Battle junkie cleric

[Jweezy]

Starting a 5e and looking for an idea to make a battle junkie cleric that I had in a 3.5 champaign

[nickl_2000]

Starting a 5e and looking for an idea to make a battle junkie cleric that I had in a 3.5 champaign

Is Battle Junkie a particular class in 3.5? In looking at the name, it screams War Domain Cleric to me.

[RogueJK]

Yeah, you're going to have to further define "battle junkie cleric". What specifically are you wanting to achieve?

Flavor-wise, War Domain Cleric is the subclass that's by definition a battle-oriented Cleric. But mechanically, War Domain is nothing special, with rather lackluster abilities. There are several other Cleric domains that are just as good or better at "battle" than a War Cleric, including Twilight, Tempest, Forge, Order, and potentially even Death, Arcana, or Light.

From there, if it doesn't specifically have to be a Cleric, there are also non-Cleric subclass options that would fit a religious warrior well, like Celestial Blade Pact Warlock, Zealot Barbarian, Way of Mercy Monk, most any flavor of Paladin, or even a multiclass combo like Hexblade 1/Divine Soul Sorcerer X, Life Cleric 1/Lore Bard X, or Paladin 2/Swords Bard X.

Or you could turn a character of basically any class and subclass into a "religious warrior who loves to fight" via backstory/roleplaying/etc.

[Unoriginal]

Any Domain can make a fun battle junkie.

You can even be a Life Cleric and a battle junkie. It can be a fun combo, as not only there are many characters with a "fighting is life, life is fighting" philosophy, but being good at healing help with the fighting quite a bit.

[Jweezy]

So my 3.5 character was a mixture of fighter and cleric plus a prestige class that gave more dominion So I started off strong melee then healing and support

[RogueJK]

So my 3.5 character was a mixture of fighter and cleric plus a prestige class that gave more dormant. So I started off strong melee then healing and support

A) If you want to be more of a support caster and healer with a side of melee fighting, go with a Death/Order/Forge/Tempest/Twilight/War Cleric. Any flavor of Cleric can be made to be decent in melee, especially from Levels 1-4, but those are the domains that are specifically geared a little more towards it. Swords Bard or Valor Bard can also make a decent melee/healer/support character, since Bards get access to many of the healing and support spells, and Valor/Swords Bards are the "fighting" Bard subclasses that get better armor/weapons and Extra Attack.

B) If you want to be more of a melee fighter with a side of Cleric-like support casting and healing, go with any Paladin, or a Celestial Blade Pact Warlock with either the Moderately Armored feat or 1 level of Fighter.

C) If you don't care about support casting and healing and just want to be a religious battle junkie, go with Zealot Barbarian, or just any type of martial class (Fighter/Ranger/Rogue/Barbarian/Monk) with a religious backstory.


Unfortunately, in 5E something like a Fighter 5/Cleric X multiclass is quite underwhelming. You basically end up with a Cleric who is slightly better at fighting, but noticeably worse at casting, and it's not as strong as any of the options above. Ranger 5/Cleric X is slightly better, but still underwhelming compared to the above options.

[Snails]

So my 3.5 character was a mixture of fighter and cleric plus a prestige class that gave more dominion So I started off strong melee then healing and support

If you are new to 5e and you are starting at 1st level, I think you cannot go wrong with Tempest domain. It requires no special Build Fu so it is friendly to newbies -- slap on that good armor and pick up a good weapon. Frankly, it is borderline OP in T1 -- fight nigh as well as a Fighter, blasts better than an Evocationist.

Other options could end up better in important ways in the hands of a savvy player, of course. But I am quite certain you will not regret this choice if you want to play a "fighter-cleric".

[Theodoxus]

I agree with Tempest is probably the best for a pure battle junkie cleric. War would be a close second, but you lose out on fun blasts.

One thing to be cognizant of, 5E's "BAB" works completely differently than 3.5. A Cleric and a Fighter with the same level and strength will have the exact same 'To Hit' as each other in 5E. The Fighter will have options the cleric won't, based on what Fighting Style they pick up, but only Archery provides a direct bonus to hit, and who wants to play an archer Cleric when Sacred Flame ignores all but full cover, and Toll the Dead deals better damage (both numerically and type) than arrows?

