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One of the interesting things about the summoner class is its various healing abilities and the fact that their heals can in fact be as good as or better than a cleric’s. Not all summoner healing abilities are created equally, though each has its place in DPS, support, and hybrid builds. Let’s go through them and see, shall we? Please note, all the numbers in this article are based on level one of each ability.

Blood Injection
The first healing ability that you will encounter as a young summoner is Blood Injection. It gets a lot of criticism on the class boards and most think that it isn’t worth the points you spend on it. It is a three second cast, costs 169 mana, heals for a little over 1,000 hp, but it only consumes one drop of blood. If you spend a ruby or two on Necropotency, which gives Putrefy a chance to decrease the cast time of your next Blood Injection, Acid Bolt, or Vampirism by 20%, it can be a viable heal. With Vampirism, you may not need a healing ability early in the game, and it seems easy to pass this one up in favor of other healing abilities later on. However, if you want to take a supporting role in early levels, this is a beneficial ability to have, and most especially if you take a skeleton pet. It saved my backside more than once onEvermeet Isle and lent a hand to the cleric when it came to grouping.

Plague of Mending
You won’t see anymore new healing abilities until the third row of your talent tree. Plague of Mending is an instant cast, area of effect heal over time ability. It consumes six drops of blood, costs 211 mana, and heals your target for 188.7 every two seconds for 20 seconds, and also spreads to any party members within ten yards. I’m on the fence regarding this ability. It is expensive and the amount that it heals is small. On the other hand, it is your only area of effect healing ability, not to mention an instant cast. I did find it useful while questing solo with my skeleton since it will keep renewing itself until its six charges are gone. That meant that my skeleton and I each would get three charges from one cast and it does prove useful in long battles, where I would supplement it with burst heals. To improve this ability, spend some rubies on Necropotency for a chance of decreased cast time, and Virulence to increase the duration. Advanced Genetics increases the healing power and you can spend some rubies in Empowered Infections, which will also increase the effectiveness of Wandering Fever, Putrefy, and Neurotoxin. It’s a powerful way to go but it may be a detriment to your DPS to spend so many rubies this way. In a situation where you are grouping and heavy damage is being taken, the healing that Plague of Mending does is only a drop in the bucket. My opinion is that it is a solid HoT for soloing but not enough healing power for a group.

Dark Empathy
If you are serious about healing as a summoner, this ability is a good one to take until you are able to take Reanimation and it’s a good compromise between Blood Injection and Plague of Mending. It costs 110 mana, one drop of blood, and takes two seconds to cast. It heals one target for 707.6 initially, and 235.9 every two seconds for 20 seconds. In my opinion, if you take Dark Empathy, go all the way and put all three points in it to maximize your healing power with it. Unfortunately, this ability is neglected in the talent grids. Necropotency, again, gives Putrefy a chance to decrease your cast time and that is the only thing in the talent grid you can use to improve Dark Empathy. This is a good supplemental heal but like Plague of Mending, it’s not powerful enough on its own.

Reanimation
Reanimation is a solid heal that works along the lines of Blood Injection. It’s a simple burst heal for 1273.7, 85 mana, and uses four drops of blood with a 1.5 second cast time. But! If your target’s health is below 25%, the healing effects are increased. It also gets some love in the talent grid with the Reanimator skills that gives Reanimation, Dark Empathy, Vampirism, and summoning spells a chance to decrease the time for the next cast of those spells. With my summoner, I did bypass Blood Injection so that I could spend points on this ability later, despite the fact that it uses four blood drops. This is purely choice, but Reanimation has a slight edge with a lower cast time and the healing boost when your target is low on health.

What it comes down to is your play style and what role you plan to take in a group. Choose well, squishy grasshopper!