So this is part for me, and part so that there's a basic guide on how to level a medic for anyone who may be considering it for launch. I'll try to update this moving forward so that as class changes arise, I'm able to quickly make changes to keep it up-to-date. I'm starting this build at level 10 since before that there really isn't any choices to make. Every five levels, I will give an updated LAS loadout complete with any AMPs that I would recommend taking.
In terms of gearing, I would usually recommend Tech > Moxie > Grit. However there is a caveat to this. Since gearing in Wildstar revolves around stat thresholds, it behooves the player to keep an eye on where they are in terms of reaching these thresholds for all 3 of these stats. For example: if a chest drops that has less tech on it, but helps me break a threshold for grit, it is statistically an upgrade in survivability as long as I don't lose any thresholds for tech.
This guide is based around my play style which involves mainly solo questing while nuking small packs of 3-5 quickly and moving on with as little downtime as possible. This isn't for the player that wants to shell 10 mobs at the same time, nor is it for a medic in a group although I'm sure with some tweaks this build would work fine in either of those roles. To find the builds for each level, simply click on the giant lime green headers for each section.
A little about me: I'm a co-host on Nexus Weekly and I play a medic for Drow (we're recruiting!). I've been playing medics since they first showed up and I absolutely love the style of the class. If you have any questions about the guide feel free to ask!
Anyway, without further ado... Medics: The Guide.
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Level 10:
At this time, there's not too much to watch out for. Use Dual Shock and Gamma Rays whenever they are available and otherwise use Paralytic Shock to create moments of opportunities & Emission when necessary.
In terms of AMP allotment, always buff your assault power and crit chance with your first six AMPs. It's a no-brainer and leads to some important AMPs down the line.
It is also important to note here that at level six there will be a quest in every starting zone that has a reward of a tier 2 AMP. One of the selections is Empowering Aura which is an incredibly good AMP that provides a static 6% boost to crit chance to you and your party. This is a mandatory AMP for leveling and max level DPS medics, so we may as well pick this up now, right?
Also it's highly recommended that you go ahead and get to 8000 reputation to attain "Popular" reputation with your level 6-13 zone of choice so that you can pick up the requisite AMPs available from the quartermasters. One in particular stands out here is Reboot. You have no specific need for this through your leveling process, but it's incredibly strong if you ever decide to heal and -- let's be honest -- did you really roll a medic without ever wanting to heal?
Level 15:
We get Quantum Cascade at level 13, so it is a good idea to get that immediately and switch out Gamma Rays as soon as possible. Obviously Gamma Rays is OP on single targets, but since we're questing here, you'll see a pretty substantial dip in your TTK by picking up Quantum Cascade to take on multiple mobs. It's also somewhat important to note here that whenever you're taking on particularly large nasties mano-y-mano, remember to switch out QC for GR. It might be clunky at first, but do it a bit and it'll become second nature. Just remember to switch back after the encounter!
At level 15, it is also safe to drop Emission and pick up Mending Probes. With a 15s cooldown and a 12s duration, these little guys do a pretty good job keeping you topped off at this level.
The other new ability here is Collider. This is the medic execute ability and very powerful even without tier points. In proper execute form, the ability gets a substantial damage boost if used while the target is below 30% health and has two charges, meaning that you can spam these back to back without incurring a GCD! The best way to know when to cast Collider is simply when the mob's health bar turns RED. As soon as that happens, you're in the clear.
In terms of AMPs, we've maxed out crit% and now have Empowering Aura so that we can get more consistent Dual Shock (and later Atomize) procs.
Also make sure to do enough quests in your starting zone to attain Popular reputation with your zone's faction so that you can pick up Null Zone next.
Level 20:
At 20, not too much changes in our LAS except increasing our tiering on all Assault abilities. It should be noted that at 21, you can switch out Dual Shock for Atomize which I'll explain the benefits of in the next section, but it will be a pretty substantial DPS boost, but it will not heal you... so choose from these abilities at your discretion. If you're finding yourself using Atomize, but healing up often after pulls, it may be worth your time to use Dual Shock instead to keep you in the fight longer.
Speaking of keeping you alive a bit longer, remember how we picked up Null Zone after reaching popular with Galeras/Auroria? Well, it's time to use that. If you're not there quite yet (which is a possibility), go ahead and pick up the rest of CD Reduction and Shield%.
Level 25:
Sweet, sweet tier 4 abilities. As soon as you hit 25, you'll immediately want get Tier 4 Discharge and Quantum Cascade for a pretty hefty DPS gain. Also its important to note that at level 25, we've done away with Mending Probes and Dual Shock. Why? Well, at level 21, you pick up two awesome abilities that are going to significantly cut down on your time to kill, and paired with your shiney new T4 abilities, heals become much less important. Things will (ostensibly -- we don't know quite how bad/good the dps will be at this level with all the nerfs in the newest patch) be dead before they can even work their way through your shields. These two abilities that could you could put on your bar at 21 are Empowering Probes and Atomize.
Empowering probes is a flat 10% boost to DPS, and because of this, we want to keep uptime on them as much as possible. Because Empowering Probes does take up a useful GCD, it's usually recommended to cast EP right before we start to DPS packs of mobs.
Next on the docket is Atomize. Now, it doesn't heal you the way that Dual Shock does, but it scales with assault power instead of Support Power, procs a shorter-than-normal GCD, AND has a 50% chance to restore an actuator on every cast. Pretty cool, right? It is cool. The question was rhetorical.
AMPs maintain form and don't break from what we were doing before. The only two imperative AMPs picked up at this level are the two extra levels of Cooldown Reduction -- the other points in Crit Severity aren't important at this time since we're going to be taking them away here very soon anyway .