Pure clerics are pretty freakin' sweet. Definitely my favorite class in the game.

[Unoriginal]

One thing to be cognizant of, 5E's "BAB" works completely differently than 3.5. A Cleric and a Fighter with the same level and strength will have the exact same 'To Hit' as each other in 5E.

While true, the important part is that the Fighter will have more attacks than the Cleric.

Even with the same to-hit mod, attacking twice instead of once starting from lvl 5 makes a huge difference between the Fighter's and the Cleric's weapon-based combat.

[KorvinStarmast]

Starting a 5e and looking for an idea to make a battle junkie cleric that I had in a 3.5 champaign Here's my advice.
a. Make a Tempest Domain cleric. (I played one as a human and had a great time. variant Human, Hill dwarf, Mountain Dwarf ... lots of good choices there).
b. Make sure to select Spiritual Weapon at level 3.
Most Important Thing to do, however, is...
Forget everything you know about D&D 3.5.
Treat 5e as a new game.
It is.

I did not enjoy 5e as much as I do now until I let go of all of my previous edition assumptions.

Have fun. :smallsmile:

[RogueJK]

I agree that a Tempest Cleric is a great introduction into 5E, especially for someone who's wanting a fightery Cleric. Tempest lest you heal, support, blast, and swing a weapon in melee, and do all of it well with minimal compromises.

If going Tempest Cleric, I'd suggest High Half Elf for both the better starting stat spread, plus also the racial Booming Blade cantrip. Booming Blade is thematically on-point for a Tempest Cleric, and more importantly allows you to remain relevant in melee well past the point where a Cleric usually stops bothering to make melee attacks. A Level 8+ Tempest Cleric doing 3d8+4 on a Booming Blade +Divine Strike warhammer hit is about double what a Cleric cantrip would normally be dealing in Tier 2, and still ends up beating out Cleric cantrips in Tiers 3 and 4. (T4 Toll the Dead with Blessed Strikes is 4d12+1d8 or 30.5 average damage, while T4 Booming Blade Warhammer with improved Divine Strike is 6d8+4 or 32 average damage. Plus you can crit on the weapon attack but not on the save cantrip.)

Something like this:
High Half Elf
STR 15+1
DEX 10
CON 15+1
INT 8
WIS 14+2
CHA 8
ASIs: 18 STR at 4, Warcaster at 8, 18 WIS at 12, 20 WIS at 16
Racial Cantrip: Booming Blade

[Hairfish]

In defense of the War domain, I think the really nice thing about them in T1 is that all their 1st and 2nd level domain spells are bonus action casts. Combine that with their (limited) ability to make an extra attack starting from level 1 and you've got a pretty zesty nova when low max hp is a real threat.

[RogueJK]

Combine that with their (limited) ability to make an extra attack starting from level 1

Very limited. On the average War Cleric, that's a mere 3-4 Bonus Action attacks per day.

If I wanted a Cleric with a BA melee attack, I'd literally rather have any other domain (okay, maybe not Trickery...) and just be a Vhuman/CLineage with PAM, or a Longtooth Shifter. Those at least are usable a bunch of times, rather than just 3x-4x/day. :smallbiggrin:


War is considered one of the weakest of the domains for a reason. Every one of their abilities desperately needs a buff, because they're all extremely underwhelming and overly limited in uses. I'd recommend something like this:

War Priest
When you Attack, make a BA attack WISMOD times per day until Level 5, and then no limit to BA attacks per day starting at Level 5. (Quasi-Extra Attack, with a steeper action economy cost because Cleric, and doesn't play as nice with GWM or PAM to prevent them from stepping on the Fighter's/Barbarian's/Paladin's toes.)

Channel Divinity: Guided Strike
BA activation. WISMOD bonus to your attack rolls for 1 minute, and your weapon is treated as magical. (Like Devotion Paladin's Channel Divinity.)

Channel Divinity: War God's Blessing
BA activation. For 1 minute, you can use your reaction to grant WISMOD bonus to the attack rolls of an ally within 30' for their turn. (Now you can choose between buffing your own attacks for a 1 minute or buffing your choice of an ally each round for 1 minute.)

Avatar of Battle
Resistance to bludgeoning, piercing, and slashing damage. Period. (It's 17th level, my guys! Drop the "nonmagical" and apply it to all, just like a 1st Level Raging Barbarian.)

