Evil Clerics

[Manual Labour]

I have always wanted to try an Evil Cleric and at some point I probably will. I just cannot decide on a race.

I would love to hear your thoughts on the following races: Drow, Duergar, Feral, and Demon.

Thanks in advance! Also feel free to PM me if there are any specifics you don't wanna bring up on the open forum.

[Celerity]

Depends on the cabal choice, but clerics really aren't horribly race-sensitive and there aren't any terrible choices.

Drow is a safe, well-tested route. Demon clerics are quite good as well.

I personally think duergar would be interesting at this point though, being an under appreciated, recently buffed race.

Forge new ground for glory!

[Ulmusdorn]

I think that a Druegar combat cleric could smash some faces in... Alternatively there are some other DI avenues that could be interesting with that choice too.

 

Remember with all clerics/paladins/healers etc is that MANA is more valuable then HP. Cure crit being cast 3 times is a lot more potent then 40 hp ;

[f0xx]

8 hours ago, Ulmusdorn said:

Remember with all clerics/paladins/healers etc is that MANA is more valuable then HP. Cure crit being cast 3 times is a lot more potent then 40 hp ;

That's some next level bait there :p

[Unknown Criminal]

8 hours ago, Ulmusdorn said:

Remember with all clerics/paladins/healers etc is that MANA is more valuable then HP. Cure crit being cast 3 times is a lot more potent then 40 hp ;

I guess that depends on what your base HP is, I've pinned drow clerics/shame with 550 hp and can tell everyone that no matter how much mana you have as a cleric that if you can't stand 2 rounds of combat all the mana in the realm can't help you. 550 HP and 100000 mana will never beat a warrior who can dirt kick and sleep a tick, one spell saved against is 3-4-5-6-7-8  attacks you couldn't block. 

Yes cure crit is better than sleeping a tick, however if you don't have the max hp behind it you are wasting your time.

[English lad]

11 hours ago, Ulmusdorn said:

I think that a Druegar combat cleric could smash some faces in... Alternatively there are some other DI avenues that could be interesting with that choice too.

 

Remember with all clerics/paladins/healers etc is that MANA is more valuable then HP. Cure crit being cast 3 times is a lot more potent then 40 hp ;

While this is true to an extent you have to take into account the Extremely high level of damage being put out per round these days.

Classes that were designed to be able to attrition through cure crit can't really keep up - and all the Mana in the world is worth nothing if you have 800 hps and you are taking paralysed taking 200 hps per round.

Clerical classes need to balance HP, -AC and Mana - Obviously also maintaining the appropriate saves for the fight they are in.

Focusing to much on Mana over HP will see you getting steam rolled before you can do anything.  Focusing to much on HP over-AC will see you have a large pool of HP - that does you no good.

Personally I've never geared a Cleric for Mana.  I gear for -AC and HP - the Mana i get from some of those pieces is enough for me not to worry about it.

[Ulmusdorn]

*sigh* 

Always in the extreme. Its like when someone says something we either a. forget all common sense or b. look for a way to tear it down just for shits and giggs.

At end game, mana will trump HP (Disclaimer: Excercise common sense, make sure you have enough HP. Don't run into combat with 100hp expecting to win. et cetera! et cetera! et cetera!)

[Kyzarius]

IDK why we are talking about mana, the only good cabal for a cleric is Savant.  ;) 

[Tantangel]

Drow: Low HP, but a ton of mana and it's easier to play the attrition route. If you go female you get the extra added spell with spiders you can use, though I wouldn't say that's a game changer from what I noticed at least. Since you can things easily you'd really only need 1 practice for everything and you can focus on armor with +HP and saves since you wont be hitting for high damage with your melee. My last one had around 850HP or so at 50. Depending on your religion, you could have some nice bonus perks in one way or another.

+ Can dig and has their own specific recall point making it less likely you'll be caught if you recall from across the world so it can be useful. If you're in Savant and you're far away from the tower when it's attacked, you can get there quickly. Downside is if you're getting stomped then you will have to teleport or use another method to get out of there without dying.

Duergar: Water vuln which can be capitalized on almost any melee. Druids/Invokers will be a pain in the ass to fight. Stronger than most other choices, so you can focus on more melee oriented Cleric if you so chose and their HP if I recall will be the highest or possibly second highest of Cleric choices. The downside is your mana will be lower than your Drow counter parts.

+ Has their own recall point that's a bit further than Xymerria so if you're running you can do so a little more easily without needing other alternative methods of escape. The downside is it's a bit further away from the Tower so you'll have to book it if you're already closer to your recall point than to the Savant Tower.

Feral: Great for Combat religion in general. The downside is the fire vuln so you'll run into more enemies who can hurt you with fire. You do get automastered parry  that will go to 103% so you don't have to focus on many +parry sockets  or armor. You wont have as high of an HP pool as the Duergar which makes the fire vuln a little more of a pain in the ass than the water vuln of a Duergar.

Demon: It has some pretty good promise, but it also limits you to 1 religion. That's not a bad thing though. The perks outweigh the downsides. You can focus on more melee as well so you'll have the potential to have a good melee and mage hybrid. The only real downside is you have to go it as a Human for a while which means your stats at 50 may vary more than the others since they're going to be more similar to other characters with the same race/combo.

Fire Giant: A little harder to play considering you'll have the least amount of mana of all the other races. On the other side of that though is you also have one of the highest HP base at 50, and you have the highest strength stat so you can choose to be slightly more melee than mage since you can only use spells so much. If protective shield falls you at least would have a harder time being bash locked if the opportunity presented itself, but you also need to fly at all times. You also have the vuln to ice which sucks ass, but you can at least partially prevent some damage. With some of the new wands though, this will hurt like hell coming from any class that can use them.

Ultimately each race will depend greatly upon your play style. A Drow Cleric I prefer over pretty much every other race that can be one. They're strong and pretty well rounded, but knowing the perks of a Demon (as well as drawbacks) makes me think that would be the better choice overall. The low HP is easily able to overcome, though I haven't played one since I came back. With all the new EQ added it could make the Drow Cleric a bit less desirable. If you haven't played one before though, Drow overall is good for newbies and veterans alike. If you know a bit about Demons already, adding them as a potential race is also more viable since you'd at least be somewhat familiar with them overall.

[f0xx]

My eyes bleed, Tant....

[Celerity]

2 hours ago, f0xx said:

My eyes bleed, Tant....

He had good paragraph separation this time and the content was decent. I thought it was a good post!

[Tantangel]

4 hours ago, f0xx said:

My eyes bleed, Tant....

To be fair, this needed to be a bit in depth considering the question.

[Aeva]

fire clerics now and forever!