Dwarf Cleric Build

[Blackhawk748]

Its been a bit since I've played 3.5 and a buddy is gonna run RHoD and so I decided to rock a Dwarven Cleric, which is a thing I haven't done in years. So I'm just gonna drop it in here and make sure I didn't miss anything neat.

Race: Dream Dwarf

Str: 14
Dex: 10
Con: 12
Int: 14
Wis: 21 (with +2 Item)
Cha: 16

Cleric 2/Church Inquisitor 2/ Ordained Champ 4

Domains: Protection, Inquisition, War, Good.

Feats (2 Flaws)
Protection Devotion, Extra Turning x2, Spont Domain, Imp Smiting (Evil)

Bonus Feats (Inquisition and Protection Domain Powers traded for feats): WP/WF (Warhammer), Shield Spec (Heavy Steel), SHield Ward

The plan is grab the last level of Ordained Champ and then... I don't know? More Inquisitor maybe? Not certain frankly. I have Imp Smiting cuz Im gonna be slinging around a lot of smites, and Spont Domain cuz I have 4 of them and so it gives me plenty of flexibility.

There's probably better stuff but these seemed fine to me at the moment, and as should be clear, we're going with a Heavy Armor Hammer Cleric. SO very stereotypical Moradin Cleric.

[Voldine]

Deepstone Sentinel might offer a couple neat tricks for you at the expense of a few cleric levels. You'd want to dip a level of Warblade to avoid spending three feats to qualify.

[Rebel7284]

- I would swap Int and Con. You don't need very many skill points for a Cleric, but if you ever want to be on the front lines, extra HP is VERY important.
- You need 3 levels of Cleric since Church Inquisitor requires: "Able to cast zone of truth as a divine spell." - Zone of Truth is a second level spell.
- The best way to make a frontline Cleric is Divine Metamagic + Persistent Spell, making several of your short-term buffs last all day is incredible. Highly recommended unless it's banned for making fighters cry. I can make a list of good spells to persist if you go this route.

Is there a particular list of allowed/disallowed sources?

[Blackhawk748]

Deepstone Sentinel might offer a couple neat tricks for you at the expense of a few cleric levels. You'd want to dip a level of Warblade to avoid spending three feats to qualify.

I already dropped two levels in Ordained Champ, I don't wanna give up more.


- I would swap Int and Con. You don't need very many skill points for a Cleric, but if you ever want to be on the front lines, extra HP is VERY important.

I don't disagree, but I need all the skills I have, both for PrC qualification and for being able to be a Face.



- You need 3 levels of Cleric since Church Inquisitor requires: "Able to cast zone of truth as a divine spell." - Zone of Truth is a second level spell.

Oh bugger, I only looked at the Will Save thing and I forgot Zone was a 2nd level spell. I'll need to adjust.


- The best way to make a frontline Cleric is Divine Metamagic + Persistent Spell, making several of your short-term buffs last all day is incredible. Highly recommended unless it's banned for making fighters cry. I can make a list of good spells to persist if you go this route.

Is there a particular list of allowed/disallowed sources?

Not doing it simply because I don't want to. Im aware of how good it is, I just realize its kinda busted and forces odd things out of my DM. I'd rather just spam Smites at things like a discount Pally and have a nice Spell list to back it all up.

And First Party stuff is allowed, Dragon Mag is a maybe.

[Gruftzwerg]

There's probably better stuff but these seemed fine to me at the moment, and as should be clear, we're going with a Heavy Armor Hammer Cleric. SO very stereotypical Moradin Cleric.

Err.. Imho clerics of Moradin realize that their god don't want them to pray their way to success. Moradin wants them to swing their hammer all day long > Hammer of Moradin (PRC that requires Cleric casting, but doesn't progress cleric casting at all in any way). Have a look at my signature if you should be interested into a hammer throwing Dwarf, that can "Drink-Like-A-Demon"^^.

[Blackhawk748]

Err.. Imho clerics of Moradin realize that their god don't want them to pray their way to success. Moradin wants them to swing their hammer all day long > Hammer of Moradin (PRC that requires Cleric casting, but doesn't progress cleric casting at all in any way). Have a look at my signature if you should be interested into a hammer throwing Dwarf, that can "Drink-Like-A-Demon"^^.

Pretty sure that Hammer of Moradin is more geared towards Paladins, what with that massive BaB requirement.

In any event, I rather like my spells.

[Gruftzwerg]

Pretty sure that Hammer of Moradin is more geared towards Paladins, what with that massive BaB requirement.

In any event, I rather like my spells.

;) go for it.
It's just a lil Moradin cleric joke I like to do^^

[Darg]

Instead of the spontaneous domains feat, another good feat to take is Domain Spontaneity (Complete Divine). If you expend a turn attempt, you can spontaneously cast any domain spell in the same way your convert spell slots to cast cure or inflict spells.

You would also be able to qualify for Warpriest if you pick up combat casting which would get you another domain and useful.

Contemplative is an option once you hit CL 11. I can definitely see a dwarf contemplating by drinking and smashing heads.

[Maat Mons]

Are the ability scores you listed before or after racial adjustments? Are you using point buy, or did you roll?

Which dwarven subrace were you planning to use? Desert dwarf, dream dwarf, and gold dwarf all avoid a Charisma penalty. That might help with your desire for a large Turn Undead pool. Another way to go would be earth dwarf. You'd keep the Charisma penalty, but you'd gain a Strength bonus.

[Blackhawk748]

Are the ability scores you listed before or after racial adjustments? Are you using point buy, or did you roll?

Which dwarven subrace were you planning to use? Desert dwarf, dream dwarf, and gold dwarf all avoid a Charisma penalty. That might help with your desire for a large Turn Undead pool. Another way to go would be earth dwarf. You'd keep the Charisma penalty, but you'd gain a Strength bonus.

Knew I forgot to list something. It's after, and it's an Array. Race is Dream Dwarf.

The Array is: 18, 16, 14, 13, 12, 10

[Khedrac]

I have to say, those are seriously impressive stats (starting with an 18 in Charisma?) (Assuming the two level up points went wisdom I make it 39 point buy.)

You may want to be the Party face, but dwarves are not cut out for it, and taking Church Inquisitor means your Turn Undead is only really useful for divine feats (so do you really need double extra turning?) As such boosting your charisma that far is very expensive and doesn't actually gain you very much at all.

I would go with a lower charisma and better combat stats.

Also, has your DM approved adapting Ordained Champion to Moradin? As printed it is Hextor/Heironeous only.

[Maat Mons]

Next level, I assume you plan to take the Holy Warrior feat (CC 60). But then at 12th level, you might consider the Awesome Smite feat (CC 55). And if you're aiming for Awesome Smite, you should probably swap out one of your existing feats for Power Attack.

For your future levels, maybe a 4th Cleric level, so you can use the Dwarf Cleric substitution level for +2 damage with warhammers.

Do you care very much for the spells of the Protection domain? If not, you could use the option in Complete Champion to lose the Protection domain to gain Protection Devotion as a bonus feat. Then you could switch over to the Good domain for the second one whose granted power you sacrifice for Fighter feats.

If you sacrifice the Protection domain for an extra feat, you should probably ditch the Spontaneous Domains feat. You'd be down to only having 3 domains at that point, and War shouldn't really count in that consideration anyway. There's little point in using Spontaneous Domains to spontaneously cast a War domain spell from a domain slot when you could instead use Modified Spontaneous Casting from Ordained Champion to spontaneously cast a War domain spell from a general slot.

Does your interest in Improved Smiting stem primarily from the +1d6 damage against Evil targets or from overcoming DR/Good? Also, nitpick, I believe you meant "Improved Smiting (Good)," not "Improved Smiting (Evil)." Unless you really did want to specialize in killing Good-aligned creatures.

If you're going to be using a heavy shield and a weapon, you won't have a hand free for somatic components and such. Usually, I deal with this by starting with a light shield, and then graduating to a mithril shield gauntlet (RoS 158) when I have the money. Making it out of mithril eliminates the penalty for nonproficiency (friggin' exotic shields). But shield gauntlet isn't an option for Shield Specialization, and it doesn't have any clause for counting as any other shield for feats.

[Darg]

I have to say, those are seriously impressive stats (starting with an 18 in Charisma?) (Assuming the two level up points went wisdom I make it 39 point buy.)

You may want to be the Party face, but dwarves are not cut out for it, and taking Church Inquisitor means your Turn Undead is only really useful for divine feats (so do you really need double extra turning?) As such boosting your charisma that far is very expensive and doesn't actually gain you very much at all.

I would go with a lower charisma and better combat stats.

Also, has your DM approved adapting Ordained Champion to Moradin? As printed it is Hextor/Heironeous only.

Some people play with rolled stats so lowering stats isn't possible.

Turn undead gives more smite uses.

I personally don't think 2 missing levels for turning makes it worthless to use.

[Zarvistic]

I know you said you don't like losing spellcaster levels, but I'd still consider it if you mean to hit in melee and casts spells. There's only so many actions you can take each turn.

Since your wisdom is so high, I'll throw in this suggestion: cleric 2/paladin 2/ordained 4. For feats, I'd get knowledge devotion traded from cloistered cleric, updated kami's intuition, serenity and intuitive attack. I'd also drop charisma in favor of con and strength can be as low as 14 or even lower if going without power attack. With fireblood dwarf, you can get dragonscale husk from the paladin, this would stack with something like luminous armor and is has no weight. There should still be plenty of room for feats from here.

[Rebel7284]

I know you said you don't like losing spellcaster levels, but I'd still consider it if you mean to hit in melee and casts spells. There's only so many actions you can take each turn.


Not sure I follow this reasoning. Limited actions = it's okay to make your nuke options (spells) weaker in exchange for a couple of points of damage? That seems unrelated and often false.

But talking about limited actions: If Divine Metamagic[Persistent Spell] is too cheesy for you, Divine Metamagic[Quicken Spell] is notably more fair and certainly helps meld together spellcasting and fighting.

Also, while Ordained Champion is a good class, Ruby Knight Vindicator is a lovely alternative because of the action economy thing. Extra swift actions are really nifty!

[Blackhawk748]

I have to say, those are seriously impressive stats (starting with an 18 in Charisma?) (Assuming the two level up points went wisdom I make it 39 point buy.)

You may want to be the Party face, but dwarves are not cut out for it, and taking Church Inquisitor means your Turn Undead is only really useful for divine feats (so do you really need double extra turning?) As such boosting your charisma that far is very expensive and doesn't actually gain you very much at all.

I would go with a lower charisma and better combat stats.

Also, has your DM approved adapting Ordained Champion to Moradin? As printed it is Hextor/Heironeous only.

Its an array, and I picked Dream Dwarf (should have specified) so the 16 is normal. The 18 went in Wis. My absurd number of Turns is for powering my Champion Smites and Protection Devotion (which takes 3 to use it again)

And yes.


Next level, I assume you plan to take the Holy Warrior feat (CC 60). But then at 12th level, you might consider the Awesome Smite feat (CC 55). And if you're aiming for Awesome Smite, you should probably swap out one of your existing feats for Power Attack.

For your future levels, maybe a 4th Cleric level, so you can use the Dwarf Cleric substitution level for +2 damage with warhammers.

Actually forgot Holy Warrior was a thing. I will be grabbing that, cuz hey, free damage. And Im not sure about Awesome Smite. Like, its neat and all, but that requires me to take Power Attack, which I won't really be using.

As for the +2 to damage, Im not sure if I wanna give up the 2nd level slot. I might though. That'll be a decision I make at the table.


Do you care very much for the spells of the Protection domain? If not, you could use the option in Complete Champion to lose the Protection domain to gain Protection Devotion as a bonus feat. Then you could switch over to the Good domain for the second one whose granted power you sacrifice for Fighter feats.

If you sacrifice the Protection domain for an extra feat, you should probably ditch the Spontaneous Domains feat. You'd be down to only having 3 domains at that point, and War shouldn't really count in that consideration anyway. There's little point in using Spontaneous Domains to spontaneously cast a War domain spell from a domain slot when you could instead use Modified Spontaneous Casting from Ordained Champion to spontaneously cast a War domain spell from a general slot.

Does your interest in Improved Smiting stem primarily from the +1d6 damage against Evil targets or from overcoming DR/Good? Also, nitpick, I believe you meant "Improved Smiting (Good)," not "Improved Smiting (Evil)." Unless you really did want to specialize in killing Good-aligned creatures.

If you're going to be using a heavy shield and a weapon, you won't have a hand free for somatic components and such. Usually, I deal with this by starting with a light shield, and then graduating to a mithril shield gauntlet (RoS 158) when I have the money. Making it out of mithril eliminates the penalty for nonproficiency (friggin' exotic shields). But shield gauntlet isn't an option for Shield Specialization, and it doesn't have any clause for counting as any other shield for feats.

I kinda do. I like Spell Immunity and a few of the other spells on there, but I did consider the trade.

As for Improved SMiting, its both. The Extra Damage is generally useful and getting over an annoying DR is nice.

I get around this problem by having a leather strap on my hammer's handle and just dropping it, so it hangs from my wrist, and then picking it up again.


Not sure I follow this reasoning. Limited actions = it's okay to make your nuke options (spells) weaker in exchange for a couple of points of damage? That seems unrelated and often false.

But talking about limited actions: If Divine Metamagic[Persistent Spell] is too cheesy for you, Divine Metamagic[Quicken Spell] is notably more fair and certainly helps meld together spellcasting and fighting.

Also, while Ordained Champion is a good class, Ruby Knight Vindicator is a lovely alternative because of the action economy thing. Extra swift actions are really nifty!

Its an option I'll consider, but I'm probably not gonna nab any DMM, if I did it'd be Extend.

And yes it is, but it requires me to follow Wee Jaas, and that doesn't fit for this character.