WoTR character, opinions on the Battle Templar Prc and build options

[Duskwolf]

Our group is running Wrath of the righteous currently, still early days, and I am playing a Rajah from the playtest, support mostly, which is different for me but is a challenge at times and quite a change of pace for me but fun. I am interested in making a back up character in case of well, death, and I have always been interested in the Battle Templar Prc, yea I know Prcs tend to suck but I do like the idea of spells as well as maneuvers. I have two main lines of thought, cleric 4, mystic 1 with practiced initiator or druid 4 (assuming I can count the ac and wildshape as part of the ordained knight class abilities) , mystic 1 with practiced initiator, I know this will hurt my casting progression but is it workable/ preferable? How much will delaying 2 levels of spell progression hurt me mid, or late game assuming mythic?

Druid seems fun but I fear the elemental trend of the spells will not be much of a help with Wotr although the animal companion and the ac buffs/spells seem like they might be fun/different. On the other hand the cleric is basically made to fight against evil outsiders even if I do find most of the class features kind of meh. Yea I am aware I can get an ac but at a reduced level but not sure how effective it will be at higher levels, but that goes for animal companions in general I suppose.

Party consists of a archer paladin, a lore oracle, and dwarf monk. and we just hit 2nd level. So far the Rajah is taking care of combat heals using radiant dawn maneuvers and the title veils are coming in handy but I feel they may have over done the last round of (nerfs) adjustments on the tittles.

This is just a possible builds in case of death , I have no intention to kill off my current one but I wanted to do some thinking ahead.

Thank you for your time folks.

Dusk

[exelsisxax]

1. Battle templar is a spectacular PrC, matched only by the Awakened Blade for sheer awesomeness in PoW.
2. Mystic lacks both golden lion and iron tortise, so you need a discipline exchange minimum to enter via mystic.
3. Battle templar won't progress druid abilities, so druid is terribad. Ordained knight only progresses explicitly divine abilities, not features of characters that are divine in nature.
4. Assuming late-game, battle templar loses 3 levels of spellcasting, 1 for an initiator level, and no casting progression at BT 1 and 10.

So the problem with BT entry are the feat requirements. You need golden lion or iron tortise discipline focus(which requires 3 maneuvers known of that discipline) AND martial power. Since those classes have no bonus feats, this is 2/3 or 2/4 of the feats you have at level 5. It's a major investment, but being able to move action cast buffs and healing while healing on every strike, while the strike itself can heal will make you a combat beast.

But what's your question? You need to specifically ask or you'll just get more random thoughts from people about the battle templar. For starters, here's some more 5-level entry methods!

Knight disciple 1 OR warlord 1/oracle 4
ordained defender warder 1 OR stalker 1 OR mystic 1/cleric 4 OR warpriest 4 OR inquisitor 4
warpath follower (warpriest or inquisitor) 5

[Duskwolf]

Honestly, the last time I played a cleric was in a 2nd ed game so domains and such are a bit of a fuzzy thing for me so I am unsure about them, that and my Dm is strongly wanting us to be lawful good and the good gods seem a bit boring compared to say Desna or Callistra. The druid looks interesting but unless I get a hand waving from the dm the good parts , ac and wildshape do not advance so probably no. I would strongly prefer say 1 rajah / 4 oracle but we already have an oracle in the party and I do not want to infringe even though it would be a completely different build/concept. The reason I like mystic is the recovery method even though you would have to trade out a discipline elsewise a ordained defender might be more of a favorable combination with a cleric. Although I think I would ask if I could sub out the requirement of iron tortoise/ golden lion for say radiant dawn.

At the moment am just considering build options and honestly input is welcome. I will say I prefer both full divine caster and preferable full pow. Psionics and firearms are banned (which bummed me because I had a desperado/privateer I had wanted to play) and reasonable races ( alas no bloodforge) I am thinking half orc, human, tielfing or aasaimir.

Question? is it worth building for given the ap and how well would it work with mythic I suppose is a good start.

Dusk

[Castilonium]

How much will delaying 2 levels of spell progression hurt me mid, or late game assuming mythic?

Here, this feat is for you: Prestigious Spellcaster (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/feats/general-feats/prestigious-spellcaster/)

If you like combat healing and using radiant dawn but don't like Rajah's veils, try Zealot. They use Radiant Dawn even better than Rajahs because they can refresh their maneuvers as a move action. They're the only class in the game that can refresh multiple maneuvers without a swift, standard, or full round action, every single round. That means you can use your best strike and your best boost/counter maneuver every round, which means more healing or damage prevented. Add 4 levels of Knight Disciple Paladin for +50% healing with your maneuvers and extra juicy WotR flavor!

