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Party of Conformity:
Healers
By Dalmarus
style="font-style: italic;">May 9th, 2008
For
the last couple of
months, a friend and I have been wondering what class would make the
best group. The topic originally started from a conversation we were
having about some old Everquest times we had shared. One of those
moments was watching an entire part of Beastlords hunting together on
the Plane of Nightmare. If anyone wonders, they didn't seem to be
having the slightest problem hunting out there either. In fact, I
almost wondered if it was going much better than a more traditional
group.
Now that you know where the idea for this set of polls came from, let's
get to the nitty gritty and how it relates to Vanguard: Saga of Heroes.
Needless to say, I have my own theories on which class would make the
best group, but I'll keep those to myself for now. I already know what
I think - I want to know what the general community feel of the subject
is. Over the next four weeks, I'll set up a poll for each of the class
categories: Defensive Fighter, Offensive Fighter, Healer, and Arcane
Caster. On the fifth week, I'll run a poll with each of the winning
classes to see which one would reign supreme.
You have only one Healer class to make up an entire party -
what is it?
Blood Mage
A single Blood Mage by itself is a force to be reckoned with. Now
imagine a full group of six Blood Mages working in unison. Yeah, I
shivered for a moment too. Their ability to heal while dealing damage
may only be matched by the Disciple. While I think it's possible that
the group may have a bit of a hard time when battling melee-based
targets, they should be nearly untouchable by casters. Their spell
counter may have a 25 second countdown timer, but with 6 of them
available to cast it, that shouldn't be a problem. Add into all this
the vast amounts of symbiotes they can use, including a charm-type
symbiote for crowd control, and you have quite the contender.
Cleric
For nearly the first 8 months of Vanguard's release, the masses had
been calling for a nerf to the cleric class. Fortunately, even the very
mention of the word "nerf" has seemed to become a crime within the
community, so the cleric has recently been let off the hook. The
reasons for their cries were understandable though and it's what makes
the cleric a top contender for this week's title.
No other healer can wear heavy armor, and with a good amount of thought
put into his or her equipment, a cleric can tank nearly as well as all
of the defensive tanks. Combine this idea with having some of the
biggest heals and strongest buffs in the game. After all this, toss in
some temporary invulnerability affects, resurrection ability, and you
have quite the beast of a character. Now multiple all this by 6 and you
have your full group of clerics. The big downside to this class though
is that they do not deal a lot of damage, so battles can be very long.
Disciple
Like the Blood Mage, a Disciple can deal massive amounts of damage and
heal at the same time. The Disciple has some pretty impressive group
heals, some agro management skills, and as mentioned, some pretty
impressive damage dealing abilities as well. Six Disciples in a group
would make for one of the coolest looking groups out there, similar to
a group full of monks, so they earn cool points for that. Also similar
to the monk, the Disciple is the only class out of this group that can
feign death, virtually eliminating the chance of a total group wipe.
Shaman
The Shaman is an interesting addition to this poll, because if you
stuck with just one type (Phoenix, for instance), you could be very
successful in certain situations, but limited in others. To give the
Shaman a fighting chance in this poll though, I'm going to assume for
the sake of argument that the group is made up of a combination of all
three types of Shaman - Bear, Wolf, Phoenix.
Rather than being at a disadvantage, now the Shaman group may be the
top contender because at this point, this is more in lines with a
traditional group. If you had two Bear Shamans, they could be your main
tank and main assist. You're two Phoenix Shamans would then in turn
become your DPS nukers. This would leave the two Wolf Shamans to play
the role of main healers. As good as this sounds by itself, remember
that in the case of an emergency, all members of the party have healing
abilities (duh - they're all a healer class). Taking all these things
into account, the Shaman group might do better than the others after
all.
Now it's your turn
to let us know what you think!
style="text-align: center; background-color: rgb(160, 184, 216);"> style="font-weight: bold;">VOTE
IN OUR POLL!
You have only one Healer class to make up an entire party - what is it?
- Blood Mage
- Cleric
- Disciple
- Shaman
HERE
(this poll is always open)
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