Cleric Guide
I'll start with a guide to creating a new cleric, however, and lead on from there.
The meat of this guide will be the part intended for higher level clerics, though. So skip down to the next section if you're already doing dungeon parties. I'm going to illustrate how to play a *good* healer here - how to play one 'professionally'. If you follow this advice, you'll be in the 5-10% of truly competent clerics in the game.
Playing a mediocre cleric still requires a bit of attention, but playing a good one is somewhat complicated. So bear with me as I get really detailed for some of this guide. A lot of these things will come naturally to you after enough time, but it's important that you establish these good habits as soon as possible.
If you only scan one part of this guide, read the part below labeled "MP Conservation" and "Healing Strategy".
--- Advice on creating a new cleric ---
Playing a cleric at the very beginning is much like playing any other sort of character. Your goal here is just to get to level 25 or so. After that point, you should only be doing dungeon parties. You *can* solo at any level to some extent, of course, but other classes are much better at fighting. Don't frustrate yourself by attempting to do it with your cleric - just make an alt to solo with when you don't want to group with people and heal.
Skills:
Staff Mastery - (you only use a staff for the M.Atk, to boost your heals, and Staff Mastery only boosts the P.Atk mildly.. thus, it's worthless. Don't waste your JPs)
Mace Mastery - You can put 3-4 points into this to get you through levels 1-25 if you like. After that, you'll never use a mace again (if you're a good healer). If you want to solo later on, put more points into it then.
So, do quests till you're level 25 or so. Focus on raising your heals as much as possible, along with Wizardry Mind and Mental Amplify.
As far as equipment goes...
Weapons: You can buy an r2 mace when you reach level 20 if you like, but you could just get by with your r1 mace for a few levels also. You won't be needing a mace after lvl25, so the only important thing is to have an r2 staff ready. When you go into a dungeon, don't take your mace - you should never, ever be using it. As far as using strike cubes... it's not a bad idea, but it's not a priority. It's more important *how* you heal and that you sit often, use deluxe spell potions, etc, than how much you heal for. *Don't* dump a ton of money into getting a super staff and then fail to use deluxe spell potions. One strike cube could pay for 44 *hours* of keeping deluxe spell potions on. And higher cast speed does a *million* times more good to you than the benefit of a single strike cube. But if you have the money, then yes, it's good to use some. Over +4 is just if you're bored or want to try making a really killer staff for your DM or something, though - you don't need a +8 or +10 staff, even if it would be 'nice'.
Armor: As far as other equipment goes, you want an r2 robe. You should upgrade its defense when you can, but it's not terribly important. You can also get by just fine with only minimally upgraded gloves/boots/helm/belt/etc. You'll rarely be hit, and when you do, a few points difference won't be that significant. It's good to do, but not essential. Enchanting your robes to +4 with defense cubes is a good idea, because enchanting boosts the MP regen bonus on the robe, whereas upgrading at the blacksmith doesn't. If you're choosing, enchant your robes rather than upgrade their level at the smith. NOTE however that the MP regen bonus you get from this is very small. If your money is tight, this is *not* a priority. We're talking 2-3 extra MP while sitting, verses your existing 50-65 points per tick. Not a big deal.
Rings/Earring: Acquire two +4 dex rings. This should be the highest priority after your staff, and possibly even more important than your robe. Why dexterity? Because it increases your cast speed, and that's the single most important thing to a cleric. You'll find out why below.
Cards: the most important one to have is 1 or +2/+3 heal. Why Heal and not buff cards? Because a heal card further reduces your cast time for heal, and heal is your single most important skill of course. It's expensive, though... I bought 5 heal cards at 800k each and broke four of them trying to make +2. I'm still just using a single +1 heal card. Buff cards sell for around 1 million rupees for clerics - I don't have any. I could buy one or two, but I just won't at those prices. I don't blame people for the prices of them - it's just not worth that price for me personally. Kahunas can also buff, and their cards are half the price of cleric cards. I generally rely on kahunas for higher level buffs. If a kahuna doesn't have higher buffs, or there's not one in party, I give people lvl5 buffs and we all still get by fine with that at high levels. Remember, also, that with the release of the new jobs soon, there will be much higher level buffs around from many of the new subclasses. So don't fret too much about getting your buffs high level. If you can, do so, but it's not that important. As far as priorities go, though, you should prioritize: Heal, Bless Weapon, Mental Amplify (because this helps your heals also - matk), Bless Armor (helps the group take less damage).
