Epic Divine Hireling tested, perform about as expected (very poorly)

[Shade]

Pic pretty much speaks for itself:


So some notes on the pic:
- Aside from Natasha, the lowest level hireling heals for the most (Beleth, lvl14)
- Beleth also has the most sp, and carries the most mana pots out of any of the low lvl hirelings. She likely has more then the epic ones even.
- Beleth is probably the only clr/fvs hireling who wears a deathblock item (see that in the log - did not show up for any others, tho that kinda spam doesnt belong there anyways imo). Useful in the quest we did (Beholders dispel deathward).
- Epic Hirelings are rather bad.

Also brought them all into VoN3 Epic Casual to test them in a pretty tame setting. Was as incredibly easy as expected. I left all of them on default mode, let them fight as they pleased, let them tank all the bosses. None died or even really came close to it.
Here's the performance results

So asides from the awesome Beleth who tends not to try to kill things and focuses on healing, the mighty epic hireling was outkilled by the lvl14-16 ones. Andaro also managed to waste the most SP and accomplish very little.

I also tried it on epic normal after to be sure, the results were much the same.

So yes, Level14s could complete Epic VoN casual/normal given some time and hirelings (if they were allowed to enter), argueable the toughest epics. If turbine allowed any lvl to enter epics, i've no doubt we'd see achievements of lvl5-10 characters solo'ing epic normal, possibly even hard.

And Beleth preferring not to attack is actually very much so a GOOD thing, as you generally do not want your hireling healers to get agro. She was also the fastest to respond to my ailments such as getting held a couple times, quickly clearing it with a remove paralyses. I do not believe any other hireling even has this spell except Tempys. Though none of them made any attempts at removing each others paralyses, they did heal each other some.

Some other noted U14P1 unrelated things:
- The "graze" on a 2-9 for melee was implemented. This may mean the new system is in for melee too, meaning melee gets a huge nerf in a few days when this goes live.
- Still no epic fragments in von3ec.

[JollySwagMan]

This is a tangent here, but on the Deathblock issue, I believe hirelings are supposed to be benefitting from Deathblock items that your character wears. Was Beleth the last one summoned? (perhaps this may be related to whether the other hirelings would try removing your status ailments automatically)

[Shade]

This is a tangent here, but on the Deathblock issue, I believe hirelings are supposed to be benefitting from Deathblock items that your character wears. Was Beleth the last one summoned? (perhaps this may be related to whether the other hirelings would try removing your status ailments automatically)

They do not. My character does not wear a deathblock item.

Though upon further inspection it appears all hirelings now have deathblock, disease, poison and blindness ward. May be new, dont recall that combat log spam appearing before. Bug imo, such spam is not neccesary, should just be included in there descriptions instead.

And yea i prefer her because i do have several of my own deathward clickies and her heals hit hard, and she rarely runs out of sp.

[azrael4h]

Are you really surprised? Seriously? I'm just happy if they don't die instantly upon being summoned by tripping over their own feet.

[FranOhmsford]

As someone who uses Hirelings 99% of the time I personally don't much care for Beleth - No DV, No Deathward, Cometfall not really worth it.

However for a melee with Deathblock/Deathward covered this does make her look to be a very good choice.

Me however - I think I'll be sticking with Tempy from lvl 14-15 and Isadora at 16 {Natasha if I need the DV}.

Please Shade - Do this test with Wyoh, Caraneth + Hezrou, Albus and Klin + Hezrou - Let us know how they perform. {You must however use Implosion on Wyoh's bar for it to be a fair test}.

[Phidius]

What about how they pull levers and refill mana bars with Divine Vitality? Inquiring minds want to know!

[dredre9987]

So yes, Level14s could complete Epic VoN casual/normal given some time and hirelings (if they were allowed to enter), argueable the toughest epics.

The VoN series on epic has never been very hard....

[Tembyr]

Where can I get this hireling called Greataxer, he seems to outperform the other in killing power.

