To the Developers, State of the Cleric Address.

[Cowdenicus]

Hello Developers,

The following is my opinion and my opinion only, as such take it with a grain of salt.

Mod 6 has been pretty nice so far. That being said a clerics resources are spread pretty thin throughout a quest. Now both of my main clerics are capped, so I can still recall for mana and such, but the quests are not balanced for that. I honestly prefer not to do that and try not to as much as possible, but then that means I will generally be stuck burning heal scrolls and such.

The one thing I have found to be severely lacking are Devotion items. I mean the best devotion item I have seen to date is Superior Devotion 6. The best Devotion item one can craft (known to date) is Superior Devotion 6, yet even as far back as Mod 4 I have been carrying around a superior potency 6 item, which means essentially my ability to heal (power wise) has gone up exactly 0%. Oh sure, level 15 brings in 10 more points from the heal spell when I cast it and Cure mass critical, but without a way to power up Cure Mass Critical, it is less effective than Cure mass light or moderate. Superior devotion 7 and 8 items should be populating the loot lists and has not. This is a huge issue for clerics, unless of course the lack of these items means you want others to become alot more self sufficient.

Mod 6 also brought alot of changes to consumables being able to be bought for arcanes, yet nothing new for clerics. No new wands, no new scrolls, nothing. My suggestion is as far as scrolls go, allow at least cure mass criticals to be sold. If you wanted to be real nice you could put some new 10th level wands for sale like Protection from Energy 10's and the like.

No new enhancement lines.... Clerics still do not have improved metamagics available, they have no new enhancements since the faith lines which when compared to the other classes "PrC" types of lines, well lets just say they are significantly underpowered. Can clerics get something new? Please.

Which brings me to the last issue as I see them. Domains. Still not in. The one thing that balances clerics to other classes (as a pure class) in D&D are domains. While some of them are quite strong I do not see a reason for Clerics to have had no domains for 2 years. Melee have been made stronger in this version of the game through attack bonuses going up and not down, casters have their improved metamagics and bonuses to types of damage through enhancements, clerics can heal for a little more at the cost of their domains. Does not seem very balanced to me......

Any ways, I understand that the odds of this getting a response are not great but I just wanted to let the Developers know how I feel. Thanks for reading even if you do not respond.

Respectfully,

[Dozen_Black_Roses]

/signed

[Cowdenicus]

Why should a cleric not be able to get a superior devotion 7 item? That would be like saying, a melee shouldnt be able to get a weapon with a suffix and a prefix..... it makes no sense.

[philo]

Arcanes are basically in the same boat van. Lack of higher lvl +spell dmg items makes new spells do less damage then older spells with items. But that is to be expected imo. That is how its always been.

There were no +spell dmg items that effected lvl 6 spells in mod 3 when lvl 6 spells were released. There were lvl 7 +spell dmg items in mod 4 when lvl 7 spells were released (but superiors only dropped during +1 loot weekend and were rr)...and greater 7's only dropped out of raid chests on elite during mod 4 from what I saw.

Superior 7's should theoretically drop out of the shroud on elite. Once everyone is running shroud as easily as reaver Im sure we will start seeing more superior 7's.

I think your issue is probably more about the resources clerics have to spend when running the shroud with sub-optimum groups. They wanted to make melee more necessary for the raid. They definitely did that. The side effect of longer fights, where the mobs have more hitpoints so the non-casters who dont have a limited mana pool are more useful, is that clerics also have to use more resources during the longer encounter.

[Shrazkil]

Why should a cleric not be able to get a superior devotion 7 item? That would be like saying, a melee shouldnt be able to get a weapon with a suffix and a prefix..... it makes no sense.

[eaten by cube]

Aside from that, solid complaints, but do remember , most shrines are re-usable now, so from the developers standpoint, that negates some of your main complaint points.

[totmacher]

The main problem I think Cowdenicus is trying to address is the increasing requirement for clerics to go outside sp boundaries into their pocket on an increasingly frequent basis. The Shroud is NOT completable, even on the lowest difficulty, without scrolls of Heal or the like. And although this is the cheapest alternative and most efficient because of the nature of self-healing in this game (1 heal scroll is about 1 1/2 csw pot), it usually falls on clerics to pick up this slack. The game at this point has demanded it.

[Cowdenicus]

also note, devotion is not the same as potency, it is akin to combustion. I pulled many Superior combustion 7 items out of gianthold..... Never seen a superior devotion 7 item though.

[Zenako]

The main problem I think Cowdenicus is trying to address is the increasing requirement for clerics to go outside sp boundaries into their pocket on an increasingly frequent basis. The Shroud is NOT completable, even on the lowest difficulty, without scrolls of Heal or the like. And although this is the cheapest alternative and most efficient because of the nature of self-healing in this game (1 heal scroll is about 1 1/2 csw pot), it usually falls on clerics to pick up this slack. The game at this point has demanded it.

Ummm, HEAL scroll heals 110 points minumum (bumps possible due to enhancements on both ends)

CSW Pots heal 3d8+3 or about 20-25 points if you are rolling well. So it takes 4+ pots at least to get the same healing as in one HEAL scroll. Just need to fix that for ya.

[Zenako]

also note, devotion is not the same as potency, it is akin to combustion. I pulled many Superior combustion 7 items out of gianthold..... Never seen a superior devotion 7 item though.

Completely agree on that, I have been handing out Superior Combustion 7 Sceptres to every arcane I know I have pulled so many of those. I do have a Superior Pot 6 dagger with my cleric and that works pretty well for most things.

Cow, which 7 and 8th level spells would you really get much of a benefit out of having them Superiorized. Destruction? Trivial damage or death. Superior does not make much of a difference. Firestorm? bleeh...showy. I mean some of the more useful ones are the mass buffs like death ward, and that gets no boost from Superior...

