fathomfulMember, Neverwinter Beta Users, Neverwinter Knight of the Feywild UsersPosts: 207Bounty Hunter
edited July 2013
Yea i can see how increasing the entire parties stats like crazy, increasing damage reduction for every person by a large %, increasing damage done by a large %, plus the heals that keep the party completely safe will be replaced by a potion.
Right now there is only one choice.... devoted cleric. Why dont we wait until more options are released before freaking the heck out lol.
I still maintain if you picked a cleric with only one option (healer) to do something besides party buff and heal then well... apparently there were fundamental logic issues to begin with.
People keep blasting and saying stuff like i dont want to be a healbot. Well you picked the healbot character with a healbot spec.
Wait until a different cleric spec is released, pick a different class, something. Those that were thinking clearly and examined what the cleric did and compared that with what they wanted to do in game and made a logical choice feel the class is fine.
Hmmm i want to heal and buff my party, hey ill choose the class/spec which is designated as the healer and party buffer. PROFIT!
You mean stats that get eaten up by DR (woop my rsi increased by 1% from 7000 recovery!)? Damage Reduction when the 2 tank classes can mitigate a f*ck load of damage on their own? Crazy damage percentage debuff from 2 classes that boost party dps by a f*ck ton?
That's why I said IF healing stones were cheaper we CAN be replaced. A good CW mitigates damage better through add control (while killing them I might add...), and this is to note that half of their skills are currently broken, what more if they were fixed?
And again, people need to learn to read... Divine Oracle (current paragon path) isn't even the healing path for god sakes, it's more of the damage mitigation/damage hybrid path (foresight, prophetic action, bots, hammer of fate, terrifying insight)...
I for one am sure that I didn't pick a healbot character because it wasn't advertised as a healbot character (f*ck false advertising right?), we picked Devoted Cleric, Leader Class (i really need to find that stupid dev article). The only reason we have one option is because the other options suck, and that's what they have to fix/improve upon.
You mean stats that get eaten up by DR (woop my rsi increased by 1% from 7000 recovery!)? Damage Reduction when the 2 tank classes can mitigate a f*ck load of damage on their own? Crazy damage percentage debuff from 2 classes that boost party dps by a f*ck ton?
That's why I said IF healing stones were cheaper we CAN be replaced. A good CW mitigates damage better through add control (while killing them I might add...), and this is to note that half of their skills are currently broken, what more if they were fixed?
And again, people need to learn to read... Divine Oracle (current paragon path) isn't even the healing path for god sakes, it's more of the damage mitigation/damage hybrid path (foresight, prophetic action, bots, hammer of fate, terrifying insight)...
I for one am sure that I didn't pick a healbot character because it wasn't advertised as a healbot character (f*ck false advertising right?), we picked Devoted Cleric, Leader Class (i really need to find that stupid dev article). The only reason we have one option is because the other options suck, and that's what they have to fix/improve upon.
Here is a description:
The Cleric is a class based on divine origin and has a primary role of a Leader. Leader in this context means the member of the party which stays back and fills in the cracks of their party. A leader can boost morale, tend to the wounds, make the enemies lose the will to fight or rally the members of party together.
A Devoted Cleric is a build of cleric with controller as a secondary role. They are a versatile class, equally capable of serving as a healer and of controlling the battlefield with the magical power granted by the deity they serve.
My cleric functions as billed above. Does it well in fact. I dont understand how you feel that it does not live up to snuff.
Does cleric do as much DPS as rogue, no. Does cleric have as much control as CW, no. Does cleric have as much tankiness as GF, no. I mean the cleric as billed is a jack of all trades type character.
I mean i add 25% of my stats to whole party. I increase damage consistently by like 30%. I constantly have 10% of max health ticking every 3 seconds on every person. 11% pure damage reduct on every party member consistently. I add lifesteal to every single party member attacking the boss. All this plus a little bit of damage to help out.
You say we only have one option. Every class only has one option they have not released more yet. Devoted is the only path to take lol.
Hell by your logic why take a TR when they coudl be replaced by a GWF? Why take a CW when you can take a TR? Why take a GWF when you can take a GWF? You can play this game forever.
Is it mandatory to take a cleric, of course not. It is not mandatory to take any specific class really outside of really low gear level breakpoints.
To say that we dont contribute as much as other party members is just ludacris and belies an underlying misunderstanding of what the class does IMO. (not trying to flame, i just really feel this way, we can agree to disagree if you'd like lol).
The Cleric is a class based on divine origin and has a primary role of a Leader. Leader in this context means the member of the party which stays back and fills in the cracks of their party. A leader can boost morale, tend to the wounds, make the enemies lose the will to fight or rally the members of party together.
".....just not necessarily at the same time. Also, you'll be needing AS and sunburst, so really...pick one extra role from the above (we recommend another heal)."
I think my gripe (aside from righteousness, which remains all kinds of stupid) is that when AS had 100% uptime you could be a healbot + funtimez: so "AS, sunburst to fuel it, plus a fun power. PoD? Sure. DG for boss-melting? Why not. Another heal for really really damage-happy parties? Go for it! It's not mandatory though!"
I thought this was great. As long as I kept the tanks alive and happy in their blue, I could have some actual fun. This has always been my preferred healing strategy: enough healbot to be effective, then play with other stuff.
Now unless you have a well-coordinated party you more or less need to go full healbot. For pugs it's pretty much compulsory unless you want people to start screaming NUB CLEIRC and stuff.
I for one am sure that I didn't pick a healbot character because it wasn't advertised as a healbot character (f*ck false advertising right?), we picked Devoted Cleric, Leader Class (i really need to find that stupid dev article). The only reason we have one option is because the other options suck, and that's what they have to fix/improve upon.
You mean this one? http://www.tentonhammer.com/node/249375 where they talk about letting healers do more dps and take on a more aggressive role? The one where they then nerfed cleric dps afterwards?
You can't use At-Wills while running, sorry dude, think you've been misinformed. Unless you mean DoT and then run.
And no you shouldn't have to pay ZEN and respecc just to be good in PvP (no other class has to).
You can use your channeled divinity at wills while moving.
[SIGPIC][/SIGPIC]
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vmlinuxMember, Neverwinter Beta Users, Neverwinter Guardian UsersPosts: 0Arc User
edited July 2013
Ok, so you guys are saying that the cleric really should just exist to be a healbot/buffbot. That's fair, it's just not fun for more than a month or so at the top of the game.
Lets take the granddaddy of fantasy MMO's an an example of a pure healer. In Everquest the cleric was a pure healer and hitpoint buffer. The EQ cleric set the bar for healer characters in MMO's. My standard loadout in that game included 3 heals, 3 roots, one stun, and a nuke. Other options were turn undead spells, fear undead, fear living, and I'm sure some I'm missing. I couldn't do nearly the damage of any other caster, and my crowd control abilities were pretty pathetic BUT I did actually have the ability to nuke, root, stun, and heal effectively at all times if my mana management could support it. There wasn't nearly the diverse skillset in EQ as there is in this game, the main difference is that the spells were actually there for you to use should you wish at any time without sacrificing the ability to HEAL, and they weren't gamebreaking.
