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Support Mage / Healer?

Argau

Adventurer
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
I really want to be able to participate in some of the new dungeons and encounters and actuallly feel like I am doing something useful. I love playing healers and supports in other MMOs so I was wondering if something like this could be made in UO?

My skills right now are as follows:

120 Mysticism
120 Focus
100 Cartography
100 Lockpicking
100 Magery
100 Meditation
80 Mining


Right now I use this character for Treasure Hunting and don't really have many issues soloing 6 & 7 Maps although it can take awhile since I mainly just use RC and run around.

I was hoping to be able to soulstone off Carto + Lockpicking & Mining and use the leftover skill points to pick up some more damage or utility so that I feel useful in a group.

I like Mysticism for Cleasing Winds and I was thinking that this would pretty much be my bread and butter for healing others.

My first thought was to pickup Music / Provo so that I could run the Invigorate mastery and act as more of a healer but I'm not sure how effective this would be with just those two skills and no other bard skills for the bonuses. I am also not sure if this is even viable due to mana expenditure?

Another option I was tossing around was Raising Magery to 120 and picking up Spellweaving for being able to use Gift of Renewal, but I am also not sure if Magery + Mysticism + Spellweaving is going to be more spells than I will even be able to use effectively.

Being able to withstand some hits and not die so fast is also important to me so I am open to any other ideas that people may have about what I should be running with. Pretty open to any input that people have about what they would not hesitate to bring along with them on a hunt for support.
 

Lord GOD(GOD)

Certifiable
Stratics Veteran
It sounds like you're playing purely PvM in Tram rule set facets, so my suggestions are based on that, they would be entirely different if you were playing support for Fel spawns. So correct me if that's the wrong assumption.

It would also help if you elaborated on which hunts specifically you're going along to? Are you with your own group or just helping out random people?

Reason for the first question is it affects how useful your support will be. If for example you were playing support at Paroxysmus' with the Provoke Mastery people are going to be Poisoned most of the time which means a lot of Provokes heals are going to be blocked. Same goes for anything that Mortals a lot.

Reason for the second questions is that Cleansing Wind & Bard Masteries are more useful in a party, and random players don't always want to party because it means you getting in on their loot/fame/karma, even if it's your own group on most bosses people drop the party at the end.

All that said I have the following comments for you to pick and choose from.

Melee defense. Read this post #4 to understand your own defense:
weapon defense
One of the Mysticism Masteries lets you have Mysic Weapon -5 skill for the same effect as a Mage Weapon but I'd also say that in most cases it's a waste of a Mastery.

Having multiple spell schools (Myst/Mage/Spellweaving) is ok if you understand how they all play together and what their functions are. The short version is Magery on it's own is all you really need to be a support healer. Cleansing Wind is essentially a 6th circle spell, and while it can remove a few curses they're less important than healing the damage, why this matters is because Greater Heal is 4th circle Magery and casts quicker, has the best range and heals for a substantial amount, which can be boosted further by Spellweaving, you also have Arch Cure for group curing which is more reliable than Cleansing Wind, the ability to Res, the ability to cast Wall Of Stone (if you're somewhere hectic you can block yourself and a ghost in to a one tile spot to Res safely), and Protection, I would highly recommend not playing in Prot all the time, but switch in and out of it as needed, it is much more beneficial to learn how to cast and time spells while being attacked, also has Dispel/Mass Dispel. Mysticism is a powerhouse of defense for yourself with a few things you can do for supporting others. From the sounds of it you know all about Cleansing Wind already, you've also got Stone Form, which makes you completely immune to Poison as in can't be Poisoned at all, stat curses, Bleed (I think), and gives you a nice boost to your resists so you take less damage with a few penalties to speed etc. You also have Mass Sleep which is very useful when you see someone struggling whether 1v1 or by a group you can unflag all the monsters from them, useful on spawns and selected bosses (like Semidar) but not much else. You have to also be aware that most boss level monsters counter attack, and their counter attacks are triggered by you damaging/cursing them. You also have Healing Stone, and Spell Trigger which you can set to Cleansing Wind for an emergency button. All in all it's pretty damn hard to die on a Mystic. Spellweaving again is hugely defensive, it has two great Masteries, Mana Shield which can reduce incoming damage, and Summon Reaper which has a nice area draw effect for distracting mobs. Attunement allows you to ignore an amount of melee damage, though on some bosses it also prevents you doing any damage to them while it's active. Gift Of Life can be useful sometimes, providing you aren't going to get Res killed. Gift Of Renewal is great for the fact it heals through all of the things that block healing but it also has a cool down and can only be on one person. Arcane Empowerment boosts the effect of your Magery heal spells, it's often better to switch to Lesser Heal when using it as they are so much quicker.

