Fizzle chance 0% Heavy Armor,which armor setup is better.

Fizzle test's for 100% of my spells (spells such as Ice Arrow, Searing Ray, all Heals etc.. Sun, earth, water, life trees) to be 100% fizzle free I have two choices.

#1 Full Plate with Chainmail Chest and Gloves using two wands DR16.7 (max 64.1%) Avoid 17% Life Attunment 166.4
or
#2 Full Chain Mail using a shield and one wand DR23.8 (max 58.5%) Avoid 17% Life Attunment 140.2.

What a shield gives me is the "block" additional defensive ability, like parry, DR & DA etc...

The effect on Spells
Healing Grace 13-34 vs 16-40
Healing Ray 80-116 vs 96-139

I am more effective casting spells by alot with two wands, yet have 50% more DR with a shield + the ability to block.

I am leaning to getting Plate with Chain Gloves and Chest as that will allow me when soloing with a single two handed weapon casting most spells at 0%-7.6% fizzle chance (healing Grace 5.4% fizzle), while mainly being melee in solo mode. However it does mean I will not have the gear to use a shield and cast spells easily (full Chain).

Thoughts?


Here is the testing I have done

Heavy Armor Fizzle Testing results so far, & more

Unless we as players are willing to test our assumptions and the information given to us by the developers for accuracy for ourselves, we will never know how things truly are in game to that end I am testing various things that interest me in game that I am able to test easily.

I will post my results and you my fellow community member can decide for yourself the value of the information to you. Where I offer an opinion, I will tell you it is one, and not say a fact is a fact without testing it in-game.

Things I would like to test but do not have the access to the equipment (and characters with certain skills at ZERO needed to test) are Damage Resist (DR) and Damage Avoidance (DA) and Magic Resistance.

Fizzle Testing

Spells used in testing:
Healing Touch, Healing Ray, Healing Grace, Stone Fist, Stone Arrow, Ice Fist, Ice Arrow, Searing Ray, Ignite Weapon, Immolation

Character used in testing has Focus skill “Follow Through” at 81 for 10.1% fizzle reduction

Majority of test were done standing still.

HT HR HG SF SA IF IA SR IW I

Full Plate

2 weapon 0% 2.5% 16.9% 0% 4.9% 9.1% 24.1% 24.1% 59.2% 74.2%

Wand&Shield 0% 0% 14.4% 0% 2.4% 5.1% 20.1% 20.1% 52.4% 67.4%

2 Wands 0% 0% 1.9% 0% 0% 0% 0.1% 0.1% 18.7% 33.7%



Plate w/Chain

Gloves&Helm

2 Weapon 0% 0% 12.9% 0% 0.9% 2.7% 17.7% 17.7% 48.4% 63.4%

Wand&Shield 0% 0% 10.4% 0% 0% 0% 13.7% 13.7% 41.7% 56.7%

2 wands 0% 0% 0% 0% 0% 0% 0% 0% 7.9% 22.9%



Plate w/Cloth

Gloves&Helm

2 Weapons 0% 0% 6.9% 0% 0% 0% 8.1% 8.1% 32.2% 47.2%

Wand&Shield 0% 0% 4.4% 0% 0% 0% 4.1% 4.1% 25.5% 40.5%

2 wands 0% 0% 0% 0% 0% 0% 0% 0% 0% 6.7%


HT HR HG SF SA IF IA SR IW I

Full Chain

2 weapon 0% 0% 3.4% 0% 0% 0% 2.5% 2.5% 22.7% 37.7%

Wand&Shield 0% 0% 0% 0% 0% 0% 0% 0% 16% 31%%

2 Wands 0% 0% 0% 0% 0% 0% 0% 0% 0% 0%

Using Chain with Cloth Gloves and Helm and 2 wands, Most (90%+) spells in game 0% fizzle standing still.

