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UMDPenguin
2007-12-05, 12:03 PM
Some of you may remember a post i made last week about using RSoP and the spontaneous domain casting to get all healing spells maximized and empowered. Well my DM likes the idea of a strong healer cleric, not one that is also doing as well al the fighters in melee, so he's approved it.

Now i am looking for some help making the character since this is my first cleric. We are starting at lvl 1 and will go all the way to 20 so i'm looking for a full build progression. I want to focus on healing and buffing (already have a wizard, rogue, fighter and melee druid), and want 10 lvls of RSOP. Core, PHB2, and the complete series are allowed.

Mainly i'm looking at help with feats and PrCs past the RSOP. As far as feats i've already been looking at augmented healing, touch of healing, and sacred healing. Also the DM isn't a big fan of DMM, particularly persistant, but since i'm healing/buffing focused i doubt thats a big issue (you can't persist buffs on others can you? just personal range or fixed areas?)

Oh, its also a Very high powered campaign... 39 point buy =)

Any help or suggestions are greatly appreciated.

Toliudar
2007-12-05, 12:19 PM
If you're heading for RSOP, take a good look at the Cloistered cleric option. Not only does it give you more skill points, but the lore ability and knowledge domain will give you more stuff to contribute out of combat.

The cloistered cleric's low BAB and armour (initially, see below) will further encourage you to take a support role. Since RSOP requires extra turning anyway, you might explore investing in either Divine Metamagic - quicken (not quite as cheesy as Persistent, but great when you really REALLY need to heal/buff/dispel) or Divine Spell Power as feats, and keeping a high charisma.

The Zen Archery feat, taken at level 3, will assist you in contributing some modest damage output from the rear of the group without exacerbating your need to keep wisdom and charisma high.

As a bonus, for some reason I can't fathom, RSOP gives full armour and martial weapon proficiencies, so once you get there, you'll have more options for armour and weapon use anyway. I recommend going with a reach weapon, to keep the baddies at bay while you're buffing and healing.

Yeril
2007-12-05, 12:31 PM
Mobility is also somthing you want to keep high, avoid bulky armor slowing you down, because you might only have the 1 round to get that CSW on your buddy at the back.

Hario
2007-12-05, 12:32 PM
Cloistered cleric is fairly balanced another possible build is going with an archivist from heroes of horror, yes they don't get turn undead but if you take one level of sacred excorsist you can get turn undead and then take extra turning. This will next you a bit more in power, in the versatility of spells. You can also pick up spontaneous healer from Complete Divine.

Archivist are like a divine wizard they have all their spells from a prayer book, and get 2 free spells every level just like the wizard. They get abilities called dark knowlege in which the archivist uses a knowlege check versus a DC 15 and can give his allies bonuses versus the monster, much like a bard but gives an insight bonus. They get low BAB and 6+int skills (Int based rather than wis based) Overall as long as you don't cheese it out like get lesser restoration from the paladin spell list, you should be fine, the archivist is fairly balanced if you don't cheese by getting every obscure spell in the game including more domains than the cleric has.

I have a current Archivist which is a Archivist 5/ Divine Oracle 2 (evasion w/ armor ftw!)/ Loremaster 1 but Archivists also fit the flavor to be archivists 5/ Sacred Excorsist 1/ RSoP1.

Edit. Also There is a feat that allows you to apply touch spells at range, I think its called ranged spell, and I'm pretty much sure its in complete divine its only +2 Spell level adjustment. and makes your spell into a ray of 30 feet, very nice to have, though some people cheese it out by using Otto's iristible dance.

Keld Denar
2007-12-05, 01:23 PM
Archivists also fit the flavor to be archivists 5/ Sacred Excorsist 1/ RSoP1.


This is not a possible build. Sacred Exorcists DO get turn undead...they DO NOT get domains though. One of the prereqs for RSoP is the Sun Domain. Therefore, you can't build that way. You need either a level of cleric in there somewhere (redundant) or a couple levels of Contemplative.

As far as advice for the OP. I would suggest something like this.

