I think WAR is one of the weakest Cleric domains.

[CTurbo]

My biggest gripe is with War Priest. It's just not very good IMO and is my biggest complaint about the subclass.

War Priest
From 1st level, your god delivers bolts of inspiration to you while you are engaged in battle. When you use the Attack action, you can make one weapon attack as a bonus action.

You can use this feature a number of times equal to your Wisdom modifier (a minimum of once). You regain all expended uses when you finish a long rest.


First of all I don't understand why the War domain couldn't just get a full extra attack like the Valor/Swords Bard, Bladesinger, and Bladelock. Would it really break anything? I like the idea of 1 Cleric domain being much more Fightery than the others. Anyway, here are a few proposals on how to make War Priest better.


1. This is the houserule that my groups actual use and it works better without being too OP. When you take the Attack action on your turn, you can make one additional weapon attack as part of that action. You can use this feature a number of times equal to your Wisdom modifier (a minimum of once). You regain all expended uses when you finish a long rest.

Removing it from the Bonus Action makes it much stronger and no longer has to compete with Spiritual Weapon which is a Cleric staple.

2. War Priest regains all expended uses on a short rest instead of long rest. This is probably the next best thing to just giving it a full extra attack.

3. At level 8+, allow Divine Strike to also work with the Bonus Action attack. This would make that limited extra attack hit much harder.

4. Swap War Priest and Guided Strike. War Priest is used with your CD now and Guided Strike can be used Wisdom mod times per day. Just mimicking the Devotion and Vengeance Paladin's 1 minute CD. War Priest: For 1 minute, you can use your Bonus Action to make a melee weapon attack. This way you could cast a big spell, and still crack off an attack, or get 2 attacks that round if you want. This could easily be swapped out with: For 1 minute, you gain the extra attack feature. When you use the Attack Action on your turn, you can make 1 extra melee weapon attack as a part of that action. Guided Strike as written is probably too powerful to be used Wis mod times per day so it could be downsized to +5 to hit instead of +10 or maybe Guided Strike just turns into Advantage, or maybe it becomes a re-roll on a miss Wis mod times per day.

What do yall think?

[LudicSavant]

First of all I don't understand why the War domain couldn't just get a full extra attack like the Valor/Swords Bard, Bladesinger, and Bladelock. Would it really break anything? I don't see any particular reason it would be significantly more troublesome for a Cleric subclass than a Bard, Warlock, or Wizard one.

[RogueJK]

My compromise solution is having War Priest become freely usable whenever they take the Attack Action, starting at Level 6. This still isn't full-blown Extra Attack, since it still requires your Bonus Action so you'd sometimes have to choose between a BA racial ability/spell and your second attack. It's more like a better TWF (higher damage, wider weapon selection, still use a shield, no need to have two magic weapons, no need for a fighting style, etc.), while also cutting out the possibility of stuff like stacking with PAM or GWM's BA attack.

This allows them to be more like the "fightery Cleric subclass", and makes your Cleric's weapon attacks continue to be worthwhile past Tier 1, while at the same time not giving them straight-up Extra Attack on top of all their other abilities and therefore not stepping on the toes of the true martials. I think this simple change turns War into a domain that's actually worth taking. (Though in light of Valor/Swords/Bladesinger, I don't see it as being completely overpowered if a DM wanted to simply allow them to gain Extra Attack at Level 6ish.)

[DruidAlanon]

war domain is weak but not unplayable. If in your table you have heavily optimised builds, your suggestions seem ok on paper.

[Kish]

What is it good for?

[diplomancer]

My compromise solution is having War Priest become freely usable whenever they take the Attack Action, starting at Level 6. This still isn't full-blown Extra Attack, since it still requires your Bonus Action so you'd sometimes have to choose between a BA racial ability/spell and your second attack. It's more like a better TWF (higher damage, wider weapon selection, still use a shield, no need to have two magic weapons, no need for a fighting style, etc.), while also cutting out the possibility of stuff like stacking with PAM or GWM's BA attack.

This allows them to be more like the "fightery Cleric subclass", and makes your Cleric's weapon attacks continue to be worthwhile past Tier 1, while at the same time not giving them straight-up Extra Attack on top of all their other abilities and therefore not stepping on the toes of the true martials. I think this simple change turns War into a domain that's actually worth taking. (Though in light of Valor/Swords/Bladesinger, I don't see it as being completely overpowered if a DM wanted to simply allow them to gain Extra Attack at Level 6ish.)

