Will only say you seemed to take my comments much more seriously than I meant them. As you can see, people have some very basic disagreements about Empathy powers and their use. If you're unwilling to consider other views or listen to constructive criticism, then your guide can hardly be called definitive.
Don't get me wrong, it's a great guide, a very good place to start, I wish everyone I had ever grouped with had read it. =)
Well done!
I'm playing my first char- lvl 11 defender empathy/dark blast
I've got teleport as my first pool power, but my question is- should I start looking at adding the fitness pool? I burn end so fast when watching out for large groups that its just not funny. Anyone else with experience have any ideas? I've maxed my enhancements.
Thanks for the guide! 
Its kinda hard to say what to chose. Leadership may be worth looking into. The only reason I say that is think of healing as a theory. "Would it not be easier to prevent the damage rather than repair it?" Sure there is always the forcefield/empath discussion, but for this thread we are looking at empath so what power pool would follow that theory?...In my opinion Leadership would be a nice fit. You give nice damage and defense bonuses to the team with Tactics/Maneuvers/Assault. AND they work great for the solo game. Its an extreme approach to damage prevention but I think the pluses from a soloist aspect really appeal to me.
Mabye we can come up with the ideal template and add it to the guide here.......
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First Aid of "The Rookies"
emp/psy lvl 11 on Pinnacle
Foxbat_Defender:
There are MANY paths to go when enhancing. Some folks like smaller heals they throw a lot. Others prefer larger heals they throw less regularly. There's really no right/wrong here and you can try different approaches to see what suits you and the groups you tend to run with.
With my defender I fell into the former camp and I used Hasten from the Superspeed Pool to increase the frequency yet again. The reason for this was I felt it was less risky for the group if I kept the group topped off. While throwing larger heals less frequently is more END efficient, the downside is that you have to allow people to lose more health (so that your bigger, less-used heals don't end up 'overhealing' or wasting healing pts) ... and that imposes more risk to those you're with.
I placed -all- enhancement slots on odd levels into Healing Aura, Heal Other, and Absorb Pain to try to bring them to 6 slots as rapidly as possible -- with my focus being on Aura and Other, since Absorb Pain's already highly efficient. I ran the following up until Level 17:
Healing Aura: 3 generic END reduction, 2 generic recharge reduction, 1 generic +heal
Heal Other: 3 generic END reduction, 2 generic recharge reduction, 1 generic +heal
Absorb Pain: 1 generic recharge reduction, 4 generic +heal
Hasten: 1 generic recharge reduction
At 17 I added another slot to Absorb Pain to bring it to 6 and switched to DO enhancements. Knowing that Recovery Aura was coming at 18, my layout changed to the following:
Healing Aura: 2 DO END reduction, 2 DO recharge reduction, 2 DO +heal
Heal Other: 2 DO END reduction, 2 DO recharge reduction, 2 DO +heal
Absorb Pain: 1 DO recharge reduction, 5 DO +heal
Hasten: 1 DO recharge reduction
This is how my enhancments remained until it was time to switch up to SO enhancments. Layout stayed the same, just SO instead of DO.
NOTE: This is a highly END INEFFICIENT build. It sacrifices the ability to conserve end for the ability to heal often. As such, it's built to rely on Recovery Aura very heavily -- which I slotted with 6 recharge reduction enhancements as soon as I could.
I did not have Stamina and were I to do it again, it'd be in the build.
Interestingly, I DID take leadership -- the whole pool. It seems to be a popular choice among empaths who would prefer to sacrifice attacks in favour of adding more to the group. This has the side-effect of the empath drawing almost zero aggro, as the empath isn't attacking, but rather, providing heals and buffs.
Leadership will compound your END-woes if you take all 3 toggles from it -- even with 1 END reduction enhnacement in it. I personally would not take leadership again for one reason and one reason only: too many mezzes/roots/holds/stuns at the higher levels without a GROUP buff/clear to counter them (a game design flaw in my opinion) means your toggles will go down a lot. This annoyed me and so did burning time and watching the same cheesy leadership animation (for all 3) as I re-fired them.
