This guide is for the person who wants to be the healer of the party. Being the healer is a lot more involved than being a damage dealer and requires concentration and strategy. Healers are an absolutely necessary part of every party so, as a healer, it's easy to get parties. But there's a lot of responsibility involved. Do your job well and you'll find yourself in high demand, instantly scooped up as soon as you shout "LFDP 70 healer". Do your job poorly and you'll likely find yourself pk'd in the middle of a dungeon.

Starting off: Once you get your first job transfer, you'll need to do quests and farming for a bit to get yourself up to a decent level. Parties are going to be hard to come by till you get around level 30 or so and really you don't have much to offer till then. It might not be a bad idea to get a good tanking pet like a tortoise to start off. Get your pet some decent armor and weapons and let him take the hits. The reason is, clerics are squishy. Heck, the R2 armor is so thin it almost looks sheer.

Spells to level up

• One of the most valuable things a healer has to offer a party is buffs. Strength (str), Vitality (vit), Wisdom (wis) and Intelligence (int) are a must.


• you would think as a healer, you want massive heal spells, but it just isn't so. The reasons why, I'll explain later. For now, just know that for your first parties, up to about level 5 is fine.


• Restoration is a spell that gives a little health back and more health over time. It's great for the tank of the party as it keeps the tank alive while you do other things.


• Energy beat ftw! This attack spell has a very quick reset time, does a lot of damage and doesn't cost much in terms of mp. A +1 level 13 energy beat will do more than 3k damage and can even steal aggro.


• minor shining weapon and minor shining armor - You're not going to need them in a party but when you're out farming, they can't hurt.

In the dungeon
The best part of Rappelz (besides the pets) is the synergy of a dungeon party. Everybody has a role to play and relies on everybody else playing their part. One of the most critical roles is that of healer. Without a healer, a party is limited to lower level mobs must take time out to recover now and then. With a healer (or even two) on board, it's non-stop kill, kill, kill which equates to massive experience and job point gains.

The right tools
Once you get in the dungeon, it's time to lose the shield and club or whatever you've been using and get a two handed staff. I don't know why or where it's written but the common wisdom is that staffs help the mage classes regain mp quicker.

Stones
Soulstones are the little stones you pick up as drops that the soulstone crafter in town can embed into your armor and weapons. As a mage class, you'll want intelligence and wisdom. A little extra vitality doesn't hurt as it equates to more hit points and can greatly increase the survivability of your character.

Who to buff what
Before the action even starts, everybody gets buffed. This takes a lot of mp for a full-sized (8 person) party so do a couple of buffs and then quaff some tea or lemonade to start recovering it right away. For the most part, all the party members get all four buffs and the pets get str and vit. Here are some exceptions.
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Archers don't use a lot of mp and their spells are attack spells rather than magical. Just give the archers str and vit.

Mages - Dark Mages, Chaos Mages and Warlocks are squishy and don't melee well. They won't find much use for str. Give them vitality so if they do get aggro, they might survive long enough to get rescued and give them int and wis to make them more effective.

pixies - These pets have a ranged attack and are mostly magical. Give them vit, int and wis like the mages. The blue pixies will have more mana and heal better. The reds will have more effective attacks.

Tank Pets Quite often, a party will use a High Level Pet (HLP) to do the tanking. The tanks job is to gather aggro and take all the hits so the rest of the party can survive. Tank pets often use attack spells to acquire or re-acquire aggro so, besides str and vit, give the tank pet int.

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Surviving as a healer
Healers die a lot and there's no mistaking that. The act of healing a character marks you as a threat to the mobs that are trying to kill that character. There are some ways to minimize the danger.

• Timing is everything. The most dangerous time to cast a heal spell is when someone has thrown a chip at a mob but hasn't yet hit it. Even a low level heal at that point will have the mob veer off straight at you. Another dangerous time is when there are a gang of mobs attacking the tank all at once. Try to heal the tank at that point and you get all his aggro. Bam! One Dead Healer. Wait till there are only one or two mobs on the tank and then start healing.


