Short Term Group Buffs
Those are the most mana expensive buffs but also net the most gain in terms of pay-offs.
All of them cost 300 mana to cast and stay up between 15 and 30 seconds.

I love to have the two short cool-down buffs up as much as I can, if not constantly. But if you plan to do that, be prepared to have a huge amount of Greater/Major Mana Pots with you. Otherwise decide which of the buffs you need to cast at which moment to get the best out of it.

BUFFS, ARE THEY REALLY WORTH IT?
This is a much discussed and debated question. My personal opinion is yes, specially end game wise. This discussion also comes up often because Chanters are not a straight forward class to play.
I am a strong believer that being a good Chanter heavily relies on you combining the tools you have at your disposal in the best way possible for a given situation opposed to just using one after the other. Most classes have straight forward tools which are clearly meant for a specific occurrence whereas a chanter has to combine several skills to really get the best benefit out of it. Aion is a stacking game and you should use that fact as much as you can.

To go with some numbers anyway here is some of the setup I’ll be looking at at lvl 50 with my chosen stigma build focused on Support:

Mana Recovery: 32 Points
Magical Boost: 250 (that is equal to 10 max value mb stones)
HP 25%
Physical Attack 35%
Attack Speed 20% (Word of Wind active)
Physical Defense 90 plus 10%
Elemental Resist 210
Block 200 (that is equal to 8 max value shield def stones)
Parry 200 (that is equal to 8 max value parry stones)
Evasion 150 (that is equal to 10 max value evasion stones)
Accuracy 100 (that is equal to 4 max value accuracy stones)

This is with Invincibility Mantra, Protection Mantra and Shield Mantra up
Blessing of Rock and Blessing of Health on every member
Word of Inspiration and Word of Protection active
Word of Wind active

I believe that going the defensive route with Mantras in pvp is better then attack mantras. Most burst and damage classes will already focus on Damage anyway and are likely at the cap for most of the stats (minus raw attack). Thus the gain with diminishing returns in mind would most probably be less.

On an additional note, to be seeing the real benefit of the Chanters buffs you would also have to take into consideration that the same time we do apply buffs we also use our debuffs. In this case Physical Defense Debuffs which in turn adds indirectly to another increase on top of our buffs, in melee attack power.

With that being said, is the Chanter a class that has any skill that is a real must have in a given situation. No, it is not. But there are only a few classes who really do have such skills (Cleric, Templar and Sorcs).

The whole beauty of the Chanter doesn't rest on one or a few specific skills like for other classes but in the combination and how you use them. Buffs, Debuffs coupled with mitigation from HoTs and direct Heals on top make a very powerful playfield if you know how to use it

STIGMAS
Even though you can be creative in your stigma choice, in the end it comes down to two builds to chose from, depending if you want a more Damage oriented or Support oriented build.
In the case of going for the one of the two highest Advanced End Game Stigmas you will have 5 Stigmas already picked out for you as prerequisites, only leaving you with 2 slots to freely chose from. However, since Recovery Spell is pretty much a MUST have stigma, essentially you are only left with one single slot to freely assign after your own likings.

Offensive Stigma Build
This will get you access to
Aion Armory - Chanter Stigma Calculator - By Terhix
Combined with an offensive, aggressive Manastone build, this will enable you to open a nice can of whoop-*** on your opponents.

Defensive Stigma Build
This will net you the Invincibility Mantra in the end
Aion Armory - Chanter Stigma Calculator - By Terhix

I personally find the Healing Conduit (which regains HPs not MPs as noted on the tooltip) and Promise of Aether Stigma Lines a total waste and instead would chose any other stigma to fill my last spot.
You are however free to not go for the advanced stigmas and freely combine stigmas as you see fit.

The three additional slots to the right in your stigma field are where your Advanced Stigmas need to go. However you can fill those slots with any normal stigmas as well, instead.

