To new clerics. Things that you should know

[Theolin]

Leave 4-5 feet between blade barriers
If the are too close or touching they become 1 ... this is also usful to know if your in an enemies BB

Be sure you have clicked your ardor clickie before you click you aura on

[sirgog]

Wait, why does a caster specced cleric, who wishes to kill mobs with spell and not used weapons at all need STR?

1) Carrying capacity.
2) To prevent being dropped to 0 STR (which makes you totally helpless, and unable to even heal yourself) by poisons and Ray of Enfeeblement.
3) Less importantly, sometimes you will swing a weapon (Shroud portals, etc).

14 is a good number. 28 point builds cannot afford that and so will need to be careful to equip a Str item.

You can have as many sup. ardor clickies as you want. 2 is enough to get you through most quests however, carry 3 if you want to be sure, 4 if you want to be crazy careful - I rarely run out of 2 however. No reason to run out of ardor, so no reason for devotion. And as others have said, you can just take potency that will be helpful for BBs as well and give the same benefit to healing spells as devotion.

There is a very good reason that you SHOULD wear a Devotion or Potency item at all times.

If you die and are raised, it takes time to recast Ardor clickies (3 seconds to gearswap, hit the clicky, then swap back to your 'real gear', that's 3 seconds in which you CANNOT CAST SPELLS), and just after a healer death is exactly when you are most likely to need intense healing.

Ardor = 75% boost to healing when you don't really need it
Devotion/Potency = 50% boost at the moment you absolutely need it most.

Absolutely carry and make heavy use of Ardor clickies, but have some form of Devotion or Potency as a backup.

[NovaNZ]

Dear OP

Please allow me a little satirical musement.

I support your view to minise the occurance of new=bad in relation to clerics.
Personally I favor old=bad. It provides me with much more ability to confidently chant the following ....'dear lord grant me the strength to change the things I can, ......'

Another wicked thought ... I accept it is unlikely that there is any demonstratable causation, however is it possible that there exists a corrolation beween your reported 'cleric numbers are running low' and the nature of your post?

One potential piece of advice would be for players who are developing their cleric play skills - take on quests/difficulties that you know you can reasonable handle (especially if pugging). It can be detrimental to one's desire to develop a cleric if adverse party events occur too often.

[Mubjon]

Dear OP

Please allow me a little satirical musement.

I support your view to minise the occurance of new=bad in relation to clerics.
Personally I favor old=bad. It provides me with much more ability to confidently chant the following ....'dear lord grant me the strength to change the things I can, ......'

Another wicked thought ... I accept it is unlikely that there is any demonstratable causation, however is it possible that there exists a corrolation beween your reported 'cleric numbers are running low' and the nature of your post?

One potential piece of advice would be for players who are developing their cleric play skills - take on quests/difficulties that you know you can reasonable handle (especially if pugging). It can be detrimental to one's desire to develop a cleric if adverse party events occur too often.

Sometimes, and by some I mean most, a cleric joins a party and the group goes ELITE!

so no it is not always the cleric that is at fault for adverse party events and if you are new and you join a group that says normal or hard and then you have them talking about elite once you join, drop and find a different party.

There is a reason that parties on the LFM boards are looking for clerics and FvS and that is because the mentality for most pugs is that Clerics and FvS, especially Clerics, are free hirelings that are just there to heal and maybe swing the weapon once or twice or cast an offensive spell like comet fall once. But, primarily they are there to just be a nanny to everyone else. And that leads those that can run a cleric or fvs to say f'it and go solo the content on normal or hard and in some cases elite.

[NovaNZ]

Hail Mubjon.

Absolutely agree with your post. When playing my cleric alts, I have experienced this 'diff amp phenomena' when a healer joins a pug.

I apologise if my post left the impression that I somehow subscribed to the school of 'It's the hjealer fault'.

I relay only what has been a phase of my personal journey while playing a cleric.

I will rephrase: "It has been detrimental to my desire to develop a cleric if adverse party events occur too often".

This actually occurred primarily due to a unstable OC which provided a series of spectacular BSOD while in quests/raids.

Unreasonable expectation/blame by others towards players of clerics can also temporarily reduce one's desire to share their playtime with others.

Thankfully (for me anyway) it was a phase and not permanent infliction.

[Mubjon]

Hail Mubjon.

Absolutely agree with your post. When playing my cleric alts, I have experienced this 'diff amp phenomena' when a healer joins a pug.

