Why Battle Cleric's get a bad name

[JasonJi72]

Why do battle cleric's get a bad name?

I am considering playing a Cleric again. I do not want to invest too heavily in arcane past lives to get a decent caster cleric, so I am making a battle cleric. When I mentioned this to one of my guildies, I got into an hour long discussion about how battle clerics suck, and never heal anybody. Personally, I think it has more to do with the player than whether or not they have a fighter or monk splash, but whatever.

I have noticed this in the past when I was leveling and experimental clonk. Sometimes, when I would join a group, the leader would make this huge deal about how people should bring potions, and I wasn't a real healer. My max/emp bursts wands and spells kept everybody up just fine. It was Gweylan's Stand, and the only guy who died was by himself on the other side of the map, and I had triple the kill count of the barbarian.

From my experience, the game has changed a bit. It is much easier to self heal, and it has become harder to be a DC caster in end game. No divine should ever be played as a healbot, but they should know when to go into heal mode.

Why do people still insist that a pure cleric is the only way to go?

Here is a look at what I am considering building:

18 cleric, 1 fighter, 1 wizard Human with a fvs past life

Str 16
Dex 08
Con 16
Int 10
Wis 14
Cha 14

+2 Tomes, and +3 str/con tome

Feats:

Power Attack, Cleave, Great Cleave, Extend, Empower, Maximize, Emp Healing, Toughness, Imp Crit Slashing, Quicken, Overwhelming Critical, and Epic Toughness

It seems like it will be fun, and be able to solo very well, and be a strong healer who can stand with the melee's. The only thing I am worried about is that I might tell someone what they can do with themselves if they give me too much flak about having a fighter level.

I played divines all the time when I started this game, but haven't really touched em in a year and a half. I developed a thick skin, but sometimes I let the idiots get to me. That is why most of my 'healers' have been parked for so long.

[Vellrad]

1. This name sounds really stupid.
2. Its beacuse of all battle clerics having extremally small DPS and 0 heals saying 'f*** off, I'm battle cleric, so I don't hjeal!'. You may call it bad memories.

If thats any important, I'm calling my melee capable offensive cleric, who also burst and heals a lot, a Warpriest .

[erikbozelie]

1. This name sounds really stupid.
2. Its beacuse of all battle clerics having extremally small DPS and 0 heals saying 'f*** off, I'm battle cleric, so I don't hjeal!'. You may call it bad memories.

If thats any important, I'm calling my melee capable offensive cleric, who also burst and heals a lot, a Warpriest .

the dps of my battle cleric was fine up to the update to damage from hit dice damage. rerolled him few days ago to a 930hp, 25%dodge, 345 to 400% healing amp freak with Ein and cleave, great cleave, momentum swing and lay waste.

Curious how the cleaving dps works out for him with spear of the sky.
ill let you know how that build works out.

PS., clerics beat fvs in melee power on the heroic level. (dont start a debate about this, search the forrems, already proven this many times over). so why nitpick on clerics? start with fvs please!

[Phidius]

As long as you have 17 levels of cleric, I would blame people dumping their Int in RL.

[MeliCat]

As long as you have 17 levels of cleric, I would blame people dumping their Int in RL.

^ yup

CITW this morning I was basically ignored by a couple of party members and never referred to as a"healer". But it was one of those fairly messy chaotic pugs that I just totally love so we had a lot of dead pure cleric and dead FvS and I got to go to total healbot mode at times. In between times I got to punch things and ein to get my kill count up. Was awesome fun

Playing a pure caster divine feels less viable for me as after your sp goes you're kinda stuck. At least with clerics you have the awesome positive burst that regenns. Add to that some ability to apply melee smack down and it's a lot more fun

[Xaargin]

just a quick comment:
I saw someone commenting on the release of the new enh. How will that affect the melee aspect of said battle cleric when most of the goodies for their melee prowess come from spells which, unless I'm mistaken, wont change anytime soon...

this is a purely observational statement no flame war starting intended

[ZeebaNeighba]

just a quick comment:
I saw someone commenting on the release of the new enh. How will that affect the melee aspect of said battle cleric when most of the goodies for their melee prowess come from spells which, unless I'm mistaken, wont change anytime soon...

this is a purely observational statement no flame war starting intended

Just the regular DOOOOoooooOOOMMmmm!!!1! that comes with every other update.

