Circle of Spores / Death Domain multiclass

[Trustypeaches]

Heya

So i was considering making a character with the release of Ravnica that focuses on the Circle of Spores subclass while incorporating worship of a death god Talona. I was going for a real "Swamp witch" vibe, a crippled cantankerous crone who wanders the swamplands trading in fingernails and hair.

I think I might make her a lizardfolk, but I'm not sure what other race options would work thematically. I was also wondering if there's anything cool I could do optimization wise with this combination!

[Vogie]

The core would likely be Spores Druid 2 / Death Cleric 8. That gives you reliable damage on melee hits from both subclasses. Save your Channel Divinity for the Crits.

If you expect you're going to be solely in the melee range and not slinging spells, you could also consider a single level in barbarian. It will give you even more damage with non-finesse weapons, and reduce your damage taken in lieu of concentrating on a spell. In addition, if you use your Wild Shape feature in the normal sense, your unarmed defense feature may give you a higher AC than that creature would normally have. If you go this route, I'd suggest upping the amount of Spore Druid levels, as that THP will be incredibly powerful.

Alternatively, since your Wisdom is going to be as high as possible for your Spore Druid features, a single level in Monk may give you an AC higher than Medium armor would allow.

I would also ask your DM if you can use the Elemental Adept feat for Poison - if so, pick that up as early as possible, potentially with a variant human free feat.

[Trustypeaches]

The official Circle of Spores (leaked from Guildmasters guide to ravnica) deals necrotic damage, not Poison.

Is there a reason you suggest investing more in Cleric than Druid instead of leaving it at a 1 level dip?

[Mana Opal]

Judging from the fact that his drop point on Cleric is 8, I believe he's suggesting to get up to Divine Strike (which adds an extra 1d8 Necrotic damage to your melee attacks (which improves to 2d8 at Lv. 14, if you opt to go that far). It does stack with your Symbiotic Entity damage, and comes with a few nifty tricks like Twinned Toll the Dead and the ability to ignore enemies' Resistance to Necrotic damage(!), but you do lose out on 40 THP and a few high-level Druid spells in the process. On the flipside, you'll get access to a zombie squad!

[Man_Over_Game]

The core would likely be Spores Druid 2 / Death Cleric 8. That gives you reliable damage on melee hits from both subclasses. Save your Channel Divinity for the Crits. [...]

There wouldn't be any reason to save the Channel Divinity, though. Criticals only let you double your damage dice, but flat numbers are never included. Channel Divinity adds 5 + (2 x Cleric Level), so it doesn't benefit from a Critical Hit. On the contrary, it's possible to be wasted on a critical hit (since the enemy is likely near death after taking the critical damage).

I'd say that focusing on the Death Cleric aspect is a valid choice if your team already has enough durability or support to allow a squishy melee character. Something along the lines of an Ancestral Barbarian, Life or Grave Cleric, or some other high-end survivability character. Without that, you're a major liability as a Death Cleric, and I'd recommend prioritizing the Druid for the defensive traits.

[Trustypeaches]

Judging from the fact that his drop point on Cleric is 8, I believe he's suggesting to get up to Divine Strike (which adds an extra 1d8 Necrotic damage to your melee attacks (which improves to 2d8 at Lv. 14, if you opt to go that far). It does stack with your Symbiotic Entity damage, and comes with a few nifty tricks like Twinned Toll the Dead and the ability to ignore enemies' Resistance to Necrotic damage(!), but you do lose out on 40 THP and a few high-level Druid spells in the process. On the flipside, you'll get access to a zombie squad!Well, yes, the point of dipping into Death Domain is to pick up Reaper, Toll the Dead (plus other good cleric spells like Bane and domain spells like False Life / Ray of Sickness), and a martial weapon proficiency.

From there is it really worth going past 1 level dip though? I feel like I'd get better returns investing in Druid with the large THP bonuses and it'd also fit into the theming better as a swamp witch. If I invest in death domain, I get a mediocre channel divinity, the ability to bypass necrotic resistance (pretty situational), Divine Strike (decent ig?). Circle of Spores also gets a zombie squad with animate dead and Spreading Spores.

I like Death Domain cleric but if I wanted to go that deep then I don't think there'd be much of a point investing in Circle of Spores.

[Man_Over_Game]

Well, yes, the point of dipping into Death Domain is to pick up Reaper, Toll the Dead (plus other good cleric spells like Bane and domain spells like False Life / Ray of Sickness), and a martial weapon proficiency.

