EQMac.com

Al’Kabor
A Cleric’s Guide

Part 1: Character design and attributes

Prologue

This guide isn’t intended to be really comprehensive. It is primarily intended to talk about Clerics from the perspective of a high level Cleric. There isn’t going to be a lot of time spent on how you get there, but rather on what you want to focus on as you do and what you can do with your character once you are there. That being said, the purpose of this document is to introduce everyone to the Cleric Class within the special limitations and features of the Al’Kabor server. Most of the material here (at least to start) comes from my own experience in the game of Everquest. I started playing prior to the release of Kunark, and have watched the game evolve – until I stopped playing on the PC side with the Lost Dungeons of Norrath expansion. I am most familiar with High Elf clerics, but have toyed around with Gnome clerics and Dark Elf clerics a bit. Parts of this guide are only going to apply to high end raiding Clerics. And many clerics who read this may never get into that aspect of the game. But, I have tried to be quite helpful where I can to suggest alternatives in terms of gear and such to help allow non-raiding Clerics see some of the same benefits as raiding Clerics.

Al'Kabor does not have enough Cleric mains, and while we see a lot of botted and boxed Clerics, my hope is that this guide may also invite some persons to give Clerics a go as a main and to see the fun that this class can be.

Strengths

First, Clerics generally make a good party better. Clerics do not add much DPS to a group. In fact, many times, we may feel like we are essentially an experience soaking insurance policy. However, Clerics tend to allow everyone else to focus on their respective roles without worrying about whether or not they are going to live or die. This usually translates into faster kills.

Second, Clerics are the only (pure) caster class that is also a plate class. This means that Clerics tend to do fairly well in terms of AC. However, this is mitigated somewhat by a bug on Al’Kabor. Unlike other classes, Clerics have a hard cap on our AC at 1450. Even with this limitation, Clerics can tank rather well up to a certain point in the game. Cleric tanks do have a harder time maintaining aggro (unless they are healing themselves), and tend to need to load and use several stuns to maintain aggro, but Clerics do make effective tanks. That certain point in the game will be determined by a number of factors including overall HPs, AC, and AAs purchased.

Third, Clerics make excellent green mob farmers at high levels. Unlike any other PBAoE farmers, Clerics have the advantage of a high AC with plate mitigation. This means that Clerics can usually pull more mobs at a time to AE nuke without suffering huge risks in the process. This makes Clerics excellent faction and green drop farmers. There are limits to this of course, and enough mobs will take you out, but, once you know your limitations, it is very effective.

Fourth, you never need to ask someone else for a rez. Maybe for a corpse summons, but never a rez.

Fifth, in the high level range, Clerics make great soloers for single large targets. When we can bring our formidable arsenal to bear on a single target, we can do some amazing things. This is good for farming gear, but does not help us as much in farming EXP. Our DPS is quite limited, so when we solo, it is usually with a specific need in mind, and not just to grind AAs. (Although some zones do yield EXP at rates that aren’t horrible solo). We cannot compete with high end EXP soloing classes like Wizards or Bards, but, we can often do things that cannot be achieved by these classes.

Sixth, with the exception of weapons (more on this later), Clerics have some of the best gear selections in the game. Being both a Wisdom caster and a Plate Class, the Cleric’s unique position of functioning like a hybrid in this regard without being a hybrid gives us an excellent range of equipment to work from. At the same time, not all of it is optimized for our class.

Seventh, Clerics are very good when dealing with undead. We aren’t the best when dealing with undead (for the most part), but there are enough decent undead targets to make this a useful way to progress.

Weaknesses

First, Clerics have terrible melee DPS. We compensate for this in a number of ways, but my actual melee DPS (excluding procs) usually amounts to less than 10 percent of total damage done to any target I solo. This would go up quite a bit if I didn’t have a number of ways to augment my DPS, but, raw melee DPS numbers are low enough that we don’t make successful melee soloers without finding ways to add significant DPS.

Second, Clerics cannot efficiently get EXP outside of groups after the mid 40s. While we can still solo for EXP up into the mid 50s and beyond, it is a rather time consuming process relative to other classes. Clerics aren’t the only ones in the boat, but making it into the range where you can group for EXP on Al’Kabor is important.

Third, Clerics do not get a broad range of utility spells. Usually various steps have to be taken to augment the Clerics abilities to provide for these missing utility spells.

Fourth, Clerics are usually poor. Their spells are expensive, plate armor is expensive, gear is generally expensive, potions are expensive, and we use reagents all the time. And then there is the obligatory horse. This means that Clerics very early on have to learn to farm cash. Eventually, we are as good as anyone at doing this, but it takes some effort to get there. (It’s usually worth the effort once we get there). On Al’Kabor where we don’t have the competitive market, and we don’t always get reimbursed for our reagents, or paid for that long Corpse Run, we need to make sure that Clerics are taken care of.

Fifth, Clerics in general make poor Power Levelers.

Sixth, Clerics tend to have more well-defined roles than nearly any other class in groups and raiding. And simply healing and medding can get monotonous (that's part of the point of this guide however - to help Clerics expand their horizons).

That probably sums up the strengths and weaknesses. There are probably others, but these are things that I generally have seen the most issues with.

Character Creation

So having decided to play a Cleric, there are a lot of options. I am not going to deal with an in-depth look at all the races. Some races are better suited to certain styles of play than others. One key thing to know is that the racial stats really have far less impact on the game than they did once upon a time. (There will be more on this under the attributes section below – which you should read before deciding). To this end, its best to choose a race based on what you want in the race rather than on the attributes. Some races have specials that also ought to be considered:

Halflings: Halfling Clerics get Halfling racial skills – forage and hide. These are nice, since Clerics normally do not get forage abilities and have to rely on others for foraged drops. At the same time, this is more of an issue for Trade Skills than anything else. Halflings get tailored racial armor. This is nice in that Halflings get all of the racial tailoring stuff (making the weight reduction bags and so on), but they do not get decent plate racial armor unlike most other Clerics. Generally, these things may well balance themselves out. Halfling Clerics probably have a better time grandmastering all of the Tradeskills, but if they do, it isn’t by much.

Gnomes: Gnome Clerics generally start with the best factions for any race. Since factions aren’t a huge issue in the later part of the game, this isn’t a huge benefit, but it is helpful. Factioning is an important part of the game for Clerics who are required to take a deity, and so have both racial and deity related faction adjustments. On the down side, Gnomes do not have any kind of advanced racial armor (we do not have minotaur blood implemented). This isn’t a huge blow either, but it is a significant issue. But, Gnomes do get the unique tinkering skill, and tinkered items do fill several utility gaps in a Clerics arsenal. (Tinkered stuff is so useful, I have created a tinker mule to keep me stocked).

High Elves: High Elves, due to their intense popularity early on in the world of Everquest have perhaps the most developed race specific content for any Cleric race. If you enjoy the quests and the character development aspects of the game – including intense factioning – then this might be the race for you. Included in this is good racial armor, with lots of smithing options. High Elves also start with the highest Wisdom.

Dark Elves: Like High Elves, Dark Elves have a lot of extra race related content available to them. This makes them fun to play. They also have faction issues to deal with, although killing their gods doesn’t have the same impact on them as it would for a High Elf Cleric, and they have a legitimate shot at a certain drop from Tunare that is worth getting. Dark Elves also get a quested clicky snare (unavailable to any other Cleric race) which is quite possibly one of the best features for this race. (Other clicky snares are available to Clerics, but all of them have charges). Dark Elves also have the standard set of issues with being an evil race.

