On the Merits of Clerics

Can anyone weigh in on why they keep their cleric around? I've been swapping through party members like I'm speed dating, and clerics are slowly starting to fall out of favor with me. I feel like their reactionary healing cards do less than most melee attacks, their buffs circumstantial (and often weaker than most melee attacks), and their melee cards too few to reliably use as front-liners. As such, my clerics always end up trying to play 2 or 3 roles and never filling them all correctly or at the right time.

All this leads me to believe I'm playing them wrong, or maybe their cards are lagging behind my wizard and fighter cards. I normally really like support casters, but 9 times out of 10 when I roll with one I'm left wishing I'd brought another class instead when I draw into dead hands (heals with a full health party, buffs with few melee attacks on my fighters, no melee while on the front line). Does their role get more focused? Am I just using them poorly? Bueller?

 

I only just started playing today but I too felt the cleric was lacking something. Even if my cleric had a heal when I needed one, which can be hit or miss, most of the time the heal would only serve to forestall an otherwise inevitable death. Perhaps I wasn't using him properly but from my experience I would agree with you that more damage seems to trump healing.

Edit: Would this issue be resolved if there was "Temporary HP"? Basically the ability to heal above a characters Max Health. Perhaps Temp HP would drop off after the round is over?

 

This right here is my driving credo when playing CH. With timed missions (Ruby Demon Portal) and the card advantage the AI gains from having extra people alive (each minion draws a card, is able to attack, and makes their move card multiplicatively more useful) I almost always prefer to go for dealing damage over patching myself up. This is only compounded by the fact that most damage cards quickly outclass healing.

As such, I've got to be doing something wrong because lots of people are using clerics and doing a lot better than I. Cleric sensei, tell me your secrets!

 

Let's see . . .

I totally give my cleric Violent Overswing and other such cards. He's an elf, but I still put him in the front ranks, because this way I have options: any one of my characters can suffer a bad draw, and so long as somebody else has something better, the combination can turn the numbers in my favor. Consider:

Frenzy is a pretty darn useful property. Boosting damage by two is enough in most cases: if an enemy has 10 health, then suddenly the massive collection of available damage 3 attacks (e.g., Stab with its useful range 2) will kill in two hits. Or, you know, most any melee plus an attack from your Wizard in the back ranks (e.g., Big Zap); as long as either of them has a little choice in the draw, you can do the numbers for a more efficient killing.

Of course, waiting an extra play just to boost damage by 2 means you take more damage in return. Heaps of armor keep the damage down to a level that a cleric's healing is useful, even if you don't restore to maximum. Again, it's the numbers: if you know that your enemy can do 11 damage in melee, and you're at 10 health with no movement left, then 4 points from Heal is more than enough. You'll live long enough to hit the pass button first. A good draw from anybody in the team might save them on the next turn.

Then there are the little extras on the side, like dropping Bad Medicine left and right. Hit an armored enemy at the start of the match, and then there's 4 damage waiting for when you've secured the cards necessary to beat the armor.

Obviously, I wrote the above for a Warrior-Wizard-Cleric party. Given that my Cleric has strong melee attacks, and my Wizard has some strong melee too, I like to think I can apply it to other builds that have yet further melee focus.

 

I am a fan of frenzy (love offense!). But in a War/Cle/Wiz party the warrior is the only reliable target and even then you need >2 attack cards to make frenzy be a more efficient card than Bludgeon. Upping the strength of an attack is great for getting past heavy armor or a Weak Block, but it seems less reliable than simply having more attacks at hand. Maybe I simply havent paired frenzy with more useful melee attacks like Penetrating Cut or Stab, but that just seems to make frenzy's use even more reliant on my warrior's draw. Maybe if frenzy had some self-target options?