Sure the NW cleric is just a devoted cleric at this point, so the argument goes that even though every other class can have multiple viable paths through their powers and paragon feats etc the cleric should be confined to a tiny subset of the powers they have, and realistically limited to one paragon path under the DC path. So the argument is that just because the developers can't do the devoted cleric justice doesn't mean they won't be able to do a good job with other types of clerics. If the DC is the ultimate in healing, and does such a limp job of it, then I can't imagine any other type of cleric not being booted out of a group unless they are the 5th wheel.
I wonder if the game can survive long enough with the strong competitors on the horizon coming out later this year to ever see anything but the current paragon paths.
You can use your channeled divinity at wills while moving.
You sure can, but they are both pretty weak. The best use of a channeled divinity in my opinion is to throw linked spirit on a remote target followed by a healing word.
You pretty much destroyed your credibility there. What are you, 5 years old? "since when is nerfing a favor, lol"? "nope, not at all, we are clerics not goldfish"?
Whollyhandgrenade you are the only person I know in these forums who makes it a point to slot unfeated Lance of Faith even when multiple people have stated that Sacred Flame is superior in terms both DPS and divinity gain, not to mention the freebie temporary HP. You make it a point to ignore certain key powers simply because, in your own words, you do not like how they look or sound. You have made it a point to post unnecessarily dire tidings in various "how do I play my cleric" threads. And all you do is whine about several issues instead of simply learning how to play your class better or at least understand how our various powers and feats work.
While Clerics do have serious balance issues (every class does, some are just better off than others on the imbalance scale) I hope you realize that whatever it is you are doing is not helping with the situation at all. God forbid Cryptic reads your posts and start focusing on L2P issues instead of things that are actually important.
I assure you that my clerics do quite well in PvP relative to other clerics and that I'll continue to use lance of faith.
Well, you could afford to not have to slot a 3rd heal (without bringing a 2nd cleric to the picture)... Provided you have a good team in front of you....
Who are we kidding. A lot of the player base do NEED to l2p (also learn2read for people who feel that DClerics are full on healers). A lot (not just the newer ones, even the veteran ones who relied on double AS shenanigans) just quit without even putting ANY sort of effort (healing has become so easy that it's become boring). Supports were never the easiest class to begin with in any game for that matter. However, that isn't to say the class isn't broken/boring. Diversity is basically gone unless you have a good party behind you. A good cleric also won't really make or break a party as much as a good CW would, and we're really just in parties because we save people a couple of pots along the way. If healing stones were cheaper I reckon we'd go completely obsolete for full DPS parties.
nobody really needs a cleric in PvE except for at end bosses and then the only players that will hang around the cleric's shield are the CWs and TRs... that the other classes don't need the cleric in the only battles that clerics are truly helpful in except for their CW and TR protection is an indication of a pretty poorly designed class
You can use your channeled divinity at wills while moving.
when the cleric casts anything it stops moving, to make matters worse many casts are time delayed and require additional stand still time to get them off (if you don't stand still after clicking them they get broken and don't work)
Ok, so you guys are saying that the cleric really should just exist to be a healbot/buffbot. That's fair, it's just not fun for more than a month or so at the top of the game.
Lets take the granddaddy of fantasy MMO's an an example of a pure healer. In Everquest the cleric was a pure healer and hitpoint buffer. The EQ cleric set the bar for healer characters in MMO's. My standard loadout in that game included 3 heals, 3 roots, one stun, and a nuke. Other options were turn undead spells, fear undead, fear living, and I'm sure some I'm missing. I couldn't do nearly the damage of any other caster, and my crowd control abilities were pretty pathetic BUT I did actually have the ability to nuke, root, stun, and heal effectively at all times if my mana management could support it. There wasn't nearly the diverse skillset in EQ as there is in this game, the main difference is that the spells were actually there for you to use should you wish at any time without sacrificing the ability to HEAL, and they weren't gamebreaking.
Sure the NW cleric is just a devoted cleric at this point, so the argument goes that even though every other class can have multiple viable paths through their powers and paragon feats etc the cleric should be confined to a tiny subset of the powers they have, and realistically limited to one paragon path under the DC path. So the argument is that just because the developers can't do the devoted cleric justice doesn't mean they won't be able to do a good job with other types of clerics. If the DC is the ultimate in healing, and does such a limp job of it, then I can't imagine any other type of cleric not being booted out of a group unless they are the 5th wheel.
I wonder if the game can survive long enough with the strong competitors on the horizon coming out later this year to ever see anything but the current paragon paths.
You sure can, but they are both pretty weak. The best use of a channeled divinity in my opinion is to throw linked spirit on a remote target followed by a healing word.
the cleric wasn't designed as a heal bot, in fact up until level 50 the cleric is a good all around player and up until the patch which reduced AS, placed penalties upon the cleric, fixed a skill that cut one of my cleric's divinity power gains in half, and boosted the fighter classes giving them stuff like extreme healing, immunity, increased defense and the like clerics were pretty solid as a class.... see that is the thing, the cleric was needed so what did this game do, they nerfed the cleric while bolstering the classes that they supported so that they no longer needed cleric support
Anybody who says the other classes only have 1 legit "option" probably haven't played the other classes or just don't mind them. With 1 paragon path, the rest of the classes via their paragon feat trees can do different roles making them versitile.
TRs can choose to do crazy single target DPS (PvE/Executioner) can choose to fight in near perma-stealth for PvP (Saboteur/Scoundrel)
GWFs while still being not needed in PvE as adds can either be thrown off cliffs or perma-controlled while being killed by CWs. Not to say that their feat trees are useless, only made useless by game mechanics) are beasts (to the point of OP) in PvP (Sentinels)
GFs have one good feat line (Conqueror), but game mechanics and a good pilot can make them do crazy single target DPS AND tank (currently a bit OP). Their other feat lines are good, but doesn't make sense.
CWs can choose to focus on control (Renegade) or damage (Thaum), hell the Thaum line and a good geared CW can do both relatively well. The "Ice" control wizard is frowned upon but it still is good for what it does.
So what do DCs have? Virtuous is the hybrid line, Faithful the support line, and Righteous the Tank line. Of these 3 lines only faithful does it's job fine. Righteous and Virtuous are considered as gimicky as the Ice CW it's a joke. We don't tank anymore due to the .20 patch so Righteous is lackluster for what it does. Virtuous is also a bit all over the place
Regarding Cleric self heals, they will likely remain fairly minor for the Cleric. This is to help balance the fact that Clerics don't need to use as many health potions as other classes. Before the self heal reduction, Clerics would pretty much always have more gold than all other classes.
Complete BS lol.
