Cleric = fun fun fun

[Raziel]

Cleansing works on minions, but Meditation doesn't. I can sort of see the reasoning - minions can get poisoned, but technically, their mana is irrelevant. I think.

Anyway I agree it sucks but there you go :(

Monkorn: do you use blessed hammer much? Or are you purely a party healer/undead slaughterhouse?

[monkorn]

Pure Healer/Undead killer, Hammers do 300 damage so if I am going to be in norm/nm I could use it, but other than that I am screwed if doing solo in hell if it isnt 100% undead.

Also, because of this I have found pindle is my prime target to MF/level without a party. Because of this I have found a decent technique to kill in a single-player game in 1.10 fast.

I have very little life ATM, and 2 charges kill me so I have to be careful when going in. I simply can not go and kill pindle and quit, because HB only hits 1 guy at a time and even if they die in as little as 3 shots, I cant kill pindle fast enough before they hit me twice so...

A weapon-switch +1 redemption means that 3/4 of the monsters die before they respawn making crowd control a LOT easier without me having the need to spend the 5+ points to get it. I simply run around the level, however I get no exp out of it, tough luck. I have yet to get higher than a set off of pindle, and I have got 1 set off of the minions, but I have been getting decent exp, even if I am removing 1/2 of the possible exp.



Also, due to me being an UD killer, I want to know how sanctuary works...does it only work for me? I have put it on from an item a few times, and I have never seen the aura go under an ally's feet. Would it be useless to me than, because I dont attack with a sword?

[Raziel]

From what little I know of Sanctuary, it:

1) only affects you, not your allies
2) adds damage to your attacks - presumably ranged, even though it says "melee attacks"
3) won't affect your holy bolt damage, as that's a spell
4) periodically knocks back undead

Point 4 would be the only useful feature for a cleric. Add to that the fact that this skill for some braindead reason does NOT synergize with FOTH, Holy Bolt or Prayer.. sheesh. It's out on it's own and all it synergizes with is Cleansing. Erm.. cleansing? WTF sort of choice is that??

Still, you *could* make an amusing undead killer if and only if the damage is added to ranged attacks also. Because it's a percentage, it would take a high base damage and multiply it like crazy. Imagine if, say, a Paladin used a Buriza with Sanctuary on - it would be like firing mana-less superpowered piercing holy bolts.

But I bet Sanctuary really is only for melee attacks. Wow, what a worthless skill.

[Occhidiangela]

He is a BH Cleric, probably along the lines of my Order of the Beacon Cleric Variant.

Maxed BH.
Maxed (planned) Synergies.
One point plus skill adders and BH synergy for HB ( I am aiming at maxing Combat Skills adders in amulets and circlets, the gambling and drop luck has not been with me. That will boost Holy Bolt, which is nice. :) )
Some Holy Shield and Dex to keep blocking high, lots of Vitality. I expect Hell to be difficult unless I adopt "walking Paladin" techniques to keep my blocking and DR intact. Still on the lookout for fast boots.

One point in Concentration, I may add more later.

Without synergies, I agree, BH will definitely suffer from missing the combined 600% damage bonus. :)

[TaMeOlta]

I'm just adding to the comments on Merc selections - also mostly this is from Online (1.09) use (tried for couple hours in Beta also) . Anytime I can tweak up a prayer merc (I normally play support/ missile/ caster type chars) with a Skin of the Flayed one (nice regen additive/ plus leech) , coupled with an Honor Runeworded weapon (also regen /leech) , the helms vary (any extra leech/regen ;) ) I go for it - these guys have brought me from deaths door several times . So far I have this merc build coupled w/ a Trapper Sin (armed w/ Venom on a DemonMachine- tho this may hafta go when Patch comes :( ) fighting alongside the Sin's Shadow , and an FoH/ Aura slave Pallie (that means I bounce between auras depending on party requests :P !).

I don't know what the Med / Prayer trick is on the pallie - is this Patch (Beta) only ? Is it turn on prayer then swap to Med and it keeps prayer active , allowing you to spamm FoH , BH , or HB ?

