Hi Casters!
I have always loved playing a caster, however after returning from a 3-year break a lot of stuff is weird and I would like to be informed about some things. I am trying to determine what my next life would be, but what I knew then is totally different from today's game. If you wouldn't mind answering a couple questions, I would love you very much.
1. Where do Clerics/FvS stand in today's end-game? Talking about pure or maybe a monk splash if that is still a thing. Caster-specced, healer, etc? I was told "everyone" is now self-sufficient from heroics to epics, and they don't really have a space in raids anymore unless they melee. How true is this? I certainly do not see a lot of clerics or favored souls these days. While I was always happy with BYOH groups, BYOH raids? How interesting.
2. Bards, can they nuke now? Feats like Ruin, Arcane Pulse, etc. Had me wondering if their SP pool, and their sonic dot/slas, plus some others are viable or is this just an idea that needs to be wiped from my head? I would love to make a bard caster who could do some spell DPS, but I'm not sure how well this would go.
3. Warforged for caster self-healing or is Cacoon on a fleshie really "that good"?
4. Artificers and the Archanotechnician Enhancement Tree + DI (Electric), while I do see a potential to spam the SLAs, the arty spells, and having energy burst + vortex. Is this a silly idea as well? What exactly is immune to electricity other than Raiyum and Abbot?
5. Lastly, Assuming you only had gear from late 2013... If you only had these past lives which caster class would you TR into and why? 3x Wiz, 3x Sorc, 3x Fvs, 1x Cleric, 1x Druid, 1x Monk, 1x Paladin - 1x PDK
Thank you in advance, I'm trying to learn as much as I can but I generally feel like a new player all over again!
Results 1 to 4 of 4
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03-14-2016, 01:40 PM #1Community Member
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- Jul 2010
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- 158
Give me the scoop, the 4/11, the facts!
[Tyrs Paladium]
Pewf, Bank Toons
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03-16-2016, 06:08 AM #2Community Member
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- Nov 2007
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- 1,159
First off, end-game can mean different things to different people. For me, end-game specifically refers to Legendary Elite raids - with a definite focus on LE shroud as the other two aren't in the same caliber of difficulty. If you count Legendary Hard as end-game, well then your options open up considerably. I'm going to speak to you with the assumption that you mean legendary elite raids. If this is not your goal, you would be best served by another player with more expertise in "building for flavor".
Originally Posted by Pewf
1. Clerics and FvSs are dead in end-game. Current end-game is all about optimizing your build and playstyle for dps and cc. Most groups run with 11 dps toons + 1 DC caster (almost exclusively a pm). Clerics and FvSs lack meaningful CC in these raids AND their dps is abysmal. The ability to heal to full at the push of a button (often due to high hamp from pally pls and equipment) means that dedicated healers are at best a niche role. Cocoon, sacred ground/consecration, silver flame pots, bladeforged sla reconstruct, and palemaster neg healing obsoleted traditional healing.
2. A sonic focused spellsinger bard can do decent dps relative to other traditional casters (non shiradi / non warlock). However it doesn't even come close to where it needs to in order to meet the threshold of where I would bring it into a LE shroud. A swashbuckler bard or warchanter bard however are completely different stories - these are in the upper ranks of the dps food chain if built right (they aren't casters by any stretch of the imagination tho).
3. Bladeforged for self healing or fleshie + cocoon or palemaster healing - all 3 are relatively equally good options. I tend to favor cocoon/fleshie myself because of low sp cost and the ability to heal others if needed.
4. I haven't done a "ton" of testing on this but I can tell you that from my quick and dirty lamm tests it was weak. Artificers suffer from a lot of issues just like druids and fvs. They lack a third tree that complements their other two. On top of this even with the changes in the last update - the archanotechnician tree is missing A LOT of power. As for what is immune to electricity, a lot of things (all demons and sorjek LE TS btw). Not to mention that they have to deal with evasion and high reflex saves on a lot of mobs.
