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Astral Shield non divinity is ok sometimes
rnewton8
Member, Neverwinter Beta Users, Neverwinter Guardian Users Posts: 131 Bounty Hunter
Ok so i have started altering my play style some and started casting Astral shield quite a bit more in non-divine mode, and I can just feel the eyes on me when i do it like it is some big no no.. So i thought i would just clarify that Astral Shield should NOT always be casted in divinity and here is why - Divine Power Management.
Here are my guidelines -
Start of pulls in D/D with elites = Divine AS
Start of pulls in D/D with no elites present = Non Divine AS - why waste a pip on a low end trash pull with no elites.
Also, once a pull with elites has been whittled down below 50% and provided evryone in the group is about 80% health, i will lay down non divine AS, to save the pip since were nearing the end of that pull and everyone is ok
Hallowed Ground feated - i use to really over heal and pop HG and then lay down divine AS on top of it, but now i only do that in a few places where i know there is high spike damage. Now I dont even put any AS on top of hallowed ground unless the group is just terrible.
And what i have found is that by using non divine AS, i have a lot of extra divinity to play with and use on other skills for buffs, debuffs, or to help dps with some channel divinity
Ive been playing DC since early beta, very well geared @ 6k power and am really starting to get the hang of the class. Its all about divinity management, and knowing the instance in PVE and how much healing is going to be needed for each pull. Ive gotten to where i can heal MC in my sleep now lol.
Here are my guidelines -
Start of pulls in D/D with elites = Divine AS
Start of pulls in D/D with no elites present = Non Divine AS - why waste a pip on a low end trash pull with no elites.
Also, once a pull with elites has been whittled down below 50% and provided evryone in the group is about 80% health, i will lay down non divine AS, to save the pip since were nearing the end of that pull and everyone is ok
Hallowed Ground feated - i use to really over heal and pop HG and then lay down divine AS on top of it, but now i only do that in a few places where i know there is high spike damage. Now I dont even put any AS on top of hallowed ground unless the group is just terrible.
And what i have found is that by using non divine AS, i have a lot of extra divinity to play with and use on other skills for buffs, debuffs, or to help dps with some channel divinity
Ive been playing DC since early beta, very well geared @ 6k power and am really starting to get the hang of the class. Its all about divinity management, and knowing the instance in PVE and how much healing is going to be needed for each pull. Ive gotten to where i can heal MC in my sleep now lol.
Post edited by rnewton8 on
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I guess it's a similar concept as PvE.
Playing a DC is much about divine management, that's what most people should learn really fast, since almost every spell gets nice buffs - starting by knockback, instant cast, bonuseffects, more damage,... and there are only 3 (may 4 if skilled) bips.
AS mitigates 20% anyway (at least whats the buff icon telling) - bonus on divine is only the heal, whats the tooltip telling.
So yeah, if the party runs fine or dealing last hits, no need for divine AS, by that point may a divine <any damage/support> will be more usefull.
Depending on your builds, equiped skills and playstyle... it's needed to place it the way.
On my build an way to handle my DC I actually don't have no need to watch it really, running mostly with 1.5bips, depending on party +-1 - but all time way enough to throw out one divine spell kinda instantly... (on PvE)
On PvP its a bit needed to watch out, but actually I mostly go for dailys only, so I dont care that much about
A blue circle usually means everyone will group up inside it. Have noticed that on a yellow circle people stay spread out. They either don't know what the yellow circle means or they go by 'I'm not being hit so don't need it'. So having everyone grouped up in it usually means the monsters are also in or near it. This allows me to use the Sunburst/tab/divine mode trick. Dealing damages to lots of monsters while hitting the party with a divine healing/linked spirit.
Link Spirit gives out a huge bonus.
Personally if I end up with people who lack the common sense to stand in my AS yellow or blue, then unless there are red circles in there I point out that they should. If they don't listen, then there's a good chance I'll leave. You can't heal/save stupid.
You wouldn't want to carry people like these, unless you want them to start popping up in your Karru/CN/MC/etc. groups.
But seriously blue circles are the <font color="orange">HAMSTER</font>
Despite all the +divinity feats/powers my character has I rarely max out my divine power gauge. I usually end up with 3 full pips only when when I find myself in a situation where 'm just standing there spamming Sacred Flame on the last remaining mob.