The other races all fall into the general mix. Usually there are a number of benefits and detriments to each race. But in the long run, there isn’t anything too standout for any particular race or a penalty that would make it unplayable. And some of the rarer deities can provide sources for imbued gems that aren't otherwise available on the server (for racial armors).

Just a quick note on faction (which will be addressed later): Faction plays a significant role for clerics. Because they are always aligned with a deity, and because most of the races are identified as a good/evil race, factioning plays an important part of a Cleric's game - through certain levels of content. While it is true that a Cleric could level to PoP as fast as possible, and then spend all of their time there and nowhere else, Clerics will generally need to decide which factions to work on, and then work their way through those factions (often with the increased difficulties caused by both race and deity) to give them safer access to additional content. Some factions may simply be impossible to raise effectively (although there is almost always a way, it just may not be worth it in the end).

Attributes

In the early days of EQ, Wisdom was nearly impossible to push to the cap (255). High end gear was highly valued and very rare. It mostly consisted of drops from the three planes in existence (Fear, Hate, and Sky). Even the rez stick (the clicky from Plane of Sky) was unbelievably rare, and entire raids were aimed more at this item than any other drops (this was before epics were introduced). Because of the scarcity of Wisdom, the common thought was to allocate as many points to Wisdom as possible. So as many of the initial points were allocated here as possible. The additional points were usually put towards Strength or Stamina.

With the release of Kunark and its high end raiding content (along with epics), it became possible with a bit of work, to exceed the Wisdom cap. And for those who wanted to maximize their characters, a lively debate ensued over whether or not it was better to keep Wisdom as the stat to add the initial points to, or to instead use Stamina (HPs were becoming a huge issue for Clerics – particularly with the AEs of the high end raiding targets). This line of thinking continued in Velious and during this period there was an increasing number of Clerics for races which didn’t start with particularly high Wisdom.

Several things in Luclin dramatically altered this debate again. The first was the introduction of gear which added more attribute points uniformly. Stamina became more available, and along with improved Stamina buffs, and the addition of AAs increasing attributes, Stamina could be pushed to its cap (albeit with some effort). The other major change was the introduction of the proc on the Cleric summoned hammer. This along with the self-only mana regen buffs (Armor of the Zealot and Yaulp IV) made Clerics a more viable soloing class. With the hammer proc only being affected by Dexterity, and with Stamina and Wisdom being able to be set to the cap for raiding Clerics, Dex was now seen as an attribute worth pumping on character creation.

Finally, with the release of PoP, and the increased caps, as well as a wider range of attribute boosting gear, the question of how to start a character is once more an open issue. Capping Dex is still probably the most difficult of the three major attributes. The minor attribute of significance – Charisma (used only for raiding, and then only for a single spell) also became a possible consideration. The non-critical stats still remain far less useful. There is no longer really a wrong way to choose, although your objectives for the end game do matter. With the Wisdom cap at 355, unless your character will be in a high-end raiding guild, going with Wisdom is not a bad move. If you wish to solo most of the time as a Cleric, and be a damage dealer, then Dexterity might be your best option. In any case, any of the primary four attributes is a good option as long as you understand why you are choosing it. I would generally recommend Wisdom as it has benefits in terms of soloing and getting up to a high enough level to start finding regular groups. But this is a short-sided option in some ways. Although I managed to get to level 65 in about a month, it took me another nine months (of active raiding) to reach my 355 cap (including getting all the AAs) so its not a completely useless option for the long run, and it does give you more mana naked when making a CR. At some point, your gear will completely eclipse your cap though. (My main Cleric is currently sitting at nearly 100 Wisdom over cap).

I prioritize the attributes as follows (this is also for the long term benefits of deciding what gear is better and so on):

1) Wisdom: Wisdom determines the lion share of your mana pool. The significance of the size of your mana pool makes Wisdom the most important of your attributes.
2) Stamina: Directly affecting your base HPs, and since Clerics take a pounding from time to time, Stamina becomes number two on my list.
3) Dexterity: Even though Cleric hammers already have the fastest proc rate in the game, my estimates show that from melee damage, I do more than 75 percent of my damage from my proc. The proc is unresistable, and also hits mobs that cannot be hit by normal weapons (so the proc goes off even if no normal damage is dealt), making the hammer an impressive weapon against any foe. This makes the proccing hammer more effective (in terms of DPS) for the Cleric against LIS or the Emperor in Ssra than bane weapons produced for either target. The unresistable nature of the proc means that it is highly effective against even the most Magic Resistant targets.
4) Charisma: Apart from the affects when dealing with merchants, Charisma only has application with the spell Divine Intervention, and is really only useful to Clerics in high end PoP raiding. Because CHA wasn’t seen as a necessary Cleric stat (unlike a Paladin, or a Warrior or Charming classes), we don’t see a lot of great CHA gear aimed at Clerics. Even so, it is far enough down on the priority list to make it a seriously questionable attribute to boost on creation.
5) Everything Else: We do see some minor benefits from other attributes – but there is no value in prioritizing them in this fashion.

Derived Stats – Mana, HP, and AC.

I usually rank this in this order. Mana comes first, then HPs, and then AC. AC is given the least priority for several reasons. While it does help avoid some damage in melee combat, until you are well geared, you won’t be doing a lot of melee. So, it can wait. AC is also capped on Al’Kabor. We have a soft cap that is bugged as a hard cap. Our AC cap is applied after all spells and gear except for the shield, and is 1450. After the Cap is applied, the shield value is added in. So effective AC can get into the low 1500s with a nice shield. This will take significant time. 20 months after character creation, Cromis finally managed to cap his AC with raid gear and self-buffs. HPs are pretty straight forward. The more you have the better. But mana is king.

Mana and Wisdom generally have a linear relationship. Wisdom up to 200 adds on average 12.2 points of mana per point of Wisdom at level 65. After 200, it adds roughly 6 points of mana per point of Wisdom at level 65. At level 1, you get 1 point of mana per 5 points of wisdom (and this scales up to level 65). This should help you decide whether gear that adds Wisdom or gear that adds raw mana is more beneficial for you. The quested Shield of Bane Warding, for example, is nice for the 20 Wisdom it adds. If your Wisdom is below 200 (and your level is 65), this 20 Wisdom will add on average 245 Mana. If your Wisdom is beyond 200, it will only add about 120 Mana (still an amazing amount). If your Wisdom is capped, then it adds nothing at all of course. At level 1, this shield will add 4 mana. (Since a High Elf Cleric at level 1 with no gear and maxed Wisdom has a Wisdom of 130, this will still add significantly to his mana pool – maye 25 percent – and this will scale up as he levels - of course a ring which adds 30 mana directly to your mana pool will be far more efficitent at low levels). Wisdom based Mana tops out at 3,617 Mana for a level 65 with 355 Wisdom. On Al’Kabor, theoretical mana pool limits top out in the low 6,000s unbuffed with Elemental and Time gear. Even with the best gear, Wisdom will remain the most significant contributor to your mana pool, and Wisdom adding gear will remain the highest priority until you reach the cap. A later section will discuss the issue of AC in more details.