5. Most people would recommend a warlock or mok shiradi ruin spammer. However, this is not a traditional caster and will not play like one. If you truly wish to stick with the traditional caster route, I would highly recommend a palemaster. You have all the required heroic pls (3x wiz, 3x fvs). I would follow Andoris' Palemaster Guide to the letter (you can make personalization touches to it if you want after playing it for a while). Strong self healing, strong cc (discos OP), instakills (select mobs, target low fort mobs), and decent dps (ruin/gruin + arcane pulse for boss fights - not top tier by any stretch but its passable considering how much utility you bring in form of cc). The thing I will caution is that in LE raids the damage mobs deal is one-shot territory for most traditional casters (w/ effort and epls you can maybe get it to the point where some of the trash won't one shot you). This means that positioning your character so you don't get hit, using your cc and aggro mechanics to your advantage are imperative. That said even perfect play, you will get one shot at times from stray arrows or spells - nothing you can really do about it. The only other traditional caster I could possibly recommend would be a cc caster druid - this is inferior to the palemaster's cc but it will play more closely inline with a cleric/fvs of old.
if you want to try a non-traditional caster, I recommend a fiend warlock - there is a build in my signature that is optimized for end-game content. You should also check out slarden's guide in the warlock subforum as well. I would advise to stay away from mok shiradi ruin spammer builds as they are heavily pot reliant - which doesn't bother some people as they have a nearly endless supply from legitimate sources (card farming from last anniversary event) or duping (past exploits related to card event).
As a parting note, I just want to say that welcome back to the game. It might feel like everything is new, indeed there are new strange mechanics like prr/mrr/melee power/ranged power/etc. and completely redesigned endgame (no more healbots / intimitanks / etc. - with rare exception). If you have any questions about casters or just general game stuff, feel free to shoot me a pm and I'll get back to you asap. Take care! Originally Posted by Vargouille
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05-09-2016, 04:03 AM #3Community Member
- Join Date
- Sep 2009
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- 4,835
Assuming little to no multiclassing. Originally Posted by Pewf
1) Clerics and Favored Souls are quite behind on both DPS, instant-kills, and CC, can be workable but the investment is far bigger compared to a Warlock. Light Nuker + Ruin Builds are workable but not optimal, I can easily burn down ~6k mana between shrines on my Favored Soul, and i have nearly 5k standing spell points. - For endgame defenses 1,2k hps 150prr, heavy armor + towershield is recommended. (yes ouch on feats)
2) Cant comment much - except Ruin is a manadump feature, and bards arent really rich in that aspect, Wizard and Warlock are the best to maximize Ruin due to the crit multipliers.
3) Wf is still ok for the immunities, can save you gear slots and gear is super powerful now.
4) Cant comment
5) :
A) Warlock - best passive sp scaling, free aoe with better atk.speed vs cooldowns, can be built nearly unkillable, works in multiple EDs, sentinel for god mode, EA for DC casting, Shirady for free DPS.
B) Google "Ruin King", or look up Shiradi builds with wizard, fvs and warlock levels.
C) The lesser option is probably an Air+Cold Sorcerer Savant, but you can make it quite fun with the new epic feats like glacial wrath.
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05-09-2016, 09:19 AM #4Hero
- Join Date
- Oct 2008
- Posts
- 5,415
Its no longer a game of balanced teamwork..
DPS=win. a team of hard hitting speed Brute DPS will get through content where a balanced party is less likely to succeed.
The game has evolved away from inter-team dependency to solo'ists grouping together, be self sufficient or you will go nowhere..
1. Cleric/FVS - Hardcore veterans with lots if ideal gear/tomes/pastlives and suck lots of mana pots.. can make these work, but imho they are a dead end class waiting for a revamp..
Generally, High level content is a lot of one shot damaging mobs that results in spam heals and mana pot sucking healers become rezbots that struggle to stay alive themselves.
Perhaps once bring in divine pacts that mimic Warlock pacts and you may be able to recover these into playable classes...
2. Bards are decent, lots of cookie cutter templates on the forums, still takes some gearing and specialization to get them going.
3. Warforged are the master race.. Bladeforged are the Cadillac's of the master race.. Solid self healing is good.. dead players do no dps..
4. Arcanotechnician=meh.. Brute DPS is King.. Battleengineer is superior.. also Artificers are liked for their 'Deadly Weapon' buffs.. don't forget to pick that up..
Ranged players tend to do well since going toe-toe with mobs is inadvisable due to the mob boost to melee damage. not being where the mob is swinging = better survivability.
5.
~Drow Undead Necro focus Trash instakiller and CC. Its a straight forward build, self sufficient and good party contribution.
~Warlock (race depends on variant) Good all round build, low SP dependency, walking DR breaker, Solid DPS.. make sure to focus on ranged casting or aura.
..takes some gear wrangling (light power/CHA stat maxxing) but once you have the gear it all comes together.
I would avoid Gnomes and Illusion focus... there is an illusion that they are useful..
There is a complete lack of illusion spells especially DC focussed spells... something that should have come with Gnomes but didn't...
Originally Posted by JOTMON
Originally Posted by JOTMON
Last edited by JOTMON; 05-09-2016 at 09:30 AM.
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