Overall pretty happy with the spot the Cleric is in. In D&D Clerics are more than just heal bots, and I think we've addressed that pretty well.
3 heals. 3 encounter slots. Not a heal bot definitely.
Given the nature of the game, we didn't want them healing so well that other players would not bother avoiding damage on their own. This also meant that we could up their damage and let players enjoy a more aggressive healer type.
Aggressive healer type? Do they mean stand up and spam healing word, astral shield, and sunburst? Maybe run around dodging the THREE mobs chasing you?
The trinity plays a different role in Neverwinter. This is something that has changed a lot over development, and in the end it just wasn't as fun to have a 'dedicated healer.' Being a game based around action combat, having a class that focuses entirely on healing or entirely on aggro management wasn't as fun. The Guardian Fighter still controls the battle and takes a bunch of damage for his team, it is just done in a different way than in more traditional MMOs.
GF tanks, TRs DPS, CWs control, Clerics heal. Yup. No trinity right there.
I agree with many of the posts here. Of course the cleric should not be a heal bot but that is exactly what the cleric currently is forced to be. To be able to heal, the cleric needs to concentrate on his healing abilities like astral shield, healing word, foremasters flame, sun burst, hollowed ground and divine shield. Sure, a cleric in a skilled and well equipped group might switch for some damage spells, but I would like to see improvements for the average player.
Only 2 of these above mentioned abilities deal some damage, namely sunburst and forgemasters.
In D&D the cleric was designed to do be flexible. In 3.5 version he could simply convert spells to healing. In 4.0 healing even is a minor action that can be performed with out any effort on the fly.
In Neverwinter you have to choose either to heal or to do damage, because there are too less powers that can do both.
In Neverwinter I have the feeling there is no real concept of the cleric how it should work and what he should do, beside beeing a heal bot.
A quite nice system would be that ANY spell do additionally the same amount of damage in healing when cast in divinity. This would make spalls like daunting light and searing light more usefull for end content.
Aggressive healer type? Do they mean stand up and spam healing word, astral shield, and sunburst? Maybe run around dodging the THREE mobs chasing you?
On the surface I would have to agree they have done a fairly good job of making a dps/healer but there are two major problems, the first is you need to severly outgear the content and the second is along the lines of the devs not wanting DC heals to be so good that players can stand in the red and get healed through it.
If players stand in the red and don't get the heals they want then look over to see their cleric dumping PoD, Daunting Light and LoF/SF on a mob they assume your a bad healer and it's your fault they died. Which of course is totally not the case the debuff's you apply to the enemies and buffs to your team coupled with the trickle of heals coming from Repurpose Soul, Astral Seal and Prophecy of Doom(well hardly a trickle, feated this baby gives some stellar heals) is more than sufficient to keep everyone topped up so long as nobody stands in the red.
On the surface I would have to agree they have done a fairly good job of making a dps/healer but there are two major problems, the first is you need to severly outgear the content and the second is along the lines of the devs not wanting DC heals to be so good that players can stand in the red and get healed through it.
If players stand in the red and don't get the heals they want then look over to see their cleric dumping PoD, Daunting Light and LoF/SF on a mob they assume your a bad healer and it's your fault they died. Which of course is totally not the case the debuff's you apply to the enemies and buffs to your team coupled with the trickle of heals coming from Repurpose Soul, Astral Seal and Prophecy of Doom(well hardly a trickle, feated this baby gives some stellar heals) is more than sufficient to keep everyone topped up so long as nobody stands in the red.
the cleric was perfectly fine before they nerfed it, all they should have done was made AS non-stackable but instead they nerfed it in several ways and then bolstered the fighting classes like all beat hell so they could handle all the adds that the cleric had and from the cleric's standpoint the cleric would have rather kept those adds and be made immune and able to heal like all beat hell instead
I love my DC. Love healing dungeons. PVP is another matter and is dependent upon me hitching my wagon to one or two really good players and doing my thing with them as a group.
Dungeon wise i always feel like i have the tools to heal. I roll with a Sunburst/Healing Word/Astral Shield/Divine Armor/Hallowed Ground/Astral seal.
Now i will say that a PUGS ability to stand in red circles is only exceeded by their ability to not stand in blue circles... lulz.
I just never have problems, didnt do T1s, just spent 15k in AD and 20 gold to get gear to jump straight to T2.
I know most people roll with Divine FF for the heals, but i already have enough heals on the tank or around the tank, HW allows me to control heals on idiots running from the group lol.
AShield always up on tank and close range, HG up always on whole group, Aseal always up on big adds or boss, HW always rolling on 3 people not named cleric or tank.. profit.
Edit: it is almost too easy. I mean % max health heal + % max health heal + lifesteal for everyone + huge DR in circle, + huge DR on every single ally + constant HoT. Not to mention awesome Oh **** button in Divine Armor (which i rarely use) When i am on my game peoples health bars literally never move... ever. I got like 36% recover, 34% crit and like 6k power. only have 10.2 GS right now and its almost too easy.
This is scary. I did the exact same thing, heal in a similar way, have the same gear-score and feel the same way. Well... they say everyone has a twin... I don't suppose your Cleric is named Bob too?
the cleric was perfectly fine before they nerfed it, all they should have done was made AS non-stackable but instead they nerfed it in several ways and then bolstered the fighting classes like all beat hell so they could handle all the adds that the cleric had and from the cleric's standpoint the cleric would have rather kept those adds and be made immune and able to heal like all beat hell instead
I agree the Divine Cleric is broken. I'd like to see more things like Repurpose Soul since it is with mechanics like this that the Cleric can both dps and heal at the same time.
Also it is a bit ridiculous that a Cleric has to stack things like Regen and Life Steal just to keep themselves alive during fights. It makes no real difference to the Cleric, it is the rest of the party that suffers because there is a good 1500 points worth of stats that should be dedicated to dps or heals which must be wasted on survivability. Righteousnes is the main reason why a Cleric needs to severely outgear content in order to do pugs because without that extra 1500 stat points invested in something like regen the Cleric stands no chance.
I agree the Divine Cleric is broken. I'd like to see more things like Repurpose Soul since it is with mechanics like this that the Cleric can both dps and heal at the same time.
Also it is a bit ridiculous that a Cleric has to stack things like Regen and Life Steal just to keep themselves alive during fights. It makes no real difference to the Cleric, it is the rest of the party that suffers because there is a good 1500 points worth of stats that should be dedicated to dps or heals which must be wasted on survivability. Righteousnes is the main reason why a Cleric needs to severely outgear content in order to do pugs because without that extra 1500 stat points invested in something like regen the Cleric stands no chance.
Uh... what?
You can't take life steal and regeneration, for survivability purposes, in sufficient quantity without gimping your main stats. You can take some regeneration, life steal and deflection so that you can give it to the rest of your party (and increase its effect on yourself) using Linked Spirit. No stat is wasted on a Cleric. I try to take a bit of everything for that reason. It also means you don't have to go hard up against the 3k DR caps, Linked Spirit puts you way over them if you are in the 2k zone.