At this point, you should have a fair idea what you want your Cleric to look like, how you prioritize your attributes, and are ready to start looking at the post-creation details of the class.

Continued in part 2.

Al’Kabor
A Cleric’s Guide

Part 2: Spells


This discussion of spells is geared more towards the high level Clerics than to the low level Clerics (although when I get around to writing a section on leveling and soloing at lower levels, I will include more information there on lower level spells). For the most part, our spells come in specific "lines" of spells in which the use of a lower level spell is replaced entirely by the next spell in the line.

Recast times

A note about recast times: if you look them up on Lucy, you will see something called a fizzle time. This is the refresh rate of your gems (as a whole) when you cast this spell. For the most part, this is low, but some spells (like Supernal Remedy) have a higher fizzle time. That is, when you cast the spell, you have to wait the fizzle time before you can cast any other spell (not just to recast the spell you just cast). Usually this is pretty straight forward.

There is, however, a bug in the game. Since the game mechanics tend to round things off, a spell with a fizzle time of 2.25 seconds will refresh the gems after 2 seconds, and an immediate casting of a spell with a short cast time (like Yaulp VI – casting in .5 seconds) will often result in a message that the spell cannot be cast yet. This is considered a bug, and it remained in the EQ game until significantly after our code base split off. The best way to deal with this is to wait an extra moment to cast those spells that you know that this problem effects. There is a synchronization process that occurs periodically, that will keep this from happening (so that you won’t get such a failure on a longer casting spell), but it will happen with our fastest casting spells (our Yaulps, our stuns, and so on). And it won’t usually happen following a cast spell that has an unusual fizzle time (like Supernal Remedy).

Hate

Cleric spells generate aggro in much the same way as all casting classes do. In general, heal spells will generate aggro on a 2 for 3 or 1 for 3 for each point of health healed. Most spells have a base aggro generation that occurs even if the mob resists the spell. So, for Sound of Might (the Cleric level 63 stun) a Cleric generates 5000 aggro whether or not the spell actually lands on the target (sometimes these numbers are different as with the lower level stun Holy Might). I do not know the exact mechanics of how this translates for beneficial spells and mob aggro, but the base aggro generated by a CH is not 7500 (which is the maximum aggro it will generate), but 0. This means that there is a significant chance that a Cleric healing with a CH will generate no aggro at all. This happens with a relatively high frequency, and causes some annoyance when Clerics are trying to get faction adjustments in. This is true to a lesser extent for many Cleric heals, which is why Clerics will sometimes get no faction adjustment if they have only been healing – it is useful at times to get a minor damage clicky to be able to guarantee faction adjustments.

Spell Lines

For most spells, I am not going to discuss entire lines of spells – only the best ones or most useful ones.

Another thing worth mentioning is that ALL Cleric damage spells are magic based. The only focus effects worth getting for increased damage are those that affect all damage spells, or those that specifically affect Magic damage spells. Since specific magic type focuses are usually more effective, these are what we want most in terms of drops from raid targets.

Healing spells

In general, healing spells come in several varieties – instant heals (IH) – of which Complete Heal (CH) is a special sub-category, Heals over Time (HoT), Group Instant Heals (GIH) – of which Group Complete Heal (GCH) is a special sub-category, and Group Heals over Time (GHoT).

The Instant Heals line culminates in two different spells:

65: Supernal Light (600 Mana, Cast Time 3.75 sec, Recast Time 2.25 sec, Range 100, Alteration) Heals 2750 HPs.
61: Supernal Remedy (400 Mana, Cast Time 1.75 sec, Recast Time 2.25 sec, Range 200, Alteration) Heals 1450 HPs.

This generally follows the Luclin pattern of producing a normal moderate aggro heal, and a high aggro super fast heal. AAs affect these spells as follows – Advanced Healing Adept 3 adds 19% to the base value of an instant heal. The Improved Healing 4 focus adds an additional 1-20% to the base value (averages out to 10.5 percent). The typical heal for the two spells given AHA3 is SL: 3272 and SR: 1725. IH4 can improve these on average to SL: 3588 and SR: 1892. Advanced Healing Gift works with these, and AHG3 gives a 16% chance for a critical success, doubling healing.

Focus affects affecting spell haste do not work on spells casting in under 3 seconds. So, Spell Haste does not help speed up Supernal Remedy, but does help with Supernal Light. BoR reduces casting time by 10%, and various focus effects reduce it by an additional 20, 25 or 30 percent. With the Nightcaller Leggings and BoR, the casting time on SL is reduced 40% to 2.25 seconds. While still not as fast as SR, it is close enough to make SR less useful except when the extreme range is helpful. Unfortunately at that kind of range, HP updates are poor, and with the smaller healing of this spell, it is still a difficult choice. Nightcaller Leggins however are only available from the second floor of VT. Other haste items will reduce the casting time, and there are a few nice ones out there. Until a Cleric has the spell haste options, Supernal Remedy may still be viable – especially for healing characters with smaller HP totals. However Supernal Remedy has a relatively long fizzle time of 3.5 seconds – meaning that while the spell lands relatively quickly, it actually takes a longer cast window, since it picks up an extra 1.25 seconds on the wait for gem refreshes. So the difference (before focus considerations) is smaller than at first glance. SR casts in 1.75 with a 3.5 second fizzle for a total of 5.25 seconds (for the purposes of chain casting). SL casts in 3.75 with a 2.5 fizzle for a total of 6.25 – a difference of only 1 second. When fully reduced by focus effects and cast spell haste SL can be reduced to a 2.2 second cast time – for a total cast time of 4.7 seconds – significantly less than SR.

Because SL has a higher mana/hp efficiency, it is preferable, even for casters, against mobs that can tear through the minimal healing of a SR faster than we can recast. At the same time, SR is a high aggro producing spell compared with SL (generating twice the aggro for the same healing). So it use is generally not recommended early in fights. In my opinion, once a Cleric has a spell haste focus item, SR should be abandoned completely as a useful healing spell. The only arguments in favor of SR remain its huge range (200) which is twice the normal healing range (and can be further enhanced with distance focus gear) – which also reduces casting aggro, and its lower mana cost (although this is only useful when a full heal isn’t necessary – usually a HoT for the same mana cost is a better deal). (As a side note, even with the huge range, SR is nowhere near the max range for spells generating aggro of 400, so you cannot avoid aggro altogether with this spell).

39: Complete Healing (400 Mana, Cast Time 10 sec, Recast Time 2.25 sec, Range 100, Alteration) Heals up to 7500.

Complete Heal is a little different. It is not affected by any kind of spell haste (which is a rather good thing, it allows us to set up predictable healing rotations). It is not affected by Improved Healing focus items either. The AAs do affect this spell, allowing for a normal CH to land for 8925 HPs and a crit to land for 17850 HPs (if only we had tanks with that many HPs). Mana preservation also does not work with CH. This is the spell used in CH rotations. With a range of 100, we also tend to look for an ER item to use with this spell, although at level 39, an ER3 item will work just fine.

There are two important Group Instant Heals (although they are rarely used):

64: Word of Replenishment (1100 Mana, Cast Time 4.5 sec, Recast Time 2.25, AE Range 70, Alteration) Heals 2500, Decrease Poison Counter 14, Decrease Disease Counter 14, Decrease Curse 7.
60: Word of Redemption (1100 Mana, Cast Time 12 sec, Recast Time 2.25, AE Range 70, Alteration) Heals 7500.