As for Bard skills. On most bosses Provoke itself is pretty useless but it depends where you are. For example if you were doing Ilshenar Champion spawns are Valor then it's very useful because there's a woods full of Parragon Greater Dragons to Provoke on the champion. The Mastery for Provoke increases stats and HP, based on real Bard skill points at 4x120 (Music/Peace/Prov/Disc) it is 23 HP which goes over the cap to give you 173. It heals you, your followers and anyone you're partied for that is in range for about 20 every 2 seconds, it is blocked by Poison/Mortal. Discord, most bosses shrug off most of the effects, but it is nearly always good to have a Discorder it allows everyone to have an easier time. The two Mastery's for Discord are also very powerful and allow you to get damage and rights while supporting the group. To sustain Discord Masteries I think you pretty much need 40 LMC, 120 Med and 30 MR on the suit, the damage is boosted by real Bard skill points. Peace, the skill itself is useless most bosses can't be Peaced. The Masteries, however, I would highly recommend for your purposes. They actively reduce all incoming damage, give an auto Cure effect for some levels of Poison (like how Vamp Form/orange petals do) and boosts all three Regens which also over cap and because it's Regen rather than healing it works through all things that block.

Other potential options you may want to consider are cross healing with bandages. Entirely different playstyle, you would need to maintain 140 Dex for the fastest bandage speed, which means it combines well with something like Stone Form where you can't have your stats lowered. Lacks range obviously you have to be within 2 tiles. Also 4/6 Chivalry, Close Wounds lacks range but it's fast and you can move in and out, Cleanse By Fire has great range, Noble Sacrifice redlines all your stats but Res's everyone in an area and I think Heals/Cures them too... if you were playing somewhere where you're not going to take any damage you could use Lich Form (for 13 MR) and stand there spamming Noble Sacrifice. It also has a very fast Remove Curse and Dispel. For your own defense Ninjitsu is also very strong, you can combine Bard skills/Masteries with Animal Forms (for example Prov+Wolf for 43 over capped HP, or Peace+Cat/Dog for 80+ HP Regen), plus Mirror Images. Like Mysticism it's near impossible to die on a Ninja playing defensively. These are more all out 'I'm just there to heal you guys' options which lack offense but all worth knowing to combine with other options to make something fun/interesting/useful.

If you're going with Bard skills, I'd suggest getting at least 2, either Prov+Discord or Peace+Discord. You could go 4x120 on Bard skills with 120 Mage/Med, or Myst/Focus, but with Myst obviously you wouldn't have any melee defense. Unless you relies on the Mystic Weapon Mastery which would mean not using a Bard Mastery (which kinda defeats the point). I'd suggest either that or you could do Mage/Med/Music/Disc/Peace/Spellweaving, Spellweaving gives you the added bonus of Word Of Death and is a great stand alone skill like Magery.

If you're staying with Mysticism, which I expect you are, I'd suggest using a Crystalline Ring as it has 20 Focus/20 Magery it'll give you a bit of freedom to do something with points wise.

Probably the best option would be Myst/Focus/Music/Disc/Peace/Magery. Get as many skill points on there as possible and put whatever in Med... if you can't get any Med you may as well make the suit non-Med and get 55 LMC.
 
