Tsalinx (prime)/Tsalinx's Cleric Guide

WORK IN PROGRESS

Clerics are my favorite class. Since the class received a "review" in 2019, they have become extremely powerful, versatile, and fun to play. In 2022 we received a class service, Sanctify, that made playing a cleric extremely lucrative. We are also sought out for rescues since we can bring dead adventurers back to life, providing cleric players with a sense of value and importance. Overall, if you choose to play a cleric, you can't go wrong. Here I will use my experience to provide some advice to help maximize your powers and reap the rewards of the holy (or unholy) life.

My experience: I played a cleric named Tsalin in the 1990s up to roughly level 160 - I believe I was the highest level cleric in the lands when I quit. I returned in 2017 and rolled up a new cleric, Tsalinx, who I capped in about a year. In 2021 I started another cleric, Tsalyn, who I capped in 7 month's time. I have another cleric in his 60's as well. Point being: I have a ton of experience leveling clerics and I hope this guide helps you or someone you know!

First Things First

If you're brand new to the game, make sure to check out the New Players' Guide to learn the basics.

I also recommend you read my Pre Level 20 Leveling Tips for some more general advice, although I will cover some of that here where pertinent.

Using a Training Spreadsheet can be very helpful for planning your skills and stats. Many of my screenshots below will come from this spreadsheet.

Pre Level 20 Decisions

Choosing a Race

Gemstone is a roleplaying game - so first and foremost, if that matters to you at all, you should choose whatever race you want to be. No race is bad - they all have their strengths and weaknesses. The important thing is to have fun...so pick something fun!

That being said, if you're like me and you think you'll have fun playing any race, here are some considerations:

• Many attacks/setups that clerics use are CS-based. Our CS is modified by our wisdom bonus, and there are only two classes that have a bonus to wisdom: dark elf and forest gnome. Many people choose dark elf because they don't want the -10 strength bonus that forest gnomes receive. All of my modern clerics are dark elves.
• Historically, two other important attributes have been sought after in clerics: being strong for dragging dead bodies and having a high spirit generation rate for Raise Dead. This meant that dwarf and giantman were common cleric races. While they are still excellent choices, dragging dead bodies is less of an issue/concern these days and spirit regen, while helpful, is no longer of huge importance.
• While we do have a diverse set of bolt attacks, which are improved with dexterity, I find them to be the weakest part of our overall toolkit. I would not highly prioritize a dexterity bonus when choosing my race, but if you want to use bolt spells as your primary attack (it's still good!), you may want to take that into consideration. I'll discuss bolting more below.
• If you're rolling up a cleric primary to sell the Sanctify service, you might be interested in a race with a nice influence bonus.

Setting Your Initial Stats

Let's talk about the importance of each individual stat for clerics pre-20:

• Wisdom - increases your warding CS and gives double training points benefit
• Intuition - gives double training points
• Dexterity - increases your Bolt AS and reduces melee roundtime
• Logic - increases the rate of experience absorption
• Strength - allows you to carry more and improves melee/brawling attack strength (AS) if you choose that route
• Constitution - allows you to carry more
• Agility - increases brawling Unarmed Attack Factor (UAF) and reduces melee roundtime
• Aura - increases spirit points which is useful when you reach level 18...not so much before then unless you join CoL
• Influence - not very useful early on
• Discipline - not very useful early on

Clerics have wisdom and intuition as their prime requisite stats, which grant double the training points. Wisdom is key for improving your casting strength (CS) as well. I'd set both of these to 100 to start. After that, it depends somewhat on what strategy you want to use (see below). Other things aside, we favor the mental stats over the physical ones, because these grant mental training points (MTPs) that we need for our magical training. It is normal to quickly run out of MTPs and have to use PTPs instead, which requires 2 PTPs converted for each 1 MTP.

Note: you get 5 “free” stat changes that you will lose when you hit level 20. After 20, you have to buy (with silvers, simucoins, or bounty points) a FIXSTATS potion, which is rather expensive. You can use these by checking in to the local inn. When you adjust your stats, you are adjusting your level 0 stats, which will then automatically "grow" to your level when you're done.

Early on, set your stats to give you the best combat effectiveness. If possible, I also like to make sure Logic is 100 to maximize EXP gain, though you may have to settle on 90. You might want to change your stats to accommodate different builds as you get closer to 20 and test out your strategy options. When you’re about to hit level 20, use one stat change to lock in your long-term plan. This means you need to save one for your "final" stats change before you hit level 20. More on this below.

Here's an example of how I would start a new dark elf cleric at level 0. Note that if you choose a different race, you may want to compensate in different areas. For example, if you choose a forest gnome, you may want to increase strength some more to make up for their -10 bonus. INSERT SCREENSHOT HERE

How to Train a Young Cleric (Skills)

Clerics have a diverse toolkit with many options for how to hunt. It's often better to focus on one strategy rather than to be a jack of many trades (you can't do them all!), but this comes down to your playstyle and preferences.

