1 cleric level will not help you!

[Entelech]

For a new player, wands are the cheapest form of consumable healing per charge.

Also, that one level of Cleric gets you weapon and armor proficiencies which will be handy if you're an Elf, Drow, or Half Elf with Arcane Fluidity. It makes those lower levels go by smoothly.

It also gets you more spell points than a fighter, paladin or ranger splash would. So if you recognize that your offensive melee is going to be short-lived, it's certainly a reasonable option.

For a Wizard aiming for Pale Master, it also gets you access to Inflict wands, unlike Paladin or Ranger.

Sure, it's a barnacle at endgame, but for a first character endgame is not really a consideration.

[JasonJi72]

After playing a bit, and figuring out the mechanics, I decided to buy 32 point build and start playing. My first character was a rogue (it always is). One thing I remember was that my biggest pain in the abdomin was the low will saves of a rogue, and that potions were way beyond my ability to replenish them. At the time I thought that rangers and palladins had to be able to cast spells to use wands (sorry, it kinda made sense to me at the time). That left cleric or bard. Today I would choose bard, but at the time I really wanted will saves (I even took Iron Will... imagine that).

Anyway, my build is 18 rogue / 1 fighter / 1 cleric. I had no aspirations of ever reaching level 20; I just wanted to get to level 12. When I posted the build on the forums, it started a huge debate over the value of 1 cleric level that would make this one look like a quiet day at the beach (I'd dig it up, but that was over 2 years ago).

What 1 cleric level brings to the table for this guy:
12 wis + 2 cleric will save = +4 will save above your average rogue, and a reason to take iron will and halfling will save bonus' if you choose.
divine vitality (not much, but it's there)
faster wand healing with cure light
more health before shrining from cure light
PROTECTION FROM EVIL (protection against many spells that are the bane of rogues)
no fail from cure wands = easier to level

I play this guy off and on (like many of my characters). Right now he is a mule, but I plan on bringing him back and eventually reincarnating him. The main reason I have kept him around is that I bought a +2 supreme tome for him, but he is pretty good, and more survivable that many rogues.

Please do not deny him to your group because he is 1 cleric / 1 fighter / 13 rogue, deny him because he is a str based dual kopesh halfling with high saves, or that the player just sux lol whatever your pleasure. The character is Radji of Thelanis. If you myddo him, keep in mind that he is a mule atm.

Thank you for your cooperation.

[Therigar]

Here's my question, how much can you heal yourself with a cure light wand? And is it going to be fast enough to keep yourself alive even though you take bunch of damage from bunch of mobs end game.

You clearly do not know what you are talking about.

Wands do not depend on your caster levels. With a single cleric level you can use every clerical wand, regardless of caster level, just as long as the character level is high enough.

That means cure moderate at character level 3, cure serious at character level 5, etc.

If a player is willing to do without the capstone it makes total sense to splash a single level of cleric or a single level of wizard (or FvS/sorcerer) simply for the wand use.

As for fast healing....

Unlike potions, you do not stop moving when using wands. So, if you are smart enough to run away from bad fights then you can emergency heal very readily with wands. Because you don't stop moving it means the mobs probably won't catch you. And, that means you can indeed keep yourself alive even if you took a bunch of damage.

[Therigar]

I did want self healing on some of my toons, for those who want to self heal as a dps or caster class, I recommend they go human for heal amp and take 2 rogue levels for UMD and use heal scrolls on themselves.

Once more you do not know what you are talking about.

Wand healing is fast and easy and begins immediately. UMD takes a long while to build up before it becomes useful.

But, what is more important is that a player can do both. It has been proven multiple times on the forums that a 6 CHA with half ranks in UMD can get enough UMD to rez and heal. If that is what you want there is no need to splash rogue for full ranks in UMD.

An even smarter person would splash BARD if their focus is on healing. Bard gives full access to clerical cure wands plus full ranks in UMD.

There are good reasons for 2 rogue and good reasons for human. But your premise that 1 cleric is not helpful is wrong from the outset and your suggestion about rogue splash for UMD is highly misleading as well as substantially inaccurate.

[Therigar]

I think U have forgotten one thing - the usage lvl of a wand or scroll is based on NOT the single lvl of cleric BUT the TOTAL lvl of the toon. i.e. cleric 1/fighter 4 can use lvl 5 divine wands/scrolls, cleric 1/fighter 19 can use ANY lvl divine wand/scroll.

This is only partly correct.

Wand use is not tied to caster class level.

Scroll use IS.

One level of cleric opens all wand use. It only opens scroll use up for L1 scrolls. If you try to use L2+ scrolls you do not have 100% success rates. And, once the scroll level gets high enough you cannot use it at all.

