Beginner's guide to playing a cleric

Feeling the calling to be a cleric? Clerics are a crucial profession in Elanthia, as they are they only profession able to resurrect other adventurers. Clerics are also strong casters in their own right, with a variety of abilities and flexible training paths to suit many characters. Finally a cleric's intimate connection to the Arkati affords unique role-playing opportunities. If you are in the first 30 days of your account, you can switch training points between your skills at no cost, so use this guide as a starting point to experiment with different styles to see what suits you best!

Clerical Overview

Clerics have several general training paths available to them. One end of the spectrum is the warding cleric who focuses solely on warding spells. A little more versatile is the pure cleric that also trains in bolt spells. Less popular after the introduction of the paladin profession but still viable is the melee cleric, who tend to favor two-handed weapons or brawling. Finally the rescuing cleric focuses on saving other adventurers from death.

Life and Death in Elanthia

No matter your training path resurrecting the dead is a hallmark of being a cleric. Clerics do not gain this awesome power initially, as they must advance to at least the 18th level to cast raise dead. Clerics earn a significant amount of experience from resurrecting the dead, in addition to the general gratitude of the populace. The general process is as follows. When an adventurer dies, they have a race-specific decay timer of at least ten minutes. The cleric can pause this timer with their preservation spell, or another adventurer can use a white flask. Preservation is not required for resurrection but is generally advisable. Once the corpse is in a safe location and cleaned of wounds, the cleric must establish a spiritual link with the corpse to prevent another cleric from interfering with the rite. Finally the cleric casts raise dead at a cost of mana and spirit to the cleric, raising the adventurer in a weakened state; the exact costs of this spell depend on the cleric's training. More details of this process can be read in the respective spell entries.

The Arkati and You

Another nearly universal aspect of being a cleric is your relationship to the "gods" of Elanthia, the Arkati. Although it is not strictly necessary to convert to a specific Arkati, aligning yourself with a specific Arkati will effect the damage and messaging of some cleric spells. In particular the main offensive warding cleric spell smite/bane depends upon alignment, with Liabo Arkati strong against the undead and Lornon Arkati strong against the living. Your chosen Arkati can also have a non-mechanical influence on your character, depending upon your style of roleplay. Powerful clerics are able to commune with their Arkati, a unique opportunity to interact with a GameMaster.

Starting Your Character

While each race has different adjustments to their stats, making some races more optimal than others, these differences are ultimately marginal and do not preclude a viable character of any race. The main clerical stats are wisdom and intuition - these stats yield double training points. The wisdom stat bonus also increases casting strength (CS). Aura is also somewhat important for clerics since it determines spirit, which is necessary to resurrect other adventurers. Other stats become important depending on the training path. For example, bolting clerics will want a higher dexterity since it affects bolt attack strength.

Training Paths: Pure Warder

As pures, clerics are intended to utilize magic to survive in Elanthia. The pure warding cleric is the most traditional play style and can serve as a starting point to experiment off of. All casting clerics need eight ranks of Armor Use to fully train for double leather. This basic armor provides full coverage with no spell hindrance, and the goal of most pures is to avoid being hit by a foe in the first place. At least 24 ranks of Spiritual Mana Control are needed to successfully resurrect an adventurer (you can over-train in this skill to cast resurrection at level 18). Physical Fitness, Perception, and Spiritual Lore, Blessings are basic skills that should be trained in once per level.

Beyond these requirements, the pure caster will want to invest in spell ranks. The cleric spell circle naturally provides the main arsenal of spells. CS is calculated so that each additional spell rank beyond the player's level increases strength at a decreasing rate. The most efficient investment is an extra 21 ranks beyond the current level (e.g., 41 ranks for a level 20 player). However clerics also have access to the Major Spiritual and Minor Spiritual spell circles, which have important spells (and also boost CS). Each player will have different priorities, but spirit warding, spell shield, and lesser shroud are important goals. Remember you must be at least the same level as the spell to cast it.

A variety of secondary skills will also be useful and can be trained in at the player's discretion. Arcane Symbols and Magic Item Use are necessary to use scrolls and magical items respectively, providing the cleric with access to outside spell circles. These skills also contribute to runestaff defense, the cleric's main defensive weapon. Early on, training twice per level in Harness Power will provide much-needed mana. First Aid is useful to bandage bleeding wounds when no empath is available. The other two types of Spiritual Lore enhance cleric spells in different ways and can be trained in as the player sees fit, particularly if one of the below variations is used. Finally some ranks of Climbing and Swimming will be needed to access certain hunting grounds.

Base Training Plan

#	PTP/MTP	Skill	Level 0	Level 10	Level 20	Level 30
	15/0	Armor Use	1	8	8	8
	0/3	Spirit Mana Control	1	11	24	30
1x	7/0	Physical Fitness	1	11	21	31
1x	0/3	Perception	1	11	21	31
1x	0/6	Spiritual Lore, Blessings	1	11	21	31
	0/8	Cleric Spell Research	1	15	35	51
	0/8	Major Spiritual Spell Research	1	3	3	5
	0/8	Minor Spiritual Spell Research	1	8	12	19
1x	0/2	Magic Item Use	1	11	21	31
2x	0/4	Harness Power	2	22	42	62
0.5x	1/1	First Aid	0	5	9	14

Variation: Bolter

The bolting cleric supplements the pure training with two ranks per level in Spell Aiming to utilize the three bolt spells available to clerics (holy bolt, fire spirit, and web). Bolt attacks can be particularly devastating in combination with the various disability spells available to clerics. Bolts also help the cleric fight effectively against a wider variety of foes and provides access to a variety of wands with sufficient magic item training.

Variation: Rescuer

The rescuing cleric focuses on defensive and utility magic to find and resurrect fallen adventurers while maintaining offensive capabilities. The hallmarks of this training path are transference and spirit guide, which allow the cleric to teleport from town to adventurer and back. Of course raise dead is necessary to return players to life. As these are high-level spells the beginning player cannot neglect some offensive training.

See Also

• Cleric (main article)
• New Players' Guide (a comprehensive beginner's guide for new players of any profession)
• Cleric Guild
• The Art of Roleplaying in GemStone IV (guide)
• Player Guide Contest

References

• Cleric profession on Play.net
• GemStone IV New Player Guide on Play.net

This article is a Stub. You can help GSWiki by expanding it.