Disciple
Creation
Guide
by Ralsu
Archetype:
Healer
Primary Attribute:
VIT
Continents:
Kojan, Qalia
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style="font-style: italic;">October 23, 2007
The Disciple is the most melee orientated
of the healer classes and is the only healer class that has counter
attacks.
style="font-weight: normal;">She
looks and feels
like a
martial artist because of her
style="font-weight: normal;">
weapon and armor choices
class="pn-content-page-body"> and fighting style, but the Disciple is
first and foremost a healer.
style="font-weight: normal;">The
Disciple uses melee attacks to heal her
allies and replenish energy.
style="font-weight: normal;"> She
also can use her inner energy to form powerful bonds with her
allies and enemies.
All healers use vitality for a bonus or a penalty to healing, so
vitality is easily a Disciple's primary attribute. Vitality also
increases in-combat regeneration. After that (and even about vitality),
opinion varies widely.
Wisdom gives the Disciple a
large
pool of energy to cast healing spells, but healing can be
achieved other ways for the Disciple. Intelligence makes
it harder for enemies to counter a Disciple's heals and allows the
Disciple to detect who has aggro more easily. Some people believe it
could also help your chances of success when using Feign Death.
Dexterity increases the chance to dodge and parry and the likelihood of
scoring a critical hit. Strength increases melee damage, but the
Disciple also gets a buff for strength and dexterity.
Building a good Disciple takes some careful planning at the
character
creation screen and requires you to learn a handful of tactics in the
lower levels.
Disciple Creation Guide
I. Selecting
the Right Race
Disciples of all races start with the same attributes, but the
choice
of race can affect how many points the Disciple automatically gets
placed
into its prime attributes.
Starting
attributes:
Each character
gets 20 attribute
points
(AP) per level, starting at level 10. 6 of your AP are placed
for you automatically--one per attribute (STR, CON, DEX, VIT, INT,
WIS). 4 points are assigned to attributes based on your race if you are
not a human (humans are kojani, mordebi, qaliathari, and thestran).
You can
place 10 (14 for humans) wherever you want to within soft caps of 5 per
level.
Additionally,
characters get
racial bonuses to their soft caps. These
are called preferred stats and allow characters of a race to flesh out
in a way that reflects the traits of the race. Non-human races get 4
bonus points to soft caps (usually two or three attributes only) while
human
races get 6, 1 for each attribute. Thus, a human can be more balanced,
while a non-human becomes more specialized.
The table below shows the attribute scores at level 50 before
gear
and buffs for
the Disciple based on the race selected. We've highlighted the best
results for the primary attribute for you. It is possible to
reach the soft cap for three attributes as a human, but those soft caps
may be lower than those attainable by other races.
src="http://media.tentonhammer.com/vanguard/gallery/albums/album32/DSC.jpg">
name="II">II. Racial
Abilities
The other important factor to consider when picking the race for your
Disciple is racial abilities. With their short durations and long
recasts,
racial abilities are less important than attributes in the selection
process, but they can be used to pick between races that are otherwise
equal. The racial abilities are listed below.
style="font-weight: bold;">
style="font-weight: bold;">Kojani:
Spirit of Jin
This ability will immediately restore 45% of energy and hit points to
the target. This ability has a diminishing effect on any target that
has benefitted from this ability (used by another player) in the last
10 minutes. Recast is 30 minutes.
Human Ingenuity + 10 bonus to all weapon skills, and dodge.
Crafting: +10 Ingenuity
Harvesting: +5 Lumberjacking
Goblin:
Hex of Ghalnn
Whoever is afflicted by this hex will return 3% of the mana and hit
points for every hit that is made on them. The effect lasts for 60
seconds. Recast is 15 minutes.
Small Race: 2% bonus to evasion
Crafting: +10 Reasoning
Harvesting: +5 Mining
style="font-weight: bold;">Half Elf: Symbol of Jin
This ability will apply a rune to every member of the group for 60
seconds, which will mitigate damage by 15%. Recast is 30 minutes.
Human Ingenuity: + 10 bonus to all weapon skills, and dodge.
Crafting: +10 Finesse
Harvesting: +5 Skinning
Orc: Fury of Ghalnn
For the next 7 seconds after this ability is activated, you
will
receive a 10% increase to damage and 100% of all the damage you do will
return
to you in the form of hit points. Recast is 15 minutes.