Vengeance has other issues. Too situational IMHO -- AND it's a ranged power, not a toggle, so you had to have line of sight AND be within range of your fallen comrade to use it. Nice buff -- a la fortitude with a small heal ... but seems to last a bit longer. Just not enough and too many usage drawbacks for me to take it again.
NOTE: The above was only 1 way to go about things .... to each his/her own.
As a controller right now I have only 4 slots in Healing Aura and Heal Other ... and a measly 1 slot in Absorb Pain (which is all I'll ever have in AP on my controller). This is all I intend to put into them.
I draw more aggro now since I must attack -- and on my build, most of the aggro I draw is from AoE attacks, which is nasty, so I have to be more sparing about AP use. I heal for less than my defender and always will ... but I don't -need- to heal people as often or for as much, as CC keeps them from getting as badly damaged in the first place. Many fights with only me as both the controller and the healer I don't need to throw a heal at all...
Current controller layout for heals is as follows:
Healing Aura: 1xDO END reduction, 1xDO recharge reduction, 2xDO +heal
Healing Other: 1xDO END reduction, 1xDO recharge reduction, 2xDO +heal
Absorb Pain: 1xDO +heal
Hasten: 1xDO recharge reduction
Despite being far more END effieicient now (costs less END to prevent damage than to heal it back) I took Stamina at 20 and will pick up Recovery Aura at 28. This is somewhat redundant, but because I'm attacking the damage mitigation issue from both sides (preventing it in the first place as well as healing it after it's taken) I am shooting for the ability to spam heals out while I control. It's the heals that bleed me dry of END, not the control powers ... and circa 29 I am hoping to be able to heal as often as I could on my defender ... for less health per heal, of course ... while I control -- without emptying my endurance tank between Recovery Auras.
I look forward to others posting their builds and reasoning behind them...
-- Xurbax
Excellent posts here 
As someone who prefers to be the empath/healer I have to admit I've yet to get into that roll in CoH as much as I would have though, but instead have built in some aspect of healing on nearly every character I've made thus far. I look forward to the progression of learning how to play the Emp/Dark class, but I am having such a blast with a storm defender it may be a while yet.
[color=violet]
Amethystle - 63 Elven Empath - Dragonrealms
Amethystle - 50, RR5 Mend Healer - DAOC
[color=black]CoH - Guardian
[color=violet]Lady Amethystle - 10 Defender Emp/Dark
[color=cyan]Tefnut - 16 Defender Storm/Ice
Anne Jefferys 10 Blaster Fire/Knetics
Congrats on the guide it's excellent.
I decided early on that I was aiming for a 'pure' empath build with my character. I had a moment of weakness when I went for the blast snipe power but I won't do that again.
My theory on 'slotting' is that you can improve the end and speed of the skills via other methods (hasten / stamina), so i've slotted all heals in the actual powers. This at least at the lower levels has paid off massivly. And it allows you at later ones to 'rebuild' to add end reducers and speed ups if required.
Heal other seems to be the bane of any end effeciency, and having to use it means i'll be fighting the end bar for the entire battle. If people stay in the aura, it's quite possible to walk out with a spotless team and > 50% end.
Something that's kind of funny, is that inexperianced players have a habit of running away when they're injured. Which means you either need to chase them down to heal them (thus risking the rest of the team), or let them fend for themselves.
I took rez as early as i could and havn't looked back. I've pulled off a few 'combat' rez's now and they've been worth every point of end. Obviously it's good to stack up with end inspirations if you're going to try that
good guide. The question is: is it the empath's place to tell certain players when they are not playing their archetype? Some people keep getting all the damage or getting killed due to lack of proper inspiration use or going melee as a blaster.
I hate when I have to start making choices of healing as I finally decide 'they are just going to die anyway!'