PS: People, in comments, keep saying "you need buff cards!" (though they also keep saying 'but I didn't read all of your guide'...) so I'm putting this here again so it's clear: buffs help a lot at higher levels. Much more so than at lower ones, really. So *yes*, good buffs are very important. What I said is simply that your **focus** should be on being a good healer and **then** worry about other things. lvl8 buffs are not *essential* - they're just very nice. They even make your job as a healer easier, yes. A +3 cleric buff card is *tremendously* expensive, though. So that's why I emphasized the above... that clerics needn't feel it essential. Even if everything goes perfectly with the combines, you need: four 1million rupee cards (that's what they sell for on Lydian) and 3 skill cubes. So, around five million... and that's if things go *perfectly* (they won't). So then, realistically, add in the cost of using ancient skill cubes, and we're up at maybe 8-9 million in terms of in-game cost. 8-9 million for one +3 card. See why I emphasized that clerics should probably rely on kahuna buffs?
-- Spell Arrangement --
Hopefully by this point you at least have level 6 heal and level 5 rapid heal. When you first go at level 25-30 to a dungeon, you'll probably want to only use those levels of heals. But as you raise your heal, you definitely want to have two versions of each spell hotkeyed.
Open your skill list, scroll down to Heal and Rapid Heal, and click the arrows next to the spell level to turn the level down, then drag the icon to your hotkey bar.
Now you should have two versions of normal heal on your hotkey bar, and two versions of rapid heal.
For most of DMR I had a level 5 heal/rapid heal hotkeyed and then my highest level heal/rapid heal hotkeyed.
Take "fight" off your hotkey bar... seriously. You shouldn't ever need it and you have a lot of things you need on your hotkey bar.
The most important thing to have on is ***sit***. Press Alt-T and drag the sit icon to one of the main F1-F4 keys. You should be pressing sit every bit as much as heal. Literally, you should be pressing sit twice as much as heal. I'll illustrate how and why later.
You'll also want to have some MP scrolls / potions dragged to a position on the hotkey bar, but not a primary spot. You also need "spell" potions hotkeyed there. (The ones that raise your cast speed). I'll get more into that later as well.
-- MP Conservation --
Now, this is something that a ***LOT*** of clerics at all levels fail to realize, but the biggest factor in conserving and regaining your mana is speed and sitting.
The faster you can use a normal heal, the faster you can resume sitting.
When you sit, you regain mana at approximately 500% the rate you do when standing. Look at your MP bar sometime sitting and then standing and compare for yourselves.
I regain enough mana in one single 'tick' of the bars sitting to pay for a lower level heal of mine.
This is also something most people don't know: your MP regeneration is counted as "sitting" the *instant* you press sit. Many people think "oh, it takes so long to sit all the way down and stand up". In fact, that's just something your client does, though. Your MP is regenerating at 500% the second you press 'sit'. I've tested it extensively.
Many people also think "Oh, I can't sit because people are still fighting". This is also a mistake for one reason: you don't need to wait to sit back up. If you press 'sit' again to stand up, the 'stand' animation is superfluous. If you press 'heal' an instant after pressing 'sit' again to stand up, you'll heal that instant. Of course, this is only true if your heal spell is recharged. You can press 'rapid heal' instead if you can't wait for your heal spell. The only real delay is that you have to wait for yourself to sit *down*, but that's a very, very short delay.
Go in game sometime and experiment with this. Sit, press sit again then tap heal quickly. You'll "pop" up instead of standing slowly. Then press sit again when done. Remember, the instant you press sit, you're 'seated'. The animation means nothing.
I keep entire 8-person-parties alive, with almost completely full mana the vast majority of the time, fighting level 70 things in the lost mines with this strategy.
The other key to mana conservation is speed. +dex rings and +cast speed potions (spell/deluxe spell potions) boost your cast speed drastically. I can cast a normal Heal almost as quickly as most clerics can cast a "rapid" heal. Beyond that, though, I'm reducing the amount of time I spend standing. The faster I can get my heals off, the faster I can sit back down. Thus, +dex rings actually give you *substantially* higher effective MP regeneration than +wis or +int.
Another somewhat obvious strategy is using your "recover MP" skill whenever you can. It'll give you more and more as your MP pool gets larger and larger. I get around 800-900 MP each time I use it now. Every 10 minutes that's a nice bonus to keep me full. Generally I'll try to time using it after I buff the party (if I buff) so that I can fill myself back up. If I'm not buffing, I'll use it after something went wrong... 3-4 mobs came in, a boss, etc. Generally I waste around 1,000 mp if things get really bad, rapid healing and not sitting as much as I should. The recover MP skill gives me a buffer to get me full again after something like that.
