 25-June 20 with all the heal hate the modern cleric is a complete walk in the park. I spent two months as the party tank and healer in one so I have absolutely no fear of going where no modern cleric goes.


Oh and here is another useful bit of information on how to not be squishy as a cleric.

esteena

ambisinisterr wrote: »

My view is that you can do both.

You don't need that third spell to be a healing spell. You don't need to sacrifice all damage to do well.
And all you really need, since sunburst is both a healing and damaging spell, is one damaging spell to be extremely effective at both.

Plus, here is a method to the madness in being a <Do Not Name and Shame> which I have always taken part in even in Alpha. There's less need to heal the more damage you do. As such there is a happy medium that you can do enough damage to help the party while also keeping them very safe.

Also there are various nuances that you will either do or not do no matter what. As I hinted earlier on I don't treat the cleric as a range character; I go right into the middle of the fray and often get yelled at for pulling mobs rather than remaining patient for the GF.

I think a lot of that came from playing a cleric exclusively until July and often in pugs, though. Sometimes I wish the devs would revert the healing aggro changes so clerics could learn this very basic rule.

After playing a cleric quite successfully from April 25-June 20 with all the heal hate the modern cleric is a complete walk in the park. I spent two months as the party tank and healer in one so I have absolutely no fear of going where no modern cleric goes.


Oh and here is another useful bit of information on how to not be squishy as a cleric.

I'm not sure how can you heal decently and deal damage.

I run with sunburst/AS/and healing word. IF i don't use healing word my CWs will be dead in few secs everytime they cast a singularity or the TR would melt down if he has too much mobs on him. CWs are the most classes who take aggro because of their AoEs, so healing word = less wipes when you run with them.

Healing word is amazing to take the aggro off somebody. Sun burst is my divinity factory, 1 sun burst fills one pip of divinity for me if i hit 5 targets with it. Astral shield is mandatory.

In the new Castle never for example, since the draco is fixed, if i don't cast healing words/AS on TR and CWs they will melt down due to the massive add swarm they get. Also my sunburst is keeping linked spirit buff up 90% of the time.

so i'm not sure what can i replace here?

fondlez

Heh, ambisinisterr sounds like one of the veteran players in Unspecifiederror playstyle. That's exactly how I used to play my DC - as a tank/rogue. It's just a huge shame that the effectiveness, hence enjoyment, of that playstyle has been reduced dramatically since beta.

Also, as moritans advised, if you really are aiming for damage in group PvE with your third encounter, you really want Searing Light (especially in Divine mode) instead. Personally, I used to run with Divine Glow as my default third power after they fixed it to not unintentionally debuff allies since it buffs group damage noticeably. I only went full debuff/dps mode (with High Prophet set, two damaging encounters and Terrifying Insight) when I was in a group with two Clerics.