I like the idea of taking some of the leadership skills if that only meant that people recognized empaths as logical leaders....we are usually the only ones behind the scenes seeing what's going on in the mess of fireworks!
great thread! It helps to have other team members understand what we are doing and how to help make us more effective.
One powerpool that I have noticed has been overlooked is the Jump Pool. You can get combat jumping and have an increased defense bonus for battles. I rarely get hit with this on, providing I'm not aggro'ing at all (I'm empath/dark, so I do get a few hits in per round, like tentacles or something). Also the superjump IMO, is an empaths best friend. I'll explain why: You know when your team is travelling from one nav to another in hostile territory and you all kind of split up? The superjump gives you a swift way to get to those players that have accidentally aggro'd a group they can't handle. This fits my play style. I'm usually the last one to reach the mission point as I am babysitting my teammates, regardless of if they need it or not. I'd rather be there when things get hectic than not. I also use it to be a scout as well. I can get ahead of my team very quickly, find safe routes, find the purplr guys so we can avoid the wussies, etc.
To bring up another point and question, what should the empath be doing in combat? I see many empaths that sit in the rear and wait for someone to need a heal. Not I. I stand immediately behind the tankers and keep them in the aura at all times. When endurance permits, if we are holding our own and My teams life meters can take a 20 second or so break from my heals, I always cast confusion and tentacles on anything available.
What do youguys think?
Anwyn.
watch the health levels, when no-ones yellow or red, target my leader (assist) and nail the nasties with radiation defense debuffs ....
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Something that's kind of funny, is that inexperianced players have a habit of running away when they're injured. Which means you either need to chase them down to heal them (thus risking the rest of the team), or let them fend for themselves.
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It's funny. My highest character is only lvl 11, but I've already developed the instinct to, when injured into the red, run backwards toward the healer (direction interpolated based on the circular Heal Other radius that I can usually see near my feet). Maybe it has something to do with being a Scrapper, so the tank tends to quickly pick up the aggro.
Honestly, as far as empaths go... I always appreciate the healing, but I feel bad because it doesn't seem like all that much fun to constantly watch health bars. Half the time I want to tell them, "go ahead and blast if you want, I'll try to keep aggro off you... and if I die, no biggie, I'll run back from the hospital"
"if you sacrifice your Defender's secondary (offensive) powers for more group-oriented play."
This seems to imply that offensive powers are not group-oriented. In my opinion, offensive powers, when used to benefit the group by ending battles more quickly, thus conserving the resources of the whole team for the next fight, can be just as "group-oriented" as buffs/heals/crowd control.
I hate to re-post something, but I wrote this for a thread on effective grouping, and it actually would have worked better here, I think.
Something esecially interesting, I thought, is that I tend to use Heal Other as my main heal, and Healing Aura as my supplemental - although that only works if one or two team members are successful at containing aggro for the most part. Anyway, here goes - my personal play tactics as an Empath (note I wrote this before getting Fortitude, and I don't have Clear Mind yet, so my tactics are still evolving.)
First, I want to stress that not all defenders are healers! Im an empathy/electric defender, and my personal purpose in a group is to keep you alive, which means that when youre in any real danger, Im doing nothing but healing. But not all defenders are so focused on support! There are several defender lines that contain great damage and crowd control powers, but arent very effective as a main healer. Before assuming youre covered on heals, be sure to ask what that defenders specialty is before assuming.
Healers Fighting in Battle?
Dont assume that if Im fighting occasionally, Im not focused on healing. As long as my endurance is full and no one in the group is in any real danger, then I can throw off an electric blast every 10 seconds or so and still stay at full endurance, ready to handle a sudden turn of the tide.
If no ones in danger of dying (say, were fighting blues), then my secondary purpose is to help defeat the enemies a little faster to reduce my groups endurance use over time, reducing downtime. (We shouldnt be ending fights with you at zero endurance and me at full, since we still have to wait for your endurance anyway.) However, even while attacking I always assume there could be a boss ambush around the corner, and keep enough endurance on reserve to handle it.