-- Healing Strategy --
You'll be using the lower level heal to "top people off" when they're hurt, but not enough to warrant your full heal.
This is ***very*** important for multiple reasons.
First of all, healing for more than someone needs wastes your mana. Secondly, it generates almost twice the "threat" level. If you heal for 1,000 HP, you generate "1000" threat level.
Let's say a puller just brought a mob to your party, but they're badly hurt and you're afraid they might not take even one or two more. What do you do?
If you used your full heal spell, sure, you healed them, but then everything that was on them is now on you and, oops, you created too much threat for the rest of the group to pull them off you quickly enough. If you had used your lower level heal, it would be far easier for someone else to hit one of the mobs and pull aggro. You can always use another lower level rapid to heal the puller again, if they need it. But by splitting the threat into two parts like that I have *often* kept a puller healed without drawing aggro myself where other clerics have pulled them all on themselves.
Again, as I said in the MP Conservation section, you should always be seated unless you're actively healing in that moment. Likewise, you should always have a spell potion activated to increase your cast speed. If you want, tell people that you'll donate less force chips to a party because you keep those active. Buy them from the store or the deluxe spell potions from other players. The best clerics at high levels generally all use deluxe spell potions all the time. I take 30 with me whenever I go into a dungeon. They last 10 minutes each, and you can generally buy them for 3,000 each. So it costs 18k per hour - not bad. At lower levels buy the normal spell potions from the vendors - they're much cheaper. You should always use one of these, though. The top echelon of healers all do. On Lydian server, I've only seen a small handful that do, though - but they're the absolute best healers on the server. It makes a big difference.
Also, really work on getting a feel for when your heal is done recharging. That way you won't try to sit up prematurely. If you were planning on sitting up and using a lower level heal, but heal isn't done recharging, then just wait for it and use a level10/8/etc heal instead. It's more efficient. It can be tempting to not sit when you only have 2-3 seconds between heals you need to do, but you should sit. It makes a *tremendous* difference.
--- Situations ---
Now, let's talk situations.
If two people are mildly hurt, and you're seated, what do you do? Let's say.. PLAYER1 and PLAYER2.
You could:
stand,lvl5 heal PLAYER1,sit,wait for recharge,stand,lvl10/8/etc heal PLAYER2.
OR, you could: stand,lvl5 heal PLAYER1,rapid lvl5 PLAYER2,sit
Which is better? Using the lower level along with rapid is better. Why? Because it gives you more time in which you can remain seated afterwards *along* with keeping both player's HP topped off at the same time. Using rapid is normally to be avoided, but this is a circumstance in which it's best to use it along with a normal heal.
If PLAYER1,2, and 3 are all hurt, but only 1&2 still have aggro, then do that to 1&2, and wait through another round of sitting to lower level heal player 3.
Another situation:
PLAYER5 is a DM (dark mage) and has taken a hit or two. What do you do?
Unless someone else is on the verge of death, stand, lvl5 rapid heal them ASAP. Always rapid heal DMs. Why? They have severely low defense and HP. Ideally, they shouldn't take aggro at all... they need to learn not to for their own survival. But if they do, you need to rapid heal them ASAP. If they don't cease attacking when they have aggro, yell at them, of course
Healing DMs is the #1 sink for a healer's MP, because almost any other kind of character can wait for you to cast a normal heal.
Another situation:
Someone was on the verge of dying, you healed them, and now you have 1-3 enemies on you. What do you do?
If you have time to type something, type "add" or "agg" or "help" when you can.
Then, what you do depends on several factors. How many hits can you take? If there's *1* mob on you, and nobody else is close to dying, then target them and use frozen snare then move a bit. If frozen snare doesn't work, then just keep the group healed and low level rapid heal yourself when needed. You can tank 1-2 mobs like this just fine for some time, really. It's not good for your mana, of course, but if you're doing everything else I've mentioned you should have mostly full MP beforehand and you can get it back.