[Therigar]

And I agree that endgame favours specialisation to such a point that experimental builds are not recommended. However I don't think that an endgame focus is relevant to all build advice.

The first sentence is false. The second is accurate.

Just what constitutes END GAME?

There are no quests in the game that are so difficult that the party must be made up of only specialized characters. In fact, in some cases having specialized characters is a weakness -- particularly when the remainder of the group is not specialized as well.

Even epic content does not require specialization to such an extent that experimental builds won't work. More often it is the degree of experimentation that determines if the build will work.

But, that is the second sentence truth. Up until epic content there is a lot of room for experimental builds and some are very functional. In most cases the value of an experimental build lies in the player and not in the build.

But, keep in mind that many of the builds that now are considered standard were, at one time, experimental. And, don't forget that the game constantly changes. So the builds that are standard now will be replaced as the game evolves and new classes, races, etc. are introduced.

Of course, it will be experimental builds that provide the replacements as they prove to be effective.

[Therigar]

And potions > wands especially for a melee in combat as you don't need to swap an item, just chug and swing.

That is just plain bad advice.

First, drinking potions stops all other action. So it really is "chug and swing" since you are doing nothing while drinking that potion. OTOH, the mobs are still attacking you and you are still taking damage.

Second, "they who learn to run away live to fight another day." Too many players are bad players because they just stand there in the middle of the mobs trying to self heal. When the character dies they can't figure out what went wrong.

Good players know when to move out of combat and how to take advantage of short breaks. And, wand healing lets you achieve this on the move.

Did I mention that you cannot do anything else when drinking potions? If you run out of combat and drink a potion you stop. You don't move, you stop still and you drink.

With wands you keep moving and cast the cure. A very important part of the running away so that you can fight another day concept.

It is unfortunate that a founder should give such poor advice. The reality is that potions have specific uses. The same is true of wands and even scrolls. But, in the world of healing it is inaccurate to say potions > wands and irresponsible to make such a statement and follow it with "especially for a melee in combat...."

[krud]

I have been seeing a lot of builds like 18 wizard 1 cleric, 19 fighter 1 cleric. When I ask them why they took 1 cleric level, they all tell me they wanted self heal.

Here's my question, how much can you heal yourself with a cure light wand? And is it going to be fast enough to keep yourself alive even though you take bunch of damage from bunch of mobs end game.

one level in a class allows you to use ALL wands available to that particular class, provided you meet the minimum charcater level. Wand usage is based off of total charcater level, not class level. So, a 1clr/4ftr can use all wands available to a level 5cleric (i.e cure serious wand, and at level7 cure critical) . Ranger and paladin wand usage also works of of character level, so at level 5 they are able to use a cure serious wand (min level5) even though they cannot cast the spell yet.

Do not take this as an endorsement of 1 clr splash for wand usage. it's just an fyi. That kind of splash is usually a bad idea.

[Wizzly_Bear]

So much false information here it's sickening.

1 cleric is useful.

1 cleric allows use of all cleric wands if the CHARACTER level is high enough.

1 cleric does NOT allow heal scroll use

1 bard is many times better than 1 cleric (song, umd, all cure wands)

Drinking potions does NOT require being stationary. You can jump-chug, just like jump-wand, jump-cast, et cetera.

Stop throwing ******** answers around. Shut your mouth, open your ears, and learn a thing or two.

[Lorien_the_First_One]

So much false information here it's sickening.

1 cleric is useful.

1 bard is many times better than 1 cleric (song, umd, all cure wands)

I think these are the two that most of us are reacting to.

While 1 cleric does give you wands, 1 bard, ranger, or pali would tend to give you more. 1 Cleric is therefore a very poor choice.

[Wizzly_Bear]

I think these are the two that most of us are reacting to.

While 1 cleric does give you wands, 1 bard, ranger, or pali would tend to give you more. 1 Cleric is therefore a very poor choice.

Not being the optimal choice does not mean that it's a "very poor" or "not useful" choice though.

[Noctus]

1 cleric level will not help you!

But it will help others!

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To insta-decline you from their pugs when they are not in a mood to teach Newbies.

[Wizzly_Bear]

So much false information here it's sickening.

1 cleric is useful.

1 cleric allows use of all cleric wands if the CHARACTER level is high enough.

1 cleric does NOT allow heal scroll use

1 bard is many times better than 1 cleric (song, umd, all cure wands)

Drinking potions does NOT require being stationary. You can jump-chug, just like jump-wand, jump-cast, et cetera.

Stop throwing ******** answers around. Shut your mouth, open your ears, and learn a thing or two.

Negging me does not make me any less right.

[Wizzly_Bear]

Not being the optimal choice does not mean that it's a "very poor" or "not useful" choice though.