The enhancement pass isn't near finished, heck we haven't even seen the cleric's 3rd prestige yet, so don't bet your life that clerics will or will not be healbots with the enhancement changes.

PS., clerics beat fvs in melee power on the heroic level. (dont start a debate about this, search the forrems, already proven this many times over). so why nitpick on clerics? start with fvs please!

I actually wondered why my favored soul, 17/2/1 class split, doesn't get "hate" for being an Arcane Archer build, like the battle clerics in this thread. Occasionally people ask to make sure I'll heal, but I haven't seen anyone outright say or act like I won't be a healer. It also could be that my 2 split is in ranger, which makes it look like an AA build and people might be more tolerant because I am ranged instead of melee, but I don't really know.

And favored souls technically have less DPS because they get a feat for +2 damage at level 12, and enhancements for +1 damage at levels 15 and 18, while clerics get +6 or +8 damage from divine might. Extremely slight difference

[Rubbinns]

Clerics get a bad name because the players can't do the content, need a healer on them to kill first mob, then complain their healer isn't good enough. Solution= Only join BYOH descriptions.

[arkonas]

i looked at the feats the op had and i guess i was disappointed to see that he doesnt even have empowered healing. so that means his heals are **** imo. What is the point since empowered healing is the only thing that effects heal/mass heal. empower and maximize dont. he doesnt even have Radiant Servant. So free healing there. So why not dump maximize for empower healing so your heals are much better?

[jandhaer]

My main earlier this life was a DC caster cleric on her 14th life with the following past lives 3x wizard, 3x favored soul, 3x sorcerer, 3x paladin and this being her 2nd cleric life.... long story short I run epic elites almost exclusively and she sucked.

I decided to LR her into an 18 cleric/1 fighter /1 wizard "battle cleric" dumped wisdom, took full cleave line and overwhelming crit. She's a wrecking ball and a lot of fun.

Haters gonna hate, but I'm too busy being awesome to hear em'.

[firemedium_jt]

Battlecleric is just a four letter word and if asked if I am I just play dumb and say nope. Then I ask if they mean melee Cleric?

U might want to trade extend for THF. I like divine power items. I save sp with them. I just keep one hot keyed if the timer runs out in the middle of combat.

[shadereaper33]

"Battle clerics" have a bad name for the same reason that drow have a bad name. It stems from people being very loud and very bad at their character, which seems to be prevalent amongst those types of character builds for some reason. Some people seem to get the idea that because they swing a sword, they can completely ignore the fact that they have a blue bar.

[JasonJi72]

I thought about taking Imp Crit Bludgeon instead of slashing. Perhaps I will drop Extend, and have them both. There are times when it would be better to use a staff as a melee healer.

I aggree about the name battle cleric. I don't know who came up with it, but it seems to have stuck.

Divine Warrior would be better I think. We can't use Warpriest, because the prestige... will be... comming soon... I think... oh yes... very soon... let me get back to you on that.

Jandhaer, your situation is exactly why I decided to go this route. I don't feel like putting the time into making a caster cleric, and in many EE's you get regulated into a healbot role anyway. I would rather play a caster druid than a caster cleric.

Shadereaper33, I think you are half right. The other half of the problem is that people play differently when they see the Cleric Icon. It is like all common sense goes out the window. A group that could easily complete without a cleric is now having difficulty, because they are now playing like a bunch of drunk kobolds. Bad players are everywhere, they are just more noticable as a Cleric.

[Kmnh]

Battle clerics get a bad name because of Dungeon Scaling.

The barbarian runs a quest with his hireling, kills stuff fast enough to be easy to heal, the hireling can easily keep him alive.

The battle-cleric runs a quest solo, does enough damage to complete the quest without much troublecompletes with half his sp bar left.

