Gathornia's Guide to Devotion Tanking

michaelrn1982 · May 2016

Gathornia's Guide to Devotion Tanking - Edit #2 - Tank/Healing Hybrid

Before I begin, I would like to note that this build is purely build on theory-crafting and conceptual ideas based upon game mechanics, numbers and experience playing the class. I am by no means a master of the Oathbound Paladin, but would like to share some things I have learned since mod 6 was released.

Race

Many can argue that this or that race is better. When it comes down to it, it is personal preference. With that being said, I personally prefer the Human for the 3% to DR and the additional 3 feats. I will explain later on how these additional feats are used.

Abilities

This is another area where some may debate. I personally went with all in for CON and WIS. This is used to beef up HP/DR and Bonus to Healing.

Dailies

While recently we have been nerfed, there is some very much useful Dailies we have available to us. I will cover the ones I commonly use.

Heroism - Gives 100% temp HP and also makes you immune to control effects. This is my preferred Daily when it comes to tanking.

Divine Judgement - Provided us with a small AoE damage around your target.

Shield of Faith - While this has been nerfed, this is still a fairly useful daily. Provided the group a buff to their DR and increases healing done to those affected.

Encounters

I personally have several setups that I use. Here are the 2 main setups I use.

Healer/Tank Group

Relentless Assault - Best charge for OP's, good AP gain per attack. Use at you're own risk. Most DPS classes hate this encounter.

Vow of Enmity - This makes everyone a trigger for healing as long as they deal damage to your target. Amount healed is based upon their DPS.

Bond of Virtue - Root of sharing the healing love.

Divine Touch - The source of the big heals. Never leaves my bar.

*Bane - Reduce target's damage to up to 30% and increase damage to target. This I reserve for Boss Targets

Solo

Relentless Assault

Divine Touch

Smite

Class Features

This is one area that I am constantly changing due to the situation I am in.

Aura of Wisdom - Everyone gains a good chunk of recharge speed. One of my personal favs since it affects how quickly you can recast Bond of Virtue if you are stunned/controlled.

Aura of Courage - Another personal fav, even for DPS. Every hit gains some Radiant damage for the whole party.

Aura of Truth - All mobs around you hit for less while this is active. Combined wth Bane, it takes a good chunk away from Boss mobs.

Feats

Instead of posting every single part of this, below is an image for your viewing pleasure.

Boons

Here are the boons I have as of now. As I update, I will update on here as well. I will be starting the new area very soon.

Companions

Running around with a Goat (because its freaking hilarious), but do slot him with Loyal Defender gear with Azure/Radiant slotted. Using Profane runestones to beef up Def/Crit (some crit is needed for this build so far). I also have a Frozen Galeb Duhr. The other ones I am looking at as I work out the kinks in the build.

Gear and Stats

Below is the stats I am currently working with.

As far as actual gear, I currently have two pieces of Dragonflight and two pieces of Dusk to optimize the bonus gains. I have a full set of Tiamat to gain the healing gain (both incoming and outgoing). Rings I have a +4 Ring of Rising Power and +4 Ring of Rising Defense. Shirt and pants I have both Warrior Gemmed Exquisite Elemental. All slots are fitted with a minimal Rank 8 Radiant enchantments to focus on Power and HP Gain. I am currently playing around with several Armor enchantments. Negotiation while a very valid enchantment, I am looking to see if there are others out there that might work better with my specific playing style.

Weapons I am using a complete set of Drowned with Radiants in the enchantment slots. As far as the weapon enchantment, Dread or Vorpal seems to work well. I am toying with changing these out with either Lightning or Holy to see if it works with my playing style.

ghoulz66 · May 2016

Tanking...?

You should have no problem not dying. It's the opposite. Worrying about your party dying.

michaelrn1982 · May 2016

This build does do shared healing as long as they are in the 60 ft radius. Otherwise, they heal themselves based upon their DPS (Vow of Enmity affect). This build isn't meant to replace a Prot or GF, but to add a potential different style of tanking with a perk of being a primary healer. I have had the idea/concept of holding this as a secondary tank/side tank. This comes from my many years playing MMO's. While Neverwinter only has several instances where something like this is usual, who's not to say that even on Orcus that having a second tank may become useful due to the level of difficulty he has provided.

With that being said, this build does have a high level of survivability provided you actually swing your sword/mace. Perhaps listing all the perks I have experienced personally during this build will give an idea what I am trying to say.