GEAR OPTIONS

Armor choices:
Chanter, like Clerics can wear all types of armor with the exception of plate.
Chain is generally the armor type mostly preferred due to the highest possible physical defense.
You don’t really have to worry extremely about particular stats on your gear. Every piece of Chain has Concentration as one of the base stats which will help you not get interrupted during casting (in our case this is mostly important for heals).

Generally chain armor tends to have HP, MP and Magic Boost on most pieces. Despite the fact that we don’t really benefit much from MB it’s not complete waste. Smite, Promise of Wind and Blessing of Wind damage proccs, Heaven’s Judgment's skill damage, Godstone procs if you have a magic damage one will benefit from it. However it is in general advised that you are trying to get your hands on chain gear with stats that benefit our Class more, such as attack speed, phys attack. You won’t use Smite after a while because like Heaven's Judgment it doesn't scale more while leveling and most of our attacks are still physical damage.

It is still under heavy debate and testing if any lighter type of armor such as Leather or Cloth would be more beneficial in terms of either resistance or avoidance. I personally think that Evasion gear slotted with additional evasion and crit could make for a very nice option. I did try some leather sets but didn’t have enough time to test it properly. Depending on if it’s possible to get Evasion high enough to not have to sacrifice too many manastone slots it might be a nice alternative.

Additionally, evasion could be a good choice to have a safer way of meleeing on big boss fights such as Fortress Guardian fights or any fight with big 360 attacks. Our parry and HP is normally not enough to survive a big AE hit of one of those big uglies. An additional advantage to a mixed evasion/parry build is that evasion and parry both get checked after eachother thus creating a higher evasion/mitigation gain. Not being hit at all vs hit for less is always a winner. Specially considering that if you pass your Evasion check, no negative effects are applied either this might play a big role in pvp fights to evade CC of any kind.

Weapon choices:
Mace/Shield versus Staves
Maces have a chance to crit with higher damage but lower sustained damage over a longer period of time whereas staffs have lower crit cap damage but higher consistent damage over time and the additional knockdown chance on crit (like all 2h weapons).

Pros for mace/shields:

Pros for Staffs:

My preferred choice of weapon is the staff but there is no reason you shouldn’t have a backup set of Shield/Mace to change to according to the situation. My choice would be to use the additional Manastone Slots you gain with the Shield and Mace Combo for Evasion stones.

Extend-able weapons:
These weapons have a sightly longer range and therefor give you a nice edge against your opponents.
As of now it is hard to find more then one extend-able staff. As far as I know there is only one available right now and it drops from the end boss in the lvl 50 Theobomos Lab instance.

There is, however, a nice amount of maces more or less easily available through instances or crafting (the first crafted lvl 35 Experts Gold Mace version for example).

Mitigation and Avoidance in comparison with gear:
The following order is being used for checking if an attack lands and if it does for how much:
Evasion check -> Block check -> Parry check
If you pass the Evasion Check you will not get the hit at all and no negative states are being applied to you.

Enchanting
Enchant your gear, I can’t stress this enough. Do it! The differences in stats are really big.
I personally like to enchant my weapon to +10 first for easier grinding but make sure you don’t neglect your armor either.

As a rule of thumb you need the following level of Enchantment Stones for:

White Item = Item's Level +1-10 Levels
Green Item = Item's Level +5-15 Levels
Blue Item = Item's Level +15-30 Levels
Orange Item = Item's Level +25-40 Levels

Manastones
Heh, had to be here, right? This would probably fill a whole book in its own so I try to keep it short:

Slotting for Magic Boost or Magic Power is in our case a total waste. We don’t have enough Magic Skills to give up precious Slots which can be used in a much better and more beneficial way. Heals are NOT influenced by Magic Boost.

Most picked Manastones for Chanters

Lesser used Manastones

There are different schools of thoughts about Manastone builds but if you are a staff Chanter then you should focus on crit until the softcap at 440 to get your knockdown rate as high as possible. Later on you will probably be able to exchange some stones if you can get your hand on gear with high crit modifiers.

