Can a Drow Cleric be good?

[tadkins]

Not good as in the alignment, of course. I'm talking a down-and-dirty true evil female cleric of Lolth. The very thing that all those Drizzt clones rebel against. A drow the way they're born to be!

However, that +2 LA sure can hurt...

With that in mind, can an iconic Drow Cleric be built well? From what I've been reading, Lolth gives some pretty nice domains, Pride and Trickery in particular. What would be some good ways to capitalize around this? Basically, how would you optimize a Drow Cleric, assuming most material is allowed?

Though I'll likely never get to play such a character in a real game (A CE drow would be a tough sell to most DMs), I'm still finding it fun to build a theoretical character around this concept.

[AuraTwilight]

LA Buyoff pretty much negates that +2 LA as a real problem.

[Snowbluff]

I think there's a Savage Progression for Drow.

[Grod_The_Giant]

Lesser Drow? I'm pretty sure the race exists somewhere, though I'm not sure the fluff would work.

[tadkins]

LA Buyoff pretty much negates that +2 LA as a real problem.

If LA Buyoff is allowed in a game, definitely. Not sure it's something that can always be counted on though, so I'm just making sure it can work even without it.


I think there's a Savage Progression for Drow.

I think there's a level 1 progression mentioned in Drow of the Underdark, which would be used if the game started at that level for sure.


Lesser Drow? I'm pretty sure the race exists somewhere, though I'm not sure the fluff would work.

It does, but it just seems wrong for someone with the Pride domain accepting being called "Lesser". xD

[Sian]

If you read the 'Lesser' Variants it explicitly says that either noone of the race have it, or all of the race have it, and the 'Lesser' is only something used to mechanicly differencate, From the ingame perspective, a Drow is not more of a drow than an lesser drow, since if its an lesser drow, all drows are lesser drows and the LA variant doesn't exist in the first place

[tadkins]

If you read the 'Lesser' Variants it explicitly says that either noone of the race have it, or all of the race have it, and the 'Lesser' is only something used to mechanicly differencate, From the ingame perspective, a Drow is not more of a drow than an lesser drow, since if its an lesser drow, all drows are lesser drows and the LA variant doesn't exist in the first place

Ah thanks, that makes sense.

Worst case scenario though, with the character forced as the standard +2 LA type without the buyoff available, can a cleric be made optimized and effective? What would be a good way to do so that would play off the drow's racial strengths.

[Bakkan]

At what level are we talking about? At level 3-4, your lower HD will make you more of a liability than an asset without some major shenanigans. At medium levels, you'll be OK, but you'll be down on BAB and base saves and you'll be a spell level behind a full caster. As long as the rest of your group is playing to about a Tier 3-4 level of power you'll keep up. At high levels you'll almost be at full Cleric power, and past level 19 the differences between a Drow Cleric and a Human Cleric will be minimal.

My problem with a Drow Cleric is that the Drow race gives the Cleric almost nothing that synergizes with the class other than a +2 Charisma which gives 1 more turn attempt/day. At levels where spell resistance is important, the cleric gets the spell spell resistance. Darkvision can be obtained with items or +0 LA races.

It seems to me that the religious leaders of the drow would be much more likely to be Archivists and Favored Souls, both of which benefit from the Drow's ability bonuses.

[(Un)Inspired]

Pathfinder has the drow noble which have really beefy stats and SLAs compared to normal drow. It would be pretty easy to make on into a devastating cleric.

[dantiesilva]

My friend is playing a Dark maiden (forgot her real name so using sir name) touched drow (instead of lolth touched) And even though she ate 3LA from it she is outshining most of us in combat powers as well as health. Her build is Wizard 1/Paladin 5/Abjurant champion 3 at the moment and we are all about to jump onto level 12 besides her, no LA buyoff was allowed and she seems to do fine.

[Vertharrad]

Eilistraee I believe is the name your looking for...the daughter of Corellon and Lolth(who was Araushnee).

[dantiesilva]

Yup thats her, the point is mostly though that yes you can play a drow, as long as you play to your strengths, and yes they can be good.

Our player even plans on going into the Silverhaired knight PrC so she will be able to cast 3rd level wizard spells and I think 2nd level paladin spells. Not great, but for a gish with our limited resources available, its great as I plan on being a cleric/druid.

[tadkins]

Mainly wondering what those strengths are, and how I can best play to them. The Trickery domain leads me to believe they'd make a good skillmonkey cleric, though I do like the idea of building a graceful dark elven swordswoman cleric as well.

[SinsI]

LA Buyoff pretty much negates that +2 LA as a real problem.

No, the worst part about LA is low level play (except for some races that are almost invulnerable at low levels, like pixie), and buyoff doesn't do anything to address it.

It might be *somewhat* viable if you start it at, say, +1 ECL compared to what the characters without LA have.

-2 Con is also very bad. Drow are nowhere near the LA +2 in power.

[Psyren]

Pathfinder has the drow noble which have really beefy stats and SLAs compared to normal drow. It would be pretty easy to make on into a devastating cleric.

Drow Nobles are essentially the Matriarchs. Also, they are LA +1.

There is the regular Drow though with no LA. While they're not the absolute best race out there for clerics, they aren't the worst either (and they make decent Oracles.)