Can Someone Explain the Idea of a Charisma Cleric?

[ajfonty]

I was talking with a few friends about an upcoming campaign we're doing, and they briefly mentioned a charisma based cleric who can get pretty insane charisma bonuses -- they didn't elaborate though.

What is the point of building a charisma-based cleric, apart from the turning? What type of builds do you get?

[deuxhero]

Divine Metamagic?

[Keld Denar]

I'd imagine it mostly revolves around [Divine] feats. Using Turn Undead attempts for things OTHER than turning undead. With Dynamic Priest from one of the Dragonlance setting books, you can make your cleric pretty Cha focused.

[Kuulvheysoon]

Favoured Soul?

[ajfonty]

Divine Metamagic?

That's it? Just load up on turn attempts to use DMM on your spells?

Sounds powerful, if only a little ... lame.

(Not discounting your answer or anything, moreso the fact that someone would build a character like that.)


I'd imagine it mostly revolves around [Divine] feats. Using Turn Undead attempts for things OTHER than turning undead. With Dynamic Priest from one of the Dragonlance setting books, you can make your cleric pretty Cha focused.


Favoured Soul?


I'll have to check those out, then.

[eggs]

More likely than not, the point is the Turning.

Turning is useful in fueling Divine and Domain feats, which are often very powerful. Divine Spell Power, for instance, can mean up to +4 CL (based on a Charisma-based Turning check), and Divine Metamagic can mean Twinning or Persisting spells 8 to 12 levels early.

[Answerer]

Favored Soul isn't a Cleric, and isn't Cha-SAD anyway.

Dynamic Priest mitigates the importance of Wis on a Cleric (and eliminates it for a Favored Soul), but there's still some need for Wis.

IIRC, Favored Souls use Wis for DC, Cha for bonus spells; Dynamic Priest makes Divine spells use Cha for DCs but not for bonus spells.

[Aasimar]

Evangelism?

[nedz]

IIRC, Favored Souls use Wis for DC, Cha for bonus spells; Dynamic Priest makes Divine spells use Cha for DCs but not for bonus spells.

Favoured Soul is a base class in CDiv.

With Favoured Soul you can just dump Wis and simply not cast spells where the DC is important, eg buffs.

Favoured Soul seems to have been designed for combat, but doesn't get Turn Undead and so it not eligible for DMM.

[Snowbluff]

I'd imagine it mostly revolves around [Divine] feats. Using Turn Undead attempts for things OTHER than turning undead. With Dynamic Priest from one of the Dragonlance setting books, you can make your cleric pretty Cha focused.

Wait... Clerics can use Turn Attempts to... turn Undead? :smallconfused:

[Zaq]

Wait... Clerics can use Turn Attempts to... turn Undead? :smallconfused:

It's an ACF, like that weird Barbarian one that lets you trade Pounce for the ability to move faster.

[Morph Bark]

Can a Cleric use non-undead turn attempts for Divine and Domain feats, such as turning plants or air/earth/fire/water creatures?

[ShneekeyTheLost]

It's an ACF, like that weird Barbarian one that lets you trade Pounce for the ability to move faster.Nah, it actually comes free, if you read the fine print. It's just that no one bothers with it since turn undead uses are so much more valuable doing other things.

I will admit, there are some pretty weird ACF's out there. Like Swordsage's ACF that trades their unarmed damage for light armor proficiency.

[Zaq]

Can a Cleric use non-undead turn attempts for Divine and Domain feats, such as turning plants or air/earth/fire/water creatures?

Depends on the wording of the feat in question. The majority specify turning/rebuking undead, but a few specify just "turn/rebuke attempts," and those ones let you use your other T/R pools.

Then of course you have the ones that explicitly specify non-undead T/R attempts, like some of the feats in Races of Stone, but they're rare and generally not that interesting.

[eggs]

Divine Spell Power's usually the most useful feat that doesn't specify Undead turning. I'm not sure about others that do anything particularly interesting... Sacred Vitality's sometimes useful in a really circumstantial sort of way.

[Suddo]

Can a Cleric use non-undead turn attempts for Divine and Domain feats, such as turning plants or air/earth/fire/water creatures?

Yes & No.
Only if it says it can. The Turn Air/Earth/Fire/Water from Domains don't. The Destroy Undead ACF from the Expidition to Ravenloft (I think) does work. The standard idea is to get that, then get Rebuke, then get Turn Undead. Then buff Charisma. This gives you 3 pools that all get additionals from your Charisma and then you can get Divine Metamagic (or some other Divine feat) and use them as another resource.

Also Blue is sarcasm around here.

[vampire2948]

I often use the feat to help make a multi-classed cleric easier. I'm using it for a character this week that's a Cha-based arcane caster / Cleric. Being SAD is good.


vampire2948,

[Morph Bark]

Yes & No.
Only if it says it can. The Turn Air/Earth/Fire/Water from Domains don't. The Destroy Undead ACF from the Expidition to Ravenloft (I think) does work. The standard idea is to get that, then get Rebuke, then get Turn Undead. Then buff Charisma. This gives you 3 pools that all get additionals from your Charisma and then you can get Divine Metamagic (or some other Divine feat) and use them as another resource.

Hmmm... any easy ways to get all four elemental domains and the Plant domain? Or at least their domain powers? The other two are easy enough with just a level each in Cleric and Dread Necromancer (put in Precocious Apprentice, Theurge it up, one level in Warweaver and maybe five in Spellguard of Silverymoon and you can buff everyone all day, every day).

Divine Metamagic says:

You must spend one turn or rebuke attempt, plus an additional attempt for each level increase in the metamagic feat you're using.

The further fluff text indicates it is meant to be turn/rebuke undead, but the crunch does not specify.