• Low level heals Here is why leveling up the healing in the beginning is not that critical. High level heals in the middle of the dungeon are sure to get you aggro. Especially if the character you're healing is the one under attack. If there are only one or two mobs on that character and the character has solidly acquired aggro, you can usually get away with level 1 or 2 heals. The trick here is not to wait till your party is in the red. Keep all the party members as close to full health as possible. Use Restoration on the tank as that spell starts off low but keeps adding health. If you need to, cast Restoration and then a couple of level 1 heals to keep him alive till he only has one mob on him, then fill him up.


• Blue pixies - Once you start joining parties, it's time to get a blue pixie. Blue pixies unity will increase the rate at which you regain mp and they can give you a break if you get low. They can also help keep you from getting aggro. Casting a level 1 heal and a level 1 prayer at the same time is a great way to get more bang for the buck. Celestial prayer works something like Restoration with a little health right off the bat and more over time. Also, if somebody really needs the healing but there's a lot of mobs about, you can hit them with a high level pixie heal and then immediately recall your pixie.

Some things to remember

Sit... a lot!When you sit, you regain mp at a much greater rate than when you're standing. Sit/Stand should be on a hot-key and you should sit whenever possible. Some healers complain that it takes too long to stand and then cast but you have to remember you don't have to wait for the animation. You can cast heal as soon as you hit stand and the program will skip the animation and cast that spell right away. Get good at hitting those hot keys in sequence; stand/heal/heal/restoration/sit. Remember, eventually those buffs will wear off and if you're empty when they do, party is over till you sit long enough to charge up anyways. I can't stress it enough. SIT a lot!

Scan, scan, scan - keep the party screen in a clear place on the screen and continually scan it. You never know when somebody who isn't necessarily the tank is going to spell spam a mob and get aggro or a mob is going to come in from nowhere and attack a random player. So while most of your attention is going to be taken up by the tank, never stop scanning for long.

Tea - bring lots of tea with you and keep an eye on your mp. Stay as full as possible at all times.

A buff in time - the first buff of the party is probably not going to be the last. During your scans of the party, be sure to check the buffs. Don't wait till the buffs run out before you rebuff. If you do, you'll end up with a party that has less than full health all the way down the screen. Also, buffing can pull aggro but it helps if the effect is not great, like re-buffing before the last buff runs out. Also, as the party progresses, you might want to stagger your buff rotation. Start at the top when the buffs are only half gone and buff one or two characters. Wait till you regain your mp and buff a couple more. That way, you don't have to expend all your mp at once.

Requiem for the hero There are times when your tank will get ganged and his health will shoot down from green to red before you know it. A good time for your highest level heal right? WRONG!! It hurts to say it and hurts even more to see it but there are times in every healer's career when they just have to watch the worst go down. Trying to save the tank at that point will only get you aggro and then there's nobody there to save the rest of the party and res the tank.
Spell pots - These are the turquoise potions you'll pick up as drops and they're very handy. They enable you to cast more heals in less time and can help keep up with the action.

Speak up! There are time when a party will bite off more than it can chew. Actually, this happens a lot. If you notice you're just barely keeping people alive and your mp just keeps going lower and lower with buffs coming up, speak up. The ones that are too dumb to realize they can't do it without you, you don't want to be responsible for anyway. But some people (especially new players) don't have the concept of keeping an eye on the healer's mp yet and they'll try to blame when the party wipes out. Head them off at the pass and speak up when you realize it just ain't happening. If the party is doing well, but you just happen to hit a patch where you need to use a lot of mp and you get too low, maybe you just need an mp break. Speak up! Better that than to watch your charges die off one by one while you haven't the mp to stop it.

Setting up for healing Personally, I like the Epic V settings because it uses the F1-12 keys that have the little spaces between every fourth key. That way, I don't even have to look at the keyboard to know what spell I'm casting. Here are the spells you need on the straight F-keys (no ctrl or alt modifiers). Level 1 heal, level 4 heal, highest level heal and restoration go on one set of four. To get here, put restoration on the F9 key, your highest level heal on F10, level 4 heal on F11 and level 1 heal on F12. To get a level one heal, you open up your skills box and look for heal. It will have a set of arrows off to the right of it and show your highest level. Click the left arrow till it shows level 4 and drag the icon into your quickslot. Click the left arrow some more till it shows level one and then drag the icon into the quick slot.

Open the actions box and put the sit/stand icon on a quickslot. I like F4 for this.

Other things that need to go in quickslots are tea, blue pots, blue scrolls, food (for healing yourself), and dance (for when you know you did it right).