Turning/Rebuking fire creatures and losing the Water domain?

[TalonOfAnathrax]

The Fire domain grants the ability to Rebuke and command fire creatures. Therefore it is quite possible for a Cleric to wander around with a bunch of fire elemental minions as well as undead. But what happens to those fire elementals if the Cleric loses the Fire domain, for example with the Substitute Domain spell? Do they stay commanded? Do they suddenly go free and then suddenly go free when the spell ends and the Cleric regains access to the domain?

I just realised that a Cloistered Cleric could use Substitute Domain to get 3 domains like Fire, Slime, Scalykind and get minions, and then swap them for Earth, Air, Water, and then swap them for Warforged, Spider and one other and get even more minions...

Of course this would be very limited by the availability of such minions, but could it theoretically be done? Sounds like a thing to do next time I get huge political power and access to resources at the end of a campaign :D

[Venger]

They will act according to their last set of programmed orders until someone else wrests control of them from you. You could easily perform the trick you outline, but your minions will largely be useful outside of combat since anything puny enough for you to command in the first place isn't going to be much threat in a fight.

[Falontani]

D20 + charisma modifier = maximum hit dice with many items to help boost it. Since it is a d20 roll many effects will help boost it. This roll can give you up to your cleric level +4 in maximum hd you can hit with a low number to reach of 22. This means that at level 12 you should be hitting a 16 consistently.

2d6 + cleric level + charisma means that at level 12 you should be able to hit the 32 needed to command a 16 HD creature. If you work on it at all.
2d6 avg is 7+12+ cha mod

That is to command above your level. Usually you don't need to command above your level, you want to command something else that won't be weak for your level. With the warforged domain command a warforged (not a golem) around your level. Pc's are stronger than monsters usually.

Maybe it's because I'm sleep deprived, but I don't see a problem

[TalonOfAnathrax]

They will act according to their last set of programmed orders until someone else wrests control of them from you. You could easily perform the trick you outline, but your minions will largely be useful outside of combat since anything puny enough for you to command in the first place isn't going to be much threat in a fight.
Point. But what if the command were "obey me in all things" and I could speak to them?
That would probably work better with intelligent targets though.


D20 + charisma modifier = maximum hit dice with many items to help boost it. Since it is a d20 roll many effects will help boost it. This roll can give you up to your cleric level +4 in maximum hd you can hit with a low number to reach of 22. This means that at level 12 you should be hitting a 16 consistently.

2d6 + cleric level + charisma means that at level 12 you should be able to hit the 32 needed to command a 16 HD creature. If you work on it at all.
2d6 avg is 7+12+ cha mod

That is to command above your level. Usually you don't need to command above your level, you want to command something else that won't be weak for your level. With the warforged domain command a warforged (not a golem) around your level. Pc's are stronger than monsters usually.

Maybe it's because I'm sleep deprived, but I don't see a problem
Thanks for the math, but my main concern wasn't "how powerful is the stuff that I control". It was "do I keep controlling it even if I lost the ability to Rebuke/Command more stuff".
Or were you showing Venger that you totally can control useful stuff? Well then yes, that's a success. Controlling useful stuff is indeed possible. And any minion is a good minion: guard, scout, trap-tester...

[Ashtagon]

If you substitute out a domain that grants a turn-like effect, you lost that turn-like effect.

What that means for ongoing turn-like effects depends on their duration.

Anything with a Concentration duration would end immediately (you can't concentrate on an ability you don't possess). Anything with a duration measured in rounds (or minutes etc.) would last till the timer expires.

Turned (and rebuked) creatures remain turned (or rebuked) for the full ten rounds. Bolstering (does anyone do that?) would likewise expire after one minute. Destroyed creatures remain destroyed.

At the point when the cleric lost the granted power, any commanded creatures would suddenly be in excess of the cleric's new command limit (new limit of zero HD). How those creatures react to being suddenly released from control depends on their Intelligence and how they were (ab)used by the cleric.

I'd personally allow any cleric who has commanded creatures to instantly downgrade commanded creatures to a rebuke effect, which would probably be advisable if they are about to swap out the granted power.

[Venger]

D20 + charisma modifier = maximum hit dice with many items to help boost it. Since it is a d20 roll many effects will help boost it. This roll can give you up to your cleric level +4 in maximum hd you can hit with a low number to reach of 22. This means that at level 12 you should be hitting a 16 consistently.

2d6 + cleric level + charisma means that at level 12 you should be able to hit the 32 needed to command a 16 HD creature. If you work on it at all.
2d6 avg is 7+12+ cha mod

That is to command above your level. Usually you don't need to command above your level, you want to command something else that won't be weak for your level. With the warforged domain command a warforged (not a golem) around your level. Pc's are stronger than monsters usually.

Maybe it's because I'm sleep deprived, but I don't see a problem

It is impossible to command above your level. You may only ever command undead who have 1/2 as many hd as you have levels, regardless of what your check results are


Point. But what if the command were "obey me in all things" and I could speak to them?
That would probably work better with intelligent targets though.
Then, as I said, they would continue to operate under those orders until someone else came along and wrested control of them with his own rebuke pool.