& Cleric. Divine Punishment and why Divines should use it more. DOTs rock.

[Ranncore]

This wasn't the OP's complaint. The OP seems to think we should all be speccing fully into maxxing Divine Punishment's damage. As for me, no thanks. I don't have the AP's on my FvS to do that, and yes, I'm taking Wand and Scroll Mastery Enhancements, OP. I think I have them up to Tier III. I'd like to fit in Tier IV, but again, I don't have the AP's for it. Go take your maxxed Smiting FvS into Epic Lord of Blades and come back and report about how well you contributed.

Oh man, there's no way I'd give up my wand and scroll mastery enhancements. There's at least 5 other people in my party doing damage - I don't need to min/max mine. A basic investment in Divine Punishment will do.

I agree that every divine should have DP and a radiance spellpower item and crit chance.

Not every divine needs to min/max for it.

If you do, more power to you. It looks like a lot of fun. Maybe sometime I'll make a smiter FvS.

[Faent]

If you do, more power to you. It looks like a lot of fun. Maybe sometime I'll make a smiter FvS.

There are a few FvS's out there that refuse to heal. If I ever go that route on mine, it'll be many, many past lives down the road. On a first life FvS, you gimp yourself if you try to max your Divine Punishment Enhancement lines out. I think I managed to fit a little bit in, but they cannot be maxed without gimping yourself.

[Ranncore]

There are a few FvS's out there that refuse to heal. If I ever go that route on mine, it'll be many, many past lives down the road. On a first life FvS, you gimp yourself if you try to max your Divine Punishment Enhancement lines out. I think I managed to fit a little bit in, but they cannot be maxed without gimping yourself.

I've got a second life FvS I enjoy immensely. Pretty sure I took only the smiting enhancements required for the PRE and he blasts with divine punishment and his pastlife clicky.
He sucked real hard first life.

[Ranncore]

Admittedly, tho, I know an FVS that smites exclusively, and he took aggro in an EE chronoscope from the tank REAL fast. I was impressed.

But I would never play a character with the capacity to keep 10 other players alive who chooses not to.

[firemedium_jt]

There are a few FvS's out there that refuse to heal. If I ever go that route on mine, it'll be many, many past lives down the road. On a first life FvS, you gimp yourself if you try to max your Divine Punishment Enhancement lines out. I think I managed to fit a little bit in, but they cannot be maxed without gimping yourself.

If you could explain to me how you gimp yourself?

I have builds with out Life of the Magic 4 and they heal just fine.

Scroll Mastery 2 I have, but might drop. It is only 17 extra on a scroll per tier.

I would say Smiting 4 is expensive and even Smiting critical damage 3 for another .25x, but the 'to hit' for 9% critical seems worth it. Heck my melee Divine does not have LOTM4 or Smiting critical damage 3 for another .25x. But he has the gear for radiance and radiance lore on almost always.

The damage numbers are posted here. You see what Divine Punishment can do. Flavor how you like.

Never said it should always be used. And since the lord of the blades advice I will not pull aggro in that one then.

Just seems too many builds on here gimp DP for all the wrong reasons and wrong enhancements. I have seen builds with tier 4 enhancement into marginal gains at best and none into smiting. I.e. Does +1 from human versatility = 600 damage? What about saving 20-30 sp from improved empower healing? 17 points from a heal scroll?

Boss fights are the hardest in the game and the most important usually. The last the longest especially without DOTs running. And that does not mean you should always use DP for it. But have it ready if you need it and don't gimp it with tier 2s or less. It is a Divines best boss weapon IMHO. All kinds of party combos requiring different rolls when you play and lots of opportunities to use it... or not... depending.

[arminius]

I don't play Clerics so I wasn't sure what you all were talking about, so I Googled "DP videos" to see it in action.

Gosh, that looks like it would certainly preoccupy the target monster. I'd say it seemed more like crowd control than direct damage, but I guess that would depend on a few key factors.

[Fhauvial]

If you could explain to me how you gimp yourself?

The damage numbers are posted here. You see what Divine Punishment can do. Flavor how you like.

This just about sums it up, well put.

+1

This wasn't the OP's complaint. The OP seems to think we should all be speccing fully into maxxing Divine Punishment's damage. As for me, no thanks. I don't have the AP's on my FvS to do that, and yes, I'm taking Wand and Scroll Mastery Enhancements, OP. I think I have them up to Tier III. I'd like to fit in Tier IV, but again, I don't have the AP's for it. Go take your maxxed Smiting FvS into Epic Lord of Blades and come back and report about how well you contributed.

