Law AA Cleric Build Questions

[Elibolas]

Team,

I play with a static group of friends, and every once in a while we run heroic toons from 1-20. Don't know if this toon will go Epic or not.

Rolling an Elf Cleric (AA Archer) build around in my head. I think I only want the Elf AA to conserve spell points and for the Enchantment bonuses. I think there's a real synergy possible with Law Domain. I have two Ranger and two Cleric past lives.

So if I plan an 18 Cleric (max Law Domain Enchantment), 1 Fighter, 1 Wiz then I should be able to max my Enchantment bonuses and Spam Greater Command while shooting paralyzing/smiting/banishing arrows. For feats, I like Pt Blank Shot, Rapid Shot, Manyshot for ranged feats. I don't think I need damage so much as lots of shots.... For spellcasting I like Quicken, Enlarge, Heighten for maximizing the effects of the Greater Commands. Seems silly to consider cleric without Emp Healing. Spell Focus: Enchantment and Improved Spell Focus: Enchantment feel thematic.

L1: Emp Healing
L2: (Fighter) Point Blank Shot
L3: Quicken
L6: Spell Focus: Enchantment
L9: Rapid Short
L12: Many Shot
L15: Heighten
L18: Improved Spell Focus: Enchantment
L19: (Wizard) Enlarge

Enhancements:
Elf 18 gets +3 double shot and access to AA
AA 24 gets all possible enchantment bonuses
Rad Servant 34 gets the Aura for passive healing, some tier 5 goodies, and improved turning capacity

That leaves six points I have absolutely no idea what to do with (I have +1 Racial and +1 Universal Tomes). At least one needs to go in a Universal Tree.

Skills: Heal, Jump and Balance are about all I think I really need. 1 pt in Tumble is nice, and UMD is always helpful.

Okay, before I start trying to get serious about this toon, does anybody have any suggestions for improving playability?

-- Eliboas

[unbongwah]

Elf 18 gets +3 double shot and access to AA

It costs 14 APs to unlock the racial AA tree. After that it costs another 5 APs to grab two more ranks of Aerenal Weapon Training + Grace.

As you've probably realized by now, the main downside to this build concept is the high AP cost to add tier-4 AA for Paralyzing Arrows + Enchantment bonuses. You're not going to have enough APs for Paralyzing Arrows until level 9. You're probably also going to want to invest at least 12 APs into Falconry for WIS to-hit and damage to make WIS your all-in-one stat (apart from DEX pre-reqs on ranged feats), unless you're just giving up on ranged DPS entirely. It's the sort of concept which really benefits from a ton of bonus racial APs; but the sort of player who's invested that much time into DDO probably wants to play something more powerful than an AA Enchanter.

[Elibolas]

Copy, 19 for AA Archer.

I really think I can give up on the DPS, so I can skip Falconry. I don't mind healing and CC. Not all of my toons have to compete for the top Kill Count. Just some of them.

Honestly, I think I can wait even longer than level 9 for the Paralyzing Arrows. Getting the regen turns from Radiant Servant will have to take priority. I do enjoy obliterating undead in great swaths.

-- Elibolas

[archest]

Elf Eldritch Knight with long sword and shield.

you can dive into AA but the points are better spent elsewhere as the number of ranged shots is limited before you need to get into spells for med ranged charging mobs.
still have the elf racial longbow proficiency for use without it. unless your grouping and can stay ranged.

but with mithril med armor I add fearsome as a enhancement because it turns monsters at melee range when they hit you in a mob its help reduce multiple hits at range giving your a chance to heal before that one comes at you again.

get moderate PRR MRR and you can take a few hits before you need to heal or run.

doing a elf cleric / rogue 2 now with quarterstaff

[Elibolas]

I never understood going sword and board or 2HF with Eldritch Knight. I mean, the damage comes from the bonus to each hit. Surely TWF produces the most hits if you want a melee toon. Ranged, similarly, you'd be best off with whatever produces the most hits per second. So a repeater or Inquisitor build would be best there. I just don't know if the Eldritch Knight trees with archer builds.

Elibolas

[archest]

I never understood going sword and board or 2HF with Eldritch Knight. I mean, the damage comes from the bonus to each hit. Surely TWF produces the most hits if you want a melee toon. Ranged, similarly, you'd be best off with whatever produces the most hits per second. So a repeater or Inquisitor build would be best there. I just don't know if the Eldritch Knight trees with archer builds.

Elibolas

The Eldritch Knight tree is a melee tree. Elf is free proficiency for long sword and long bow.
+1w for Eldritch Strike
Spellsword: which scales with spell power
and Eldritch Tempest as a cap stone +5w

as well its the caster and the PPR and AC from medium mithril armor
after playing the cleric rogue I think concentrating on a high bluff and spot skill would come in handy for adding additional archery shots from range before having to switch to melee .

[SocratesBastardSon]

I just don't know if the Eldritch Knight trees with archer builds.

It does, quite well in fact. Or at least, when doing an Elven AA for racials. I did a Wiz 18/Ro 2 Elf AA (41 APs)/EK t4 (25 APs) with a strong emphasis on enchantment through feats, and it sailed through heroic and epic, going mid-reaper all the way. I was shocked at how effective it was. There are a few - only a few - enhancements in EK that don't work with archery, and the power of stacking AA and EK imbues was impressive. Gearing and enhancement focused on max'ing out USP and your chosen elemental spell power (I used acid), and I was sitting at around 1200 acid spell power with the ability to boost it to almost 1500 when I was level 30. And that was with mediocre gear.