I agree, but I also think this highlights the damage outclasses healing problem. Whenever my cleric is the last person alive, I know I've likely lost. Even the superior Heal will lose a war of attrition to the same level attacks. I can imagine that if healing outclassed damage we might have an even bigger problem on our hand (forever-healed mobs, or slow grind-em-out battles) but as it stands the situation you've highlighted is one of the few times I think I really want a heal. And even then I'd probably do fine with more armor, a block, staying out of range, or Memory Loss.

I've never used Bad Medicine but this idea is very intriguing! I like the utility of Misguided Heal too.

My wizards are almost always ranged, and I think that might be a reason for my slow departure away from clerics. Maybe I need to throw them in the mix a little more... I think a cleric can also really shine in a War/War/Cle party where there's more buff options, but having a wizard seems so useful... Still, you've given me some great things to dwell on, Sir!

 

Really, I've used Frenzy on that Wizard, so my Warrior isn't always "the only reliable target." But heck yes I'd like self-targeting options. Sometimes I even forget I can't do it, and it messes with my plans.

But suppose I set up two Priests as front-rank melee: boost each other, lay on the pain. I'll probably do that as the basis for the all-Priest challenges.

 

Yea, for the all-priest challenges I think three melee priests is the best bet--for no other reason than having a dedicated healer might be overkill!

 

I like the clerics in the MP packs. The one that gives EVERYONE frenzy is nice, the Bless Ground one is great for defense, hes got his own share of offense, can load him up with lots of ranged strikes or violent swings, and when hes got some Holy Armor on with that auto-self healer, hes pretty tanky.

It DOES seem that so far, clerics may benefit low health races more than high health races, since healing an elf for 8 is like HALF there hp, rather than 1/4 of 1/3 it would heal a dwarf.

However, i have not played WITHOUT a cleric, so anything he does in a game may be a reaction to not having another wizard or fighter. Time will tell.

 

whats in the diffrent mp packs?

 

You can preview them all for free. Take a look in the multiplayer menu.

 

Oh i mean you can just see some higher tech cleric spells there that im looking forward too

 

Unholy wellspring nuff said!

but i know what you are talking about yesterday i was feeling like the only reason i was stuck and losing badly was the priest being much less useful unless he draws just the right cards at the right time then today in shop i had some really nice cards for cheap picked them up and now damn is he a great asset again. so to sum up mediocre priest really bad good priest amazing!

 

See--this is exactly what I imagine my cleric doing! I've seen snippets of this at times, but never a complete player. What level is your cleric and what sort of gear is he using?

 

Priest healing can get you back from the brink. While it doesn't do much card for card, you will win the war of attrition if you also kill off a few enemies, and play keep away with injured characters(tactical retreat). Or you could just load up on so much healing that you're always in tip-top shape. 3 priest party works.

Note that there are some very nasty priest attacks that go in the divine item slot. Specifically I've got a Demon's Hand item that gives 2 touch of death attacks, magic attack, range 1, 2 damage per card in opponent's hand, penetrating. Usually I time its use so it does 8 or 10 damage. (This item does require a silver slot though). I bought it in the lvl 6 store for 15 gold... hardly a huge amount, it's a common. It does have a drawback card, but it's not so bad(specifically it does encumber 2, but you can use it as a 1 damage 2 range attack to get rid of it).

 

Just got my first epic item! Club Of Wrath!

Been playing around with elven Wiz/Cle/War today, and it looks like the cleric is now here to stay!

 

So far I've only been using the default Warrior-Wizard-Cleric (that's Elf-Dwarf-Human, respectively), and my mostly full-time healer cleric is working out okay (though I'm probably not as far into the game yet). I agree that she will lose eventually if the other two go down, but the key here is teamwork. Keep the party together and don't let your support-not-damage character be the last one standing.

 

Congratulations! I just picked up one of those, too. It's, uh . . . my second copy of that same item.

Hmm.

Will player-to-player trading be implemented during beta?

 

I sold my 3rd and 4th club of wrath, I'm fairly certain it's a guaranteed drop from that particular chest.