I would definitely try out this solution before straight up giving Extra Attack for free. Bladesinger is something of an outlier (specially with its souped up Extra Attack), so War Priest wouldn't necessarily be better than they, but I think they'd be ahead of the Bards.

[Atranen]

How do they activate their CD, for 4? It would make a big difference if it costs an action vs not.

[Dork_Forge]

It's worth keeping in mind, regarding extra attack, thst because of the 8th level ability the War Cleric's attack routine would scale ahead of actual martials.

Combine that with Divine Favor and i can see why EA isn't used.

Personally I like it how it is, it provides variety in the martial caster subclasses, but if you were set on improving it id go with the SR recharge.

[CTurbo]

How do they activate their CD, for 4? It would make a big difference if it costs an action vs not.

This is a good question that I hadn't thought of. The Devotion has to spend an Action to activate Sacred Weapon, but the Vengeance only has to use a Bonus Action to activate Vow of Enmity. Interestingly enough, the first CD option allows for a Bonus Action attack so you'd still be able to activate it and attack once in the same turn.

Speaking from a little experience regarding option number 1 as we've been using it for a while now, it seems to be a pretty decent boost and overall we've been happy wit it. I just wonder of it couldn't be made better still without breaking anything. It's definitely made the War domain more popular while not being overwhelmingly so. Previously nobody would touch it.

[diplomancer]

Speaking from a little experience regarding option number 1 as we've been using it for a while now, it seems to be a pretty decent boost and overall we've been happy wit it. I just wonder of it couldn't be made better still without breaking anything. It's definitely made the War domain more popular while not being overwhelmingly so. Previously nobody would touch it.

Bolded part is good indication that it's a decent balance point for your table.

[Amnestic]

Changing the 6th level feature into a passive letting you use Wis instead of Str/Dex for your weapon attacks and letting you War Priest an unlimited amount of times is probably enough to fix all the problems with it honestly. Can even keep the name the same, just shave the Channel Divinity part off the start.

Something like:

War God's Blessing

At 6th level you are no longer limited in uses for the bonus action attack granted by War Priest. In addition, whenever you make a weapon attack you can use your Wisdom modifier, instead of Strength or Dexterity, for the attack and damage rolls.



The opportunity cost of using your bonus action helps balance out Divine Strike giving a weapon attack boost over martials at 8th level. You may want to also strip the attack action requirement from War Priest, just so you can cast spell+BA attack. It's fine for the BA attack to 'conflict' with Spiritual Weapon, since this opens up spell slots for other stuff.

It being a BA attack also lets it still work with a martial multiclass that does get extra attack, if you want to be extra war.

[Mongobear]

Ive started using a homebrew version, almost strictly pulled from Solasta: Crown of the Magister

Their War domain (renamed Battle) get's Extra Attack, and their Channel Divinity is changed to sort of a mini-Smite that can Stun things. It is quite functional and not OP whatsoever in the context of the game.

For reference: https://solastacrownofthemagister.wiki.fextralife.com/Battle+Domain

[5eNeedsDarksun]

My biggest gripe is with War Priest. It's just not very good IMO and is my biggest complaint about the subclass.

War Priest
From 1st level, your god delivers bolts of inspiration to you while you are engaged in battle. When you use the Attack action, you can make one weapon attack as a bonus action.

You can use this feature a number of times equal to your Wisdom modifier (a minimum of once). You regain all expended uses when you finish a long rest.


First of all I don't understand why the War domain couldn't just get a full extra attack like the Valor/Swords Bard, Bladesinger, and Bladelock. Would it really break anything? I like the idea of 1 Cleric domain being much more Fightery than the others. Anyway, here are a few proposals on how to make War Priest better.


1. This is the houserule that my groups actual use and it works better without being too OP. When you take the Attack action on your turn, you can make one additional weapon attack as part of that action. You can use this feature a number of times equal to your Wisdom modifier (a minimum of once). You regain all expended uses when you finish a long rest.

Removing it from the Bonus Action makes it much stronger and no longer has to compete with Spiritual Weapon which is a Cleric staple.

2. War Priest regains all expended uses on a short rest instead of long rest. This is probably the next best thing to just giving it a full extra attack.

3. At level 8+, allow Divine Strike to also work with the Bonus Action attack. This would make that limited extra attack hit much harder.

