Tempest priest build suggestions

[Joe dirt]

I am thinking of playing a tempest priest in an upcoming game... here is my thoughts on the build so far... variant human, polearm master at level 1, sentinel feat at level 4, warcaster level 8

so typical fight will go like this baddie comes and tries to get in melee sentinel feat stops them then on my turn cast thunder wave to force baddie back, rinse and repeat
At level 6 it could get worse as thunder wave cause baddies to fly back 20 feet instead of 10.

Any thoughts?

Basically its a hybrid battlefield controller/healer I'm going for.
Oh my stats are 15 str16 con 16 wis 8 dex 8chr 8 int

[BW022]

Such tactics are highly situational. I've played a tempest cleric / blade lock... and things often don't go as planned.

As a cleric you will find you are often forced to heal. Unless your party has a lot of other healers... don't expect to be able to do this tactic more than a couple of times per combat. Much of the time, you'll need to move and heal someone else, buff, put a defensive spell up, etc. Healing word can help (but you can't cast bonus spells in rounds where you cast other spells using your action). The area of affect of thunderwave is also an issue. Often your best place is behind another front line character or you have to move to heal the rogue or wizard. You also only get one reaction... so expect it isn't that great against multiple opponents as you likely can't take 2-3 hits per round. Finally... don't expect most creatures to fail their saves or be knocked back. It is also unlikely you'd be able to go 2-3 rounds of repeated thunderwaves to get that extra 'free' attack in. Chances are you'll need to heal someone by then... likely yourself.

It's a good tactic, but just don't plan on it working too often. Plan on multiple tactics which you can employ... stay behind your fighter, buff, and heal -- attacking with the polearm if you have actions. Off-tanking for your wizard or rogue if they get in trouble. Move, attack from distance, and keep moving -- useful when getting to another PC (say to heal next round). etc. In that way, you don't get upset if your reach/thunderwave tactic can rarely be used or isn't that effective.

[Gtdead]

I was trying to do same things with Tempest Cleric. Like MC into sorc and Quicken Booming blades, then knock the enemies back with Call Lightning Thundebolt Strike and let them sit there or move and take the rider.

This class seems like it has endless possibilities, but limited ASIs, the fact that everything is so elaborate and resitances/immunities can completely kill it, and the complete lack of actual scaling, makes these tactics poor. Perhaps a new splat book will come and allow us to use this class to it's full potential, but till then.. I'd urge to consider just playing him as much vanilla as possible.

If it had more ASIs, the first thing I'd do would be a Spellsniper/Pam build.

[Joe dirt]

I've seen on multiple threads that people take magic initiate to gain access to shocking grasp.... I think I will take this at 8th level

I can see seing sentinel to stop and shocking grasp to throw as a good combo