Melee Healer

[Quazar]

The Zealot seems to me to be a melee version of the Runepriest. He buffs his allies before combat by placing Marks on them, but he also places Harbringers to debuff enemies. My question, considering "he is hardly the soft target that he might appear to be", is how closs does he have to be to place those Harbringers on people? And he does have a dagger, not a staff. And pseudo-pet crows to assist him. Maybe the classes aren't as parallel as we like to think.

[Rowhin]

Well, most of his abilites known so far (http://warhammerinfo.com/c-zealot.shtml) have a 100 ft range, similar to those of the other casters, so he doesn't need to get that close.

[Dagoth]

Yup, the zealot is not melee, but people who have played at GamesDays said that they have to be close to the fight for their rituals to be more effective.

[mowow]

I played abit of Zealot at games day uk. The zealot has some nifty rituals, these are AoE spells (you aim a template e.g. rain of fire from WoW), these are so much easier to judge at close range. I found that when the zealot is close up and in the action, he is much more effective than at the back. Also, if you run out of action points and you're in close range, you can always bring out the good old sacrificial dagger. I remember knifing my best friend to death(who was on the other team).

[Aqe]

I played abit of Zealot at games day uk. The zealot has some nifty rituals, these are AoE spells (you aim a template e.g. rain of fire from WoW), these are so much easier to judge at close range. I found that when the zealot is close up and in the action, he is much more effective than at the back. Also, if you run out of action points and you're in close range, you can always bring out the good old sacrificial dagger. I remember knifing my best friend to death(who was on the other team).
IRL? ;)

[Godric]

The classes are not meant to be totally parallel. Sure they run along the same basic guidelines, but they are going to have aspects that make them unique unto their own.

[Gemini]

They aren't melee in the same the WP is, but they are a close combat sorta career. But that's just from what Mythic has shown us in the way of abilities, which is defiantly lacking, and of course from convention builds which means half those abilities won't exist, and the other half will have been re-named and tweaked more times then a poster gets all huffy-puffy over a Dark Elf class in these forums.

[Estebar]

This guy explains well why the Zealot is effectively a counter to the Warrior Priest, rather than a direct mirror.

Zealot - Hands down, my favorite class not just in this game, but in any MMO from UO to date. We've all heard Mythic talk about how casters will be able to hold their own in melee, and I'm sure that like me, you've smiled politely while thinking to yourself "BS." However, 5 minutes into playing my level 21 Zealot, I had an epiphany - they're not just capable of holding their own in melee. They're bloody freaking good at it. I'm not talking about taking hits on the chin, ripping your opponents to shreds. That's far too simplistic. Zealots, on the other hand, are one of the most beautifully innovative and complex careers in recent memory. The Harbinger I was most fond of reduces all damage done by a whopping 25%. After that, I'd put down a ritual which debuffed opponents considerably. Predictably, a melee class would charge at me, and get hit with a debuff the second they entered the ritual circle. My own buff, a Mark of Chaos, boosts my fighting skills by a good amount. The speed with which I was able to drop enemies with auto-attack after my debuffs, buffs, and DoTs were stacked was pretty surprising. I barely even needed to heal. There were also some very powerful nukes (my eyes popped out of my skull when I saw the numbers on the Tier 3 morale ability for the zealot, I can't remember what it was called, but goddamn that thing was amazing), most of them in the Morale section. It's not that the Zealot is any better at melee combat than any other caster, but didn’t seem nearly as prone to interrupts. As of now, it's definitely my career of choice - hopefully Black Guard will be up to the task of luring me away once I get to try them out. If they end up being as cool as the Zealot, there's a good chance I'll be playing this game for years to come.

[Foofmonger]

The Zealot is definitly not a meele healer.

But he is a close combat support class.

[Kozai]

From reviews on this site(see above for example) and on othersites of players who have not chosen to play as straight up healbots/debuffers, it definitely looks like zealot can be played as a close combat caster.

Sorta like a wow's elemental shaman/shadow priest/lock mixup. So close combat caster, not so much a melee stab stab(got auto-attack if that counts i guess but pff). So you want to sit in the front lines doing your offensive thing go for it but if you want to hang back and just healbot(/yawn)/debuff then do that(I'd rather stick my head in a blender than just healbot but it's your $$).

[thetheory]

The zealot has no melee attacks(so far). He has a weapon associated with melee and he fights mid-range.

[logicalmayhem]

zelot isnt melee lol check ya facts before u post

[Kozai]

I love these kinda threads. We have the people who believe that 1 melee attack (Swing, tier 1, ap50, 0-10 ft - A basic melee attack.)= melee healer. We have the 'omg stfu and heal' people. Then we have the combat casters vs the mid/long range casters.

I think that 90% of us can agree that having a 'Swing' ability does not a melee healer make. And if you actually bother reading ALL the reviews across the major war fan sites(and some of the guild sites) you'll find accounts of - combat casters, mid/long range casters some playing offensive and some playing healbot.

So at the end of the day - your not a melee healer and that's definite, the rest well is up to you. But I guess we'll find out for sure at release....