High Healing capabilities (Base: +60%/+76% increased healing to party/self from Feats/Bond of Virtue/Boon)
High AP gain (Base: 50% AP gain from Stats and etc, +10% more AP from each heal done)
High Recover/Lower Encounter Reset timings
High Damage Resistance (Base: 60% DR, +30% from Sanctuary)
3x chance while being hit to heal from Boons
Every 15 seconds, there is a chance to reset your encounters completely
Every 10 seconds, your encounters cools down by 35% and gain 35% more damage.
Several different ways to heal others (Passives with BoV/VoE, At-Will and an encounter)
Temp HP/CC Immunity from Heroism. This can be perma-temp hp/cc immunity with the high AP gain.

There is plenty provided that gives enough to utilize what OP's have. I will say for certainty that there is many ways to play this class. I am merely sharing one way that I have found.

balufunke · May 2016

Looking forward trying out this build. Already have an OP protection, who is doing fine with the right party. Want to try out a devotion now. Just hit level 30 today and curiuos how it will work later on. Just a few questions to heroic feats: imp.pleas not needed? Light´s Shield useful? I don´t have it on my protection build because of armor, gear, abilities...instead I would max out exempl. haste´s, seems very usefull for cooldown encounters.

seridove · May 2016

What are you rocking for gear?

volzhenin1 · June 2016

devotion OP can not be any tank. Because this path has no aggro. Almost at all.

obsidiatryx · June 2016

Unfortunately that's not true that Devo Paladins can't tank. For every damage we cause, we make 5 times the aggro due to the 5:1 ratio of our healing abilities. Devotion OPs can be a very good off-tank at higher gear levels and with the right team of DPS supporting them, the heals will outweigh the aggro generated by the DPS members. Just prior to the nerf I was tanking CN. Now, I'll still be an off tank but I know how to build my team to make sure it works.

artifleur · July 2016

The powers and features you listed are the ones any healadin would use.

Tanking means reducing the damage taken by the team by either forcing opponents to attack you, transfering damage or reducing damage directly.

In the case of a devotion paladin all you can be is a healer. Off-tank? Sure. But that's what healers usually are. You dont want a healer to die after taking a few hits.

The problem of devotion paladins at the moment is that a cleric can give some nice buffs to their team that stack with the ones from the protection paladin. They dont heal as much but they heal enough.

michaelrn1982 · December 2016

I have been gone for a while, but I am coming back to the game with this build. It seems to be viable so far as the healer and able to take some damage.

This build is known to have some aggro management issues, but that is why I did state this is "theory-crafting". This is not a perfect build, yet wanting to share what I have.

I do plan on updating this build for Mod 10, as there are many changes as I have learned.

slappdaniel · December 2016

i always get sad when i see builds with no aura gifts

majorcharvenak · December 2016

You might want to respect your dread ring boon to burning guidance and add healing warmth (if you don't have it already).Volzhenin and Artifluer make fair points in the need for additional threat gen if you want to seriously tank. Plus there is the 'wisdom' of adding more threat to the party's principle healing source than they're naturally going to get, however...We're pallies and that can't be avoided.

Though between your own heals and the constant tics of burning/healing warmth (if you add them)...you'll pull some aggro. If you're not going to invest any feat points in either Beacon of Hope or Prism, you might want to put some points in Aura Gifts for the power boost to your party. Problem with that though is they can't be all over the bloody map. Otherwise, looks similar to my own build.

I would, however, suggest you suppliment the Vow + Bond mix with Divine Touch vice Relentless Avenger when in a group. Since we haven't received any word from the devs (other than the free respec token) as to whether they will fix the animation for Vow, you're taking a risk of not being able to mark the target to get the healing started. Have DT can be a good back up given the power of its heal. The AP gen is meh when compared to RA, BL and others but its there. If folks have the burning set, DC sigil and a good cloak you can keep your dailies rolling though without too much worry. That's my two coppers.

Anyways, looks like an interesting build and guide. Looking forward to seeing it at work. Hood's off for you putting this to paper.

omgitszeph · December 2016

Welcome Back to the frey my friend, happy to see you here again

michaelrn1982 · December 2016

Glad to be back. I need to submit a ticket as she does not have a free respec as of yet. Other than that, off to Mimic. I'm planning on testing a few weapon and armor enchants with a slightly altered build, keeping in mind of all the changes that have happened since Feb of 2016.