Pure Warding

This is the build I recommend to START, although sometime between level 9 and 20 it becomes one of the weaker options. Early on you will pretty much do nothing but spam cast Smite/Bane (302), which is also fairly boring. It is, however, effective early on with the right training.

Condemn (309) Build

This strategy uses Condemn (309) as your primary attack spell, and so it is not available until level 9. Depending on many factors, it may be mana-intensive, and really takes off at level 20 when you learn Ethereal Censer (320). The game plan is to bind them with 301 or 118 and then cast 309, giving you a +100 bonus to the end roll and practically guaranteeing huge damage.

Bolting Build

Against undead targets, this can be a strong build. I don't prefer it, but early on against undead it is strong. At higher levels, it becomes weaker than Condemn (309). Similar game plan as above: bind them, then bolt.

Melee or Brawling

This used to be the most common method for almost everyone to get to level 20, mostly because young casters didn't have enough mana to hunt effectively until later in life. Years ago, however, changes were made to how Harness Power provides mana at lower levels, granting lowbies a much larger mana pool.

I won't spend much time on it here because I don't think it's fun or necessary, but in general you're going to train once every level in physical fitness, combat maneuvers, harness power, and whatever weapon skill you choose to focus on (generally either two-handed weapons to use a claidhmore or brawling to do unarmed combat). The rest of your points should probably go into spells, with a priority towards learning the spells that provide +AS/UAF: Benediction (307), Bravery (211), Heroism (215). Remember that you can change your spell training at any time, so feel free to focus in one area and then completely change it at level 7, 11, and 15 when you are able to cast those spells.

Join a Society

Joining a society is an important decision for roleplay, hunting power, and utility reasons. Each society has its own benefits, but in general it's best to join early so you can start using those benefits to help your hunting. It may also affect your strategy decisions: for example, if you join the Order of Voln you will likely hunt mostly undead.

Personally I think Voln has the best utility and synergizes very well with clerics, given our powerful Prayer of Holding (301) spell that only works on undead and our ability to get undead-only holy fire flares for free. However it provides a number of benefits that are redundant with our profession abilities (preserving corpses, group teleportation, blessing weapons, etc.). Voln also requires ongoing undead hunting, because killing undead earns favor, which is required to use your symbols. The biggest draw here, personally, is the use of Symbol of Seeking which provides amazing utility and costs no favor to use.

CoL is also a strong choice, mainly due to Sign of Wracking. While you won't NEED this ability, it is very strong and useful. You will want to make sure you have enough spirit points to use it. The main disadvantage is the risk of having low spirit, which includes spirit death and reduced defensive ability. CoL is also the most boring society...but the signs you use are fairly cheap (mana and spirit) and last a long time. Mastering CoL is the fastest/easiest of the three societies.

The Guardians of Sunfist is probably the least popular society, although it has strong utility and sigils. This is probably because it's the most difficult to master; you'll really want to complete it before you hit level 20. The sigils cost mana and stamina. You get access to your own personal hunting areas called warcamps. To me this is the least attractive society but some swear by it!

This debate about which society to join is heavily debated and it comes down to your personal preference and roleplaying decisions. The above are just my personal opinions.

Before You Hit Level 20

When you get close to 20 it’s time to consider your long-term stats and skills. After you hit 20, you won't be able to change these easily anymore. When you are 1000 exp away from level 20, the game will pause your experience gain until you CONFIRM that you're ready to proceed...so that's a great time to make these changes. Hopefully you already tested out different strategies and know what you want to focus on!

Locking In Your Level 20+ STATS

Now that you've chosen a strategy for go forward with, you will need to set stats that are best for that strategy. The main decision, in my mind, is whether you want to put extra points into dexterity so you can use BOLT spells. I capped Tsalyn in 7 months using mostly 309, and never needed bolts, so you're ok skipping them...but many people enjoy the diversity.

There are generally two schools of thought with regards to level 20+ stat allocation:

• Optimize for cap: set your stats at 19 such that you will have “perfect” stats at cap (level 100). While this can be rewarding later on, it makes the leveling process much more difficult. You will be weaker in key stats for a long time, and you’ll have less training points to use. Not recommended for new players.

Here are examples for a level 19 dark elf cleric - again you may want to adjust based on your race choice: INSERT SCREENSHOTS HERE

• Optimize for level 50 (ish): set your stats at 19 such that your most important stats will hit 100 at level 50. This is a good balance and will not greatly hinder you early on, yet you will still have fairly good stats at cap. At some point after you cap, you can invest in a FIXSTATS potion to achieve perfect stats. If you do bounties throughout the process, you can usually afford to buy one with bounty points you’ve earned along the way.

Here are examples for a level 19 dark elf cleric - again you may want to adjust based on your race choice: INSERT SCREENSHOTS HERE