Divines, Spellpoints, and Melee Expectations

[svinja]

If the group is really bad, I will just let them wipe, but the situation is usually more complicated. I was healing an EChrono yesterday, and the party leader was someone who I know is a decent barb. The other healer I didn't know from before, but he did a good job. The DPS was good. But the casters did a terrible job, barely anything was ever CCed, caster enemies weren't instakilled, casters needed to be healed (and of course, they were never in range of mass healing), didn't remove fire walls and fogs... I also run this on my caster so it's not like I don't know what a caster is supposed to do in there. I was at 10% or so SP by the time we got to the bank and shrined, this was already a bad sign as I should have a ton of SP left at that point. Unsurprisingly, I ended up using pots.

What do you do in this kind of situation? 9/12 people did their job (everyone except the casters and the party leader who took them) and don't deserve a wipe. So I drank pots, but I wasn't happy about it.

[Jevern]

I have no high level healers - my only healer is still mid-levels. But I thought you might want some melee opinion too. I dont really think a majority of melees are the type that demand you use potions. Furthermore, if I see healers using pots in raids, I either split any pots I have on hand between them or hand them to the one who used more. I also do try to ask nicely for heals when I'm at half hp and the cleric/FvS is not topping me off and there is a fight coming up.

I see less wipes that are due to healer incompetence as compared to lack of DPS/hp on the melee's part. As a melee, I consider it my duty not to die, and feel guilty if I do. It costs the healer sp to res me and rebuff me, and they sacrifice time to cast that spell would could spell danger for the rest of the group in say, VoD with a bunch of cleaving orthons. I guess that a lot of melee don't actually see it as *their* responsibility not to die, but rather, the healer's responsibility to keep them up. And that's a mindset change that would be pretty hard to bring about too. Would be nice if it happened though.

[PNellesen]

I think that anyone that is brand new to healing a particular raid (or new to healing raids in general) should be willing to chug a pot or two because they're not going to be familiar with the pace of healing and they will end up throwing more heals than are required. I think that if the Cleric/FvS runs out of SP because they are spending SP more quickly needed, then it's the Cleric/FvS that should eat the cost.

On the other hand, after spending maybe 5 pots on the first three runs of a raid, the healer shouldn't need to spend any more pots again unless something bizarre happens.

I just look at pots in the first few attempts at a raid as a cost of doing business. My melees had to get Silver+Good weapons for the Shroud. My FvS had to spend a couple of pots to get used to the pace of healing.

I have no interest in spending pots every time I step into a raid, though. That's just a recipe for disaster.

I agree with this to a large extent, though what I like to do is run my melees through new raids a few times before taking my Clerics. I ran ToD at least 3 times, VoD at least 5, and Epic Last Stand at least 5 on my Ranger before I ever stepped foot in them with my Cleric, and it paid off nicely in helping me to know when I should try to conserve SP, and where I needed to spam Heals. There's nothing you can really do about lag though, which is the main reason I carry 5 or 10 pots on me when entering any raid.

[baddax]

I personally would start my own lfm and "borrow" all players from said goup with the exception of the ones who decided to blacklist me. As my group filled and departed I would send a tell to former group leader and tell him how sad i was that he backlisted me before I /squelched him.

Well probably not unless i was in a particularly sh!#$% mood. But it would still be funny!

[dasomdas]

when u get
torc
conc opp
bauble
spell storing
talisman

if someone telling me 'be sure to have ur pots' im linking 'em these things. thell will stop talking about potions

[sirgog]

As you say, it's MY decision on whether or not to use a pot, and the group dynamics play a significant role in whether or not I do. (If Harry's at 75% after Round 1 in Part 4, and 3 of the "tanks" are one-shot by a fireball after the first 3 seconds, I'm probably not going to bother drinking one )

See, this is one of the situations I might drink a mana potion.

Not to heal the 'tanks' at all, but to solo Harry the rest of the way down.

[PNellesen]

See, this is one of the situations I might drink a mana potion.

Not to heal the 'tanks' at all, but to solo Harry the rest of the way down.

One of these days I'm going to have to try that, but my main couldn't pull it off with his current setup (he's probably got the HP, but weak melee, ok-but-not-great offensive spell capability, no evasion, etc.) Now when he finally gets a Torc, some better gear, and TRs into something resembling a REAL cleric (and I get some better multitasking skills ) it might be a different story.

[RandomKeypress]

Must have been lucky on my cleric. He's level 20, although he mainly farms PUG shrouds / VOD and the odd epic. I have never been told to drink a pot.
I have been asked every now and then, and I've always felt free to say no if I didn't want to. People have promised more pots than I've drunk on many occasions. Never felt the need to take them up on the offer - my rogue uses more pots than my cleric - paying back clerics for healing the ToD runs he does.

[Sarisa]

Thinking back over the past month for the number of pots I "had" to drink on my Cleric...