I took my cleric into an eLoB just a few days after I had reset my enhancements to include more of the smiting line, and sadly dropping Wand and Scroll Mastery was the only reasonable option AP-wise. Raid went great, scroll healed for 90% of the raid, spent more SP on break enchantments and buffs than I did overall on healing. Doubt anyone there would say I didn't contribute. And I had way more SP left over at the end than I would've liked, but oh well. A raid without a pot is a raid gone right.

[ShadowFlash]

This is an update to my formula's used in the thread found in my signature.
For this example I'll be using Epic Luminous Truth, as it provides a simple one swap to 108 spellpower AND Superior Radiance Lore. Moreover, this item is available to anyone regardless of playstyle, build, or packs owned. Smiting Enhancements are 4/3/3 maxed as well

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Points of Reference
Divine Punishment does NOT use loaded dice
Divine Punishment DOES cap at caster level 20
FvS AoV PrE does NOT provide a static 30% boost to light spells (this seems to be a very common misconception)

FvS AoV Shield of Condemnation light curse is almost impossible to quantify. The currenttly accepted average is 20% de-buff, but is still open to debate. This varies greatly depending on the individual boss, the main tank's (named champion) AC & Dodge... so I'm leaving this out of my calculations. It is easy to apply this value to any of my final numbes if so desired, but I do encourage caution here as this is a calculation over time and whether or not it procs at the full 50% at times is mitigated by times it doesn't proc at all. Again, 20% seems to be the accepted norm.

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*The Formulas and mathematical process I use is as follows ...

1 Tic = 2 seconds with no initial tic (common knowlwedge)

Base damage = 1d6+CL = (1+6)/2 + CL = 3.5+CL

Base x [ 1(represents no spellpower) + 1.50(maximize) + .75(empower) + .80(enhancement) + 1.08(Epic Luminous Truth)] = A

Simplified this is... Base (23.5) x 5.13 = A (120.55)

Critical Chance per 100 Tics = [ 9(enhancement) + 12(Superior Lore)] = B (21)

Critical Multiplier = 2.25(Enhancement) + ( .5 Superior Lore) = C (2.75)

Calculating Average Tics (including Criticals)....
{[(100 - B) x A) + ( A x B x C )] / 100} = Average Tic = D (164.86)

Starting DPS calculations are based off the 1st 34 seconds of average tics. The Tier III number can be used as a representaion of the maximum achievable DPS, but in fact will never be reached due to diminishing mathematical returns, overall time, and total damge dealt. Tier III damage should be used as reference only and never as an accurate representation of DPS.

Tier I = D(average tic) x 5(10 seconds then stacking to next tier) = E (822.75)
Tier II = D x 2 x 5 = F (1648.6)
Tier III = D x 3 x 7(14 seconds until refreshing the full triple stack) = G (3462.06)

E + F + G = Total Damage over the first 34 seconds = 5933.41

To get average DPS over the 1st 34 seconds we take...
(E + F + G) / 34 = starting DPS = ~174 DPS
(D x 3) / 2 = theoretical final Tier III DPS = ~247 DPS

As long as the triple stack is maintained, the DPS will very slowly move from the starting DPS to the theoretical Tier III DPS. Again, reaching this point is mathematically impossible, but is nice to use as an e-peen reference.

ShadowFlash

[Ranncore]

I took my cleric into an eLoB just a few days after I had reset my enhancements to include more of the smiting line, and sadly dropping Wand and Scroll Mastery was the only reasonable option AP-wise. Raid went great, scroll healed for 90% of the raid, spent more SP on break enchantments and buffs than I did overall on healing. Doubt anyone there would say I didn't contribute. And I had way more SP left over at the end than I would've liked, but oh well. A raid without a pot is a raid gone right.

This is a little bit misleading because of the current spellpower to scroll bug

[Alaunra2010]

I feel like I'm sticking my neck out here, and it'll probably make me unpopular to admit it. Advice is welcome, but please be merciful.

I'm one of those clerics who doesn't use Divine Punishment very much anymore. DP, Cometfall, BB... I used them all the time before the spell power change. Now I don't. I am resigned to casting offensively much less often (only when solo or in a very slow-paced group) because I get so overloaded by the user interface.

You know what I'm talking about: equipment swapping.

• Spellpower changes mean many different types of spell power.
• Different items enhance different types of spellpower.
• Boosting different types of spellpower therefore requires situational equipment swapping.
• I'm terrible at managing this aspect of DDO. I literally am not able to do it quickly. I have been working on improving this skill for over a year to help out in melee. More recently, this has been done in earnest because of the very relevant changes to spell power. But I give up. I just can't do it.

I can either dedicate 15 seconds of time to watching red bars, chasing down folks to heal, clearing conditions on teammates, and avoiding hazards... or I can dedicate that 15 seconds to looking at the bloody OnHover property of my weapons to figure out which one adds to light spell power. As a matter of fulfilling the party's expectations, the safest path for me is to stick to spells and skills that do not require equipment swapping. Healing, harming, no-fail turning... energy drain... I have to accept my limitations.