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Argau

Adventurer
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
Thanks for the breakdown! Right now I am not going on any specific hunts but I would love to be able to go to anything and feel like I am actually helping out and able to contribute.
I really like the idea you suggested of Myst/Focus/Music/Disc/Peace/Magery.
I am not opposed to moving Mysticism off and just using Magery as it didn't really occur to me that Magery could be as useful as cleansing winds.
What would your suggestion be for something that didn't use any of the bard skills? I'm willing to give it a shot again but I tried bard once long ago and was not a huge fan of the playstyle, granted I'm sure it has changed quite a bit since then. This would also potentially free up 480 skill points.
 

Lord GOD(GOD)

Certifiable
Stratics Veteran
One thing I didn't consider before, was Peace Masteries vs Stone Form are kind of doing the same job as far as Poison protection goes, so if you were dropping one for the other it might not be a bad idea. Prov Masteries in Stone Form would therefore be a good combination as the heal effect won't get blocked. I'm very pro Bard. They're a lot easier to train than they used to be. Once you get to 90 you can train exclusively with toggling the Masteries on/off. Playstyle wise, for Prov/Peace Masteries you can more or less put them on and run around cross healing people. Discord is more involved because you need to change the damage type for Despair/Tribulation to match the targets weakest resist. For example a Dragon/Reptile Slayer instrument, set to fire damage will do a ton of damage to a White Wyrm compared to if it's set to cold it's highest resist. You can change the damage type with no cool down but have to toggle it on/off to see the new damage, on a long fight it's not hard to figure out what it's lowest resist is if there's no Tamers around to ask. Changing between Masteries has a 10 minute cool down. All Bard Masteries get instant tier 3 from the very easy quest. The effects stop if you don't have enough mana for upkeep or get hit for (I think) 30+ damage, Stone Form, Swamp Dragons, Peace Masteries all helping you take less damage to avoid the effect stopping. Though on many bosses you'll get hit for a lot anyway.

I know you said if not a Bard, but just thought I'd mention those last points.

If you're keeping Mysticism I'd recommend being a gargoyle.

Some templates I'd suggest:
1) Mage/Med/Music/Discord/Prov/Peace
Pure Bard, Mage Weapon setup, no SDI needed. Summons/Mindblast/Vollems/Despair/Tribulation for damage. Switch to Prov/Peace Masteries when playing support. This is what I play on GOD my main, you can solo Doom with instruments. Great cross healer.

2) Mage/Med/Music/Prov/Discord/Spellweaving
As above but less potent Bard Masteries, more defensive with Spellweaving Masteries, needs SDI to make the most out of Word Of Death.

3) Mage/Myst/Focus/Music/Prov/Discord
Summoner template. Mage Weapon setup, SDI optional. Stone Form+Prov Mastery, Discord+Colossus. Great cross healer but more mana intensive (due to no Med) you can make the suit non Med and get 55 LMC.

4) Mage/Myst/Focus/Music/Discord/Spellweaving
As above but SDI is more useful. Stone Form, Discord+Colossus, Word Of Death to finish.

5) Mage/Med/Myst/Focus/Spellweaving/Wrestling
Mage Weapon not required so you can use spellbooks/shields for mods in your hands. Stone Form+Wrestling Mastery for some monsters, on boss fights change to Spellweaving Mastery for Mana Shield, use Colossus until Word Of Death starts working then change to Summon Reaper for extra Word Of Death.

6) Myst/Focus/Music/Discord/Spellweaving/Wrestling
As above but with non Med 55 LMC suit, Discord to help lower defenses of monsters allows Colossus to hit more, may be too mana intensive to use Despair/Tribulation and as such you wouldn't necessarily need 120 Music/Discord in real skill you could jewel up just to Discord bosses and put 60+ points in something else, especially if you're gong to want mana for Word Of Death at the end. No Magery means no Invis, so you will need to use Mass Sleep, you could potentially build this to play just in Stone Form and permanently in Protection (cast from Scroll) which would affect how you build the suit with or without casting. Can't Res.

