Paladin 4/ Cleric 1 domain choices/ othe

[ZhanStrider]

So, I have taken Leadership (victory is mine) in our current long-running campaign. However, our DM is really hard about his universe being consistent, so i can only gain NPC's we've met as a cohort/follower.

The NPC in question is currently a level 4 Paladin of Freedom. I want to have him start taking cleric levels, so as to be more useful (we've house-ruled that Turn Undead stacks between cleric and paladin) buttt his deity SUCKS for domains.

Our DM made his own pantheon, and my domain choices are Moon, Plant, Healing, and Scalykind.

Whattt are the best choices of those four?

[torrasque666]

How did you get Leadership at 4th? It's (only) prereq is being 6th level.

[GilesTheCleric]

Moon and Plant are actually pretty good. Both grant turning pools (hello free uses of divine feats!) which should be great on a cha-heavy paladin body. (Try to get any sort of Wis-SAD feats if you can, regardless -- Serenity, Intuitive Attack, Zen Archery).

Moon's great spells:
Faerie Fire: not as good as glitterdust, but if your pally has true seeing (he should), then he can help out the rest of the party who doesn't.
Moon Blade: stops your foes from casting. This can be pretty good (not as broken as a SoS, but it's a great backup plan, and is one more dangerous target locked down).
Moon Path: Dark Way and Sanctuary in one spell. Eh. At least it lasts longer, so it could have some use if you're expecting a long fight (waves of foes). Protip: Dark Way/Moon Path work just fine on their sides as impenetrable walls.
Permanent Image: limited only by your imagination. Go nuts.

Plant's great spells:
Entangle: Heavy-duty BFC. 80' diameter and it doesn't even matter if they save? Amazing.
Plant Growth: Entangle, but 100' diameter or even larger shaped areas.
Wall of Thorns: worse than Dark Way, but you can use it to entangle things that are in the air. A bit niche.


Scalykind:
Animal Growth: best for druids. I guess you could combo it with polymorph, but does poly really need to be any stronger?
Shapechange at 9; by that level you don't need it on your list to cast it.

Healing:
Heal: One more daily use of Heal. Eh.
Heal, Mass: ditto

[sleepyphoenixx]

Honestly, taking cleric levels this late won't make him more useful. He'll always be 2 full spell levels behind, meaning that any casting he does is weak and easily dispelled.
You'd do much better building him up into a proper paladin. Sure, he won't ever be as good as a properly build cleric, but with 4 levels of paladin that ship has already sailed.

If you really want a cleric what's stopping you from going to a tavern and hiring one? Surely you aren't the only adventurers around? If all else fails you could go straight to a temple of a god that's compatible with your alignment and ideals and hire one there.

If you insist on taking cleric levels on the paladin it doesn't really matter which domains you choose. The domain powers all suck, and any good domain spells would come too late to help much. Your best bet would probably be to trade them in for devotion feats from Complete Champion, but i don't know which feats relate to which non-core domain from memory. You'll have to look it up.

Edit: Note that most divine feats explicitly require Turn Undead uses, so using alternate turning from domains doesn't work unless your DM is nice and houserules it.

[ZhanStrider]

How did you get Leadership at 4th? It's (only) prereq is being 6th level.

I'm Level 6. the paladin is level 4. i'm planning for when he levels up.

[GilesTheCleric]

I think you could go either way with the build. One level in cleric gets you entangle and all the good level one cleric spells; for a cohort that's probably already as much as a gm is going to want to deal with. If you're allowed to retrain, then removing Paladin levels and replacing with cleric is probably faster to reach a more useful cohort (even at one retrain per level). If you want access to the Paladin list, then it sounds like prestige Paladin might be available in your game, which is far more efficient than base Paladin. Add gray guard if you can't get a freedom prestige and the alignment matters.

[Ayrynthyn]

depends on what aspect of cleric you deem as "making him more useful"... to answer your actual question, i guess i'd go plant and moon, but meh? How many levels are you honestly expecting him to get? What amount of splat books are available to you when you do?

Perhaps an elaborate and cliched backstory on how the abby has heard of your wonderous exploits, and have dispatched an inexperienced (perhaps problem child) acolyte to aid in your quest may change the DMs mind and let you pencil in a more 'useful' cohort? (acolyte #3 in session 4, back when we were in the hamlet of smee??)

... i'm in agreement that his spell progression would be way behind if you opted to multi-class at this point. If your DM is really stickling to what NPCs you can draw, my guess is that magic items aren't readily as accessible either for purchase. No magic shoppes on every corner? If this is not the case, keep working the paladin levels, and augment his spell casting / usefulness with wands? but of the 4 you can choose... plant and moon for my money

[ZhanStrider]

depends on what aspect of cleric you deem as "making him more useful"... to answer your actual question, i guess i'd go plant and moon, but meh? How many levels are you honestly expecting him to get? What amount of splat books are available to you when you do?

Perhaps an elaborate and cliched backstory on how the abby has heard of your wonderous exploits, and have dispatched an inexperienced (perhaps problem child) acolyte to aid in your quest may change the DMs mind and let you pencil in a more 'useful' cohort? (acolyte #3 in session 4, back when we were in the hamlet of smee??)

... i'm in agreement that his spell progression would be way behind if you opted to multi-class at this point. If your DM is really stickling to what NPCs you can draw, my guess is that magic items aren't readily as accessible either for purchase. No magic shoppes on every corner? If this is not the case, keep working the paladin levels, and augment his spell casting / usefulness with wands? but of the 4 you can choose... plant and moon for my money

I'm okay with the spell loss, and I expect him to get to 13-15ish by the time we wrap it all up. Clerics get some cool minor stuff in this world by virtue of being clerics, and I like the character the paladin is. He has a couple items that make him functionally a level 6 or 7 paladin, so that's about all the SMITE I need, but buffing stuff and healing is always a plus.

[Ayrynthyn]

sounds like there really is no "wrong answer" here then. Pick 2, and augment spell casting with wands? :smalltongue:

[ZhanStrider]

sounds like there really is no "wrong answer" here then. Pick 2, and augment spell casting with wands? :smalltongue:

There really isn't, I just know "healing" is a crap domain, and haven't ever played with the other three. Plant and Moon seem to be the top picks though.

[Troacctid]

If those are your domain choices, the 5th level of Paladin is probably going to be better than the 1st level of Cleric. Actually, I think the 5th level of Paladin might be better than the 1st level of Cleric just in general, or at least it's close. Special mounts are legit good.

If the plan is to multiclass to get better casting, then you'd probably want to go for a prestige class that has its own casting, like Chameleon, War Mind, or Knight of the Weave. It tends to be more efficient that way, since it generally gives you either a faster progression, a better chassis, or both.

If he does go Cleric, though, I would probably use the Divine Magician variant from Complete Mage to replace one of his domains. It's an option for a Cleric of any deity, and you can cherry-pick the spells you want. For the other domain, I'd either go with Moon for Faerie Fire (decent support spell) or Healing and trade it for Healing Devotion (which provides very efficient out-of-combat healing: 1 turning attempt = 20 HP restored).