[selutha]

I feel like I'm sticking my neck out here, and it'll probably make me unpopular to admit it. Advice is welcome, but please be merciful.

I'm one of those clerics who doesn't use Divine Punishment very much anymore. DP, Cometfall, BB... I used them all the time before the spell power change. Now I don't. I am resigned to casting offensively much less often (only when solo or in a very slow-paced group) because I get so overloaded by the user interface.

You know what I'm talking about: equipment swapping.

• Spellpower changes mean many different types of spell power.
• Different items enhance different types of spellpower.
• Boosting different types of spellpower therefore requires situational equipment swapping.
• I'm terrible at managing this aspect of DDO. I literally am not able to do it quickly. I have been working on improving this skill for over a year to help out in melee. More recently, this has been done in earnest because of the very relevant changes to spell power. But I give up. I just can't do it.

I can either dedicate 15 seconds of time to watching red bars, chasing down folks to heal, clearing conditions on teammates, and avoiding hazards... or I can dedicate that 15 seconds to looking at the bloody OnHover property of my weapons to figure out which one adds to light spell power. As a matter of fulfilling the party's expectations, the safest path for me is to stick to spells and skills that do not require equipment swapping. Healing, harming, no-fail turning... energy drain... I have to accept my limitations.

Just a suggestion on laying out your UI, it works for me so hey why not suggest it...

I create vertical bars on the right side of my screen. Then place my gear in there, 1st bar is for melee, second Offensive casting, and finally healing. There are more, some bars are just for buffing or what not.

Anyway place your hear in there, trink, neck, helmet, ect. ect. Now that it is layed out, You should have a line that is your primary gear (the gear you use most of the time.) You can see them all being worn on by the white X on them. In the bar next to them have your next set of buffs. So on mine I can see the gear layed out and by the weapons, I have another set there just for offensive casting, and next to that another for healing (mainly for raiding).

So doing a quest after buffing the first line should be selected, Need to offensive cast select the gear in the second line. Healing a raid select the next like of gear.

|melee|Off. Cast|Heal|Clickie|
|minos|blank|mask of com.|
|torc|bold trink|blank|
|Dt armor|blue dragon scale|blue dragon scale|
|lit2|Radiance buff stick|Devotion Item|
|tod belt|blank|blank|plannar grid (for GH)|

Thats not the real list, just to give you an Idea. It allows me to see what I have on currently in what slot and be able to change easily back and forth. If it works for you great if it dont ;/ sorry, I couldn't help.

Though on a side note, I try to get equipment that I dont have to change. I try to permentally slot, devotion on my healers, spell power for my dps spells... ect.

[eachna_gislin]

I feel like I'm sticking my neck out here, and it'll probably make me unpopular to admit it. Advice is welcome, but please be merciful.

I'm one of those clerics who doesn't use Divine Punishment very much anymore. DP, Cometfall, BB... I used them all the time before the spell power change. Now I don't. I am resigned to casting offensively much less often (only when solo or in a very slow-paced group) because I get so overloaded by the user interface.

You know what I'm talking about: equipment swapping.

You're not the only one!

Not every player (or even every forum reader) is a Leet zerging powerhouse whose memorized the wiki contents and has a multi-screen command station set up to play. Heck...I don't even use a mouse (which horrifies anyone I mention it to in play). I use a touchpad on a cr*ppy laptop I bought at Kmart on sale.

Just a suggestion on laying out your UI, it works for me so hey why not suggest it...

I create vertical bars on the right side of my screen. Then place my gear in there, 1st bar is for melee, second Offensive casting, and finally healing. There are more, some bars are just for buffing or what not.

|melee|Off. Cast|Heal|Clickie|
|minos|blank|mask of com.|
|torc|bold trink|blank|
|Dt armor|blue dragon scale|blue dragon scale|
|lit2|Radiance buff stick|Devotion Item|
|tod belt|blank|blank|plannar grid (for GH)|

I do something very similar with my bars laid out horizontally (so I look at top to bottom columns rather than left to right rows). I find I'm better able to sacrifice screen real estate that way.

It's a little tricky to start, but like anything else repetition turns it into a "no brainer" eventually. But, any method of using hotbars is slow and clunky to start until you get used to it.

[firemedium_jt]

Well the clickies like ardor and brilliance are less popular for me. I don't even use them. I like Eardweller and sometimes I might click an ardor belt, but anything with less than +20 just is not worth it. It was before when it freed up my hands for melee, but not now.

I have 15 shortcut bars organizing items and spells and buffs. You just need to get a system down to find stuff quick.

I have some threads on hot keys that make it easier too.