Our heroes join a 6-man party, all the enemies have 3 times the hp and do 3 times the damage. The barbarian is no longer that easy to heal, the battle-cleric no longer does enough damage to kill fast enough, they both blame each other for being bad players. What happened is that the game got a lot harder, punishing them for running together.

[Braegan]

Battle clerics get a bad name because of Dungeon Scaling.

The barbarian runs a quest with his hireling, kills stuff fast enough to be easy to heal, the hireling can easily keep him alive.

The battle-cleric runs a quest solo, does enough damage to complete the quest without much troublecompletes with half his sp bar left.

Our heroes join a 6-man party, all the enemies have 3 times the hp and do 3 times the damage. The barbarian is no longer that easy to heal, the battle-cleric no longer does enough damage to kill fast enough, they both blame each other for being bad players. What happened is that the game got a lot harder, punishing them for running together.

Mostly true assesment.

Regarding the bolded part, The game punished both players for playing solo in a group instead of changing their tactics and adapting to the strengths and weaknesses they both could potentially bring.

[JasonJi72]

I really don't see how GTHF would be better against a single durable target than OC and Cleave feats. You lost me on that one.

My Gweylan's example was only to comment on other player's attitude, and had no relation to anything else.

Why I chose to make a melee cleric has already been argued quite well by others. Thanks Guys!

The need to stay alive does concern me though, because I realize that my primary role in difficult quests will be to provide healing, and a dead man tells no tales. The reason I want a melee capable Cleric was because I have found myself having to be a healbot of divine casters more than I would care for.

Will my defense be good enough with no reflex/evasion? I plan on getting my healing amp and HP as high as I can. If I build for an effective evasion on a Cleric, I will lose HP and SP. Also, by using plate mail and occasionally 'turtling up' with a tower shield, I can be my PRR much higher.

[Kinerd]

I really don't see how GTHF would be better against a single durable target than OC and Cleave feats. You lost me on that one.

You generate glancing blows against your main target. Cleaving slows down your attack chain more than the +[W] can make up against single targets. OC is not that big a DPS increase. For example, with a falchion:

OC and no THF
main blow: 13 + 4 * 2 + 2 * 3 = 27 * base
glancing blow: 19 * .5 * .2 = 1.9 * base
total: 28.9 * base

no OC and GTHF
main blow: 13 + 6 * 2 = 25 * base
glancing blow: 19 * .75 * .5 = 7.125 * base
total: 32.125 * base

Or in a general case:

OC increase of main blow: +2 * 1 = 2 * base
GTHF increase of glancing blow: +19 * [.5 * .3 (stronger glances) + .25 * .5 (a third glance)] = 5.225 * base
GTHF net: 3.225 * base

My Gweylan's example was only to comment on other player's attitude, and had no relation to anything else.

I think you underestimate yourself there. Wands are very effective in low level content, but because they max out at CSW off the shelf are pretty useless in high level content. The DPS gap increases as levels increase, especially as PrEs increase for melees and not you. The difference between a level 1 barb and a level 1 cleric is what, +2 Strength? That's nothing, Divine Favor pretty much covers that. The difference between level 20s starts at +16 Strength, +3 multiplier on 19-20, 6d6 damage on hit and glance... and that's vs. a mediocre DPS class. How about against a rogue getting 57.5 sneak attack * TWF * haste boost... and all that before Shadowdancer and epic feats?

