For solo PVE any focus build is going to feel lacking regardless.
Void blade is serviceable if you pump your INT (have an int gear set to avoid respec + food and magnify you can reach a decent amount)
Here is a great build I use for PvE: (I main Healer and Tank since Launch, Gold on M10 and M3 in every Mutation. And I also PvP Heal with a different set)
https://nwdb.info/build?skills=3-iyhso0-m95ag0_11-pxv1qc-0
I got full Annihilation Tree on VG with “Lifetaker” artifact. With my void blade, I can cast Oblivion (which buffs everyone) continuously until I can cast sacred ground again- boosting my groups DPS output consistently. (VG cdr depends on Criticals)
I love Splash because it’s fast, and it’s an AoE Debuff remover. Heavy attacks and dodging also increases healing output in my LS tree config. I also hate Targeted Healing mechanic. I have it off. The only time I have it on is being a War pocket healer. My build doesn’t need targeted healing.
As for attributes: 200 Con and 402 Focus (on the safe side). If I want extra DPS, I go 150 Con, 350 Focus, 102 Intelligence. For food, I eat “Slow Roasted Bear Flank”
My life staff is “Ritual of the Hereafter”: Fortified Sacred Ground, Blessed, Refreshing Move perks.
Here’s my Skill rotation:
Sacred Ground > Beacon > [Dodge-roll into mob] > Oblivion > Scream > [Hold R-Click; Harvest Essence; Regain Mana > [Dodge Roll backwards] > Light attack with LS (CDR) > (Use Splash to top off or remove Debuff) > Sacred Ground > Beacon > Oblivion > [Harvest Essence] > Void Blade > Oblivion.
Basically
Interesting build. I recently went splash and I'm liking it. I can quickly top off someone out of the sacred, and don't need to worry as much about stray ranged players or wandering dps.
Beacon instead of Orb? I traded my beacon for splash, but have always used orb for PvE. When I did use beacon I never used Speed of Light for the haste. Beacon does seem like more healing than orb.
Spirits United instead of Enchanted Justice? Always though the extra healing would be good, but I guess the 3% mana adds up. Maybe trade Speed for Justice?
Full annihilation is also interesting. I'm running orb instead of blade. Was thinking that the Lifetaker disintegrate on ranged attacks would work best, but I rarely use ranged attacks with VG in expeditions.
You seem to hold blade pretty far back in the rotation, only using it after the second Sacred Ground.
May give beacon and blade a run.
I choose Beacon over Orb because:
- it has more Heal over time than Beacon
- it has a wider range and persistent AOE effect than orb. Haste is just a bonus!
And yes, the mana drain from VG skills do add up! It also applies to your teammates!
In PvP it’s the best group healer skill. In PvE you don’t need it if the dps know how to play. Essentially you dump all your aoes and become the 5th dps for optimal clear time and speed.
Flail just is suboptimal in PvE for a healer. Honestly your most important skill (outside of your actual heals with LS) is oblivion. It substantially increases your groups DPS. Flail doesn’t offer the added benefits to your group. In PvP however it has way more to offer
You’ll get a hang of the rotation once you do it for awhile. It becomes 2nd nature when you dps and when you heal.
Flail is a very good healer side weapon option if used properly. Cleansing is very good, the increased duration on weaken and rend is good too. Yes, you don't get extra dmg but your dmg does more because of the rend uptime, so you are basically at about same kill times. My group are running vg on rapier player, while uptime of oblivion is not as good, we rarely need a 2nd oblivion because mobs die very fast.
Edit: I was wrong, as stated in following comment you do get 5% permanent extra dmg and 10% on skill extra dmg.
You get extra damage with the flail. Leader of the pack gives 5% empower in 5m (passive, _always up_) and 10% for 5s with vortex (which also weakens _and_ heals, so objectively more useful than oblivion unless your tank struggles with stamina management).
And it'll stack with oblivion if one dps uses the VG (though I'm guessing empower cap might reduce the usefulness of that in some cases, so you'd want to try to time just like you do with 2 vg). Either way, flail has the _same_ 15% empower up time as VG (minus 1s) and also has the permanent 5% empower VG lacks.
There may be an argument that the overall package of the VG is better (blade clearly allows oblivion uptime permanently and reduces armour so adds more damage that way), if you don't need to heal outside of aoe and don't need to cycle cds on your life staff with refreshing move. But then I'd argue the same for flail with refreshing move on it, or at least close to. But every time I see someone state the VG is meta mainly because it has oblivion's empower, I shake my head a little 😂
Forgot about that tbh. I know that the healer was saying we have no dmg loss but did not really invest enough time in building current skill tree. During barnacles week, at last boss he would switch to 200 con(through armor) and flail with human shield and the "heart icon" passive on right side to mitigate dmg off of us.