4. Swap War Priest and Guided Strike. War Priest is used with your CD now and Guided Strike can be used Wisdom mod times per day. Just mimicking the Devotion and Vengeance Paladin's 1 minute CD. War Priest: For 1 minute, you can use your Bonus Action to make a melee weapon attack. This way you could cast a big spell, and still crack off an attack, or get 2 attacks that round if you want. This could easily be swapped out with: For 1 minute, you gain the extra attack feature. When you use the Attack Action on your turn, you can make 1 extra melee weapon attack as a part of that action. Guided Strike as written is probably too powerful to be used Wis mod times per day so it could be downsized to +5 to hit instead of +10 or maybe Guided Strike just turns into Advantage, or maybe it becomes a re-roll on a miss Wis mod times per day.

What do yall think?

I'd agree that War Domain is weak, though War Priest is only part of the issue. First the other bits:

Heavy armor + weapon using Clerics, to my mind is not an upgrade. You're investing in Str at a 15, and probably a 16 to even be viable, compared to Med Armor users, who can stick with a 14 and be more SAD + maybe get Con to a 16. Dex based is better for saves and initiative. Then, if you really want to be half way decent at fighting with weapons you've got to invest at least 1 feat to support it, on top of the MADness of needing Wis + Str. Meanwhile your Med Armor + Cantrip Cleric just pumps Wis.

Channel Divinity: This is fair to good if you have a Rogue in the group; otherwise it's lackluster as using a reaction + CD for a generic hit isn't much bang for the buck. Compare this to Death Cleric who can just paste damage onto what they're already doing (100% scuccess) without a reaction; that'd be 17 points of damage/ CD at 6th, 25 at 10th, and so on.

Spells are OK in that there are some decent ones in there, but a lot of them are already on the Cleric list already. Again, mediocre.

So, War Priest: Yes, it's crap, and I think your first 'fix' addresses a chunk of the problem. If you're going to lean into a weapon using Cleric you need to figure out a regular BA, which likely means something like PAM, as a few extra attacks/ LR isn't going to cut it. Then War Priest is pretty much redundant. I think if someone wanted to play one of these at my table I'd put in your first 2 fixes and see how it went. Make the extra attack part of the Attack Action and have it recharge on a SR (maybe this 2nd bit at 6th level).

[LudicSavant]

War domain is situational, but it at least has a couple of things going for it that lend it potential.

- A strong tier 1 game. That bonus action is pretty meaningful early on.
- The CD is good value if you're running with teammates who have a lot riding on an individual swing (like Rogues or War Casters or the like).
- It's just about the only way (other than being a Paladin) to access Crusader's Mantle (https://www.reddit.com/r/dndnext/comments/6cd9pb/crusaders_mantle_is_brutal/), which is strong in the right parties (those with very high numbers of attacks and minions).
- Solid domain list overall. Lots of things on there that you would have wanted to prepare anyways (like Spiritual Weapon and Spirit Guardians).
- Avatar of Battle is a good 17th feature, as nonmagical BPS damage is common even then.

[stoutstien]

War domain is situational, but it at least has a couple of things going for it that lend it potential.

- A strong tier 1 game. That bonus action is pretty meaningful early on.
- The CD is good value if you're running with teammates who have a lot riding on an individual swing (like Rogues or War Casters or the like).
- It's just about the only way (other than being a Paladin) to access Crusader's Mantle (https://www.reddit.com/r/dndnext/comments/6cd9pb/crusaders_mantle_is_brutal/), which is strong in the right parties (those with very high numbers of attacks and minions).
- Solid domain list overall. Lots of things on there that you would have wanted to prepare anyways (like Spiritual Weapon and Spirit Guardians).
- Avatar of Battle is a good 17th feature, as nonmagical BPS damage is common even then.

Yea. Power wise it ok it's just kinda all over the place.

[JackPhoenix]

3. At level 8+, allow Divine Strike to also work with the Bonus Action attack. This would make that limited extra attack hit much harder.

Divine Strike does not care about the sort of action you use to make the weapon attack, only that it is a weapon attack. Attack, bonus attack, GFB/BB, reaction attack if you can get one on your turn... doesn't matter.

What I'd do is to change War Priest to have the cleric use Wis for weapon attacks instead of getting BA... that's what TWF or Spiritual Weapon are for. Wouldn't surprise me if that's what WotC will do in D&Done, given the Wild Shape precedent.