Battle Templar is a good Prc, and the PoW prestige classes are good in general compared to Paizo prestige classes. It's not so great with Zealot, though, because of action economy incompatibilities. If you go with Battle Templar, don't forget about the fact you're a full caster and can do more than just heal. I think that a Zealot will be better at raw combat healing, but obviously a Battle Templar will be better at, you know, everything full casters do. Up to you what you value more!

[Duskwolf]

Sadly, Oh wise one, psionics is banned, as is firearms. Yea I am giving knight Disciple a long and lingering look for my current character, the increase in healing might be worth the loss of essence and veil usage. Of course that depends on if a pet archetype comes out for Rajah ( or I cobble one up or my Dm does). Thank you for the link, interesting, will see if I have room feat wise, I will do my best to do so. Thank you.

[Duskwolf]

Also, I do rather like the rajah, just unsure about how it will play in later levels in wotr and how the recent nerfs to veils will effect play.

[Duskwolf]

Okay then, clerics. I have read the guides and it seems interesting but the archetypes? The Holy warrior let's you trade domains for full bab and d10 but is it worth the loss of domains which a lot of archetypes seem to trade out anyways for greater or lesser effect. Any gems among archetypes I may have missed elsewise?

[upho]

Okay then, clerics. I have read the guides and it seems interesting but the archetypes? The Holy warrior let's you trade domains for full bab and d10 but is it worth the loss of domains which a lot of archetypes seem to trade out anyways for greater or lesser effect. Any gems among archetypes I may have missed elsewise?Disclaimer: although I've built and played quite a few cleric/battle templar NPCs, clerics aren't really my forte, so take the following with a grain of salt.

Generally speaking, I'd say options which decrease the number of spells/day are bad from an optimization perspective. So an archetype which trades both domains - and thus the domain spells/day - for full bab and a mere +1 hp/level seems like a very poor option. If chosen and cast at least somewhat competently, spells are generally much more powerful than what is typically implied by the various options which trade them for other supposedly equal abilities. Off the top of my head, I'd say the only potential exceptions to this are the PoW: E class templates/archetypes which grant maneuver progression for the cost of 1 less spell/day.

However, based on the hunches I get when looking at your party's other members and knowing how powerful the BT is, it seems highly unlikely you'd need to worry about optimizing a cleric/battle templar build to match your party's general power level. Instead, if you and your group believe PC balance should be considered, I think it might actually be a good idea for you to intentionally gimp such a build with some sub-par options. Especially if those options come with a flavor you find suitable. Likewise, I think it's worth noting that maximizing the full caster side of the build will typically increase its versatility and overall power. Meaning for example a cleric 9/initiator 1/BT 10 is usually more powerful than a cleric 3/initiator 7/BT 10, although this of course depends on other build choices and the roles you intend to fill.

In other words, the BT probably gives you quite a lot of room to play around with interesting class/archetype/race combos without there being much risk of your character ending up too weak. And note that especially in WotR, an initiating divine "gish" like the BT is most likely going to be a major kicker of enemy butts, and may very well end up being too much of a butt-kicker if optimized and the AP is played as written.

When it comes to class combos, I'd first consider which primary and potentially secondary roles you'd like to cover, in combat as well as outside of combat. Are you the insightful and wise defender/leader who wades into melee protected by his shield and faith? Or perhaps a more classic paladin-ish tank striker "knight in shining armor" who buffs himself to the high heavens and smites his enemies all the way back into the deepest layer of the Abyss with his holy greatsword?

[The Mystic]

I've got only a little familiarity with the PoW options, so I'm going to quickly read over the battle templar to get a basic idea of where you're headed, but focus mainly on clerical advice.

Hmm, first thing that I notice is that you're going to need to beware of counters as a battle templar. If I remember correctly they take an immediate action, which essentially costs you next turn's healing. Also Reach of the Divine is Amazing! Forget healing, being able to fight and combat buff as a cleric probably puts you ahead of the fighter at round one of combat.

In mythic the loss of a spell level isn't going to cripple you, so long as you're capable of doing something else. Though thanks to inspired spell it's a huge loss of versatility. That said, I feel like the loss of two to three feats for the aforementioned prestigious spellcaster feat is well worth it to keep access to high level spells (I like me some versatility, I does).

My overall answer to "How would this work with Mythic?" is... mixed. Heirophant will support your cleric casting and abilities very nicely and you could dual path to Champion for boosts to combat action economy and numbers that could well end up breaking the game (haven't looked for specific exploits, also not that you can't do that with Mythic anyway) given how important actions are to an initiator. On the flip side, you'll get absolutely nothing that directly boosts your initiator abilities, as they weren't a part of the design for Mythic. Even new Paizo classes can struggle to find useful things in mythic, which tend to centre more around the core classes. That said, many of the universal abilities are more than powerful enough even if you can't find anything that directly synergises with a class ability.