@chocobofarmer
You don't seem to understand the point of this discussion. The point here is that yellow AS is OK for some builds and some situations, and yes that includes T2+ dungeons. By using Divine BoH + AS instead of Divine AS + BoH, for example, and then possibly using HG (so yes, that also means I'm spamming normal/divine HW whenever I can to boost AP generation as I do this) I am focusing on improving the killing speed of my group (through Linked Spirit) instead of unnecessarily overhealing everyone already inside the AS. Everyone else is giving their own examples.
Seriously, considering the CD of divine HW's how fast is your character actually spamming those if you can pull off HW spam + casting divine BoH/divine AS and still end up with 4 pips constantly? I know for a fact that that kind of activity would easily use up all my divine power. And how do you pull it off while juggling BotS spam/HW spam/dodging/repositioning? If we're only talking about easy content then why bother overhealing?
Btw I don't make "extremely heavy use" of Healing Word. I spam it. The bulk of my "healing" is preventive, not reactive. As I said above, both my normal/divine HWs are almost always on CD. I use the divine/normal version on everyone whom I expect is going to take some damage during the battle so I don't have to go around chasing after people once the damage has already been done. This way I'm also generating AP quickly so that my feated HG becomes reusable asap. For actual healing emergencies I just keep 1 HW charge and 1 divinity pip on reserve, and there's always Divine Armor. Outside of emergencies my basic healing comes from feated HG, normal BoH and Divine Astral Shield.
Everyone here already agrees that divine AS is our go-to power for challenging content.
A normal astral shield and some healing word spam might be the best I can do after that, so that's what I'll do. That might mean no divine astral shield for an encounter rotation. I'm ok with that trade if it meant a member of the opposition team went down quicker, or had to run for a pot.
" Anyway, blue circle is far superior to yellow circle, definitely far superior to divine healing word. I'll just be more direct and say this discussion is pretty stupid."
Everyone knows Divine Astral shield is better than non-divine. So not debating that, what i am debating is that if you are using only blue AS, then most likely you are overhearing and wasting divinity (in my opinion) which could be used for any number of things (link spirit), channel divinity damage, Divine Glow etc.
Take this example- 1st Pull in MC -- use blue AS to start, then fast forward, AS is back on Cooldown and mobs are at 30% health - now you could pop another blue AS, and waste a pip, or you could just pop a yellow one since the pull is almost over, and let the seals keep everyone topped off, and use the divinity for something else or save it for the next pull. ---That's called divinity management
I gave a lot of advice on divinity management, the only insult I gave was to this topic and I'll explain why below.
Linked spirit can only be procced by a few things, divine bastion of health and divine sunburst being the most common methods. Let's say you hit all five teammates with it in a dungeon, and on average each person has 5k power, and other stats aren't hitting steep softcaps. That's about 5% more damage from the additional power, and let's just say 5% more overall. So 10% more damage, but at the expense of losing 7k hp heal over 10 seconds. Let's say the average HP is 28k, that's losing 25% in healing for 10% more damage, and we have to consider linked spirit costs 5 feat points and people will be dodging more and be more nervous if they see a yellow shield instead of a blue shield, blue usually making people stand still and fight. I think in some circumstances this tradeoff may seem good, particularly in 20v20 pvp, but I personally would much rather have my teammates feeling certain that they can stand still and keep attacking and be healed from any hits they may take and benefit from 5 feat points somewhere other than linked spirit (Invigorated Healing is what I'd sacrifice if I had to get Linked Spirit)
Divine AS will heal each person on average 7k HP over 10 seconds, not counting Invigorated Healing since that applies whether it is yellow or blue. Seal would require someone to do 70k damage to get the same amount of healing, and also keep in mind many classes' damage are in bursts, while AS is every half second in equal amounts, so it is more reliable. MY idea of divinity management is making sure I always have enough divinity to cast divine astral shield, because I'm an AS bot and proud of it.
(I advise against there being trolls alive after ten seconds, but I guess it's a personal preference. O.o )
I ran MC on my CW with a Cleric who subscribed to a yellow AS and HW spam idea. Not that I ever saw any of that HW and not that he could keep the GF on his feet. My pots were on CD the whole run because there was never any safe place to retreat. I honestly will drop the next time I encounter a Cleric who subscribes to the yellow AS theory.
