Double Duty Cleric

[leegi0n]

Playgrounders,

Can I get your ideas for a 3.0/3.5 cleric build? It is to be a 28 point buy setup.

I would like to include prestige classes for flavor and a bit of power but definitely not looking to tick the DM off too bad.

Heal and Fight. That's what they do, that's what I'd like, a bit of both.

Can you all help me with an optimized build? I'm thinking fire and war domains - god neutral, if that's possible.


Thank you in advance -

[Darrin]

We need to know what sourcebooks are available. Online material OK? How about Dragon Magazine? Any specific campaign material you want to avoid or are you ok with cross-pollinating?

Also, we need to know your stance on DMM Persist. Is this allowed at your table? If so, how comfortable are you with it? How far do you want to push it?

[leegi0n]

Ok. The usual splatbooks are allowed. Dragon Magazine and online material isn't allowed. DMM PERSIST is off the table too.

The setting is a homebrew world with 3.0/3.5 rule base. The character is a female elf. I know they aren't necessarily the best candidate for a cleric build but the party setup is elves.

Thanks again.

[noob]

"usual splatbooks" have a different meaning depending on the group.
Can you get a dip in contemplative and prestige paladin?(those are almost always cool)

[leegi0n]

"usual splatbooks" have a different meaning depending on the group. Can you get a dip in contemplative and prestige paladin?(those are almost always cool)

All basic Core, PHB2, ALL of the "complete" books (mage, champion, warrior, arcane, etc.), Book of Exalted Deeds, Forgotten Realms books, so on.... I think that covers it.

Sorry, I usually step on my own toes when I start throwing around jargon....like 'splatbooks'.

LOL!


I would try a dip in paladin, sure.

[Nifft]

Ordained Champion might work for the homebrew, with adaptation.

The feat Holy Warrior improves weapon damage while you have an unspent War domain slot.

The feat Initiate of Amunator (from FR) allows you to spontaneously cast [Fire] spells. Might be adapted to your Fire god.

Seeker of the Misty Isle is a good Elf prestige class, because it gives you some good Domains.

[noob]

At high level clerics naturally have a bunch of correct direct damage spells(at lower level they have correct battlefield control if you use the splatbooks) but the hp healing part is best done by casting one or two times planar binding: you should not waste your energy in healing hp.
Try to prepare at least one time each blanket protection spell if you want to be a healer(protection against evil, death ward and a bunch of others) because preventing is healing.
At high level heal(the spell) and mass heal are good spell due to how they solve most conditions.
Healing is more choosing the rights spells than using prcs specific for that.(And always having maximum level spells)

[leegi0n]

Would it make more sense to stay straight PHB cleric and source feats/spells from the other books? I mean, it seems like a very well rounded class, as designed in PHB core.

[noob]

Would it make more sense to stay straight PHB cleric and source feats/spells from the other books? I mean, it seems like a very well rounded class, as designed in PHB core.

Unless you use turn undead you have a purely better cleric if you take one level in prestige paladin and one level in contemplative.(prestige paladin is a prc that progress casting at the first level and have full bab so never take more than one level)

http://www.d20srd.org/srd/variant/classes/prestigiousCharacterClasses.html
http://dnd.arkalseif.info/classes/contemplative/index.html

For the two classes I mentioned.
So you get an extra domain(which you use to get a feat you already have thus getting another generic feat thus compensating the lost feat) and some more saves and the same bab and all the paladin spells.
Or if you do not worry about losing some bab only take the dip in contemplative.(in which case you have no feat tax and get a domain for no reason whatsoever)

[Eldariel]

PHB Cleric is really strong but you lose basically nothing but Turning progression by PRCing away. Since you can use Divine feats to burn your Turning away, you lose essentially nothing. Divine Spell Power, Domain Spontaneity [Complete Divine], Divine Might [Complete Divine], as well as Divine Defiance [Fiendish Codex II] are all interesting with the prohibitions you seem to have in place - and if Divine Metamagic: Persist isn't allowed, there are plenty of other good metamagic feats to use with Divine Metamagic (Quicken Spell, Twin Spell [Complete Arcane], Reach Spell [Complete Divine], Chain Spell [Complete Arcane], Fell Drain [Libris Mortis], etc.).

And many of the prestige classes are really quite excellent and lose no casting:

Radiant Servant of Pelor is basically just Cleric++ (it grants you martial weapon proficiencies, improves your Turning, improves your healing spells). Note that as it advances turning, it is indeed strictly superior
Contemplative [CDiv], Seeker of the Misty Isles [BoED], Church Inquisitor [CDiv], Divine Oracle [CDiv], etc. grant extra domains. Domains expand your spell list (Domain Spontaneity [Complete Divine], Spontaneous Domains [Complete Champion] and Spontaneous Domain Casting [Player's Handbook II] allow you to make use of multiples daily) and grant you a great variety of useful powers so this is wonderful (though work out how the non-Core domains are granted by deities as Spell Compendium and Magic of Eberron are full of great domains no deity might grant in a normal settings restricting you to a Cleric of an Ideal).
Dweomerkeeper [Complete Divine Web Enhancement] improves your metamagic, lets you cast XP-costing spells for free, etc. Really strong but probably too much so. Hathran [Player's Guide to Faerun] is similarly probably prohibitively strong.
Ruathar [RotW], Thaumaturgist [Core], Divine Disciple [Player's Guide to Faerun] and Sacred Exorcist [Complete Divine] are just fine generalist PRCs with no particular downsides that give you more than standard Cleric.