The build I posted earlier this year did have Rousing Warmth. Thanks for the input. Will take it to Mimic to test it out. Always open to other perspectives and ideas.

omgitszeph · December 2016

still noodling around with my OPs ....I just cant put them down, its a sickness I tell ya , lol. I am gonna take a little break and enjoy the winterfest madness, who knows maybe Ill get more free respecs there ROFLZ..at any rate, keep on truckin, shine on crazy diamonds, we will overcome, thanks to everyone in the community for all the shares, and discussion, it keeps ideas fresh in my head. PEACE

fastrean3 · December 2016

don't think about tanking, just stay alive remain heal.

My devote palladin issue is i can't find a party to higher lv dungeon like fbi & sva

sva from any source to group party....all DC !!!!!

majorcharvenak · December 2016

fastrean3 said:
don't think about tanking, just stay alive remain heal.

My devote palladin issue is i can't find a party to higher lv dungeon like fbi & sva sva from any source to group party....all DC !!!!!

Yep. Know the feeling fastrean. Unless you're already in a premade or run with your guild mates...good luck with breaking down that door. The problem is we're a specialist who's specialty has been made redundant (unneeded) by the player base at that level. We don't bring enough powerful buffs to the party (when compared with to the GF and DCs- especially the latter) to make it worthwhile for team to invest its time into unfortunately. I'm almost (almost) to the point of pulling my former level 70 main (a DPS DC) out of semi-retirement and respecing her from DO to AC just to play that level of content. Until the Devs either take a look at either all the DPS power creep, the amount of damage mitigation/self heals available at that level of play, or give the Paladin class as a whole, additional buffs on par with either the GF or the DC, I'm not sure you'll see that major demand for our services.

thrill · December 2016

I prefer the Justice Healadin with Burning Guidance and Prism. Heals well enough and does fairly good damage.

valon79 · December 2016

interesting idea, as most of you are a lot higher IL(im 2.3k) and i havent gotten the much needed boons yet finding my place in a party is interesting, finally got to heal decent(without VoE) up to the boss. i have pulled aggro a few times from tank so i know its doable but not fun lol. Also wanting to check on Bane with the reset of encounters its being reset is that normal, if so it really sucks to have to the recast penalty...maybe i need to space it a touch more to start with?

With VoE i find easy way to check if its on is by trying to run away, if i dont turn its on.

We as healadins im guessing run at least 2 encounter for heals, one for that ohh dang moment or a dps power, tried many, RA is great, but only works well in group on a few dungeons. Templars works well up to boss for the stun, without burning guidance burning light is less optimal, but is normal go to, hate the charge time it kills me a lot. i haven't played much other than OP so idk, but seems like our animations are really long and easy to be interrupted?

Auras standard, but have played with a couple others. Solitude(maybe just me) is useless as it doesn't work with a companion.

I would like to hear if anyone is having good luck with this, thus far i enjoy the Justice tree, it makes solo life easier also.

majorcharvenak · December 2016

thrill#1417 said:
I prefer the Justice Healadin with Burning Guidance and Prism. Heals well enough and does fairly good damage.

Just wait until you add Healing Warmth into the mix.

valon79#4291 said:
interesting idea, as most of you are a lot higher IL(im 2.3k) and i havent gotten the much needed boons yet finding my place in a party is interesting, finally got to heal decent(without VoE) up to the boss. i have pulled aggro a few times from tank so i know its doable but not fun lol. Also wanting to check on Bane with the reset of encounters its being reset is that normal, if so it really sucks to have to the recast penalty...maybe i need to space it a touch more to start with?

With VoE i find easy way to check if its on is by trying to run away, if i dont turn its on.

We as healadins im guessing run at least 2 encounter for heals, one for that ohh dang moment or a dps power, tried many, RA is great, but only works well in group on a few dungeons. Templars works well up to boss for the stun, without burning guidance burning light is less optimal, but is normal go to, hate the charge time it kills me a lot. i haven't played much other than OP so idk, but seems like our animations are really long and easy to be interrupted?

Auras standard, but have played with a couple others. Solitude(maybe just me) is useless as it doesn't work with a companion.

I would like to hear if anyone is having good luck with this, thus far i enjoy the Justice tree, it makes solo life easier also.