Word of Replenishment is a relatively nice fast casting large heal to your entire party. It costs a lot of mana. It is affected by all AAs and Focus equipment that apply, meaning that it hits everyone in the party for a heal a little smaller than a Supernal Light. With optimum spell haste, it casts at 2.7 seconds. The secondary effects, reducing the Poison, Disease and Curse counters seem nice, but in reality they aren’t terribly helpful in the encounters where we might use a spell like this. Grummus, for example, has three spell effects – a single target disease based DoT and debuff, an AE diseases based DoT and debuff, and a Curse. Both the disease based DoTs come with 36 Disease counters, while the curse has 9 counters. 3 Casts of WoR would use most of your mana pool, and probably complete about the time that Grummus managed to fire off a new round. By Comparison, Bert’s massive AE Disease based DoT (the 500 per tick one) comes with 72 Disease Counters. This is also a fairly high aggro spell, despite following the normal hate ratios for our instant cast heals.

Word of Redemption is a Group Complete Heal and is subject to all of the normal issues associated with CH spells (no focus effects or Spell haste effects improve the cast time). Its very long cast time makes it of very limited value, although it is capable of healing an awful lot of damage. Like CH, this spell does have a hate cap on it, although it is sufficiently high enough that you are likely to get aggro in some situations where you may want to cast it.

Both of these spells are important additions (if rarely used) to your spell book.

There are a couple of critical Heal over Time and Group Heal over Time spells.

62: Supernal Elixir (480 Mana, Cast Time 4 sec, Recast Time 2.25 sec, Range 100, Duration 24 seconds, Alteration) Increase HPs by 600 per tick.
60: Ethereal Elixir (975 Mana, Cast Time 5 sec, Recast Time 2.25 Sec, AE Range 75, Duration 24 sec, Alteration) Increase HPs by 300 per tick.

Supernal Elixir is a fairly efficient healing spell, particularly when you have SCRM and a buff extension focus item. While SCRM will add 2 ticks (12 seconds) to the length of the spell, the focus effect has a 50 percent chance of adding another tick. A spell lasting 7 ticks will heal 4200 HPs (which is decent for that mana expenditure). Its larger use is in providing constant healing to help balance out other heals, or to use when a party member has taken some damage (not enough for a SL), and is likely to continue taking some damage (as a Ramp Tank might). It is also useful as a cast before an engage. Often an unslowed mob can chew through an MT, however, this spell slows the damage down some and gives you time to gauge what kind of heals are necessary.

Ethereal Elixir is quite expensive, and doesn’t heal as much as Supernal Elixir. But it has one thing going for it. It is a group HoT – and takes a buff slot. This is important because it can be MGBed. It is used in this fashion when fighting a mob with an AE DoT. Its 300 HP per tick healing is reasonably decent in most such circumstances. It will not be enough to overcome the later effects of splurt type spells though.

HP and AC buffs.

HP buffs come in several types. We have single target HP only, Single Target AC only, Single Target HP and AC, Group HP only, Group HP and AC (what happened to our Group AC?) and the Self only armor spells. Our real concerns with these spells is viewed in terms of maximum HPs, AC, and so on. And unlike our heals, we are much more concerned about stacking affects with these spells.

63: Kazad’s Mark (1800 Mana, Casting Time 5 sec, Recast Time 2.25 sec, AE Range 100, Duration 63 minutes, Abjuration) Increase Max HPs by 910
61: Symbol of Kazad (600 Mana, Casting Time 5 sec, Recast Time 2.25 sec, Range 100, Duration 63 minutes, Abjuration) Increase max HPs by 910

The basic symbol spell is our bread and butter on raids. It pretty much stacks with everything. The only initial concern a Cleric has is that the duration of the spell (63 minutes) is less than the reuse timer on MGB (72 minutes). SCRM takes care of this as does most Buff extender focus items.

61: Ward of Gallantry (425 Mana, Casting Time 7 sec, Recast Time 2.25 sec, Range 100, Duration 81 minutes, Abjuration) Increase AC by 54.

This is our basic AC buff. It also stacks with just about everything. This much AC makes a decent amount of mitigation difference. It has a nice duration.

65: Hand of Virtue (2500 Mana, Casting Time 24 sec, Recast Time 2.25 sec, AE Range 100, Duration 2 Hours 30 Minutes, Abjuration) Increase Max HPs by 1405 and adds 72 AC.
62: Virtue (1000 Mana, Casting Time 14 sec, Recast Time 2 sec, AE Range 100, Duration 2 Hours 30 Minutes, Abjuration) Increase Max HPs by 1405 and adds 72 AC.

This is a long lasting AC and HP buff. Modified with a Coldain Prayer Shawl (1-20 percent), and SCRM AAs (50 percent), this comes out to lasting just over 4 hours on average. It does however have significant stacking issues, discussed below.

65: Armor of the Zealot (400 Mana, Casting Time 4.5 sec, Recast Time 2.25 sec, Duration, 2 hours 24 minutes, Abjuration) Adds 450 HPs to Max HPs, adds 36 AC, and adds 8 Mana Regen.

Virtue doesn’t stack with 9s. But it does stack with the Cleric self buff AotZ. Virtue is designed to replace both Symbol and Ward of Gallantry in a single long lasting buff. And it actually out performs both of them. But, in raid environments, we also have to look at the other high level buffs – 9s and Focus. Since Virtue does not stack with 9s, it isn’t an option for most of the raid. Since the Cleric Self Buff AotZ falls into the same slot as 9s, Virtue/AotZ becomes a viable option for Clerics (since mana regen > HPs for us). However, AotZ is overwritten by Focus, which means losing a few HPs. Paladin’s likewise can use their self-buffs, and for them, it is more efficient to get Virtue. For Clerics, however, it is a toss up – using only two buff slots and skipping out on some HPs, or taking all four buff slots and maxing it.

Symbol/9s/Focus/WoG:2072 HPs, AC 76, Mana Regen 8, Str 75, Dex 70
Virtue/AotZ: 1855 HPs, 108 AC, Mana Regen 8

Of course, whenever Druid cast 9s is not available, there isn’t any reason not to use Virtue/AotZ. My personal preference is to go with the raid buffs. At some point, I expect my AC to be high enough that WoG becomes completely unnecessary (as it won’t help once the character is at the cap). AotZ also has some other peculiarities. It also won’t stack with certain Ranger/Druid DSs, But at least it overwrites these and blocks them.

Yaulp

65: Yaulp VI (10 Mana, Casting Time .5 sec, Recast Time 18 sec, Duration 24 seconds, Abjuration) Increase ATK 60, Mana Regen 12, Dex 90, Haste 30%.

Yaulp is our self only combat ATK buff. Well its classified as an ATK buff, but we really see it as a Dex buff. It cannot be used in conjunction with meditating. Sitting on a horse, or sitting down cancels the spell. It does not stack well with a range of other spells. It overwrites Vallons (Enchanter Haste) because of the Dex conflict. It works well with other haste spells that do not have a Dex component. On the other hand, haste DOES NOT affect the proc rate of a weapon, only Dexterity does, and the 90 Dex given by this spell adds impressively to our proc rates. This stacks with most other Dex buffs. And since most of our melee damage comes from our procs in any case, this makes this spell very useful. It also does not stack with the BL SV line (the ATK causes the conflict). Strength of Tunare (and that line of Ranger spells) blocks it also.

