Lineage II/Shillien Elder

Shillien Elders (SE) are generally seen as healers and are considered the best wizard buffers. They can use robes and light armor and any weapon. They have Dyrad Root, Recharge and Greater Group Heal as well as all standard buffs and two exclusive (and very good) buffs.

The first one is Vampiric Rage which gives the player healing from the melee damage they deal; this spell is of course especially interesting for classes which deal a lot of melee damage, but have not many hitpoints and relatively bad defense (for example, Tyrant or Treasure Hunter). In any case, this buff saves mana otherwise needed for healing and makes up for the lack of the Greater Battle Heal of the Bishop.

A likewise effect to Vampiric Rage is available for level 74 Bladedancer and level 44 Warcryer; still the SE gets this buff much ealier (level 30) and masters it first (level 72) (Warcryer maxes at 74).

The second buff is Empower. This spell causes nukers (Sorcerer, Spellsinger, Spellhowler) to make more damage in their offensive spells. It can be combined with the prophets Berserk and Acumen as well as the corresponding Bladedancers dances to max the damage of nuker spells. I have no idea if the corresponding Warcryer buff stacks or replaces.

Key Skills
Format: Spell Name (Max Skilllevel) - Description (Level of Update+Number of Updates [; Namechange of skill on higher levels])

Buffs

 * Concentration (6) – Decreases chance that the magic will be canceled due to damage. (20/30/44/52/60/68; 3+: Greater Concentration)
 * Death Whisper (3) – Increases damage on critical hit (40/48/56)
 * Empower (3) - Increases m.atk. (25/44/52)
 * Focus (3) – Increases critical rates (25/44/52)
 * Greater Concentration: See Concentration
 * Guidance (3) – Increases accuracy (40/48/56)
 * Kiss of Eva (2) - Increases lungs capacity (20/52)
 * Mental Shield (4) - Increases defense against mental attack such as dryad root (25/40/48/56; 3+: Mental Aegis)
 * Mental Aegis: See Mental Shield
 * Might (3) – Increases P. atk. (7/20/40)
 * Resist Wind (2) – Resistance to wind attacks (35/40)
 * Shield (3) – Increases P. def. (7/25/44)
 * Vampiric Rage (4) - Converts part of the damage dealt into healing for the character (30/44/58/72)
 * Wild Magic (2) - Increases chance for critical magic, very useless buff (62/70)
 * Wind Walk (2) - Increases moving speed (20/30)

Other Spells

 * Battle Heal (15) - Fast healing on target (14+3/20+3/25+3/30+3/35+3)
 * Cure Poison (3) - Remove poison effect (7/35/58)
 * Dryad Root (33) - Disable movement of target (25+3/30+3/35+3/40+3/44+3/48+3/52+3/56+2/58/60/62/64/66/68/70/72/74)
 * Greater Group Heal (29) - Improved version of Group Heal (48+3/52+3/56+3/58+3/60+3/62+2/64+2/66+2/68+2/70+2/72+2/74+2)
 * Greater Heal (29) - Improved version of Heal (48+3/52+3/56+3/58+3/60+3/62+2/64+2/66+2/68+2/70+2/72+2/74+2)
 * Purify (3) - Removes bleed and poison (44/52/62)
 * Recharge (32) - Give mp to target (30+2/35+2/40+2/44+2/48+2/52+2/56+2/58+2/60+2/62+2/64+2/66+2/68+2/70+2/72+2/74+2)
 * Resurrection (2) - Raise target from the dead (20/30)
 * Wind Shackle (19) - Lower atk.speed of target (14/20/25/30/35/40/44/48/52/56/58/60/62/64/66/68/70/72/74)

Lowlevel/Replaced Spells

 * Disrupt Undead (8) - Attack on undead (20+2/25+2/30+2/35+2)
 * Group Heal (15) - Healing the whole party (14+3/20+3/25+3/30+3/35+3)
 * Heal (18) - Healing on target (7+3/14+3/20+3/25+3/30+3/35+3)
 * Sleep (9) - Sleep target (25+3/30+3/35+3)

Equipment
Like all other clerical classes, SEs get a skill for using both robes and (magic) light armor and get a generic weapon skill which works for all weapons equally good (or bad). Naturally, the way to play this class vary a lot. Like the other clerical classes, it is quite popular to wear dual swords and light armor. Alternatively, one can also use a bow in combination with Dryad Root. Simply wearing wizard outfit is also very popular.