[Shade]

Where can I get this hireling called Greataxer, he seems to outperform the other in killing power.

I'm available every friday and tuesday on khyber after my scheduled guild raids. I take requests and run any raid desired. And unlike hirelings, i do it for free

[DrNuegebauer]

Test all the FvS hirelings against the Epic one.

Generally speaking it seems that cleric hires have Empower Heal while the FvS ones don't.

Is there a cleric epic hireling?


(it's still failzor though)

[Shade]

Test all the FvS hirelings against the Epic one.

Generally speaking it seems that cleric hires have Empower Heal while the FvS ones don't.

Is there a cleric epic hireling?


(it's still failzor though)

There is not.

And I don think they use any metas. If they do, they use them for free because all of them seem to use only 40 SP for a heal.

I might check the other one, think i just saw one other fvs healer, lvl21 or 22 irrc. No other 24s. No 25s.

Item wise, Andaro wears the medium green dragonscale as you can see. iirc it doesnt have any spell power, while the blue dragonplate does have Potency VII which would explain why Natasha has the most effective healing.

They should just give every non epic hireling a superior potentcy VI (~54 equiv uni spellpower iirc) necklace, and every epic hireling the Epic Vulkorim pendant (~90 healing power iirc) and problem would be solved.

[Lilliana]

<snip>
So yes, Level14s could complete Epic VoN casual/normal given some time and hirelings (if they were allowed to enter), argueable the toughest epics. If turbine allowed any lvl to enter epics, i've no doubt we'd see achievements of lvl5-10 characters solo'ing epic normal, possibly even hard.
<snip>

From the score card screenshot we can see that the kill score is:
Greataxer: 97
Tempys Lorben: 3
Andaro: 2
Natasha THorston: 3

So if lvl 14 can complete Epic Von with hirelings, does this mean that Shade is only good as a lvl 14 barbarian? :-P

Humour aside, am I the only one that find it absurd to compare a lvl 14 character (or lvl 5 even) with a lvl 25 character with epic destinies?

But the comparison of healing abilities between divine hirelings is fair though, and thanks for that.

[Shade]

Humour aside, am I the only one that find it absurd to compare a lvl 14 character (or lvl 5 even) with a lvl 25 character with epic destinies?

But the comparison of healing abilities between divine hirelings is fair though, and thanks for that.

I think it's absurd for you to think my memory is that bad. I played the game for YEARS at lvl10/12/14. I know how powerful I was at that time. He (my char as it existed all those years ago) could solo VoN3 EN/EH as it is now, 100% confident in that. He could not solo heroic elite, its harder then both of those, as perhaps it should be. Should hard be that easy tho? I dont thnk so.

They even DISABLED the trap at the end of von3. I mean completely. It's gone. The only trap that hit me was the force one on that door, did about 120 damage.

[SpoilSpot]

I played the game for YEARS at lvl10/12/14. I know how powerful I was at that time. He (my char as it existed all those years ago) could solo VoN3 EN/EH as it is now, 100% confident in that.

If you could solo it as level 14, then I guess it's balanced about right for the rest of us now

I doubt the henchmen did all the work, or they wouldn't have let you take 97 of 105 kills, so the player does make a difference. Not any level 14 would be able to do it, even with the same henchmen.

Not arguing about the worth of epic henchmen at all, though, I haven't tried them.
/L

[Matuse]

A level 14 cleric healing for 361? Sounds like she got a spell crit.

[Shade]

A level 14 cleric healing for 361? Sounds like she got a spell crit.

incorrect. Spellcrits are displayed in the log as you can see Natasha crit on my first atempt, thus i used hers twice.

[Ilindith]

Try it with Larafay Do'rret see if she can solo the quest.

[FranOhmsford]

Try it with Larafay Do'rret see if she can solo the quest.

Larafay can solo any quest in the game - BUT only when she feels like it!