Help with a melee cleric build liv 1-8

[Jacco]

Hi all, i'm about to start a new adventure and i need some tips on my build. These are my stat 17-14-14-14-13-11.

My idea is a cleric who is in the fray by striking with weapons and using when needed spiritual weapon or spiritual guardians. Outside of battle, I'm gonna focus on healing or utility spells (i'm the only caster in the group, warlock excluded).

I'm not sure about race, domain and how to allocate the stats. I can also multiclass but the adventure starts at level 6 and ends at level 8.

Thanks a lot :biggrin:

[RogueJK]

Melee cleric that starts at 6 and ends at 8?

That sounds like an Arcana Cleric Frontliner to me, which is a hard-hitting, tanky melee Cleric who is almost totally WIS-SAD. (See Ludic's Build 4 here for more details: https://forums.giantitp.com/showthread.php?583957-An-Eclectic-Collection-of-Fun-and-Effective-Builds )

Variant Human Arcana Cleric 6
STR 14
DEX 14
CON 14
INT 13+1
WIS 17+1
CHA 11

Take Warcaster as your Level 1 feat, and Magic Initiate Druid (Thorn Whip, Shillelagh, Absorb Elements) as your Level 4 feat.

Then plan for +2 WIS at your Level 8 ASI.

Choose Booming Blade and Green Flame Blade as your two Wizard cantrip picks from Arcana domain. Wear half plate armor and use a shield, for 19 AC. Use a Quarterstaff in your other hand, which lets you use Shillelagh for WIS-based melee, which you can combine with BB/GFB. Warcaster also allows you to make nasty BB opportunity attacks, to punish enemies who try to move past you to get at squishier party members.

At Level 6 with 18 WIS, this combo lets you do 2d8+4 on your Shillelagh Booming Blade/Green Flame Blade hits, plus any applicable riders from BB/GFB. That's more than a Greatsword, and doesn't require investing in STR.

Then at Level 8, Potent Spellcasting lets you add your WISMOD to your cantrips. So with your 20 WIS a Shillelagh BB/GFB will then do 2d8+10.

Plus your Bonus Action is still free for Spiritual Weapon, for a 2nd WIS-based attack each round. At Level 8, that's potentially a total of 3d8+15 melee damage each turn, plus any BB/GFB riders and passive Spirit Guardians damage on top.

You also have Thorn Whip, which you can use to pull enemies that are just outside your Spirit Guardians radius into it, triggering double damage in each round. They'd get one hit of SG damage the first time they get dragged into the radius by Thorn Whip, and a second hit of SG damage when they start their turn in the radius. It's a handy trick to use against enemies that are 20-25' away.



Or, if you're willing to sacrifice some of your combat ability in order to have extra out-of-combat utility, perhaps a Variant Human Nature Cleric:
STR 14
DEX 14
CON 14
INT 13+1
WIS 17+1
CHA 11
Choose Shillelagh as your Druid cantrip from Nature domain.

Take Ritual Caster Wizard as your Level 1 feat, and for your Level 4 feat take Magic Initiate Wizard (picking either Absorb Elements or Shield, along with Booming Blade and a utility cantrip like Mage Hand/Minor Illusion/Mold Earth). Plan for +2 WIS at Level 8.

This still lets you make WIS-based Shillelagh BB attacks, so you'll still be able to deal respectable melee damage with 2d8+4, plus Spiritual Weapon BA hits. While you won't be able to double up on your WISMOD at Level 8, you'll instead get to add +1d6 elemental damage, which is close to the same damage bonus (+3.5 vs. +5). You won't get the nifty Thorn Whip+Spirit Guardians combo or the nasty Warcaster BB OAs though. And your Concentration will be easier to break. (Plus if your DM is a stickler for spell components, you may have to juggle your shield/quarterstaff while casting since you don't have Warcaster.)

However, in exchange for that lessened combat ability, you'll have access to all the Wizard rituals for utility casting. And the Nature Domain spells includes a Druid ritual too: Speak With Animals.

This would be sort of a Cleric-Wizard-Druid, just without having to multiclass.