[Kane0]

Most Important Thing to do, however, is...
Forget everything you know about D&D 3.5.
Treat 5e as a new game.
It is.

I did not enjoy 5e as much as I do now until I let go of all of my previous edition assumptions.

Have fun. :smallsmile:

Oh yeah, should probably drop my usual helpful checklist


- Proficiency bonus is used for skill/ability checks, attacks and saving throws instead of BAB, save progressions and skill points. It's all based off Stat + Proficiency, and the numbers are lower and scale slower. HP and abilities/options are the primary differentiation between low and high levels.
- Due to reduced scaling of basic numbers (skills, attacks, damage, AC) it is expected that low CR creatures remain a threat to higher level parties in significant numbers. This is intended.

- You have a saving throw type for each attribute.
- You can't have a stat higher than 20 by normal means, nor a stat higher than 30 by any means.
- Movement is not an action, and actions can happen between movement. Bonus actions are like swifts, reactions are like immediates. No action can be traded for another type. You can also make one interaction (grab a weapon, open a door, etc) per turn for free.
- Attacking does not impede your ability to move (ie ‘Full Attack’) and you can in fact move between attacks if you have multiple.
- Attacks are classified oddly but they mostly boil down to a combination of [melee or ranged] and [weapon or spell]
- You cannot delay your turn, only ready an action.
- By default only one thing provokes an AoO: Moving out of a creatures reach.
- Learn the advantage / disadvantage mechanic, it replaces 90% of fiddly +1s and -2s.
- Dying works differently. You only die outright when you take damage equal to your max HP in one hit after reaching 0. When reduced to 0 you make saving throws, three successes stabilizes you and 3 failures you die. Taking damage while making death saves counts as one failure.
- Damage resistance, reduction and vulnerability is simplified. It's half damage, doesn't exist (as such) and double damage respectively.


- There are two kinds of rest: short and long. There are expected to be two short rests for every long on average, which is important to in balancing short rest classes (monk, warlock) against long rest classes (paladin, sorcerer).
- Everybody can heal via hit die, which are spent during short rests.

- Concentration is a thing casters should learn well. Most buff, debuff and control spells need concentration, and you can only concentrate on one thing at a time. You have a chance to lose concentration each time you take damage.
- There are relatively few permanent or near-permanent bonuses/buffs
- All casting is 'spontaneous', as in you don’t put individual spells into slots, you just have a collection of spells available to you and spell slots to fuel them with. Your spells will either be prepared or known based on class.
- High casting stat doesn’t give you additional spell slots, but does affect your spell attack bonus and spell DC (which is the same across all spell levels).
- Spells scale by spell slot rather than by caster level, which makes multiclassing considerably more friendly for casters
- Cantrips are notable now, offering viable damage output based on PC level not caster level
- There is a rule that restricts how many levelled spells you can cast on your turn, but it’s… complicated.

- Levels 1-3 are supposed to go by very quickly, and 4-5 fairly quickly. The majority of PC time is angled to be spent in the level 6-11 range.
- Encounter design and challenge rating is also different. A CR 6 enemy is an easy (little resource expenditure & low chance of falling) challenge for a level 6 party of 4, not an easy challenge for a single level 6 character. You are expected to deal with half a dozen or so medium encounters during an adventuring day, not one or two hard ones.
- Don't use any optional rules to start with. This includes multiclassing and feats.
- The core math of the game does not expect you to get magic items by default. You can play through levels 1 to 20 without seeing a magic item at all, anything you get/give is a bonus.

Golden Rule: Thou shalt not assume to know that which shares a name
Sneak attack works differently. Protection from Evil works differently. Critical hits work differently. Do not skim over things that look familiar because they are almost all different in subtle ways that become very apparent in play.

[Snails]

In defense of the War domain, I think the really nice thing about them in T1 is that all their 1st and 2nd level domain spells are bonus action casts. Combine that with their (limited) ability to make an extra attack starting from level 1 and you've got a pretty zesty nova when low max hp is a real threat.

That seems to be the design intention of the subclass. In typical scenarios, the Tempest domain is better at this aspect of war than the War domain.