From there is it really worth going past 1 level dip though? I feel like I'd get better returns investing in Druid with the large THP bonuses and it'd also fit into the theming better as a swamp witch. If I invest in death domain, I get a mediocre channel divinity, the ability to bypass necrotic resistance (pretty situational), Divine Strike (decent ig?). Circle of Spores also gets a zombie squad with animate dead and Spreading Spores.

I like Death Domain cleric but if I wanted to go that deep then I don't think there'd be much of a point investing in Circle of Spores.

The martial weapon proficiency would be a good add-on, but remember that Druids generally don't use metal weapons, which defines pretty much every martial weapon available. You'd basically get bows and whips as options, which aren't bad.

[Vogie]

The official Circle of Spores (leaked from Guildmasters guide to ravnica) deals necrotic damage, not Poison.

Is there a reason you suggest investing more in Cleric than Druid instead of leaving it at a 1 level dip?

Only the Halo of Spores deals Necrotic Damage. The Melee attacks are augmented with poison damage. I've included the screenshot below

Since neither class gives a second attack, you want to squeeze out as much damage as you can with that one attack you do get.

https://i2.wp.com/www.sageadvice.eu/wp-content/uploads/2018/10/spores1.jpg?w=1268&ssl=1


The martial weapon proficiency would be a good add-on, but remember that Druids generally don't use metal weapons, which defines pretty much every martial weapon available. You'd basically get bows and whips as options, which aren't bad.

They can also pick up polearms, which are largely wooden, and Polearm master, which also works with quarterstaff. The leaked image states "Your melee weapon attacks deal 1d6 poison damage to targets you hit" without any "once per turn" modifier. If you're looking to get the most out of the subclass, getting more attacks (such as the PAM other-side attack, 5 levels in a martial class or 3 levels in Gloom Stalker Ranger) is all upside.

[Trustypeaches]

Idk, I was considering the bonus melee damage as somewhat incidental and not what I’d be doing most of the time when I have cleaving cantrips.

Also I see now that the melee damage from symbiotic entity still deals poison damage. That makes it even worse to invest into IMO, since even if you pick up Elemental Adept you get stopped by Poison Immune enemies (of which the monster manual has twice more of than Poison resistant enemies). It seems like a really poor use of a feat / ASI.

On a side note, god damn the nerf to Halo of Spores is sad. Changing it to necrotic damage was not enough to offset the added Con save, and nerfed damage IMO :(

[Alexwellace]

Wouldn't the draw of this build be the ability to stack all the auto damage abilities? First turn cast Wild form and Spiritual weapon. Second turn cast spirit guardians. Now we're talking spirit guardian wis save or 3d8, con save or whatever damge the spore is x2 due to Wild shape, plus 1d8 + wis for spirtual weapon. On subsequent turns you can also throw in an attack if you'd like, a magic initiate booming blade perhaps, add in poison damage and channel divinity. Might be worth skipping one turn of spiritual weapon to up a shilleaghle.

You're a walking maelstrom of damage when everything comes online, get close to enough things and at least some of them will fail a save. Fluff the spirit guardians as swamp mosquitoes, spiritual weapon as a flying etheral plague bat, now I think that'd be a cool character concept for a woods witch.

[Vogie]

Idk, I was considering the bonus melee damage as somewhat incidental and not what I’d be doing most of the time when I have cleaving cantrips.

Also I see now that the melee damage from symbiotic entity still deals poison damage. That makes it even worse to invest into IMO, since even if you pick up Elemental Adept you get stopped by Poison Immune enemies (of which the monster manual has twice more of than Poison resistant enemies). It seems like a really poor use of a feat / ASI.

On a side note, god damn the nerf to Halo of Spores is sad. Changing it to necrotic damage was not enough to offset the added Con save, and nerfed damage IMO :(

I mean, you can do what you wish - it just looked like something to build a build around.

Please note, RAW Elemental Adept does not allow poison - it would require DM fiat, and even then, as you say, there are a lot of poison immune enemies out there. That would largely depend on the campaign.

[Trustypeaches]

I mean, you can do what you wish - it just looked like something to build a build around.

Please note, RAW Elemental Adept does not allow poison - it would require DM fiat, and even then, as you say, there are a lot of poison immune enemies out there. That would largely depend on the campaign.I feel like it'd be better to just convince the DM to change the bonus melee damage to necrotic.

[Ruffbassn]

That is a cool build idea. I had a thought on a death cleric/ wild magic sorcerer. Its fun just even starting to mess around! Have fun with the hag witch!