Large Race: 2% bonus to mitigation
Crafting: +10 Problem Solving
Harvesting: +5 Quarrying
Raki: Planar Shift
While this ability is active, you will gain a 50% mitigation to all
spell damage. Recast is 30 minutes.
Animal Reflexes: 10% bonus to run speed.
Crafting: +10 Reasoning
Harvesting: +5 Reaping
style="font-weight: bold;">Qaliathari:
Swiftness of the Sands
For this next 10 seconds, you will evade all melee attacks and spells.
Recast is 30 minutes.
Human Ingenuity + 10 bonus to all weapon skills, and dodge.
Crafting: +10 Ingenuity
Harvesting: +5 Lumberjacking
Dark Elf: Spawn of Haelufir
This ability allows you to summon forth a small drake for a short
duration. The type of drake you summon will be based on class and
level. Each type of drake will have a variety of effects at their
disposal, ranging from group auras, to breath attacks. The
higher
level drakes will also learn spells that are sympathetic with their
associated class. Recast is 30 minutes.
Elven Wisdom: 2% reduction in mana cost
Crafting: +10 Finesse
Harvesting: +5 Skinning
Kurashasa:
Symbiotic Armor
When this armor is active you will be protected by a proc (a process
that fires under certain conditions). In addition to a rune that
mitigates 25% of all types of damage,
you have a chance to apply an effect to all enemies within a 20 meter
point-blank
radius when you attack, cast a spell, or receive damage. Anyone
affected by this debuff will become snared and slowed. Recast is 30
minutes.
Animal Reflexes: 10% bonus to run speed.
Crafting: +10 Reasoning
Harvesting: +5 Skinning
Mordebi:
Curse of the
Ancients
This ability stuns the target for 8 seconds,
and reduces the aggro range to 0. The target will not assist/aggro
while
stunned, and the effect does not generate any aggro. Recast is 30
minutes.
Human Ingenuity + 10 bonus to all weapon skills, and dodge.
Crafting: +10 Finesse
Harvesting: +5 Reaping
III. Levels 1-4
Tactics
Like most
classes, Disciples will probably find themselves soloing throughout
their early days. At these levels youll want to
grab all the quests you can to help you gain more experience.
Youll find the Disciple class very capable of
soloing. From the very start, you will notice that you have
very little downtime in between kills, in order to really take
advantage of this, you want to be in a fight as often as possible.
Unlike the healers you may be used to, the Disciple not only wants to
be engaged in up close combat; they need to be to reach their fullest
potential. This is not your typical healbot. While healing is
the Disciples primary focus, we have a wide range of skills
and abilities that allow us to do much more than just that.
At level 1
you start with two abilities and the tactics will be fairly
straight-forward. Void Hand will be your primary attack; it deals
normal melee damage plus a little extra.
Youll notice that as you use Void Hand you will be
accumulating Jin. Your second ability, LaoJin
Flare, requires two Jin. This is a fairly small instant cast
heal (roughly 75 points). At these levels you will probably not find
yourself
using the heal that much. But it is important to remember
that LaoJin Flare does have a cool down attached to
it, so you can't spam it. Go ahead and think of it as a patch heal to
put on top of other heals or to save someone's life long enough to get
off a bigger heal.
At level 2
you get Blessed Wind. This is a fairly high endurance
attack that will also put a small heal over time on your defensive
target. You'll probably continue to use Void Hand as
your main attack, but Blessed Wind can give you a little boost here and
there. Blessed Wind build up 1 point of Jin.
By level 4,
perhaps youve noticed that you always have close to a full
stock of Jin. Dont worry: your new attack, Cyclone
Kick, should undoubtedly help you with this. This is a
moderate damage attack that requires 3 Jin to use.Your other skill is a
new heal,
Breath of Renewal. This is a fairly quick heal that costs energy to
cast and
will be more than enough to keep you alive.
IV. Endowment of
Life
With Cyclone Kick, you will also be able to use your first endowment,
Endowment of Life. Endowments are not listed in abilities until you
discover them by doing your
attacks in a certain order. The Endowment of Life is a
healing effect you will get from using Blessed Wind followed by Cyclone
Kick followed by Void Hand. You must perform the moves in that order,
but other moves can come in between so long as less than 8 seconds pass
between any two moves in the
combo.
Since Cyclone Kick costs 3 Jin, you can open a fight by using Void Hand
twice. Then you can use Blessed Wind to start the chain. You'll have
the 3 Jin needed to use Cyclone Kick. You complete Endowment of Life
with another Void Hand. You'll get a nice heal of roughly 180 points at
level 5 and scaling as your level increases.