It's amusing that some people still bother to rep, especially neg when it very clearly does not even achieve it's most basic objective

PS to anonymous negger - at least neg the one that's semi-incendiary. This one is much too rational and polite to stir up enough drama to start a flame war over

[JOTMON]

That's still a fail build. What did that 1 clr give you that 1 ranger or 1 pali would not? (or even 1 rogue for UMD)

Agreed, a minor cleric/fvs splash is not overly usefull compared to other splashes.

Possible benefit...
First level cleric spell nightshield for those magic missle moments. ( I would get clickies)
quick heal on the fly for healer/wf caster that got himself endcapped. (Korthos Island clickies)
Separate timer for pots/spell/wands ( at low level not much mana anyway.. get a hirling)

Detriments..
Lose capstone ( depends on class some capstones are not that good)
-1 BAB ( not sure on this one at 19/1)

At low level soloing may appear to be helpful and cost effective but vs the cost of an LR at higher levels to get back to optimal.....Get a hireling...

Rogue - UMD is not usefull until higher levels and may require gear swap out to get it to a reliable point (still my preferance as a long term splash solution for a generalist type build).

Half-Elf Dilante - offers some interesting alternatives.

[Alabore]

At low level soloing may appear to be helpful and cost effective but vs the cost of an LR at higher levels to get back to optimal.....Get a hireling...

Problem with hirelings is, they only recently started curing debuffs, such as curse, poisoning and so on.
Before, they were only good for raw healing - and some cleric splashes date back to earlier times.

I'm not trying to defend what could be a less than desirable option - but keep in mind not every player is equally committed to keeping their character up to date to the point of reincarnating or rerolling them.

I, for one, am not.
Will that marginalise me and my characters?

* shrug *

[Therigar]

Drinking potions does NOT require being stationary. You can jump-chug, just like jump-wand, jump-cast, et cetera.

Tell you what you do. Load the game and run. While running drink your potion. Tell us what the animation does.

Now run and jump and drink. Again, tell us what the animation does.

Try it with swimming.

The reason you jump & drink is because the jump animation has a start and end point. But, if you watch the animation you will see your character stop and drink. It is noticable.

The ability to do things that normally cause your character to stop movement is the reason we jump while doing it -- the jump animation does not seem to trigger the negative effects.

So, yes, you can jump and drink. But only because the jumping animation takes you to your fixed end point* regardless of what you are doing mid-jump.

*Note that turning during a jump changes where you land but not the distance you travel. It is this distance that I'm referring to when I say fixed start and end point. And, yes, it is modified for height differences. The only thing that interrupts jump distance is a solid object (which you may bounce off of).

[Wizzly_Bear]

And? Who really cares what the animation is doing? You're moving away from the mobs and drinking a pot. You don't have to stop and let them beat on you.

[blitzschlag]

*Note that turning during a jump changes where you land but not the distance you travel. It is this distance that I'm referring to when I say fixed start and end point. And, yes, it is modified for height differences. The only thing that interrupts jump distance is a solid object (which you may bounce off of).

ever tried to not move forward injump? guess what happens. jump animation never has a fixed landing point that is determined at jump-start.

drinking pots does halt your animation same as whipping a wand/reading a scroll slows you down tremendously. thats the cause you drink pots while jumping and you whip wands while jumping.

so your assumptions are semi right. but not the kind of "know it all" right to look down upon others...

[wonkey]

Empower Healing for Halfling Dragonmarks? A Command spell that's effective (against the right targets) up to about level 8? Use of Restoration scrolls that doesn't depend upon UMD (and thus can allow you to restore neg levels upon yourself).

I think the utility from a single Wizard level is better as it grants Stoneskin and 10th level Shield/Blur wands and the Dragonmark Heal is so slow

1 Clr doesn't compare favourably with the Bard or Paladin capstone imo, but levelling in a static or permadeath group 1 Cleric on a high Charisma character is handy for divine vitalities and wand use. Especially if you don't use rest shrines :P

Yeah, but builds for 'hardcore' PD guilds like the Core and Mortal Voyage don't count :P

I'd probably be declined to most groups with the builds I run that are generally well appreciated in MV.

I mean, one build I'm currently running is a 5 Wiz/2 ranger who will be 7 wiz/2 ranger/1 fighter at level 10 should he make it that far.

I entered our 'duo tournament' (which means no more leveling past 4, among other restrictions) with a 1 cleric/3 bard and my partner was a 3 cleric/1 rogue. Since I died due to a bad pull near the end of Proof is in the Poison hard (my build was near immune to melee damage at this level - magic, not so much), I have created another toon with this build.

The list goes on.
Our builds often just don't look at all like 'standard' builds...