Thasmudyan
08-09-2008, 03:12 PM
Because, seriously, we need one of these... If only because I'm lazy and don't like to repeat myself every time a new stat point or empowerment question comes up.
Anyways, as the title indicates, this is a place for new clerics to post their questions regarding where to put free stat points and which skills to empower (the two most common questions new players have). It's also for those of us who have been around for a while and want to share our favorite builds and how they work - in the hopes that the aforementioned new players will read about them and not have to post a question. :)
Now, with that said, here are my thoughts:
Build
With regards to the placement of free stat points for clerics - the two stats you should be focusing on, depending on the type of cleric you want to play, are STR and END. STR if you want to increase your damage, and END if you want to increase your defense.
Why STR and END? Well, INT is useless for clerics at this time (none of our skills use it for damage). DEX could be useful, but aim is not usually an issue due to the existence of aim scrolls, and the bonus clerics get to evasion from free stat DEX is small as our evasion is naturally low. If you want evasion, it's better to add END, which gives you block rate to evade attacks and also defense and HP to survive the ones you don't evade. Finally, there's SPR, which does have usefulness for clerics - but my feeling is simply that STR and END are more useful than SPR is. See here (http://www.outspark.com/forums/showthread.php?t=87687) for my thoughts on SPR for clerics.
With this in mind, my recommendations for cleric builds are quite simple:
- If you like to solo, or feel your cleric will be primarily a soloer, put all your stats into STR. It will increase your damage by a lot, as free stat STR ignores defense. You'll be squishier than other clerics, but this isn't a crippling factor by any means. Full STR clerics can still heal in parties and can do quite well doing so. This is the most versatile cleric build, although it's probably not for beginners, as you'll need quick reflexes to keep yourself alive at times.
- If you party more than you solo, but still want the option of being able to fight when you can't party, try a 1:1 STR:END build or some similar combination (50 points into END, rest into STR is a good option, as END becomes less useful after 50 points). This is the build I recommend for most clerics. The END will help your survivability in parties, and the STR will help you when you are soloing or questing.
- If you party all the time, go with full END. This is the "full support" type cleric - your damage will be low, but you'll be able to shrug off more damage than other clerics, allowing you to focus on your party. This build I recommend for those clerics who have little to no interest in fighting or who want to focus exclusively on healing. (There is no free stat that affects your ability to heal, so that's why END is the full support build).
Skill Empowerments
Choosing the right skill empowerments is, if anything, more important to a cleric - specifically a healing-focused cleric - than choosing the right free stats.
When empowering skills, remember that you get the biggest benefit from your first empowerment point and your fifth empowerment point. So if you want to empower a skill, but don't want to invest 5 points, just stick a single point in and stop there. Points 2 through 4 in any skill really don't add much. If it's something you use a lot, though (like most of the empowerments I recommend) you'll want to put the full 5 points in as that last point is a significant boost.
For starters, here's what I recommend you DON'T empower:
- Any of the buff skills. They all last for an hour which is plenty long enough, their SP cost is negligible and they don't need shorter cool times.
- Revive. Many clerics are tempted to add to Revive's cooldown time after experiencing the Mara KQ - where there always seem to be a lot of deaths and people begging for revives (and only one or two clerics actually able to revive). Don't do it. At higher levels, Revive cooldown time is almost never an issue. These points are better spent elsewhere.
- Anything for SP consumption. (Note: Possible exception of Heal, since it's used so much). At lower levels, SP reduction empowerments are very tempting, as they make your spells more efficient. However, I again recommend saving your points for other things. The reason for this is that at high levels, SP consumption really isn't an issue. You can hold more SP stones than any other class, so in a party you'll always be the last one that needs to restone, and if you're solo you can still fight for hours without any SP empowerments.
Now, with that said, here's what I DO recommend:
- Heal (cooldown then power, in that order). These should be the first 10 points you spend, as Heal is at all levels your most used skill regardless of whether you solo or party. If you're a full support cleric, you may also add SP consumption to Heal, because you'll have the points to spare.
- Bash (power then cooldown). Your second 10 points if you are a soloer or a party cleric who likes to fight a lot. Bash is used almost as much as Heal, so you'll get a lot of use out of these points. If you don't fight or rarely fight then you can skip this, though.
