Wisdom and melee Clerics

[Mechanize]

How useful is it? I'm playing a melee battle cleric, starting at lvl 5, going to ordained champion next level. With most of my spells being self buffs, or team buffs, I'm not seeing a real use for Wisdom. In fact, I'm thinking of skipping the 5th level of OC, because holy warrior uses Wisdom to buff. My big spells that I will be getting soon, like Divine Power and Righteous might, all boost strength.

I feel like my stats are spread way too thin... at the moment I have str, con, wis and cha all required for different aspects...

Any advice?

[Troacctid]

Well there's certainly no reason to skip the 5th level of Ordained Champion, since it advances your casting, and the +2 CL for War spells is actually very relevant, since it represents +1 AC via Magic Vestment and +2d6 damage for Flame Strike and Blade Barrier.

That being said, you can mostly replace Wisdom with Strength by choosing Illumian (aeshkrau) as your race, which lets you use Strength to determine your bonus spells, as well as giving you +2 to your caster level, Strength checks, and Strength-based skill checks.

[Mechanize]

Hah... if I make it long enough to cast blade barrier... :P

I'm playing human for the extra feat to be honest. Doing quicken spell and divine meta, plus extra turning x2. I don't really have to optimize, but I do feel like there is a lot of spells/abilities spread out all over across different stats. Have anything else in mind other than the race change? (what book is that in by the way? I've never heard of it)

[Geddy2112]

If you are not trying to boost DC's just have the minimum wisdom needed to cast spells of the levels you have access to.

[Mechanize]

That was my thought, except I haven't played a mid or high level cleric enough to know if I am ruining my ability to cast some amazing spells later. Are there still plenty of good spells that don't require a DC?

[Troacctid]

Hah... if I make it long enough to cast blade barrier... :P

I'm playing human for the extra feat to be honest. Doing quicken spell and divine meta, plus extra turning x2. I don't really have to optimize, but I do feel like there is a lot of spells/abilities spread out all over across different stats. Have anything else in mind other than the race change? (what book is that in by the way? I've never heard of it)

Races of Destiny (http://archive.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/ex/20041203a&page=2)

I probably wouldn't DMM Quicken on an Ordained Champion, since you get to automatically quicken your War domain spells at ECL 8, and you can use turning for smites (which is also a swift action).

Flame Strike and Blade Barrier are staple spells for you at high levels just because the action economy advantage from quickening them for free is so great. Both of them allow Reflex saves, but still have a partial effect on a successful save, so it's not a HUGE deal if you don't pump up the DC super high.

[sleepyphoenixx]

You're going to want a 19 Wis minimum (to cast 9th level spells), but you can get that with items if you really don't want to invest in it.
Just keep in mind that, aside from spell DCs, you're also losing out on quite a few bonus spell slots. That's a pretty big hit to your casting stamina.

On the other hand you can get by in melee just on your buffs alone while boosting wisdom all the way, and chances are you'll have a few turn undead uses left over for the OC 5th level ability anyway because DMM requires a multiple of 7 or 5.
You don't really need DMM:Quicken though because your important buff (Divine Power) is quickened for free, and Channel Spell takes care of most offensive spells.

You could benefit greatly from DMM:Persist (everyone can) and your party (and your spell slots) from DMM:Chain, but you can also do well without it and spend your saved feats on improving your melee.

That said you're still a cleric. Unless your game is really high-op or you make really bad spell selections you'll probably do fine either way.

[Eldariel]

That was my thought, except I haven't played a mid or high level cleric enough to know if I am ruining my ability to cast some amazing spells later. Are there still plenty of good spells that don't require a DC?

Well, for one, you'll simply have less high level slots if you have lower Wisdom. That's the primary problem with not maxing your casting stat; your biggest bombs are gonna be high level and thus you generally want to maximize their availability. Of course, save-or-X effects are occasionally useful too, even if less so on Cleric than on Wizard.

[Mechanize]

I guess I should have mentioned we are running a module, levels 5-12. So I'm not too worried about what happens at high levels.

The reason I took Quicken DMM was to be able to still cast spells if they were needed for support as well as still do my melee thing. More of a fun factor than anything. I doubt I'll be given free reign on night sticks to fuel any sort of crazy shenanigans with Persist:DMM, that and I know the DM will frown upon anything too strong. I see the point with the OC giving me a lot of swift options and Channel spell though. Any ideas for better feats to take then with the above info added?