5 Majors, 1 Greater, and 166 Heal scrolls in an Epic Chain of Flames on Sunday night. We had an excellent CC spec'ed Air Savant sorc, two bards, an AA, me, and the leader was a monk. The monk barely stunned anything, the SS bard contributed what he could, the Warchanter piked most of the time (along with blowing two traps because he forgot to switch to his disable item). Our AA was the biggest damage dealer. It succeeded, and I was able to conserve SP for a long time just by using scrolls and smart play by the AA, Sorc, SS, and me. The end fight is where I had to drink all the potions, but after 2 hours in there, I was not going to see my time wasted.

2 Majors in an Abbot over the weekend, post u10.1 change. Excellent group, but the 2.7x HP buff is a huge drain on resources, and really isn't worth running Abbot anymore. The Abbot was down to under 20% when the other healer and I were down to fumes, so we just both drank to get the completion. Skunk as normal, **** Abbot.

1 Major in the end fight of Small Problem on epic. It was a zerg run, trying to help the party leader beat the completion record. We got very close, but didn't quite do it. Still fun, and was worth the major.

1 Major in an Epic VoN6. We had to burn extra healing resources on the bases because some people insisted on running ahead of the bard...

2 Majors in an elite ToD. This was my last quest to get favour capped. I normally avoid ToD because there is nothing worth anything for a divine caster, and it almost always costs me a pot or two.

[Mubjon]

Note: I know they're technically called "Spellpoint potions" but "mana potions" is both quicker to type and still descriptive of the functionality.

If you've ever played a capped divine, I'm sure you've been told that you will need to drink a mana potion for a quest or raid. I'm not complaining about the potions themselves, but about the thought of melees expecting you to keep healing at whatever cost, including mana potions. While some melees are usually nice and donate mana potions back to you after the quest/raid, or in rare cases before the quest/raid even begins, most melees are not of that thinking. They personally don't care what you have to do to get them through the quest/raid, and will blacklist you for not doing "everything" to get through the quest/raid.

I play a divine, and have the thinking that it's MY choice what to use and what NOT to use. In an Elite Amrath quest, since I am a Cleric, you darn well better stay in my healing aura for healing between fights. Even if the quest takes longer because of waiting, it will be easier on everyone. I'm not going to ask you to drink CSW pots between fights; I have an aura ticking and will throw a burst when it's needed between fights. My turns come back; my spellpoints don't under most circumstances.

So now I ask of you capped Divines: What is your take on the "requirement" of mana potions? What is your take on the melees who don't care what it costs you to get the quest/raid done, they expect you to do it or else you'll be blacklisted? What is your take of the current end-game situation, where if you don't have mana potions you are pretty much considered "gimp"?

I have only had this happen two or three times on my cleric, with the melee telling me to drink mana pots. I am not sure if they blacklisted me, but I let them all die and then blacklisted them.

Pots are expensive and I am not going to spend money to buy them just so I can keep a rude melee alive.

Now I have been in PUG's where there was no demands on me like that and I have chugged pots to help get us through the quest, burned through heal scrolls, wands and raise dead scrolls if I ran out of pots (as I carry no more than 10 and lots of time 2 to 5). But it was my choice to do so and I have had quite a few people that were really decent players that would give me a pot or 2 during the quest if it was needed, and they became the main focus of my attention to make sure they did not die during that quest, or if they got one shotted they got a rez within seconds.

[NaturalHazard]

Note: I know they're technically called "Spellpoint potions" but "mana potions" is both quicker to type and still descriptive of the functionality.

If you've ever played a capped divine, I'm sure you've been told that you will need to drink a mana potion for a quest or raid. I'm not complaining about the potions themselves, but about the thought of melees expecting you to keep healing at whatever cost, including mana potions. While some melees are usually nice and donate mana potions back to you after the quest/raid, or in rare cases before the quest/raid even begins, most melees are not of that thinking. They personally don't care what you have to do to get them through the quest/raid, and will blacklist you for not doing "everything" to get through the quest/raid.

I play a divine, and have the thinking that it's MY choice what to use and what NOT to use. In an Elite Amrath quest, since I am a Cleric, you darn well better stay in my healing aura for healing between fights. Even if the quest takes longer because of waiting, it will be easier on everyone. I'm not going to ask you to drink CSW pots between fights; I have an aura ticking and will throw a burst when it's needed between fights. My turns come back; my spellpoints don't under most circumstances.

So now I ask of you capped Divines: What is your take on the "requirement" of mana potions? What is your take on the melees who don't care what it costs you to get the quest/raid done, they expect you to do it or else you'll be blacklisted? What is your take of the current end-game situation, where if you don't have mana potions you are pretty much considered "gimp"?

I dont play a divine or an arcane caster yet past level 5, I only have a ranger and 2 bards, to me, if pots are consumed its a bit of a fail on the groups part, usually, thats how I feel, quests/raids should be done without pot consumption. Pots are for emergencies, really bad lag, and stuff like that, it should not be a given that you *have* to drink one or some to complete certain quests raids.

[NaturalHazard]

Now I have been in PUG's where there was no demands on me like that and I have chugged pots to help get us through the quest, burned through heal scrolls, wands and raise dead scrolls if I ran out of pots (as I carry no more than 10 and lots of time 2 to 5). .

I think you should be burning the scrolls and wands before you touch the pots. Its up to you, though but thats how i play.