- Rejuvenate (cooldown then power). If you spent your first 20 points on Heal and Bash as I recommend above, then you'll be able to start adding to Rejuvenate's cooldown at 43, so by level 51 you'll have its cooldown maxed. This is good, because it's about that level where you will start to really make use of it in parties. You don't need to start adding to its power until later on, but by the time you hit 70 and start partying in Trumpy Remains, you will want some additional power on your Rejuvenate, since tanks will start to have enough hp to make use of it.
Solo clerics don't really need to empower Rejuvenate, but if you party at all it does come in handy.
Now, the above empowerments won't use up all your points (you will have 39 total empowerment points when you hit level 79) so here are some optional empowerments for the rest of your points:
- Invincible (duration). This is a good place to stick one point, as it gives you a nice 3.8 second boost. When you're using Invincible, though, it will often break from damage before the duration expires, so this isn't a requirement. 5 points here can be worthwhile for full support clerics, as it allows you to cast Invincible a bit ahead of time when you know someone's going to take massive damage soon.
- Trip or Bleed (whichever weapon you use) (cooldown). This one is for pure solo clerics. Their damage bonus is low, but using them does give you an extra attack, and the faster they cool down the faster you can attack, so it does have some benefit from a damage standpoint. I wouldn't empower either of them for power, though, the additional damage is just too small.
- Recover (cooldown). This is an option for support clerics (or those who like to tank and want to make use of Recover's aggro). It still tends to be a once-a-fight type of spell, though, because the cooldown is still pretty long even empowered. And unfortunately you can't empower Recover's healing ability so it's still only of limited usefulness...
Bonus Advice - Weapon Choice
Honestly, whether you choose a mace or a hammer isn't a big deal - both do fairly equivalent damage, and if you're a support cleric you aren't fighting much anyways. The general advice here is to choose whichever you can find that has better stats.
If you are the full STR solo type cleric, though, consider a mace, as it will allow you to use your STR bonus more often (faster attack rate). Against normal monsters, it's not much of a difference, but when you're fighting elites or bosses - the mace is significantly more damaging, if you've got a lot of STR.
For most other clerics - the hammer has a slight edge in damage, particularly if you're talking about +9 weapons (as long as you have access to power scrolls to make up the aim difference).
And that's all the advice I have for now. As I stated above, feel free to add your own advice, or ask questions.
Anyways, as the title indicates, this is a place for new clerics to post their questions regarding where to put free stat points and which skills to empower (the two most common questions new players have). It's also for those of us who have been around for a while and want to share our favorite builds and how they work - in the hopes that the aforementioned new players will read about them and not have to post a question. :)
Now, with that said, here are my thoughts:
Build
With regards to the placement of free stat points for clerics - the two stats you should be focusing on, depending on the type of cleric you want to play, are STR and END. STR if you want to increase your damage, and END if you want to increase your defense.
Why STR and END? Well, INT is useless for clerics at this time (none of our skills use it for damage). DEX could be useful, but aim is not usually an issue due to the existence of aim scrolls, and the bonus clerics get to evasion from free stat DEX is small as our evasion is naturally low. If you want evasion, it's better to add END, which gives you block rate to evade attacks and also defense and HP to survive the ones you don't evade. Finally, there's SPR, which does have usefulness for clerics - but my feeling is simply that STR and END are more useful than SPR is. See here (http://www.outspark.com/forums/showthread.php?t=87687) for my thoughts on SPR for clerics.
With this in mind, my recommendations for cleric builds are quite simple:
- If you like to solo, or feel your cleric will be primarily a soloer, put all your stats into STR. It will increase your damage by a lot, as free stat STR ignores defense. You'll be squishier than other clerics, but this isn't a crippling factor by any means. Full STR clerics can still heal in parties and can do quite well doing so. This is the most versatile cleric build, although it's probably not for beginners, as you'll need quick reflexes to keep yourself alive at times.
- If you party more than you solo, but still want the option of being able to fight when you can't party, try a 1:1 STR:END build or some similar combination (50 points into END, rest into STR is a good option, as END becomes less useful after 50 points). This is the build I recommend for most clerics. The END will help your survivability in parties, and the STR will help you when you are soloing or questing.
- If you party all the time, go with full END. This is the "full support" type cleric - your damage will be low, but you'll be able to shrug off more damage than other clerics, allowing you to focus on your party. This build I recommend for those clerics who have little to no interest in fighting or who want to focus exclusively on healing. (There is no free stat that affects your ability to heal, so that's why END is the full support build).