Cleric survivability comes from having a decent health pool, Holy Resolve (Seriously, this feat rocks. I've lost count of the times it has saved me), Linked Spirit (Sunburst switch spam), Astral Shield, Holy Word spam (non-divine to soften damage spikes and generate divinity), Divine Armor, good use of the slide and the occasional pot.
I've said it before and I'll say it again - Clerics don't heal through big damage in this game. Get your head around that concept and you'll be fine. Think mitigation, softening damage spikes, buffing your friends and constantly providing a stream (not a torrent) of regenerative effects. That's what we do well.
Cleric survivability comes from having a decent health pool, Holy Resolve (Seriously, this feat rocks. I've lost count of the times it has saved me), Linked Spirit (Sunburst switch spam), Astral Shield, Holy Word spam (non-divine to soften damage spikes and generate divinity), Divine Armor, good use of the slide and the occasional pot.
So that's all three encounters, one daily and at least two feats (three if you include the +%health feat that admittedly you'd be stupid not to get anyway).
Just to...stay alive?
And you still need potions. This is not a great state of affairs, no?
Simply put, your usual MMO healer does gimpy damage but has incredible survivability. This is useful in PvE because the healer is usually the line between win/wipe, and doubly useful in PvP because the healer is the one everyone tries to gank first, because they're stopping you killing anyone else.
In Neverwinter, we do gimpy damage but have mediocre survivability, and an inherent debuff to self healing. This is annoying but managable in PvE, and downright laughable in PvP, where everyone ganks us because we're stupidly easy to burn down, not because we're a priority asset.
We CAN do pretty good damage, but to do that (given that we only have so many slots on the bar) we have to sacrifice a lot (or indeed, all) of our heals, so we become "acceptable damage, zero survivability".
It's all managable, certainly, but it's just frustrating, and increasingly less fun. I'd like to feel like I was playing to the classes' strengths, rather than constantly fighting its stupidly-imposed weaknesses. Playing basically any other class makes me think "holy <font color="orange">HAMSTER</font> this is SO MUCH EASIER".
You can't take life steal and regeneration, for survivability purposes, in sufficient quantity without gimping your main stats. You can take some regeneration, life steal and deflection so that you can give it to the rest of your party (and increase its effect on yourself) using Linked Spirit.
Actually that is the point, taking Regeneration/Deflect/Defence/Life Steal in sufficient quantities WILL gimp your stats. A dead Cleric heals nobody though so the rest of the party will just have to deal with it.
As for using the Linked Spirit|Sun Burst "Exploit", diminishing returns on the classes you buff mean they get negligible returns from it anyway.
On the whole a party would no doubt get more DPS and sufficient heals by stacking the Regen and Life Steal that a Cleric needs to themselves then just bring along one more DPS instead of the Divine Cleric.
Now I'm all for the Devs to want a situation where Cleric heals are insufficient to heal through standing in the red but they should make it clear to the other classes that this is the intended mechanic through an early quest chain but should they make it so blatently obvious then parties will just drop Clerics altogether and stick with Tank and four DPS all with Regen/Life Steal.
Righteousness needs to be countered in some way, it's a 40% debuff and Cleric heals are not supposed to keep other people up(just topped off) so obviously that 40% debuff to self heals is excessive and needs to be countered with +40% survivability from other forms (Defence/Deflect/Regeneration/Life Steal).
Personally I think the easiest solution is to buff Repurpose Soul to more like 30% Crits becomes an 80' range AoE heal. That way you can run with whatever you want, slot one good spot heal encounter like Healing Word or Bastion of Health for when things go a little pear shaped and away you go. Oh and introduce some good Regeneration gear.
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cichardMember, Neverwinter Beta Users, Neverwinter Hero Users, Neverwinter Guardian Users, Neverwinter Knight of the Feywild UsersPosts: 0Arc User
edited July 2013
currently right now i have no issue healing t2s its silly all these complaints about fix the class or im leaving QQing threads or delete it.... the Cleric fits the role as support not heals. Bring group mitigation/buffs and small party heals. once you understand the DC is support role similar to CWs (CC/partybuffs/enemy debuffs) you will start to enjoy the job you are ment to do in the instance.
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fathomfulMember, Neverwinter Beta Users, Neverwinter Knight of the Feywild UsersPosts: 207Bounty Hunter
This is scary. I did the exact same thing, heal in a similar way, have the same gear-score and feel the same way. Well... they say everyone has a twin... I don't suppose your Cleric is named Bob too?
Nice, no i have an Ioun stone named Breeze lol does that count?
I have been meaning to try out some other builds, just havent gotten around to it since this works sooo well. Doing the Divine + SB trick for linked spirit is something i cant really bring myself to do, so havent gone that route.
God i hate having to pay for respecs... there are tons i would love to try.
As with anything in forums everything is always laced with such hyperbole. I mean lets take a look, all Rogues are quitting for some reason, the company only cares about cash, there is never going to be an meaningful update ever again, clerics are broken, pvp is screwed up and not fun, the economy is completey crashing.
You can go to like 15 different game forums and this is all repeated **** near verbatim lol.
So that's all three encounters, one daily and at least two feats (three if you include the +%health feat that admittedly you'd be stupid not to get anyway).
Just to...stay alive?
And you still need potions. This is not a great state of affairs, no?
Simply put, your usual MMO healer does gimpy damage but has incredible survivability. This is useful in PvE because the healer is usually the line between win/wipe, and doubly useful in PvP because the healer is the one everyone tries to gank first, because they're stopping you killing anyone else.
In Neverwinter, we do gimpy damage but have mediocre survivability, and an inherent debuff to self healing. This is annoying but managable in PvE, and downright laughable in PvP, where everyone ganks us because we're stupidly easy to burn down, not because we're a priority asset.
We CAN do pretty good damage, but to do that (given that we only have so many slots on the bar) we have to sacrifice a lot (or indeed, all) of our heals, so we become "acceptable damage, zero survivability".
It's all managable, certainly, but it's just frustrating, and increasingly less fun. I'd like to feel like I was playing to the classes' strengths, rather than constantly fighting its stupidly-imposed weaknesses. Playing basically any other class makes me think "holy <font color="orange">HAMSTER</font> this is SO MUCH EASIER".
I never said you had to use all of the abilities I listed at once "just to stay alive". I just listed most of the tools I use throughout the course of an engagement to keep myself AND my team alive. As for the "exploit", I already have a solution if the devs decide to change that mechanic. I try to use every tool available to me at the time. If you're choosing not to use the mechanic as it stands then you are shooting yourself in the foot. It's a bit like GWF who refuse to sprint-cancel because it goes against some unspoken code of gaming honour.
