Dual Role Support/Carry Build

[Arderat]

Hello, hello! First post, so I'm naturally quite anxious that I'm putting this in the right place and not cursing as much as I'm used to, but I think I got it it right.

SO
I play with a couple groups, all of whom play a hodgepodge of 3.5 and Pathfinder. Usually, if it exists for either format, it's approved, given the relatively easy translation between the two. I say this first just so that it's clear how broad the scope of available resources is for this; be it DragMag or Dreamscarred Press, if I can slap it down in front of my DM, there's a solid 99% chance it gets approved.

What I'm looking for is some sort of build that can function as primarily support, in whatever manner that may be, but in a pinch can step in to carry an encounter. A lot of the time I play Cleric, for this very reason, but I'm finding it difficult to handle opponents with high SR and saves, as usually they can take me down before I can shore up my personal buffs to a significant level (given that the first several rounds are usually me buffing allies or attempting minor battlefield control). If I spend time protecting my allies, I myself am not in a place where I can reliably hold my own against these enemies, and if I don't spend time protecting my allies...then I'm a Cleric who doesn't spend time protecting their allies, which I feel is pretty self-explanatory.

Does anyone have any ideas for something that doesn't need to be in the spotlight to shine, but can step in and take over a primary combat role if necessary? The more effective the supporting aspect is, the better; though it's happened, it's not very often that everyone else in the party has been rendered ineffective.

For context, my party usually consists of a primary melee type (gishy if the player can manage it), either a straight rogue or a straight fighter (3.5 fighter, tragically), and one utter wild card...the player has run everything from a highly effective Swordsage flanker to a gestalted Wizard/Cleric whose strategies consisted of either Fireball or turning into a dragon and suplexing the enemy. I'm the only one at the table who really goes that hard on character optimization

Thanks in advance! I suspect that there's not much out there that's better than Cleric in this regard, but I figured I'd ask!

[weckar]

War Cleric seems the obvious choice? Bard, perhaps?

I am not sure why SR and Saves are a problem for you, though, if you are targeting your allies rather than your enemies?

[noob]

You can go Druid.
Or do a better cleric.
Or play a bard Sulbime chord if you like to sing and cast ninth level spells.

[Arderat]

SR and saves give me trouble if I need to go on the offensive, as I'm usually specced for support. The smooth transition from one to the other is where I'm lacking. After all, given enough time, any Cleric can become a melee powerhouse.

Druid, hm? I'm not too familiar with what they have at their disposal in the way of buffs/debuffs...I'll poke around.

[noob]

Druids have access to wild shape And also have a pet that is super strong And have tons of spells.
Summoning can be a good support due to how summons either waste opponent actions(for example they dispel it or kill it) or block passage(it is somehow battlefield control) And as a druid you do not need to prepare the summons.
Can you tell at which level you are playing?
You could consider war spells too: they are cool dragon magazine content: if you want to summon armies it can do that.
Cleric is really powerful if you can get divine meta magic persist and then persist all the boost spells you like.

[Gruftzwerg]

the odd warlock mobility support^^:

This type of build depends heavy on your team setup to work, on group size, optimized teammates & teamplay.

Main-tool to work with is "Flee the Scene" (Dimension Door + Afterimage illusion) which you can get at lvl6. Note that FtS ain't limited to you, so you can take your teammates with you!

- your ubercharger friend is stuck in melee range and can't get a charge off? move to him and FtS with him to a good position to charge from.

- your squishy teammate got flanked? help him escape

- the rouge wants to flank to get his sneak attacks off, but can't get around the enemies? help him to get there.

Later when you can fly, take Fly-by-Attack. FbA gives you a "standard action" between your moves:
move to teammate > FtS away > move/fly to a save position

Add a few crowd control invocations and/or blast essences with Eldritch Chain and you are rdy to go.

Most buffs & heals you can buy as wands and use em via UMD (and warlock 4 gives "take10" for UMD).

If you still want some heal & buff spells without magic items, go for the Eldritch Disciple prc.

[Eldariel]

Yeah, Quicken/Persist the buffs to sidestep the action issue you're rightly detecting. This is more tactical than anything, really. Stock Cleric can do everything but not everything at once; you have to pick what to use your actions for. Quicken Spell helps (Quickened Divine Favor, Quickened Ice Slick, etc. enable you to BFC/buff/etc. as swift actions in lieu of doing everything else) but doesn't solve the problem entirely. It's more about which spells are worth the action and making your actions count; thus, a tactical judgement made separately for each combat. In general on higher levels though, minor buffs like Bless are no longer worth casting in combat and most of your buffs should be out-of-combat ones (1 hour/level or 10 min/level generally; Magic Circles, Resist Energies, etc.).