Parry stones both add to your mitigation and complement the already high parry gain Chanters get while leveling and their self buff. Since Parry is not linked to diminishing returns per se but checked against your opponents accuracy from encounter to encounter there is no real number to look out for.

Attack Stones add both to your Base Attacks and Skill Attacks and would be a nice addition to a offensive Chanter focusing on a crit/attack build.

Slotting for pvp is not really different then your main choice for Manastones. It comes down to your decision of being more offensive (i.e crit, attack, accuracy), defensive (i.e evasion, parry, magic resists,) or a mix of both (i.e crit/parry).

Godstones
Eventually, if you are lucky enough you might get your hands on a Godstone drop (can be found on lvl 40 elites and up), which can be socketed into a Godstone enabled weapon in the main racial cities next to the skinning NPC. Those drops are VERY rare however, so good luck..
The gold versions are quested through the PvP Questline.

Even though I personally use a Fire Direct Damage Godstone on C-Aion I will most likely go for a Silence one for EU Release, if I have the chance. As nice as it is to see procs for up to 3k go off, it is just very unreliable at 1% and not really helping against my personal enemies the casters. I find myself struggling much more with any kind spell casters then against enemies with physical attacks.
Since my overall build will most likely be nicely setup against melee classes in general, I like to add a nice counter for casters as well.

There are however several choices and if you want to compliment a full damage build then some Direct Damage Proc would be the way to go. A little note on the edge is that the root Godstone doesn’t break on damage, but that is probably more important information for ranged classes.

In the end it will come down to your own preference and how to best add to your existing setup as there is a nice range to chose from.

CHANTER AND FIGHTING

As a note at the beginning it is important to mention that every melee attack we apply adds a slight short time debuff to your target. This debuffs consist of Attack Speed Slow, Run and flight speed snare and physical defense debuffs (which do stack which eachother). You might to keep that in mind if you decide to just stand back and heal.

Solo PvE
Not much to say here: in the middle if the leveling curve we kill slower then most other classes but we do it without any big downtime if any at all. However, be prepared to bring a good amount of mana potions with you Keep your hot and parry buff up and you should be golden.

You can and should weave your Auto Attacks in between skills (try to execute the Skills the same time as the AA would go off, which takes a bit of exercise but eventually you will get the rhythm down) until you have enough attacks to permanently spam your skills without any cooldowns.

In lower levels you might even want to use smite to pull and hit twice before the mob gets to you but Smite doesn’t level up nicely and will eventually get quite useless (unless for tickle pulls if you are too lazy to run up to your target).

There is hardly any target you won’t be able to take down (depending on your gear and in reasonable level range of course). In general though I prefer to not grind on Elites despite the fact that they give very good exp. The time vs. payoff is still less then grinding normal orange or red mobs faster.

With Celerity Mantra and Hots it ’s also really easy to get away from pretty much anything or train through areas easily. Unless you decide to sneak by that super duper uber high lvl raid boss, obviously. There should be no reason for you to die in PvE.

Keep your gear up with our level, try to enchant it as much as possible and keep consumables and shards with you if you can afford it.

The Abyss is a great place to grind after lvl 25 (if you can stand being ganked often). Abyss monsters net slightly higher EXP on top of AP and have lower Hitpoints then monsters in the normal quest areas. The drops consist mostly of stigma shards, money and some crafting and rarely include normal gear.

Group PvE
Well, this is where it gets interesting and where it’s pretty much up to you how busy or lazy you want to be. Unlike most other classes which have their role nicely cut out for them in terms of when to react how, Chanters have a lot of choices on what to do in any given situation. I love to jump between Hotting my group, meleeing, rebuffing, switching mantras around according to the targets, backup the cleric, try to time my stuns for interrupts on big incoming skills..you name it. If you can think if it then you should probably do it but make sure you chose the right moment.

One thing to keep in mind is that in tough situations it’s all about stacking the right tools to get the best benefits. Just having crit mantra up because you are too lazy to check if all the crit slotter are already at the cap or not is not beneficial to the group.
Check the gear of your group members if you are not familiar with it and switch your buffs accordingly. Check how well your tank is geared and decide if you need the added defense or rather go with another Mantra instead.

