I thought I would take my time and try to answer some questions and highlight some interesting cleric tips, I suppose its a guide of some sorts, but there’s no right or wrong way to play as long as you enjoy it. I’ll use the name Cleric for the class, although everything applies to Tyrean Prophets or Khemtar Priests, etc. Anyway:

The Cleric

What is a Cleric then? Short answer is Healer. Long answer is “An essential instrument to a party able to heal, harm, fight with the POWER OF THE GODS!” You have tons and tons of options available to you, in fact it might seem a bit overwhelming at first but that’s partly why I write this crap I suppose we should start in the beginning with Character creation.


CHARACTER CREATION
An important section, as it determines your total CP cap and thus how much you can learn in your 50 levels. I wont be lying, you REALLY will gimp yourself by taking more merits than flaws. There are some better flaws than others though:

The Appearance ones: These range from +5-15k in CP cap. Although they prevent you from writing 1930’s German race perfection Character Bios, they are still worth taking. Ugly is a good middle ground.

Poor Listener: Why learn the language of other unbelievers when your Gods clearly are better than theirs? +1k CP thank you

Lousy Leader: Mercenaries might be great, eventually, and as a cleric you could really keep them alive, however, they start out very weak and are prone to get “lost” in various ways, at least in the past. +5k CP

Unenergetic: -5 stamina and stamina cap for +5k CP is good, you can bear that loss with the help of the bless spell. I do not recommend using the same logic for the HP and Mana lowering flaws though.

Stat lowering flaws: Might be worth it, especially STR and DEX if you don’t plan on fighting as well. Personally I didn’t take them since I consider flaws and Merits have to be roleplayed out, ie you pick clumsy, you damn well RP clumsy. +5k per flaw if you pick any.

Inept Rider: Face it, you have better things to place your hard earned CP on than the Riding skill, basically another free +5k CP cap.

My thoughts on deaf and mute: Nobody I know has picked them yet because they give too little CP cap in proportion to their penalty, if they were +30k CP each they could be worth it. Mute at the least offers some interesting “Vow of Silence” rp.

Merits of note:

Merits are bonuses that lower your precious CP cap, get too carried away here and you will find yourself unable to build the character you want to play.

The Regeneration merits: All good. Seriously. You only really need the Mana regenerating one as a cleric, but I really recommend the stamina one too, since you will be running a lot of long distances without that riding skill. Personally I took all 3, I find the HP regen to be a nice little boost, and it just might save your life once or thrice. -5k CP for each merit.

Faithful: In my honest opinion, as a Cleric, this one is mandatory for the RP value alone, besides ever heard of an unfaithful Cleric? -2k CP

Able Healer: Placing bandages faster is always a good thing. I have it. -5k CP

Other merits:

Small, while technically a flaw, makes you harder to hit but lowers your STR and STR cap by -5. Could very well be worth it for a cleric if things get chaotic.

Life Savings: 1k CP for 5k Copper is something to really consider. It helps a lot if you are new and need some equipment. I took it mostly because my Cleric is old and had a life to get those savings.



Well that was my thoughts about Flaws and Merits. They are not absolute, or the one true way to “Pwn”. Pick the ones that appeal to you and gives your character more flavour. Remember, we like characters because of their Talents. We love them for their Limits.



SKILLS
This will take a while, as there are tons of skills you need and another ton of optional ones.

Need skills:

Faith: You need to get this one to 100% if you are to reach your full class potential. Raising Faith makes your spells better, notably Heal and Bless. Cap as much as you can, and as soon as you can.

Invocation: Slightly less important, but still essential. You want to GM this one as well and soon. It has the same effect as Faith on some spells.

Meditation: More mana faster all the time and an ability to actively increase mana regen? Yes, you NEED this, not to GM maybe, but at least 60% for the passive mana regen it offers.

Useful skills:

Anatomy: More damage, more healing with bandages. You’ll want 100% of this eventually. Although it can hold on at your starting 20% for a good while if you have a decent heal spell.

Healing: Needed to cure poison, as there are no spells to cure it. You need at least 60% for that as well as a 60% anatomy. This skill can be put on hold if your mana pool is large and your heal spell is decent, but don’t skip it, mana free healing is always good.

Optional skills:

Macefighting: You get a chance to learn a feat that gives you the ability to imbue your clerical STAFF with powers (+10% Defense chance increase and Spell channeling) All clerics get a 100% weaponskill cap in Macefighting, as well as 75% cap in an optinal weapon category tied to their race. But frankly I don’t see a point in getting the optional weapon type, as it cannot be imbued. I ‘d pick Macefighting.

Tactics: More damage if you plan on standing near the frontline and hit stuff dead. Also keep in mind that Tactics is needed for Armour feats if you plan on using them. 30% Will let you learn Light armour 3. 60% Tactics will let you use Medium armour 3. 90% Will let you learn Heavy Armour 3. The total cap for clerics is 100%.