7) Mage/Med/Spellweaving/Necro (60)/SS (60)/Music/Discord or Peace
Mage Weapon setup, ditching Mysticism for Necro, for Wraith Form. Allows you to drain mana out of monsters, you'll need to use Spellweaving+Discord Masteries for damage. Or if you build with Peace you could change the Necro/SS levels and use Lich Form for super Regens. You could boost with skill items and get it to a full Necro (100/100 is plenty). This templates gives you more offense and debuffs. You can Corpse Skin and Evil Omen for people.

8) Music/Peace/Ninjitsu/Wrestling/Healing/Anatomy/Chivalry
Human character, 4/6 FC/FCR, 18 HP Regen on suit, Cat/Dog Form, plus Peace Mastery. Gives you 68 HP Regen 6.8 HP per second. Mirror Images to stop things hitting you (at 120 Ninjitsu, 90% chance attacks will divert to an Image, the monster loses target but you can still hit, on lesser monsters you could use Wrestling Mastery and Chiv to Wrestle them to death). 4/6 Chivalry when out of Animal Form. This would be a very experimental build I wouldn't recommend this if you're not fully aware of how all the skills work but super fun. Suit would also require 30 MR and 140 Dex to be maintained. Basically you're invincible and can sit there cross healing people with bandages to your hearts content, while the Peace Mastery auto cures them/gives them regens/lowers their damage intake. Could even change Wrestling for a slow weapon skill with a weapon with high base damage and 100 Hit Mana Leech to help with mana upkeep.You could then also add 50 Hit Lower Defense to the weapon to constantly debuff for the group.
 
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CorwinXX

Crazed Zealot
Stratics Veteran
Myst/Focus/Music/Disc/Peace/Magery
It's good setup. I think with Provo instead of Peace it would be even better... especially on the roof. I myself use Provo.
Cleansing Wind is the best skill for healing because you needn't wait till poison goes off. And it also removes curses.
You can get good damage with a slayer spellbook.
 

Argau

Adventurer
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
Thanks so much for all the for all the info! Finished up Magery and now I am working on training up bard skills and I think I am going to give Mage/Med/Music/Discord/Prov/Peace a shot. I think that finally raising all of the related bard skills will allow me a lot of flexibility in switching up the template and finding something that I enjoy.
 

Merlin

The Enchanter
Moderator
Professional
Governor
Supporter
Stratics Veteran
UNLEASHED
Campaign Patron
Thanks for the breakdown! Right now I am not going on any specific hunts but I would love to be able to go to anything and feel like I am actually helping out and able to contribute.
I really like the idea you suggested of Myst/Focus/Music/Disc/Peace/Magery.
I am not opposed to moving Mysticism off and just using Magery as it didn't really occur to me that Magery could be as useful as cleansing winds.
What would your suggestion be for something that didn't use any of the bard skills? I'm willing to give it a shot again but I tried bard once long ago and was not a huge fan of the playstyle, granted I'm sure it has changed quite a bit since then. This would also potentially free up 480 skill points.
My support caster is a Mystic Bard similar to this, noting similar to Corwin, that I have Provo instead of Peace. I run the Provo masteries and also have 120 meditation and 28/30 Mana regen. I get quite a lot of points from items and rings (I get 55 focus from crystalline ring, mystic memento talisman, obidence belt, and a legendary bracelet). My mana regeneration is almost too high at this point, so I was contemplating adding some points to Eval Intel so that magery wouldn't be completely wasted.

Generally, I just throw up an RC, run both provo songs for my group and focus on healing. I will disco the boss and primarily focus on keeping my team healthy instead of damage output.
 

Lord GOD(GOD)

Certifiable
Stratics Veteran
Thanks so much for all the for all the info! Finished up Magery and now I am working on training up bard skills and I think I am going to give Mage/Med/Music/Discord/Prov/Peace a shot. I think that finally raising all of the related bard skills will allow me a lot of flexibility in switching up the template and finding something that I enjoy.
Dungeon Doom is going to be relevant and a desirable place to hunt again soon and this build can solo it just with instruments. Obviously it's also a powerhouse of support and cross healing capabilities.
 
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