Clerics with only domain spells

[tedcahill2]

Domain powers are one of the few things that a Cleric can consider a class feature. In addition to gaining 2 domains at level 1, and never again, is there anything imbalanced about them gaining a new domain at every 5th level (like a wizards bonus feats)?

I'm also trying to come up with a unique method for clerics to be spontaneous casters, so instead of them spontaneously casting healing spells I was thinking that they could pray for a few spells (it would be a small number) for casting each day, like a spirit shaman retrieves spells, and then they spontaneously cast from their daily list. Their domain spells would always be available to cast however.

Thoughts?
--------------------------------------------------------
Edits made here
--------------------------------------------------------
Domains: Clerics would start the game with 2 domains, chosen from their deities list of domains. At levels 5, 10, 15, and 20 clerics may pick a new domain. They may choose any domain as long as it is not opposed by it's deity. The cleric adds spells from all known domains to their list of spells known, and can use all domain powers.

Divine Favor: Clerics can invoke divine favor from their deity, temporarily adding a spell to their list of known spells. Once per day, per cleric level, a cleric can pray for favor from their god, adding any cleric spell to their list of spells known. Using this ability is a free action. The new spell is available to cast for a number of rounds equal to the clerics Charisma modifier. In the case of spells with casting times longer than one round, a cleric must start casting, but not necessarily finish casting, the spell within the time the spell is available. (Notes: This fits with the divine aspect of cleric really well I think. They can cast any spell from their domains as often as they want (as long as they haven't used all of their spells per day), and they can cast any spell they want, but only a limited number of times per day. This gives them the flexibility to adapt to changing situations, but makes them stick to their domain spells and powers more often than not.)

[eggynack]

Would that be the cleric's only native domain access? So no domains until 5th, then two at 10th, three at 15th, and four at 20th? That'd probably be fine, because you're usually behind a basic cleric and by the time you're ahead it's generally going to be irrelevant.

[tedcahill2]

Would that be the cleric's only native domain access? So no domains until 5th, then two at 10th, three at 15th, and four at 20th? That'd probably be fine, because you're usually behind a basic cleric and by the time you're ahead it's generally going to be irrelevant.

Sorry, I messed up how I typed that. I was thinking more domains as the main means of gaining new spells known.

So let's say a level 1 Cleric gets to keep their spells per day (except the domain spell is just wrapped up in daily spells) they have two spells known, from their two domains, and they can pray for one more spell. So now they have three spells, and they can spontaneous cast any combination of those spells.

[eggynack]

Sorry, I messed up how I typed that. I was thinking more domains as the main means of gaining new spells known.

So let's say a level 1 Cleric gets to keep their spells per day (except the domain spell is just wrapped up in daily spells) they have two spells known, from their two domains, and they can pray for one more spell. So now they have three spells, and they can spontaneous cast any combination of those spells.
I was talking about the first part, which isn't apparently about spontaneous casting stuff.

[bean illus]

I don't think clerics need much help, but as a thematic thing sure, i like it. I think there are several prc's that approach the concept, but there's always room for more good ideas.

In DnD there's usually a fluff. A 'polytheist'? An 'agnostic'?

So as a separate class or prc (as opposed to giving clerics more power), i see a believer that claims that all power emanates from one source, and that you don't need gods to tap it. Gods can be used to tap it, but are not absolutely needed.

So due to his tenuous connection to the gods, he has somewhat less power but a broader spell access.

Thinking of it as a base class: The Agnostic keeps the same spell progression. His main class ability is "Religious Freedom" with which he gains 1 domain every 5th level (in addition to the two he starts with), but also loses -1 CL for certain (most) applications and math.

Religious Freedom also converts the Agnostics' Spell Per Day to Spontaneous with every boost. So at 20th level you must still pray for the cleric list, but have 5 spell slots per level that can be spontaneously converted to any domain spell you know. but you would cast it ALL at 16th CL (which could probably be fixed with 'practiced caster' or something, which would make the class overpowered to get all that and buy it for one feat).

[ZamielVanWeber]

The evangelist from Dragon Magazine does something like this. It trades out turn undead for a progression of domains that caps at 6th at 20th and casting like a sorcerer, except you know all your domain spells in addition your normal spells known. You end up doing fine mechanically but you play out as some unusual caster not as a cleric per se. Really cool IMHO.

[Darth Ultron]

Thoughts?

I've done the add a domain every five levels and it has worked out just fine.

A tweak I'm still working on is clerics can spontaneously cast domain spells, but still get their boring generic normal spell list to memorize. I really like the idea and flavor of ''domain only spell clerics'' that do Not have all the normal cleric spells. I just have not found a good work around...

