Category:Clerics

Originally, there was only one caste of clerics. They were formed under the goddess of Tul-Sith. With her as their guide, clerics stretched far and wide healing the sick and wounded and protecting all from danger with their clerical spells. The prime requisite of Clerics is WISdom. They are specialists in healing hit points, creating protective spells, and many clerical enchantments. Unlike in the past, they can now worship any of the pantheon.

Abbreviation: Cle.

Prime Requisite: Wisdom.

Clerics in General

Clerics specialize in casting both curative and protective spells and are the only "core class" that does this; because of this, players who enjoy serving in healing roles may find this class very appealing. As many groups, regardless of tier, will not run without including a healer, clerics may have less trouble than average finding groups. Also, because popular cleric deities, namely Tul-Sith and Kra, will increase their worshippers' buffing-spells' armor class, clerics who worship these deities may find their buffing spells in great demand, as well. Although clerics may find groups more easily than average due to their healing abilities, they may find soloing much more challenging than average due to their relatively low capacity to do damage, via both weapons and spells.

Cleric Creation

Characters of any race may be clerics but some races are better suited for clericry than others. Although the prime requisite of clerics is Wisdom, it's not really important, since clerics of all races will have enough practice points. Since clerics are spellcasters, races which make good casters (mages for instance) will also make good clerics. Good creatable races are Cen, gno, elf and drw. Liz is also a good option for tua remort option. Likewise, characters of races with relatively-low intelligence, such as gargoyles, giants, and kobolds, tend to be poor clerics with high rates of spellcasting failure, although some people still choose to play mages of such races because they enjoy their novelty or difficulty.

Some races such as centaurs, dwarves, duergar and ents have mana reductions to their divine spells, which can be also be a positive factor in choosing a race for cleric, though not all such races are no-fail.

Another factor which may influence the choice of race for cleric is how your race will react with the pantheon spells, but currently not all ten of these spells have been released, and the exact way race affects them is not fully understood.

See also Wiseman's Avatar race comparison chart and/or Another Avatar MUD Site for some excellent comparative data to aid you in choosing your new cleric's race.

Clerics at Lowmort Tier

Training

As with any new character, train Wisdom first, followed by Intelligence and Constitution. Since clerics have the most learnable skills out of all classes, it's especially important to make the most of your practices. Note that intelligence doesn't affect a cleric's healing or buffing spells, it will only affect mana gains and the number of practices needed to adept skills.

Each point of Strength will increase carry capacity, and add a point of Hit Roll and Damage Roll, but it won't do anything special for a cleric's skills or spells. Likewise, each point of Dexterity will increase inventory capacity and add -10 Armor Class, but will not affect a cleric in any other way.

Practicing

Clerics learn a wide assortment of spells with a web of prerequisites, so it's easy to get sidetracked while practicing and end up without enough practice points to learn your important skills. Be sure to keep enough practice points to get the following skills:

• All of your healing spells Cure Light, Cure Serious, Cure Critical, Heal, Divinity
• The curative spells Cure Blindness, Cure Poison, and Cure Disease
• Sanctuary and is many prerequisites Detect Evil, Detect Alignment, Protection Good and Protection Evil
• Frenzy will be cast on hitters, and is used at all tiers
• Water Breathing you can do without until you can't do without it, and then you'll drown and die. So don't do without it.
• Arcane Knowledge will allow you to use wands and staves to cast spells without using your mana
• Calm allows you or your group to escape combat if needed.
• Remove Curse is always useful if you are cursed and can't recall, or if you are stuck holding cursed gear.
• Portal makes group travel quick and easy

Some spells you can forgo include:

• Flamestrike is a level 15 damage spell which doesn't have much use, since it isn't a prerequisite for anything else.
• Turn Undead and Turn Demon rarely work as well as you might like.
• Dispel Evil actually does good damage for its very small mana cost, but it's hardly important.

Other spells such as Pass Door, Locate Object, and Earthbind are useful if you have the practice points to spare, but are not critical.