STR 9
DEX 10
CON 14
INT 10
WIS 18
CHA 16
Human
Domains Sun/Healing
1 Cleric 1 Augemented Healing, Extra Turning
2 Cleric 2
3 Cleric 3 Domain Spontinaity (Healing)
4 Cleric 4
5 Cleric 5
6 Cleric 6 Extend Spell
7 RSoP 1
8 RSoP 2
9 RSoP 3 Divine Ward
10 RSoP 4
11 RSoP 5 Purification Domain
12 RSoP 6 Divine Spell Power
13 RSoP 7
14 RSoP 8
15 RSoP 9 Quicken Spell
16 RSoP 10
17 Sacred Exorcist 1 (Favored Enemy: Evil Outsiders)
18 Sacred Exorcist 2 Chain Spell
19 Sacred Exorcist 3
20 Sacred Exorcist 4

This build grants you CL20, TL20, the ability to turn outsiders, oodles of Greater Turnings, the ability to heal warded creatures at close range, Recitation as a 3rd level spell (Quickened as a 7th level spell) and a ton of other useful stuff.

Pick up an Orange IWIN stone, a Phylactery of Undead Turning, a +6 Wis and +6 Cha item, a Vest of Resistance +5, a Necklace of Prayer Beads (Karma). For extra oompf, if you can convince one of the other players to put a couple ranks in Perform: Stringed Instrument, you can grab a cheapo Lyre of Restful Souls from Libris Mortis: The Book of Bad Latin. This will knock down the effective HD of undead faced by 4, making them even more succeptible to your greater turnings.

By level 20, you'll have CL29 or so for your buffs, making them immune to Dispel and Greater Dispel. You'll regularly turn 28 HD undead, more if you invest in sacred shield/armor upgrades. You'll be a healing machine, since your Mass Cure Light Wounds will be hitting (1d8 +15 +10) x1.5 +8 or average 52 to all party members and dealing 52 damage to all nearby undead. Your higher level heals will do even more.

You can even drop a couple nukes if you want, because your Sunburst spell hits as a 9th level spell, is Widened, and will probably cap out at 25d6 vs undead and anything vulnerable to bright light (drow/orcs/fungi), including the capability to utterly destroy vampires/dreadwraiths/greatershadows/etc with a very high DC reflex save.

Your buff suite would probably look like:
Chained Greater Magic Weapon +5 All Day
Magic Vestiment cast on everyone (twice if they have an animated shield) All Day
Freedom of Movement on everyone who doesn't have a ring All Day
Deathward on anyone with a low fort save
Extended Battlemagic Perception to have counterspells on hand
Extended Hero's Feast All Day
Extended Mass Conviction
Extended Mass Shield of Faith

1st round of combat drop Quickened Recitation + Rightous Wrath of the Faithful. If everyone worships Pelor, they get a +5 hit, +2 damage, +3 saves, +3 AC, extra attack (like haste, doesn't stack). Eat your heart out bards.
2nd round take a nap/heal/continue buffing as situation requires
3rd round nothing should be alive anymore.

At low levels, don't understimate the power of Sanctuary. It'll effectively give you Invisibility, and allow you to dance around the battlefield skipping and healing. Open with Bless. Keep a Silence or 3 memorized to deal with casters. Prayer should eventually replace Bless. Hold Person can and will end low level fights with BBEG fighter types. Keep Delay Death prepared AT ALL TIMES!!!!

Suppliment with metamagic rods and plenty of Pearls of Power, and you'll be golden.

(I personally don't think levels 6-10 of RSoP worth taking, I'd take 5 more levels of Sacred Exorcist, but that's me)

(Also, I think there is a build that lets you use Church Inquisitor to get into RSoP at level 5, instead of 7. If you can meet the prereqs for CI, you can do it, because CI gives +2 will saves at 1st level, and Cleric3 already has a +3 will save, for a total of +5, which is what the RSoP prereq is.)

UMDPenguin
2007-12-05, 01:42 PM
That is a pretty amazing build lussmanj. I like it a lot. I'll look into the church inquisitor and more levels of sacred exorcist.

I did have 2 quick questions though. i plan on using the spontaneous domain alternative class feature from PHB2 to get the spontaneous healing domain for the RSoP healing abilities, so i don't need that feat at level 3. any other suggestions?

Also, where should i put my lvling ability points? obviously at least 1 in wisdom. But past that should i do more wis for bonus spells and DC, or CHA for more turning?

valadil
2007-12-05, 02:29 PM
Also, where should i put my lvling ability points? obviously at least 1 in wisdom. But past that should i do more wis for bonus spells and DC, or CHA for more turning?

I'd go with Wisdom, but you'll probably have to run with the character and see how it plays out. I've planned something similar (though my GMs weren't as supportive of domain spontaneity for maxed empowered healing domain winning) but never got to play it. I think you'll have to see if you have extra turning attempts or if you run through them quickly. This will probably depend on if you only burn them for casting off the healing domain or if they often go into divine metamagic too. If your GM allows night sticks, you pretty much just win.