[adb82]

I saw no one mentioning Arcana clerics. Using booming blade and green flame blade it gets very powerful attacks (and opportunity attacks if it get warcaster as feat), it probably deal much more constant melee damage than any other cleric; spell breaker it's nice for action economy and potent spellcasting apply to booming blade and green flame blade as well, also to the rider damage, plus it have all the goodies of a full spellcaster progression. In my opinion they are great as melee clerics.
I'm not so much into war cleric because the cleric already has its bonus action kinda busy normally.

[Mastikator]

So my 3.5 character was a mixture of fighter and cleric plus a prestige class that gave more dominion So I started off strong melee then healing and support

GWM fighter into war cleric. The Guided Strike channel divinity + GWM is pretty darn stronk at low level.
Levels

Variant human (GWM), fighter (GWF, interception, defense are good options)
Fighter (you get action surge)
Cleric (war domain), gets you spells and bonus action extra attack wis mod/long rest
Cleric (gets you channel divinity, guided strike)
Fighter (battle master is just plain good)
Fighter (+2 str or +2 wis, or round up one or both)
Fighter (extra attack)
Rest cleric (you get magic weapon at this level, so a +1 great sword/maul on demand is available, 2/long rest, or other spells)


You'll want to max strength, get at least 14 wisdom, rest constitution.

[Sigreid]

I can't remember if there's a peace domain but my twisted humor likes the idea of a priest bringing peace...by beating the war mongers into unconsciousness.

[CTurbo]

Just to echo what others have said, I'd go for a Tempest Cleric. They're great, easy to play, and fun! Could be my most played subclass in 5e. I've played a melee focused Polearm Master Tempest, a non-GWM melee focused maul wielding Tempest, a Dex based blaster Tempest, and the traditional high Str, high Wis Tempest that did the whole Spiritual Weapon + Spirit Guardians thing while rarely swinging his weapon. Any playstyle will do.


I also agree that War Clerics are very underwhelming in play. War Priest definitely needs to be removed from the Bonus Action, and really War probably should have just gotten a straight extra attack like Swords/Valor Bards, Bladelocks, and Bladesingers. As written, War Priest is extremely weak outside of single level dips for actual melee builds like Fighters, Barbs, and Rangers. I love a 1 level War Cleric dip on GWM builds.

[RogueJK]

As written, War Priest is extremely weak outside of single level dips for actual melee builds like Fighters, Barbs, and Rangers. I love a 1 level War Cleric dip on GWM builds.

What are you getting out of a 1 level War Cleric dip for a GWM build that's worth being a level behind in your Fighter/Barbarian/Ranger class?

There's the BA attack WISMOD times per day, but a non-Cleric is unlikely to have a significant WISMOD (even a Ranger), so you're likely only looking at 1-2 BA attacks per day. Maybe 3x on on the occasional build.

Other than that, you're only gaining a couple cantrips and 1st level spells, since you already have weapon and armor proficiency...

Barbarian can't really benefit from the 2x 1st level Cleric spells per day, other than perhaps occasionally busting out an out-of-combat Detect Magic or Create Food and Drink.

Ranger seems the most synergistic of the three, with the slight boost to their Ranger spell slots as well as the couple additional Cleric spells known, but then you're pretty much better off taking just about any other Cleric domain if you want that, to get better 1st level Cleric subclass abilities than what War offers. Any 1st level ability from Twilight, Peace, Nature, Arcana, Death, Forge, Light, or even Life would appear to offer more to a Ranger than War's ~2x/day BA attacks.

A Fighter with the ability to cast 2x Bless spells per day could be handy, but I'm not sure it's worth being a level behind. It seems like beelining for Extra Extra Attack and higher level subclass abilities would be a better option, and then consider taking Fey Touched for Misty Step and Bless 1x/day apiece along the way (and a +1 to INT/WIS/CHA too).


So I'm just not seeing the attraction of a War Cleric 1 dip on a GWM Fighter/Ranger/Barbarian here.

[MadMusketeer]

What are you getting out of a 1 level War Cleric dip for a GWM build that's worth being a level behind in your Fighter/Barbarian/Ranger class?

There's the BA attack WISMOD times per day, but a non-Cleric is unlikely to have a significant WISMOD (even a Ranger), so you're likely only looking at 1-2 BA attacks per day. Maybe 3x on on the occasional build.