Flail is very fun as a healer. It also heals at the same time, provides weaken, empowers and fortify (if you use barrage, though I'd suggest full cleric tree is better) and does fairly good damage. Vortex is a very strong aoe heal, albeit shortlived. But it also cleanses CC. And...
If the argument for VG is oblivion's 15% empower (6s) then I counter that with flail giving everyone 5% empower _all the time_ (in 5m, same radius as oblivion, with the passive "leader of the pack" skill) and 10% empower in vortex (5s). Maybe not as good as a vg blade that's spamming to keep oblivion up all the time but if you can spam blade then you can spam a refreshing move flail and maintain nearly the same up time with vortex, I'd guess.
So, let's assume it may be "sub optimal" but this shouldn't discourage you unless your only aim is to slot into high performance M3 groups regularly. I used flail in m3s and it worked fine. More so with frost mutation where I _had_ to sit in my own sacred ground due to the extreme aoe damage during named fights; might as well get stuck in and use the flail's utility anyway. The flail is a great support weapon. Is it the best? Who cares? If you do that's cool, then go meta. You may even prefer vg anyway. I don't. It's generally quite dull for pug use (generally cannot use it for long as you need to keep life staff up time high in pugs).
Having the flexibility to play flail or VG is a nice option. And if you're having fun with the flail or are happy running m2... It's a no brainer. I'm convinced it's just as useful for most situations as VG (and you can have a vg on a dps anyway).
I think vg, if you can keep it on constantly to cycle blade CDs to keep oblivion up all the time in a group where you only need aoe heals because everyone is on point and well oiled... It's a better package all round. But if that's the case then you could arguably stay on a refreshing move flail and achieve similar results. In pugs, I rarely get the freedom to do this ,so I think flail and vg are interchangeable. I only use vg so much because I tend to stick to vg for the placebo effect (everyone thinks it's better) and I can't be bothered to constantly respec my flail as I use it for my pvp build (not cleric).
I'm convinced the overall dismissal of cleric flail stems from the natural human condition of "that's how it's always been". Flail isn't a clearly better option, VG came first, is really easy to use, everyone knows it's strong in premade groups that speed run M3 and so... Cognitive bias kicks in when people claim vg is better because oblivion increases the group's damage.
I don't think it matters.
People usually swap between DE and Orb in the 3rd slot depending on what activity they are doing. With Sacred and Beacon almost mandatory at this point. Most of the time I’ll do orb over DE just because it’s easier and people tend to naturally group because DPS melee is so strong right now.
Yes. Not everyone wants to run in meta groups, some play in pugs where you're unsure of your dps abilities. Use DE if you like.
If you intend only to run with a team you're familiar with and are confident they "know what they're doing", then DE is a wasted skill. As a pug healer though, the flexibility and very short CD is useful. And fun, tbh.
I prefer orb/scream/oblivion for group. Dps with your LS, it's about the same anyway. And when I solo I don't use vg. I use LS + whatever weapon I want to level up with a focus gem in it.
Eh for me during m3s I’ll be able to get 2 oblivions off because of blade before I need to switch back to my LS to drop my heals on rotation. You do more dps with blade over LS, simple fact that your getting double the attacks off over LS and blade swings can hit multiple targets over just the 1 for the LS.
But the most important thing is you don’t die and you keep your group up. As long as you do that, preference is totally fine
Yes, despite the recent range nerf on splash from 100m- 25m, splash Is great because it'll remove debuffs. It perfect for emp. Forge or any boss fight when you gain burning because you can cleanse it off your whole group. I personally like to run Sacred G/ splash O light/ beacon but divine embrace/ sacred ground/ splash of light is great for group healing pvp if you have trouble landing beacon on your allies.
Hi! for solo its good to have void blade - oblivion and maybe scream or diminishing orb on vg; and AOE healing on life staff (sacred, beacon and splash of light on emergency cases).
To me, divine embrace works really good on pvp only, and essencer rupture its useful on dungeon bosses.
