Helping a Cleric be effective

[SilverLeaf167]

So, the party in the campaign I'm DMing (which only has three characters) is composed of a Dwarven Dungeoncrasher Fighter/Barbarian/Warblade, a Strongheart Halfling Rogue/Swashbuckler and a Strongheart Halfling Cloistered Cleric, planning to go into Divine Oracle. The whole party is level 8.
The thing is, in a seemingly unusual turn of the tables, the Cleric tends to be relatively useless in combat and usually just heals the others when they get low on health, though out of combat he's very versatile, of course. Everyone is having fun, but the Cleric has asked me for some help with being a more capable combatant. The problem is, I'm not so sure how to do that either.

He has the Travel and Trickery domains, which AFAIK are considered some of the most capable in the game but don't fully kick in until higher levels. DMM shenanigans are banned with a Gentleman's Agreement, though I guess that might actually be waived at some point if necessary. The Dwarf somehow manages to be incredibly competent in combat and I doubt that some buffs would really make the small Cleric surpass him.
The Cleric has invested two feats (Knowledge Devotion and Zen Archery) into his crossbow, as well as a bunch of money to enchant it, but his tiny bolts are pretty darn useless and I think they only serve to distract him from realizing and utilizing his full power. I've notified him about this and offered to let him retrain one or both of those feats, which would at least allow him to enter Divine Oracle without having to wait another level, but he has declined.

So, what could I do to help this Cleric be more useful in combat? I'm mostly looking for spell choices and tactics, since he's rather adamant on keeping his feats for some reason

[Bubzors]

I think he should definitely stick with the Knowledge Devotion Feat. Make sure he jacks up his knowledge skills as high as possible, that way he can consistently get +3 or higher on his attack and damage rolls. I would suggest divine power and going into melee but he seems pretty stuck on the ranged crossbow.

I would see him probably doing best as a battlefield control type. With his domains he can make himself go all over the battlefield. Use fly or longstrider to move around more freely while dropping obscuring mists or something of that nature on the enemies in the back. When you get in trouble you can always dimension door out. Also, with trickery you can turn invisible, so maybe being invisible and sneaking up to the big bad monster and Bestow Curse on him? Moon Bolt is a 4th level ranged spell that does 1d4 str damage per 3 levels. So at level 9, with a good roll can basically greatly reduce the effectiveness of a brute you are fighting, or completely knock out a low strength caster.

Also, no one complains about a resist energy mass or other mass buffs. They may not seem overwhelmingly useful, but I know it has saved my party more than a few times having those extra points of resistance. Magic Circle against evil is another I would suggest wholeheartedly.

Basically, he won't be delivering damage near as high as the dwarf, but if he utilizes spells in intelligent ways he should be able to contribute. And when there isn't an opening, just sitting above the enemy with fly taking potshots at them is always fun.

[Raimun]

In this case, I'd recommend Summon Monster-spells. Some monsters are really good. Grappling monsters or "Full attack charge w/pounce+rake"-monsters must be more useful in combat than a halfling with a crossbow. This way he could also keep shooting with the crossbow.

[King Atticus]

The Cleric has invested two feats (Knowledge Devotion and Zen Archery) into his crossbow,

Just to be clear, he did trade in his knowledge domain granted power to get that knowledge devotion feat...right. He's not going to want to use a regular feat slot for that.

[SilverLeaf167]

Just to be clear, he did trade in his knowledge domain granted power to get that knowledge devotion feat...right. He's not going to want to use a regular feat slot for that.

No, he didn't. IIRC, he wouldn't even have any Knowledge skills without the domain and the feat would be useless. :smallconfused:

[Sith_Happens]

Well, as long as he insists on using a crossbow as his primary weapon he's not going to be doing much damage, so I'll second BFC. Clerics actually have a lot of good choices for this if the right books are available (Spell Compendium being the obvious one). For instance, there's a 1st level Cleric spell in Frostburn that creates a 10ft radius ice slick; DC 10 Balance check to move half speed, just like Grease.

[WhatBigTeeth]

No, he didn't. IIRC, he wouldn't even have any Knowledge skills without the domain and the feat would be useless. :smallconfused:
Clerics already have the most important skills for Knowledge Devotion on their base lists, and the bonus for the feat usually makes it pretty close to comprehensive.

But the cleric spell list has enough control/minionmancy/debuff/buff/save-or-lose spells that if his wisdom is high enough to justify Zen Archery, I'm sure he could contribute more just by acting like a caster than by using a crossbow to pretend to be a fighter.