Theoretically you could just sit back and throw a heal and a hot here and there. Not bother with changing from offensive to defensive target and no one would probably say anything but in order to contribute the most to your group you have to work your butt of as a chanter.

You might pull aggro if you are solo healing or heavy backup healing, specially in combination with Word of Protection Spam and stun attempts. Don't sweat it, you should be able to stand your own until the tank can pull the bugger off of you again.

Even though our debuffs are a bit weak in direct comparison to other classes, I am of the mindset that every little bit helps and stacks up in the end. Unless I do whatever I can even if it is just a little thing, I won’t be satisfied in my role.

As mentioned in the healing section, we can solo heal groups under certain circumstances. It is less efficient and much more work then for a cleric but it is often possible.

Solo PvP

Introduction
Sooo yeeeeah, Chanter solo pvp. There is much rage going on about this and while I agree that we have a harder stand then other classes, at least until after lvl 42, it’s by no means that you just have to fall over and die through the whole leveling process.

Much like PvE Scaling you will have an easy time until around mid 20s, with a really tough time in between and once again getting stronger in your 40s.

The trick to any kind of pvp with the Chanter is to be on the move and use your stuns and knockdowns smart. I like to compare myself with an annoying mosquito: Hard to catch, really annoying and coming in and out to get a zip here and a zip there until your opponent is too tired to focus. 90% of our skills can be cast while moving as long as you are in range, this is a great benefit to the hit and run fighting tactic.
Run and kite melee classes, have celerity mantra up to gain a speed advantage and additional mantras as you see fit (against burst classes I like to have defensive focused Mantras active, against dotting classes I might use HP mantra, magic protection, you get the idea). The whole concept behind moving is not only to have a breather to land a stun and go back in to safely whack your opponent but it will also interrupt chains your enemy was about to execute on you. Keep a constant eye on your opponents status effects and react fast if you see a stun or a knockdown land.

With the changes to spell range interrupts coming sometime in Autumn, it won’t be as easy to interrupt casters while just running out of range. Instead you have to focus much more on breaking their line of sight. Casters are harder to fight in my opinion because you do have to break through their shields first to do any kind of damage and just kiting them won’t do the trick for several obvious reasons. Or in other words, think more "rabbit/hide" then "cheetah/sprint in straight line'

The biggest downside of Chanter solo pvp is coupled with the fact that we are a support class foremost, the lack of burst damage, burst heals, dispels and very few direct means of controlling our opponent (other then having to rely on procs, knockdowns and Heaven’s Judgment landing) until later in game, doesn’t help either. Another VERY important reason to have Greater Healing Potions on you at any given time.

Additional Items and general tricks for PvP

HoT Potions are not necessary since they don’t stack with our own HoTs and thus are pretty much a waste.

PvP From 10 to late 20s
You won’t have much problems, as most of the burst classes didn’t get their powerful attack skills/chains yet and you can easily heal through their attacks (with one exception being casters).

Protective Ward I

Really nice way of limiting damage if you are not able to heal at all (like while being Stunned, Slept, Airlocked or in any other way incapable of doing anything. This of course means you need a good understanding of the class you are fighting to know when to use it. Sins in general like to unleash early in the fight so you might want to get the Ward up as soon as possible. It will give you also a bit of time to heal back up since the burst classes just used all their ammunition and need to wait on the CD. If you are able to, it is also a good idea to be in the air if you notice a hidden enemy close by. Ambush for example doesn’t work in flight. Any HoTs you might have active before using Protective Ward will tick while you are disabled but only for the limited amount listed. It doesn't matter if you cast them before or after you used the Skill.

Binding Word I

Also very handy early on and a good use of a stigma slot in my opinion. It is not only a short time snare it will also disable your opponent from using any skill that is not categorized as a spell (you could compare it with a silence for non casters.)