While moving almost all Water, Earth, Life 0% fizzle, most Sun and Moon 0 to under 15% fizzle, Immolation 8%, Corpse explosion 0%, lightning 15.5%

Spells damage adjusted for increased intelligence and Strength

Healing Touch Skill level 97

INT 50 60-87

INT 70 64-92

INT 102 80-115

Searing Ray Skill level 80

INT 50 27-81

INT 70 29-87

INT 102 33-99

Ice Fist Skill level 80

INT 50 23-40

INT 70 25-43

INT 102 29-49

Ice Arrow Skill level 80

INT 50 33-50

INT 70 36-54

Earth Fist Skill level 80

INT 50 STR 68 32-46

INT 70 STR 68 34-49

INT 50 STR 89 33-47

Earth Arrow Skill level 80

INT 50 STR 68 32-49

INT 70 STR 68 34-52

INT 50 STR 89 33-50

 

Is your build to be a mage tank or healer? I know you are asking about fizzle but to how you want to play will help me write more. My healer build is chest chain and the rest of the armor epic carpacian. I use 1 wand and a shield, but my shueld is for testudo to aide the tank and the chain chest for valiant warden. So if you are seeking inputs on dps...Im not your guy .I just noticed you had a lot of healing spells in that build.

 

Thanks!

With my guild or in group I play the role of healer. I do want to have a solo/melee option as well. However 75% of my time in game is grouping with my guild. I want to purchase ONE set of armor. I could by a plate and a chain set and mix and match for best setup each circumstance... but I am trying to economize

I use have used Testudo off and on debating the value because of the range. Valiant Warden I require the tank to use on another player as when used on me can divert my heals from others to me which I find counter productive.... However I admit there is probably a better way to play my character!

 

if you plan to be a group healer i would recommend going full cloth, the bonuses associated to cloth will be definitely better for healing. Then for solo, just change your chest to a chainmail, then use defenses from heavy armor and tactics (defensive stance glancing blow, fortify defense, parry (you can parry with wands as well)).

You can also go full cloth except chest in chainmail, shield and one wand, it works, though you will get a higher fizzle, works fine, but when you reach defensive skills at gm u really do not need the shield anymore.

If you go magic for damage, i personnaly do not like to mix magic. I prefer to focus on only one tree to benefit for the max attunment. A major mistake I made at the beggining was to tryto put points everywhere to get the maximum diversity of attacks... I would personaly advice you to specialize instead. you use immolation so you get the atunment bonus in fire...use fire spells instead of mixing earth ice and fire.

 

I will post my healiing 101 tomorrow, but in the mean time know that as a healer if you do any attack spells your heal spells will be reduced. My guess is that they want a healer to be a healer...as for valiant warden, if your tank is doing their job he should hold most the agro, so you casting it on him gives him essentially more hp and makes him more tanky and you heal easier as gis hp dont banish as quick ..if he casts it on others he is absorbong their damage and my personal opinion is that DPSrs need to learn how to play and not pull the agro . Given agro is a bit wonky, but our guild tanks hold most 95% of the time (I like giving unsubstanitated percents, lol)

 

@istyrl I understand about mixing magic tree's with regards to damage, I list spells and fizzle numbers for testing purposes showing to people with different priorities how the information I gathered effects them. I plan on specializing two skills (life+ either Earth/Sun or Water) my listing those trees are because there are more to those trees than damage spells.

@Crendel I have watched a lot of @Sara Dreygon @Andartianna 's streams and asked several questions. As for agro and healing issues... there is a lot wonky with the game currently, however my focus for this post is more about equipment choices. I am interested on reading your healing 101 however. I have had the discussion on Valiant Warden with a couple of high level healers and everyone seems to view who it should be on differently ( if on healer can take damage & warden same time killing healer).

All, currently I have neither a survivability issue nor an issue with focus when healing my group in places like The Rise, with Dragon's etc... I am trying to figure out one set of armor (with maybe two or pieces I need to swap out) for both a solo melee build and a group healer or healer/utility/damage dealer build. Fairly comfortable with the idea that Chain/Plate will be basis for my build.

 

After 2 years of being plate and damn near fizzling on everything, and I only use basic spells, I've switched to full chain. Unless they fix the DR to be the way it was before, or at least make more sense as to why you would wear plate... IMHO, it make absolutely no sense to wear anything plate other than cosmetics… You get NO worthwhile benefit compared to the amount of negatives.

<--- You see that guy over there... proud plate wearer for 2 years... but no more.