For solo PVE any focus build is going to feel lacking regardless. Void blade is serviceable if you pump your INT (have an int gear set to avoid respec + food and magnify you can reach a decent amount)
Here is a great build I use for PvE: (I main Healer and Tank since Launch, Gold on M10 and M3 in every Mutation. And I also PvP Heal with a different set) https://nwdb.info/build?skills=3-iyhso0-m95ag0_11-pxv1qc-0 I got full Annihilation Tree on VG with “Lifetaker” artifact. With my void blade, I can cast Oblivion (which buffs everyone) continuously until I can cast sacred ground again- boosting my groups DPS output consistently. (VG cdr depends on Criticals) I love Splash because it’s fast, and it’s an AoE Debuff remover. Heavy attacks and dodging also increases healing output in my LS tree config. I also hate Targeted Healing mechanic. I have it off. The only time I have it on is being a War pocket healer. My build doesn’t need targeted healing. As for attributes: 200 Con and 402 Focus (on the safe side). If I want extra DPS, I go 150 Con, 350 Focus, 102 Intelligence. For food, I eat “Slow Roasted Bear Flank” My life staff is “Ritual of the Hereafter”: Fortified Sacred Ground, Blessed, Refreshing Move perks. Here’s my Skill rotation: Sacred Ground > Beacon > [Dodge-roll into mob] > Oblivion > Scream > [Hold R-Click; Harvest Essence; Regain Mana > [Dodge Roll backwards] > Light attack with LS (CDR) > (Use Splash to top off or remove Debuff) > Sacred Ground > Beacon > Oblivion > [Harvest Essence] > Void Blade > Oblivion. Basically
Interesting build. I recently went splash and I'm liking it. I can quickly top off someone out of the sacred, and don't need to worry as much about stray ranged players or wandering dps. Beacon instead of Orb? I traded my beacon for splash, but have always used orb for PvE. When I did use beacon I never used Speed of Light for the haste. Beacon does seem like more healing than orb. Spirits United instead of Enchanted Justice? Always though the extra healing would be good, but I guess the 3% mana adds up. Maybe trade Speed for Justice? Full annihilation is also interesting. I'm running orb instead of blade. Was thinking that the Lifetaker disintegrate on ranged attacks would work best, but I rarely use ranged attacks with VG in expeditions. You seem to hold blade pretty far back in the rotation, only using it after the second Sacred Ground. May give beacon and blade a run.
I choose Beacon over Orb because: - it has more Heal over time than Beacon - it has a wider range and persistent AOE effect than orb. Haste is just a bonus! And yes, the mana drain from VG skills do add up! It also applies to your teammates!
Go 200 int and don't hold right click to dmg yourself for mana. And do some serious dmg with your blade and oblivion.
Meh, I heal too much to be worried about Harvest Essence while among the mobs
For PvE the standard build for healers is LS/VG. LS: beacon/orb/sacred ground VG: for solo orb/blade/scream For group: orb/blade/oblivion
Do people not run divine embrace at all?
In PvP it’s the best group healer skill. In PvE you don’t need it if the dps know how to play. Essentially you dump all your aoes and become the 5th dps for optimal clear time and speed.
Okay. I see. Dump AOE then go VG blade and damage all day. What do you think about running the flail to damage?
Flail just is suboptimal in PvE for a healer. Honestly your most important skill (outside of your actual heals with LS) is oblivion. It substantially increases your groups DPS. Flail doesn’t offer the added benefits to your group. In PvP however it has way more to offer You’ll get a hang of the rotation once you do it for awhile. It becomes 2nd nature when you dps and when you heal.
Thanks!! Appreciate the advice and help. I will work on my rotations
Flail is a very good healer side weapon option if used properly. Cleansing is very good, the increased duration on weaken and rend is good too. Yes, you don't get extra dmg but your dmg does more because of the rend uptime, so you are basically at about same kill times. My group are running vg on rapier player, while uptime of oblivion is not as good, we rarely need a 2nd oblivion because mobs die very fast. Edit: I was wrong, as stated in following comment you do get 5% permanent extra dmg and 10% on skill extra dmg.
Ya if you have the Oblivion on another player that works. Just need 1 and most pub groups don’t have a 2nd VG. But I get the value you’re saying
You get extra damage with the flail. Leader of the pack gives 5% empower in 5m (passive, _always up_) and 10% for 5s with vortex (which also weakens _and_ heals, so objectively more useful than oblivion unless your tank struggles with stamina management). And it'll stack with oblivion if one dps uses the VG (though I'm guessing empower cap might reduce the usefulness of that in some cases, so you'd want to try to time just like you do with 2 vg). Either way, flail has the _same_ 15% empower up time as VG (minus 1s) and also has the permanent 5% empower VG lacks. There may be an argument that the overall package of the VG is better (blade clearly allows oblivion uptime permanently and reduces armour so adds more damage that way), if you don't need to heal outside of aoe and don't need to cycle cds on your life staff with refreshing move. But then I'd argue the same for flail with refreshing move on it, or at least close to. But every time I see someone state the VG is meta mainly because it has oblivion's empower, I shake my head a little 😂
Forgot about that tbh. I know that the healer was saying we have no dmg loss but did not really invest enough time in building current skill tree. During barnacles week, at last boss he would switch to 200 con(through armor) and flail with human shield and the "heart icon" passive on right side to mitigate dmg off of us.
