You're not getting it.
To make the best cleric possible in the game takes forever.
You have to get the right gear, right weapons, right spells, right abilities. Nothing is handed to you.
Yep storybricks goes to both NPCs and things. Example of "Dark energy" could cause different reactions in people if you're carrying a "dark energy" item. Tried to nail down Storybricks and gods but told to wait for lore panel.
Also there may be (not decided) some impossible combinations...
Some type of instancing/phasing is in the game related to authored content (confirmed from dev this is not me speculating). Comment is - if you're on authored content and someone is on the same authored content they'll see you - suggesting that if you're not on some particular content there is...
Eh? There's the comment on authored content (e.g. go retrieve artifact at bottom of the mine). The fun part is figuring out how to do it. Given that the dynamics of the situation may change daily. Goblins may control. Village may control. Bandits may control. Etc.
Tiers.
But yes no levels or AAs (no AAs is confirmed btw. Classes substitute for AAs) Tiers substitute for levels. If you're tier 2 in a tier 4 area I got the impression that you're fucked.
Dev comment - its too make the game accessible even if you're gone for a while. I assume to...
to can do it if you spent the time but impression is thats a long time.
confirmed class class dependencies. Some class require other non starting classes.to access.
confirmed additional classes added after start.
no stamina use on teleport left you with nothing to spend on back stab. So you teleport behind the mob and hae to do a low Sta attack. Not that drunk yet but soon.
confirmed Raids are small. Didn't get a number but presumably 24ish. You are conflating raids and rallying cries. Number is speculation.
confirmed no camping in game. Mobs move around.
confirmed mob Ai is a bitch. Demo had no Ai playing.
dev comment. Not at all like playing modern...
current answer at pool party is they are aware of issue and thinking about it. Lack of proper gear is huge hit for one thing . One option is additional benefit to someone who chooses to specialist and and doesn't multiclass. But will ask talisker tomorrow.
as for slotting. Weapons...
gear isn't fungible. Families are distinct. Maybe you need compete elven tier 3 can't mix and match with qeynos tier 3. Except for sub components which I don't have a handle. Anyway need gear and abilities to progress. Also currently 5 tiers in game.
Tiers are in game. For characters and for areas.
When you dig down, you dig down in tiers
If you don't have the right items you can't break into tier 3 (down).
Tiers can also go up. You can have tier 4 content on the surface (e.g. a Raid area).