Self-Healing Halfling Mechanic For New Players

[unbongwah]

And then Cleric for the healing part, why not just cure serious pots?

So the whole point of this build is to have better self-healing than a rogue typically has. It's in the title, after all.

Obviously, anyone can use Cure potions. A pure rogue can also invest in Use Magic Device (UMD) which allows them to use wands and scrolls. But it takes a while until your UMD is high enough to be useful, particularly for newbies who don't have all the UMD-boosting gear etc. which a veteran player does. What if that's not enough to keep you alive?

So this build is halfling to take the Dragonmark of Healing and splashes cleric to unlock Heal skill and metamagics, with the fringe benefit of being able to use divine wands too. Not just for Cures but also Resist Energy and any other useful buffs.

The downside to this approach is the AP and feat cost incurred by the Dragonmarks. Pure rogue Mechanic is feat-starved and even a F2P Mechanic wants to spend something like 44 Mechanic / 23 Assassin / 3 Acrobat, which doesn't leave a lot of wiggle room.

If you drop the splashes and the Dragonmark, then you're just another pure Mechanic and those builds are pretty well-documented in other threads (e.g. this one).

[Derda]

So the whole point of this build is to have better self-healing than a rogue typically has. It's in the title, after all.

Obviously, anyone can use Cure potions. A pure rogue can also invest in Use Magic Device (UMD) which allows them to use wands and scrolls. But it takes a while until your UMD is high enough to be useful, particularly for newbies who don't have all the UMD-boosting gear etc. which a veteran player does. What if that's not enough to keep you alive?

So this build is halfling to take the Dragonmark of Healing and splashes cleric to unlock Heal skill and metamagics, with the fringe benefit of being able to use divine wands too. Not just for Cures but also Resist Energy and any other useful buffs.

The downside to this approach is the AP and feat cost incurred by the Dragonmarks. Pure rogue Mechanic is feat-starved and even a F2P Mechanic wants to spend something like 44 Mechanic / 23 Assassin / 3 Acrobat, which doesn't leave a lot of wiggle room.

If you drop the splashes and the Dragonmark, then you're just another pure Mechanic and those builds are pretty well-documented in other threads (e.g. this one).

but you don't get resist enegry because you're a lvl 1 cleric and you're not using metamagics because you're a lvl1 cleric.

pure rogue is not feat starved, I showed you that it even has 1 more feat available than this 18/1/1 build.
the link you posted requires harper agent, which is not free.

you're also not getting the good stuff from mechanic from lvl12 on because you (as in the OP, which isn't personally you) wasted 2 levels on cleric and fighter and now need lvl14 to get mechanical loader but 1st you need improved detection, which also requires rogue 12.

Drow is a bad choice vs Halfling for pure mechanic because you don't get the sneak attack additional die from the Halfling tree, instead you have more resistance, but it's lower dps ~.
More DPS, less need to survive, faster exp, more favor/DDO points faster.
Or let's rephrase that, Halfing has more damage potential vs Drow having more constant damage and a bit more robustness in saves.
The only good thing Drow has in this context is not starting with 6 str, even 2pt in str to have 8 as a halfing is bad in terms of ability to carry stuff (yeah I want my cake and eat it too).
You can have buff pots to counter that but it's annoying having to think about it, just like it's initially annoying to buy bolts. It gets better with t4 mechanic (ca. lvl8-9).
Drow also requires 400 favor to unlock for 1 server.

The only thing that's useful here in this build is you can burst heal pots/cure light/dragonmark heal for quick heals, because pots have a cooldown, very useful when your cleric hireling is dead.
Depending on wands for heals in "oh ****" moments isn't working, you misunderstood me there.

I'd even consider speccing thunderstone and not lacerating shots because its bleed so far (lvl12) is neglible.
The only area where I saw it being decent, not great, is on giants, but everything is decent on giants.
Having Thunderstone means aoe mez and damage, having some crowd control is always good, you can single out enemies, and it's free.

lvl12 I'm not even using or crafting traps. The only areas where I'm having problems is when the hireling runs into traps and gets himself killed and the only CC I have is the acid bomb + aoe snare.
I'll play it until 20 and see how much favor I have and if I can afford a 2 dex tome. 532 favor so far, doesn't seem like I will.

Revisiting my build I'd put points into heal for pot power if they're affected by the heal skill, if not, then not.

This build is still a strong build but it can be stronger is what I'm saying.

[Blueytone]

Really like the look of this for a first character on my account with all the content, but none of extra's (premium races, iconics, premium classes, premium enhancement trees, etc).

I have played before so know how to use a good rogue, and like the look of the great crossbow setup with the way things have changed from way back when.

I'll splurge for the Epic Destinies when I get up there, may be able to do it from favour points generated and when on sale (and if not, well a few dollars won't hurt i reckon )

If there's any significant changes I should know about, just yell, but I think I'll be able to work it out as i go for anything minor.


Thanks for putting up this build, should be ideal for getting up favour and surviving on loot drops until I can get some resources behind this account.

[C-Dog]

There are a couple other spins on this build you can try...

Instead of Cleric, go Wizard. 1 AP for Invis, and free Maximize for all the Halfling healing SLA's - boom. Shield and +10 Jump are bonus spells (and you can cast them out of combat and not worry about the ASF). Last spell is dealer's choice - I find Summon Animal I really useful as a distraction/chew toy for mobs, but Obscuring Mist can be good too for a Ranged. Could even try a combat spell like Grease, if you don't rely on it too much - this is (mostly) an Int build, after all.

Early(ish) Barbarian for +10% kiting speed is, of course, a classic. Tough to squeeze it in - you'd have to either abandon the "extra healing" aspect of Cleric (you'd still have the SLA's, just not the wands), or lose the extra Feat of Fighter (and drop... Rapid Shot? Not a huge boost in DPS, esp that late).

W/ either you want to plan out the leveling order to get the most out of the skill points.

[Reynarn]

Thought this build would be fun. Turns out I was wrong. Can't hit the broadside of a barn. If I didn't have hireling, I would have died. Range is not for me, apparently.

[nanobak]

I just reached lvl 20 with my first character and I have to say this build is very enjoyable in both solo and group.
I hope this guide will be updated with the new epic destiny trees, in the meantime I'll have to make something up.
Should I still pick Consecration III and Rejuvenation Cocoon for self-healing? Any other advice is welcome.