Is it just me or?

Christona - Raging Tide

(Please no trolling)
Am I the only one, that when I was a newbie and just leveling my cleric, I was told that sage cleric were the ultimate healing power in PWI? (Before the addition of mystics and even the infamous blood paint.) Not to start a troll page about sage verse demon clerics. Even to this day, as a demon cleric I still find people scoffing although be it in a half sarcastic tone, that sage is SO much better.

Example: I was talking to a high level barb (this barb has never really even considered being a cleric) about cultivation paths, demon and sage barbs, demon and sage archers, demon and sage clerics and other classes. He had the understanding that demon clerics don’t have an all exp saving rez, weaker buffs, and some other things that degrade demon clerics. (Please do not troll this person for being misinformed or ****)

That’s not the only person I have talked to that they have the impression that sage clerics are way better than a demon in most aspects of healing. My post isn’t trolling people misinform or stupidity.

One prime example is that most people, still today, think that sage buffs are better. I can see where this would happen. Normally people click “C” and look at their defenses. Seeing their defenses way higher than normal NOT knowing that it will go back to the same old buffed defenses that any 70+ cleric buffs would give you (granting them that have leveled their buffs up to max by now) after 10 mere seconds. After that not bothering to check their defenses again. I haven’t seen this as much these days but when I was leveling up, most people would pay anywhere from 50k to 100k for full sage buffs. My FB69 tank got sage buffs for 100k as I recall.

The point of this post, is it the people I talk to, or has the sage clerics of old, played their cards very well, and have the general population today, thinking that sage is the way to go. Giving the impression that demon clerics do not have good buffs, or 100% exp saving rez. By this, I mean, players that have no intention of being a cleric and wouldn’t bother to look at the skills online.

I can even include other classes in this post. Such as people do not know that demon hp buff does give 40% increase on hp same as sage. The only difference is that sage is an hour and demon gives 15 (is that right?) chi. Also, the serve hatred of sage archers, I have seen from a lot of people. (Do not even dare start a troll about sage archers or any class cultivations.

I was just wondering if I was the only one that had encountered this in game play. Thanks for the non-TROLLing replies. XD

y4kuzi

I've encountered such sort of situations as well.

Nowitsawn - Heavens Tear

Christona - Raging Tide wrote: »

is it the people I talk to

Yup.

People that are that horribly misinformed and still feel the need to tell people that actually play the class about it are generally not worth talking to.

What caused this weird stereotype of cleric cultivation choices is still a mystery to me. Maybe people made some weird connection between sage and ''holy and supportive'' and demon with ''offensive and unsupportive''.

ovenusarmanio

I've actually gotten flak for being sage and if you look at the sage/demon culti discussions on the forums, a lot of people recommend demon more than sage. So I guess the misconceptions about clerics continue and there is always someone else that thinks they know more about what culti which would best for you than you do.

Sage does factually have a stronger IH than demon though. Sage buffs are objectively better in an instance because they are spammable and reliable. Sage IH objectively heals more than Demon IH. Demon IH heals mana though which is arguably better, depending on who you ask. Demon purify may be better for the cleric because it requires no chi, but sage is instant and in instances where you need that. Which do you think the tank will prefer? I'm not saying that demon doesn't have it's strong points, all in all this a very balanced culti choice and skill matters much more than a chosen cultivation. I'm just saying this the old perception did not come from nowhere. And there are some things sages do better than demons (like buffs and single target heals) and some things demons do better than sage (like group heals, chi gain, and damage).


edit: Also because sage buffs are better when the cleric is hanging out with you, people just assumed it's because they are better period. But both of are the same if the person is just paying you to buff them so they can off on their own.

Sakubatou - Sanctuary

I remember those days, but that changed almost 3 years ago. Hard to believe there are still some people around believing those things.

I leveled my cleric, barb, and bm all together along with a friend who was leveling his cleric. I wanted to be a class was needed and helped greatly and that was either the healer or the tank, and back then there was only one heal class and one tanking class. He wanted to pvp and thought a class that could heal themselves would be excellent in pvp, but when he found out some of the dd difference and squishiness of clerics he felt it was too late to switch classes and level something new.

So I was designated a "support cleric" and "pve cleric" and he was a "dd cleric" and "pvp cleric" builds. Okay. So, whats the difference? Well, a support cleric has to have strong heals so they go almost pure magic. And a PvE cleric doesn't really need extra vit for just pve so they go pure magic. BUT! A dd cleric wants strong attacks so they're pure magic build. And for the pvp build to get by charms and heal themselves fully and quickly they'll need pure magic. He always tried to put labels on what I was and what he was but in the end we both were pure magic builds, both healed as much as was needed and DD'd/debuffed as much as we could afford. Same build, similar playstyles, almost the same gear, just different titles, lol.

So when it came down to choosing our cultis it was the old belief of "demon is for pvp/DDing, sage is for support." Well. I'm support so I have to chose sage right? I looked it over, did the math, and like demon for healing better and thought I could support more with faster rezzes, mana healing, defense buffs, not needing chi for purify so it was reliable, passing chi... as well as faster dding and less penalizing seals which was in line with my idea of supporting. So I chose demon for support/pve and my friend chose demon for dd cleric/pvp.

My barb married a cleric who I leveled with since about level 25 and she went sage for support. Does a great job, too.

I think alot of our beliefs were set in 2009. Sage barbs tank. Only apsers chose demon for archer/bm/barb. Support clerics chose sage. If a veno wants to pk they go demon... But the game has evolved. These ideas were set when level 80 squads were doing TT 3-x and the tiniest bit of cleric "oompf" in heals helped. When TT80 +5 was consider endgame. When aps was almost unheard of, when we had limited choices for +stat gear and no one could afford multiple sets of gear for gear swapping. When aggro was done by skills rather than damage output and was unremovable despite the DD output.

Xainou - Sanctuary

Yep. Some people seem to be stuck with "demon clerics metal mages, sage healers!".

I'm a demon myself and to me, a good cleric is a good cleric. Both culti choices are pretty balanced and I've met epic pros of both paths.

Xx_BeLLa_xX - Harshlands

Yup many people don't know really all the difference of sage/demon clerics, as we don't know all difference of other class sage/demon as well.

Sometime it's just people that are not informed, as sometime it come from clerics them self, as sometime it's just come from stupid people.

The ''sage=support or demon=pvp'' it's stupid, as ''sage=chi'', on all class people think sage=chi, but actually for cleric it's not true.

There was a sage cleric in game that was telling me that ''sage cleric make chi faster bla bla'' so we did build chi from 0 to full many time and every time I was full before him (on my demon cleric) and he was kinda on the shock cause he was sure that sage cleric was getting more fast chi than demon and that was with heals/buff, so in a TW or PvP where clerics use a lot plume shell and purify the sage waste way much more chi than demon as well.

There's almost 80-85% of people that think sage cleric is better for chi, other class and sage cleric them self, I think only the demon clerics know that we actually make chi more fast and our skills cost less chi as well.

Yes I'm personally someone that prefer demon, but a good cleric will do a good job demon or sage or even with skills level 10. Some people in game say sage is better or demon is better while they are terrible clerics.

I don't think sage is bad even if i prefer demon, what I hate it's sage cleric trying to trash demon cleric on fake reasons as saying ''Sage is better we got more chi'' ... zzz not even true.

The sage vs. demon will probably always exist for some class like cleric and mystic, as there will always be people that don't play cleric or know our skills that will judge and say sage or demon is better, I personally think that the best person to know which one is better is someone that played both culti, but even there it's a personal choice.

Some people have 2-3 skills level 11 and are still really good cause to be honest which cleric skills other class really notice it's sage or demon, in a stack of IH they don't know if it's sage or demon (in the way of the healing, ofc the tank will prolly notice his mp get up on demon, but on a IH stack the 10% cannot be feel), the culti doesn't affect the BB, the only damage skill that a other class can notice it's on demon wield thunder and even that probably 5% of people (other class) know what demon wield thunder do.

People will often notice a sage cleric by sage vanguard spirit and a demon by SoR and demon ress, some people don't even know what's the sage ress bonus, many people think that sage ress save 100% of exp and demon ress fast, while both save 100% exp and sage have 40 meters range and demon the channeling.

Some people will say also sage can be see by Celestial Guardian's Seal and Magic Shell, but of my own experience I never saw a sage cleric use them on people, some sage clerics will use Magic Shell on them self, but it's rare. No idea if it's cause my server is full of fail sage clerics that don't know their skills, but I never saw one use those skills unless that was for solo buff a person that died or wasn't there at the AoE buff.

Even in caster I saw a lot of demon clerics use Spirit's Gift, but never saw a sage use Magic Shell.

Fryvorg - Sanctuary

In general, sage is rather defensive (and sometimes less depending on luck = safer) and demon is rather offensive. I think it's just the identification with the path you chose for yourself that makes one say it is better. Or just the lack of knowledge. But in my opinion, the choice of cultivation is hyped too much. The skills give a nice little bonus you can live without if you don't have it, but you also won't want to drop it if you do have it^^
I have all sage skills on my Cleric. I chose this path because I just liked sage's extras more than demon's overall. However, sometimes I think of how nice it was if I could do the tank a favor (especially vortexing Seekers) with the little MP add every IH. Or if I could revive twice as fast. Or if I had the freeze effect of Tempest. But that's really the minority of skills for me (basically these three) and yet again, I have another extra which is cool, as well.
Also, all buffs (wether demon or sage) last 1 hour and have a range of 30 despite what the description (or your friend) says. And both revives absorb all exp losses.

Xx_BeLLa_xX - Harshlands wrote: »

Some people will say also sage can be see by Celestial Guardian's Seal and Magic Shell, but of my own experience I never saw a sage cleric use them on people, some sage clerics will use Magic Shell on them self, but it's rare. No idea if it's cause my server is full of fail sage clerics that don't know their skills, but I never saw one use those skills unless that was for solo buff a person that died or wasn't there at the AoE buff.

Even in caster I saw a lot of demon clerics use Spirit's Gift, but never saw a sage use Magic Shell.

In case of Sage Celestial Guardian's Seal it's just that hardly anybody owns it. It's either very expensive or rare or both. But ever since I have learned it, I used it constantly on every pulling occasion. And I could even go into VD for the phys immune version of the double boss in AEU
That's one of the few lv. 11 skills that really changed my play style (as an exception to what I said above).

Sakubatou - Sanctuary

Xx_BeLLa_xX - Harshlands wrote: »

The ''sage=support or demon=pvp'' it's stupid, as ''sage=chi'', on all class people think sage=chi, but actually for cleric it's not true.

Its true for BMs as well where demon BMs build chi/conserve chi in many ways better than sage.

Another sage/demon culti myth is with the chi skills themselves. Sage gives you 50 chi every 60 seconds, demon removes 50 chi every 30 seconds, meaning when sage and demon pvp the demon can remove opponent chi twice as fast as a sage can put it on.

Still... cloud eruption ftw. Off topic but another misconception is how much mana pots casters use verses how much HA/melee users use. I can tell you right now my barb never uses an hp pot but some of my casters will use one right when they're hit "just in case" and end up using 3-4 times as many hp pots, while my barb, bm, seeker, and slightly less-so but my sin need to constantly spam mp pots. For my barb I get 6-8 skills then need to use a pots, same with my bm. Seeker skills are less expensive but they spam skills like crazy and therefore run out of mp fast, and vortex eats them as fast as they cooldown. Meanwhile my wizzy and cleric have 16k and 11k mp and a recover rate of 70-80 mp/sec and I might use 3 mp pots per BH.

My main expense for my cleric is chi stones for my genie from having to holy path and the occasional cloud eruption.

Xx_BeLLa_xX - Harshlands

Sakubatou - Sanctuary wrote: »

Its true for BMs as well where demon BMs build chi/conserve chi in many ways better than sage.

No idea for other class cause I never played a BM high level enough to be sage or demon, I just played sage & demon cleric and mystic and demon veno, but no demon skills on veno. xD

SxeChik - Archosaur

The opt was wrong. Demon is way better than sage!

I'm just kidding. Like people have said above, each path has its own perks.

Being a demon gives me the ability to pull the tank back up fast (within less than 3s as I have channeling gears) to continue tanking even when squad (except the cleric) is wiped. Also, my demon SoR gives the tank extra phy. def. along with the heal. These 2 skills have saved me and my squad countless of times in TT3-1 against GBA. With demon Silent Seal and Sleep, I can cast on the target without getting weak(attack) or slow(speed) debuffs.

Yet, being sage would allow cleric to res the dead from a 40m range. Also sage Celestial Guardian Seal can heal the target, so a cleric can heal the tank as he's pulling without even getting aggro. As I don't read much bout sage skills, I cannot tell more (I did go through both paths when I was making my choice, but now I forgot most sage bonuses). But based on what other people have said above bout sage, one can compare it to demon and make their own preference.

At the end of the day, if a cleric knows what to do in certain situations while playing, they'd do fine regardless whether they're an angel or a devil. People who have been in squad with me are always pleased with the way I take care of them, and again, I'm a demon.

I do not agree with the idea of sage being better than demon or the other way around. However, I do agree that sage is slightly more for healing as there are more HP bonuses coming with sage (IH, Celestial Guardian Seal,...) , and demon is more for DD-ing as demon Thunder Wield gives metal debuff, demon spark gives more damage,...

Cleric is a very interesting class to play because if geared and added points right, one could pull and tank also b:chuckle. The trolls know nothing. One should be their OWN judge. I love this seem-to-be-squishy class.