level 6 sea sorcerer/tempest cleric build help

[Seekergeek]

So after over a year of play, my wizard is dead. It's sad and life is going to be hard for a while but in the end I have to move on. I'd really love some help in shaping his replacement.

I'm in a group that is particularly fun and pretty RP focused so some choices below are motivated that way though nothing is written in stone.

Some quick facts:

I'll be playing a Triton from Volo's guide.
Starting stats, pre-racials, are: 14, 8, 15, 10, 14, 15
We are level 6.


Our party composition is:

A Moon Druid
A Barbarian/Fighter (not actually sure of either specialization or his MC level spread)
A Knowledge Cleric
A Shadow Sorcerer


The Druid, despite his circle choice, plays a much more back-line blast and conjure game. This has left the Barbarian Fighter as our only front liner if Summon Nature's Ally isn't in play. My previous character was a bladesinger but I felt like it wasn't exactly what it claimed to be on the tin, and I spent the majority of my time controlling and debuffing which was fun but I'd like to take the opportunity to get my hands dirty in a less traditional way this time around.

What I imagine for myself in combat is focusing on curse of the sea along with shocking grasp, lightning lure and frostbite as my usual round-to-round DPR options. The cleric levels will give me some goodies in the form of armour profs along with thunderous rebuke and the channel divinity as well as access to some party-friendly buffs like bless, healing word and cure wounds.

I also don't know exactly where to focus the level progression - am I better suited to go cleric long-term or sorcerer? Sorcerer seems like the only option to me in order to avoid MAD considering I'll be using CHA for my attack rolls ect. with curse.

Lastly, I need to be viable from level 6 even if it means a choice that may be less than optimal for a level 20 white room build. I need to be playable from the jump. We don't play more than a couple times a month and we have been levelling slowly - It took a year or so to progress from level 1 to 6 so I don't expect to see level 12.

With that in mind, I imagine the following:

Sorcerer 4/Cleric 2

STR 15
DEX 8
CON 16
INT 10
WIS 14
CHA 16

ASI into CHA at Sorc 4 (or would elemental adept - lightning make more sense?).
Quicken and Twin as my metamagic out of the gate.
Fullplate and a shield along with an empty hand.

At level six, sorcerer spells might look like this:

Sorcerer Cantrips
Friends
Lightning Lure
Message
Frostbite
Shocking Grasp

First Level Sorcerer Spells:
Charm Person
Shield
Second Level Sorcerer spells:
Blur
Hold Person
Misty Step


How does that look compared to other options? Is there something glaring I've missed? Is this a poor combo?

[MrWesson22]

I would strongly suggest warcaster at 4. No more empty hand, and your buffs like bless will last a lot longer before concentration is broken. It also fits flavorwise and allows you to be up in the thick of things with a melee weapon (as well as AoOing with shocking grasp).

[retaliation08]

I feel that Storm Sorcerer synergizes much better with Tempest Cleric than Sea Sorcerer does. This is because both subclasses (tempest and storm) affect both lightning and thunder damage. Sea sorcerer is cold and lightning damage and is lacking the thunder synergy.

I would start with Sorcerer 1 and take warcaster at level 4. This gives you con save proficiency and advantage on concentration checks which will be a great boon as you mix it up in melee.

You can do pretty respectable short range AoE damage once you get to Storm Sorcerer 6 with things like thunderwave, thunderclap, shatter, and by twinning spells like booming blade and shocking grasp.

Warcaster is great with booming blade (which does thunder damage) because it really lets you punish creatures with OA's.

I think you are best off going Storm Sorcerer 18/ Tempest Cleric 2. I would probably start out with my first 4 levels in Sorcerer, then go into cleric. The reason I prefer sorcerer levels over cleric levels is the comparison of class abilities.

2nd level tempest is great for free maximization of your thunder and lightning damage. (you should go tempest 2 in this build regardless of which class you put most of your levels in)

After that, at 6th level you can push a creature away, but usually you will want them close anyway for your heart of the storm ability (you can always try to push them with thunderwave).

At 8th level you get a Divine strike, but it is weaker than simply casting booming blade (which you can get at level 1), although it can stack with booming blade for better melee damage, but I think you will be casting spells more than using weapon attacks due to lack of Extra Attack.

Basically, going deeper than Cleric 2 does not give you anything you can't essentially do with the same levels in Sorcerer with the exception of spell casting. Taking those levels in sorcerer, however, gives you free AOE damage against creatures whenever you cast a spell, you get an improved reactionary damage dealer over the cleric version at level 14, and your capstone gives you damage immunities as well as a fly speed for your whole party while allowing you access to spells like Wish.

There is just so much synergy between Storm Sorc and Tempest Cleric, but if you insist on Sea Sorcerer you can still do well.

[Seekergeek]

I thought about storm rather than sea, but leaned in to sea more heavily for two reasons - 1) curse ability comes online for me immediately and boosts damage significantly. We level so slowly that it will be a while before I see any mechanical progression. 2) I really like the survivability of sea - the ability to mitigate damage at level 6 and then at 14 to escape through a crack in the floor/under a door ect. is both pretty flavourful and unique but also will serve me well. I can pretty safely say, though, that this character will absolutely max out at 12 or lower so all of that is moot.

If I were looking at starting at a higher level or at a campaign that leveled more quickly I would probably take a much longer look at storm/tempest.

[Galadhrim]

You do get shatter and thunder wave as domain spells through tempest(assuming only level two cleric) so you shouldn't be too lacking in thunder damage. Lightning is really what tempest lacks in its list so I think you will be fine going sea. If you do want some additional thunder damage, you could always grab booming blade as one of your cantrips.

[RaynorReynolds]

I would strongly suggest warcaster at 4. No more empty hand, and your buffs like bless will last a lot longer before concentration is broken. It also fits flavorwise and allows you to be up in the thick of things with a melee weapon (as well as AoOing with shocking grasp).

Warcaster is redundant with cleric. Just get a shield with your holy symbol on it.

[RaynorReynolds]

I would also recommend storm sorc. You will be doing plenty of damage so that isn't a concern. Just wear heavy armor, a shield, and grab the Shield spell. You'll never get hit. :)

[retaliation08]

Having played a handful of sessions as a sea sorcerer, I have to say that the curse ability has not been as useful as I initially thought. Dealing damage with a cantrip tends to be fairly difficult in and of itself against many creatures. If the encounter isn't made up of a few mooks, I wouldn't count on being able to use Curse of the Sea that often. It is usually more economic to simply cast a higher level spell. If you happen to get a cantrip to work, you can always quicken the curse triggering spell the same turn, but it kind of has to be a perfect storm to work out. Granted, the Curse of the Sea is nice to have around when you are out of or low on spell slots as it allows you some creativity with your cantrips, but this has been more of a back up plan in my experience.