Going into combat I would set up by laying down Enlarged Mass Holds after casting a disco ball or two (Quickened), Webs and Ice Storms (I had a secondary focus in Conjuration) to slow down those that made their save against the Holds. Then I would mop up with little difficulty. It was an excellent solo build, and did fine in groups, including most raids. R10 wasn't great, but it wasn't a disaster either.

It does not compete in terms of pure DPS compared to the current Ranger/Rogue DWS/HW meta, but then, this build could do a lot of things that one can't.

Going back to the original OP, having been very pleased with using AA this way, I too started wonder how an AA Cleric would fare. I would never have considered it if I hadn't seen first hand how effective enchantment spells are with that extra +4 to DCs the AA tree grants, including +3 from heroic feats (if you include Wiz past life; you can also pick up another +1 from Elf racial tree). With the right gear you can easily hit +16 and more to your enchantment DCs by level 20 with Cleric 18. And now with all the DCs you can pick up in Epic, I don't think the OP is mistaken.

Well, with one exception: 14 APs in Elf, 12 APs in Falconry, and 24 APs for t4 in AA equals 50 APs. That leaves exactly 30 APs for RS, so unless you have extra racial APs to spend you're not going to have enough APs for t5 in RS. My preference would be to go to t5 in Falconry and rely on native spell casting with a few points in RS to handle healing. If you don't own Falconry, even then I'd lean toward WP over RS. My feeling about Positive Energy Aura is it is more of a front line, melee-support enhancement, so working in a back line support role makes it less important.

Obviously, this is not a DPS build, it's filling a support role with healing and CC. It's difficult to number crunch these kinds of builds, which means, in my opinion, they have to be field tested rather than simply theory crafting it. In other words, give it a try and let us know how it works!

[Elibolas]

Hmmmm. Yeah, I had not considered full on Falconry instead of Radiant Servant. Lots more damage capability, I see that. I bet killing things faster will offset the reduced healing. Good feedback. Thanks!

[unbongwah]

I never understood going sword and board or 2HF with Eldritch Knight. I mean, the damage comes from the bonus to each hit. Surely TWF produces the most hits if you want a melee toon.

On a 2H Eldritch Knight, your extra hits are coming from Strikethrough plus EK Cleave attacks. A human or Warforged EK with Great Weapon Aptitude can hit 100% Strikethrough pretty early on (20% base + 60% THF + 20% GWA); technically as soon as level 2 although you'll probably focus on the Harper and EK trees first. Whereas non-Tempest TWF builds can't get Strikethrough at all. Since so much of the current meta embraces trash-clearing over boss DPS, the 2H EK comes out ahead of TWF, especially if/when you have some helpless-inducing AoE CC like Mass Hold Person.

[Elibolas]

Oh. Ok, that makes good sense. 2HF EK would proc the extra elemental damage as often as TWF, as long as there is more than one opponent, and have a higher base damage. Got it!

-- Elibolas

[Stormraiser]

Team,

I play with a static group of friends, and every once in a while we run heroic toons from 1-20. Don't know if this toon will go Epic or not.

Rolling an Elf Cleric (AA Archer) build around in my head. I think I only want the Elf AA to conserve spell points and for the Enchantment bonuses. I think there's a real synergy possible with Law Domain. I have two Ranger and two Cleric past lives.

So if I plan an 18 Cleric (max Law Domain Enchantment), 1 Fighter, 1 Wiz then I should be able to max my Enchantment bonuses and Spam Greater Command while shooting paralyzing/smiting/banishing arrows. For feats, I like Pt Blank Shot, Rapid Shot, Manyshot for ranged feats. I don't think I need damage so much as lots of shots.... For spellcasting I like Quicken, Enlarge, Heighten for maximizing the effects of the Greater Commands. Seems silly to consider cleric without Emp Healing. Spell Focus: Enchantment and Improved Spell Focus: Enchantment feel thematic.

L1: Emp Healing
L2: (Fighter) Point Blank Shot
L3: Quicken
L6: Spell Focus: Enchantment
L9: Rapid Short
L12: Many Shot
L15: Heighten
L18: Improved Spell Focus: Enchantment
L19: (Wizard) Enlarge

Enhancements:
Elf 18 gets +3 double shot and access to AA
AA 24 gets all possible enchantment bonuses
Rad Servant 34 gets the Aura for passive healing, some tier 5 goodies, and improved turning capacity

That leaves six points I have absolutely no idea what to do with (I have +1 Racial and +1 Universal Tomes). At least one needs to go in a Universal Tree.

Skills: Heal, Jump and Balance are about all I think I really need. 1 pt in Tumble is nice, and UMD is always helpful.

Okay, before I start trying to get serious about this toon, does anybody have any suggestions for improving playability?

-- Eliboas

One minor comment, but unless you're playing very high reaper difficulty, there is no concept of spell point conservation in heroics... A caster cleric will out DPS an archer hybrid in heroics without a regard for SP due to all of the slas.

[Whitering]

One minor comment, but unless you're playing very high reaper difficulty, there is no concept of spell point conservation in heroics... A caster cleric will out DPS an archer hybrid in heroics without a regard for SP due to all of the slas.

The main difference is that you can easily stun and be killing the entire screen at once with no-fail paralyzing arrows. It is incredibly easy to do I did that on a 1st life toon, half-elf archer.