Recommendations for a Cleric/Rogue-Hydrid

[Lactantius]

Hey playgrounders!

I'm helping a mate of mine optimizing his new character a bit.
We are a group of three players, covering all archetypical classes needed.
So, while I'm playing a Diviner, our second mate is playing a dwarven fighter, he will play a Cloistered Cleric of Tymora3/Rogue3/Divine Trickster10.

His combat style will be archery. Besides that, he will be the party scout, rogue, face, buffer and healer.

ATM, we are at level 6.

FEATS: his first taken feats are quicken spell, divine metamagic (quicken spell), extra turning and touch of healing.

Now, he will focus his other feats for archery style.
- Zen Archery isn't worth it since his DEX is high enough as rogueish character with light armor.
- Precise Shot: I think he should take this feat as weapon enchantment since he is feat starving.
- Point Blank Shot is the basic archery feat, though its pretty weak. I wonder if its worth taking the archery feat chain, then.
- Knowledge Devotion: could be worth it if he invests more skill points inot KL Arcana and Planes. Religion is already maxed.
- Holy Warrior is off the table since Tymora does not grant the War Domain (his domains are trickery and luck).
- Practised Spellcaster was my idea as 9th-level-feat since he misses 3 CL.
- Rapid Shot seems kinda must-have, but now, the feats get less and less.

Any other feat ideas? Maybe skip the whole DMM stick, even if it helps? Or just cover some basic archery feats?
We don't need to optimize too much, but a reasonable limit is okay.
As balance for archery, I thought he could invest more into items?

ITEMS:
Taken so far:
- periapt of WIS +2 and reliquiard holy symbol (+2 turns/day to feed DMM).
- composite shortbow +1 [+4 mighty]
- mithral chain shirt
- Healing Belt

General Idea what to take:
1.) Cover the cleric casting abilites
2.) Strengthen the roguish abilites
3.) Archery Items

ad 1) Amulet of Retributive Healing, Circlet of Rapid Casting, Ring of Counterspells, Pearls of Power, Strand of Prayer Beads (Bead of Karma), lesser meatmagic rod of extend spell

ad 2)
Face: Mask of Lies, Moonstone Mask or Mask of Silent Trickery. Any of these masks seems to support stealth and social skills greatly.
Got better face items besides the Third Eyes?
Rings: Ring of Darkhidden to keep undetected by creatures with darkvision;
Shoulders: Cloak of Resistance. Couldn't find any better one, ideas?
Feet: Anklet of Translocation or Boots of Swift Passage to gain a short teleport / escape mechanism. The Boots are more expensive, but they allow farther jumps, more useages/day and are activated by move action (instead of swift). Is that worth the price difference of ~4k gold?
Are there any better boots?
Torso: Rogue's Vest sound good, but are they worth the 18k gold? +1d6 sneak, +2 hide, +2 MS and +2 Reflex saves?

ad 3)
- Bracers of Lesser Archery, maybe a strong bow like bow of the wintermoon or the energy bow. Both would help to balance the missing damage from archery feats like rapid shot and manyshot.
- Gloves of DEX and Belt of CON +2/+4/+6 for obvious reasons;
- maybe raptor arrows to get unlimited, enchanted arrows
- Weapon enchancements:
splitting is off. I was considering precise, warning, holy, deadly precision for more sneak dice and improved critical. Ideas? Suggestions?

I think this char would be moderately optimized. His weaknesses are fragility, since we are a small adventuring band of three heros. So, in combat, his goal would be to stay as far away as possible. But then, he wont sneak that much since he needs to stay withing 30 ft to do so.

Ideas for the adventuring day?
Suggestions for combat?
What is the standard application of DMM quicken? At mid levels, i thought of divine power (quickened) plus righteous might. But thats the buff selection for boss fights, IMO. More ideas?
I have read the cleric handbook and the cleric archer handbooks.

[Asrrin]

I would recommend grabbing Travel Devotion so you can move and full attack in the same round. It dovetails nicely with your turn attempts as well.

[Rhatahema]

DR#357 has the feat sacred outlaw, which allows rogue and cleric levels to stack when determining sneak attack and turning levels. The prerequisites are 2d6 sneak attack and turning. That's another 1d6 SA at lv6, or 3d6 SA at lv20, if his last 4 levels are cleric.

There's also the SA fighter variant from Unearthed Arcana. With that variant and sacred outlaw, he could go rogue1/fighter1/cleric4/DT10/clr+4, ending up with 18 levels of cleric casting and 11d6 SA. Haven't looked into the skill prerequisites though.

If the character happens to be a coward, Craven (Champions of Ruin) is solid . -2 on saves vs fear, but +1 sneak attack damage per character level. From the same book is the splitting ranged weapon enhancement (+3), which duplicates every projectile fired from it. It requires the wielder have precise shot.

If he decides to take Knowledge Devotion, look into the spell Lore of the Gods from Complete Champion. It grants a +5 insight bonus on all knowledge checks (2nd, 10min/level). Sniper's Shot is a 1st level Asn/Rng/Sorc/Wiz spell, but for 1 round you can sneak attack from any distance.

[Valwyn]

There is a PrC in Complete Divine, the Black Flame Zealot, that advances both divine casting and sneak attack. Sadly, it probably doesn't fit his style (needs Exotic Weapon Proficency: Kukri) and is sort of weak (+1 CL on even levels and SA on levels 3, 6, and 9). Plus, I can't really imagine Tymora with a sect of assassins, though you could always change the flavour to some sort of hunter of Beshaba or something.