Damage Shields

65: Mark of the Righteous (200 Mana, Cast Time 3 sec, Recast Time 3 sec, Range 200, Duration 15 minutes, Abjuration). 34 point reverse damage shield.

This is a reverse damage shield. Every time the mob hits something it takes 34 points of damage. It pretty much stacks with everything. This does generate aggro, but is very useful for extended fights, and in battles with single larget targets. It is useless against hordes of smaller mobs. Once a mob gets slowed, it tends to lose some of its efficiency. It is based on MR, and can be resisted. The earlier version, Mark of Retribution, can be found as a clicky on Velious era BPs, and can be used instead of the spell in many circumstances for a mana free Reverse DS.

64: Mark of Kings (75 Mana, Cast Time 2 sec, Recast Time 5 sec, Range 200, Duration 4 minutes, Abjuration) Decreases Damage Shield by 20.

This spell reduces the DS by 20 and can make the DS become a negative number on a mob, meaning that everyone who hits it gets healed. This spell has far less utility than even the Reverse Damage Shield. On mobs where they are going to last through the full 4 minute duration, usually only the MT should be being damaged to begin with. 20 additionally HPs per hit isn’t too terribly spectacular. What it does do that can be very important, is that as a DS iteslef, it overwrites most DS spells – so, if the mob has a DS, this will not only clear the DS, but will provide some minor healing benefits as well.

Lull

65: Pacification (350 Mana, Cast Time 4.5 sec, Recast Time 2.25 sec, Range 200, Duration 42 seconds*, Alteration) Reduce Frenzy and Reaction Radius – up to level 65.
55: Wake of Tranquility (300 Mana, Cast Time 4.5 sec, Recast Time 18 sec, Range 200, AE Range 35, Duration 42 sec*, Alteration) Reduce Frenzy and Reaction Radius AE up to level 60.

These spells reduce the frenzy radius (the proximity aggro radius) of a mob and the reaction radius (the radius at which it responds to others’ aggro). But it merely reduces it. This means that while you can get very close, getting too close will still result in aggro. If you pull a mob that moves on top of the Pacified mob, it may well move within the minimal reaction radius and bring it along. So be careful with this aspect of the spell. Charisma is the effective stat for determining resistance to it (which has a very good chance of aggroing the mob – but won’t always – particularly if the mobs are not KOS to begin with). On Al’Kabor, the duration of these spells are broken. Prior to getting any of the SCR/SCRM AAs, these spells can last as long as 8 minutes. Purchasing the AAs fixes the duration to its intended 42 second duration.

Stuns

We have several kinds of stuns. Simple stuns (with only the stun effect), Stuns with a damage affect, AE stuns with and without damage components, and then stuns with a damage component and a debuff. While all of our stuns are of value, there are lots of issues to look at with each one. The ones which we use the most for farming are those which are fairly unqiue on Al’Kabor (they are quite different for us than the PC).

PB AE Nukes with detrimental duration effect

65: The Silent Command (550 Mana, Casting Time 1 sec, Recast Time 120 sec, PB Range 20, Duration 3 Sec, Evocation) 605 DD, Fear (up to level 55)
59: The Unspoken Word (427 Mana, Casting Time 1 sec, Recast Time 120 sec, PB Range 20, Duration 3 sec, Evocation) 605 DD, Blind (up to level 55)

Although they are classified with the stuns, and are extensions of the AE stun line. Unlike Lucy’s description, our Level 65 The Silent Command has a short term fear component (although it is limited as to what it works on) instead of a stun. These are farming spells, and I find little use for them on raids (mostly due to the long recast time). Their very short casting time makes them useful when AEing more than 10 or 15 mobs. The fear component and the blindness do not stack. If you cast The Silent Command, and then immediately cast The Unspoken Word, The Unspoken Word will not land. I am not aware of any other stacking issues because I do not use these when grouped.

Single Target Stuns

63: Sound of Might (75 Mana, Cast Time .75, Recast Time 30 Sec, Range 200, Evocation), 5 second Stun up to level 65.
5: Stun (35 Mana, Cast Time 1.5 Sec, Recast Time 12, Range 200, Evocation) Stun 4 sec.

Singe Target Stuns with DD component

61: Tarnation (250 Mana, Cast time 2 sec, Recast Time 24 sec, Range 200, Evocation) 300 DD, 8 Sec Stun. (I have no idea what level this stun works up to, it is less than 65, it might be limited to level 60).
58: Enforced Reverence (200 Mana, Cast Time 3 sec, Recast Time 24 sec, Range 200, Evocation) 300 DD, 8 sec stun up to level 55.
46: Sound of Force (120 Mana, Cast Time 3 sec, Recast Time 24 sec, Range 200, Evocation) 220 DD, Stun 9 sec (up to level 55).
31: Force (90 Mana, Cast Time 2.5 sec, Recast Time 18 sec, Range 200, Evocation) 90 DD, 6 Sec Stun.
16: Holy Might (60 Mana, Cast Time 2.5, Recast Time 18, Range 200, Evocation) 60 DD, 6 Sec Stun.

Targeted AE Stuns

55: Stun Command (150 Mana, Cast Time 1 sec, Recast Time 30 sec, Range 200, AE Range 20, Evocation) 9 second Stun (up to level 55).
39: Sacred Word (120 Mana, Cast Time 3 sec, Recast Time 18 sec, Range 200, AE Range 20, Evocation) 6 sec stun.

I listed all of the stuns. The stun is the bread and butter of the Cleric tank. It is about the only way we can maintain aggro (unless we want to try with heal aggro, but I don’t recommend that, except in a boxing situation where you can control all of the aggro tightly). Usually, for those mobs that give Exp, only the highest couple of stuns will actually stun them, although they all generate aggro. I usually mem 3-4 stuns when tanking and cycle through them. The stuns (when they land) also provide significant damage mitigation. All of the stuns except for Sound of Might and Stun also have a knockback component (usually 2 or 3). This can be quite large, so be prepared for it. Finally, Stun and Sound of Might can be used to prebreak mezzed targets (although why a Cleric would want to ….) All of a Cleric’s stuns are MR based, and highly Magic Resistant targets will not be affected by these spells.

Nukes

We have several kinds of Nukes, single target and PB AE, as well as Undead only and Summoned only nukes. Because our Summoned only nukes end a bit prematurely, there isn’t any reason to use them (the high level normal nukes are much more efficient).

62: Condemnation (365 Mana, Cast Time 6 sec, Recast Time 7 secs, Range 200, Evocation) 1100 DD.

Because of the long recast time, it cannot be chain cast. If you need to chain Nuke, I would recommend adding the level 56 Judgment spell.

64: Catastrophe (650 Mana, Cast Time 5 sec, Recast Time 24 sec, AE Range 35, Evocation) PB AE for 850 damage.

This is our bread and butter AE spell. The recast time is long – but not as long as our fast AE stuns w/ DD components. I usually start in on 30 mobs or so with this and then cast the two fast ones. I do use this from time to time when raiding. I don’t use any of the lower level PB AE nukes – there isn’t any reason to. If you want to chain PBAE, you can mix in Upheaval.

