Hello fellow clerics and non-clerics. This is guide to the cleric, however, not all of it will be written by me. In fact, I'm sending you to another site so you can find out about all things cleric because they do a better job of explaining than I ever could.
For the record: this is merely a -guide- you don't have to follow their build, you can fiddle with how you want to build your DC in the preview server and find what works for -you-. I -always- test a build before I apply it to live server in case it doesn't fit my play style. That being said, Kaelac has a pretty good guide on the cleric, including both paragons, which is extremely helpful. Check out his guide here:
laggygamerz.com/forum/index.php?/topic/17-kaelac%E2%80%99s-guide-to-devoted-clerics-in-neverwinter/ And when you're done with that, come back here.
Read the guide? Good.
As everyone can tell you, I'm a fairly decent DC (some say amazing, but I honestly think they're exaggerating) and I have followed some of that guide. What follows is my thoughts and my loadout. Again, this is just tuned to -MY- play style and is merely a guide.
I am a Divine Oracle and have never tried Annointed Champion, for the record.
I have, in truth, a mix of sets. One day I'd like to finish them. I still run T2s, not just to finish said sets, but to gain experience with dungeon runs. One thing I can tell you is that every dungeon run, especially depending on who you're running with, is different.
This is my older gear. You will note that I have 2/2 sets of T2, notably Miracle Healer and Beacon of Faith. I don't use these as much anymore but I do still have them in my inventory in case I need an extra boost to gear score or defense. With this set, plus Castle Never weapon, I rock about 12.8k GS.
So, then when I heard about the goodness of a certain T1, I went on a Cragmire Crypts spree for the boots, as I'd gotten the chest and gloves from a guild bank, and the helm was a gift from another player. This is my T1 self, with my Castle Never weapon (which is part of a set, but I'm missing the icon) With this set, I have 11.9K GS.
It should be noted that for some reason, the gateway shows me in T2, that's not how it looks. Anyway, as you can see, I'm missing a lot of things, namely two more artifacts.
My Play Style
I take different roles as needed. I judge how a party starts with trash. Are they taking too much damage? Swap some skills for more heals. Are they taking hardly any damage? Swap for more DPS on them and debuffs.
For my loadout, my dailies almost never change. Hallowed Ground and Divine Armor, always in parties. With Hallowed Ground, you're not just boosting party defenses but also party offenses, and if you have Moontouched feated you're healing the party. I took Moontoched out once and realized my dire mistake later. Never again. Even when I'm soloing stuff, sometimes I'll use Hallowed Ground instead. Flamestrike is good for solo stuff and so is Hammer of Fate, but Hammer only works on one enemy though.
My passives tend to change depending on the situation. I always have Foresight up though, with the Benefit of Foresight feat. I have heard that it will be nerfed later though, so we'll see if I end up changing that out. When in dungeons I tend to slot either Holy Fervor or Divine Fortune. The former gives more AP gain and while I already have quite a bit AP recharge and have little trouble with it, it's handy as usually within 1 -2 packs of mobs in a dungeon I will already have daily up and be able to drop a Hallowed Ground to clear faster. With Divine Fortune, plus two other feats (Righteous Rage of Tempus + Ethereal Boon), my divine bar tends to fill up quite nicely for those dungeons where I need to be healing quite a bit. In PvE content I go with Terrifying Insight which is pretty handy to have some extra DPS to the fights in my dailies.
Encounters For Dungeon Content -
All Heals - Astral Seal/Healing Word/Forgemaster's Flame for great DPS parties who are all up close and personal OR Astral Seal/Healing Word/Bastion Of Health.
In this loadout you would cast Astral Shield first after it goes down, wait about a couple seconds, then divine Bastion of Health and then in a couple seconds Astral Shield will be back up. The trick is to cast the Bastion between Shield downtime. Healing Word is just handy to have and can be useful for healing that one player that might need it.
Heal + Buff - Divine Glow/Healing Word/Forgemaster's Flame. Divine Glow doesn't get NEARLY enough usage as is. In a party with two clerics, at least ONE should be casting Divine Glow. I love standing there in my T1, dropping a Hallowed Ground and the hitting Divine Glow in Divine Mode and watching the numbers fly and things go down with a quickness.
Encounters for Solo Play -
Forgemaster's Flame/Divine Glow/Daunting Light - I love sliding/riding right in the middle of the mobs, hitting tab, casting Divine Glow and then hitting Daunting Light and watching everything die in 1-2 hits. Soloing as a DC has never been easier for me since I finally optimized myself for solo play. If you haven't killed the group, hit Forgemaster's Flame in divine mode for the heals (seriously heals me back up from half life) while nuking things.
For At-Wills in dungeons, most go with Astral Seal and Sacred Flame as will I when it's most needed, however, I will almost always have Brand of the Sun as an at-will as the crit ticks off the mobs give me divine power and melt the mobs faster. Not only that, but casting it on multiple mobs helps. Sacred Flame tends to be my second at-will most of the time, especially for solo content as it not only does more damage than Lance of Faith, but that 3rd strike with temp HP heal is helpful.
Enchantments:
Radiant - In Offense slots, it gives more Power. Power stat has -NO- diminishing returns or cap. If you have nothing else to stack, this is the one to stack. In Defense slots it gives more HP and that's quite helpful. Most of my Offense slots have Radiant enchants.
Dark - In Utility, this gives movement speed which is handy for walking out of red splats when you're out of stamina and following the crazy CW/TR/HR who swears they're a tank (yes, it happens). Otherwise, if you don't think you want it and can live with being slightly slower than the rest of the party, you can do the Feywild campaign and make Fey Blessings for more runestones and enchants.
Azure - In Offense slots this gives more critical, however with the right gear and stats you might have quite a bit of critical (my current crit sits at over 38% or so) but more crit is fine if you think you need it. In Defense slots it gives more Defense. I find it funny how squishy DCs are in chain mail, and more defense never hurts, especially if you're picking up party mates.
Armor Enchant: Lesser Soulforged - Picks me back up after a death, has a cooldown of about 90 seconds. Am planing to get a normal.
Weapon Enchant: Lesser Vorpal - Adds crit severity. Most DPS classes use this to get on the top of charts and to clear content faster, which is understandable to a degree, but as a DC, this makes my heals so much more effective. As my heals crit often, the crit severity is fantastic.
Companions:
Ioun Stone of Allure: It's active bonus is a slow, which is okay, but the fact that it's an augment (its stats go to the wearer) and doesn't die in battle is what makes it great. I currently rock two +7 Empowered Runestones in the offensive slots for added Power boost (about 185 each) and an Elderich runestone in the Defense slot which gives me a percentage of the stats. Now hold on, you ask, doesn't the stone already give you the stats of all the items equipped to it plus runestones. It sure does, but with Eldritch, add over 100% to that. In my case it's like all stats plus 6% more. I'll do a test and post a screen soon of my stats page with it. Anyhow, the gear is sub-par unfortunately, but I do plan on getting gear.
To Upgrade or Not to Upgrade Your Companion: One of the things most people don't realize is that for certain enchantments, the cost of getting them to +10 is very high. If you're looking to make a perfect enchant based upon a certain stat, I'd suggest you look no further than your own companions. Stat-wise the white companions have a piddling amount, like +25. Upgrade them to green and you're looking at +100, to Blue is +190 and Purple is +300. A rank 10 enchant is also +300. So for the price of 1,550,000 AD you can take a white companion to purple. And if you've looked at the AH, you know perfect rank enchants are more than that. Take a look, check out the companions and their active bonuses and seek the ones that would benefit you the best.
Here's the
Wiki in case you need it.
Any questions or thoughts are welcomed.