[lord_khaine]

I will admit, there are some pretty weird ACF's out there. Like Swordsage's ACF that trades their unarmed damage for light armor proficiency.

That one is actualy worth taking, since it also allow you to keep your Wis-to Ac bonus while using light armor, something thats more or less unike, and a really powerfull ability.

[eggs]

The further fluff text indicates it is meant to be turn/rebuke undead, but the crunch does not specify.
Undead Turning is specified in the same sentence that describe's the spell's function and that specifies that it's a free action. You'd need a doozy of an argument to establish that the statement has no bearing on the rules.

I'd agree that RAW favors any turning pool, as far as certain other feats are concern (Divine Spell Power, Sacred Vitality, etc.), but in DMM's case, it's a pretty clear "no."

[GreenSerpent]

Dynamic Priest feat? Lets Clerics cast off CHA.

[nedz]

Also Blue is sarcasm around here.

Or Incarnum

[Urpriest]

In terms of getting very large Charisma bonuses, I've heard there's a Cleric spell in BoEF that does just that.

[ShneekeyTheLost]

That one is actualy worth taking, since it also allow you to keep your Wis-to Ac bonus while using light armor, something thats more or less unike, and a really powerfull ability.

Mithral Chain Shirt = 0 ACP, which means no penalties in it, which permits the wis-to-AC thing. Before that, MC Studded Leather does the same thing.

With 0 ACP, there is no downside to using the armor without proficiency. :smallwink:

[MesiDoomstalker]

Mithral Chain Shirt = 0 ACP, which means no penalties in it, which permits the wis-to-AC thing. Before that, MC Studded Leather does the same thing.

With 0 ACP, there is no downside to using the armor without proficiency. :smallwink:

Which is why any character has a minimum of a Gnome Twist Cloth (Exotic light armor with no ACP of ASF that I remember, +1 AC).

[SirFredgar]

Mithral Chain Shirt = 0 ACP, which means no penalties in it, which permits the wis-to-AC thing. Before that, MC Studded Leather does the same thing.

With 0 ACP, there is no downside to using the armor without proficiency. :smallwink:

Wait... are you saying that a Monk then could wear a mythral chain shirt and retain his AC Bonus class feature? Or am I misreading this?

[Answerer]

Yeah, I... don't think that's how it works, Shneekey. Just because there are no penalties for wearing it, doesn't mean that it's not Light Armor anymore. The feature clearly specifies that it does not work if you're wearing armor.

[ShneekeyTheLost]

Wait... are you saying that a Monk then could wear a mythral chain shirt and retain his AC Bonus class feature? Or am I misreading this?

Who said anything about a monk? This is a Swordsage we are talking about here. They get their Wis bonus to AC in light armor. I was pointing out that you don't get any penalties if the armor has 0 ACP, because he was mentioning that having light armor proficiency was worth it for said armor.

Non-proficiency in armor gives you a penalty on all rolls equal to your armor's ACP. An ACP of 0 means you have a penalty of 0 to everything. Oh woe as me! :smallwink:

I was referring exclusively to non-proficiency in armor, not in respect to any class abilities other than the Swordsage one.

Yet another reason why Swordsage is everything Monk was supposed to be, but wasn't.

[Answerer]

Unarmed Swordsages lose Wis-to-AC if they wear Armor.

Curiously, they don't. Could have sworn that was in there.

Oh well, carry on. Shneekey is correct.

[SirFredgar]

Who said anything about a monk? This is a Swordsage we are talking about here. They get their Wis bonus to AC in light armor. I was pointing out that you don't get any penalties if the armor has 0 ACP, because he was mentioning that having light armor proficiency was worth it for said armor.

Non-proficiency in armor gives you a penalty on all rolls equal to your armor's ACP. An ACP of 0 means you have a penalty of 0 to everything. Oh woe as me! :smallwink:

I was referring exclusively to non-proficiency in armor, not in respect to any class abilities other than the Swordsage one.

Yet another reason why Swordsage is everything Monk was supposed to be, but wasn't.

Okay, yes. It appears I was a little off.

I thought the unarmed Swordsage's AC buff only worked in no armor, just as the monks.... and the vanilla Swordsage got to use it in Light Armor. Thus, I thought you were telling us "Why pick vanilla swordsage, when you can just use an unarmed one, and can still wear the armor without loosing wisdom to AC just because it has no check penalty."

When, I guess, the Unarmed and Vanilla version of the AC bonus both allow for light armor, and the unarmed version simply doesn't receive that proficiency? (I don't have ToB with me, atm)

[Answerer]

When, I guess, the Unarmed and Vanilla version of the AC bonus both allow for light armor, and the unarmed version simply doesn't receive that proficiency? (I don't have ToB with me, atm)
Correct; I just checked. I was surprised too.

[SirFredgar]

Correct; I just checked. I was surprised too.

It makes the original post much funnier to me now. WoTC: Here's the Swordsage.... um.. but yeah... we'd rather you play the "alternate" version. Also, for shiggles, try asking your GM if you can use spells instead of maneuvers!

[ShneekeyTheLost]

Okay, yes. It appears I was a little off.

I thought the unarmed Swordsage's AC buff only worked in no armor, just as the monks.... and the vanilla Swordsage got to use it in Light Armor. Thus, I thought you were telling us "Why pick vanilla swordsage, when you can just use an unarmed one, and can still wear the armor without loosing wisdom to AC just because it has no check penalty."

When, I guess, the Unarmed and Vanilla version of the AC bonus both allow for light armor, and the unarmed version simply doesn't receive that proficiency? (I don't have ToB with me, atm)

Swordsage's bonus to AC only works with Light Armor, by the strict reading of the ability. Unarmed lose proficiency in light armor, not the AC bonus.