To make the most of your abilities, practice healing spells such as Cure Light or Heal as soon as you are able. Cure Light heals 25 hit points, Cure Serious heals 50, Cure Critical heals 75, Heal heals 125, and Divinity heals 250. The most efficient uses of mana are cure light, heal, and divinity. Cure critical is slightly less efficient, and cure serious is the least efficient.

Mass healing spells are of a lower priority than single target healing spells. In general, if you need to heal the entire room, you should use Arcane Knowledge to brandish a healing staff such as the Shard Of Durrite or Gold Dragon Orb. Even though a cleric's own spells will heal more than a wand or staff, a mass spell costs about 3.5 times as much as a normal one, whereas brandishing costs nothing, and the lag is similar as well. Learn them as prerequisites for Mass Heal and Mass Divinity but don't feel required to learn them as soon as possible.

Attack spells such as Cause Light, Harm, and Earthquake are of questionable usefulness. They are good if you find yourself soloing, but in groups a cleric will never be called upon to stop healing and start casting damage spells.

Worshipping

Tul-Sith and Kra are the two most popular deities that clerics worship, while Gorn and Roixa are less popular alternatives. Peruse the worship table for the full breakdown.

Kra versus Tul-Sith: Both of these goddesses improve the power of a cleric's healing spells, and the power of their Armor Class buffing spells. Tul-Sith has stronger healing spells, while Kra's protective spells are more potent. Kra will also improve melee damage (which is something to consider if your cleric is a strong race such as Dwarf, Centaur, or Ent) while Tul-Sith will worsen melee damage and make spells last a slightly shorter amount of time. Tul-Sith will vastly improve mana and hit point regeneration, while Kra will worsen regeneration slightly. Both Kra and Tul-Sith worsen spell damage.

Roixa: Roixa is typically only worshiped if a cleric wishes to become a Druid. She improves healing spells very slightly, but decreases Armor Class buffing spells significantly. Roixa also improves archery damage the most out of any god, but that only applies after a cleric has become a druid, so she offers very little for ordinary clerics.

Gorn: Gorn is usually worshiped by monks, but also offers some benefits to healers. He improves healing spells by about 10%, though their mana cost also increases. Gorn's most significant effect is his Armor Class buffing spells, which are the best available; however they are also the shortest lasting spells. Clerics who want a slightly more relaxed experience usually opt to worship Kra, though Gorn Frenzy is always a nice thing to have cast on oneself.

Fighting

Like other classes, lowmort clerics should have little trouble soloing from level 1 to level 20 very quickly. Afterward, gaining experience alone will grow increasingly difficult and clerics should seriously consider grouping.

Soloing: Clerics are not well-suited for soloing and will likely find this terribly challenging. Get a mix of tank and hit gear, then use a combination of healing and attack spells. After level 30 or so, this will be difficult for a cleric.

Tanking: If a cleric tanks, they will need a set of tank gear. A tanking cleric can serve as their own healer, which opens up an extra group slot for another hitter, but avoid relying on brandishes for healing. They lag twice as much as casting healing spells, which will result in a slow paced run.

Hitting: Clerics aren't grouped for their hitting, simply put. Even if a god such as Kra improves melee damage, it won't make them good hitters at lowmort, and cleric damage spells have basically no use outside of soloing.

Healing: Clerics usually serve as healers in groups. Clerics should wear mana gear to maximize their available mana for healing. Clerics can also use staves to cast healing spells on the entire room without spending mana. This is generally preferable to casting a mass healing spell, because of their higher spell costs.

The three most efficient healing spells are Cure Light, Heal, and Divinity, followed by Cure Critical and trailed by Cure Serious. Wands and Staves heal less than if cast naturally, and lag twice as much, but don't carry any spell cost at all.

Clerics are usually responsible for keeping Sanctuary and Frenzy applied to the group, but since it costs so much to cast sanctuary repeatedly, the White Marble Cross is frequently used to sanc the entire room (and as such, sanctuary duty can fall to anyone with Arcane Knowledge, not just the healer).

Lastly, be sure to stick a monitor in your Prompt so that you can monitor a groupmate's hit points, for example %u: %w/%Whp might show up as SoAndSo: 655/700hp.