And as a note on questing here, per usual, before moving on to Farside, get to 8000 rep with Whitevale so that you can pick up the AMPs provided from the vendors (Recycler in particular). We're going to be using these later.
Level 30:
Welcome to level 30 and that elusive 8th action button! In the last five levels, seemingly not too much has changed, but we should see a pretty sizeable survivability boost thanks to the introduction of Calm onto our bars.
Calm is the creme de la creme of our "oh shit" buttons even without any points spent. It has two main purposes: to return shields and to pacify enemies. The shield heal (should but doesn't right now) scales with a mixture of assault & support power and the innate 5 second pacify will give you a window to either create some space or do some unrequited DPS.
If you were going to skip a zone's reputation, Farside is NOT the place to do it. The quartermaster there sells THREE very important AMPs to improve your leveling time (In Flux, Quick Dodge, and Danger Zone), so it is imperative to not move on to Wilderrun until you hit 8000 reputation with Farside. Luckily we get this before we even get to the surface of the moon, so as long as we do a bit of questing in the biodomes, we're going to be just fine.
For AMP choices, you see that we've utilized that Recycler AMP we picked up in Whitevale. It got a pretty hefty nerf in the patch, but at the time being, it's one of the stronger choices you have. We're going to use it and trash it, but for the time being it's a pretty good DPS increase.
Level 35:
Level 35 sees two pretty huge DPS boosts to your character. We now have T4 Fissure to allow for more uptime on Quantum Cascade, and, of course, Danger Zone. (PRO TIP: Any Kenny Loggins-themed ability or AMP is ALWAYS MANDATORY)
Fissure has been our opener for pretty much ever, but now there is simply no excuse. This is becuase whenever T4 Fissure is cast with full actuators, the next time we cast our spender (Gamma Rays or Quantum Cascade), we're refunded an actuator 100% of the time. This effectively removes 1.5 seconds from our DPS rotation.
Also Danger Zone just gives you a straight 17% AP boost with 100% uptime. Like, yeah. You read that right. It costs six AMPs, but there is nothing else that we can pick up that is that efficient.
At level 37, we'll pick back up Quick Dodge by getting rid of the Maximum Shield AMPs again.
There aren't any mandatory AMP pick ups in Wilderrun for a DPS Medic, but there are some good healer and utility AMPS such as Converter, Solid State, Shield Protocol, and Power Cadence -- all of which you will most definitely use at some point if not for leveling. Feel free to level through Wilderrun at your leisure or do some dungeons instead -- it's really up to you here.
Level 40:
You can smell max level now, can't you? Only ten levels to go!
This build looks the same and in most cases it is, but it is significantly stronger. How? There's a couple reasons for this. Now that we have the levels necessary, we have Empowering Aura, In Flux, and Recycler activated which greatly increases our uptime for our spenders by increasing the amount of crits we have coupled with T4 Fissure, and empowers our spenders by 12% 75% of the time with In Flux.
While our damage is pretty great now, our survivability has increased as well. By activating our Quick Dodge AMP, we are essentially buffing Calm and restoring a significant amount of shields pretty regularly.
Level 45:
Welcome to level 45 and welcome to Grimvault! By this time, we've done a lot and we're feeling pretty good about our ability to destroy things efficiently and effectively. We change out Quantum Cascade for Gamma Rays as almost second nature now when we need to, and we're masters of using Calm effectively and dodging even the most ridiculous of telegraphs. We pretty much have this leveling game down pat, right? Well, Grimvault gleefully tell you that you're not. You're pretty much nothing. What you thought was a light at the end of the tunnel was really just a thousand egos burning to ash. I'm adding two builds here because while you've been having a great time pumping out as much DPS as you can up until this point, the fact is that you may very well hit a pretty sizeable brick wall at this point and become super frustrated. I, of course, am not speaking from personal experience.
The first build is the one linked to above. This is what I refer to as the "Base Damage" build which is pretty much the evolution of the build we've been using up to this point. We have obviously taken our first tier 8 ability (yay!) in T8 Discharge and kept everything else pretty much steady.
In terms of AMPs, not much has changed. We've went ahead and activated Core Damage which is a little bit better than it seems at first glance since it doesn't increase attack power, but rather base damage, which means that the damage is not affected by armor or resist values, so it's pretty solid. You're going to see a pretty good boost from the ability.
Now that's great and all, but what about those of us who maybe can't avoid all the red or may have slightly sub-par gear? Well, don't you worry because now there's a second build just for you. The Survival Medic can keep Mending Probes up almost 100% of the time, and can create some space between his opponents by using urgency whenever they need it. The build will still output pretty decent DPS so it's not like you won't progress at all -- just not quite as fast. But you'll be alive so you'll be progressing a lot faster than those Medics who are face down in the dirt.
And with that, you can simply make the decisions you'd like to level 50. I definitely recommend keeping both the pure damage and survival builds at your beck-and-call so you can switch out as the situation mandates. You'll find that even at level 50, you're going to need multiple builds to do a number of tasks, so may as well start practicing and refining to your taste as you see fit.
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Thanks for reading! I hope that you learned something from my guide and that it sparked your interest to play a medic at launch. If you have any questions about any of the decisions in the guide, feel free to ask and I'll try to respond as quickly as I can.
Here is a link to a helpful Medic lvling guide I found for those that are interested. The OP has been keeping it up to date with any changes carbine makes to the class.
https://forums.wildstar-online.com/forums/index.php?/topic/29581-medic-leveling-guide-updated-417/