[CartmanTuttle]

A friend of mine has conceived an idea similar to this, although he wanted to base the class off of the Ardent, so maybe there's some mileage there?

[Ruethgar]

This was somewhat the original concept of the Evangelist Cleric variant. It got the normal two domains and then up to eight more thereafter and was intended to be a spontaneous caster with his domains as his only spells known. However, the printed Evangelist was pretty much just a Cleric, sans turn undead with an extra domain every 5th level.

[tedcahill2]

I've done the add a domain every five levels and it has worked out just fine.

A tweak I'm still working on is clerics can spontaneously cast domain spells, but still get their boring generic normal spell list to memorize. I really like the idea and flavor of ''domain only spell clerics'' that do Not have all the normal cleric spells. I just have not found a good work around...

He's a thought I just had. Clerics as spontaneous casters, their spells known list comprised solely of their domain spells. Add class feature, Divine Favor (or whatever name), at level one.

Divine Favor: Once per day a cleric can pray to their deity to grant them a spell outside of their chosen domains. The cleric requests a specific spell, any cleric spell of a level they can cast. All of the normal rules for casting the spell in question apply, the prayer is essentially the verbal component of it, spells without verbal components can still be cast with the prayer being thought instead of said.

A cleric can use Divine favor an additional time per day at every odd numbered level (1, 3, 5, 7, 9, 11, 13, 15, 17, 19) for a total of 10/day at level 19.

This fits with the divine aspect of cleric really well I think. They can cast any spell from their domains as often as they want (as long as they haven't used all of their spells per day), and they can cast any spell they want, but only a limited number of times per day. This gives them the flexibility to adapt to changed situations, but makes them stick to their domain spells more often than not.

[Ruethgar]

cool stuff
I think a flat 10 extra spells per day is a little light for versatility. Maybe instead make it 5 or 7 spells but they simply get added to spells known for the day similar to an StP Erudites unique powers per day.

Another thing I thought immediately upon reading that ability was that you should increase casting time by a step for the specialty spells similar to using meta magic on a spontaneous caster.

[ATHATH]

The Evangelist is from Dragon Magazine #311, by the way.

[Darth Ultron]

He's a thought I just had. Clerics as spontaneous casters, their spells known list comprised solely of their domain spells. Add class feature, Divine Favor (or whatever name), at level one.


The problem is a lot of domain spells are very limited. You'd really need to add like 25 spells per domain so that the cleric can do things. For example Domains like Fire are just ''mindless pure attack spells'', but you'd think a cleric of a god of fire would have more spells like ''control flame'' or ''create fire'' and such and not just ''boring fire attack spells''. And a lot of domains have very boring spells that only vaguely fit in the domain. And on top of that you get a lot of over lap as some domains have the same spells over and over and over again.

The real trick is to domain spells of a lot of the generic spells....but that would be 100's of spells at least.

[Cosi]

If you want Clerics to be more focused on their domains, just kill off the Cleric class. Then make "Cleric" a feat or PrC that other classes can take if they're members of the clergy. So instead of having one class for Clerics of Pelor, and Vecna, and Boccob, and Obad-hai, Clerics of Pelor are Paladin/Clerics, Clerics of Vecna are Dread Necromancer/Clerics, Clerics of Boccob are Wizard/Clerics, and Clerics of Obad-Hai are Druid/Clerics. That seems much better than trying to hack domains if you want to force a greater focus onto Clerics.

[tedcahill2]

If you want Clerics to be more focused on their domains, just kill off the Cleric class. Then make "Cleric" a feat or PrC that other classes can take if they're members of the clergy. So instead of having one class for Clerics of Pelor, and Vecna, and Boccob, and Obad-hai, Clerics of Pelor are Paladin/Clerics, Clerics of Vecna are Dread Necromancer/Clerics, Clerics of Boccob are Wizard/Clerics, and Clerics of Obad-Hai are Druid/Clerics. That seems much better than trying to hack domains if you want to force a greater focus onto Clerics.

I'm not trying to force greater focus on Clerics. I'm trying to come up with an interesting way to turn Clerics into spontaneous casters. What I absolutely don't want it to just say, here's your spells per day, pick your spells known, you now cast spontaneously like a sorcerer.

So far I like the idea of having domain only spells, first two domains must come from your chosen deities list, domains gains at level 5, 10, 15, and 20 can be any domain that doesn't conflict with your deity. The domains represent spells that you have been granted to cast as frequently as you want.

I also like the idea of accessing spells outside your domain, but on a more limited basis. I would also keep turn undead, or maybe adopt the pathfinder version of it.

[thorr-kan]

There's the spontaneous cleric version from Unearthed Arcana.