 

@Yipp got it
still do not understand why healing in chain/plate, it makes no real sense to me except in a (what is a paladin) perspective

 

Lifetime plate user here. Going to be giving chain a try soon. Too bad I bought heraldry plate armour

Not only does my plate/shield prevent me from using all kinds of magic beyond light and healing touch, but reckless stance, berserker stance and berserk all nullify my armour's damage resistance anyway. IMO it doesn't make any sense for a warrior's stance or style negate the full set of plate armour they're wearing. Disable parry, disable dodge, half block but to simply turn my DR to 0 is asinine.

 

@istyrl I heal in plate/chain because I am playing the game solo too and at the moment only want to invest in one set of armor... and when solo I melee, not caster mainly.

@Baratan Berserk is -50 Avoidance the other's you mentioned -DR. The difference matters as one is a % chance or dodging all or some of the blow, versus an increase in damage received on each attack. One of the tests I am trying to gather enough players with the right ZERO's in skills to test is the effect of DR/DA/Resists against damage types (including attacks from arrow, versus a animal versus a weapon'd melee versus magic), which is currently not fully understood

 

Sorry, I wasn't in-game to remember which skill was -Avoid-Resist. The point still stands, using an aggressive attack stance shouldn't negate my worn armour. Let me come at you aggressively in full plate armour and you point out how my being relentless somehow negates my armour's effectiveness.
I don't mind the idea of these skills having drawbacks, and it makes sense for them to limit active defenses like dodging, parrying and blocking. But it doesn't make sense for them to effect my armour's ability to deflect or absorb blows. I'm attacking relentlessly, I'm not getting naked.

 

Curious as to what you do not understand about avoidance not being % based any more. A few releases ago @Chris changed the combat math to make avoidance no longer % based and never updated in game information or told us on the forums what the new math was. Assuming avoidance as % based in testing would be like assuming a clear liquid in your chem lab was water.

 

In case you forgot here is the proof that they changed it and never gave us new math.

 

@DAKelam1 Once again you come into a thread I am in, and throw around words such as "here is proof" and claiming it is because that is "what the developers have told us". You can either continue to troll in the forums and my posts, if that is your goal, your doing a fine job. The developers posting something in the forums does not mean what they have posted is accurate.

Maybe you should actually test how Damage Avoidance, Damage Resistance, Magic Resistance, etc... actually works or does not work in game. As of today for example Warding gems are broken and do not work at all, even though tool tip says they provide resistance they do not. Yet, its in the game that Warding provides resistance (reduction in damage).

However, I am sure this thread will now degenerate like the last one.... with you whining about how unfair it is that players have to test anything themselves.

 

@Yipp I am not saying it can't or shouldn't be tested. I am saying that testing is irrelevant when it's based off false information. You want to test what avoidance % does but it's not % based. That's like testing what apples taste like to see if they truly taste like oranges. Damage resistance is testable, dps is testable. Currently avoidance is not because we do not have the proper information to base our tests on. I do not give a flying crap about resistances atm only avoidance. I am not arguing that avoidance has no bearing on defensive capabilities, and even if they gave us a formula that was wrong at least then that could be tested.

 

Crendels Healer Build (Long Live the Syndicate)


GEAR:

I use a mix of cloth and chain. My cloth is Carapacian Epic with the masterwork/enchants on intelligence, spell crit, and focus. My chest is Meteoric Chain with intelligence and life attunement. My hand slots are situational but my primary build is a Pine wand (get the best you can). My secondary could be another wand, but I find myself using the shield more (Testudo). If you choose shield I recommend making sure it has the Testudo move rate penalty debuff. With both wands I am at 182 attunement and with the shield 167. I am adventure level 96 and skill buffed are health 638 focus 1031 (1049 wand) str 87 dex 50 int 121 (117 wand). Always seek extra attunement if you can.



FOCUS: you increase it by your adventure level by your skills and your gear. The two innate skills that directly increase your focus are Heightened Awareness and Train Intelligence. Leveling past 80 in your innates takes a huge sum of xp, but is worth it. Work to get your two innates to 60 then level up to 80 when you can. For Heightened Awareness level 1-60 takes 133k xp, from 61-80 takes 753k xp, and from 80-100 5.1M xp. For Train Intelligence level 1-60 takes 266k xp and 61-80 takes 1.5M xp, and going 80-100 10/3M. Another innate that affects focus is Inner Calm (Focus tree) which reduces focus cost of all spells.


