Cleric dip-- devotion feats?

[Hiro Quester]

Thinking about dipping cleric as a 21st level dip, since my bard character would no longer have to worry about losing a caster level. He would have some kind of road to Damascus experience, and decide to be more active and preachy in his deity-related activities.

Do I understand this right?

It seems that if I dip cleric, I can chose two domains ( or knowledge plus two for cloistered cleric), that fit with my deity, character, etc.

It seems that I could then choose the devotion feat from each domain, rather than getting the domain spells.

So for a one level dip, I could get three bonus feats, such as (from complete champion) travel devotion, trickery devotion (and knowledge devotion, for cloistered cleric).

Plus 3+CHA turn attempts. Since my character is a bard, that's a pretty good pool with which to power these feats.

Many say that dipping one level of cleric is advantageous, but this seems too good. Am I misunderstanding something?

[Karnith]

Many say that dipping one level of cleric is advantageous, but this seems too good. Am I misunderstanding something?
No, you aren't misunderstanding anything. Dipping a level of Cleric is very nice. There's even a handbook about it. (http://brilliantgameologists.com/boards/index.php?topic=2773.0)

[firebrandtoluc]

AFB answer: You can only swap one domain for one devotion. And you lose the domain completely, the power and spell access. You can only buy two devotions with feats. So you can get three but only as a cleric that swaps a domain and spends two feats. Anyone else gets two at most for the cost of two feats.

[heavyfuel]

Thinking about dipping cleric as a 21st level dip, since my bard character would no longer have to worry about losing a caster level. He would have some kind of road to Damascus experience, and decide to be more active and preachy in his deity-related activities.

Do I understand this right?

It seems that if I dip cleric, I can chose two domains ( or knowledge plus two for cloistered cleric), that fit with my deity, character, etc.

It seems that I could then choose the devotion feat from each domain, rather than getting the domain spells.

So for a one level dip, I could get three bonus feats, such as (from complete champion) travel devotion, trickery devotion (and knowledge devotion, for cloistered cleric).

Plus 3+CHA turn attempts. Since my character is a bard, that's a pretty good pool with which to power these feats.

Many say that dipping one level of cleric is advantageous, but this seems too good. Am I misunderstanding something?


No, you aren't misunderstanding anything.

The only misunderstanding that's happening is that you don't lose access to the spells, but to the entire domain. This means no spells, no granted power and a lack of the actual domain (if that's required as a prerequisite)

[Hiro Quester]

Thanks all.

So with a one level dip, and without spending further feats, one can only give up one of the domains for the devotion feat (e.g. travel devotion) but would still get the other domains' powers and spells.

But since this would be at epic level (21), and I would already have 20 caster levels (bard /sublime chord) I wouldn't add more spells known, though, right?

[Curmudgeon]

AFB answer: You can only swap one domain for one devotion. And you lose the domain completely, the power and spell access. You can only buy two devotions with feats. So you can get three but only as a cleric that swaps a domain and spends two feats. Anyone else gets two at most for the cost of two feats.
The highlighted sentence is correct, but your interpretation of it is more restrictive than the actual rules.

This 1:1 swap rule needs to be stated because of planar domains (Spell Compendium, pages 282-285), where each takes the place of two regular Cleric domains. So Complete Champion emphasized that you get one domain feat for any one domain you trade in, rather than two feats for a planar domain if you come up with extensions to the DOMAINS NOT IN THE PLAYER’S HANDBOOK list (Complete Champion, page 53).

There isn't any rule keeping you from making more 1:1 domain->feat swaps as long as you don't exceed the maximum of 3 total domain feats for a Cleric.

[firebrandtoluc]

Better check with your DM. I went back and reread it and I still think it means you can only sacrifice one domain. However... It does look like the kind of rule language that people would have 20 page forum debates about what the meaning of "is" is. Keep in mind, either way it goes, if you trade all of the domains away, you have nothing to put in your +1 spell slot. Not that it seems to concern your epic bard. :smalltongue:

Edit: Oh, and I know almost nothing about epic progression. I would assume you would get cleric divine spell progression but I vaguely remember the epic rules being silly.

[dextercorvia]

Better check with your DM. I went back and reread it and I still think it means you can only sacrifice one domain. However... It does look like the kind of rule language that people would have 20 page forum debates about what the meaning of "is" is. Keep in mind, either way it goes, if you trade all of the domains away, you have nothing to put in your +1 spell slot. Not that it seems to concern your epic bard. :smalltongue:

Edit: Oh, and I know almost nothing about epic progression. I would assume you would get cleric divine spell progression but I vaguely remember the epic rules being silly.

Not true. You can trade spontaneous healing/inflicting for the Spontaneous Domain ACF (Before you give up your domains, obviously). One of the benefits is that you can then prepare cure/inflict spells in your domain slots. Even if you trade that domain away you can still prepare a Cure Light Wounds in your domain slot. This is more useful the earlier in your career you do the cleric dip, of course.

Those two ACFs interact even better than that, because trading your domain for the feat only prohibits you from preparing domain spells. You can still cast them spontaneously.

[TiaC]

Remember, there are a few domains that have powers as good as a feat. I always like the Pride domain for instance.

[Hiro Quester]

Thanks, everyone.

This is much clearer. The language in Complete Champion says that you can trade more than one domain for the domain feat. They give the example of trading one domain, but also say:


In addition, you can choose to give up access to a domain in exchange for the corresponding domain feat. Doing so allows you to select up to three domain feats, but you cannot prepare domain spells or use the granted power of the sacrificed domain. (p. 53)

I'm not concerned about the spell casting side of things, since the SRD says this:


For spellcasters, caster level continues to increase after 20th level. However, spells per day don’t increase after 20th level. The only way to gain additional spells per day (other than the bonus spells gained from a high ability score) is to select the Improved Spell Capacity epic feat.

So dipping Cloistered Cleric for three useful feats seems a good use of a epic level.

Which domains to select could be another discussion thread in itself. But I'll probably I'll try to get knowledge devotion (insight bonus on attack rolls), travel devotion (wift action movement for 1 minute) and either trickery devotion (combination project image and unseen servant) or luck devotion (lower than average save becomes average). These all fit well with my Bard's approach to life. Fharlanghn explicitly endorses Travel and Knowledge, and would probably be okay with adding the Trickery domain.