What is it with people and potions in this game? How hard is it to understand that the clearly intended way to rapidly regenerate a large percentage of your health pool is to use a potion? Clerics are clearly not intended, and I hope will never be intended, to replace this mechanic. Clerics are the gap fillers in groups. We bring all the extra bits that other classes can't provide or can't provide in sufficient quantity in one neat package. Sure, if you only need more of one thing, you are better off going to the class who specialises in the one area. It's why you see so many groups opting for 2x CW in PVE but if you need a bit more of a lot of things, there's only one class that does the job. Clerics.
From a PVP perspective, survivability is a bit of a moot point at the moment for all classes. Time to kill is too low and the amount of CC available (without diminishing effects) is too high. That doesn't mean the Cleric class is broken. It means the PVP system is or, at the very least, it means that the PVP system needs some adjustment in my opinion.
I think the truth of the matter lies in your last point. The Cleric class, as it is, just doesn't make sense to you. Clearly, you have a better understanding of other classes so you'd probably be happier (or less frustrated) playing them instead. That doesn't mean you are a bad player or stupid or anything else derogatory. It means exactly what I wrote, the Cleric class isn't for you right now. The supposed strengths you, and others demanding buffs, keep pointing to are false assumptions. We are not tanks and we are not healbots. Just because other MMOs supposedly have healers like that (and I'd be interested to know which ones you are referring to) doesn't mean that this game has to follow the same formula.
You don't use the trick or you don't take Linked Spirit? In my opinion both are almost mandatory. I say almost because there is a chance that the devs will change the mechanic, or nerf it, so it's good not to base your entire play-style around it (like the screams of woe that still echo the Temple from those that used Astral Shield as a crutch) What build are you using?
I don't have an Ioun Stone. I don't feel that I need one (or the Cat). I guess you could make the same arguments for the stone as I do the feat. :cool:
I'm glad to see there are others out there who are prepared to tinker with the class rather than settling on one build, having it fail and then rushing to the forums to demand buffs for a class that is *undeniably broken* because they couldn't make it work on the first attempt.
As with anything in forums everything is always laced with such hyperbole. I mean lets take a look, all Rogues are quitting for some reason, the company only cares about cash, there is never going to be an meaningful update ever again, clerics are broken, pvp is screwed up and not fun, the economy is completey crashing.
Can't comment on the rogue complaints but after wiping a few times to trash in whispering caverns just because I was too obstinate to drink my health potions, wearing full tier 1 with chants a small mantra came to mind "fck the Cleric" and I logged out.
I have not done PvP (not even once) for two weeks on my Cleric, last time I tried it upset me rather extremely. I refuse to do PvP on a Cleric.
I did some tests on Lance of Faith and Sacred Flame yesterday, I have Lance of Faith feated and 3/3 powered, Sacred Flame is 2/3 with no feats. The DPS I got from Sacred Flame was the same as Lance of Faith so with an extra power point in Sacred Flame it would do 10% more than Lance of Faith AND free up 5 feats. The Cleric is not even remotely balanced within its own set of abilities, how does anyone expect to find it balanced amongst the other classes.
edit: I just swung past the thieves den for a look since I will be shelving my Cleric and am looking for something else to play. One of the Threads has screen shots of solo'd dungeons on a Trickster Rogue, you know that thing that Clerics are not allowed to do and have been nurfed beyond repair to make sure we can't. The state of the Cleric is beyond a joke and there is no reasoning for it.
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fathomfulMember, Neverwinter Beta Users, Neverwinter Knight of the Feywild UsersPosts: 207Bounty Hunter
Can't comment on the rogue complaints but after wiping a few times to trash in whispering caverns just because I was too obstinate to drink my health potions, wearing full tier 1 with chants a small mantra came to mind "fck the Cleric" and I logged out.
I have not done PvP (not even once) for two weeks on my Cleric, last time I tried it upset me rather extremely. I refuse to do PvP on a Cleric.
I did some tests on Lance of Faith and Sacred Flame yesterday, I have Lance of Faith feated and 3/3 powered, Sacred Flame is 2/3 with no feats. The DPS I got from Sacred Flame was the same as Lance of Faith so with an extra power point in Sacred Flame it would do 10% more than Lance of Faith AND free up 5 feats. The Cleric is not even remotely balanced within its own set of abilities, how does anyone expect to find it balanced amongst the other classes.
edit: I just swung past the thieves den for a look since I will be shelving my Cleric and am looking for something else to play. One of the Threads has screen shots of solo'd dungeons on a Trickster Rogue, you know that thing that Clerics are not allowed to do and have been nurfed beyond repair to make sure we can't. The state of the Cleric is beyond a joke and there is no reasoning for it.
soloing a dungeon is pretty crazy.
Although i know that i can run T2's easily with just a CW and a TR. CW on adds, TR applying damage wherever its needed and me the cleric tanking boss and keeping everyone healed.
Just finished a 3 man Pirate King with zero wipes in record time lol.
Although i know that i can run T2's easily with just a CW and a TR. CW on adds, TR applying damage wherever its needed and me the cleric tanking boss and keeping everyone healed.
Just finished a 3 man Pirate King with zero wipes in record time lol.
I think Repurpose Soul is great, but it doesn't proc of half our abilities. Giving the cleric "passive" healing is really the way to go. Astral Seal, Sun Burst, Divine Forgemaster's Flame are all in right place. Repurpose Soul doesn't work right. It won't proc off half our encounters. And those do big AoE damage. If one crits, it stands to do a lot of healing "for free" while we're doing DPS. I think they need to expand on the passive-healing-from-damage idea. I throw out a TON of AoE damage. If we had heals proc'ing off that, we'd be in a good place. We get some really great abilities that we can never pull out in group because they don't add any healing utility, and it's just sad. Even if Repurpose Soul worked for all encounters, I think it would be a big step.
I think the issue is, the damage is from a "Created Entity" rather than from the cleric. It seems like it shouldn't be that hard to fix the procs.
You don't use the trick or you don't take Linked Spirit? In my opinion both are almost mandatory. I say almost because there is a chance that the devs will change the mechanic, or nerf it, so it's good not to base your entire play-style around it (like the screams of woe that still echo the Temple from those that used Astral Shield as a crutch) What build are you using?
I don't have an Ioun Stone. I don't feel that I need one (or the Cat). I guess you could make the same arguments for the stone as I do the feat. :cool:
I'm glad to see there are others out there who are prepared to tinker with the class rather than settling on one build, having it fail and then rushing to the forums to demand buffs for a class that is *undeniably broken* because they couldn't make it work on the first attempt.
PvP buid taking the last defensive tree. Really easy to solo foundry quests with and plays excellent in PvP, but not interested in GG. For group runs, switch out chains of light for astral shield when stuff becomes difficult otherwise won't use AS until its absolutely needed (love having another cleric in the group so I don't ever have to slot AS). Chains is a really nice protection spell, someone is chasing you and you have damage simply cast it ahead of you at stairs or a hallway and keep going, sometimes use sunburst in divinity mode fist. Also when trying to hold a node its good for casting at the entrance to buy extra time to ensure its captured, also its good for protecting the party when stuff is approaching or when they are trying to flee or when they are in combat (oh hey, 3 of them are on you, lets just freeze those 3 and let you have fun with them for a short bit). In short, there is no way that I'm ever giving up chains of light (addition note: chains of light doesn't draw agro but sunburst certainly does). I end up first on randomly joined PvP teams quite frequently and get blues for it.
