Channeler Questions

Discussion in 'Priests' started by Vokan, Jan 17, 2018.

  1. Vokan Well-Known Member

    I am trying to decide which healer I want to play. Because there is such a huge time sync with trying to get any char to be raidable, I want to make sure I don't waste my time to find out I am going to be disappointed.

    So I knew little to nothing of Channelers and the only person who I ever knew that played one told me they are broken before he quit the game a few months ago. I don't really have an idea if he was just bad or if he was in fact correct.

    The more that I read up on the class, the more I am confused.
    So please bear with my ignorance as I ask a few questions...
    1. So I understand that Construct's Intercept is my single buff that I place on a char, most likely the tank, and it basically blocks damage from hitting that player, and transfers the damage to my construct. SO how much damage is absorbed by my construct? 100%, 75%? Is this just acting like one big ward? And healing my pet, I am just replenishing the ward?

    2. Is there a reason to have my pet attack?

    3. On the bottom of the construct tab, there are 4 abilities, one of the ones I have chosen is Aquatic Essence. Is that for my attacks or the constructs attacks that it heals group members?

    4. In the #5 slot, I have Interpose Redirect. It says it heals players for 75% of the damage intercepted which leads me to think that the intercept much is much lower than 100% as then there would be no need for a heal.

    5. My goal is to single heal heroics and raid on occasion when needed. Am I needed if our guild doesnt have an active Channeler? Will I be really frustrated in heroics?

    6. Is this class as complicated as I think it is?

    I just have some basic gear, had enough Eth runes to buy his stuff and leveling up in the questline before I go invest time to do epic 1.0 and 2.0. Here is my char:
    http://u.eq2wire.com/soe/character_detail/2581277800337

    Any info you can provide would be appreciated.
    Thanks
  2. Porrum Member

    1. Construct's Interception is gained at level 10, and by default will intercept 30% of incoming damage as long as the construct is not below 25% of it's health. You can modify this via Essence, Amphibian Essence reduces the interception by 5% (To 25% total), while Dire Essence increases it by 5% (to 35% total).

    There is also Overloaded Interception, an AA from the Shaper tree, which applies to the entire group, but intercepts half as much damage (15% normal, 10% amphibian, 20% dire). You can't use this with normal Construct's Interception, only one can be active at a time.

    2. The pet can kill grey trash while soloing old questlines. It might proc things? Also, if it's attacking, it might stay closer to the enemy and thus closer to the tank to stay in range for intercept. But overall, the construct's damage is extremely small and many channelers keep it passive.

    3. The pet procs that heal when it attacks. Other than Amphibian/Dire, the essence abilities are pretty minor.

    4. This ability helps with healing, since Intercept only blocks 25-35% of the incoming damage.
  3. Vokan Well-Known Member

    Even at 35% it is much less than I expected.
  4. Nebuleus New Member

    Hiya Vokan, glad you are considering trying out the channeler! There seem to be so few around. I main a channeler in a raiding guild and have had very good and enjoyable success this xpack! In the past I have raided with a fury, inqiz, and mostly the defiler but recently I have been all channeler for the past 3 xpacks. I'll try to best break down how I chann.
    First your questions:
    1. Dire essence is a must and as replied before me, 35% for single and 20% for group. For group dungeons I run the group intercept 100% of the time, there are just too many group hits and dots not to. If you go left side prestige (Interception Regeneration), you will find your life is much easier! Currently with my pot/fer, it hits for roughly 6 million hp per sec, about 15-20% of my max hp every second and around 15% of a tanks hp. It's huge! Now for raids, I am in mt group and usually run single target intercept on the tank, but sometimes switch to group if I find my second healer is struggling with the group (not ever often because our defiler is a beast). If it's a new raid mob we have no strats on, then single intercept to start and then adjust if needed. I can solo heal every dungeon with easy aside from one mob that "can" give me troubles if the group lacks in the hp department which is the last named in winds of change. Now left side prestige also gives your rift, normally I marco this to myself. The heal it procs is pretty bad (somewhere around 0-1% of my total healing) but I use it on the scouts/mages for the 6% damage reduction. Every tank I have ran with has been easy to heal, however some low hp deeps need the love. I find will the bulk is sitting, run to them and pop it on myself.

