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The new style of Cleric, what do you think of it?
godhric
Member, Neverwinter Beta Users Posts: 437 Bounty Hunter
You're free to post how you feel when you have tried the new cleric gameplay in the preview shard.
This is strictly speaking of the Divine mode rework and Empowered system. Not the paragon feats or the encounter tweaks... because most of them are great!
I still need huge adjustment, but of the top of my head.. there would be some serious drawbacks when adopting this new play style
The Pro :
*It has a great burst due to the 1x normal mode, then 3x spammable div encounter and followed by another 1x normal mode (+other 2 normal encounter in between)...
Note : Because of this, the divine encounters are gonna feel like half enc and half at-will due to its huge spammability. Remember, the devs really is against spamming of dailies... i feel that encounters should not be as spammable either..
*PvE situation this is gonna be great due to the lack of CC that enemies dish out and surely a boost to DPS DC.
The Con :
*I predict that due to lack of means to CC resist will render DCs still losing in most PvP fights. Because we need to "spam" THREE TIMES of 1 type of encounter (@ 15 sec interval before the stack runs out) to get that particular encounter's Empowered mode. In PvP situation, it will be a bit troublesome to achieve good stack of Empowered, because of the many CCs & prones we often get... The strength and quality in divine mode are severely nerfed (because of the them being more spammable now) and doesnt feel as rewarding when casted.
*Some divine versions of encounters arent well thought out yet.. like Astral Shield and HW only giving temp HPs. Really huge trade between it being spammable but really low effect quality and non-spammable but with the good effects that actually matter..
*Some normal version (altho empowered) are still not gonna do great... To name a few :
1. Bastion of Health : Forced to do the normal version to get a good effect... with the long cast time you will mostly get proned/CCed first (not counting having to spam the skill THREE TIMES first).. Also, our allies will most likely get out of the area when we actually cast the empowered BoH.
2. Daunting Light is gonna be downright unusable in PvP situation due to the empowered version's long wind-up and small AoE.
___________
All in all, i feel that the previous style is better and not much 'micro' managing of the 'stacks' and whatnot. Boosts/tweaks in the current encounter base capability and improvements in both heroic and paragon feats should suffice to our current live version.
TL;DR :
i dont like spamming too many 'mini' encounters just to cast 1 bolstered encounters.
It does trivialize the encounter down to an at-will level..
This is strictly speaking of the Divine mode rework and Empowered system. Not the paragon feats or the encounter tweaks... because most of them are great!
I still need huge adjustment, but of the top of my head.. there would be some serious drawbacks when adopting this new play style
The Pro :
*It has a great burst due to the 1x normal mode, then 3x spammable div encounter and followed by another 1x normal mode (+other 2 normal encounter in between)...
Note : Because of this, the divine encounters are gonna feel like half enc and half at-will due to its huge spammability. Remember, the devs really is against spamming of dailies... i feel that encounters should not be as spammable either..
*PvE situation this is gonna be great due to the lack of CC that enemies dish out and surely a boost to DPS DC.
The Con :
*I predict that due to lack of means to CC resist will render DCs still losing in most PvP fights. Because we need to "spam" THREE TIMES of 1 type of encounter (@ 15 sec interval before the stack runs out) to get that particular encounter's Empowered mode. In PvP situation, it will be a bit troublesome to achieve good stack of Empowered, because of the many CCs & prones we often get... The strength and quality in divine mode are severely nerfed (because of the them being more spammable now) and doesnt feel as rewarding when casted.
*Some divine versions of encounters arent well thought out yet.. like Astral Shield and HW only giving temp HPs. Really huge trade between it being spammable but really low effect quality and non-spammable but with the good effects that actually matter..
*Some normal version (altho empowered) are still not gonna do great... To name a few :
1. Bastion of Health : Forced to do the normal version to get a good effect... with the long cast time you will mostly get proned/CCed first (not counting having to spam the skill THREE TIMES first).. Also, our allies will most likely get out of the area when we actually cast the empowered BoH.
2. Daunting Light is gonna be downright unusable in PvP situation due to the empowered version's long wind-up and small AoE.
___________
All in all, i feel that the previous style is better and not much 'micro' managing of the 'stacks' and whatnot. Boosts/tweaks in the current encounter base capability and improvements in both heroic and paragon feats should suffice to our current live version.
TL;DR :
i dont like spamming too many 'mini' encounters just to cast 1 bolstered encounters.
It does trivialize the encounter down to an at-will level..