If you have 2 on you, it's generally best to move a little bit so that they follow you and also makes it easier for the striders/HWs/DMs to disable them for you. Do not try to use frozen snare... the odds are low that it'll work on things at very high levels anyway, and you have two things on you, so you can't get them all off you anway. Moving a bit shows the group that there are things on you and what they are - very important. Just move a little bit though. Then stand and rapid heal yourself (lower level rapid) till they can draw them off. If your rapid heal isn't even enough to keep you alive standing still, run around in circles and rapid yourself once you get to the other side of the group, etc. Just *do not* draw any other aggro. Often, doing this, I can keep myself alive and still rapid heal some others who're about to die. If, say, there are 4 on you... then it's your call whether to log off or not. Sometimes I will, sometimes I won't. Generally, if 4 are on you, the party can't get them off in time for you to live no matter what. But sometimes it works out. If you do decide to log, type "LOG" before you do so the group has warning that they should also. Don't just leave them all without that direction. I normally only log off when I'm fairly certain I'll die. I never log even then if I can't give people lots of warning for them to log as well, beforehand. Sometimes I'll let myself die, someone will res me quickly, and I can keep anyone else from dying. Look at it this way... you can get groups almost instantly unlike any other character, so XP is easy enough for you to get compared to most. Another way of looking at dying is that you get more JP.. eventually your level doesn't really matter too much, later on. Your JLVL is generally much more important. But still, it's up to you - just give people warning and don't do it unless there really is no hope.
Another situation:
The puller has pulled 3 mobs. They've done their job and announced '3' in party chat so you're warned. What do you do? It's not vital, but you should try to stand up and target the mob at the back that's trailing the puller and use frozen snare on it. It often misses, but if it works it gives the rest of the party a bit more time to react. If you don't miss it, don't worry... it's primarily the job of the Striders/DMs to HB (Head block) or sleep mobs like this. But it's good to help if you have time to. And when 3 or 4 are incoming, your'e not busy healing at that moment so you have the time to.
Bosses:
There is only *one* situation in which you won't want to sit between heals, and that's when you need to do two or more consecutive rapid heals. There's no real wait for rapid heal to recharge, so there's no sense sitting then because the pause isn't long enough. One example of this is when a strider/pet user/kahuna somehow ends up 'tanking' a boss. It's bad, but let's face it - it happens a lot. In those cases, unless they have good defense for a DD, you may need to rapid heal them many times in a row. In that case you'll need to stay standing because, facing a boss, they can't live through a 2-3 second pause sometimes.
If a HW or fighter is tanking a boss, though, and they seem to be tolerating the damage well enough to sit briefly while heal is cooling down, then you should sit. If a HW tanks a boss I can generally heal all the way through and have full MP when the boss is dead.
Also, don't hesitate to tell the group what they should do. Even if someone else is party leader, it's a healer's role to keep the group alive and well. How the party behave affects how well you can heal them... how soon your MP runs out, etc. I'm normally the one who tells people "back up" when the group has run after the puller into the middle of dangerous territory, etc. Also, don't hesitate to tell the party "stop after this for a moment - need MP". Sometimes I'll outright threaten to let them die if they don't cease doing something when I need a break, etc. There's nothing wrong with this at all - you're doing them a favor by being bossy like that, because if you weren't, they'd do whatever, you'd run out of MP, and everyone would die.
Generally people will listen to you as a cleric - they know your job is only to keep them from dying and they'll gladly do something you need to help you keep them safe
--- Finding a party ---
One tremendous advantage to playing a cleric is that you can almost always get a group within a few minutes. Other classes can often try for hours to get a party. In this sense, a cleric is the fastest leveling character you could pick.
To find a group, just do "!lvl__ cleric LFDP" every few minutes. Normally I type it out, then ctrl-shift-leftarrow back through it, ctrl-c, then hit enter. Then I can just paste it (ctrl-v) to try again in a minute or two. Don't spam it, obviously.
Look at what people are saying in shout, too. Often people are pasting DPLF Cleric and aren't reading to check if you're advertising. If something still hasn't panned out after a few minutes, consider starting your own group. Just do "/pcreate partyname" and then do "DPLF lvl(your level)-(your level+9-10)". When it's really slow I can normally still get together a group myself.
The dungeon locations are DMR1/2,LM1/2,and CV1/2. DMR1 and 2 are due west of Horizen (Gaian's hometown). Go due west (rent an ornitho) for a long time and cross the bridge across the river to the west. Then you'll see a path further west to the north and south. To the North is DMR1, and to the South is DMR2. DMR2 tends to be less crowded, on average. Or at least, it was when I played there. DMR1 is easier to pick up players in, though. If I had a full group, I'd tend to go to DMR2.
You should stay at DMR until you're at least level 50. The higher level you go, the closer towards the center of the dungeon, or the further north, you'll go. You want to fight enemies no more than 10 levels above your own level, or your experience will be very handicapped. I could go into more of a description of the dungeons here, but I'm sure others have done that in guides before.