Thus, I do suggest PRCing out at some point. The options are quite good and due to Divine Power coming online at level 7, you don't really care about BAB down the line (as long as you retain full casting) anyways when you layeth the smackdown, DMM: Persist or none. You can just DMM: Quicken it just as well, but often it's even just precastable.

Note, you can also outsource combat to summons or use summons to help you in fight; Cleric summons are some of their better combat spells in Core and remain so with more sources. In melee, summons can at the very least use their auras/SLAs/etc. for you while also taking Aid Another actions to help your attack/AC and also giving you flanks, and often even doing reasonable damage with abilities or attacks. On low levels, Conjure Ice Beast [Frostburn] is great while good ol' Summon Monster picks up the slack higher up with the various SLAs you have access to. And if you're neutral, you can use Summon Undead [Spell Compendium] too (incorporeals such as the Allip are the strongest thing it brings but Skeletal Owlbear is a brutal beater and Ghasts are quite solid too).

[Darrin]

Would it make more sense to stay straight PHB cleric and source feats/spells from the other books? I mean, it seems like a very well rounded class, as designed in PHB core.

The typical advice for clerics is to avoid PrCs, because there are very few divine PrCs that don't cost you caster levels. Cleric 20 is one of the top tier powerhouse builds. Adding PrCs usually weakens it. Once you get access to divine powah!, you have the same BAB as a fighter. Everything else you could possibly need is probably available via spells.

That being said... there are no class features beyond level 1 (outside of spellcasting). If you want something interesting to look forward to... Paragnostic Apostle (Complete Champion) offers some class features and is relatively painless to get into. Thaumaturgist (DMG) is also decent, if you have more than a passing interest in summoning. Some other PrCs that offer full casting:

Church Inquisitor (Complete Divine)
Contemplative (Complete Divine)
Divine Oracle (Complete Divine)
Hold Warden (Complete Champion)
Sacred Exorcist (Complete Divine)
Stormlord (Complete Divine)
Windwalker (Faiths & Pantheons)

[ATHATH]

Ordained Champion might work for the homebrew, with adaptation.

The feat Holy Warrior improves weapon damage while you have an unspent War domain slot.

The feat Initiate of Amunator (from FR) allows you to spontaneously cast [Fire] and 'Light' spells. Might be adapted to your Fire god.

Seeker of the Misty Isle is a good Elf prestige class, because it gives you some good Domains.
The Initate of Amaunator feat only lets you spontaneously cast [Fire] spells; the feat that lets you spontaneously cast [Light] spells and spells with "light" in their names is the Initiate of Lathander feat.

[Telok]

Elf cleric. Domains: elf and war. Feats: multishot(not improved, standard), dmm-extend, dmm-reach spell, craft wand.

You craft wands of divine true strike. Wand chambered longbow, +1, collision. Spell storing arrows.

You'll cast divine power for combat, extended greater magic weapon on the bow, and the spell that makes your weapon a bane weapon for a while. Stck on any damage adds that you have room for.

Reach spell means you don't have to always be adjacent to allied. Wanded truestrike means not worrying about concealment and multishot penalties. Sure you only shoot every other round, and you can pretty easily reach 1d8+10+xd6 damage per arrow.

It's not superpowered, but it's decent and avoids all controversy.

[Nifft]

Would it make more sense to stay straight PHB cleric and source feats/spells from the other books? I mean, it seems like a very well rounded class, as designed in PHB core.

Cleric 20 is perfectly viable.

PrCs can be good, if you find one which fits your concept. Much as I personally like Contemplative, for example, it seems like a bad fit for someone interested in melee.

As others have said, the main feats to check out are [Divine] feats and [Reserve] feats, both of which give you new options. Some highlights:

- Divine Metamagic: Quicken [Divine] gets up your buffs fast.

- Divine Vigor [Divine] gives you +10 ft. speed and a bunch of temporary HP (2x character level) for a few minutes. Useful if you expect to have a spare round to activate the feat near the start of combat. Very good if you can convince your DM that it should be a Swift action, like Divine Might.

- Retrieve Spell [Divine] gives you more spells per day. Requires 2 other [Divine] feats first but it's quite strong.

- Sacred Radiance [Divine] is a generic replacement for the light cantrip, plus it buffs a decent assortment of Fort saves, plus it imposes a -2 penalty on Fear saves by Evil creatures. This is overly specific, but if the rest of your party likes [Fear] effects, it might be a fun buff. Plus the visual is awesome: you start to glow and your enemies tremble.

- Holy Warrior [Reserve] gives you a bonus to weapons based on your highest uncast War domain slot. Solid.