Keld Denar
2007-12-05, 04:01 PM
That is a pretty amazing build lussmanj.
Thank you!



I did have 2 quick questions though. i plan on using the spontaneous domain alternative class feature from PHB2 to get the spontaneous healing domain for the RSoP healing abilities, so i don't need that feat at level 3. any other suggestions?

Um...I'd suggest Craft Wonderous, if you want to get into that. That'll cut the cost of 90% of the goods you want to be purchasing. Its a good thing.

If you don't want to go with that, something like Reach Spell (CD) combined with Chain Spell would allow you to use pretty high level spells to pass out mass buffage. Thats a SL+5 adjustment though(meaning Reached Chained Magic Vestiments is a 9th level spell!), and is a little controversial as to whether it ACTUALLY works. You don't need Reach Spell for healing, since you have Divine Ward.

If all else fails, you can't go wrong with Improved Initiative. Going first means buffing first, before everyone goes charging off in their own directions. Or ANOTHER Extra Turning, so you can use DSP and DW more often. You can take that feat multiple times.



Also, where should i put my lvling ability points? obviously at least 1 in wisdom. But past that should i do more wis for bonus spells and DC, or CHA for more turning?

The short answer is pump wisdom.

The long answer is that Cha kind of caps out when you can make DC 11 turn checks on a roll of 1. This will always give you a base of your caster level when using Divine Spell Power. So, a 16 base, +6 item nets a 22 cha, or a +6 modifier. 5 ranks in Know:Religion adds 2 more, for a +8. The Divine Spell Power +3 bonus brings this to +11. Sacred Exorcist's persistant Conceration Aura nets another +3 I think, so that lands you at +14, or a 15 minimum check on a d20 roll. That automatically nets you +2 caster level when using Divine Spell Power. A roll of 7 or higher caps you out at +4 CL when you cast. Each use of this ability burns a single turn attempt.

The Church Inquisiter thing SHOULD work, but I'm AFB right now, and don't know the prerequs for CI other than you have to find out a source of corruption within your church, and you have to be LG (while RSoP requires NG, so you'd have to have a "change of heart" after discovering said corruption and training by your church).

It does land you the Inquisition Domain, which nets you a +4 unnamed bonus on level checks for dispel magic, but on the downside, loses a turning level. The turning level can be recovered 10fold by liberal application of magic items. I can think of 4 items off the top of my head that increase turning level by 13 when combined.

EDIT: To make a long post longer, the reason I only advocate taking the first 5 levels of RSoP is that at 6th level, you get Maximize Healing. Maximize is actually WEAKER than Empower for healing, since a goodly amount of the healing comes from the +CL and the +2/SL from Augmented Healing. As I have debated with others in other threads about, since this is fixed healing added onto a variable component, it IS multiplied by Empower. Maximize's very small dice advantage over Empower is dramatically undershadowed by this bonus fixed healing. You don't regain Empowered back until RSoP10, where you get Supreme Healing. By that point though, the extra bump in healing is pretty minor. Also, the RSoP abilities after level 5 are all pretty meh (the positive energy burst is a total let down...just cast Sunburst!)

Sacred Exorcist, on the other hand, gets full casting, full turning, and a HOST of other fun abilities, including a few SLAs that are pretty much like bonus spell slots. Holy Smite does ok damage to outsiders, but is really a shaped Glitterdust that convienently only blinds evil things, but not good aligned allies who might be in the blast radius. Holy Word is pretty situational, especially if you have neutrally aligned party members. Holy Aura is AMAZING! with a capital OMG. SR 34 is pretty tough to crack, even for a mid-high level caster. The other benefits are gravy on top of that. Sure, you can hard cast Holy Aura yourself, but another casting per day of it can't hurt!

If you don't mind losing more turning levels (not an undead heavy campaign) consider levels of Contemplative. This nets you MORE domains (you can never have TOO many domains. I know a guy with a cleric who has 5). Glory is a good domain under Pelor, as is Good. If your campaign uses a non-Pelor specific Radiant Servant, see if you can net the Travel Domain from Contemplative. That gives you the best domain ability, and access to some nifty spells that will help you move around a battlefield while healing.

UMDPenguin
2007-12-05, 05:10 PM
i definitely agree that empower is better than maximize for heals, which is kind of a shame.