Rage Spell

I personally still see this as more of a pve skill then pvp despite the recent changes. The slightly added damage does not add enough to a fight that it would outweigh the need of healing off burst damage. It’s easier to use during the lower levels but I would never have it active during higher levels.

Focused Parry I

Have it up, always. It also helps against Casters Autoattack and ranged bow attacks.

PvP Between 30 and 42
This is where it gets tough, specially if you are in the Abyss and getting jumped by one of the Ganking Classes or a group. There is really not much you can do but to try to get away with your wings still attached. Greater Healing Potions, Running Scrolls, Raging Wind Scrolls and Instant Healing Pots will be your best friends once more.

During these levels most classes have their powerful chains and Crowd Control skills. You will get kited, locked and burst down like no tomorrow. Get used to it, the sooner you do, the better you can handle it eventually. If any of the classes get the jump on you it will be hard and in those situations I have no shame and try to make a run for it, or a last stand if it’s not an overwhelming force against me.

A nifty trick to lose your opponents in the Abyss is to fold your wings and let yourself fall down a bit then get them out again. However, be careful you don't fall too long or you will end up dead in the air.

With that said, additionally to the Skills mentioned during earlier levels, you get a few new ones, as well as the third stigma slot at lvl 30.

Word of Life I

It has a long cool down but at lvl 30 it’s a nice buffer to tick alongside Spell of Recovery (those two HoTs do indeed stack)

Word of Quickness I

Don’t blow it too early but be a bit patient and use it when you are getting slightly into trouble. It takes a bit of experience to not use it too early but not too late either. It will help you with healing up fast once active and help get through burst damage.

Word of Wind I

A beauty of a DP skill. Not only for getting away but also for making a stand. The Speed attack will speed up all our fighting animations and turn you into a whirlwind of staff wielding goodness.
Additional information: This buff will stay active on your friends even after you left the group but you need to be in range for the cast and in group by the time you activate it. The main reason I carry DP Food with me at all times.

In this level range I always cancel Rage Spell if I actually have it active and slotted.

Besides knowing your opponents skills which I won’t all list here for now, it is important to not waste your Greater Healing potions on a Cleric too early. You want to wait for Word of Destruction, nothing else. If you can’t cure that DP skill off it is game over within a few seconds.
The things mentioned in the earlier section apply to the higher up sections as well.

PvP After lvl 42
This is where it gets fun again! You get your first real ranged skill (which was unfortunately slightly nerfed from 10 seconds to 12 seconds Cool Down for whatever dumb reason..and in general your skill list will get a nice array of additional tools depending on your stigma choices.

The fighting style in PvP doesn't change, however it gets easier because with the standalone stun you will be even more flexible.

Inescapable Judgment I
Get it and love it. Not much to say about it. It doesn't land constantly but together with Heaven's Judgment and knockdowns it sure helps. I am still trying to figure out if Accuracy influences the chance of landing this phys attack stun and at this time I still believe it does. At least against Evasive targets a high accuracy helped me land the stun every single time on a ranger while doing some testing. Last but not least, finally a tool to stop those pesky runngers!

Enhancement Mantra I

Theoretically handy in PvP. However the exact numbers and how much it really helps hasn't been tested in detail. If you have the stigma slot for it, there is really no reason to not have it up during PvP.

Recovery Spell I

One of the must have Stigmas. The real life saver to finally heal through some heavy incoming damage. Even though while under the influence of Protective Ward your healing gets cut down, Recovery Spell and any other HoT in combination with the Ward Line seems to be a very nice mitigation for burst damage while being disabled from healing normally.

Word of Spellstopping I

Nice emergency spell against heavy incoming damage on your whole group. I am as of yet not sure if this stacks with the Protective Ward line.

Depending on your chosen End Stigma build you will have additional options but they are listed in the Stigma section, so I won't repeat them here.