But yeah, Cleric and Druid are your best bets. Druid has the edge of Wildshape lasting all day and Natural Spell letting them cast in Wildshape so you come prebuffed to all combats while still having the full array of control/debuff/buff/offensive spells. And the animal companion having its own set of actions allowing you to "fight" through it while spending your actions on spells. All permabuffs (Greater Magic Weapon/Fang, Magic Vestment, Heroes' Feast, etc.) save combat actions while still doing stuff and in general, prebuffing helps as in combat, it's generally more efficient to take attack actions of some kind (spell or weapon) if they're available. For buffing as a Cleric, Righteous Might or Divine Power is generally enough if you can't persist buffs. Knowledge-checks are key in picking the right strategy for any given encounter; buffs and summons and beating face and SR-no spells (like Wall of Stone) might be preferable against high SR enemies and knowing enemies' weak saves is always exceedingly useful.

[Nifft]

Cleric into Malconvoker might be fun.

You'd get multiple actions, so you could do the Cleric support-y stuff and still have fun attacking things as the summoned fiends.

[Arderat]

Thank you for all the suggestions! I'd respond to them individually if I knew how, but I'm still getting the hang of the system.

We're currently playing at very high levels, somewhere between 15-18 (I don't know the precise plan going forward).

War spells, hm? Any idea what issue they're in?

[noob]

Thank you for all the suggestions! I'd respond to them individually if I knew how, but I'm still getting the hang of the system.

We're currently playing at very high levels, somewhere between 15-18 (I don't know the precise plan going forward).

War spells, hm? Any idea what issue they're in?

They are in Dragon 309 page 44.
It is a template for spells.
Of course each war spell have to be approved before being researched.
One cool war spell for impacting a setting would be war create greater undying.(undying are not undead)

Divine metamagic allows to turn turn attempts in metamagics which allows to persist boost spells for having a bunch of short duration spells last all day.

Other cool option for cleric is a one level dip in prestige paladin(unearthed arcana for getting paladin spells) or a one level dip in contemplative(for getting another domain)(or both).
Cloistered cleric is like a regular cleric but who gets the knowledge domain and extra skill points in exchange for lower bab and lower hit dice but the bab problem is compensated with persisted divine power and the extra domain can be replaced with substitute domain(a boost spell).

[Eldariel]

Thank you for all the suggestions! I'd respond to them individually if I knew how, but I'm still getting the hang of the system.

We're currently playing at very high levels, somewhere between 15-18 (I don't know the precise plan going forward).

War spells, hm? Any idea what issue they're in?

In very high level, the problem with actions is somewhat alleviated. Polymorph Any Object (e.g. Trickery-domain) can be made permanent and you can travel most day in Shapechange (e.g. Animal-domain) by using Greater Rod of Extend Spell for 6+ hour duration, which allows you to also take extra actions as e.g. Chronotyryn [Fiend Folio], Choker [MM] or similar. These allow multicasting. Also changing shape is a free action so you can switch from cast form to combat form whenever. Shapechange handbook (https://docs.google.com/document/d/127el4KqlL2ALu1chZ9WLPGFOu1InVTJ2pmxAmYAARbE/edit?ts=59f7dabb#) here. Basically just quicken stuff and get in the fray when need be; also remember that Supernatural Abilities ignore Spell Resistance making Shapechange-based supernatural attacks a convenient means of bypassing immunities.

More generally, buff with all day stuff, Quicken Divine Power and then just wreck enemies until they are all down. Miracle guarantees access to almost any buffs and you can use Beads of Karma (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/magicItems/wondrousItems.htm#strandofPrayerBeads), Ankh of Ascension [Magic Item Compendium] and company to buff your caster level for Magic Vestment/Greater Magic Weapon/Heroes' Feast/etc. making it very hard for enemies to dispel your spells while also enhancing their effects. Pearl of Power IX would allow a second use of Shapechange daily.


Much depends on your domains though. But yeah, high level Clerics can fight while casting. Become Huge+ (Giant Size [Complete Arcane] exists in some domains and can be Miracled), wield a reach weapon, pick up Combat Reflexes and AoO enemies to death while casting spells/using supernatural abilities until your enemies go down.