Magic resistance: Im not sure how it works on Khaeros, but I assume it makes magic hurt you less. This is not a magic heavy world though (Which is sweet as hell by the way!) So it can probably be skipped entirely in my opinion.

Parrying: You get a 75% cap in this, its quite handy too if you can spare the CP. Getting hit less is always good for a soft healer.


A note on concentration: Concentration was broken before, and does now work as intended by preventing fizzling based on your skill value and the number of opponents 1 tile away.


FEATS
The fun part, this is where all your spells are and spells is what makes or breaks a cleric.

Armour feats: Alright to take, will help you survive and you could even pull off a warrior priest build with some decent armour.

First Racial Power: It summons a servant of your Gods to fight for you, does very little damage though but its main use is to be an emergency tank. Just summon one up to intercept a monster and you just bought yourself some precious seconds, perhaps minutes if you keep it healed.

Secondary Racial Power: This varies a lot on your race, Tyreans get to bless weapons to do more damage and hit more often, that bonus is hidden though, it wont show on the weapon. Vhalurians get to create holy water, which is used for something I guess.

Sanctuary: Makes a barrier around the clerics and attacks cannot cross that barrier. Basically it breaks Line Of Sight. Anything inside the barrier can still fight.

Aura of Protection: Nice spell that gives you a flat out armour increase to blunt/slashing/piercing. Rank 1 gives +5, I assume the other ranks increase it by +5 each.

Shield of sacrifice: Target an ally, and you share some of the damage he takes, pretty good to ease the pressure of the main tank if you have the HP to take it.

Holy Strike: A melee attack that increases your chance to hit. If you do, you will heal yourself or an ally nearby, very nice for warrior priests.

Sacred Blast: Damages an enemy AND heals an ally at the same time. Useful when you aren’t facing HUGE damage leaps on your main tank. It also gives you basically 2 spells at once, something to consider as we can only cast one spell every 8 seconds.

Hold Person: the PVP killer. It paralyzes the target for 2 seconds per rank, and it doesn’t break paralysis on damage. Costs a LOT of mana to use though, so make it count. Useful when the tank is immobilized and you need to keep the monsters away from everyone else.

Mending: Very nice utility feat with a long cooldown timer. 8 hours. Repairs an item, amount repaired depends on the feat level. Really handy if you walked across half the world and realize after 5 minutes of hunting that the tank’s shield is falling apart.

Halo of Light: Another very good utility skill. Rank 1 places a light similar to a torch on your character. Rank 2 gives you nightsight, and rank 3 makes it target several allies around you.

Consecrate item: Creates magic stuff! Rank 1 allows you to make Amulets that offers some energy resistance. Rank 2 lets you imbue your race’s Clerical staff with +10% DCI and Spell channeling, allowing you to meditate with a weapon in hand. Rank 3 lets you imbue your race’s clerical robe with +2 Mana regen and +1 HP regen, which helps A LOT with your mana issues.

Curse: Lowers the enemy’s Current and Cap values of HP/Stam/Mana by 10 per rank, basically it hurts them for 30 damage that they cannot heal back for 15 minutes at rank 3.

Bless: The opposite of curse, it increases the HP/Stam/Mana by 30 for 15 minutes on your target, it only increase the cap though, so you have to heal up or regen before profit. Clearly still good to have despite the Nerf from +60 stats.

Cure Famine: Good utility spell. Basically it makes you less thirsty/hungry depending on your feat rank. Good to have when you’ve been out hunting and you start to get warnings that you’re hungry.

Heal wounds: The cleric’s bread and butter, this is why you made one, isn’t it? Heals damage depending on your feat rank and Faith/invocation skills. Rank increases range

Inflict wounds: The opposite of Heal wounds (Duh). Does ranged damage to a target depending on your feat rank and your Faith/Invocation skills. Range increases with rank.


Which feats to pick then? If I could I would pick them all, but basically you need the Heal spell, once you have that you can focus on Utility, Buffing or Damage dealing. Or a mix of the three. I recommend that you plan your character so you can be useful at level 20, and pick feats to rank 2 or 3 before moving on to the next.



“BUILDS”
Some ideas I had when making my cleric, builds are adjusted for level 20


HOLY SMITER

Focuses on dealing damage at range. Often unarmoured they call down divine vengeance on their foes, crippling and destroying them from afar.

Skills: Faith/Invocation/Meditation to 100%

Feats:
Heal rank 2
Inflict wounds rank 3
Hold person rank 2
Curse rank 3
Sacred Blast 2

CP’s Needed: 51.000

Pros: Good ranged damage, no need to pick armour feats if you take care to keep opponents at a distance. Nice crowd control if things get too scary.

Cons: Frail against archers or spellcasters. No bless makes for a smaller mana pool, so increasing that with level stats becomes very important. Meditation should help some with mana problems.


DIVINE SERVANT

Focuses on helping others kill monsters, they keep their companions alive and prays for the gods to bolster their courage and skills.

Skills: Faith/Invocation/Meditation to 100%

Feats:
Heal Wounds 3
Bless 3
Aura of Protection 2
Consecrate Item 3

Total CP’s Needed: 51.000

Pros: Very good Party Cleric. Bless and Aura of Protection should let your friends live longer, and your heals will be legendary if costly mana wise. The Robe from Rank 3 Consecrate Item and your GM Meditation should help you cast heal after heal anyway though.

Cons: Have no real hope of solo hunting, your best bet would be animal skin questers or party hunting. Teaching is another alternative, anything that doesn’t involve you trying to kill anything scarier than an elk. No armour makes you somewhat frail too, but you should get a nice HP boost from bless.


WARRIOR PRIEST

Mixes the powers of a cleric with that of a decent warrior, they stand at the frontline in defiance to those that would take up arms against their Holy Cause.

Skills:
75% Macefighting
75% Tactics
75% Faith
75% Invocation
75% Meditation
75% Anatomy

Feats:
Heal wounds 2
Inflict Wounds 2
Bless 2
Halo of Light 2
Medium/Heavy Armour 3

Total CP’s Needed: 51.000

Pros: Good mix of buffs, healing and damage. The Macefighting will let you stand at the front and whack away at your opponents, conserving mana for other things like emergency heals or ranged damage on enemies you don’t want to face toe to toe (Rust monsters, Wyverns) Medium/heavy armour should give you nice protection as well. And get that Macefighting up to 100% ASAP.

Cons: You need to distribute lots of stats, and none can really be neglected, although the potential for solo hunting is great, it takes a lot of time to get to the point where you can actually pull it off effectively. Slow character development.

Potential Multiclass options

I’ll be a little more brief in this section, since its all theory still, but some ideas cant hurt. Much.


Fighter/Cleric aka PALADIN

“Gee Dess, I didn’t see this one coming from you at all!” Still though, the Paladin is less versatile than his parent classes, but still can be developed pretty well indeed. However you need to split your stats thin. I suggest not learning past Heal 2, and stick to Buffing spells like Aura of Protection and Bless so you don’t have to put too many points into Mana. Halo of Light 1 could be taken for the RP value alone. Fighter feats to take depends if you want to tank or do damage, I recommend the shield feats, Brute strength, Quick reflexes and one stance. Heavy Armour mandatory.


Bounty Hunter/Cleric aka INQUISITOR

The bounty hunter skills and feats suit well with someone tasked with brining the church’s enemies and other heretics to justice, add to that some healing, Inflict wounds and Curse/Bless, hell, even hold person if you can spare the CP’s and you got yourself some nice RP potential there. Suggest Light or Medium armour for this “class”.

Martial artist/Cleric aka MONK

Not really fond of this whole monk thing, not that I dislike it in itself, its just that previous experience has shown that most “monks” tend to be played by wannabe Asians. Hopefully we can avoid that on Khaeros (Right Typhon?). feats to pick is pretty obvious, Bless and Heal really stand out from the rest. A scary thought though, a Martial Artist with Stun AND Hold Person? Hopefully some kind of failsafe will prevent stunlocking.

Dragoon/Cleric aka TEMPLAR

Tanking, tanking, tanking. Short spear + Shield, Heavy armour, Defensive stance, TripFoe is hard to kill already. Add to that Aura of Protection and Healing, maybe even Bless and you can start being mined by smiths, because I doubt anyone will move the MOUNTAIN you become.

Archer/Cleric aka HOLY ARCHER

I know, name sucks, but the character wont! Picture if you will an archer with a good bow, riding skill, a horse, Far Shot, Focused Shot, Mounted Archery, Bow Mastery, Quick Reflexes. Scary huh? Now add to that Curse and Hold Person, and you’ll be hoping he had .spar mode on.

Berserker/Cleric aka PARAGON

The berserker has a huge damage output and HP pool when raged. With Bless and Inflict wounds he can really put the spike in “Spike Damage” Consecrate Item 3 for a +1 HP regen robe may not help much, but it opens up the Tyrean Bless Weapon feats for some really insane damage potential.

Weapon Specialist/Cleric aka AVENGER

Name sucks again, lets see if the character does! The WS could use some of the cleric feats for healing the damage that gets through, Holy Strike also gets very tempting, Hold Person will get really well if you use a fast weapon like a quarter staff or a double bladed staff.

BONUS CHAR:

Weapon Specialist/Cleric aka DARKMAGE FENCER

Making this class immediately makes you raised by dragons, able to kill with a gaze, walk silently over dry leaves in the forest, all that jazz. You must use a rapier, a robe and wizard hat dyed black with a red cloak. Awesome WS feats coupled with a huge manapool, Inflict Wounds, Sacred Blast. Meditation, Curse. Actually, I hope you die a horrible death if you make this class.





Conclusion

That’s it for my Cleric “Guide” I’ll try to update it with changes as we go along, and feel free to discuss it further, point out errors, post builds, etc.

-Dess

Edited the guide to include the concentration changes.