[PF] Balancing Clerics and Druids

[Bovine Colonel]

Basically, how would one bring the cleric and druid classes down to tier 2~4?

[Kantolin]

I believe 'losing enough caster levels' does a good job of dropping their tier, and in the case of some, by the two necessary to make them tier 3. Prestige classes may help encourage this.

How soon those drops need to occur, and exactly how true this is, is probably more debatable. For example, if Heirophant is a -2 prestige class, but the cleric doesn't take his first level until level 16, then that's 15 levels of tier 1 and presumably tier 3 at level 20, but a kinda fuzzy middle.

This also brings up 'how many drops are necessary' as a secondary question.

Edit: Alternately, you can use the Favored Soul, Shugenja, or Spirit Shaman, call them 'Cleric of the gods, Cleric of the elements, and Druid' respectively, and call it a day.

[Bovine Colonel]

Sorry, I didn't make myself sufficiently clear. I meant as a GM.

[tyckspoon]

Sorry, I didn't make myself sufficiently clear. I meant as a GM.

Do you mean by houseruling how they work, or by attempting to bludgeon them with existing in-game rules until they conform? The first is relatively simple, at least for tier 2- make them spontaneous casters, give them a Spells Known chart, job's a good 'un. Their Tier 1 status comes from the ability to reselect their entire spell load every day from every available printed spell. Make them select a set list of spells, and you've got Tier 2 in exactly the same way as the Sorcerer. Lower than that takes some proper work, because you have to pretty carefully trim and tune what they have access to without going overboard and making them half useless.

If you mean the second, don't, it never works out.

[Arutema]

Basically, how would one bring the cleric and druid classes down to tier 2~4?

Replace Cleric with Life Oracle. Replace Druid with Nature Oracle.

They get stuff to make up for lack of domains and wild shape, but limited spells known is still a check on power levels.

[Grommen]

Play game as you like. When player gets out of line. Use stick. :smalleek:

Not talking about on the character.

No amount of house ruling will stop a player hell bent on power gaming. If you don't like something they are doing. Ask them to stop. If they don't. They need to find a new game.

If they are unwittingly tanking your game, you have to make them see the light. Explain to them nicely, "Quit freeken tanking my game!" :smallfurious: They don't; See above.

What you want is to teach the players to limit themselves. Then you don't have to go all Godzilla on them. A simple fix for clerics and druids is one buff spell at a time, and don't go shape changing into Godzilla.

Now for what ever reason you wish to engage in a contest of wills with an unruly player. If they want to fight the DM on what he says....I have twenty years of dirty tricks up my sleeve. If they give me grief, I start adding in nasty thing like material components, IE. hay how are you lugging that around anyway? Exactly where did you get the gallbladder of a dragon? What pocket is that in, cause you have 1 second to remember or were moving on. Where do you keep your spell book cause someone just took it.

Here are some more BTW....

So you want to cast Clerity? No one has invented that spell yet, would you like to research it? Ok great, the DC to invent that is 100. You can take "20" though. You can make 100? I meant the DC is 1000, sorry typo in my notes.

What RAW says I'm doing it wrong? It also sad to change anything I don't like. So deal or find someone else to abuse.

O you just cast "Kill that sucker dead" spell? Sorry your god is busy right now. Besides you skipped last nights prayer anyway....No spells for you! And no I don't care that you were up all night fighting that Demonic Dragon. You missed prayers....Get spells tomorrow.

What you mean this is the 5th encounter of the day and you need to rest? Hell I have 10 more planned before you find the inn. If your character is tired, take a cat nap. I know it will not get his spells back, but he won't be so damm cranky. :smallsmile:

Ya he saved verses that spell. I know he prolly needed a 20 on the die. He nailed it. He'll save against the next one too even if he needs a 30 on the freeken roll.

Honest in my book NPC fighters have a Spell Resistance equal to their level+10. Funny it's not in your book.

And I know that you cast grease on the golem. He is wearing iron spikes and digging into the floor...O I mean your wizard...


In short it's your world. If it evolves into a contest of wills. You win, they loose. If they are playing nice and realize that D&D is a game of story telling and collaboration not a War Game; They have fun too.

[TOZ]

Make them spontaneous. (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/variant/classes/spontaneousDivineCasters.htm)

[tyckspoon]

In short it's your world. If it evolves into a contest of wills. You win, they loose. If they are playing nice and realize that D&D is a game of story telling and collaboration not a War Game; They have fun too.

It is also the player's right to not deal with your crap. So. You know. Enjoy ruling your empty table with an iron fist. At least the table is playing the way you want.

[Bovine Colonel]

For the record, this is purely theoretical. I do not, at this point in time, actually have powergamers playing clerics and druids.

[Greenish]

Here are some more BTW....

So you want to cast Clerity? No one has invented that spell yet, would you like to research it? Ok great, the DC to invent that is 100. You can take "20" though. You can make 100? I meant the DC is 1000, sorry typo in my notes.

What RAW says I'm doing it wrong? It also sad to change anything I don't like. So deal or find someone else to abuse.

O you just cast "Kill that sucker dead" spell? Sorry your god is busy right now. Besides you skipped last nights prayer anyway....No spells for you! And no I don't care that you were up all night fighting that Demonic Dragon. You missed prayers....Get spells tomorrow.

What you mean this is the 5th encounter of the day and you need to rest? Hell I have 10 more planned before you find the inn. If your character is tired, take a cat nap. I know it will not get his spells back, but he won't be so damm cranky. :smallsmile:

Ya he saved verses that spell. I know he prolly needed a 20 on the die. He nailed it. He'll save against the next one too even if he needs a 30 on the freeken roll.

Honest in my book NPC fighters have a Spell Resistance equal to their level+10. Funny it's not in your book.

And I know that you cast grease on the golem. He is wearing iron spikes and digging into the floor...O I mean your wizard...
That sounds more trying to be a jerk for the sake of being a jerk. I don't think the solution for problem players is to try to out-douche them.

[Blisstake]

Well, first of all, Pathfinder has already done some work in balancing the two. Druid's shapeshifts are limited in what abilities they can gain, and it's dependent on their physical statistics as well. Many gamebreaking spells like celerity no longer exist, and Divine Metamagic isn't anywhere to be seen.

So first, identify why you believe they are overpowered. If it's because of them having many buff spells on before getting into combat, try to add more surprise battles or enemies with dispel magic. If specific spells are causing grief, alter them a bit, or find enemies that can maneuver around them.

[Analytica]

Maybe require that they learn spells? Not necessarily like wizards, but sit down with them and compile a list, from all sources you allow, of spells that their particular deity grants. Go through every one, if a spell is too strong, maybe their deity does not generally grant it. Make the same judgments with spell research.

If this is the case, other priests of that faith shouldn't get those spells either, of course. Or some spells may require unlocking through special initiations or pilgrimages. Consider adding some thematically appropriate spells to the list from other spell lists as well, to lessen the impact.

EDIT: To be honest, the game might be more fun if all (and that would mean all, NPCs as well) casters were fixed-list casters like beguilers or dread necromancers, with the option of adding a few spells here and there as class features and through feats.

[FMArthur]

You could knock them down to Bard casting progression chart (but remove the 0s from it and bump the whole chart up by one level - they are a bit more reliant on their spells than bards, so it shouldn't just be 'optional' to gain spells at the level they appear). With all the turning-related feats available and domains, Clerics would still be useful, interesting and powerful. Druids still pretty much have it made with the animal companions and wildshape.