I apologise if my post left the impression that I somehow subscribed to the school of 'It's the hjealer fault'.

I relay only what has been a phase of my personal journey while playing a cleric.

I will rephrase: "It has been detrimental to my desire to develop a cleric if adverse party events occur too often".

This actually occurred primarily due to a unstable OC which provided a series of spectacular BSOD while in quests/raids.

Unreasonable expectation/blame by others towards players of clerics can also temporarily reduce one's desire to share their playtime with others.

Thankfully (for me anyway) it was a phase and not permanent infliction.

I understood what you were getting at, I have played clerics on every server I just wanted to make sure that a new player to the role of cleric was away that it might happen to them and if they joined a group that was set for normal or hard and the party goes "hey we have a hjealer lets do elite!" and they are at the quest level or in my case a few were 2 or 3 levels before the quests level and I was at the quest level. To back out because you are asking for problems

And I wanted to make it clear to others that have the opinion that the cleric population is down, it is not, those of us that can play a cleric to its fullest do not bother joining groups that put in the comments of their LFM "Looking for Healer". At least I never hit those LFM's no matter if I am on a level 20 or level 4.

[Firesmall_at]

Wait, why does a caster specced cleric, who wishes to kill mobs with spell and not used weapons at all need STR?

Are you Lesser reincarning a Cleric at level 7?

If not, you don't have any offensive damage spells till then that are better than your melee with as low as a 10 STR. Holy Smite is not bad, but really until Divine Punishment you will be mostly using soundburst and command. Soundburst is the best offensive spell till DP IMHO. Your melee if spec'd right with 12-14 base STR and gear can possibly be better than some pug builds till level 10. Elfs with keen Scimitars, Drow with keen Rapiers and even pure humans (human versatility) with a keen falchion having a -4 to hit can do nice melee critical damage if u don't dump STR.

What do u plan on doing when u run out of mana and everyone wants to not go back to rest shrine. I mean I love the concentrated DDO store mana pots, but during my spell cool downs I don't plan on piking, and the group would like you to swing something. Just take the best moderate/heavy fortication, and you wont die often.

There are so many links on here that I don't want to repeat myself. But most of those that respond on here have builds, and lots of great advice that is tested. Just click on their name. Look at their threads and posts for cleric by clicking on their name.

Reading about builds and knowing your play style is important. In an ideal universe 2weapon fighting meleeing is more damage, but with play style and lag and graphic slowdowns (slow computer/connect) 2handed fighting with longer weapons and splash damage might fit your play. That is just one of many examples.

[Falco_Easts]

Don't be afraid to tell someone to pull their head in if they get too demanding.
Cleric=/=Babysitter

[ericrd]

PSA to new clerics

it generaly sucks pugging as a cleric at low lvls,people think you can heal through walls and across vast distances,they also feel that you should be in 3 places at once.

regardless of the actual situation party wipes almost always get blamed on you.

luckily this tends to go away as you lvl up so these frustrating situations are the exception instead of the norm.

ive found it quite fun to play a mid/high lvl cleric not so much fun getting there

[Firesmall_at]

I had tons of fun with my CLR18/FTR2 build at lower levels as a CLR3/FTR1.

I took keen falchions of pure good with icy burst, Power Attack as a fighter feat, 2 tiers of human versatility to hit bonus +3, and out melee'd many pug melees with a base STR15. Got hooked up with an ardor item early by a nice mentor Divine, Divine favor, divine power, and never looked back. Clerics all the way. I was thinking about trying FavSoul, but when I found out their Prestige enhancement did not work for Divine Punishment I decided that was not for me. I like more spells, and buffing. Maybe later. I have gotten use to not waiting for groups to form.

[Flavilandile]

I won't go back in what the other wrote.

You are not just a healer.

You have lots of interesting spells, especially offensive ones.
Use them, use them wisely.
There's situations where it's recommanded to go into full healer mode and situations where you can race that FoD wizard kill count with your Destruction.

A commanded mob ( Command ) is a mob that will not inflict damage you'll have to heal later.
A stunned mob ( Sounburst ) is a mob that will not inflict damage you'll have to heal later.
A slain mob ( Slay Living, Destruction ) is a mob that will not inflict damage you'll have to heal later.
An imploded ( Implosion ) pack of devil is a pack of devil that will not inflict damage you'll have to mass heal.

That's what I call preemptive healing... or preventive healing... you preempt or prevent the need to heal.

[pHo3nix]

It's often more efficient to let bad players die than trying to heal them: natural selection is a great thing, everyone should help it in its job

[rayworks]

What do u plan on doing when u run out of mana and everyone wants to not go back to rest shrine.

I go back to the shrine. If they don't follow that's not my problem. More than once I've told people they were riding the fine line between being healed and being left behind.

[Dendrix]

Command (and Greater Command) is a healing spell. It prevents damage.
Soundburst is a healing spell. It prevents damage.

Preventing damage is better than helaing damage.

Con is not a dump stat. 14 con, then think about raising wis, str.
Dex is a dump stat.

[badbob117]

Best advice i can give is find a cool guild and awesome friends who have no qualms about letting you play as you see fit!!!. Then open up the social panel and click on "who"! Then go anonymous as fast you you possibly can, so you do not have to put up with every ones advice, lectures, tells, invites, nerdrage and opinions on how you should play your toon! Then make us proud and go kill everything with your buddies!

The #1 most important thing about being a divine!

And never let anyone give you hell. That is why they made Kormors belt! Dance them at the boss fight and take some screen shots if they give you lip! Then post them here so we can all laugh!

[FuzzyDuck81]

A couple more tips:

Dont be afraid to ask for contributions... at mid to high levels if you're low on funds, people may often be willing to supply a small stack of Heal & raise/rez scrolls. At low levels other newbies may not be able to contribute so much, but but you can always try "any1 have a few of those wavecrasher manifest collectables spare?" since they can be turned in for CMW wands.. which will really stretch out your SP.

Soundburst - this spell is awesome at low levels, not for the damage so much as for the stun chance, stopping enemies from attacking & thereby reducing need to actually do any healing. Incidentally, if someone dashes off ahead & dies messily, the enemies will likely then be gathered on a point allowing you to use this to maximum effect, come in, methodically destroy them & maybe teach a valuable lesson to said fool... assuming they havent ragequit or been distracted by ranting, whether in party chat, over voice or on these very forums.

Although AC at higher levels is a joke, at low levels its not too hard to achieve a decent enough AC to provide reliable protection.. so pick up a large shield & full plate... adamantine if you can get it, otherwise you could ask around (in house K is your best bet) to see if a friendly crafter can make you an invulnerability shard for 5/magic DR which combined with the ac will provide a high degree of damage mitigation at low levels. Incidentally, crafted invulnerability armour (without even a +X on it) has ML1

[nat_1]

There is a very good reason that you SHOULD wear a Devotion or Potency item at all times.

If you die and are raised, it takes time to recast Ardor clickies (3 seconds to gearswap, hit the clicky, then swap back to your 'real gear', that's 3 seconds in which you CANNOT CAST SPELLS), and just after a healer death is exactly when you are most likely to need intense healing.

Ardor = 75% boost to healing when you don't really need it
Devotion/Potency = 50% boost at the moment you absolutely need it most.

Absolutely carry and make heavy use of Ardor clickies, but have some form of Devotion or Potency as a backup.

Emphasized for great justice. If you ain't dying, you ain't trying. I mean, if you aren't in danger of wiping sometimes, why not just play on casual? The moment when party members start dropping is when all that time I spend in front of a mirror saying "Be cool" starts to pay off. Saving a wipe can be a near thing, and that time to get the clicky off might not be there after you catch a rez from the Bard's scroll, and the 50% from devotion suddenly becomes attractive. I love that moment, personally, when something has gone pear shaped and I'm waiting for a rez, knowing that I need to get up, prioritize correctly and heal efficiently or end up crying salty tears of nerd rage as I pay my repair bill.

[SirValentine]

Keep a careful eye out on wizards for palemaster forms. You CANNOT heal palemasters in form unless you have Harm loaded. Oh, and Harm has about 1/4 the range that heal does. So you'll need to be practially right next to them to cast it.

Inflict Wounds, Harm, and Mass Inflict Wounds all work.

Inflict Wounds, single target versions, have an near-uselessly short range.

Harm and Mass Inflict spells have a decent range; I never tested it in detail, but it seemed similar to Heal.

The issue with all of these is that you have to be facing the target, unlike Heal or Cure spells. Takes some getting used to. Mostly, PMs tend to take care of themselves, but having Harm or an Inflict slotted will both suprise them and occasionally save their bacon.

[Firesmall_at]

I think we scared him away.

[Habreno]

But having Harm or an Inflict slotted will both suprise them and occasionally save their bacon.

Qft.