Armor
A SE needs spellcasting speed more than anything else. On d-grade, the mirthil robe set is meant for clerics and oracles, but in fact the no-grade devotion set is maybe better. The best c-grade cloth for darkelven mystics is the Karmian robe set. On b-grade the light Blue Wolf armor is a good choice, as is the Avadon robe. On a-grade, Tallum Robe is maybe best, with Dark Crystal at least very close second and Majestic thanks to its mana regeneration not bad at all either.

Weapon
M.atk. is quite useless to SEs, as none of their spells (except the wizard damage spells of the starter class dark mystic and the no longer updated spell Disrupt Undead of the Shillien Oracle) are improved by it, for healing spells only marginally get better with high m.atk. Still Shillien Elders still often will prefer mage weapons on higher levels as those can have special abilities like UpDown, Mana Up or Acumen, which greatly increase the party value of this very party dependend class.

Dyes
A SE will want to sacrifice Men for Wis to speed up the very slow spellcasting. Also, lowering the Strength by 8 to increase both Dex and Con by 4 will help a lot with more hitpoints, faster running, better evasion etc. As others can make a douzen times more damage anyway, sacrificing strength doesn't change much anyway in party play.

Etc
SEs need the following spellbooks: Level 40: Death Whisper, Guidance; Level 44: Purify; Level 48: Greater Group Heal, Greater Heal; Level 62: Wild Magic.

Playstyle
SEs are harder to solo as Prophets, as they can't buff themselves as well, and harder to solo as Bishops, as those at least get an ambundance of good spells against undead, and are still worse than Elven Elders, who also get at least a specialized damage spell against undead that is still getting updated. Therefore SEs are even more dependend upon getting a party as the other clerical classes.

The best party for a SE is a combo with Prophet and a couple of melee high damage dealers and/or nukers. Together with the Prophet, a SE can buff such a party much faster (if the prophet has a clue which spells the shillien already has, so he can concentrate on the rest) and to the maximum possible effectivity level (except for the buffs Agility and Resist Shock, which are exclusive to Elven Elders). Too, a SE can heal quite well, even if not as fast as a Bishop, but as a replacement at least the SE will potentially be longer able to heal (the Vamp Rage already gives healing without any further doing of the SE, plus the SE can't waste any mp through the expensive Greater Battle Heal, plus unfortunately darkelves are the slowest of all casters). Compared to the Elven Elder, the SE has the problem of his slow spellcasting, but on the other hand he has Greater Group Heal and not only Greater Heal.

On higher levels, the SE becomes the dreampartner of nukers, because the high level spells are very mana expensive and the SE can give them lots of Mana; for one point spend by the Shillien the nuker gets four points back into his mana pool, if the nuker has the skill for it.

For raids, SEs are not as good as a Bishops, as they can't heal as fast as the later, while raid bosses usually deal huge amounts of damage that can't be healed up just with Vampiric Rage. But in dungeons, SEs shine, especially if the warriors of the group use polearm weapons. With the Vampiric Rage, such a warrior can fight a large group of opponents at the same time with the pole, and still need no (or much less) healing.

Bugs
The "Greater Heal" spellbook description states that only Shillien Elders get this spell. This is wrong, Bishops and Elven Elders get that spell as well.

If you are creating a macro which should include the Mental Shield spell, and you have stage 3 or above (then called Mental Aegis) and simply drop the icon into the desired command line of the macro, the program insers "/useskill Mental Aegis". You have to change it to "/useskill Mental Shield" to make it work.