The problem with church inquisitor is that RSoP still requires knowledge religion rank 9, which afaik there isn't a way around. i'm not too worried about that. my main thing there is deciding if i want to convince the DM to let me be a cloistered cleric for some more skill points for less armor til lvl 7.

I definitely have some questions about the sacred exorcist though. I'm looking at the complete divine and it doesn't say anything about turning outsiders, holy word or holy smite. were you thinking of something else or is there a different version of sacred exorcist.

Thanks for all the help. Its gonna be a great campaign.

Keld Denar
2007-12-06, 07:18 AM
i definitely agree that empower is better than maximize for heals, which is kind of a shame.

The problem with church inquisitor is that RSoP still requires knowledge religion rank 9, which afaik there isn't a way around. i'm not too worried about that. my main thing there is deciding if i want to convince the DM to let me be a cloistered cleric for some more skill points for less armor til lvl 7.

Eh, I knew there was another reason it wouldn't work. Otherwise everyone would have done it by now. Oh well, cleric6/RSoPX is still pretty powerful.



I definitely have some questions about the sacred exorcist though. I'm looking at the complete divine and it doesn't say anything about turning outsiders, holy word or holy smite. were you thinking of something else or is there a different version of sacred exorcist.

Thanks for all the help. Its gonna be a great campaign.

Sacred Exorcists get to choose a favored enemy from a short list of undead and evil outsiders. I thought there was something in there about using turning attempts to otherwise negatively impact outsiders.

As to their spell-likes, I probably just misremembered. Again, AFB. They do get Dispel Evil and Holy Aura though, right? I know they get a couple spell-likes that have the [Good] discripter.

In short, Sacred Exorcist is the better way (IMO) to go than RSoP after RSoP5 if you don't want to lose turning levels. Contemplative is the better way to go after RSoP if you don't mind losing turning levels. Nothing precludes you from taking some of both though.

TheOOB
2007-12-06, 09:33 PM
The trick to being a good healing cleric is to heal as little as possible. You normally get far more effectiveness out of a few protective spells then you get out of an equivalent amount of healing spells. Healing is important, no matter what you do your party will take damage, and without healing you are playing a dangerous game, but it is far more effecient to prevent the damage before it is done. Compare a first level shield of faith to a first level cure light wounds, the cure spell heals an average of 5.5 hp, which means shield of faith will only have to block one or two attacks to be better then the cure spell, in addition shield of faith can be cast before battle, allowing your actions in battle to be spent attacking enemies, making them die quicker and dealing less damage, further improving shield of faiths utility.

Remember the old adage, an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.

martyboy74
2007-12-06, 09:57 PM
If you can drop one of those levels, you could pick up a level of Hierophant and get Divine Reach. The class does advance CL, so you could actually take it again and get the reach increased to 60'. That'll be useful for both buffing and healing, as well as the aforementioned chain spell fun.

Jack_Simth
2007-12-06, 10:48 PM
Divine Metacheese(Persistant Spell) (Mass Lesser Vigor)!

Give everyone fast healing 1 - no more out of combat healing resources.

UMDPenguin
2007-12-07, 02:52 AM
it increases CL but you don't get a spell level from hierophant, so personally i'll pass.

as for persisted lessor vigor, thats illegal. persisted spells must have a target of personal or fixed

Jack_Simth
2007-12-07, 07:17 AM
it increases CL but you don't get a spell level from hierophant, so personally i'll pass.

as for persisted lessor vigor, thats illegal. persisted spells must have a target of personal or fixed
Range of Personal or Fixed, actually; Hence the Mass version of the spell - flat range of 20 feet. Vigorous Circle when you can (11th).

littlechicory
2007-12-07, 03:09 PM
One of my friends swears by the Radiant Servant of Pelor PrC in Complete Divine for her healbots.

Keld Denar
2007-12-07, 03:29 PM
One of my friends swears by the Radiant Servant of Pelor PrC in Complete Divine for her healbots.

Really, RSoP only has 3 class abilities that make it a better healer than a non-RSoP. Of those, the 2nd is arguably weaker than the 1st, seeing how it completely replaces it and tends to lower damagehealed/cast. Of all those 3 abilities, all of them only function a limited number of times per day, and restrict your domain spell usage to fully utilize them. There is debate whether or not use of domain spontinaity (feat or alt class feature) allows for broader usage of this ability.

For most heals, you will get about as good of a result from the usage of the Augemented Healing feat, than you will from the RSoP's abilities. Nothing says you can't combine them though.

RSoPs real strength is IMO the greater turnings, and the bonus domain.