[Zuras]

The War domain is quite respectable in the right campaign. Any time you’re actually fighting in a war the CD is pretty awesome. Especially in naval engagements where you’re firing a really big gun or ballista and don’t want to miss.

[sambojin]

It depends on the party.

Got a Rogue? Nearly auto stab, 1-2 times per short rest.

Got a GWM/SS martial? Meh, it's a nearly auto +10 damage 2/sr by lvl6.

Got a Pally? Auto-smite, even if they would have missed. It's not a crit-smite, but having it nearly always reliable 2/sr is nice.

Got a Druid? That restrain-on-hit or other attack rider for their wildshape forms makes even non-Moon druids pretty amazing as a lockdown class.

The other features (+Wis BAttacks/ lr and H.armour) aren't that great, but +10 to-hit is amazing, if your party can use it well. It's not as good as it should be, but it does turn a lot of things into "so close to automatic that the roll is a joke", which is dangerous in a bounded accuracy game with attack riders for some characters. That opening round of any combat encounter is pretty important, making it be silly-reliable is great.

[LudicSavant]

The +10 reaction CD is a fixed bonus applied after seeing the roll, meaning you can use it only in situation where it's guaranteed to transform a miss into a hit.

This means that you're essentially spending a Reaction for guaranteed damage equal to (insert the attack that missed). It's mathematically better than if you got to spend the Reaction to do a copy of the attack yourself (because said attack could miss). And Reaction sneak attacks are good.

It's a solid CD, albeit a very (perhaps overly) party composition dependent one (you need allies that are actually making big swings like SA or Potent BB or whatever).

Considerably less awesome is the fact that it takes up two class features instead of one for a CD, but c'est la vie.

[CTurbo]

Regarding heavy armor access. I like that heavy armor is offered for some Clerics, but I think they went overboard offering it to way too many domains. Heavy armor access should have been limited.

Right now we have 14 different domains according to wikidot and 7 of them get heavy armor. Looking through the unreleased UA domains, most of those had heavy armor as well.

I'd have limited it to War, Life, Forge, and Tempest. Honestly I'm biased towards Tempest because it's my favorite, but I could see possibly even limiting it to medium armor.

I just think War should be the defacto choice for users looking to make a "melee" or frontline Cleric. That playstyle seems to be popular from what I've seen and experienced, but even in that situation, War is usually not considered.

It's also always irked me that not only does the Forge Cleric get the same resistance to bludgeoning, piercing, and slashing damage from nonmagical attacks at level 17, but it also get straight immunity to fire damage too, which is way better by itself. For that, I think War should get something extra at 17 or maybe just upgrade the resistance to bludgeoning, piercing, and slashing damage to include magical attacks too?

[LudicSavant]

I just think War should be the defacto choice for users looking to make a "melee" or frontline Cleric. That playstyle seems to be popular from what I've seen and experienced, but even in that situation, War is usually not considered.

War Cleric's features aren't especially well suited for the melee cleric playstyle (compared to some other subclasses, anyway), with the notable exception of low levels (and even at low levels, all of their features work just fine with ranged attacks. Even Blessed Strikes works on ranged attacks).

A different way to play a War Cleric is to snipe people while handing out Reaction CDs and staying in a safe position so that Crusader's Mantle stays up on the army swarm.

[Hurrashane]

I played a multiclass Battlemaster/war cleric and let me tell you being able to get three attacks in at like, level 7 (BM 5/WC 2) was pretty sweet. Especially when I can apply BM maneuvers to all the attacks.

[RogueJK]

I played a multiclass Battlemaster/war cleric and let me tell you being able to get three attacks in at like, level 7 (BM 5/WC 2) was pretty sweet. Especially when I can apply BM maneuvers to all the attacks.

Whereas an Echo Knight 5/War Cleric 1 could get 4x full power weapon attacks in at Level 6.
Attack+Extra Attack+Unleash Incarnation+BA War Priest (if their Echo is already manifested)

Or 7x attacks if they Action Surge.
Attack+Extra Attack+Unleash Incarnation+Attack+Extra Attack+Unleash Incarnation+BA War Priest

Although they're limited to doing that CONMOD/WISMOD times per day, and rightfully so. I recently played a PAM Echo Knight/Ancestral Guardian to level 8 (Fighter 5/Barb 3), and the DM was frequently exacerbated when the conditions were right - Action Surge and Unleash Incarnation available, Echo already manifested and in position, and already Raging - and I was able to go off on a big baddie with 7x attacks in a turn, often with Advantage on all of them due to good teamwork. A more impressive nova than even a Smiting Paladin in Tiers 1 and 2.

[arnin77]

I’ve always wanted to make a VHuman GWM War Cleric pushing for 18 Str, Con and Wis… running bless or shield of faith and using the CD on missed GWM attacks but I end up going with something else.

[CTurbo]

I do like a 1 or 2 level War Cleric dip on any hard hitting GWM/SS build that can also afford a 16+ Wis which usually isn't hard because we always roll for stats. Both War Priest and Guided Strike come in handy on those builds. It helps that the base Cleric in general offers quite a bit of good bit of useful things on any of those builds(Guidance, Bless, Healing Word) to name a few.

[Bosh]

I do like a 1 or 2 level War Cleric dip on any hard hitting GWM/SS build that can also afford a 16+ Wis which usually isn't hard because we always roll for stats. Both War Priest and Guided Strike come in handy on those builds. It helps that the base Cleric in general offers quite a bit of good bit of useful things on any of those builds(Guidance, Bless, Healing Word) to name a few.

War cleric dip with Shadow Monk is fun for a GMW build. Works well as a dark knight/horror movie slasher.

[Dork_Forge]

War cleric dip with Shadow Monk is fun for a GMW build. Works well as a dark knight/horror movie slasher.

A Str-based Monk/Cleric build that ignores MA? Doesn't this just work with really high stats?

[5eNeedsDarksun]

It depends on the party.

Got a Rogue? Nearly auto stab, 1-2 times per short rest.

Got a GWM/SS martial? Meh, it's a nearly auto +10 damage 2/sr by lvl6.

Got a Pally? Auto-smite, even if they would have missed. It's not a crit-smite, but having it nearly always reliable 2/sr is nice.

Got a Druid? That restrain-on-hit or other attack rider for their wildshape forms makes even non-Moon druids pretty amazing as a lockdown class.

The other features (+Wis BAttacks/ lr and H.armour) aren't that great, but +10 to-hit is amazing, if your party can use it well. It's not as good as it should be, but it does turn a lot of things into "so close to automatic that the roll is a joke", which is dangerous in a bounded accuracy game with attack riders for some characters. That opening round of any combat encounter is pretty important, making it be silly-reliable is great.

Interesting how perceptions are with some of these abilities. I've often seen Death Cleric's Touch of Death (2nd level CD) panned when it's more damage than if every Paly spell slot was used for (non crit) Divine Smite. It scales at 4 points / 2 levels and has no impact on the action economy and 100% success rate, while War Cleric's War God's Blessing (6th level CD) if applied to a Rogue's SA (which is a fairly optimal situation for regular play) scales at 3.5 points / 2 levels, uses a reaction, and has less than 100% success rate. Even under optimal conditions War God's Blessing is worse in almost every way.

[JackPhoenix]

Interesting how perceptions are with some of these abilities. I've often seen Death Cleric's Touch of Death (2nd level CD) panned when it's more damage than if every Paly spell slot was used for (non crit) Divine Smite. It scales at 4 points / 2 levels and has no impact on the action economy and 100% success rate, while War Cleric's War God's Blessing (6th level CD) if applied to a Rogue's SA (which is a fairly optimal situation for regular play) scales at 3.5 points / 2 levels, uses a reaction, and has less than 100% success rate. Even under optimal conditions War God's Blessing is worse in almost every way.

Except you have to include all other modifiers to damage for War God's Blessing. In the case of the rogue, that's not just the Sneak Attack, but also weapon damage itself, ability bonus, and any bonuses from magic weapon or other abilities. It turns no damage (because miss) into whatever damage you get on a hit. Touch of Death is great when it works, but doesn't give you a hit when you need it... and plenty of enemies are resistant or immune to necrotic. While the success rate is less than 100%, you generally have a good idea if it'll be enough when you see the roll... obviously, you won't use it on nat 1, but the monster AC doesn't get beyond 25.

[5eNeedsDarksun]

Except you have to include all other modifiers to damage for War God's Blessing. In the case of the rogue, that's not just the Sneak Attack, but also weapon damage itself, ability bonus, and any bonuses from magic weapon or other abilities. It turns no damage (because miss) into whatever damage you get on a hit. Touch of Death is great when it works, but doesn't give you a hit when you need it... and plenty of enemies are resistant or immune to necrotic. While the success rate is less than 100%, you generally have a good idea if it'll be enough when you see the roll... obviously, you won't use it on nat 1, but the monster AC doesn't get beyond 25.