The Cleric is undoubtedly broken. One of the things you really come to notice when fiddling around with different specs is how messy it all is. The Cleric has splashes of things scattered across the paragon paths. Even if there were enough feat points to access all of the related buffs there still aren't enough to build a solid spec. A touch of %max health heals, a touch of debuffs, a touch of buffs, a few actual heals(with charges or prohibitive cooldowns).
The Cleric is a mess. It very much looks like a few ideas were thrown in a hat, jumbled about and then drawn at random.
Apparently the devs ran 5-man content with the cleric to test it, if this is true I would really appreciate the specs they used.
Comments
Right now there is only one choice.... devoted cleric. Why dont we wait until more options are released before freaking the heck out lol.
I still maintain if you picked a cleric with only one option (healer) to do something besides party buff and heal then well... apparently there were fundamental logic issues to begin with.
People keep blasting and saying stuff like i dont want to be a healbot. Well you picked the healbot character with a healbot spec.
Wait until a different cleric spec is released, pick a different class, something. Those that were thinking clearly and examined what the cleric did and compared that with what they wanted to do in game and made a logical choice feel the class is fine.
Hmmm i want to heal and buff my party, hey ill choose the class/spec which is designated as the healer and party buffer. PROFIT!
That's why I said IF healing stones were cheaper we CAN be replaced. A good CW mitigates damage better through add control (while killing them I might add...), and this is to note that half of their skills are currently broken, what more if they were fixed?
And again, people need to learn to read... Divine Oracle (current paragon path) isn't even the healing path for god sakes, it's more of the damage mitigation/damage hybrid path (foresight, prophetic action, bots, hammer of fate, terrifying insight)...
I for one am sure that I didn't pick a healbot character because it wasn't advertised as a healbot character (f*ck false advertising right?), we picked Devoted Cleric, Leader Class (i really need to find that stupid dev article). The only reason we have one option is because the other options suck, and that's what they have to fix/improve upon.
PVP: How to make your life less miserable as a Devoted Clerics -- Still in it's Unfinished Glory
Dragon
Here is a description:
The Cleric is a class based on divine origin and has a primary role of a Leader. Leader in this context means the member of the party which stays back and fills in the cracks of their party. A leader can boost morale, tend to the wounds, make the enemies lose the will to fight or rally the members of party together.
A Devoted Cleric is a build of cleric with controller as a secondary role. They are a versatile class, equally capable of serving as a healer and of controlling the battlefield with the magical power granted by the deity they serve.
My cleric functions as billed above. Does it well in fact. I dont understand how you feel that it does not live up to snuff.
Does cleric do as much DPS as rogue, no. Does cleric have as much control as CW, no. Does cleric have as much tankiness as GF, no. I mean the cleric as billed is a jack of all trades type character.
I mean i add 25% of my stats to whole party. I increase damage consistently by like 30%. I constantly have 10% of max health ticking every 3 seconds on every person. 11% pure damage reduct on every party member consistently. I add lifesteal to every single party member attacking the boss. All this plus a little bit of damage to help out.
You say we only have one option. Every class only has one option they have not released more yet. Devoted is the only path to take lol.
Hell by your logic why take a TR when they coudl be replaced by a GWF? Why take a CW when you can take a TR? Why take a GWF when you can take a GWF? You can play this game forever.
Is it mandatory to take a cleric, of course not. It is not mandatory to take any specific class really outside of really low gear level breakpoints.
To say that we dont contribute as much as other party members is just ludacris and belies an underlying misunderstanding of what the class does IMO. (not trying to flame, i just really feel this way, we can agree to disagree if you'd like lol).
".....just not necessarily at the same time. Also, you'll be needing AS and sunburst, so really...pick one extra role from the above (we recommend another heal)."
I think my gripe (aside from righteousness, which remains all kinds of stupid) is that when AS had 100% uptime you could be a healbot + funtimez: so "AS, sunburst to fuel it, plus a fun power. PoD? Sure. DG for boss-melting? Why not. Another heal for really really damage-happy parties? Go for it! It's not mandatory though!"
I thought this was great. As long as I kept the tanks alive and happy in their blue, I could have some actual fun. This has always been my preferred healing strategy: enough healbot to be effective, then play with other stuff.
Now unless you have a well-coordinated party you more or less need to go full healbot. For pugs it's pretty much compulsory unless you want people to start screaming NUB CLEIRC and stuff.
You mean this one? http://www.tentonhammer.com/node/249375 where they talk about letting healers do more dps and take on a more aggressive role? The one where they then nerfed cleric dps afterwards?
You can use your channeled divinity at wills while moving.
Lets take the granddaddy of fantasy MMO's an an example of a pure healer. In Everquest the cleric was a pure healer and hitpoint buffer. The EQ cleric set the bar for healer characters in MMO's. My standard loadout in that game included 3 heals, 3 roots, one stun, and a nuke. Other options were turn undead spells, fear undead, fear living, and I'm sure some I'm missing. I couldn't do nearly the damage of any other caster, and my crowd control abilities were pretty pathetic BUT I did actually have the ability to nuke, root, stun, and heal effectively at all times if my mana management could support it. There wasn't nearly the diverse skillset in EQ as there is in this game, the main difference is that the spells were actually there for you to use should you wish at any time without sacrificing the ability to HEAL, and they weren't gamebreaking.
Sure the NW cleric is just a devoted cleric at this point, so the argument goes that even though every other class can have multiple viable paths through their powers and paragon feats etc the cleric should be confined to a tiny subset of the powers they have, and realistically limited to one paragon path under the DC path. So the argument is that just because the developers can't do the devoted cleric justice doesn't mean they won't be able to do a good job with other types of clerics. If the DC is the ultimate in healing, and does such a limp job of it, then I can't imagine any other type of cleric not being booted out of a group unless they are the 5th wheel.
I wonder if the game can survive long enough with the strong competitors on the horizon coming out later this year to ever see anything but the current paragon paths.
You sure can, but they are both pretty weak. The best use of a channeled divinity in my opinion is to throw linked spirit on a remote target followed by a healing word.
I assure you that my clerics do quite well in PvP relative to other clerics and that I'll continue to use lance of faith.
nobody really needs a cleric in PvE except for at end bosses and then the only players that will hang around the cleric's shield are the CWs and TRs... that the other classes don't need the cleric in the only battles that clerics are truly helpful in except for their CW and TR protection is an indication of a pretty poorly designed class
when the cleric casts anything it stops moving, to make matters worse many casts are time delayed and require additional stand still time to get them off (if you don't stand still after clicking them they get broken and don't work)
the cleric wasn't designed as a heal bot, in fact up until level 50 the cleric is a good all around player and up until the patch which reduced AS, placed penalties upon the cleric, fixed a skill that cut one of my cleric's divinity power gains in half, and boosted the fighter classes giving them stuff like extreme healing, immunity, increased defense and the like clerics were pretty solid as a class.... see that is the thing, the cleric was needed so what did this game do, they nerfed the cleric while bolstering the classes that they supported so that they no longer needed cleric support
TRs can choose to do crazy single target DPS (PvE/Executioner) can choose to fight in near perma-stealth for PvP (Saboteur/Scoundrel)
GWFs while still being not needed in PvE as adds can either be thrown off cliffs or perma-controlled while being killed by CWs. Not to say that their feat trees are useless, only made useless by game mechanics) are beasts (to the point of OP) in PvP (Sentinels)
GFs have one good feat line (Conqueror), but game mechanics and a good pilot can make them do crazy single target DPS AND tank (currently a bit OP). Their other feat lines are good, but doesn't make sense.
CWs can choose to focus on control (Renegade) or damage (Thaum), hell the Thaum line and a good geared CW can do both relatively well. The "Ice" control wizard is frowned upon but it still is good for what it does.
So what do DCs have? Virtuous is the hybrid line, Faithful the support line, and Righteous the Tank line. Of these 3 lines only faithful does it's job fine. Righteous and Virtuous are considered as gimicky as the Ice CW it's a joke. We don't tank anymore due to the .20 patch so Righteous is lackluster for what it does. Virtuous is also a bit all over the place
http://www.tentonhammer.com/node/249375
Look at how much BS this contains:
Complete BS lol.
3 heals. 3 encounter slots. Not a heal bot definitely.
Aggressive healer type? Do they mean stand up and spam healing word, astral shield, and sunburst? Maybe run around dodging the THREE mobs chasing you?
GF tanks, TRs DPS, CWs control, Clerics heal. Yup. No trinity right there.
PVP: How to make your life less miserable as a Devoted Clerics -- Still in it's Unfinished Glory
Dragon
Only 2 of these above mentioned abilities deal some damage, namely sunburst and forgemasters.
In D&D the cleric was designed to do be flexible. In 3.5 version he could simply convert spells to healing. In 4.0 healing even is a minor action that can be performed with out any effort on the fly.
In Neverwinter you have to choose either to heal or to do damage, because there are too less powers that can do both.
In Neverwinter I have the feeling there is no real concept of the cleric how it should work and what he should do, beside beeing a heal bot.
A quite nice system would be that ANY spell do additionally the same amount of damage in healing when cast in divinity. This would make spalls like daunting light and searing light more usefull for end content.
On the surface I would have to agree they have done a fairly good job of making a dps/healer but there are two major problems, the first is you need to severly outgear the content and the second is along the lines of the devs not wanting DC heals to be so good that players can stand in the red and get healed through it.
If players stand in the red and don't get the heals they want then look over to see their cleric dumping PoD, Daunting Light and LoF/SF on a mob they assume your a bad healer and it's your fault they died. Which of course is totally not the case the debuff's you apply to the enemies and buffs to your team coupled with the trickle of heals coming from Repurpose Soul, Astral Seal and Prophecy of Doom(well hardly a trickle, feated this baby gives some stellar heals) is more than sufficient to keep everyone topped up so long as nobody stands in the red.
the cleric was perfectly fine before they nerfed it, all they should have done was made AS non-stackable but instead they nerfed it in several ways and then bolstered the fighting classes like all beat hell so they could handle all the adds that the cleric had and from the cleric's standpoint the cleric would have rather kept those adds and be made immune and able to heal like all beat hell instead
This is scary. I did the exact same thing, heal in a similar way, have the same gear-score and feel the same way. Well... they say everyone has a twin... I don't suppose your Cleric is named Bob too?
I agree the Divine Cleric is broken. I'd like to see more things like Repurpose Soul since it is with mechanics like this that the Cleric can both dps and heal at the same time.
Also it is a bit ridiculous that a Cleric has to stack things like Regen and Life Steal just to keep themselves alive during fights. It makes no real difference to the Cleric, it is the rest of the party that suffers because there is a good 1500 points worth of stats that should be dedicated to dps or heals which must be wasted on survivability. Righteousnes is the main reason why a Cleric needs to severely outgear content in order to do pugs because without that extra 1500 stat points invested in something like regen the Cleric stands no chance.
Uh... what?
You can't take life steal and regeneration, for survivability purposes, in sufficient quantity without gimping your main stats. You can take some regeneration, life steal and deflection so that you can give it to the rest of your party (and increase its effect on yourself) using Linked Spirit. No stat is wasted on a Cleric. I try to take a bit of everything for that reason. It also means you don't have to go hard up against the 3k DR caps, Linked Spirit puts you way over them if you are in the 2k zone.
Cleric survivability comes from having a decent health pool, Holy Resolve (Seriously, this feat rocks. I've lost count of the times it has saved me), Linked Spirit (Sunburst switch spam), Astral Shield, Holy Word spam (non-divine to soften damage spikes and generate divinity), Divine Armor, good use of the slide and the occasional pot.
I've said it before and I'll say it again - Clerics don't heal through big damage in this game. Get your head around that concept and you'll be fine. Think mitigation, softening damage spikes, buffing your friends and constantly providing a stream (not a torrent) of regenerative effects. That's what we do well.
So that's all three encounters, one daily and at least two feats (three if you include the +%health feat that admittedly you'd be stupid not to get anyway).
Just to...stay alive?
And you still need potions. This is not a great state of affairs, no?
Simply put, your usual MMO healer does gimpy damage but has incredible survivability. This is useful in PvE because the healer is usually the line between win/wipe, and doubly useful in PvP because the healer is the one everyone tries to gank first, because they're stopping you killing anyone else.
In Neverwinter, we do gimpy damage but have mediocre survivability, and an inherent debuff to self healing. This is annoying but managable in PvE, and downright laughable in PvP, where everyone ganks us because we're stupidly easy to burn down, not because we're a priority asset.
We CAN do pretty good damage, but to do that (given that we only have so many slots on the bar) we have to sacrifice a lot (or indeed, all) of our heals, so we become "acceptable damage, zero survivability".
It's all managable, certainly, but it's just frustrating, and increasingly less fun. I'd like to feel like I was playing to the classes' strengths, rather than constantly fighting its stupidly-imposed weaknesses. Playing basically any other class makes me think "holy <font color="orange">HAMSTER</font> this is SO MUCH EASIER".
Actually that is the point, taking Regeneration/Deflect/Defence/Life Steal in sufficient quantities WILL gimp your stats. A dead Cleric heals nobody though so the rest of the party will just have to deal with it.
As for using the Linked Spirit|Sun Burst "Exploit", diminishing returns on the classes you buff mean they get negligible returns from it anyway.
On the whole a party would no doubt get more DPS and sufficient heals by stacking the Regen and Life Steal that a Cleric needs to themselves then just bring along one more DPS instead of the Divine Cleric.
Now I'm all for the Devs to want a situation where Cleric heals are insufficient to heal through standing in the red but they should make it clear to the other classes that this is the intended mechanic through an early quest chain but should they make it so blatently obvious then parties will just drop Clerics altogether and stick with Tank and four DPS all with Regen/Life Steal.
Righteousness needs to be countered in some way, it's a 40% debuff and Cleric heals are not supposed to keep other people up(just topped off) so obviously that 40% debuff to self heals is excessive and needs to be countered with +40% survivability from other forms (Defence/Deflect/Regeneration/Life Steal).
Personally I think the easiest solution is to buff Repurpose Soul to more like 30% Crits becomes an 80' range AoE heal. That way you can run with whatever you want, slot one good spot heal encounter like Healing Word or Bastion of Health for when things go a little pear shaped and away you go. Oh and introduce some good Regeneration gear.
Nice, no i have an Ioun stone named Breeze lol does that count?
I have been meaning to try out some other builds, just havent gotten around to it since this works sooo well. Doing the Divine + SB trick for linked spirit is something i cant really bring myself to do, so havent gone that route.
God i hate having to pay for respecs... there are tons i would love to try.
As with anything in forums everything is always laced with such hyperbole. I mean lets take a look, all Rogues are quitting for some reason, the company only cares about cash, there is never going to be an meaningful update ever again, clerics are broken, pvp is screwed up and not fun, the economy is completey crashing.
You can go to like 15 different game forums and this is all repeated **** near verbatim lol.
Loving my cleric. Awesome stuff.
I never said you had to use all of the abilities I listed at once "just to stay alive". I just listed most of the tools I use throughout the course of an engagement to keep myself AND my team alive. As for the "exploit", I already have a solution if the devs decide to change that mechanic. I try to use every tool available to me at the time. If you're choosing not to use the mechanic as it stands then you are shooting yourself in the foot. It's a bit like GWF who refuse to sprint-cancel because it goes against some unspoken code of gaming honour.
What is it with people and potions in this game? How hard is it to understand that the clearly intended way to rapidly regenerate a large percentage of your health pool is to use a potion? Clerics are clearly not intended, and I hope will never be intended, to replace this mechanic. Clerics are the gap fillers in groups. We bring all the extra bits that other classes can't provide or can't provide in sufficient quantity in one neat package. Sure, if you only need more of one thing, you are better off going to the class who specialises in the one area. It's why you see so many groups opting for 2x CW in PVE but if you need a bit more of a lot of things, there's only one class that does the job. Clerics.
From a PVP perspective, survivability is a bit of a moot point at the moment for all classes. Time to kill is too low and the amount of CC available (without diminishing effects) is too high. That doesn't mean the Cleric class is broken. It means the PVP system is or, at the very least, it means that the PVP system needs some adjustment in my opinion.
I think the truth of the matter lies in your last point. The Cleric class, as it is, just doesn't make sense to you. Clearly, you have a better understanding of other classes so you'd probably be happier (or less frustrated) playing them instead. That doesn't mean you are a bad player or stupid or anything else derogatory. It means exactly what I wrote, the Cleric class isn't for you right now. The supposed strengths you, and others demanding buffs, keep pointing to are false assumptions. We are not tanks and we are not healbots. Just because other MMOs supposedly have healers like that (and I'd be interested to know which ones you are referring to) doesn't mean that this game has to follow the same formula.
You don't use the trick or you don't take Linked Spirit? In my opinion both are almost mandatory. I say almost because there is a chance that the devs will change the mechanic, or nerf it, so it's good not to base your entire play-style around it (like the screams of woe that still echo the Temple from those that used Astral Shield as a crutch) What build are you using?
I don't have an Ioun Stone. I don't feel that I need one (or the Cat). I guess you could make the same arguments for the stone as I do the feat. :cool:
I'm glad to see there are others out there who are prepared to tinker with the class rather than settling on one build, having it fail and then rushing to the forums to demand buffs for a class that is *undeniably broken* because they couldn't make it work on the first attempt.
Can't comment on the rogue complaints but after wiping a few times to trash in whispering caverns just because I was too obstinate to drink my health potions, wearing full tier 1 with chants a small mantra came to mind "fck the Cleric" and I logged out.
I have not done PvP (not even once) for two weeks on my Cleric, last time I tried it upset me rather extremely. I refuse to do PvP on a Cleric.
I did some tests on Lance of Faith and Sacred Flame yesterday, I have Lance of Faith feated and 3/3 powered, Sacred Flame is 2/3 with no feats. The DPS I got from Sacred Flame was the same as Lance of Faith so with an extra power point in Sacred Flame it would do 10% more than Lance of Faith AND free up 5 feats. The Cleric is not even remotely balanced within its own set of abilities, how does anyone expect to find it balanced amongst the other classes.
edit: I just swung past the thieves den for a look since I will be shelving my Cleric and am looking for something else to play. One of the Threads has screen shots of solo'd dungeons on a Trickster Rogue, you know that thing that Clerics are not allowed to do and have been nurfed beyond repair to make sure we can't. The state of the Cleric is beyond a joke and there is no reasoning for it.
soloing a dungeon is pretty crazy.
Although i know that i can run T2's easily with just a CW and a TR. CW on adds, TR applying damage wherever its needed and me the cleric tanking boss and keeping everyone healed.
Just finished a 3 man Pirate King with zero wipes in record time lol.
yeah I know my TR solos dungeons.
I think the issue is, the damage is from a "Created Entity" rather than from the cleric. It seems like it shouldn't be that hard to fix the procs.
PvP buid taking the last defensive tree. Really easy to solo foundry quests with and plays excellent in PvP, but not interested in GG. For group runs, switch out chains of light for astral shield when stuff becomes difficult otherwise won't use AS until its absolutely needed (love having another cleric in the group so I don't ever have to slot AS). Chains is a really nice protection spell, someone is chasing you and you have damage simply cast it ahead of you at stairs or a hallway and keep going, sometimes use sunburst in divinity mode fist. Also when trying to hold a node its good for casting at the entrance to buy extra time to ensure its captured, also its good for protecting the party when stuff is approaching or when they are trying to flee or when they are in combat (oh hey, 3 of them are on you, lets just freeze those 3 and let you have fun with them for a short bit). In short, there is no way that I'm ever giving up chains of light (addition note: chains of light doesn't draw agro but sunburst certainly does). I end up first on randomly joined PvP teams quite frequently and get blues for it.
The Cleric is a mess. It very much looks like a few ideas were thrown in a hat, jumbled about and then drawn at random.
Apparently the devs ran 5-man content with the cleric to test it, if this is true I would really appreciate the specs they used.