Immunity to disease is nice, but seldom comes up. The +2 will save aura is so limited in radius, that its almost more of a hinderence to keep it up. Empowered Healing/Maximized Healing/Supreme Healing are great, but only useable a maximum of 8 times a day, at 17th level, less at lower levels, and as I mentioned, forces you to give up your other domain spells to use it.

RSoP is a great class, but it isn't neccesary to make a very effective healer.

UMDPenguin
2007-12-13, 10:57 AM
Once again thanks for all the help. I'll be going with Cloistered Cleric 6/ RSoP 5/Sacred Exorcist 9

I think i'll take Imbued Healing over Augmented healing because with the healing domain that scales with character level instead of spell level, a cure light wounds (or any heal for that matter) would give 20 temp hp at lvl 20, 30 with RSop abilities, as opposed to the 2*spell lvl. not only more healing but the ability to give temp hp above thier max. i still try and fit augmented if i can.


I did want to get some suggestions for skills though. I'll have 7 points per lvl for my first 6, then it will plummet to 3. Obviously i need diplomacy (looking like i'll be the only character in the group with a Cha in the double digits), as well as knowledge religion and planes. Only need 5 points in heal, a few other 5 pointers for synergies like know. nobility and history(for the lore), at least 1 point in other knowledges (and collector of stories skill trick). My main question is how much does a cleric normally use concentration and spellcraft(we do have a wizard for spellcraft), knowing that i will mainly be buffing and healing, trying to avoid melee. I never thought i'd be stretched thin on skill points with 7 per lvl, but i'm trying to cover as many bases with those as possible until i get dropped down to 3.

thank you very much for any help.

Keld Denar
2007-12-13, 11:26 AM
Concentration is still important. Even if you aren't rushing into combat, combat often comes rushing into you. 5' stepping and casting isn't always an option. Also, as a battlefield medic, you often need to get into touch range to deliver most spells (can be avoided somewhat with the Divine Ward feat and the Mass Cure XXX Wounds spell). The Sanctuary spell can help at low levels, but unless you have Heighten Spell, the DC isn't gonna save you at higher levels. You won't be able to nab the Trickery Domain for Invisibility, so unless you get invis cast on you by a friendly arcanist, you will be a target, mixing it up with all the rest, even if you arn't attacking or offensively casting. Consider your friendly fighter type adjacent to a huge cloud giant, in desprate need of healing, and you can't make your concentration check to cast defensively to heal him while in the giants threatened area.

Spellcraft is also important for a cleric. Because prevention is often the best form of healing, if no one needs buffing/healing, you should be readying your action to counterspell using Dispel Magic. In order to counterspell, you have to be able to ID spells. IDing spells involves a spellcraft check. See where I'm going here? The spell Battle Magic Perception (2nd, SC) is your friend here, but you still need the ranks to ID anything thats about to rain down on your party.

So, yes, you do need those skills, probably more than just about any others. You might not have to max them, but you should get them high enough that you can automake the ID and cast defensive checks on a roll of nat1 for up to 9th level spells.

Telonius
2007-12-13, 11:36 AM
This probably doesn't match very well with the character concept, but I'll throw it out there anyway. I've found that three somewhat counter-intuitive Healing feats are Legendary Artisan, Exceptional Artisan, and Extraordinary Artisan. Use them together with Craft Wand, and make wands of Lesser Vigor to heal out of combat more efficiently. Except for the emergency "man down!" heals, you are most often going to use heal spells out of combat. Crafting wands to do this for you does require time, XP, and gold; but it allows you to focus your daily spell allotment on combat or buff spells.

Spellcraft: not really very much. Concentration: you bet. Concentration checks to Cast Defensively are very important.

A bit of a critique of the previous build ... Domain Spontaneity (Healing) is not a particularly good choice. It allows a Cleric to spontaneously turn a normal spell into a domain spell at the cost of a turn attempt. The thing is, the Healing domain is filled, unsurprisingly, with Cure spells (and a couple of other high-level things like regeneration). The Cleric can already spontaneously change any spell into a cure spell for free, so this feat is almost completely redundant. (EDIT Unless it's a prereq ... I'll look into that. EDIT2: Ahh, that does make sense then.)

UMDPenguin
2007-12-13, 11:40 AM
normally you are correct Telonius, but the reasoning behind it is the RSoP's healing abilities, which will auto empower/maximize/or both any domain healing spell. also i'm using the PHBII variant that lets me do it for free instead of using a feat and costing turn attempts