Class specific PvP tips
Currently being worked on. Coming soon [tm]

Group PvP
This heavily depends on your group setup. Most of the time I am keeping an eye on the Clerics and squishies: Backup healing and protecting them with either fighting off the attackers or interrupting, annoying attackers.
Mantra switching can be quite intense in PvP group fights if you chose so. If there is no caster around I will switch Protection Mantra out for a more suited one. In chasing fights you want to have Celerity Mantra up but in a toe to toe mass fight you probably should use it for something more beneficial. Don't forget to keep your short term buffs fresh as well.

Those fights tend to be similar to PvE Fights but much more dynamic and unpredictable. You will have to make decisions fast an there is really no general guide as how to play. As always though, it's a good idea to stay moving and if possible also assist the MA on FF targets if there is nothing burning on any other end.
Don't count on the cleric to dispel or burst heal you but instead use your own potions if necessary.

Chanters in raiding situations
I would setup raid groups sorted by casters, melee/MA, healers and tanks then throw a chanter in each of those groups. Now you don't even have to spread your mantras but can have three mantras up for the specific attack types and needs of those groups. Just imagine a group filled with sins, glads or rangers, that is 5x 35% increase in attack power.

This is also only the buff side -whereas I will be most likely not be in melee range of a boss mob (depending on his attacks however) I will have my very powerful lvl 45 hot on 10 sec cool down and be ready for any type of adds to use my stuns and help with debuffing or backup healing if necessary.

The danger which Chanters and raid or big boss fights in general is that we have a hard time with AE attacks. The Sins Evasion and the Tanks block and shield skills are much more suited to fend off those huge attacks then our parry. More often then not Chanters take a nose diff while being caught in a huge AE attack.

GENERAL GAMEPLAY

Misc Tips

Crafting
Except for sewing (however debatable if you would want to focus on leather evasion gear and be able to create it yourself instead of rolling against your Ranger and Sin friends) I don't think there is a craft that you won't benefit from and in the end it comes down to what you like to focus on or what you won't be able to get through friends. I'll be working on Alchemy in order to have a supply of any items I need handy whenever I want. Most players won't follow this profession I figure, so unless you are the first one to max the Crafting it won't end up being very lucrative.

It is important to note that crafter items are among the best in game and very thought after. Armorcrafting is the easiest to to Expert, since you only have to crit once on the Expert Quest to proc to gold. In all other Professions you will have to proc twice (from green to blue and blue to gold). As with 1.5 it is possible to Master/Expert two Crafting Professions.

Titles
I like to switch my titles according to needs. Speed titles to run around and stack with Celerity Mantra, other titles I see fit depending on my stats. Crit titles might be nice early on but become redundant once you hit the cap for a stat with diminishing returns. Parry is always a no brainer for me or phys attack increase. In general anything that you might benefit from directly.

Food
I am never leaving Sanctum without some Frillneck Aether Sausage, Perer Aether Jelly and Lumine nyerktails (not sure about the current EU/US name on the last item) in my bag

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COMPARISON WITH CLERICS
As it stands now there is a discrepancy between Clerics and Chanters that is highly in favor of the Cleric. They are not only much more powerful in 1vs1 pvp throughout pretty much the whole leveling process but they also bring more direct tools which are considered must have, to both group pvp and pve content with about the same damage output and a much wider range of healing tools.

Something that strengthens that image for other players is that the tools the Clerics have in their arsenal are much easier to understand and point out (Dispels, Strong burst heals, Root, Blind to only name a few), whereas the Chanter is mostly about numbers which a lot of players like to neglect and chances/procs.
Another reason is the disadvantage of the Chanter having to get into melee range until much later in game to do any kind of damage.

Going 1vs1 against our Mirror Class who knows how to play, can be utterly frustrating for a Chanter for several reasons:
You have a hard time even getting close to the Cleric due to their spammable root
You will get debuffed with 50% healing reduction
They will constantly dispel any slow and debuffs you might have landed
The will easily out-heal your damage

Unless the Cleric does a big mistake you will have a VERY hard time beating one until high end.

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SUMMERY

Don’t play a Chanter if you: