Should I Make a Human, Dark Elf or Gnome for Cleric?

[Vexenu]

Dude, you're being willfully obtuse. It doesn't matter that it's a bad snare. It matters that it's a SNARE that is castable by Clerics and Shaman, who don't normally have access to the spell at all. Of course you don't have the same sort of tricks available with it that you do with a 6 minute Druid snare, but that doesn't mean it's useless. You just cast it when the mob is about to die to prevent it from running. That's it. It works perfectly fine for that purpose. I have a lot of experience using the item. I boxed a Mage/Cleric duo with it on TAKP and used it extensively while leveling. Six seconds is a perfectly manageable cast time, and you're much better off from an efficiency perspective losing one tick of med time in exchange for the benefit of landing a snare on a fleeing mob.

This is literally not even up for debate. This is just you being in denial.

[DeathsSilkyMist]

Originally Posted by Vexenu [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

Dude, you're being willfully obtuse. It doesn't matter that it's a bad snare. It matters that it's a SNARE that is castable by Clerics and Shaman, who don't normally have access to the spell at all. Of course you don't have the same sort of tricks available with it that you do with a 6 minute Druid snare, but that doesn't mean it's useless. You just cast it when the mob is about to die to prevent it from running. That's it. It works perfectly fine for that purpose. I have a lot of experience using the item. I boxed a Mage/Cleric duo with it on TAKP and used it extensively while leveling. Six seconds is a perfectly manageable cast time, and you're much better off from an efficiency perspective losing one tick of med time in exchange for the benefit of landing a snare on a fleeing mob.

This is literally not even up for debate. This is just you being in denial.

I am not. You are simply overestimating the value of snare neck because you like it. Give me an example of a camp where you think it is needed. I'll test it and make a video showing you probably don't need it[You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

[Jimjam]

Just because it isn't needed doesn’t mean it isn’t useful. Thats a false dichotomy that has already been addressed.

[Vexenu]

I never said you "need" it. Any more than a Warrior needs an Incarnadine BP or a Monk needs Elder Beads or a Wizard needs a Rend Robe. I said that it's a great item in terms of efficiency. There is no drawback to having access to one, and plenty of opportunities to make use of it, primarily when duoing. As I said, I got a ton of use out of it with a Mage/Cleric duo leveling on TAKP.

Easy example of how it's useful: farming ice giants in Everfrost. They have a lot of HP, so having your pet melee one down the final 20% of its health while it flees can take awhile. It might also path into the spawn of the other giant, which is annoying and possibly fatal if you're not paying close attention. You're also loaded down with excessive weight from Fine steel and gold/plat, so you don't want to be running halfway across the zone to loot a corpse.

All of this was easily avoided by casting the snare neck, allowing the pet to finish off the final 20% off the giant's health while it didn't run anywhere.

[DeathsSilkyMist]

If you don't need it, then alternate strategies work just as well. So it's a preference thing, rather than something that is granting you new possibilities. That is my point. I have no problem if you prefer using snare neck. That doesn't mean it is superior, saves mana, etc.

Ice Giants are not difficult at all, you do not need snare neck to do that camp efficiently.

[Jimjam]

Originally Posted by DeathsSilkyMist [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

If you don't need it, then alternate strategies work just as well. So it's a preference thing, rather than something that is granting you new possibilities. That is my point. I have no problem if you prefer using snare neck. That doesn't mean it is superior, saves mana, etc.

Ice Giants are not difficult at all, you do not need snare neck to do that camp efficiently.

I don't think you can dismiss a camp just because it's easy. That's just trying to talk down the point.

Besides which, alternate strategies won't work just as well. Very annoying having to deal with gate/cheal because instead of snaring it you rooted it or fought it close to an ally. Especially against unstunnable clerics. Often you'll need to clear more incidental mobs to make your fight area safe too if not using snare.

I gave a real example where we would have been better off with snare (fighting giant clerics or huge hp mobs at King Tormax's house).

[Vexenu]

If you don't understand how missing one med tick is superior mana efficiency to having to cast the extra pet summon or heal to tank an additional 20% of an Ice Giant's health bar, I don't know what to tell you.

[Jimjam]

Snare is really good for removing SoW from NPCs in dungeons too. SoWed runners are a death sentence. Sure you can try rooting them, but that won't strip sow and if root breaks ... WHEEEEEEEEEEEEEE they're gone.

Also p99 very non classic, sowed runners don't flee fast enough at low hp.

[Danth]

I agree that "need" is the wrong baseline for this discussion since none of the cleric racial bonuses are necessary by definition--all clerics can perform their jobs. I also agree that snare is a nice quality of life item to have on occasion. Sure you can live without it. So what? There are many things I can live without in-game but which are nice to have. What are you going to take in its place? Clerics can live without tinkering, they can live without sneak, they can live without paineel quest items....it's all icing and all of it has relative value for various purposes.

Nobody who has a melee wants to be chasing full-speed runners to finish them off, not with P99's ever-crabby hitboxes. That's a miserable life. Hence why the snare neck sees much discussion for use in a cleric-based duo with a melee player when they don't otherwise have snare. It also opens up limited fear-kiting for such a duo. While not strictly necessary--the wife and I used to duo lower guk with our paladin/cleric duo w/o a snare, and we managed--it does open up nice quality of life and some additional options. Maybe it's not godly, but it's not junk, either, at least not to that specific sub-set of players who like to operate in that type of duo.

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Shamwowi, how often do you use Clinging on your shadowknight? I use it frequently on mine. Cascading is the one I seldom use due to the immense mana cost. Otherwise clinging, engulfing, and dooming all see fairly regular use. It isn't uncommon that I might have two of them on the spellbar at once.

Danth

[Danth]

Originally Posted by Jimjam [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

Also p99 very non classic, sowed runners don't flee fast enough at low hp.

I didn't want to bring up how gimped and generally less threatening runners are on P99, and always have been, because that's something of a different discussion. We can only play the game that's before us, perfect emulation or not, and it's best to make recommendations for the game which exists rather than for changes that may or may not ever be implemented.

Originally Posted by Vexenu [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

If you don't understand how missing one med tick is superior mana efficiency to having to cast the extra pet summon or heal to tank an additional 20% of an Ice Giant's health bar, I don't know what to tell you.

I assume that's the cleric summon pet?