If there is any missing information, please email: [email protected]
<-Go Back
The meat of this guide will be the part intended for higher level clerics, though. So skip down to the next section if you're already doing dungeon parties. I'm going to illustrate how to play a *good* healer here - how to play one 'professionally'. If you follow this advice, you'll be in the 5-10% of truly competent clerics in the game.
Playing a mediocre cleric still requires a bit of attention, but playing a good one is somewhat complicated. So bear with me as I get really detailed for some of this guide. A lot of these things will come naturally to you after enough time, but it's important that you establish these good habits as soon as possible.
If you only scan one part of this guide, read the part below labeled "MP Conservation" and "Healing Strategy".
--- Advice on creating a new cleric ---
Playing a cleric at the very beginning is much like playing any other sort of character. Your goal here is just to get to level 25 or so. After that point, you should only be doing dungeon parties. You *can* solo at any level to some extent, of course, but other classes are much better at fighting. Don't frustrate yourself by attempting to do it with your cleric - just make an alt to solo with when you don't want to group with people and heal.
Skills:
Staff Mastery - (you only use a staff for the M.Atk, to boost your heals, and Staff Mastery only boosts the P.Atk mildly.. thus, it's worthless. Don't waste your JPs)
Mace Mastery - You can put 3-4 points into this to get you through levels 1-25 if you like. After that, you'll never use a mace again (if you're a good healer). If you want to solo later on, put more points into it then.
So, do quests till you're level 25 or so. Focus on raising your heals as much as possible, along with Wizardry Mind and Mental Amplify.
As far as equipment goes...
Weapons: You can buy an r2 mace when you reach level 20 if you like, but you could just get by with your r1 mace for a few levels also. You won't be needing a mace after lvl25, so the only important thing is to have an r2 staff ready. When you go into a dungeon, don't take your mace - you should never, ever be using it. As far as using strike cubes... it's not a bad idea, but it's not a priority. It's more important *how* you heal and that you sit often, use deluxe spell potions, etc, than how much you heal for. *Don't* dump a ton of money into getting a super staff and then fail to use deluxe spell potions. One strike cube could pay for 44 *hours* of keeping deluxe spell potions on. And higher cast speed does a *million* times more good to you than the benefit of a single strike cube. But if you have the money, then yes, it's good to use some. Over +4 is just if you're bored or want to try making a really killer staff for your DM or something, though - you don't need a +8 or +10 staff, even if it would be 'nice'.
Armor: As far as other equipment goes, you want an r2 robe. You should upgrade its defense when you can, but it's not terribly important. You can also get by just fine with only minimally upgraded gloves/boots/helm/belt/etc. You'll rarely be hit, and when you do, a few points difference won't be that significant. It's good to do, but not essential. Enchanting your robes to +4 with defense cubes is a good idea, because enchanting boosts the MP regen bonus on the robe, whereas upgrading at the blacksmith doesn't. If you're choosing, enchant your robes rather than upgrade their level at the smith. NOTE however that the MP regen bonus you get from this is very small. If your money is tight, this is *not* a priority. We're talking 2-3 extra MP while sitting, verses your existing 50-65 points per tick. Not a big deal.
Rings/Earring: Acquire two +4 dex rings. This should be the highest priority after your staff, and possibly even more important than your robe. Why dexterity? Because it increases your cast speed, and that's the single most important thing to a cleric. You'll find out why below.
Cards: the most important one to have is 1 or +2/+3 heal. Why Heal and not buff cards? Because a heal card further reduces your cast time for heal, and heal is your single most important skill of course. It's expensive, though... I bought 5 heal cards at 800k each and broke four of them trying to make +2. I'm still just using a single +1 heal card. Buff cards sell for around 1 million rupees for clerics - I don't have any. I could buy one or two, but I just won't at those prices. I don't blame people for the prices of them - it's just not worth that price for me personally. Kahunas can also buff, and their cards are half the price of cleric cards. I generally rely on kahunas for higher level buffs. If a kahuna doesn't have higher buffs, or there's not one in party, I give people lvl5 buffs and we all still get by fine with that at high levels. Remember, also, that with the release of the new jobs soon, there will be much higher level buffs around from many of the new subclasses. So don't fret too much about getting your buffs high level. If you can, do so, but it's not that important. As far as priorities go, though, you should prioritize: Heal, Bless Weapon, Mental Amplify (because this helps your heals also - matk), Bless Armor (helps the group take less damage).
PS: People, in comments, keep saying "you need buff cards!" (though they also keep saying 'but I didn't read all of your guide'...) so I'm putting this here again so it's clear: buffs help a lot at higher levels. Much more so than at lower ones, really. So *yes*, good buffs are very important. What I said is simply that your **focus** should be on being a good healer and **then** worry about other things. lvl8 buffs are not *essential* - they're just very nice. They even make your job as a healer easier, yes. A +3 cleric buff card is *tremendously* expensive, though. So that's why I emphasized the above... that clerics needn't feel it essential. Even if everything goes perfectly with the combines, you need: four 1million rupee cards (that's what they sell for on Lydian) and 3 skill cubes. So, around five million... and that's if things go *perfectly* (they won't). So then, realistically, add in the cost of using ancient skill cubes, and we're up at maybe 8-9 million in terms of in-game cost. 8-9 million for one +3 card. See why I emphasized that clerics should probably rely on kahuna buffs?
-- Spell Arrangement --
Hopefully by this point you at least have level 6 heal and level 5 rapid heal. When you first go at level 25-30 to a dungeon, you'll probably want to only use those levels of heals. But as you raise your heal, you definitely want to have two versions of each spell hotkeyed.
Open your skill list, scroll down to Heal and Rapid Heal, and click the arrows next to the spell level to turn the level down, then drag the icon to your hotkey bar.
Now you should have two versions of normal heal on your hotkey bar, and two versions of rapid heal.
For most of DMR I had a level 5 heal/rapid heal hotkeyed and then my highest level heal/rapid heal hotkeyed.
Take "fight" off your hotkey bar... seriously. You shouldn't ever need it and you have a lot of things you need on your hotkey bar.
The most important thing to have on is ***sit***. Press Alt-T and drag the sit icon to one of the main F1-F4 keys. You should be pressing sit every bit as much as heal. Literally, you should be pressing sit twice as much as heal. I'll illustrate how and why later.
You'll also want to have some MP scrolls / potions dragged to a position on the hotkey bar, but not a primary spot. You also need "spell" potions hotkeyed there. (The ones that raise your cast speed). I'll get more into that later as well.
-- MP Conservation --
Now, this is something that a ***LOT*** of clerics at all levels fail to realize, but the biggest factor in conserving and regaining your mana is speed and sitting.
The faster you can use a normal heal, the faster you can resume sitting.
When you sit, you regain mana at approximately 500% the rate you do when standing. Look at your MP bar sometime sitting and then standing and compare for yourselves.
I regain enough mana in one single 'tick' of the bars sitting to pay for a lower level heal of mine.
This is also something most people don't know: your MP regeneration is counted as "sitting" the *instant* you press sit. Many people think "oh, it takes so long to sit all the way down and stand up". In fact, that's just something your client does, though. Your MP is regenerating at 500% the second you press 'sit'. I've tested it extensively.
Many people also think "Oh, I can't sit because people are still fighting". This is also a mistake for one reason: you don't need to wait to sit back up. If you press 'sit' again to stand up, the 'stand' animation is superfluous. If you press 'heal' an instant after pressing 'sit' again to stand up, you'll heal that instant. Of course, this is only true if your heal spell is recharged. You can press 'rapid heal' instead if you can't wait for your heal spell. The only real delay is that you have to wait for yourself to sit *down*, but that's a very, very short delay.
Go in game sometime and experiment with this. Sit, press sit again then tap heal quickly. You'll "pop" up instead of standing slowly. Then press sit again when done. Remember, the instant you press sit, you're 'seated'. The animation means nothing.
I keep entire 8-person-parties alive, with almost completely full mana the vast majority of the time, fighting level 70 things in the lost mines with this strategy.
The other key to mana conservation is speed. +dex rings and +cast speed potions (spell/deluxe spell potions) boost your cast speed drastically. I can cast a normal Heal almost as quickly as most clerics can cast a "rapid" heal. Beyond that, though, I'm reducing the amount of time I spend standing. The faster I can get my heals off, the faster I can sit back down. Thus, +dex rings actually give you *substantially* higher effective MP regeneration than +wis or +int.
Another somewhat obvious strategy is using your "recover MP" skill whenever you can. It'll give you more and more as your MP pool gets larger and larger. I get around 800-900 MP each time I use it now. Every 10 minutes that's a nice bonus to keep me full. Generally I'll try to time using it after I buff the party (if I buff) so that I can fill myself back up. If I'm not buffing, I'll use it after something went wrong... 3-4 mobs came in, a boss, etc. Generally I waste around 1,000 mp if things get really bad, rapid healing and not sitting as much as I should. The recover MP skill gives me a buffer to get me full again after something like that.