[firemedium_jt]

You generate glancing blows against your main target. Cleaving slows down your attack chain more than the +[W] can make up against single targets. OC is not that big a DPS increase. For example, with a falchion:

OC and no THF
main blow: 13 + 4 * 2 + 2 * 3 = 27 * base
glancing blow: 19 * .5 * .2 = 1.9 * base
total: 28.9 * base

no OC and GTHF
main blow: 13 + 6 * 2 = 25 * base
glancing blow: 19 * .75 * .5 = 7.125 * base
total: 32.125 * base

Or in a general case:

OC increase of main blow: +2 * 1 = 2 * base
GTHF increase of glancing blow: +19 * [.5 * .3 (stronger glances) + .25 * .5 (a third glance)] = 5.225 * base
GTHF net: 3.225 * baseI think you underestimate yourself there. Wands are very effective in low level content, but because they max out at CSW off the shelf are pretty useless in high level content. The DPS gap increases as levels increase, especially as PrEs increase for melees and not you. The difference between a level 1 barb and a level 1 cleric is what, +2 Strength? That's nothing, Divine Favor pretty much covers that. The difference between level 20s starts at +16 Strength, +3 multiplier on 19-20, 6d6 damage on hit and glance... and that's vs. a mediocre DPS class. How about against a rogue getting 57.5 sneak attack * TWF * haste boost... and all that before Shadowdancer and epic feats?

I agree that GTHF does more single target damage. But that is an ideal universe and not necessarily a "General Case." Also a lot of this thought process and math is pre Epic Destiny, but still true just not as much a disparity.

The big difference is that those GTHF numbers are based on...


***** standing still *****


That might be ok for a melee with 800 hit points, but not a Cleric that has the responsibility of healing. So in real gameplay the math is not everything. You may not get all your GTHF attacks in as the target might move out of range. And that is just one example.

Also I think you can still double tap the 2hd weapons for extra attacks and that interrupts the GTHF attacks.

You may not get all your glancing attacks off on a target.

Cleaving allows all your critical to go to the mobs around you, so your damage output might be more effective than GTHF on mobs.

More importantly for a Divine Melee your weapon effects like Paralyzer and Curespewing affect all mobs around you hit by your cleave type attacks, and that is really nice for heroic levels.

Cleaves reset some epic enhancement attacks like Momentum Swing and Lay Waste that critical better and really raise the damage output a lot in terms of percentage to a pure melee with 3 heroic prestige enhancements. Epic Destinies close that gap.



It should really be about what melee style you are going to use on your Divine and what will be more useful to your gameplay.

I have lvl 23-24 Melee Clerics that average with buffs about 130-150 normal attacks and average critical of 600-800 and cleave critical is average 600 to mobs around me. My lay waste is about 1600 critical. That is with an EAGA and average gear from commendations and auction house. Epic Destinies are EA and LD so far. And this does not include damage output for Divine Punishment doing over 200 damage per second when triple stacked. Melee allows me to save enough spell points to stack my DOT on the boss and orange/red names... and still heal your arse.

And I don't notice much of a difference from my STR based Horc with STR40 to my Human Generalists with a STR32 except I have to click Divine Power on the Generalist more often. And I like the higher Wisdom on the Generalist.


Saying a Cleric melee will never match up to a pure melee is not the point of clerics going melee in the first place. I hope my melee clerics don't melee as good as pure melee because then you would really suck. Cleric melee is really not about standing toe to toe with a boss although there are those that probably can. It is more about flexibility with party types and certain non elite and epic elite content. It is more about mitigating spell point use and dispatching mobs IMHO than toe to toe with bosses, but I have done Raid boss on melee when low on spell points and getting my aura and burst healing in there. It really depends more on the situation and judgment and the group.

To say Clerics should not melee because they will never be as good as a pure melee is nonsense, and really not the point.

[ThePrincipal]

battle clerics are easier to build now than ever before - pure 20, clonk, 17/2/1 whatever just pick up the Sentinel ED with Exalted Angel twists and you're a beastly 800hp first life invulnerable killing machine.

[SetofBs]

battle clerics are easier to build now than ever before - pure 20, clonk, 17/2/1 whatever just pick up the Sentinel ED with Exalted Angel twists and you're a beastly 800hp first life invulnerable killing machine.

If by invulnerable killing machine you mean hard to kill but takes forever to kill anything. Seriously. If you are running around in Sentinel and think you are significantly contributing to party DPS you are misleading yourself. Well, maybe you are if you have great gear, but then you would do much better in Fury or LD with a few Sentinel or Angel twists. Sentinel is just a really weak destiny for most situations.