64: Destroy Undead (248 Mana, Cast Time 5 sec, Recast Time 2.25 sec, Range 200, Evocation) 1200 DD Undead Only

This can be chain cast so there isn’t a need for earlier Undead nukes.

Root

We have several root spells. In general, root spells vary widely in duration and in what resists them. While the longer roots are nice, they are mana expensive. I rarely root things except in groups to handle some basic CC. I recommend getting a ring of Immobilization of you root a lot (VT root clicky), as it becomes easy to chain root something. Unlike stuns, roots are not terribly high aggro generators. While root-nuking works well at early levels for cleric soloers, by level 65, we simply aren’t very efficient at soloing for EXP in this fashion. Roots are useful to part mobs (and the longer duration, higher level spells are better for this), or to manage aggro (since rooted mobs go for the closest target, not necessarily the most hated one).

64: Petrifying Earth (180 Mana, Cast Time 2.5 sec, Recast Time 2.5 sec, Range 200, Alteration) 3 Min duration.
49: Immobilize (80 Mana, Cast Time 1.75 sec, Recast Time 3 sec, Range 200, Alteration) 1 Min duration.

Spell Haste

62: Blessing of Reverence (300 Mana, Cast Time 6 sec, Recast Time 2.5 sec, Range 100, Duration 40 Minutes, Alteration) Increase Spell Haste by 10%.

This is a raid necessary buff. I generally keep it memmed all the time, and frequently cast it on myself and others.

Undead DoT

62: Sermon of Penitance (305 Mana, Cast Time 3 sec, Recast Time 2.25 Sec, Range 100, Evocation) A DoT lasting 30 seconds doing 305 damage per tick to Undead only.

Banishment

Clerics can only banish Undead. We have limited uses for this spell:

60: Banishment of Shadows (750 Man, Cast Time 4 sec, Recast Time 2 min, Range 200, Evocation) Banishes an Undead target, takes a Star Ruby as a reagent.

Divine Intervention

60: Divine Intervention: (500 Mana, Cast Time 6 sec, Recast Time 90 sec, Range 100, Abjuration, Duration 10 minutes)

Takes 2 Emeralds. It is similar to Death Pact (although unfortunately not a true upgrade – they don’t stack either). This spell gives a chance of a large boost to health when the targets HPs drop to within a certain range. The exact range is unknown although it seems to be around 15-20 percent health. Its chance of firing is based on the CHA of the target, although the UD3 AA helps with this spell. It tends to not fire at all if something takes the tank below this trigger range without stopping in it. This is especially true of some PoP targets who are capable of doing extreme damage (5K life taps and such).

Divine Aura

29: Divine Barrier (100 Mana, Cast Time 1 sec, Recast Time 15 minutes, Duration 18 sec, Abjuration) 18 second invulnerability plus 876 HP heal.
1: Divine Aura (10 Mana, Cast Time 1 sec, Recast Time 15 minutes, Duration 18 sec, Abjuration) 18 second invulnerability.

I usually keep Divine Aura memmed. You CANNOT cast, attack, or be attacked or be cast on while this spell is in effect. If you get it off and you have no life left, you will probably get low HP aggro and die when it drops. But, it can save your life while others build aggro during your period of inactivity.

Utility Spells

Not all of these might be strictly classified as utility. Although I tend to consider them utility because I only use them as needed. Some of these are more important than others.

58: Antidote: decreases poison counters by 64.
57: Trepidation: Our highest level fear spell
56: Revivisance: 96 Percent Rez.
54: Remove Greater Curse: Remove Curse Counter by 45.
54: Unswerving Hammer of Faith: Cleric Hammer Pet spell (go Hammer DPS)
53: Annul Magic: Our highest debuff.
51: Sunskin: Group ITU
50: Improved Invisibility to Undead: Fixed duration ITU self only
44: Resist Magic: our best Magic Resistance buff.
39: Resist Disease: our best Disease Resistance buff
39: Resist Cold: our best Cold Resistance buff.
34: Resist Poison: our best Poison Resistance buff.
34: Resist Fire: our best Fire Resistance buff.
34: Atone: Cleric Memblur
29: Counteract Disease: Remove 8 Disease Counters
14: Sense Summoned: face and target nearest summoned mob (useful for targeting through walls, doors, etc)
14: Bind Affinity: Bind target
9: Sense the Dead: face and target nearest undead mob
5: Gate: Gate to bind spot

Summoning Spells

64: Imbue Valor (Takes a Raw Diamond and Metallic Liquid) Summons a Yellow Diamond of Valor
63: Hammer of Damnation Summons a high frequency proccing hammer (530% proc rate)
34: Abundant Food
29: Imbue XXX (Our gem imbue spells, deity specific)
29: Abundant Drink

Continued in part 3

This is a GREAT guide to creating a cleric by far that everone considering creating one should read, but I do have a couple of comments:

1- We are not crappy PLers ... Clerics are just still haunted by the old world of Dr00ds being the Obselete PLers. That however changed with PoP in way as all you have to do is HoV the young Character and Reverse DS(34 point) whatever he trains back. That works in a similiar way a druid PL but better(imho) as the character has much better AC/Hp than 9's and the Cleric HoT's are low agro say than a Nature's Infusion. That said druids remain as the best PLers as there are other ways to exploit there DS capabalities in a way that can make them faster PLers. I still rank Clerics as 2nd best though..

2- I read somewhere that(below 200 wisdom) the Base Wisdom(naked Wisdom) is calculated diffrently than the added gear wisdom. I aint sure if thats correct or not but I might create a dummy character on Magelo to see if thats true


P.S: I dunno why you added other races than Gnome to the race select. They are by far the best/obvious choice, The Chosen race, The Alpha and Omega, Etc....

_________________

Heh - you are right on the PLing issue Nukes - but it isn't as simple for us - I will have a section at some point discussing it. Also, using root to hold a mob in place (and beat on the high level cleric - preferrably with a DS as well as a reverse DS) and thus take all the damage while the Power levelee beats on it from max melee range, and so on. Clerics though tend to lose some PLing speed at higher levels as the mobs get tougher. Once the toons get to level 43 (and can group), I have had good success with fairly rapid PLing in places like Charasis and so on with good undead content.

Magelo won't show any differences on mana for base mana as opposed to added wisdom. (IIRC - I did do some extensive research a while back on that - I could always be wrong, but I don't think so here). This may have been true for some classes, but I don't recall it ever being an issue for Clerics (except maybe early on in Kunark - but if it was it was adjusted).