As a healer, I swear by the assist feature! Not only does it keep me on the same target as the melee fighters, ensuring that they keep the aggro and not me (since they do more damage than I do), but ideally those melee guys are the ones needing heals, and by assisting them, Ive already got them targeted. I dont generally assist controllers unless theyre not doing crowd control, since I could end up blasting a target theyve just put to sleep.
Having Max HP in Fights
Group members do not always need to be kept at maximum hit points in an extended fight! Healer endurance is extremely important, and keeping you topped off is very expensive. If youre only missing 60 hit points and my smallest heal is 95 hit points, then healing you before youre at least 95 hit points down is overkill, and wastes endurance. Also remember that heals have a recharge time, so healing you when you dont absolutely need it still renders me unable to respond right away should someone else get really hurt.
Priority and Healing Order
Im always watching the groups health, and I can always see whos getting the aggro. Thats my absolute priority not so much whos the most hurt? but whos the most hurt and currently getting aggro? If one guy on my team is down to 1/10 of his health but hes hovering far away and out of danger, then hes a lower healing priority than my scrapper with ¾ health who just drew the aggro of three red Aberrant Reactors. Its like triage as long as youre not under the effects of a DOT and have a decent amount of health and I can tell you arent drawing any aggro, youre fine for the time being while I take care of the people in the most immediate danger. (Of course, this means that if a tanker is holding aggro, then his HP will be the only ones dropping, and he gets my full attention, making my job a lot easier.)
Next step in priority is hit points people with fewer hit points will be healed a bit more quickly since they can be one-shot killed. A tanker whos at ¼ HP and being taken down slowly can probably still survive a few more seconds than the blaster who just went down to ¼ health in one hit. That is, UNLESS youre extremely low level (as in, just tagging along for the higher experience) and it comes down to a choice between saving you or the aforementioned higher level scrapper or tanker, for example. Sorry, its not a level bias thing
but he can keep us alive if I save him, while you unfortunately wouldnt be able to.
Which Heal To Use?
I have three heal powers, and they each have their place. Heal Other is my most used heal. Its a single-target heal, heals for a good amount, and isnt too expensive in endurance. I have two healing, two endurance reduction, and two recharge reduction enhancements in it, so I can cast it pretty quickly and frequently, using the order priorities listed above.
Next is Healing Aura. Its a group heal, only works if youre near me, heals for less than Heal Other, and costs more in endurance. I use it if two or more people are hurt and more than one person has aggro, or if the whole group just got hit by an area effect, or if Im seriously hurt, since thats the only one that heals me too. I dont like to spend that kind of endurance if it's only me that's hurt, though, so I generally dont use it for that reason unless Im at half health or lower, or I have aggro. I'll also use that one is if someone is dying FAST and Heal Other/Absorb Pain is still recharging.
My emergency heal is Absorb Pain. I love this spell - its certainly saved many scrappers from certain death in the early moments of an ambush. Its a big heal, healing for about twice the amount of Heal Other, and it costs me almost no endurance at all. However, it takes about 1/5 of my health, and Im unable to be healed for a short time afterwards. Im not affected by group heals, other peoples heals, inspirations, nothing. I can only use this when I am not getting any aggro, and for a while after casting it, I need to stay well out of harms way. In other words, if I just glowed red and your HP jumped 230+, watch out for me for a few seconds, please.
Finally -
Unless they ask you to, or you have reason to believe your healer is distracted, please dont ask for heals in fights. The healer is putting their fate in your hands, so put your fate in theirs. If youre at 2/3 health and arent currently being healed, theres a reason. It might be a certain heal recharging, or another member of your group is currently drawing more aggro (thus going down faster) than you are.