[honkuimushi]

Anything that reduces the out of pocket costs for clerics is a good thing to my way of thinking. While it is posible to run without a cleric a fair portion of the time, having a halfway competant cleric strengthens the party enormously-- not just healing, but buffs, croud control and attack spells. Running without a cleric gets expensive fast. But clerics have always been reliant on consumable for healing. First it was wands, now it's scrolls as well. I've always felt that these consumables should be a backup and the vast majority of healing should come from SP. But with the current attack bonuses for mobs, it's hard to mitigate damage. Adding enhancements and items to make SP usage more efficient is a good first step. But I think we're going to have to talk about AC vs. Attack Bonus pretty soon if we want to keep costs for clerics under control.

[Cowdenicus]

Completely agree on that, I have been handing out Superior Combustion 7 Sceptres to every arcane I know I have pulled so many of those. I do have a Superior Pot 6 dagger with my cleric and that works pretty well for most things.

Cow, which 7 and 8th level spells would you really get much of a benefit out of having them Superiorized. Destruction? Trivial damage or death. Superior does not make much of a difference. Firestorm? bleeh...showy. I mean some of the more useful ones are the mass buffs like death ward, and that gets no boost from Superior...

I have 3 superior potency 6 items.... for nukes this is all i need.

Superior devotion 7 and 8 on the other hand would power up mass cure serious and critical respectively (and only those 2 spells) hence my mass healing would be 50% more effective. (for those 2 spells)

[bobbryan2]

Greater Potency VII items drop common enough... it's the Greater Potency VIII drought that bugs me.

[philo]

also note, devotion is not the same as potency, it is akin to combustion. I pulled many Superior combustion 7 items out of gianthold..... Never seen a superior devotion 7 item though.

Thats a good point. I was referring to potency in my examples above.

Using mod 3 as an example again, the only devotion 6 item that was available back then was the queen helm (improved 6). There were definitely devotion 5 items in mod 3 when we got lvl 6 spells. There should be devotion 7 items now that we have lvl 8 spells.

[Cowdenicus]

Thats a good point. I was referring to potency in my examples above.

Using mod 3 as an example again, the only devotion 6 item that was available back then was the queen helm (improved 6). There were definitely devotion 5 items in mod 3 when we got lvl 6 spells. There should be devotion 7 items now that we have lvl 8 spells.

Not absolutely correct... this is an item I have had for QUITE a while.



As you will note, the ML on this item is 10, hence Superior Devotion 7 should be ML 12, Superior Devotion 8 should be ML 14, and Superior Devotion 9 should be ML 16.

While farming the shroud on elite I should have a chance at pulling a superior devotion 9 item, instead I have yet to even hear of a Superior devotion 7 item, something is amiss.

[Angelus_dead]

As you will note, the ML on this item is 10, hence Superior Devotion 7 should be ML 12, Superior Devotion 8 should be ML 14, and Superior Devotion 9 should be ML 16.

That is a false statement. There is no reason for Super Dev 9 to be available at level 16, or even at level 18.

Simply saying "I want it, I want it NOW" is not actually justification to give you anything.

[bobbryan2]

That is a false statement. There is no reason for Super Dev 9 to be available at level 16, or even at level 18.

Except that there's every reason for it to be available at level 18 because we can cast lvl 9 spells at level 18. And level 9 healing spells shouldn't be inferior to level 8 healing spells.... ever.

[Angelus_dead]

And level 9 healing spells shouldn't be inferior to level 8 healing spells.... ever.

The spells are not inferior... your gear is inferior. Cast the spells without items, and you'll see which is better.

There is ALWAYS a reason for a lower-level character to have inferior gear to someone higher level.

[bobbryan2]

The spells are not inferior... your gear is inferior. Cast the spells without items, and you'll see which is better.

There is ALWAYS a reason for a lower-level character to have inferior gear to someone higher level.

Again... having gear that is necessary for activating new abilities is bad design. Having a superior potency item of some sort has become the baseline and things are balanced around that baseline. This is even more evident when the devs add Superior Potency VIII items to quests to let poorer characters compete with people that have all those items already.

The quests are based around having certain items, and the devs are even giving those items to people that don't have them.

In that light... with a superior potency VI item... Heal mass Serior is worse than Heal Mass Moderate.

[Laith]

As you will note, the ML on this item is 10, hence Superior Devotion 7 should be ML 12, Superior Devotion 8 should be ML 14, and Superior Devotion 9 should be ML 16.

While farming the shroud on elite I should have a chance at pulling a superior devotion 9 item, instead I have yet to even hear of a Superior devotion 7 item, something is amiss.

actually, the ML on caster items is a bit... wonky.

after all, on a standard +5 weapon, the ML is 8.
Your scepter is a +8 weapon, with ML 10. '
I'd guess that it's ignoring the +2 enhancement bonus for ML purposes, and being counted as a +6 weapon due to the Superior Devotion VI alone, but i haven't really looked into that theory.

I do believe I've seen +14 scepters drop at ML14... might have been ML16, but that's not important: they break the standard.

We really should be seeing Superior Devotion VII though...

Just like i never understood why Healing Lore is always restricted to raid items, I'm not sure why Devotion is being left out this time.

[Vinos]

The spells are not inferior... your gear is inferior. Cast the spells without items, and you'll see which is better.

There is ALWAYS a reason for a lower-level character to have inferior gear to someone higher level.

You know reading your last few posts have reminded me about something my mother used to say. "Better to say nothing and have people think you are a fool than to open your mouth and remove all doubt". You are not getting the point of this thread and while your comments are funny they don't really pertain to the discussion.