- Fiery Burst [Reserve] gives you an at-will supernatural attack based on your highest uncast [Fire] type spell, domain or normal. Thematic and saves you the trouble of switching to a bow.

... plus you probably want Power Attack etc.


What is your favored weapon for the War domain? If you're going to be using that, we might be able to optimize around it a bit too.



The Initate of Amaunator feat only lets you spontaneously cast [Fire] spells; the feat that lets you spontaneously cast [Light] spells and spells with "light" in their names is the Initiate of Lathander feat.

Fixed, thanks!

[Anthrowhale]

For fighting, Zen Archer is a natural choice since you already have martial weapon proficiency[longbow] and a high wisdom. If you take the Spell Domain + Domain Spontaneity you'll be able to pay feat taxes for effective archery via Anyspell[Heroics[fighter archery feats]]. Once you get Triadspell you'll be able to get every fighter feat that the situation demands and you can use a lesser rod of extend spell to make heroics last for much of the adventuring day. Furthermore, Greater Anyspell[Draconic Polymorph] provides access to some powerful forms especially when used on top of something that turns you into an outsider like Holy Transformation.

The most powerful cleric feat is Initiate of Mystra which allows you to cast an AMF on yourself and still cast spells. Combine with Arcane Mastery (qualified via anyspell for arcane spells) to remove uncertainty from the associated level checks. The big drawback here is that you don't benefit from magic items inside the AMF, but this can remain an excellent tradeoff in many situations.

DMM (Quicken) and DMM(Heighten) are obviously useful. I like the DMM(Reach) suggestion as well. DMM(Reach) with a lesser rod of maximize spell on Shivering Touch is probably too powerful... If you want to maximize DMM then you take Rebuke Dragons as an ACF at level 1 and then Sacred Exorcist 1 for a double turning pool.

W.r.t. healing, 'Close Wounds', 'Healing Lorecall', 'Alter Fortune', and 'Heal' are pretty excellent.

W.r.t. prestige classes, as an Elf you can't take Hathran. The only new suggestion I'd make is Runecaster which becomes aberrantly good at ECL 13 when you can start making permanent runes.

[Kobold Esq]

Heal and Fight. That's what they do, that's what I'd like, a bit of both.


Just to be clear: You're asking how to make a cleric into a cleric?

[Biffoniacus_Furiou]

I'd go Cleric 5/ Morninglord 1/ Radiant Servant 5/ Morninglord 9 for the final build. Radiant Servant of Pelor (or any sun god) is in Complete Divine, Morninglord of Lathander (or any sun god) is in Player's Guide to Faerun. For flavor, go with an Illumian in Races of Destiny with the feat Bright Sigils in that same book, especially if it gets boosted by your light-buffing class features.

Domains should be Sun and Healing, and use the PH2 spontaneous domain casting ACF for Healing so you can spontaneously convert prepared spells into that domain's spells, namely Heal.

Take Extend Spell, Persistent Spell, and Divine Metamagic: Persistent Spell in Complete Divine. You can skip the first two if your group isn't using the Complete Divine Errata. Also take Power Attack, and you'll need to have Improved Turning and Extra Turning early to qualify for those prestige classes. Take two flaws (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/variant/buildingCharacters/characterFlaws.htm) if possible (murky-eyed, which is why he always wants it to be bright so he can see better, and either vulnerable or weak will) to have two extra feats starting out. You'll probably also want Craft Rod at some point.

Get items that boost your effective Cleric level for turning undead (Phylactery of Undead Turning, Ephod of Authority, Rod of Defiance, Scepter of the Netherworld, etc.) and that give you additional uses of Turn Undead (Reliquary Holy Symbol, multiple Nightsticks which is not expressed as a bonus and should stack). Radiant Servant allows you to use Greater Turning a lot more often, and with your boosted level you should outright destroy pretty much any undead that show up. The extra Turn Undead uses are to power DMM: Persistent, which you should use with Divine Power, Righteous Wrath of the Faithful (party), Mass Lesser Vigor (party), Elation (party), Stormrage, etc. Keep enough Turn Undead uses available each day to use your full allotment of Greater Turning uses.

This build does many things quite well: It can fight with persistent Divine Power and other buffs. It can heal with persistent Mass Lesser Vigor on the whole party, Radiant Servant empowering your cure spells, and spontaneously casting Heal. It can obliterate undead like nobody's business, and it can use tons of light effects for thematic and character development purposes.

[Eldariel]

Cleric 20 is perfectly viable.

PrCs can be good, if you find one which fits your concept. Much as I personally like Contemplative, for example, it seems like a bad fit for someone interested in melee.

I mean, considering it comes up after level 10, you'll have plenty of Divine Power access by that point so it's not like the BAB deficit really matters and the HD difference is pretty irrelevant next to the defensive spells. While not perfect fit, it can certainly be great in a warrior Cleric build as well as any other. Class base stats are really pretty irrelevant for spellcasters; it's the casting and the special abilities you want from your class after the first ~5-7 levels.