V. Levels 5-10
Tactics
Now level 6
is where you should notice an increase in your ability to kill
things. With the new finisher Falling Petal, you will be able
to down things much quicker. Falling Petal is only usable
after you get a critical strike with one of your other abilities.
Luckily, you get them quite often after a Cyclone Kick.Falling Petal
also buffs your defensive target so that heals cast on that target for
the next 5 minutes give extra hit points. The boost isn't much, but
it's there. Practice using it with other people as your defensive
target so that you'll be in the habit of buffing your tank at higher
levels. At only 10 endurance, you
will want to use it whenever possible to maximize your damage
output. Falling Petal also adds 1 Jin to your pool.
The other ability you receive this level also adds to
your damage and is your first Focus Bond. Like most focus
bonds, Touch of Woe requires 2 Jin to use. When you have this
maintained on the enemy, it will take a small amount of damage whenever
it attacks. This can be very useful for creatures that are
higher in level and harder for you to hit, but don't waste your Jin
putting this on weaker enemies. Just pound those into submission.
There is another aspect of the Disciple that will first become
available when you reach level
8. Counter Attacks are usable after a dodge or
feint. Dodge is a defensive maneuver that when used
successfully will open up the counterattack Kiss of the Slug. Kiss of
the Slug reduces the enemy's strength and damage output for a few
seconds. The combination of Dodge and Kiss of the Slug will not be very
useful against most 2-dots in your
level range. Against tougher foes, it can help reduce the damage you
take considerably. Keep in mind that you can use Dodge to simply avoid
a hit that would have landed. You do not have to follow it with Kiss of
the Slug.
Soul Cutter is another ability that is more useful for groups than solo
play. This attack doesnt have amazing damage but
it reduces the aggro you have on a creature, meaning he will want to
attack you less. In a group situation, this attack is best
used before the creature is already attacking you. This level
also brings with it a slower but more powerful heal called Astral
Wind. When using this, you want to make sure you or your
target have enough life to survive the 3 second cast time.
You have achieved level
10! You will now have the solid foundation to
what the Disciple class is all about. At this level, you get
a few new things that will make you all the more valuable to a
group. While this class can solo very well, you will almost
always find grouping to be the best XP and loots. Astral Walk
is an ability that can only be used while in a dungeon and will bring
your group mate directly to your location. Reincarnate resurrects your
friends if they happen to fall in
battle. You'll also want to use Summon Symbol of Unity, which
places a stone in the pack of an ally that can be used to resurrect the
Disciple if he happens to die. You want to put one on all of
the group that doesnt get its own resurrection spell.
This is the level where you get your first buff, Wisdom of the
Grasshopper. This increases the physical damage you will put out and
reduces the physical damage you receive(by increasing strength and
dexterity), so
you want to have it on you at all times.
Also pay attention to the new focus bond called Kiss of
Heaven. This defensive focus bond heals your defensive target over two
minutes for a huge amount. Keep in mind that heals build aggro, so if
you put this on your tank, be sure to use Soul Cutter pretty often.
Finally, Touch of Discord does some massive damage (4x normal damage +
over 100 more!) while building 1 Jin.
VI. Managing Jin
Jin is a staple of the Disciple class. How you manage this in
tougher fights can be the difference between victory and
death. Out of combat you will lose 1 Jin every 30
seconds. A great way to go from one fight to the next without losing
Jin while solo is to carry some throwing stars for pulling. The
throwing stars will give you a much-needed ranged attack and allow you
to get "locked" into combat mode between pulls faster. In groups, make
sure you have the puller targeted and use your Assist macro to target
the incoming enemy. Then be ready to throw a star as soon as the new
mob is safely away from any crowds. Harvesting also marks you as in
combat, so you can feel free to harvest a node and retain your Jin.
VII.
Conclusion
As healers, there is always the added pressure of holding the group's
life in your hands. Disciples must learn to
pay attention to a lot of things--more than just the life
bars. For endowments, be sure to check that the creature
youre targeting has enough life for you to successfully do
it or that you have another mob left to target. It's possible to switch
targets when performing Endowment of Life, but you definitely dont
want to realize youve had a corpse
targeted for the last few seconds as a group mate dies. Good healers
are easy to recognize and always sought
after by guilds and groups. When the fighting gets tough,
healers (more than anyone) need to have a cool head and quick
reactions. And this only comes with experience. So good luck and happy
hunting!
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