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On domains. While technically it depends on the domains you'd be giving up, but, especially with your magnificent healing and spellcasting abilities I can't really see the need for the extra HP. BAB could be useful, depending on exactly what you're trying to do, but honestly it doesn't seem like you'll be needing bigger numbers (especially with Mythic, again) over some ability you can't otherwise access. Not to mention losing the domain spell, as upho points out.

A lot of cleric archetypes give up one domain, but keep the other, which is often an acceptable trade. But both is a hefty cost because it also entails the spell per level loss. On the other hand, depending on interpretation, you won't gain access to higher level spells anyway, as they are not a core part of cleric spellcasting.

You mentioned an interest in Desna. So what you'd be giving up is access to domain abilities such as "Add +10 ft to your base speed," "For the next round, any time he rolls a d20 he may roll twice and take the more favourable result 3+WIS/day" or "For a number of rounds (non-consecutive) per day you can move normally regardless of magical effects that impede your movement, as if you were affected by freedom of movement. This effect occurs automatically as soon as it applies"

Or for Calistria, "For the next round, any time he rolls a d20 he may roll twice and take the more favourable result 3+WIS/day" or "As a move action create a single mirror image that lasts for a number of rounds equal to your cleric level"

These are some of the most incredible 1st level domain abilities around.

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Ultimately Wrath of the Righteous, if run as written, doesn't need much optimisation to walk all over (I feel a bit of trepidation for your GM, having an archer paladin in the party for this). Instead, if one considers the optimal goal to be "Everybody has fun" I highly recommend taking the opportunity to pick up as many unique or interesting abilities as you can, as between an initiator, cleric domains and especially mythic you have the ability to access to some of the most interesting and uncommonly available abilities in the game.

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On a less mechanical note, I've been preparing to run my own Wrath of the Righteous campaign recently, and one thing that's entailed is finding elements of the crusading deities that I found interesting and wanted to expand on, because many of them didn't really impress me on the surface. If you're interested, I can try to pitch a perspective on one of them that you like from a mechanical, or core concept sort of level.

The campaign's central deity, Iomedae, for example inspired these thoughts

Iomedae
The Inheritor

As a mortal Iomedae was a paladin in service to Aroden, perhaps the greatest of them. When Iomedae gained a spark of the divine by completing the trial of the starstone she became the herald of Aroden. For nearly 700 years she served in this role, protecting the human world from the many entities that have tried to consume them.

This ended almost exactly 100 years ago upon the death of Aroden. Where Iomedae did what she has always done. She fought chaos and the evils it brings by ascending, taking charge and leading the way. It is in this way that Iomedae is the godess of leadership and of setting an example for others to follow.

Iomedae is not Aroden. Her church is not his church, of advancement and culture. Hers is a church of protection and preservation, for that was always her role as Herald. To create a space for these things to flourish.

Iomedae is unique among the greater gods for her youth, at about 800 years old there are surviving mortals that are older than her, and for the rapidity of her rise to the status of greater god, as she had only a small following prior to stepping in to protect the followers of Aroden. For these reasons, though Iomedae herself is clear in her intent, the religion of those who follow her is, even now, finding it's feet in the world in which it finds itself.

Iomedae is a deity of desperately holding together the legacy of someone more visionary, now gone, with no real hope of improvement on the horizon.

[Duskwolf]

Thank you for your time and sharing your sage wisdom. It does give me a lot to consider and I will definitely think on it.

My concern, suprisingly enough, is not really optimization but more staying relevant and pulling my weight ( and then some at times). I do love some more damage but since I am a known power gamer I, at least at the momment, am trying not to be ( dm has had to step on me a few times during character creation, tis okay he knows the temptation as well).

Like I said no plans to kill off my rajah although game before last the monk went into negatives twice in one combat and only because of radiant dawn did he live. If the Oracle dies I may multiclass to oracle and later BT but atm just theorycrafting a back up. The battle templar has always intrigued me as well as the blade caster although I know the bladecaster has issues.

I do love the path of war for the most part, although not thrilled at the warlord nerfs, and honestly think it brings some fascinating aspects to the game as does akshaic magic and home it gets fleshed out more.

I have played since basic, with 1St and a lot of 2ND ( spell jammer) and took a long time to get into 3Rd ( via star wars d20, terribly fun) with stops long the way for mage, vampire, traveler and the like and only recently into pathfinder and in general I enjoy it although I do have some issues with it ( grapple rules cluster frak flowchart) I am a bit disappointed with starfinder but still early days.