-- Healing Strategy --
You'll be using the lower level heal to "top people off" when they're hurt, but not enough to warrant your full heal.
This is ***very*** important for multiple reasons.
First of all, healing for more than someone needs wastes your mana. Secondly, it generates almost twice the "threat" level. If you heal for 1,000 HP, you generate "1000" threat level.
Let's say a puller just brought a mob to your party, but they're badly hurt and you're afraid they might not take even one or two more. What do you do?
If you used your full heal spell, sure, you healed them, but then everything that was on them is now on you and, oops, you created too much threat for the rest of the group to pull them off you quickly enough. If you had used your lower level heal, it would be far easier for someone else to hit one of the mobs and pull aggro. You can always use another lower level rapid to heal the puller again, if they need it. But by splitting the threat into two parts like that I have *often* kept a puller healed without drawing aggro myself where other clerics have pulled them all on themselves.
Again, as I said in the MP Conservation section, you should always be seated unless you're actively healing in that moment. Likewise, you should always have a spell potion activated to increase your cast speed. If you want, tell people that you'll donate less force chips to a party because you keep those active. Buy them from the store or the deluxe spell potions from other players. The best clerics at high levels generally all use deluxe spell potions all the time. I take 30 with me whenever I go into a dungeon. They last 10 minutes each, and you can generally buy them for 3,000 each. So it costs 18k per hour - not bad. At lower levels buy the normal spell potions from the vendors - they're much cheaper. You should always use one of these, though. The top echelon of healers all do. On Lydian server, I've only seen a small handful that do, though - but they're the absolute best healers on the server. It makes a big difference.
Also, really work on getting a feel for when your heal is done recharging. That way you won't try to sit up prematurely. If you were planning on sitting up and using a lower level heal, but heal isn't done recharging, then just wait for it and use a level10/8/etc heal instead. It's more efficient. It can be tempting to not sit when you only have 2-3 seconds between heals you need to do, but you should sit. It makes a *tremendous* difference.
--- Situations ---
Now, let's talk situations.
If two people are mildly hurt, and you're seated, what do you do? Let's say.. PLAYER1 and PLAYER2.
You could:
stand,lvl5 heal PLAYER1,sit,wait for recharge,stand,lvl10/8/etc heal PLAYER2.
OR, you could: stand,lvl5 heal PLAYER1,rapid lvl5 PLAYER2,sit
Which is better? Using the lower level along with rapid is better. Why? Because it gives you more time in which you can remain seated afterwards *along* with keeping both player's HP topped off at the same time. Using rapid is normally to be avoided, but this is a circumstance in which it's best to use it along with a normal heal.
If PLAYER1,2, and 3 are all hurt, but only 1&2 still have aggro, then do that to 1&2, and wait through another round of sitting to lower level heal player 3.
Another situation:
PLAYER5 is a DM (dark mage) and has taken a hit or two. What do you do?
Unless someone else is on the verge of death, stand, lvl5 rapid heal them ASAP. Always rapid heal DMs. Why? They have severely low defense and HP. Ideally, they shouldn't take aggro at all... they need to learn not to for their own survival. But if they do, you need to rapid heal them ASAP. If they don't cease attacking when they have aggro, yell at them, of course
Healing DMs is the #1 sink for a healer's MP, because almost any other kind of character can wait for you to cast a normal heal.
Another situation:
Someone was on the verge of dying, you healed them, and now you have 1-3 enemies on you. What do you do?
If you have time to type something, type "add" or "agg" or "help" when you can.
Then, what you do depends on several factors. How many hits can you take? If there's *1* mob on you, and nobody else is close to dying, then target them and use frozen snare then move a bit. If frozen snare doesn't work, then just keep the group healed and low level rapid heal yourself when needed. You can tank 1-2 mobs like this just fine for some time, really. It's not good for your mana, of course, but if you're doing everything else I've mentioned you should have mostly full MP beforehand and you can get it back.