Other than that, you're only gaining a couple cantrips and 1st level spells, since you already have weapon and armor proficiency...

Barbarian can't really benefit from the 2x 1st level Cleric spells per day, other than perhaps occasionally busting out an out-of-combat Detect Magic or Create Food and Drink.

Ranger seems the most synergistic of the three, with the slight boost to their Ranger spell slots as well as the couple additional Cleric spells known, but then you're pretty much better off taking just about any other Cleric domain if you want that, to get better 1st level Cleric subclass abilities than what War offers. Any 1st level ability from Twilight, Peace, Nature, Arcana, Death, Forge, Light, or even Life would appear to offer more to a Ranger than War's ~2x/day BA attacks.

A Fighter with the ability to cast 2x Bless spells per day could be handy, but I'm not sure it's worth being a level behind. It seems like beelining for Extra Extra Attack and higher level subclass abilities would be a better option, and then consider taking Fey Touched for Misty Step and Bless 1x/day apiece along the way (and a +1 to INT/WIS/CHA too).


So I'm just not seeing the attraction of a War Cleric 1 dip on a GWM Fighter/Ranger/Barbarian here.

This. I can't see a scenario in which I'd do this. Either you're building to get a BA attack (and thus you take PAM or CBE) or you're not (and thus you don't). It's not worth a dip instead of one of the feats due to the extremely limited uses, it's not worth it if you're taking the feats because that would be redundant, and if you aren't taking the feats because you don't care then why would you take a War Cleric dip.

[Kane0]

Maybe because feats arent available (either because DM hasnt permitted or its a low level game) or you really want to save that ASI for something else (you rolled crap stats or really want another feat). If you have relatively few fights in a given day then 2-4 bonus action attacks might be all you need.

[Mastikator]

What are you getting out of a 1 level War Cleric dip for a GWM build that's worth being a level behind in your Fighter/Barbarian/Ranger class?

There's the BA attack WISMOD times per day, but a non-Cleric is unlikely to have a significant WISMOD (even a Ranger), so you're likely only looking at 1-2 BA attacks per day. Maybe 3x on on the occasional build.

Other than that, you're only gaining a couple cantrips and 1st level spells, since you already have weapon and armor proficiency...

Barbarian can't really benefit from the 2x 1st level Cleric spells per day, other than perhaps occasionally busting out an out-of-combat Detect Magic or Create Food and Drink.

Ranger seems the most synergistic of the three, with the slight boost to their Ranger spell slots as well as the couple additional Cleric spells known, but then you're pretty much better off taking just about any other Cleric domain if you want that, to get better 1st level Cleric subclass abilities than what War offers. Any 1st level ability from Twilight, Peace, Nature, Arcana, Death, Forge, Light, or even Life would appear to offer more to a Ranger than War's ~2x/day BA attacks.

A Fighter with the ability to cast 2x Bless spells per day could be handy, but I'm not sure it's worth being a level behind. It seems like beelining for Extra Extra Attack and higher level subclass abilities would be a better option, and then consider taking Fey Touched for Misty Step and Bless 1x/day apiece along the way (and a +1 to INT/WIS/CHA too).


So I'm just not seeing the attraction of a War Cleric 1 dip on a GWM Fighter/Ranger/Barbarian here.

The spells can give big utility. Guidance, mending, light, thaumaturgy can all give utility and roleplay benefits that a fighter can't easily replicate outside of a feat (a feat is a bigger expense than 1 level cleric). There's also some bangers on 1st level like bless, shield of faith, healing word, detect magic.
On the 2nd level you get channel divinity, which is super good if you combo it with GWM since the guided strike's +10 bonus to hit 1/short rest can make even low rolls hit when you really need it.

The bonus action extra attack can make up for not beelining to fighter 5, even if it's just twice per long rest, you use it when you really need it. I'm not entirely 100% sure it's definitely optimal, but it's not far from optimal. And OPs concern here is not only about maximizing DPR, it's roleplay and utility too.

[adb82]

The spells can give big utility. Guidance, mending, light, thaumaturgy can all give utility and roleplay benefits that a fighter can't easily replicate outside of a feat (a feat is a bigger expense than 1 level cleric). There's also some bangers on 1st level like bless, shield of faith, healing word, detect magic.
On the 2nd level you get channel divinity, which is super good if you combo it with GWM since the guided strike's +10 bonus to hit 1/short rest can make even low rolls hit when you really need it.