If I had to put my thumb down on it, I would say that the key problems is a yellow AS assumes the best possible outcome for the team for 14 seconds and it doesn't allow for the rest of the team to calculate future healing into their combat decisions. If you know you need to root to cast and you will take damage, you can retreat into a blue AS, or you can do it if a totemist agros you on spawn. If the AS is yellow, you are gambling everything on a HW that may never come. And there's no feat that allows the DC to read your mind and know that you are about to stop kiting. After clearing a couple of mobs, a DC can pick up that if I lead a mob into or follow the GF & mob into the blue AS, that I'm going to initiate an encounter rotation. If the circle is yellow I am being asked to gamble everything that the DC is a. available to direct heal larger than the damage I'm about to take. b. doesn't miss with that HW.
Some people, like that Cleric on that run, can write off a record breaking number of downs as the team's fault and poor skills, instead of the tactical choices of the player brought along to heal. More than just being a question of individual Divine Management, casting AS so that it does not heal also introduces a greater degree of risk for your team. Surviving while facing greater risk is a separate issue from the fact that more risk has been created.
I do run a DC in MC, with a Linked Spirit build and no Foresight and no Invigorated Healing. I run Sunburst/BoH/AS for clearing and Sunburst/HW/AS for boss fights with Sacred Flame and my Divinity Management's just fine. And I even have enough to catch the tank midair with Soothing Light if s/he gets knocked by an Elite. You don't have to choose between proc-ing Linked Spirit and a blue AS, you just have to commit yourself to that particular play style. And yes, I have cleared the end-fight with Valindra and a GS of 12.5k. I too am a blue AS bot and proud of it.
^^
Apparently the words "overhealing", "situational", "sometimes" and the phrase "depending on your build" have lost any and all meaning in this terrible, terrible section of the forums this thread is in.
"Situational". There's very few situations in PVE where you would cast yellow astral shield instead of blue, and I have given very good reasons why in prior posts. Only two valid reasons I can think of, 1. things have been so hectic and you had to throw divine healing word or divine sunbursts so much that you don't have enough divinity for divine astral shield, or 2. The final enemy is very close to dying and your teammates are in no threat of being hit and the next ground of mobs is at least 15 seconds away OR you are ready to open with HG at the next fight, then you might use a yellow astral shield to build more divinity and AP.
"Depending on your build". First of all, most PVE builds should have enough divinity that they should almost always be able to cast divine astral shield. It is CHOICE to overuse divine healing word, or CHOICE to use a 14 second cooldown small aoe heal that doesn't build much divinity and most often results in overhealing, that you sometimes don't have enough divinity to be a perpetual blue circle bot.
Focused during the last days alot more about whan a normal shield is enough, and when a divine should be better.
It's jsut the thing of "mass defense" vs "mass offense" - as someone said to me some time ago: "a dead enemy deals no damage, so increase your DPS". That's the point, you will survive if you kill em fast enough, you will also survive if you kill em very slow but with a weird high defense.
The balance is the key - transfered to AShield it's about "mitigation only enough, or need the heal really?"
I got no problems with divinity, even in PvP it's pretty ok-ish, but other players may specced and act a bit different and need to take a closer look to.
So since I place some more normal ones, I got some more divinity for DPS or DPS-supportives left.
To me it's not that big difference in handling - but killspeed itself feels fast then on only divine AShields.
My answer is no.
I typically lay down a yellow sheild, and use all 4 pips of divinity for punishing light and unload on him which makes the fight take a fraction of the time it would have otherwise.
When i first started doing MC I thought because it was some big dragon, that everyone would be taking damage like crazy, but it turns out, its just not the case (for his 1st apperance), no one ever takes damage in that fight, and if they do, I have other non-divinity options at my disposal. So again, it comes down to situational, and choosing increase damage versus overhealing and making things take longer.
Using a blue AS 100% of the time is like saying "Need Healer for Celadaine" lol.Hint- DC in a group for what is suppose to be a solo instance like Celadaine, doesnt need to use any healing spells period. Not Astral Shield, not healing word, not anything other than maybe a seal.
And FYI, I wouldnt have started this thread if what i was doing wasnt working. I cant even remember that last time i wasnt able to do my job as a healer and had a wipe. I am very good at reading fights and pulls and staying on top of things.
Though dropping divine AS is so much simpler, so there a good chance I'll do that anyway. It depends.
You do realize those "few" "valid" situations you gave out can happen on every battle. Right now I'm pretty sure that the only reason you're arguing here is because you're trying to prove something to someone because your own logic/chain of thought betrays your posts.