Post edited by godhric on
0
Comments
It has been very well publicized on here and other class forums which skills are either useless or significantly under performing. By the same token, the popular skills have also been recognized - these are traditionally highlighted in the Cleric build guides.
Good suggestions have been put forward in regard to our under performing skills: raising the % output, increasing their aoe, etc etc.
The long standing issue of Righteousness has been written about more or less from day one. More recently the issues of a lack of CC immunity and the poor state of the Cleric Heroic feats have also been high on the list of issues.
An alternative way forward would have been to:
-prioritize the broken/unused abilities
-revising heroic feats
-adding some kind of cc immunity
-removing righteousness
-increasing the dps output*
*I'm with the idea of the feats rework, a dps tree would obviously be popular for the class.
Not so sure about the popularity of a pure healing tree due to a couple of things:
- the efficiency of doing the standard daily quests
- the way the game has progressed with the well documented power creep and lifesteal mechanics.
At present, dps classes can out heal the Cleric. The solution here appears to have been a pure healing tree that takes the class back to the top of the healing figures - But the pve game content simply does not need this.
If groups can quite happily complete dungeons with dps classes, (even more so by a spec'd SW), then there is simply no reason to include a pure healing Cleric.
So a dps one? Well if the class's lower damage output was mitigated by buff/debuff group abilities then ok. But isn't that what we have now?
With the current game content and associated with the other classes mechanics, the Cleric would only be on an even footing if they where either:
a) a comparable high damage class
b) a buff/debuffer
Looking at these two:
->a) the game does not need another "me too" dps class. Going down this road ends in all classes doing the same thing just with different animations
->b) This is what we are, and will stay that way until changes outside the Cleric class take place.
So, focusing back to the proposed Cleric changes:
I would not have gone with such an overhaul of the class abilities, of course something had to be done.
With such an overhaul bugs will be introduced, we still have them now on the original skill set. The fear is that we would just be swapping one set of bugs for another.
Likewise with all these ability changes. The overhaul has seen reductions to popular skills and improvements to previously unpopular ones.
The question here is why? Why do the players have to be faced with this smorgasbord of lowered/raised abilities?
Surely a simpler way forward - and one likely to introduce fewer bugs - would have been to keep the overall mechanics the same, whilst focusing on improving the class's deficiencies as outlined earlier.
General micromanaging & effectiveness of these new mechanics in a high activity environment and pvp.
The requirement to cast this skill/to get to that skill/to get to the other skill - works well on certain targets. Stationary or possibly ones with well telegraphed mechanics.
PVP in particular is the antithesis of this. Only extended game time will prove the effectiveness or otherwise of this staged casting requirement. I feel that the continued lack of any cc immunity combined with the class's proposed sequential casting mechanics will not favor this environment.
Fast paced pve encounters would also appear to work against this micromanaging, skill 1->skill 2->skill 3, necessity. No doubt over time it would become easier for some players. But there are others - who have already started to post - who admit they will struggle with this new complexity.
Now it may make some people feel good to say that this is now an elite play style for hardcore and not for lesser mortals, but that should not be the target of any Cleric changes.
TLDR - This level of overhaul is unnecessary - fix the unused/broken abilities, improve dps output, add some kind of cc immunity ability, revise heroic feats. Leave popular skills alone (some of these may also be affected by an overall dps improvement)
Finally and something out of the left field - Introduce switchable feat trees as a class ability. If you are going to continue with a pure healing tree, then give the class the mechanic to have two player built presets for different occasions.
"Mod 6. Oh my f****** god. It gutted the game pure and simple. And what wasn't gutted was messed up by the poorly thought out new level cap and equip. The game never recovered from that atrocity".
..............not this one then.............
The new paragon paths and feats, etcetera: I like them a lot.
As for the new mechanics I 'kind of' like them, but it's definitely a learning curve. Here what I'm feeling - and I reiterate: it's just my feeling on it; opinion thus far:
The new Divinity aspect where there are no cool downs on encounters is a bit tricky for this reason: when I go into Divinity even spamming the encounters doesn't FEEL like they are doing any more damage or affect/effect as without Divinity. For example: I've been specifically paying attention to the new Sunburst and Daunting Light encounters (I suppose I'm in the minority when I say I LOVE the default knock-back).
I'm not sure but it appears Sunburst does NOT knock-back when in Divine mode. Daunting light 'feels' like it deals the same damage when spammed 4 time in Divine mode as it does once in normal mode.
Mu suspicion is that Divine Mode encounter pawers are designed to do less damage per shot as the non-divine mode versions, but when "spammed" will end up cause the same or near-same amount of damage. So this brings the question of "why bother with Divine mode to begin with?" - The answer to which is to intentionally build stacks of Empowerment.
So it feels like the real "special effect" of Encounter powers is intended to be the Empowered version, which we now have to use the intermediary Divinity version to achieve. THIS is bring-in the micromanagement requirement to be able to get to the true "power" version of Encounters.
So not only does it make things more confusing by literally tripling ability stats that we have to mentally keep track of and also getting to the true-benefit versions requires the extra step of using Divinity to "charge" them up, and thus taking 30% longer to get there.
I'm not saying I don't like the new system, I;m saying it's a mixed blessing of sorts (no pun intended). As it is though, I prefer this new system (all of it: mechanics and feat trees) over the old system. It's just a huge new learning curve.
I dont mind things like a feat rework or power adjustment and some bug fixes, but this entire reformulation of clerics is just overkill. And to me feels like clerics come out in an overall lesser state. Sure they excell at a few things now. But theres less room for diversity and takes way too much commitment to try and memorize playing this class well with this new mechanic.
Kind of just feels all over the place to me.
I should not complain if the clerics are able to do better healing or dps than before, but if the cleric is still worse than any other class, it is not a great motivator to learn all this new micro. Also with regards to the healing improvements, has anyone tested if the cleric can beat a temptation warlock in healing, I am guessing that it would require something like a x5 healing improvement for a high geared cleric to compete with a high geared SW, somehow I doubt they gave the cleric that much healing power though.
Well said. I have tested all three paths now and quite frankly none are anything special. Going full tard DPS build will net you a little more damage than live but at the cost of survivability. Faithful heals really well but still nowhere close to a SW because of simple mechanics. SW heals will negate the big burst heal capability of Faithful because it only procs at 30 percent health...the rest of the time you will be storing healing while the SW is actually healing. The top Virt path is a complete fail...similar or even less healing than live with all the drawbacks of live versatility lost.
The best extreme soloing build I've come up with so far is Faithful with a dip in the DPS bottom path. You are extremely hard to kill and get some damage bonus..not the few seconds of DPS capstone and the broken fire feat but the extra 20 percent damage from the top 2 selections in DPS tree at least give you something. Make no mistake, you are still working 4x harder at micromanagement bullspit for very little real gain over current live possibilities. Compared to other classes we are still light years behind and now even less fun to play.
But the changes have a great potential. I'm not completely convinced I want to give up on my hybrid role, doing a bit of everything, but the damage buffs are absolutely needed and the healing changes are nice. Hopefully gentlemancrush will realize he needs to change lifesteal so that healing DCs get some work to do. DCs are definitely on the right track, hopefully this won't be toned down. More micromanagement also means that excellent DCs will be gods among mortals if you manage your stuff well enough, as long as there arent major nerfs.
Raist Torilrocker | Dwarf | DCWaterdeep Dungeon & Salvage LLC
http://www.twitch.tv/raist718/profile
From the preliminary testings I've done against some BiS players on the preview server, I could say we're in a good shape now (HR can't kill us anymore
Our feats are working great, but heroic feats need to be reworked tho.
Mod 12.5 PvP Power/Crit/Arp Optimization
Youtube channel (PvE/PvP)
Agree with this completely.
The new changes on preview add a layer of complexity & micromanagement that makes the task of playing a DC more "daunting," than anything.
I can work around the new feats to potentially reprise my role of mitigation/buff/debuff. But as far as the encounter reworks and mini-spammable divinity mode -- they are an unnecessary and lackluster addition to the class.
Cleric: Marquis Elmdore - Current Main
Wizard: Iamblichus
Fighter: Anna the Titan
Barbarian: Anann Valkyrja
Ranger: Minerva Cory'phaia
Warlock: Suri Coralyne Reid
Guild: She Looked Level 18.
Alliance: Imperium
Probably due to one of our feats Test of Faith and several other healing feats + the improved encounters ?? Not necessarily the playstyle.. Yes, from the viewpoints of feats alone they are GREAT mostly..
But i think it is important to stress that the point of this thread is the PLAYSTYLE change... from the non-spammable but effective divine mode, to a spammable mini-encounters now known as the divine mode.
Which playstyle do you prefer?
With the change, yes we are indeed stronger.. but that can also be ACHIEVABLE without changing the gameplay of DCs. Is changing how divine mode works really necessary? That is the big question..
I've tested both Virtuous and Righteous, Virtuous capstone is really good too, but I still prefer Righteous because Test of Faith is just too good (it has the highest HPS according to ACT log).
I think the new Empowered system is an unnecessary rework, it doesn't really improve anything, what make us stronger now are the feats and the increased base healing of some of our powers.
Mod 12.5 PvP Power/Crit/Arp Optimization
Youtube channel (PvE/PvP)
It's become a lot more complicated, some divine powers can stack 3 times and empowered has 3 stacks but overall i like it.
Record is 63k with daunting light without crit
By reading the tooltips you can make very cool combo's, the only thing i am worried about is that in battle where you need to dodge, enemy's move around and look at placement of the powers it becomes very hard to actually pull of full combo's where you need to hit 5 encounters in a row.
So all in all our damage has been buffed greatly we really need to rethink how we play, what we use and in what order.
It comes down to whether or not you like it has become more complicated and skill based, for now i am saying i like it.
As feedback to the higher ups that might be reading: Look at the heroic feats half of them are truly awful.
http://nw-forum.perfectworld.com/showthread.php?694561-DC-Heroic-Feats-rework-suggestion
I am not going to try out the other tree's so would like to hear what others think about those, are they viable?
right now i am still of the opinion that buff/debuff is the way to go. Upping the damage of everyone indirectly heals them too because of life steal.
Encounter, At-Will, At-Will, Dodge, At-Will, Encounter, Dodge, Encounter, reposition, repeat.
That's been it, guys. That's been us Clerics since day-1. This uncreative, bulky, almost bloated and underwhelming force with all of four tricks up its sleeve at any given time, be it a healer or a debuffer.
But now? I'm absolutely smitten with the build possibilities. No longer do you have to specialize in one tree to be effective in whatever your specialty is. At long last, we're becoming as diverse as the D&D world portrays us.
....Now if only they'd bring back Turn Undead and thac0 from the old AD&D days.
Real Men Calculate THAC0.
Do not mistake your personal preference and playstyle to everyone else.
My DC was never boring, and for it to be the most effective i always had to be fast paced and vigilante.
I agree with you, geeq5.
I mean, if you want to go there willfoot, one could argue that with the changes, the rotation will be:
At-will, at-will, at-will, at-will, at-will, at-will, at-will, at-will, at-will, at-will...3 pips! Spam divine encounters 3 times...1.....2.....3. Now use the same regular encounter!
Yes, I am sure that is very fast-paced.
Cleric: Marquis Elmdore - Current Main
Wizard: Iamblichus
Fighter: Anna the Titan
Barbarian: Anann Valkyrja
Ranger: Minerva Cory'phaia
Warlock: Suri Coralyne Reid
Guild: She Looked Level 18.
Alliance: Imperium
I wasn't speaking on behalf of the community, sir. I was offering a singular opinion that actually brought me out of lurk. Last time I posted on here before tonight, I think Sharandar had just opened...
Point is, I do love the class, but it got a little stagnant after a year for me. Most of the other classes had received love many times, but we only got the extra paragon and were left alone. I still played him though, and I still enjoy playing him. But here we are, with a new playing field in a manner of speaking. I can't wait to tinker with the builds on the live server. I foresee a lot of respec tokens in my future.
Maybe i'm the only one here, but I thought DC was perfect. I love my DC as she is.
Now granted, I do no damage, but that's fine because I'm not there to do damage.
I also don't heal that great, but that's also fine, because good teams don't need healing.
As for buff and debuff, if i can keep everything up team DPS increases almost 100% and team survivability 200%. That is really amazing.
I think in any group of 5, the 5th needs to be a buff/debuff DC. They are just otustanding as they are and far more valuable than just about any class or spec you could take with you.
Now i loose all that for what? to spam encounters that do some more damage, but it's damage the party never needed anyway.
Oh yeah, my encounters now do more healing, but it's healing the party didn't need anyway.
It's like they are catering to people who whine the loudest instead of catering to people who make sense. Overall i think this rework is fail.
Everything you need to know about CW:
http://nw-forum.perfectworld.com/showthread.php?780981-Chem-s-CW-Compendium-Everything-you-need-to-know
The effects of cross procing are rampant and it would ruin synergy builds because they are Over Powered. Either they cancel cross procing and ruin the power system or clerics will take over Neverwinter.
(Edited out do to irrelevant for discussion)
It clashes with parts of the previous system which seems to throw off a lot of the build makeup it may need to only be restricted for clerics or something else.
You have posted this image several times in the feedback forum, where it is being questioned. Probably better to keep it to that forum where you can concentrate on the questions against it.
Now the devs want feedback, but posting a single image that is being questioned as it includes effects from the other class being trialed will not be seen as definitive evidence. Ideally players offering spreadsheets of a series of diverse group runs, highlighting the party composition etc etc.
As it is now the TR revisions are also going through the same experimental phase, so any ongoing changes to that class would ideally mean a repeat of these runs. Likewise of course with the Cleric.
"Mod 6. Oh my f****** god. It gutted the game pure and simple. And what wasn't gutted was messed up by the poorly thought out new level cap and equip. The game never recovered from that atrocity".
..............not this one then.............
How does it fare with the current live version (excluding the feats ofc and encounter boost [such as Bastion of health])... So, this is STRICLY speaking of the divinity playstyle difference.
Up till now, i still like the current live version better.. because it is SIMPLER and MORE FLUID... Why cant they just improve our class [Power & Feats] without changing how it is played?
Originally, we can cast 3 divine encounters [which has substantial impact & effects] one after another, CONSECUTIVELY... Now on ptr, we have to cast THREE TIMES the divine encounter [nerfed as hell ofc due to spammability] to be able to cast ONE empowered version of our normal encounter, we LOST time by the way in order to spam these 3 now MEDIOCRE encounters... We got NO CONTROL either when to use the power we want to be boosted. Meaning, after 3 casts of divine.. you gotta cast the power you want empowered RIGHT AFTER... While with the current live divine mode, we can safe / use depending on the situation we see fitting.
While there are some that would probably think that it is much better in the ptr version.. trust me, it has nothing to do with the divinity rework.. it is more to do with the Encounter boost & the feats...
IMO, playstyle actually is more gimped than before..
TL; DR:
I like how they actually took the time to improve this class
I like the encounter improvements especially Bastion of Health and Divine Glow & Break the Spirit.
I hate the new playstyle along with its inflexibilities
I hate how Exaltation lost its immunity bubble.. So, now AC DC seriously has to wonder why they take that paragon path to begin with.
Comments:
1. Astral seal heal healing less. I didn't feel much difference but why make things even worse.
2. I didnt get impression there is a clear distinction between first 2 support trees. It lacks more uniquness and emphasizing on role. Then i could really want to reroll my DC to pure healer role. DPS role tree is very practical for solo and LFG - teams need DPS boost and no one will complain to get such DC. Protection is much better implemented with GF KV concept, which in most cases makes DC defence way too redundant and heals are not issue either: higher DPS - more gain from Lifesteal. As i do some GF myself i appreciate Astral Seal providing heal from reflective damage and HG buff, but i don't expect special treatment. More heals at 30% sounds great but can be too late for GF.
I would like see one strong party heal-defence tree, one party-control-mitigation and debuff-buff tree and one pure dps with least party benefits which allows such DC play in same league with normal classes. What i see is that DC is treated as too special, iconic example of support class from legacy mmo games.
3. I would like to have more controls and better visual indication for Empowered mode. I like idea of working to get stacks, but i want to decide what ability and when i will use in this mode. It should be presented together with divinity.
4. Forgemaster doesn't heal anymore in divine mode - it was good healing and what are alternativies ?
5. On live, Sunburst is useful for pure team healing and spreading armor debuffs, but with new mob throw-away form you will risk to get kicked from party. Divine mode serves purpose of pushing on live, you have control when you need to do so with team sitting on boss.
— (The unwritten rule)
In a party it's horrible, anything but a dps build is unplayable. I'm not even saying it's useless, you can't play anything but dps in a group, due to the fact that by the time you're done going through your two layers of **** to use (making divinity and then empowerment) to get the "live" effect on a spell everything is dead. So um if this goes live without huge changes I'll retire my cleric. I have a CW already to zerg content, I don't need a second one.
And all this, because of 1 stupid table called "Paingiver" that measures the "ego of the whale".
I dont think so, SWs already trivialize gwf class. So they have nothing to complain to anymore.
Whats the issue with the rework is pretty clear to most of us, the healing lines are extremely sub par, with lacked utility and functionality for the group.
There just simply is no reason to play anything besides a dps cleric.
If you want to heal, roll a temp warlock, they do more dps and healing then a healing cleric after mod 5.
Feedback is posted on this in preview forum, but we will wait and see what comes of it, if they figure out something , it might work.