priest strategies?

[d_m]

What sorts of combat strategies do you guys use with priests? I've made it to level 41 playing a priest by getting +28 speed and using the orb + teleport-other + blink constantly. The best sling I found had +1 shots, and I can't seem to find a decent melee weapon. Things are fine, except that it's really tough to beat uniques who have lots of HP (particularly non-evil ones).

What do you folks recommend? I'm at dungeon-level 98 just trying to "clear" vaults (often via teleport-other) and get drops. I think at this point I'm hoping for a sling of buckland and some giant blunt artifacts. Seem reasonable?

[PowerDiver]

The best sling I found

Use a heavy xbow, unless you find an ego that makes a different launcher better.

[Malak Darkhunter]

I play dwarven priests most of the time, my best combat strategy was Orb of draining, dispell evil, dispell undead, and holy word. Having a really high armor class helped with melee combat along with usually a heavily enchanted warhammer or mace. Eventually you learn the spell heal, and are able to restore you stat's and experience through spells. The hardest one's to beat are packs of animals as they are not affected by any dispell spells. In that case I usually carried a couple wands acid bolt or ball spells. Not many creatures are resistant to acid.

[d_m]

Use a heavy xbow, unless you find an ego that makes a different launcher better.

I didn't realize priests were allowed to use heavy xbow. Is there no penalty, or is the penalty just not that bad?

[zaimoni]

I didn't realize priests were allowed to use heavy xbow. Is there no penalty, or is the penalty just not that bad?

Contrary to what one might expect, the pointy-penalty is only calculated for the melee weapon.

[pav]

And here's a feature request (permission to having it assimilated in the uber-thread next door given):

Put a note that the weapon will incur penatly in the item description (inspect, store) when playing a priest class. I bought too much egos from black market only to find out I cannot wield them.

[Pete Mack]

High-level Priest is most efficient in melee, relying heavily on Healing spell and the various buffs (rFire/rCold spell, Bless/Chant). If you can get 0-fail Heal(300) with the pointy penalty, you should probably take it. Also, you need 4 blows. Until you get there, use an xbow.