Cleric Prestige Options

Level-50 clerics may choose to become druids instead. As druids, they will wield missile weapons like archers rather than melee weapons. See Druids for more information about this prestige class.

Clerics at Hero Tier

Training

Clerics at hero tier will be able to train their wisdom five higher than at lowmort tier and to train their other statistics two higher than at lowmort tier. They will continue to be able to raise each of their statistics up to three more than they can train them to (respectively), unless they devote themselves to a deity, in which case these amounts may be modified slightly. See Devoting below for more information about this subject.

Practicing

Clerics should continue to practice skills with cleric trainers and should usually keep their intelligence as high as possible while doing so, just as at lowmort tier. Hero clerics may continue to practice their skills up to 95%. See Cleric Hero Skills and Spells for more detail about what skills clerics may practice at hero tier, at what level these skills may be practiced, and how useful they are.

Devoting

Clerics, as with all classes, may choose to devote themselves to whichever deity they have chosen to worship (if any) at hero sublevel 1 or beyond.

Kra: Clerics who devote themselves to Kra will have increased maximum wisdom, constitution, and strength, but decerased maximum dexterity.

Tul-Sith: Clerics who devote themselves to Tul-Sith will have increased maximum wisdom and constitution, but decreased maximum strength and dexterity.

See Devote for more detail about devotion and its effects.

Fighting

Clerics at hero tier, as at lowmort tier, continue to be well-suited and oft-wanted to serve as group healers. Some hero clerics may wish to increase their versatility by learning to tank groups, as well, which becomes easier for clerics to do at this tier.

Soloing: Clerics are not well-suited for soloing and will likely find this terribly challenging.

Tanking: Cleric tanks at hero tier are not common but do exist. In fact, after practicing certain hero-tier skills such as dodge, parry, and shield block, clerics can become highly effective tanks, wearing full tank gear for protection and perhaps using their mana to heal both themselves and their group members.

Hitting: Clerics have relatively poor capacity to cause damage, either with weapons or with spells, and thus almost never serve as hitters at any tier. However with diversity playing a role, a cleric in hit gear can be a useful addition to a group. In this case, Kra is a good choice for worship, as it has better melee damage than Tul-Sith.

Healing: Clerics usually serve as healers in groups. Many, though hardly all, hero tanks expect their low-hero cleric healers to carry both mana gear and hit gear during runs, to wear their mana gear until they reach their base mana, and to change into their hit gear afterward. High-hero clerics with greater base mana may opt to wear only hit gear. Clerics who run low on mana during runs may attempt to alleviate this problem somewhat by "catching tics" or by using brandishes; brandishes may also be handy when multiple group members need healing simultaneously. Cleric healers, when using their mana rather than their brandishes, typically heal with either Cure Light or, as needed, Divinity. When able to do so without it interfering with their healing role, cleric healers may also contribute to their group's combat damage by bash-targeting mobs or even by casting offensive spells during combat. Even when not tanking, cleric healers may still wish to carry a set of tank gear with them that they can quickly change into during moments of mortal peril.

Clerics at Lord Tier

Clerics get a lot more hp than mages but significantly worse mana at lord. Also, their healing spell Comfort is faily expensive. Therefore, they are prone to running out of mana at lord. The spell Light Of Hope is sometimes useful to alleviate this. The remort option priest has significatly higher mana and is thus much more desired.

Clerics also get Spiritlink which can be useful when running det gear.

Cleric Remort Options

Clerics at lord tier may remort into either priests (either human ones at sublevel 100 or ones of their current race at sublevel 200) or paladins (either human ones at sublevel 125 or ones of their current race at sublevel 250). See Paladins and Priests for more information about these remort classes.

Clerics at lord tier may also remort into clerics of remort races. Remort races that are well-suited for clericry include high elves (available only to elven and drow clerics at sublevel 25) and tuataurs (available only to lizardmen and troglodyte clerics at sublevel 25). Despite their relatively-high wisdom, griffons are ill-suited for spellcasting and thus tend to be poor clerics.