I run a box group and I've recently added a Cleric, was looking for some advice as to what buffs I should keep on my tank,group and myself. They're warrior,beast,ranger, bard and now the Cleric. All lvl 105 with max AA's and in EoK expac. I use a healer merc for now while I'm getting the hang of healing them all myself. The healing I'm okay with I think, just way to many options off buffs from the Cleric. I'd appreciate any help I can get on the subject.
just some suggestions to get you started. i'm sure some noniksar clerics have some ideas. buffs on cle: aura of divinity aura of the reverent armor of the ardent divine response buffs on group: rallied greater ward of vie unified hand of surety buffs on tank: anticipated intercession divine indemnification divine guardian shining bulwark ward of surety cast this on tank when he has a mob targeted: vicarum's retort
gnomeboss pretty much covered it. Only thing i would suggest is to leave out the following, you will get tired of the upkeep. Divine response (nothing outside of raids gonna make that trigger) AI, DI, and DG. those are only for raids really. Ward of Surety is more of a heal than a buff, and its mostly used in raids. Vicarum's retort is awesome! use it on every mob!
Vicarum's Retort is what 400dps worth of damage and 40k heal (proc based 10 charges?) There are more efficient ways to produce both of those, I'd guess trading a cast of Retort for even a single Contravention or intervention would be a wiser use of the most important resource you have: Time.
This is probably a premium list. If you are five boxing and have trouble keeping up with all these though, there are plenty that you don't need for a typical xp group. To be honest, you shouldn't have any trouble keeping your true tank up with just the ones I marked Always. The four I marked as always are long lasting casts, you can pretty much cast them and forget it. Really with a true tank you aren't going to need more than that for most group content. The Situational-A should probably be updated when you have time. They aren't hard to keep up but I wouldn't hold pulling if they are dropped. The Situational-B ones are ones that you will really only need for named or if you know its going to be an extremely tough pull. Divine Response for instance is great if you have a named that's going to be blasting a nasty AOE, but for large parts of group content it won't be firing. Ward of surety for a boxed cleric can be set in your multibind. Its not ideal, but really not a huge harm if you are playing 4 or 5 other toons simultaneously. Better in your multibind than forgotten about. Also, if you are running into mana issues I added Yaulp, its a constant refresh, but a better mana boost than combat meditating. You can't use it while sitting. Just my opinion, if you can keep all of these up and box it would be better, but really only the 4 always. And of course I'm often wrong.
bunch of haters on vicarum's retort =( I like it, provides a lot of healing via the procs. I would suggest trying it since you are boxing. For me, it provides enough healing to not require casted heals on most trash mobs. Frees you up to do other stuff.
Alright and that works for you, but it is far and away from the best method. Here's the thing, you WANT to be casting heals, because that's how you do damage. What other stuff does it free you up for? Do you mean when boxing, it allows you time to focus on the other toons? That as an answer I could see, but is very specific to that situation. The other thing is if Retort alone keeps your tank alive, they should either 1) be pulling more or 2) be using a 2hander (assuming war/sk/pal). Either of those options is going to vastly increase your throughput completion of goals in a timely fashion. Now if you are OK with taking longer to do less, that is fine, but that method may require a disclaimer.
I mean thats what he said, but w/e. so many people here just want to pick everything eachother say apart. i think im done posting here
We think you along with the OP could have better results with a different spell Casting one more Intervention per fight heals for more and damages for more
Hey Kthe, keep posting. By and large I think the Cleric community is very kind and helpful on these boards. It kind of goes along with the personality of someone who picks a cleric for their main. I can post a parse from raids and get tremendous incite from some of the people here. When people feel your steering someone down the wrong path they'll call you on it, and sometimes not in the nicest way, but it doesn't mean we want you to leave. On your point for vicarum's retort, I personally try and play my cleric as much as possible by the ABC rule which of course is Always Be Casting. If I use VR I like to use vicarum's retort when there is a space between pulls because I can cast it during a down time and it will do damage and healing when the mob is in camp. In the OP's group are you suggesting that the VR is cast on the BL and Ranger for max damage/heal? TBH I generally will only cast VR on whoever I think is hitting the most and ignore the Tank wielding a two hander, but I have no idea if this is a misconception on my part about the working of the spell. And, as was pointed out, you can do more damage and healing through either the Intervention or Contra line casts. And of course way more damage if you are twinning both with Glorious.
yall act like there is some kind of huge negative for casting it and/or it is completely useless. It does provide benefit and it only takes 1 cast per mob to upkeep on someone. The OP said he was new to boxing a cleric and what buffs to keep up. I don't see how suggesting to make use of VR is "leading someone down the wrong path" Spamming Light heal instead of using a multibind is someone going down the wrong path.
The math doesn't support your assertion. If each spell on your bar is given a value based upon total damage v healing v cast time, VR is low on the priority list. Hence what I said, which is a preferable method, that raw math supports. Using your example: the same reason Light is not the preferred method, is the same reason VR is not preferable. The game at 105 is more about immediacy then it is about delayed results.
I just dont see a down side. If you are playing your cleric solo, then you are already casting glorious and intras/contras. its not like you are giving them up to cast this. and if you are boxing the proc heals allow for your time to be better spent on the real dps classes instead of on the cleric. I didn't use to be a big fan of this spell line but the upgrade in EoK provides a lot more healing power than it did before.
I'll certainly try it both ways. I hope no one quits posting, I think we need all kinds of different ideas on how to do things, not everyone plays the same way. I've felt like I've been rushing thru this game the last several years. On adding this Cleric I'm going to go back a few expacs and play in a slower more enjoyable pace. Get to know my characters and zones a lot better. Thanks again for the tips.
It can consume the synergy charges for an extra 5k base healing bringing the base up to around 9k before any healing mods or crits.
There is certainly a school of priests who like to hate on Vicarum's Retort, or heal over times or promise or generally delayed gratification type heals. But i think those people are former dps or players that are used to looking at the math of a fight and breaking it down in absolutes. X damage, Y healed, Z number of spells cast W total time of fight. etc. That raw data is a decent place to start but it is not a practical description of what is going on during a fight. There is a flow and a rhythm to a battle. The damage taken is not a constant predictable pattern. There are spikes and ebbs. Obviously the better armored and battle skilled your tank is, the smaller the spikes- thats why raid geared tanks seem to shrug off most group content and often barely need healed at all. In the same way, your direct heals also spike at different points during a fight. Casting all the "not efficient" or "useless" heals can smooth out those spikes and help keep a pc alive. Vie, ward, elixir, shining armor, vicarums retort, celestial regen,benediction, divine intervention, promise, bp clicks- all of these types of things can keep a tank up when a damage spike hits while you are in the middle of casting a direct heal, or during universal cooldown. It doesnt matter a whole lot, a healer ignoring all those secondary things and just spamming or reacting with direct heals or macros can be very successful, but every now and then, there will be that fight where you lose a tank that you would not have if you'd dropped a VR on him while he was disced and not taking damage, but you chose to intervention instead, to get that sweet sweet crit. i think there is room for different styles, especially playing in group content that is much more forgiving of mistakes or experimentation. Personally i like to relax or goof off a little bit or try different approaches while grouping. if i want a challenge or a time to work on squeezing every ounce of heal efficiency i can get out of my character, i get plenty of that raiding.