I love the role of healing, and Im enjoying reading other peoples views on being a healer I look forward to any comments or suggestions on mine.
well, I'll say it again..I STILL can't believe that we have the one power that I know of that let's us commit suicide...but that being said, I was playing around with absorb pain yesterday and another defender kept healing me immediately after I cast - a surprise to me since I thought there was NO way to heal after casting absorb pain...unless the fact that they were 10 lvls above me somehow affects the ability to overcome the downtime for healing....anybody know how long you are unable to heal with absorb pain?
I don't know the exact time that you can't heal yourself after using Absorb Pain, but you can see the AP status icon underneath your own health bar, or even in the team window. Just wait for it to go away before you fire off your Healing Aura or healing inspiration.
Like you already found out, Heal Other for some reason can still heal you even when you have the AP status effect. I think O2 Boost works as well.
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Quite simply, empaths burn their endurance (and usually their health) to keep team members alive. As a result, they must gauge who gets how much healing, and when -- all according to available endurance. If in the first 20-30 seconds of fighting the incoming fire is heavy, an empath may well use ALL of his/her endurance to keep the team alive. This will result in a period where little to no healing is possible by the empath. As noted above, team members need to pay attention to the empath's endurance and pace themselves accordingly. A good empath will alert a team when s/he is not capable of healing, but it is a tremendous help if the group pays attention, as well.
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Vigilence would ensure that during those 30 seconds the empath who's struggling to keep up has a full endurance bar. Think on that.
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Someone dies a lot despite the presence of an empath. This is usually the result of the 2 previously-mentioned issues being repeated over and over and the empath simply making a judgement call not to waste healing/endurance on said someone anymore, as it takes away from what the empath can do for others who are more group-oriented and less self-centered. (The basic premise being the empath is choosing to let said someone learn the hard way after all other options have failed.)
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A spines/dark scrapper can easily get enough agro in the space of 1 attack to die from 20 enemies turning and firing at once. Same for a warshade who's leveraging the mires and aoes or a TA/A who's usng oil slick. If such a character is dying a lot, maybe what's needed is the empath using fortitude on the person dying a lot and not the scrapper, TA/A defender, or warshade stopping their most effective tactics.
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The distinction is subtle but important. Healing is an empath's focus; if you ask for one you're more likely to get someone who has as many enhancements as s/he can possibly slot into healing powers as is possible for his/her level ... as opposed to someone with 1 or 2 healing powers that are enhancement-neglected. This means stronger healing abilities when compared to garden-variety "healers".
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Ok, your saying that dark, kin, and rad are healers? How about storm? What people in game call a healer is a empath who does nothing but heal, and rarely if ever buffs, while refusing to take a single attack. Call my dark/rad a healer again and I'll sick fluffy on ya.
"The danger is not that a particular class is unfit to govern. Every class is unfit to govern." Lord Acton
Madam Enigma's History
DARN It Madam Enigma... Why in heavens did you have to Necro this??!?!?
This is such a chunk of garbage, and yes i have some empaths. If emp is all you have to protect an 8 man team its not going to be fun. Half the items in this list are null and void if you have any other kind of buffing debuffing going on. Of course with every other defender i see now being a purile HEELIR this may be the best newbs can hope for.
If i ever see some emp just sitting in the back waiting to use his pureness of healingness on us while we are buffed and fighting debuffed enemies i will boot his sorry backside off my team. This isnt EQ, this isn't WoW, stop trying to pretend it is and contribute to your team even when no ones getting hurt.
O
Folks, this guide is three years old. It was linked as a joke and someone necro-posted it.
Please let it drop back into the depths of the forum where it belongs.
"A good Defender is the battle hardened Corpsman who will kill a Nazi with a tongue depressor while putting a splint on your leg, then hand you a fresh clip of ammo." ~Jock_Thompson
Repeat Offenders, TNT Profile, My little hero
Great Post and a great guide. As a pure Empath Defender I would love it if more people understood what I was trying to do.
I find it almost creepy that this post mirrors my thoughts on my role almost perfectly.
Look for me on Virtue
Twilight Titan