And now you overextend yourself.
Bottomline you little git is that you cannot have enough DP to constantly use all your divinity skills despite the fact that in a really perfect world, we would be using the divine mode of 95% of our skills all the time. I have no idea why your brain seems to be incapable of grasping this concept. Even your little divinity setup can't possibly keep up if you only used divine AS, divine Healing Word, divine Bastion/Forgemaster's/Sunburst/etc, and Punishing/Soothing Light. And that's why we have divinity management.
It's because of divinity management that some people have proposed that there are situations where using yellow Astral Shield can "sometimes" (YES THAT'S IN THE TITLE) be viable. No one certainly said that we should be using it all the time, and even if someone did, everyone here would disagree. We were having a (figuratively) nice, controlled, serene, mostly objective conversation when for some reason you decided to (figuratively) just come in here screaming "WE SHOULD ALWAYS BE USING DIVINE ASTRAL SHIELD!" at the top of your lungs like some out-of-place hillbilly. What are you, 7? What's worse, you're still screaming.
If this were a real conversation someone would have already slapped you.
I really don't think it's worth the level of vitriol and frustration you're throwing around, there. It's just...an encounter. And he's basically right, too.
Personally, I'll almost always use a D'd astral if I can, because it's so much easier.
Firstly, I almost always party with randoms, and the blue circle is something that everyone can spot, understand, and then sit in. Even random idiots.
Secondly: it's a mitigation and heal in one: it's such a fantastic safety net. Yes, I could micromanage divinity, use a yellow and then save my D for other stuff, but 9 times out of 10 it's much, much easier for all concerned (not least my poor ageing brain) to just spend a pip on a blue circle and then know that whatever happens there's at least a safezone right HERE. I'd use it right at the end of a fight, right at the beginning of a fight, whenever there is a hint of a fight happening. If I've got a pip and it's not on cooldown, it's such a no-brainer. And it's a single pip.
Even if you blew your last pip on a spurious blue toward the end of the last fight, you can get a pip back in seconds through just seal/sacred spam. If your party can't survive the first two seconds of a fight without a blue circle, then they are terrible people who deserve to die anyway.
Divine Armor stay as emergency - not too love temporary hit points, but this time to potions drink.
P.S.
Sometimes, in random party, DV AS can first help ... you - not die.
Some ... (60 lvl :eek:) still fight with boss, leave you with adds. Run DC, run.
Diana (15,4 DC)
BigHalf (15,5 GF)
I often will place a blue AS at the beginning of the battle and the Tank knows where to go and pull aggro or the cw knows where to expect to find a place to get healing. as it has been said, the yellow AS generally sends a lack of confidence in the DC, justified or not. I would say the same is true if you run with a GF and you never see red marks, or a tr that does not stealth...
When i run my other toons, as a GF for example, if i see that Blue AS, I know i can use my Villians Menace instead of my fighters recovery. The blue circle give me a point to control he combat from which leads to greater team synergy. And as a gf, if i am drinking pots in a yellow AS, and the dc is using his divine power for dps, i am going to be saying something.
So for me, this is more about a confidence thing for you and your group. If you are pugging, you should not be using a yellow AS for any reason because you will be forfeiting their confidence, they are going to think you are a ****. If the dc in my group is using a yellow as then a blue, then a yellow, i find myself second guessing if the healing will be there or not and I cannot focus on my job as full as i should. I am holding off on popping the VM in case I need my FR or do in need to drink a pot now so it is not on cooldown when i really need it... If you are running with a group of folks that know you and your capability, then sure, you can experiment.
It's the mind set just needs to changed on this- instead of ppl thinking omg a yellow circle, this DC must not know what he's doing and i need to be extra careful- u should be thinking, wow this DC is so switched on, he knows when extra healing isn't needed, and would prefer to bump my power stat to 10-11k with link spirit rather than giving me healing when i'm already at full health. ---this was the whole point of the thread--a mind set change
I am yet to experience what you are describing. My experience is that the number of pots I am chugging and the more effort I need to make to keep my but alive is directly proportional to the Dc's use of a yellow AS rather than a blue AS. If is see someone in a DC that looks like they are trying to contribute to DPS rather than do their understood role (nobody recruits a DC for thier dps) , which in your example above where you have 4 pips and are using it for dps not healing.
If you do not communicate this a head of time, it is not going to go over well with the group.