Skill Empowerments
Choosing the right skill empowerments is, if anything, more important to a cleric - specifically a healing-focused cleric - than choosing the right free stats.
When empowering skills, remember that you get the biggest benefit from your first empowerment point and your fifth empowerment point. So if you want to empower a skill, but don't want to invest 5 points, just stick a single point in and stop there. Points 2 through 4 in any skill really don't add much. If it's something you use a lot, though (like most of the empowerments I recommend) you'll want to put the full 5 points in as that last point is a significant boost.
For starters, here's what I recommend you DON'T empower:
- Any of the buff skills. They all last for an hour which is plenty long enough, their SP cost is negligible and they don't need shorter cool times.
- Revive. Many clerics are tempted to add to Revive's cooldown time after experiencing the Mara KQ - where there always seem to be a lot of deaths and people begging for revives (and only one or two clerics actually able to revive). Don't do it. At higher levels, Revive cooldown time is almost never an issue. These points are better spent elsewhere.
- Anything for SP consumption. (Note: Possible exception of Heal, since it's used so much). At lower levels, SP reduction empowerments are very tempting, as they make your spells more efficient. However, I again recommend saving your points for other things. The reason for this is that at high levels, SP consumption really isn't an issue. You can hold more SP stones than any other class, so in a party you'll always be the last one that needs to restone, and if you're solo you can still fight for hours without any SP empowerments.
Now, with that said, here's what I DO recommend:
- Heal (cooldown then power, in that order). These should be the first 10 points you spend, as Heal is at all levels your most used skill regardless of whether you solo or party. If you're a full support cleric, you may also add SP consumption to Heal, because you'll have the points to spare.
- Bash (power then cooldown). Your second 10 points if you are a soloer or a party cleric who likes to fight a lot. Bash is used almost as much as Heal, so you'll get a lot of use out of these points. If you don't fight or rarely fight then you can skip this, though.
- Rejuvenate (cooldown then power). If you spent your first 20 points on Heal and Bash as I recommend above, then you'll be able to start adding to Rejuvenate's cooldown at 43, so by level 51 you'll have its cooldown maxed. This is good, because it's about that level where you will start to really make use of it in parties. You don't need to start adding to its power until later on, but by the time you hit 70 and start partying in Trumpy Remains, you will want some additional power on your Rejuvenate, since tanks will start to have enough hp to make use of it.
Solo clerics don't really need to empower Rejuvenate, but if you party at all it does come in handy.
Now, the above empowerments won't use up all your points (you will have 39 total empowerment points when you hit level 79) so here are some optional empowerments for the rest of your points:
- Invincible (duration). This is a good place to stick one point, as it gives you a nice 3.8 second boost. When you're using Invincible, though, it will often break from damage before the duration expires, so this isn't a requirement. 5 points here can be worthwhile for full support clerics, as it allows you to cast Invincible a bit ahead of time when you know someone's going to take massive damage soon.
- Trip or Bleed (whichever weapon you use) (cooldown). This one is for pure solo clerics. Their damage bonus is low, but using them does give you an extra attack, and the faster they cool down the faster you can attack, so it does have some benefit from a damage standpoint. I wouldn't empower either of them for power, though, the additional damage is just too small.
- Recover (cooldown). This is an option for support clerics (or those who like to tank and want to make use of Recover's aggro). It still tends to be a once-a-fight type of spell, though, because the cooldown is still pretty long even empowered. And unfortunately you can't empower Recover's healing ability so it's still only of limited usefulness...
Bonus Advice - Weapon Choice
Honestly, whether you choose a mace or a hammer isn't a big deal - both do fairly equivalent damage, and if you're a support cleric you aren't fighting much anyways. The general advice here is to choose whichever you can find that has better stats.
If you are the full STR solo type cleric, though, consider a mace, as it will allow you to use your STR bonus more often (faster attack rate). Against normal monsters, it's not much of a difference, but when you're fighting elites or bosses - the mace is significantly more damaging, if you've got a lot of STR.
For most other clerics - the hammer has a slight edge in damage, particularly if you're talking about +9 weapons (as long as you have access to power scrolls to make up the aim difference).
And that's all the advice I have for now. As I stated above, feel free to add your own advice, or ask questions.