The bonus action extra attack can make up for not beelining to fighter 5, even if it's just twice per long rest, you use it when you really need it. I'm not entirely 100% sure it's definitely optimal, but it's not far from optimal. And OPs concern here is not only about maximizing DPR, it's roleplay and utility too.

In my opinion it's far from be optimized, still playable probably, but not optimized. Your channel divinity isn't one of the best the cleric class offer, you can get more constant advantage with spells or feats, and if you don't have also a good wis (and you probably don't have it) the bonus action attack is just few times a day, so probably it don't work so well like it can appear on a first sight (also because multiclassing other class you can easily get additional attacks not relying on wis). The spells are good stuff, but you get the same spells with any other cleric domain.
Twilight for example is a great domain for fighters: bonus to initiative, boost against charme and frightened condition, superdarkvision, just only those are much better than all the war cleric stuff for a fighter;
probably multiclass cleric works anyway better with an Eldricht Knight and only after lv 8 or 11, but other fighter's subclasses can anyway benefit of a lv dip for the spells and cantrips, delaying extra attack (or extra attack x2) by one lv.
Forge cleric also can be a solid choice for fighters, but if i would build a frontline cleric with a good amount of damage, i would go for sure arcana with no multiclass and i would add warcaster to it. Booming Blade and Green Flame Blade are much better (and deal much more damage) than couple extra attack a day with bonus action, especially with Warcaster, as you add them also to opportunity attacks, plus you don't delay things like spiritual weapon and spirit guardians (or more in general: strong spells) multiclassing. The only cons is the medium armor, but you can solve it by feat if you feel you really need the heavy ones.

[RogueJK]

The spells can give big utility. Guidance, mending, light, thaumaturgy can all give utility and roleplay benefits that a fighter can't easily replicate outside of a feat (a feat is a bigger expense than 1 level cleric). There's also some bangers on 1st level like bless, shield of faith, healing word, detect magic.

But any Cleric gets that. And as I stated in my earlier post, just about any Cleric would be a better option than War if you really wanted to dip into Cleric, and they would still get access to all of those spells you listed off, plus a better subclass ability than ~2 BA attack per day.

If utility casting is what you're after, then some Cleric subclasses get even better non-Cleric utility spells, like Knowledge or Forge with ritual Identify, or Trickery with Disguise Self, or Nature with an additional Druid utility cantrip and ritual Speak With Animals, or Arcana for two additional Wizard utility cantrips.


On the 2nd level you get channel divinity, which is super good if you combo it with GWM since the guided strike's +10 bonus to hit 1/short rest can make even low rolls hit when you really need it.

Now you're talking about giving up two levels of your primary class, in exchange for +10 on one single attack per short rest. That's about two attacks per day. (Yes, it's on one lone attack, not for one turn, or one round.)

There are better and more frequently usable options for offsetting the GWM attack penalty. Hell, you're better off using that Channel Divinity to Harness Divine Power and regain a 1st level spell slot for another casting of Bless that day. Bless at least applies to all of your attacks for 1 minute AND applies to saving throws too AND applies to two allies as well. That doesn't require being a War Cleric, and even the War Cleric is better off using their Channel Divinity for Harness Divine Power here.

By comparison, a 1st level Peace Cleric could stack Emboldening Bond and Bless for +1d4 to all of their attack rolls AND an additional +1d4 to one attack roll per turn. +2d4/+1d4 to all attacks for a whole minute usable 2x-3x per day, is leagues beyond +10 to one single attack usable 2x per day, and it only requires one Cleric level, not two.


So I still don't see what there is to love about a War Cleric 1 dip on a GWM Fighter/Ranger/Barbarian like CTurbo originally advocated. And I especially don't see the allure of a War Cleric 2 dip like you're describing.

If you really want to dip Cleric 1 for some utility and buff spells, you're better off going with just about any other Cleric subclass with better 1st level abilities and/or additional utility spells. If you want to dip Cleric 2 for Channel Divinity to offset the GWM attack penalty, you're better off going with just about any other Cleric subclass and just using Harness Divine Power to gain another Bless casting.