If you have 2 on you, it's generally best to move a little bit so that they follow you and also makes it easier for the striders/HWs/DMs to disable them for you. Do not try to use frozen snare... the odds are low that it'll work on things at very high levels anyway, and you have two things on you, so you can't get them all off you anway. Moving a bit shows the group that there are things on you and what they are - very important. Just move a little bit though. Then stand and rapid heal yourself (lower level rapid) till they can draw them off. If your rapid heal isn't even enough to keep you alive standing still, run around in circles and rapid yourself once you get to the other side of the group, etc. Just *do not* draw any other aggro. Often, doing this, I can keep myself alive and still rapid heal some others who're about to die. If, say, there are 4 on you... then it's your call whether to log off or not. Sometimes I will, sometimes I won't. Generally, if 4 are on you, the party can't get them off in time for you to live no matter what. But sometimes it works out. If you do decide to log, type "LOG" before you do so the group has warning that they should also. Don't just leave them all without that direction. I normally only log off when I'm fairly certain I'll die. I never log even then if I can't give people lots of warning for them to log as well, beforehand. Sometimes I'll let myself die, someone will res me quickly, and I can keep anyone else from dying. Look at it this way... you can get groups almost instantly unlike any other character, so XP is easy enough for you to get compared to most. Another way of looking at dying is that you get more JP.. eventually your level doesn't really matter too much, later on. Your JLVL is generally much more important. But still, it's up to you - just give people warning and don't do it unless there really is no hope.
Another situation:
The puller has pulled 3 mobs. They've done their job and announced '3' in party chat so you're warned. What do you do? It's not vital, but you should try to stand up and target the mob at the back that's trailing the puller and use frozen snare on it. It often misses, but if it works it gives the rest of the party a bit more time to react. If you don't miss it, don't worry... it's primarily the job of the Striders/DMs to HB (Head block) or sleep mobs like this. But it's good to help if you have time to. And when 3 or 4 are incoming, your'e not busy healing at that moment so you have the time to.
Bosses:
There is only *one* situation in which you won't want to sit between heals, and that's when you need to do two or more consecutive rapid heals. There's no real wait for rapid heal to recharge, so there's no sense sitting then because the pause isn't long enough. One example of this is when a strider/pet user/kahuna somehow ends up 'tanking' a boss. It's bad, but let's face it - it happens a lot. In those cases, unless they have good defense for a DD, you may need to rapid heal them many times in a row. In that case you'll need to stay standing because, facing a boss, they can't live through a 2-3 second pause sometimes.
If a HW or fighter is tanking a boss, though, and they seem to be tolerating the damage well enough to sit briefly while heal is cooling down, then you should sit. If a HW tanks a boss I can generally heal all the way through and have full MP when the boss is dead.
Also, don't hesitate to tell the group what they should do. Even if someone else is party leader, it's a healer's role to keep the group alive and well. How the party behave affects how well you can heal them... how soon your MP runs out, etc. I'm normally the one who tells people "back up" when the group has run after the puller into the middle of dangerous territory, etc. Also, don't hesitate to tell the party "stop after this for a moment - need MP". Sometimes I'll outright threaten to let them die if they don't cease doing something when I need a break, etc. There's nothing wrong with this at all - you're doing them a favor by being bossy like that, because if you weren't, they'd do whatever, you'd run out of MP, and everyone would die.
Generally people will listen to you as a cleric - they know your job is only to keep them from dying and they'll gladly do something you need to help you keep them safe
--- Finding a party ---
One tremendous advantage to playing a cleric is that you can almost always get a group within a few minutes. Other classes can often try for hours to get a party. In this sense, a cleric is the fastest leveling character you could pick.
To find a group, just do "!lvl__ cleric LFDP" every few minutes. Normally I type it out, then ctrl-shift-leftarrow back through it, ctrl-c, then hit enter. Then I can just paste it (ctrl-v) to try again in a minute or two. Don't spam it, obviously.
Look at what people are saying in shout, too. Often people are pasting DPLF Cleric and aren't reading to check if you're advertising. If something still hasn't panned out after a few minutes, consider starting your own group. Just do "/pcreate partyname" and then do "DPLF lvl(your level)-(your level+9-10)". When it's really slow I can normally still get together a group myself.
The dungeon locations are DMR1/2,LM1/2,and CV1/2. DMR1 and 2 are due west of Horizen (Gaian's hometown). Go due west (rent an ornitho) for a long time and cross the bridge across the river to the west. Then you'll see a path further west to the north and south. To the North is DMR1, and to the South is DMR2. DMR2 tends to be less crowded, on average. Or at least, it was when I played there. DMR1 is easier to pick up players in, though. If I had a full group, I'd tend to go to DMR2.
You should stay at DMR until you're at least level 50. The higher level you go, the closer towards the center of the dungeon, or the further north, you'll go. You want to fight enemies no more than 10 levels above your own level, or your experience will be very handicapped. I could go into more of a description of the dungeons here, but I'm sure others have done that in guides before.
If there is any missing information, please email: [email protected]
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