Thank you all for your time and patience.
Dusk

[Elricaltovilla]

If you wanted to trade out domains on your cleric, you could use Ordained Defender Warder (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/path-of-war/classes/warder/warder-archetypes/ordained-defender/) to pick up a blessing or inquisition from the Warpriest or Inquisitor class. They are a little different from domains, but offer similar benefits to the domain powers.

[upho]

Just wanted to add a few comments and point out some minor details:
Hmm, first thing that I notice is that you're going to need to beware of counters as a battle templar. If I remember correctly they take an immediate action, which essentially costs you next turn's healing.This is correct, and makes Martial Healing mostly an emergency back-up if you're out of better boosts or counters. However, it's worth noting there are quite a few PoW options which can allow you to get around this limitation, allowing you to take an immediate action as a free action (such as Riven Hourglass' 5th lvl Chronal Fission (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/path-of-war/disciplines-and-maneuvers/riven-hourglass-maneuvers/#TOC-Chronal-Fission) stance).


On the other hand, depending on interpretation, you won't gain access to higher level spells anyway, as they are not a core part of cleric spellcasting.Actually, you do gain access to higher level domain spells as well, since the BT's Ordained Knight feature also makes your cleric and BT levels stack for the purpose of your Domains class feature (which includes domain spells known and the domain spell slots).


Ultimately Wrath of the Righteous, if run as written, doesn't need much optimisation to walk all over (I feel a bit of trepidation for your GM, having an archer paladin in the party for this). Instead, if one considers the optimal goal to be "Everybody has fun" I highly recommend taking the opportunity to pick up as many unique or interesting abilities as you can, as between an initiator, cleric domains and especially mythic you have the ability to access to some of the most interesting and uncommonly available abilities in the game.So much this.


My concern, suprisingly enough, is not really optimization but more staying relevant and pulling my weight ( and then some at times).Well, unless perhaps if you do decide on some extremely awkward class/archetype combo or decide your BT character has no tactical sense whatsoever, I wouldn't worry about staying relevant or being able to pull your weight. And being able to step up your game when needed tends to be easy with the many powerful tools you gain in the form of both spells and maneuvers.


I do love some more damage but since I am a known power gamer I, at least at the momment, am trying not to be ( dm has had to step on me a few times during character creation, tis okay he knows the temptation as well).If your "power gaming" primarily have resulted in your characters dealing too much damage, I'd suggest you try characters concepts who don't specialize in that particular niche. For example, you could try optimizing the BT to be an effective leader/defender focusing on party support, while dealing rather pitiful damage. Just keep in mind that damage typically isn't the most powerful aspect a BT could focus on, and that you still risk becoming OP for your game - or break it completely - if you go bananas in other areas (such as melee control/defender shenanigans, durability and/or party support). I'd be particularly wary of optimizing reach, AoOs and combat maneuver combos too far, as these can become extremely powerful with the BT's action efficient self-boosting and defender abilities. Likewise, I'd go easy on general durability and the use of counters, since opponents in AP's are generally very poorly equipped to handle PCs having powerful defenses and actions outside of their own turn.


Like I said no plans to kill off my rajah although game before last the monk went into negatives twice in one combat and only because of radiant dawn did he live.I think the monk's near death experiences should be taken as a caution sign when it comes to optimizing a potential BT for this game.


The battle templar has always intrigued me as well as the blade caster although I know the bladecaster has issues.The bladecaster is a bit more tricky to get the most out of. But even though it can be called weaker than the BT in some senses, doing so would be misleading as the bladecaster can enable some very interesting and/or extremely powerful characters which aren't even remotely possible with BT builds. Really, the dual arcane spell and maneuver progression is actually enough to ensure that, while the bladecaster's other class features are basically just gravy, if powerful gravy. For example, a magus 9/harbinger 1/bladecaster 10 can make for an exceptionally strong and versatile skirmishing striker combatant, having fantastic action economy and a huge set of tools with which to find, fool, control, cripple and brutally murder opponents with shocking ease.


Thank you all for your time and patience.You're welcome!


If you wanted to trade out domains on your cleric, you could use Ordained Defender Warder (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/path-of-war/classes/warder/warder-archetypes/ordained-defender/) to pick up a blessing or inquisition from the Warpriest or Inquisitor class. They are a little different from domains, but offer similar benefits to the domain powers.Also worth noting this is THE initiator for a cleric/BT build, having Wis-based initiation and a class feature which scales also through BT levels.