2 Lvl 20 NPC Clerics suggestions

[Arkusus]

In my campaign there is a city surrounded by evil and darkness, and in this city (among the normal host of guards and citizens and all that) are two level 20 clerics who have basically made the survival of this city possible. By this point in time, they no longer adventure like they probably did in their youth, but they prettymuch run the city, and ensure it's continued survival.


My question is this... I've never really played a divine caster, and while I can read through some of the high level powers a cleric of that level could cast, I don't really know how much you could get out of them...

There are two avenues I would pursue, one is easier for me, which is them literally physically fighting evil. Evil army shows up outside the gates, I get how a high level cleric could show up and smite some serious evil.

But I don't really know the tricks a cleric might do to protect a city... What kind of blessings he can perform, and perhaps most importantly, what permanent effects he can invoke.

Miracle is an obvious choice, but I wondered if anyone knew any other good tricks that a high level cleric could pull to protect an entire city, or even just slowly build up a group of soldiers over time to make them more effective at combating evil and all that.

[faircoin]

This is probably really obvious and a dead horse by now, but in the 1% chance you haven't considered it, get your level 20 clerics as many nightsticks as they can afford with their WBL, grab the feats extend spell, persistent spell, and divine metamagic (persistent spell).

Persist summon elemental monolith every day for something that can defend your city 24/7 without you needing to be there. Even better, grab the feat arcane thesis (extend spell) and cast the summon spell every other day for 48 hours (with DMM persist stacked on top, of course). This isn't possible; forget clerics aren't arcane casters. :smalltongue:

Persist greater visage of the deity for personal buffs.

Have both of your clerics grab the trickery domain. If there's an invasion, persist time stop and prepare your defenses. Polymorph any object should trivially solve all CR appropriate (and inappropriate) encounters. One cleric should grab travel domain; the other should grab the sun domain. They're both hopefully cloistered clerics, so they have the knowledge domain as well to identify threats with their knowledge checks.

Grab one level of wizard (conjurer w/ abrupt jaunt ACF), enter dweomerkeeper PrC, and then cast miracle for free 4/day.

Get the feat craft wondrous item, and build a crapload of auto-reset traps with spells attached to them. These are the workhorse of your society for everything. Moment of prescience and the summon line of spells are great on traps.

Um, hmm... did I miss anything?

[Gavinfoxx]

Yea, I dont think Time Stop works the way you think it does with persistent spell. but that doesn't matter.

But Clerics, especially high level clerics, can do just about anything.

Read the Cleric Handbook

http://www.brilliantgameologists.com/boards/?topic=420.0

[faircoin]

Yea, I dont think Time Stop works the way you think it does with persistent spell

I think I might agree with you here; the duration reference implies it doesn't behave like normal durations, and so therefore out of the RAW reach of extend and persist.

Also, yes, I should've linked to the cleric handbook.

[Arkusus]

Thanks guys, good suggestions. Taking a gander at that there handbook now, should help.

Didn't think about daily summons, but I like that in particular

[Biffoniacus_Furiou]

Cleric 5/ Morninglord (PGtF) 10/ Radiant Servant (CD) 5 is fitting for a protector of a city that's 'surrounded by evil and darkness' as you put it.

For defending a city, using (Greater) Planar Ally and/or Gate to get assistance from powerful outsiders is the standard method. At level 20 you can Gate in a Solar, then command it to use its own prepared Gate (or Wish/Miracle) to call another Solar, order that one to follow your orders, then go battle your enemies for 19 rounds. Give the same order to every Solar that shows up, you've got an unending supply of Solars with one arriving every round.

[Vaz]

I think I might agree with you here; the duration reference implies it doesn't behave like normal durations, and so therefore out of the RAW reach of extend and persist.

Also, yes, I should've linked to the cleric handbook.

You can extend a Time Stop, Maximise, Empower it, etc, but you cannot persist; persist changes the duration (1d4+1 (apparent time)) to 24 hours, without mention of the apparent time.

[Runestar]

I have never envisioned clerics as the mass-slaughtering warmage that wizards are capable of.

One idea is to make the cleric a solar or dragon who appears human via alternate form. :smalltongue: When push comes to shove...

Alternatively, let him be at least lv21, and use the mythal seed (empires of faerun) to erect a barrier around the whole city that keeps undead out.