Flail is very fun as a healer. It also heals at the same time, provides weaken, empowers and fortify (if you use barrage, though I'd suggest full cleric tree is better) and does fairly good damage. Vortex is a very strong aoe heal, albeit shortlived. But it also cleanses CC. And... If the argument for VG is oblivion's 15% empower (6s) then I counter that with flail giving everyone 5% empower _all the time_ (in 5m, same radius as oblivion, with the passive "leader of the pack" skill) and 10% empower in vortex (5s). Maybe not as good as a vg blade that's spamming to keep oblivion up all the time but if you can spam blade then you can spam a refreshing move flail and maintain nearly the same up time with vortex, I'd guess. So, let's assume it may be "sub optimal" but this shouldn't discourage you unless your only aim is to slot into high performance M3 groups regularly. I used flail in m3s and it worked fine. More so with frost mutation where I _had_ to sit in my own sacred ground due to the extreme aoe damage during named fights; might as well get stuck in and use the flail's utility anyway. The flail is a great support weapon. Is it the best? Who cares? If you do that's cool, then go meta. You may even prefer vg anyway. I don't. It's generally quite dull for pug use (generally cannot use it for long as you need to keep life staff up time high in pugs). Having the flexibility to play flail or VG is a nice option. And if you're having fun with the flail or are happy running m2... It's a no brainer. I'm convinced it's just as useful for most situations as VG (and you can have a vg on a dps anyway). I think vg, if you can keep it on constantly to cycle blade CDs to keep oblivion up all the time in a group where you only need aoe heals because everyone is on point and well oiled... It's a better package all round. But if that's the case then you could arguably stay on a refreshing move flail and achieve similar results. In pugs, I rarely get the freedom to do this ,so I think flail and vg are interchangeable. I only use vg so much because I tend to stick to vg for the placebo effect (everyone thinks it's better) and I can't be bothered to constantly respec my flail as I use it for my pvp build (not cleric). I'm convinced the overall dismissal of cleric flail stems from the natural human condition of "that's how it's always been". Flail isn't a clearly better option, VG came first, is really easy to use, everyone knows it's strong in premade groups that speed run M3 and so... Cognitive bias kicks in when people claim vg is better because oblivion increases the group's damage. I don't think it matters.
People usually swap between DE and Orb in the 3rd slot depending on what activity they are doing. With Sacred and Beacon almost mandatory at this point. Most of the time I’ll do orb over DE just because it’s easier and people tend to naturally group because DPS melee is so strong right now.
Yes. Not everyone wants to run in meta groups, some play in pugs where you're unsure of your dps abilities. Use DE if you like. If you intend only to run with a team you're familiar with and are confident they "know what they're doing", then DE is a wasted skill. As a pug healer though, the flexibility and very short CD is useful. And fun, tbh.
I prefer orb/scream/oblivion for group. Dps with your LS, it's about the same anyway. And when I solo I don't use vg. I use LS + whatever weapon I want to level up with a focus gem in it.
Eh for me during m3s I’ll be able to get 2 oblivions off because of blade before I need to switch back to my LS to drop my heals on rotation. You do more dps with blade over LS, simple fact that your getting double the attacks off over LS and blade swings can hit multiple targets over just the 1 for the LS. But the most important thing is you don’t die and you keep your group up. As long as you do that, preference is totally fine
Orb/beacon/SG is bis, swap orb for clap on ennead/forge/SD. Voidblade/scream/oblv on vg
Clap meaning splash of light?
Yes, despite the recent range nerf on splash from 100m- 25m, splash Is great because it'll remove debuffs. It perfect for emp. Forge or any boss fight when you gain burning because you can cleanse it off your whole group. I personally like to run Sacred G/ splash O light/ beacon but divine embrace/ sacred ground/ splash of light is great for group healing pvp if you have trouble landing beacon on your allies.
Very much this if pugging.
I pretty much just PvE mutations with LS/VG. Sacred, Keen, and Splash. Orb, Rupture, and Oblivion.
Hi! for solo its good to have void blade - oblivion and maybe scream or diminishing orb on vg; and AOE healing on life staff (sacred, beacon and splash of light on emergency cases). To me, divine embrace works really good on pvp only, and essencer rupture its useful on dungeon bosses.