Focus regeneration has many variables. One thing to keep in mind is the higher your focus pool the higher your total regen along with food and devotional buffs. The only intelligence food buff of worth is Darkstarr Fried Oysters, but it is pretty useless at higher levels so focus on whatever gives you the best focus regen. For a devotionals I go with Truth (+5 intelligence), Honor (+1.5 focus per second regen), and blessing of Skill (+5 Adventure Level).


SKILLS:

As with your innates level these skills to 60 then 80 then choose your GMs carefully.

Skills buffs that affect focus and focus regen are Spell Binders Stance and Aetheric Feedback (both in Focus Tree). As stated before increasing your intelligence affects focus so always keep your Enlightenment (Sun Tree) buff active.


Sample Primary Combat Deck

1-Healing Touch

2-Healing Ray

3-Healing Grace

4-Healing Blast

5-Purify (or Purify Burst but I prefer the reduced focus)

6-Valiant Warden

7-Testudo

8-Aetheric Feedback

9-Spell Binders Stance

0-Optional (Knights Grace/Banish)


Sample Secondary Combat Deck

1-Inner Strength

2-Healing Ray

3-Fortifiy Defense

4-Glancing Blow

5-Defensive Stance

6-Douse

7-Optional (Ice Shield/Shield of Crystal)

8-Inner Strength

9-Enlightenment

0-Celestial Blessing


For the “Optional” slots if in light armor I recommend Escape from the Light Armor tree if doing a mob boss. If in a group grind there is no need for Escape so think more utility, for example stacking stuns from the Air tree (see below for explanation) or or do ranged DPS (Searing Ray/Banish Undead). You can extend your buffing duty and do another HoT like Elysian Illumination or you can also put Douse in there and be responsible for Dousing the party…lots of options. If you do damage as a healer your healing spells will be slightly nerfed, so keep that in mind if you need to be healing more than DPSing.


Sample Passive Bar

1-Insturment Sheet Music (Harp of Invigoration)

2-Ressurection

3-Potion Focus

4-Potion Health

5-Potion Regeneration

6-Smelling Salts

7-Optional

8-Light/Night Vision

9-Teleport/Recall

0-Dash

As for the others use your judgement


ATTUNMENT:

This is increased by your skill levels in the specific tree and your gear. For a Healer I recommend Carapacian Epic Cloth with two wands. You should have your gear crafted with the goal of intelligence, focus, focus regen, spell crit and life attunement (socketing). You will need something like 150 Carapace Beetles (to compensate breakages pre R54) and the best place to farm them is Grunvald Shardfall (PVP zone). But I get about 15 an hour so…yah painful.


SPECIALIZATION:

Healing:

There are many benefits that scale with your level. This is incredibly costly so make your decision wisely.


- Healing touch cast/lock time divided by (1+ LifeMastery). This means faster charging for big heals.

- Healing ray, speed boost.

- Purify, instead of doing a single purify, will turn into a purify over time, repurifying every 3 seconds for 1+(lifeMastery x 9) ticks, so 10 ticks over 30 seconds at mastery 80.

- Banish Undead, increases the Minimum Damage it can do by Life Mastery % (Base is 10-35 so at mastery 80, it will be 20-35 base). In the Rise Lich room I hit aoe for 175 and crit in high 200s.

- Resurrection, cast and lock time reduced by (1+ lifemastery), so cuts time in half at mastery 80.

- Healing grace, reduced focus cost.

- Healing Blast, reduced casting and lock time.


My second is Heavy Armor for the Valiant Warden boost, but many go with Focus. (I am still in debate on this, but my second build is a heavy armor DPSr so I know I am not totally min/maxed but it works for me)


PLAY STYLE:

I believe the Healer should keep the Harp of Invigoration up at all time. SO make sure you are ranged if you can with the tank as he is doing enough button clicking, taking anything off their plate is a god send.