Ah yes your right with it being a Kunark Era thing. As I remember it from around that time

_________________

Fantastic guide Cromis. Im sure Nik will sticky this novel in the help forum.

~~~

_________________

hunter lyrad cypresshade forest stalker + officer of destiny + r. f. g.

Hmm. Done, but I'm wondering if we have enough material to start some sort of "guides" forum. There's been a couple of good class guides posted recently, so I'll think about it. To convince me, I think there would have to be at least a couple more guides for other classes posted.

_________________
Nikolai Lianfyrr,
Khati Sha Feral Lord.
GM Tailor (250), GM Smith (250), GM Brewer (250), GM Potter (250), GM Fisherman (200), GM Jeweler (250), Fletcher (220), Chef (200)

Al’Kabor
A Cleric’s Guide

Part 3: Alternate Abilities

AAs come in the traditional 5 categories - General, Archetype, Class, PoP Advancement, and PoP Abilities. In this rather brief discussion, I am going to discuss the different AAs, and loosely prioritize them.

AAs generally affect all spells in a determinate fashion (unlike focus effects), and can affect spells that focus items won't.

General:

Innate [attribute]: These simply add up to 5 points to an attribute at a cost of 1 AA each.
Innate [resist]: These are useful but also not a high priority. They can be particularly useful if you need to push a particular resist up to fill a void.
Innate Run Speed: This is just very useful. I recommend the first three AAs go here. This is a nice movement increase. Not as good as SOW, but good.
Innate Metabolism: This is also very useful, since it affects food consumption while on your horse (which happens a lot).
Innate Lung Capactiy: This isn't too significant an AA - unless you are doing a lot of CR runs in the Gray or in SSRA. Its better to park an extra EB item in the bank. ILC3 increases the amount of time you can hold your breath by a lot.
First Aid: This never seemed to me to be too terribly useful for a Cleric, but it does improve what you can do with bind wounds. Each point raises the Bind wound cap by 10 percent.
New Tanaan Crafting Mastery: If you like the insanity of Tradeskills, this will be a must.
Innate Regeneration: Not too important for Clerics with their healing spells. It adds 1 point of regen per AA.

Archetype:

Healing Adept: This AA increases the effectiveness of instant heals by 2, 5 and 10 percent.
Healing Gift: This AA increases the chance of an exceptional heal (twice the healing) by 3, 6, and 10 percent.
Spell Casting Mastery: This AA increases the chance for you to make your specialization checks (lowering the cost of Mana, the chance to fizzle, and so on) by 5, 15 and 30 percent.
Spell Casting Reinforcement: This AA extends the duration of beneficial spells by 5, 15 and 30 percent. (It also breaks/fixes the long Pacification time).
Spell Casting Fury: Gives you a chance to crit with your direct damage spells - 2, 4 and 7 percent.
Channeling Focus: This AA reduces your interrupts while casting by 5, 10 and 15 perecent.
Natural Durability: Increases Maximum HPs by 2, 5 and 10 percent (Base HPs only)
Combat Stability: Increases melee damage mitigation by 2, 5, and 10 percent.
Combat Agility: Increases Damage Avoidance by 2, 5 and 10 percent.
Mental Clarity: Adds a point of Mana Regen per level.

Class:

Mass Group Buff: Takes the next Group beneficial spell and applies it to all characters within the radius of affect - dubling the cost (including reagents).
Divine Resurrection: 100 percent experience rez, and no rez effects.
Innate Invis to Undead: A mana free short reuse time improved invisibility to undead (fixed duration).
Celestial Regeneration: A large HoT (broken see notes below).
Bestow Divine Aura: Casts DA on a target
Turn Undead: A large AE DoT + Fear to undead only
Purify Soul: Single target cures all detrimental effects but charm, fear and resurrection effects.
Spell Casting Reinforcement Mastery: Increases the duration of beneficial spells by an additional 20 percent.

PoP Advancement:

Advanced Innate [Attribute]: further increases attribtues
[Advanced Resist]: Further increases to resists
Planar Power: Increases the cap on all stats by 5 per level.
Innate Elightment: Increases the cap on Intelligence and Wisdom by 10 per level.

PoP Ability

Advanced Healing Adept: Further improves Healing Adept by 3 percent per rank.
Advanced Healing Gift: Further improves Healing Gift by 2 percent per rank.
Lightning Reflexers: Further improvements to damage avoidance.
Innate Defense: Further improvements to damage mitigation.
Radiant Cure: Group cure which cases a remove curse, cure poison, and cure disease.
Hastened Divinity: Increases the refresh rate of Bestow Divine Aura.
Hastened Turning: Increases the refresh rate of Turn Undead.
Hastened Purification of the Soul: Increases the refresh rate of Purify Soul.
Divine Arbitration: Takes the damge of all players in a group and averages it across all of the group members.
Celestial Renewal: Improvements to Celestial Regeneration (broken)
Unfailing Divinity: Improves the affects of Divine Intervention.
Fury of Magic: Further improves the chance to crit with a nuke.

Discussion

With one notable exception, all AAs will make your character better in some way. Some are simply much better than others. And of course, we get the AA titles if we follow the normal progression (6 general, 12 archetype, 18 class). Some AAs are far, far better than others. And while you may find a thousand different routes to spend all of them, getting the few critical ones first matters. Here is a general idea of how I think the intial AAs should be purchased for a cleric:

Runspeed1-3: Runspeed is just nice. Early on, you probably got a horse (I will talk about gear in a later section). The cheapest horse is slower than you are. While runspeed isn’t the end all of movement modifiers its certainly nice. This is perhaps the only AA I would really consider getting before leveling to 65.

Innate Metabolism1-3: Metabolism decreases food consumption. Since you are using that horse a lot, this is very, very helpful.

Really, these six are simply there to allow you to move on to your archetypes. You can swap out any six. If you are an aggressive tradeskiller, you could go for two TS upgrades. The real need is to get six done in general. This will give you your first title change.

For the next 12 (in Archetypes) there really doesn’t need to be a specific order here. They are all important. The only differences you might look at is that some are much more important for the raiding cleric than for the soloing and grouping cleric. The most important of the Archetypes are:

SCM1-3: Spell Casting Mastery results in an average mana savings of about 10 percent on all spells cast (including CH). Of course, we all know that you took Alteration as your specialty right? It never seemed to affect fizzles much for me, but it does make a huge difference in effective mana pool sizes. Because you have a specialty skill for all fields of magic (even if they are capped at 50), this is useful for all spells as well.

MC1: Mental Clarity 1 adds 1 point of mana regen for a cost of 2 AA. MC2 and MC3 are quite valuable – but, at this point, not worth the AAs spent towards them just yet.

At this point, you will have exceeded your 12 AAs in archetype and can get Class AAs. Before we start on any of those however, we want to spend a few points and pick up these two very important and useful AAs:

RC1: Radiant Cure 1 cures 9 counters each of disease, poison and curse. Additional ranks remove more counters, but experience shows that there are very few Curses that RC3 will cure, that RC1 won’t (it increases to 12 with RC2 and 16 with RC3).

DvA1: Divine Arbitration takes all the damage taken by all members of the party and redistributes it to all members evenly (those with fewer hps will still take the same amount of damage). This is an aggro free heal, and is very useful on pulls and in other situations where you need to heal a single person without risking aggro. At rank 1 there is a penalty applied which increases the damage taken by 20 percent before distributing it. This is reduced to 10 percent at rank 2 and completely vanishes with rank 3. However, ranks 2 and 3 don’t warrant spending the AAs just yet.

At this point, we pick up a couple of Class AAs, before settling into the long AA grinds. These aren’t terrible critical AAs but are very, very useful, (but still very, very optional).

MGB: At 9 AAs this is expensive, but Mass Group Buff is the bread and butter of the raiding cleric.

DR: At 5 AAs, Divine Resurrection isn’t cheap, but, I have found 101 uses for this AA (besides the obvious 100 percent rez).