    2. I have my pet on auto assist only and always! For one, I dont want my pet running off and attacking some giant as the group is trying to train to the named. Nobody likes pets that bring them into unwanted combat! While the pet dps is terrible, it is the only way for them to proc your 3rd construct essence. Which I use Aquatic, only about 1-3% of my total heals, but hey it's something! plus the dps essences arent any better (we are a healer first). Now our 2.0 spell grants our pet a large damage proc (pretty small chance but it does and will hit), which is no use if your pet isnt attacking =)

    3. Construct's attack

    4. Always have Interpose Redirect active! So say your trouby gets hit for 1 million damage before any intercept, your group intercept will knock off 200k, and then interpose will heal for 75% of that damage which is 150k. So it's 350K hp automatically "interceptted" just by standing there looking awesome. What interpose redirect wont help with is one shots (and they do happen to low hp players. when I say low I mean less than 20m hp)

    5. As I said before, I can solo heal any heroic content with ease (aside from that one named which may frustrate you, but have also heard this from inqizs). If there is a dungeon with tons of dets to be cured, your life is a breeze! If there is not a single det to be cured, then you will just have to manage your Diss which isnt annoying or anything but you will see a difference.

    6. It is more complicated than any healer I have played in eq2, played everything but templar. But there is a reason I have stayed with the channeler, I feel it is the most rewarding and by far the most fun healer I have played in any game! This includes eq2, wow, ff14, eso, any rpgs. It's just a new outlook on healing from your traditional hots, reactives, and wards.

    While I was not available for the eth runes (i will be getting them very soon heh), I have no doubt the channeler rune will be a life improvement. Truespirit Defiance will be your go to 3rd slot heal (for every heroic zone). I will only switch to Siphoned Protection on a hard hitting raid mob when there is no shammy in my group. Now, are you needed in a raid? Not really, your group can get by without one. Do I think you can make an impact? Absolutely! My mt is rock solid with myself and our defiler in the group! Personally I get bored if I am not in a tank group. I feel we are not used to our full potential if we get stuck in say the scout/mage group.

    Hope this helps in your decision! If you play on halls of fate, my character's name is Nebuleus, feel free to shoot me a tell if you have any questions. Also, I have my eq2u profile unlocked if you would like to see my aa setup and have any questions about why i picked aas over others. The one setup I am currently testing is the last aa in left side prestige compared to arrow bulwark in raids. In groups, go left. In raids, not sure yet. Hope to hear from other channelers regarding their play style and quality of life!
    Blazen and Karsa like this.
  5. Vokan Well-Known Member

    Great posts. Thank you for so much information. I guess my next question is, then how do you heal mostly? Is it healing barrage? Is there ever a time to use healing arrow over barrage? Does everyone have to be in front of me to get the heals?

    Are there other healing things I am missing?

    oh... and I love macros, any good macros?
  6. Nebuleus New Member

    Nearly all of my healing comes from group intercept. Like i said, the hot it gives is huge! If we are doing an easy burned named, i'm willing to bet we dont even have to cast a heal if our tank knows a good rotation. But I do anyways, i use maximized protection if I know a big hitting group ae is coming, or otherwise just use on cooldown. Rotate in truespirit defiance as the cures allow. If there is a tougher mob, lets say the phoenix in monolith, I lay down rift on group before pull for the DR, use healing barrage on cooldown (only healing barrage because healing arrow will not trigger a free slot 1-3 cast, left side prestige), using soulshot mostly on cooldown but sometimes I wait if the group is getting very close to dieing. but again, group intercept heals for most of the damage. Lots of bosses have that death touch skill, when i know this named we are fighting has that mech, i save eye shot for when it emotes "looking for a fighter" (eye shot basically makes the target miss 4 times). In between healing barrage, soulshot, max protect, defiance, i spam vengeful arrow and try to get our 4-8 free cast to trigger, when it does then it's usually Truespirit's Restoration on the tank. It's rare that i need to use vector or salubrious. Back to the phoenix fight in mono, i do have to use both of those spells to keep up with the curse.

    Vector will only heal the ppl in front of you, it is an arc so they dont have to be directly in front of you. Healing barrage will heal the closest 6 people to the thing you smacked it with. Which means, if you are in a group, perfect it hits everybody! But in a raid, it will probably not hit everybody in your group. If you need a group heal in a raid and soulshot is down, then vector is the way to go (just because it will hit everybody in the raid as long as they are in front of you).
    Redirection is pretty good too, gives everybody in the group a 2 tick stoneskin. On easy fights, i use this before pull because i want to beat ppl on the parse lol. Harder fights, i use in between defiance casts or wait until i know something terrible is coming (like the barrel guy in source that one shots people if the barrel person is too slow).