When the tank starts the pull I cast a stacked Healing Grace and then Spell binder stance. I DO NOT look at anything but the group health bars. I could care less about the screen because focusing on the groups health is paramount. If for some reason many of the health bars are taking damage I may look up to assess if there is an issue and call it out via voice chat. BUT most important is to focus just on the group health bars. I keep my target on the tank (“F” keys) and if needed will touch up the group with healing grace as this HoT is plenty to keep them alive. I use keypad (Razer Nostromo) and mouse to heal, I try not to use the mouse to click as it takes a bit longer to move click the mouse.

When things start to go bad I will use Healing Ray and dependent on the fight I may be close enough to the tank to use healing touch. You’re the healer and can tell people where to stand. I try and group the ranged in one spot and usually stand with them so healing touch is also an option on them. Most efficient use of both skills is to stack, but time isn’t always on your side. If in full cloth click escape glyph to keep agro down and always make sure spell binder stance, aetheric feedback and a shield are up. Remember the longer you don't do damage or move the more your heals will do as you get a modifier for doing neither.

Another play style option is AOE air stuns. I can use them in lue of heals. I can stun lock large groups of mobs with those spells and that means I don't have to heal, so this is s a judgement call but for me it works great. Essentially I am a healer/crowd control if needed. BUT I don't stun unless I feel it is worth the commitment of losing the gains to heals due to stillness and not doing damage plus the huge possibility of gaining agro.

This leaves healing blast, WOW, just WOW. I crit heal for 600+. Now that sounds great and it is...but the agro it generates can be a total headache. So use it only when needed. Like most all games the tank and the healer are the only talkers in chat (in my opinion). So if you feel you have gained the agro call it out to your tank and let him pull the mobs off you. Don't do the chicken dance and run, Healing Grace yourself then Healing Touch and let your team do their job.


Now for Testudo and Valiant Warden (always stacked). 9% damage resistance (GM) Testudo can be a very nice bump, still waiting on a long term determination but right now I find this a great buff I can keep on the tank. I do love Valiant Warden, some will argue the tank should cast but I disagree. Put the VW on the tank and you increase his overall hp as you are now taking some of his damage. This means when the Lich or Ancient Dragons hit you are effectively making your tank a much heartier tank. When doing mob bosses you should not get that much agro so just keep a healing grace on yourself and enjoy.


Last thing is call out your Resurrections, I find it most helpful for another person in the group to have this duty but either way make sure you say “resing XXX” and wait for that person to respond “got it”. Many times the Res doesn’t work and we need everyone on their feet.


Most every fight is situational and changing the deck is something I find myself doing a lot. When I am doing Superstition Canyon Control Point I tweak a bit differently than dragons or Lich platform in the Rise.


Good Luck and Happy Healing

Crendel

 

@Crendel
Terrific write up a valuable addition to this discussion thank you!

We are about the same Adventure Level so I can appreciate & understand you experience. And... your pure healer setup appears to be quite optimal.

As I kind of alluded to in my original post, my playstyle is kinda driven by my regular group who are all over 100 adventure level & they need "topping off" healing more than anything, if all I did was heal, most of the time I would not be casting very often, especially in places like the Rise (mage room). As I mentioned in OP, my focus for now is to acquire a set of (understanding it is not optimal) armor for use both solo melee & group healing to replace my mismatched collection of armor I currently have. For that I have settled upon Plate Helm, Legs, Boots with Chain Gloves & Chest, allowing me to retain the majority of Plate's DA while reducing my fizzle rate to zero on 100% of my spells using 2 wands and 99% of my spells using a two handed weapon when melee. Probably going to end up being Meteoric Iron or Constantan.

 

Agree with what you said. This setup is for the Lich podium, control points and dragons. I tend to not heal in all others and use a dual wielding dagger plate setup and let our more junior healers suck off my GMs, lol. Way over kill for mage room I agree. But our junior healers are followung this path. I find my daggers with heavy focus on STR far out pass the casters and I usually pull 4 to 6 mages in beserker stance with medium heals needed

Look me up in game and I can drop my gera in the trade window if you want

Crendel

 

@Crendel
We tended to self heal, before I decided to become my regular group's, semi-dedicated/less than optimal healer
But someone needed to do it, to make our limited playtime more smooth.

 

Obsidian plate is actually lower fizzle then other plate armors so you can use a full set without the chain gloves.