I'm Justice and my experience has been the same with the powers you listed. Usually run with Vow, Divine touch and RA when solo, settled with Bond, Divine touch, and Vow (Because of the AP gen bug...If they don't fix Vow, its a very nice consolation prize) for groups. Speeding up the cast time for Burning Light would be welcome as I've "seen the light" more than a few times up in Cold Run and SMI waiting for the damn thing to charge. Firing it off early leads to less than spectacular results. I would avoid Solitude unless you're running augment only as it will ALWAYS be interrupted by the presence of others, companions included.

All in all though, with boons like BG, Healing warmth, and Engine inspiration. You'll do enough damage and healing to get through the solo stuff and add healing/damage support in groups if needed. Needed being anything other than a speed run...Thats what these dungeons need...more bloody traps and less avenues around them. >:)

michaelrn1982 · December 2016

Been running this build up to CN and have had some interesting results. While the healing is there (enough healing comes from just using Divine Touch + Vow) and able to at least take a single hit from a Damage Reduced Orcus (by slapping on 3 stacks of Bane), there is still the aggro management issue. It's very interesting to at least play around with the notion of a healer who can take a good beating.

I am rolling a Prot OP as well to perhaps hit the healing side on the Protection Side. Just got him to 70, so gearing him fairly equal as this build shows above, then will be taking him to Mimic.

Once thing I have learned is using a minimum of a greater lightning, while may not seem like it, does help with recovery of encounters. Testing this with a greater shadowclad as well, for the damage mitigation. Again, just testing and not saying any of these are the "best".

lanalanlan1 · December 2016

Can you tank Orcus in CN with this build? What I am worried is that, can a Healadin hold aggro of the boss and tank it? I play both DC and Healadin. Both classes don't have trouble in T1 and T2 dungeon. Even at 2.8k Healadin can solo heal in Edemo and draw aggro from the boss in phase one (I usually dance around the map.) However, in CN, Healadin can heal party instantly but the boss will turn and hit those GWFs and they die in one shot because I cannot hold aggro, aka not tanking. Do you have any tips on holding aggro?

trzebiat · January 2017

lanalanlan1 said:
Can you tank Orcus in CN with this build? What I am worried is that, can a Healadin hold aggro of the boss and tank it? I play both DC and Healadin. Both classes don't have trouble in T1 and T2 dungeon. Even at 2.8k Healadin can solo heal in Edemo and draw aggro from the boss in phase one (I usually dance around the map.) However, in CN, Healadin can heal party instantly but the boss will turn and hit those GWFs and they die in one shot because I cannot hold aggro, aka not tanking. Do you have any tips on holding aggro?

I run usual Justice/Aura Gifts DevOP, and talking from experience holding aggro is not a problem up to certain point when you have really strong DPS player in party. Playing with GWF and SW around 3-3.2k IL with R9/R10 bondings and Lostmauth set, Orcus has never turned from me. That's playing with AC DC for AA (especially at the beginning and balls), using RA, Bond, Vow and spamming Heroism, additionally SoF for balls to stay in them. Old clip. But playing with really strong HR (3.1-3.4k IL, Lostmauth set, R10-R12 bondings) or GWF (3k IL, Orcus set, R12 bondings) it happens all the time. But I recently switched to Bane instead of RA so I lose a lot of damage from not running any damaging encounter and give even more damage for DPSers. I also dropped Heroism because I can survive Orcus' hits with just Bane, bondings and some debuffs from DC when there's no AA. And with Bane and SoF (and no buffs from DC) at start I can now survive the first Orcus' hit before bondings proc. For holding aggro maybe Lightning weapon enchant could help, also running companion that helps with threat could work. I use legendary Con Artist, but I'm thinking about getting the Lion and try it out, if aggro and survivability would work with it, it'd be worth to try taking Orcus without DC.

Holding aggro in Demo is the easiest. Also bringing Demogorgon to the spawn in 3rd phase is faster than when any tank try it, just slap Vow on Demo and go back, heal and kill some trash, 3 seconds later Demo is already there.

oggycz · January 2017

I found Young yetti companion very handy for my dev. pally. He has very good aggro and gives companion gift quickly. I have little less power and recovery then with Fire archon, but i give more defence (have over 90% in combat) and crit. Tanking Orcus is fine, when I survive first hit. Can stand in green balls without problem. My plan is to have Fire archon for most of content and Yetti for hard bosses and FBI + eSVA.

michaelrn1982 · January 2017

In all honesty, I have had some issues holding aggro in CN, primarily on Orcus. My current rotation is Vow, Bane x3 then Divine Touch.