    In all honesty though, the more you play the channeler, the more idea you will get about what your group intercept will heal for, what bosses require a better rotation and which ones you can just dps through. (btw, chann dps is meh.. our combat arts cant double cast like the other healers so i just rely on my fervor proc and ascension spells lol). You gotta go into it knowing we are not a shammy and some people may get one shotted as you learn how to control your dissonance and your filler healing spells. It takes practice like any other class =)

    My pet will almost never take damage, he's sitting around 1.4 billion hp.. he drops in health when I make him drop. I use construct regeneration for the long lasting hot, and essence weave for the burst heal and 24% hp gain (mostly just rely on construct regeneration). Other conducts I use are Channeled cleansing for the power regen (event heroics suck for power regen), Channeled confusion for the threat position, and poison bolt for when i get a free cast and the group is solid. I'll still use poison bolt without the free cast on easy fights.
  7. Nebuleus New Member

    Oh and I don't really use macros. I have /cancel_spellcast at the top of my group cure but that is about it. Truespirit Rift is macroed to myself most of the time, sometimes i take my name off if the zone is gonna be a cake walk.
  8. Nebuleus New Member

    One thing to remember when you play your channeler, you have to keep an eye on your quiver! When I first started playing the channeler and doing groups long ago, i would forget this and there we are, on the last named in the zone.. and i ran out of arrows.. like being dead in the water. Now days it's just second nature to check and resupply.
  9. Vokan Well-Known Member

    Wow, so much great info. Thank you very much for taking the time to respond.
    I was just working on the sig line and soloing and something was proc'ing to give me power. Wasnt the Channel Cleanse. Any idea what it was?
    Any recommended diety?
    Any recommended ascension? ( I will have them all at 15 today)

    Thank you
  10. Nebuleus New Member

    Proc'ing power? not sure. Consume Construct gives 25% power if you were casting that. If you have the golden efreeti boots, that gives power back like every 30 seconds. Does the proc show up on act under Power Replenish?

    As far as deity and ascension, i do not have a recommendation. I went tunare and thauma. Back when I made my chann, tunare just seemed like a good healer choice but doesnt much matter because your heals top everybody off anyways. Went thauma to add more combos, every dps out there is ether now days. I have grown to like thauma.
  11. Fleurs Active Member

    I have to add, as a defiler, how important it is to do that macro. If you cast it on the tank, it reduce all the ward by like 90%, and make the shaman unable to do his work. (yes, it is a bug feature)

    As a diety, Karana, lord of rain, may give you a group rez that work when already dead, and a mana regen that last 10 minute.

    As for adorn, i recommend the anti-stun, anti-stifle, (adamant resolve, adamant defiance) and the one that regen the mana every 4 second (ethernean will).

    PS: if you are subscriber, you can access the broker from anywhere to buy arrow.
  12. Vokan Well-Known Member

    THis is my char so far: http://u.eq2wire.com/soe/character_detail/2581277800337
    I am on IoR server, so able to upgrade pretty fast. I just got all 4 [V] runes on her yesterday, with some luck of returning the mats back on one of the combines.
    Just need to finish the PoP timeline, then epic 1.0 and 2.0 and ready to roll.

    Does the single target ward slot 3 ward have bleedthrough applied to it?

    I am a little confused on what reduces dissonance in regards to cures, if you could please explain.

    I have been doing the PoP timeline and the dps is painful, but I don't ever seem to lose health.

    THank you
  13. Nebuleus New Member

    If you got your V runes, you are ahead of me lol

    Single target ward does have a bleedthrough.

    Your Channeler aa tree, Enhanced: Cure, is what reduces your diss. Only works on single target cures, your group ones wont help with your diss.

    As far as dps, I don't have much to help with. I did the whole pop timeline with a trouby. Aside from ascensions, I just spam vengeful arrow on single targets and barrage with groups. Having Heartseeker aa in prestige line gives a huge boost of damage for vengeful as your target dies. If there was a lack of channeler dps at the start of this xpack, i didnt noticed it enough to research because of the trouby g/f. For our grandmaster 105 spell, I went for vengeful arrow. Salubrious and vector will top everybody off at expert lvl and Marisha kurs blessing upgrades are so minor it's hardly worth mentioning.

    I have no issues blowing through the solos by myself now just using ascensions on named and barrage/vengeful on trash. What I have noticed is our class abilities can't keep up with other healers because they can not double cast like other healers. I can only keep up with a perfectly timed fervor proc and ascensions. Hopefully we will have a way to increase our ability doublecast so make our combat arts worth while /em winks at the devs
  14. Vokan Well-Known Member

    I keep hearing of people using right side prestige to heal. I know tool tips are notorious for being misleading, but I don't understand how this works if someone could explain?
  15. Mhoramm Member

    If you take seeking cascade on the right side and then arrow bullwark, it will auto heal for a % of the damage taken. I don't think people really take it for that tho, mainly they just didn't see the use in taking truespirit rift on the left side. Neither one shows up high on the parse. Or at least it didn't before. I've been takinrg both rift and bullwark just because i need to take something and they are basically free heals. I've heard talk that Hostile Rift might do some dps now, but I haven't tested it myself.
  16. Vokan Well-Known Member

    What about intercept regeneration? Those heals are much more than the reduction.