[Raziel]

^ Basically, Meditation inherits Prayer's healing. So if you have maxed Prayer, and run Meditation, you get both Life and Mana regen.

Plus, if your MERC is running a Prayer aura, he heals you as well. So you have Merc's Prayer aura healing + Meditation aura's healing (inherited from YOUR Prayer skill level).

It still won't keep you alive in hell, but.. hehe!

[Ice]

It still won't keep you alive in hell, but.. hehe!

My level 25 prayer is certainly doing well in keeping me myself and a clay golem alive in Hell.

With regards to meditation not affecting mercs, would that be just graphical (ie. merc still heals from the prayer synergy) or is it totally ineffective?

[Occhidiangela]

Thanks to the increased merc life regen rate in 1.10s.

[Rageburst]

I've always felt that my defiance merc healed under my meditation aura.

Anyway, it seems that maxing blessed hammers would be needed to make holy bolt useful in hell difficulty. On the other hand, maxing holy thunder, FotH, holy bolt, prayer would give maximized FotH synergy damage and maximized holy bolt healing. Holy shock is already pretty useful even w/o its synergy. It's possible that with +skill items, zeal + holy shock would come in handy if your merc dies.

I prefer the latter choice and would put only 1 pt in blessed hammers for holy shield. At later levels, I would spam FotH unless the monster is an undead lightning immune.

I am also of the opinion that 1 pt in meditation is enough. I have 30 energy and plan to have +skill items to make that 1 pt wonder even more useful. If you usually party with a magic user though, it can't hurt to have more pts.

[narcisco]

What is your basic levelling method solo. I have just started a Holy Bolt Paladin/cleric and going solo can at times be slow early on.
Any tips. Or basically do you need a party to get to nm.

[Pren]

FoH is a worthless attack skill. It is completely useless except against undead.

It has a 1 second timer and only hits a single non undead target. The holy bolts don't heal.

Playing around with slvl29 FoH on a 99 character, it simply stunk. It was ineffective in hell /players 1 cold plains with almost 3000 lightning damage. On undead (act 2 sewers), it was useful due to the seeking holy bolts, but I imagine that tweaked holybolt would be better.

And it doesn't pierce immunity, despite 'ignoring' resistances.

[Raziel]

Well if you don't go for FOTH, the only other thing I can think of is making a BH/HB cleric variant. Which is basically a weaker BH Pally, because you've got no concentration and very limited points in BH's synergy.

As for playing, well, my personal experience is that you have to get to Act 2 ASAP and hire a merc. Then heal it while it kills everything imaginable. I put points into Prayer 'till I got HB, then maxed HB (and bought a +3 Prayer sceptre), divering the obligatory 1 pt into Cleansing and Meditation along the way. Getting Cleansing was a relief, as it suits Act 2 nicely (all that poison!) and you can finally stop draining mana for puny passive healing.

I hired an Act 3 Cold merc later on... mostly because I was in a party with my wife's sorc and the two mercs would interfere with eachother's healing. If you're solo stick to a Defiance (or Might or Prayer) merc. Prayer stacks with Cleansing/Meditation btw.

[InFlames]

I was wondering what you guys use for attribute distribution. This is the only thing i'm having difficulty with in the build currently. I have never played a Paladin so that makes it even more difficult...Feed back would be appreciated.

Thanks :D

[Rageburst]

I personally put 30 energy into mine, but you're probably better off with no extra energy.... Meditation is that good.

The rest of your stats should go into enough strength for equipment, enough dex for a good blocking rate, and the rest in vitality.

The build is quite versatile since meditation makes you a good magic caster and your having all your stats in str, dex, vit makes other skills like zeal usable.

[Pren]

I think that is the price you pay for this build.

You could wear Trang Oul's for firewall if you wanted, but there are many builds out there that are mono-focused on one area and incapable of handling situations that are out of their forte. That's the nature of 1.10 and necessary to promote party play.