My augment (I use the goat because I am currently testing augment vs bonding procs) has 3x Loyal Defender gear. As long as some type of healing happens, I can gain aggro (even using Tab helps).

As far as being one shot, it can and has happened (hence why I switched to Vow Rank 4/Bane Rank 4 combo) if I do not manage to get Bane on him while running up to him.

I have rolled a Prot tank as well to compare the differences in tanking styles and gear choices that truly help influence aggro management . What I have learned is that defense is great, deflect is even better. Also, ensuring your RI is up and really use Purifying Fire to help gain aggro as well.

I will be rolling my changes down to my Devo character this week to see how those will influence her tanking abilities (since a lot of the gear is account bound, I've been able to switch the gears between the two characters).

trzebiat · January 2017

@michaelrn1982 Do you run CN on your DevOP with 4 DPS on that Bulwark build? I had some issues with that on Justice, but I don't have high DR due to stacking Power over Defense from boons, and HP instead Defense for more damage.

michaelrn1982 · January 2017

I have ran several different groups in CN, including several with a Buff/DPS DC. I personally go with Def over Power on some of the boons. Unbuffed, im hitting 60% DR (running with an Augment with Loyal Defender + Rank 9 Azures in Def slots). If it becomes between hp or def, I go HP. That's my personal choice and not to say going power, def or hp is wrong by any means. It does come down to your personal preference and playing style. Another thing to try is to use Aura of Truth @ Rank 4 (reduces targets damage in your area by 12.5%). This does help lower the damage of things hitting you. Bane is another great skill to use to lower the damage done to you.

I will be testing a higher Deflect on this build to see how that also impacts how much damage is being taken per damage taken opportunity.

Edit:

Keep in mind that any healing done also adds 5% of your stats for 8 seconds. This "could" be used to buff your defense and deflect. Should be about 500 per 10000. Not a bad reason to use Divine Call while Divine Touch is down.

trzebiat · January 2017

I completely forgot about Aura of Truth, I'll have to try it the next time. The thing is it's easy with DC and buffs, even without AA (but it helps at start and to sit in balls). I use Bane, Bond and Vow, starting with SoF to survive first hit and after that when bondings proc and negation kicks in I'm good to go, I use OP Sigil and SoF on balls. Orcus hits me for max 50-75% health, that's with 190k+ HP. 49% DR before bondings, I only have R8 Negation and I use legendary Con Artist with 2x R11 offense and 1x R10 defense bondings and Brutality 5, Sudden Precision 4 and Defense 4 so that leaves me only two slots for R10 Azures in defense. I'm currently testing the Lion but I don't have yet any personalized necks to use Azures in defense so I use blue gear that has defense stat.

michaelrn1982 · January 2017

Luckily my first OP has been around since before the gateway was shut down and the Loyal Defender and Commander gear way beyond dirt cheap. Not so much on my 2nd OP. I am doing what you are doing with the decent blue gear until I can find or loot something better. The prot version of the build stacks defense, deflect and hp for defensive and arpen and power for offensive. I have grown to like the Greater Shadowclad for the 8% per hit to your deflect chance. At some point between the 1st and 8th hit received, a deflect happens and lowers that damage, then cycles through again. My base deflect is 10%. I am looking to beef that up greatly in the next few weeks as I like the result im getting in not taking as much damage from the deflect bonus.

trzebiat · January 2017

Yeah, sucks PS4 don't have any decent companion gear like PC do, especially necks, belts and off-hands, the only alternative is personalized gear. I do like Underdark rings on companion though.

About Shadowclad, doesn't it add x% to Deflection stat and not the actual chance? So with 1000 Deflect you get +80% for all stacks resulting in 1800, or when having zero Deflection it means you don't get anything at all, except DR starting at Pure?

michaelrn1982 · January 2017

Let me check it with a character with lower deflect. Im seeing %'s in the 50+ with my testing deflect OP.

Update: So, yes. When I put this on a character with a bit lower Deflect Rating, it seemed to be not returning as much. However, I do not think its not calculating it correctly as per the the tooltip, unless there is a chunk of math I am missing.

The base Deflect Rating was 1600. When 2 stacks (16%) was on, the Deflect Rating went to 2300(ish). This seems to be closer to 43-44% on two stacks. So, unless the UI was not updating and was giving 7 stacks when only reporting 2, the math would off.

I think in any way we see this, there is a bug with Shadowclad. I will try again tonight to ensure that it is not user error.