[Snails]

Maybe because feats arent available (either because DM hasnt permitted or its a low level game) or you really want to save that ASI for something else (you rolled crap stats or really want another feat). If you have relatively few fights in a given day then 2-4 bonus action attacks might be all you need.

As a practical matter, Tempest's Wrath of the Storm works out better, at least in T1/T2. Sure, you have to be hit first. But you do not urgently care much about enemies that are failing to hit you, since your defenses are good enough that you are not easily overwhelmed. But the best part your Wraths are autohits and do respectable damage to low tier enemies.

As for the War Cleric, I would consider playing one if I was in a party with a Fighter going Sentinel. To be able to choose moments 3-4 times a day where my stacked up comrade can turn a miss into a hit, and get the soft lock against a dangerous enemy for a round, that looks interesting.

But I am not going to build that stack as a cleric or battle cleric or whatever. Generally speaking, the War domain looks a bit undercooked, and these stacks work better on other domains even better than War.

[Mastikator]

But any Cleric gets that. And as I stated in my earlier post, just about any Cleric would be a better option than War if you really wanted to dip into Cleric, and they would still get access to all of those spells you listed off, plus a better subclass ability than ~2 BA attack per day.

If utility casting is what you're after, then some Cleric subclasses get even better non-Cleric utility spells, like Knowledge or Forge with ritual Identify, or Trickery with Disguise Self, or Nature with an additional Druid utility cantrip and ritual Speak With Animals, or Arcana for two additional Wizard utility cantrips.



Now you're talking about giving up two levels of your primary class, in exchange for +10 on one single attack per short rest. That's about two attacks per day. (Yes, it's on one lone attack, not for one turn, or one round.)

There are better and more frequently usable options for offsetting the GWM attack penalty. Hell, you're better off using that Channel Divinity to Harness Divine Power and regain a 1st level spell slot for another casting of Bless that day. Bless at least applies to all of your attacks for 1 minute AND applies to saving throws too AND applies to two allies as well. That doesn't require being a War Cleric, and even the War Cleric is better off using their Channel Divinity for Harness Divine Power here.

By comparison, a 1st level Peace Cleric could stack Emboldening Bond and Bless for +1d4 to all of their attack rolls AND an additional +1d4 to one attack roll per turn. +2d4/+1d4 to all attacks for a whole minute usable 2x-3x per day, is leagues beyond +10 to one single attack usable 2x per day, and it only requires one Cleric level, not two.


So I still don't see what there is to love about a War Cleric 1 dip on a GWM Fighter/Ranger/Barbarian like CTurbo originally advocated. And I especially don't see the allure of a War Cleric 2 dip like you're describing.

If you really want to dip Cleric 1 for some utility and buff spells, you're better off going with just about any other Cleric subclass with better 1st level abilities and/or additional utility spells. If you want to dip Cleric 2 for Channel Divinity to offset the GWM attack penalty, you're better off going with just about any other Cleric subclass and just using Harness Divine Power to gain another Bless casting.

Peace domain is contrary to the ideology of OP's character though. You can't just ignore the roleplay aspect.

[CTurbo]

I see a 1 level War Cleric dip on a GWM or Sharpshooter martial class as useful as a mid-late game dip. Not really something I'd do early on before extra attack. A single level of Cleric in general adds a lot to any of those classes for obvious reasons on it's on and none of those builds want to dump Wis and are often looking to grab Res(Wis) anyway. War may not be the best domain, but it does work best when that extra bonus action attack hits extra hard. Sometimes you just REALLY need an extra chance to land that big hit and War Cleric does that. My groups tend to roll for stats so I can see this likely being a bit better for than most people as I'm pretty sure both times I've done this I had a 16 Wis which is unreasonable to expect for most players. I'm not sure I would do this on a 14 Wis or less character for melee. For a Sharpshooting sniper? Probably. Bless is extra awesome when you're sniping at range.

I'll admit there are probably better Cleric domains to use instead. Tasha's and Xanthar's weren't even out yet last time I did this, but War still works for this idea.

[Hurrashane]

I played a fighter battle master 5/ war cleric 4 for a few sessions in a game once. It was a lot of fun. He was no slouch on the battlefield and he had options. Between war priest, commander's strike, quick toss, and spells he had no shortage of bonus action uses. And being able to open up round one with a spell then action surge to go in swinging was amazing.