If you are going to face a lot of undead, Skullclan Hunter (Miniatures Handbook) might help sneak attacking the undead, but it doesn't grant any casting.

[eggynack]

I'm inclined to believe that a cleric/rogue hybrid focused on archery is basically just a cleric. What exactly is it that you're seeking from rogue levels? You could use cloistered cleric to fill out the skill points, a persisted (rather than quickened) divine power to fix the BAB, and cleric spells of various kinds to do everything else. Make one of your domains trickery or something, to help with the skill and spell lists simultaneously for roguing, and then do whatever with the other one. Maybe kobold for trap stuff, if that's your inclination. Ultimately, the answer to, "How do I make an X/Cleric hybrid?" is usually just full class cleric. Their spell list is quite versatile, so they naturally fit in a number of roles, and domains are a modular enough class feature to push you the rest of the way.

[Biffoniacus_Furiou]

A Cloistered Cleric can take the Trickery and Kobold (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/we/20060420a) (rename it Trap) domains, and shouldn't even need to multiclass at all to fill the role of a Rogue. Take the Spontaneous Domain Casting ACF in PH2 for Trickery even. Make the character a Snow Elf, dip Ruathar to get Survival as a class skill and get Seeker of the Misty Isle for one or four levels for the Travel domain. Consider including the Dark Creature template from Tome of Magic with the level adjustment bought off (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/variant/races/reducingLevelAdjustments.htm) for 3,000 xp, otherwise plan on getting a Greater Collar of Umbral Metamorphosis from that same book. Definitely include the feat Darkstalker from Lords of Madness.

If you still want Divine Trickster with that, I'd go something like Cloistered Cleric 5/ Ruathar 1/ Swordsage 1/ Seeker of the Misty Isle 2/ Swordsage 1/ Divine Trickster 10, using Assassin's Stance to meet the sneak attack prerequisite. His first stance should be Child of Shadow, so as long as he's moving he can make Hide checks without relying on lighting or other conditions to give him the required concealment to do so. Pick maneuvers that mostly give utility or defensive effects, such as Shadow Jaunt, Counter Charge, and Sudden Leap, though I'd be sure to include Stone Hammer and Emerald Razor as well. Note that he would have to stay in Assassin's Stance to continue benefiting from Divine Trickster until he hits the fourth level in the class when it will give him enough sneak attack to meet its own prerequisite.

[Lactantius]

I appreciate the class tips, but the chassis Cleric3/Rog3/DT 10 is already set. Also the race is set; he picked up human because of background and flavor reasons, not cause of optimizing wishes.
We play strictly within the forgotten realms rules, so you have to stick to the domains your god granted you (and trickery and luck are fitting well and powerful, imho).

What I am looking for are exclusively tipps for gear and feats.
- Craven sounds nice, although it comes from a book designed vor creating evil characters and villains :(
- Sacred Outlaw come from the Dragon Mag and is therefore not available.

What about the feats I proposed?

[Biffoniacus_Furiou]

Tymora grants Chaos, Good, Luck, Protection, and Travel, but not Trickery. I'd switch to starting out Cloistered Cleric 4/ Rogue 1/ Spellthief 1, which also allows him to freely use wands of any Wizard spells from the schools of abjuration, divination, enchantment, illusion, and transmutation.

For feats, as a Cloistered Cleric he can trade his bonus Knowledge domain for Knowledge Devotion, and a single rank in each of the skills used for identifying creatures guarantees him at least +1 to attack and damage. Get the Collector of Stories skill trick in CS and he gets an extra +5 bonus to one of those checks per encounter.

Use two flaws (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/variant/buildingCharacters/characterFlaws.htm) if available (more here (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=258440#30)), which will give him two extra feats. Flaws must be taken "when creating a character" so starting at 6th level his flaws can show up at any level up to and including 6th.

Any FR character should consider Mercantile Background from PGtF. Not only does it allow the party to sell loot for 75% of value instead of the standard 50%, but the character who has it should be able to get every one of his starting items at 75% cost as well.

Definitely get Practiced Spellcaster, a loss of even one or two caster levels is usually worth having it, three or more it should go without saying. If he's starting out Cloistered Cleric 3/ Rogue 3, then I'd say he should definitely begin play with this feat.

Extend and Persistent Spell for Divine Metamagic: Persistent is fairly standard. He can get a Reliquary Holy Symbol and a Night Stick to get +6 Turn Undead uses to power it, though the greatest benefit at this level would usually be Mass Lesser Vigor.

Skipping Craven because it comes from a book designed for evil characters, but has no evil prerequisites itself, is like prohibiting a Wizard from taking Improved Toughness because it comes from Complete Warrior. Craven itself is specifically for dangerous cowards per its flavor, and all of the feats in that book are for characters of vicious means, but not necessarily evil motives. The feat is designed for someone who specializes in striking at opponents where they are weakest, because he's too afraid to face them at their strongest. If this would be fitting for this character, then there's no reason to skip it, especially if the only reason is which book it came from.

Item Familiar (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/variant/magic/itemFamiliars.htm) is almost always worth taking.

Say his character bested the Iron Wyrm Vault detailed in Complete Scoundrel to get the feat Tactile Trapsmith for 3,000 gp without spending a feat on it. That allows him to use Dexterity instead of Intelligence on all Search and Disable Device checks. It also negates penalties to those checks due to darkness or blindness.