IITU: At 5 AAs Innate Invisibility to Undead is a really awesome toy. It’s not critical, but very useful (as well as a fast way to max Divination skill).

This will get you your final title if you want. At this point we get some options so these are presented in any particular order – other than some comments. For raiding, the healing AAs are more of a priority, for the solo Cleric, the Defensive and Offensive AAs are more of a priority.

Healing Adept and Advanced Healing Adept – these increase the amount of damage healed by all of your instant Heal spells (this is applied before the doubling cause by an exceptional heal).

Healing Gift and Advance Healing Gift – this increases the chance of an exceptional heal. This rarely saves anyone, but it is fun to have a newbie do a double take with the CH does 17K in healing …. Now if only we had tanks like that. The extra healing is nice though when using Supernal light, and it does so without creating a huge extra hate push.

Spell Casting Reinforcement and Spell Casting Reinforcement Mastery – these AAs are a blessing and a curse. On the one hand, when the series is completed, all of your buffs last 50 percent longer. On the other, this breaks your pacification (or rather fixes it) making it last only 42 seconds instead of 8 minutes. If you solo and aren’t raiding, the decision is easy to make. Otherwise, I tend to recommend to Clerics to accumulate the AAs and buy this one all at once (all 26 points of it – or whatever it comes to).

Spell Casting Fury and Fury of Magic – Critting on your nukes is always nice. But, more importantly for us Clerics, this affects the proc on our Cleric Hammers – allowing it to crit (normal proc lands for up to 150, Crits for up to 300). Over the course of my major battles with single targets, this has added thousands to my total Damage output.

Channeling Focus – This doesn’t seem to help as much as it suggests, at least not in terms of general combat. Where I saw the most impact (at three ranks) was when I was PBAoEing 20-30 mobs at a time, and would channel through 20 or 30 bashes successfully.

Natural Durability – This AA is nice in that more HPs is always better. But it is one of the least important of the archetypes. It is useful, but not so useful as to supercede the others. Damage mitigation and avoidance tend to have more impact.

Combat Stability and Innate Defense – These AAs increase Damage Mitigation. This means that you take less damage when you get hit – and the decrease is eventually significant. But, in the long run, this is less important to the Cleric than Damage avoidance since you still have to make a channeling check when you get hit.

Combat Agility and Lightning Reflexes – These AAs increase Damage avoidance, allowing you to avoid being hit at all more often. This is very, very useful to Clerics – particularly Clerics who want to tank.

Mental Clarity 2 and 3 – While expensive, eventually these will get a higher priority, as mana regen is in longer combats more important than the depth of the mana pool.

Radiant Cure 2 and 3 – These are expensive and not as useful as RC1, but eventually, they move higher up on the priority list – if only for those half dozen PoP progression targets that use curses with 14 counters.

Divine Arbitration 2 and 3 – These are quite useful, and if you find that you like DvA1, you should buy these relatively quickly.

Celestial Regeneration – This AA is broken. It still works on a single target (isn’t a group thing), which lessens its value, but it isn’t bad for a free HoT.

Celestial Renewal – These 2 AAs are supposed to enhance Celestial Regeneration. Instead they make it quit working entirely. Don’t buy them at all.

Bestow Divine Aura and Hastened Divinity – While useful from time to time on raids, this is one that won’t help a lot (it is a DA that you can use on yourself without taking a buff slot, and even if you die, is available immediately after you get back or rezzed, which makes it somewhat useful personally as well). I generally don’t recommend that you get this early unless your guild asks you too.

Turn Undead and Hastened Turning – I hear a lot of Clerics who don’t like this one or appreciate it. It has some limited value. It is an AE (and we get so few AEs that not many Clerics understand the concept well). It will only hit a limited number of targets – and those that are immune to the fear component will be immune to the DoT as well (this was eventually fixed I think but not for us). What most people don’t realize is the scale of the DPS of this DoT. At rank three, it will kill any of the normal named vampires in the castle in Tenebrous Mountains (about 13K HPs) in 2 or 3 ticks. However, don’t use it where the fear will send the mobs into socials and pull adds. Due to its very expensive nature and long reuse time, its not a high priority AA though.

Purify Soul and Hastened purification of the Soul – This sounds really, really nice. A quick cure to everything (but fear, charm and rez effects). In reality the reuse timer is too long for this to be that effective. If you needed it on a raid to cure a MT of something, and it saved the raid, it might be worth it. Otherwise it’s a one shot toy, and not really worth getting until you run out of other things to buy.

Unfailing Divinity – This enhances the Cleric Spell Divine Intervention. The enhancement is usually only a raid oriented effect (although in going after large single targets I often use DI on myself). For guild raiding, this may be more or less critical depending on how much you use DI on your targets.

Innate Lung Capacity – I found this was really only useful for the naked CR into the Gray or SSRA (although really, this is replaced with an extra EB item in the bank).

Innate Regeneration – I never felt this was worth the AAs until I was stuck with attributes and resists left. Then I bought it.

New Tanaan Crafting Mastery – I bought these as I needed them, but these are personal preference AAs.

Innate [attribute] and Advanced Innate [attribute] – These AAs really only help on those attributes that you need to boost a bit. While I did all of the Dex advancements early on, I didn’t bother with any of the others until the very end, although some may find that boosting Wisdom early on to be very helpful in terms of the mana pool size.

Innate [resistance] and the advanced resistances (Warding of Solusek, Blessing of ‘Eci, Marr’s Protection, Shroud of the Faceless, Bertoxxulous’ Gift) – While a bit more helpful than the attribute boosts, these shouldn’t be a priority at all. When I did do them, I prioritized them as follows: MR, FR, DR, PR, CR. Although this order is probably no more than preferential.

First Aid – I think this is largely worthless for Clerics, but if you want it, go for it.

Conclusions

In the high end game, AAs are critical. The difference between a level 65 with no AAs and one with 100+ is huge. A Cleric with 200 or 300 or 400 AAs simply adds power to his game. Once a Cleric has his AC up there (1200 or so plus) and his defensives done, he can start tanking (and soloing) PoP mobs. First the tier one zones, Nightmare, Valor, Justice – but eventually, as he grows more powerful through gear and AAs, he can reach into Halls of Honor, and Plane of Storms, Torden, and Drunder … There isn’t a “best” way to move through the AAs, but, you do want to set yourself up in your primary role as healer before attempting to move on as tank and solo artist against powerful PoP mobs.

Continued in part 4.

Very nice work, Cromis! I don't have a cleric nor intend to make one any time soon, but this was excellant reading and reference.

We need more clerics on our server ... or maybe they're all running anonymous

_________________
Miztig - 65 Mage - Proud member of Pathfinders of Al`Kabor!

~http://eqpathfinders.com/ ~
http://www.guildportal.com/Guild.aspx?G ... abID=77836

Oh just for the record I got all the Celestial Renewal AA's (maxed it) thinking that might fix it or something and I was sorta running outa aa's at that time. Anyway it didnt...

Thats too bad since its a Very handy AA if it worked correctly (Instant cast group 3k HoT), That complemented Devine Arbitration.

_________________

Very nice Cromis.

_________________
SnuffysPaw
lvl 65 Human Monk
The Lollipop Guild

Just as importantly Nukes, it would be a very nice group HoT that could be MGBed for certain encounters as a raid ....

Great write up Cromis.

_________________

Heh heh it's not done yet - a lot more to go as I get time to make my notes presentable.

It nice to see someones elses take on being a cleric and can allow one to even reconsider how they play.

_________________