[tedcahill2]

There's the spontaneous cleric version from Unearthed Arcana.

That's kinda what I'm trying to stay away from. That variant just turns the cleric into a divine sorcerer. What I'm trying to do it's totally dissimilar to that, but I want it to be a little more unique than a sorcerer clone.

[ZamielVanWeber]

Spontaneous Cleric into Sovereign Speaker is closer. A cleric with only domain spells will be a highly distinctive entity, but you will have the problem of very few gods grant a large number of domains, with some gods granting a few as one, so either you need clerics of causes or start giving gods more domains.

[tedcahill2]

Spontaneous Cleric into Sovereign Speaker is closer. A cleric with only domain spells will be a highly distinctive entity, but you will have the problem of very few gods grant a large number of domains, with some gods granting a few as one, so either you need clerics of causes or start giving gods more domains.

I'm going to update my OP with this, but I wasn't going to restrict them to the domains of their deity. Domains at level 1, when they choose two starting domains, will have to come from their deities list, however, the world is just not that black and white, and any adventuring cleric should know that by the time they hit level 5. They can then choose any domain that doesn't directly oppose their deity, like a good cleric choosing the evil domain.

[GilesTheCleric]

Gaining extra domains every 5 levels is great for Clerics of well-supported deities, but there's a whole lot that were published with only 3 or 4 domains, and some GMs may not allow for extra domains for printed deities from other books. It's worth considering.

[Dagroth]

Spontaneous Cleric into Sovereign Speaker is closer. A cleric with only domain spells will be a highly distinctive entity, but you will have the problem of very few gods grant a large number of domains, with some gods granting a few as one, so either you need clerics of causes or start giving gods more domains.

Sovereign Speaker is a cool class. I want to make a version using the Greyhawk gods.

As far as a spontaneous Cleric goes... Take the Favored Soul spells per day.

Give Clerics the Healing Domain + 2 others (that gives them 3 spells known at first level). Give them all 0-level spells because... why not?

Give them "Advanced Learning" (like Warmages & Beguilers get) every time they gain a new level of spells. This gives them access to Cleric Spells that just aren't on any Domain List.

Give them a Feat every 4 levels. They can get a "Divine" Feat, a Devotion Feat or a new Domain with it.

Allow a Cleric to swap out any spell that appears on 2 of their Domains with a "thematically similar" feat. For Example, Darkness Domain & Weather Domain both give "Obscuring Mist" as their 1st level spell. A Cleric with both of these Domains could swap out for "Ebon Eyes", "Nightshield" (maybe... it is described as shadowy energy), "Updraft" or "Snow Shoes" just to give a few examples. GM's word is final on such swap-outs.

[ZamielVanWeber]

Sovereign Speaker is a cool class. I want to make a version using the Greyhawk gods.

My friend and I ported in the Gods of Chaos from Warhammer and they work fantastically for Sovereign Speaker, with the caveat that the Chaos domain does not count against your 2/god choices.

[Fizban]

I'm told that Clerics used to get spells by "spheres," which were larger pools of spells that combined to form their whole list, while domains are a much more restricted attempt to do this with one big main list and just one spell per level for the domains.

If you want to make spontaneous Clerics more interesting and are willing to put in the work, you could make them a semi-fixed-list caster by building your own spheres. Take the existing fixed list casters spells known, divide them by the number of spheres you want each Cleric to have, then make a bunch of spheres with the appropriate number of spells each level. From 1st, say: 15/15/12/12/12/9/9/6/6 for your target totals. Then each cleric can start with three spheres each with 5/5/4/4/4/3/3/2/2 spells in them (0th orisons can just stay universal).

That's basically three times a Sorcerer's spells known, but from a set of fixed lists you don't get to choose (if you give them a bonus sphere later on then you'll need to buff Sorcerer's to compensate) and many will feel compelled to take healing by default. Build each list like domain, focused with all the relevant spells but not perfect when filling in the gaps. Have the standard 3 sphere cleric be a caster type with low BAB/hp/armor, then make the good 'ol Battle variant which trades a sphere and 1 slot/level for standard cleric BAB/hp/armor and maybe a couple bonus feats later on.

If that's too much work, you'll need to at least make some new domains to fill in required spells: there are a bunch of spells Clerics are expected to have that just aren't in any domains or are in weird places (all sorts of status removal and immunity buffs). Further, when picking similar domains to make sure you have every spell for a theme, you'll often end up with overlapping spells: a cl boost or something when that happens is a bit of a refund. But if you want to make domain-only really work, I think it needs enough effort that you might as well just try building spheres- that way you don't have to narrow domains down to a single spell/make a new domain for each spell left out.