Agreed on the needing a hit with ToD. On the Damage, ToD starts with 5 points vs. those other things you mentioned then scales slightly better, so by mid levels it's pretty much a saw-off. I'm not saying the War Cleric's ability is bad, as I like ToD; just that in the best case you're probably roughly even. Without a heavy hitter in the party the War Cleric's CD really isn't that good by comparison.

[LudicSavant]

I've often seen Death Cleric's Touch of Death (2nd level CD) panned when it's more damage than if every Paly spell slot was used for (non crit) Divine Smite.

Yep! I made a post laying out exactly that comparison a while back! :smallsmile:


Can we talk about Death Cleric for a second?

Their Channel Divinity has no action economy requirements over stuff Clerics just do normally. It has all of the properties that make Divine Smite good (can't be wasted, no extra action economy, can activate on multiple hits, etc) and is a more abundant resource that does more damage.

Yes, you heard that last part right. In a standard 2 short rest day, the Death Cleric's Channel Divinity contributes significantly more damage than if a Paladin converts every single spell slot they have to Divine Smites (unless all of those smites are critting).

Since the features work in such a similar manner, they're easy to compare. Like so:

Comparison of Touch of Death vs Divine Smite
Level 2:
27 damage (Death Cleric over a 2-short-rest day) vs 18 damage (Paladin using all of their slots on non-crit smites)

Level 6:
102 damage (Channel Divinity over a 2-short-rest day) vs 63 damage (Paladin using all of their slots on non-crit smites)

Level 20:
405 damage (Channel Divinity over a 2-short-rest day) vs 243 damage (Paladin using all of their slots on non-crit smites)
__________________________________________________ __

That's just the Channel Divinity, no other resources. They aren't even spending any extra action economy for this. They just paste that damage right onto their daily output, with no chance of being wasted on a miss or anything. Poof. Hundreds of extra damage per day.

So yeah. Death Cleric is good.

So how does this all compare to the War Cleric CD? Well...

- Both CDs are resolved post-roll, meaning you can nigh guarantee that both aren't ever 'wasted'. If you're spending the CD slot, you're getting the damage. How many opportunities they have to trigger may differ (War Domain requires someone to miss first, Death requires the Cleric to hit an attack first), but you aren't wasting resources unless they trigger.

- War Cleric's CD takes more action economy than the Death CD for the ally-assisting version, and it won't help you pile on the nova if the party's already hitting everything (instead contributing more to damage consistency), and it takes 2 class features instead of 1 (L2 and L6). Death Cleric's CD requires the Cleric to actually be making attack rolls (though these attack rolls can totally be things like Spiritual Weapon).

- In order for War Domain's CD to be worth more damage than Death Cleric's, the attack it's turning from a miss into a hit needs to deal damage worth more than 5+twice cleric level.

So for example, if we're level 8, the attack that you're making into a hit would need to have an average damage roll (not average DPR, average damage roll) of 21+. So for instance, a Sharpshooter War Cleric with Blessed Strikes might do 1d10+13+1d8 (23) damage with their own attack. A Blessed Strikes Booming Blade cleric at the same level would do about 3d8+3 (16.5) + rider (potentially another 9). A Booming Blade Arcane Trickster at that level would be getting something like 4d6+2d8+4 (27) + rider (potentially another 9).

If we're at level 16, the comparison gets harder, since the damage to beat is now 37, which is a lot for an individual attack. But that BB Arcane Trickster is still holding up okay, dealing something like 8d6+3d8+5 (46.5) + rider. Maybe more, especially if magic weapons and such are coming into play. But an awful lot of other things are falling short of 37 damage per landed attack, including the Sharpshooters and such. One might have "paladins" leap to mind, but Paladins aren't blowing their smites when they miss, so it's not quite fair to say that the War Cleric CD is saving all that smite damage (it's just making said damage more immediate).

So yeah, War Domain's CD has at least some potential in the right party composition. But it's definitely party comp dependent, especially at higher levels.

[5eNeedsDarksun]

Yep! I made a post laying out exactly that comparison a while back! :smallsmile:



So yeah. Death Cleric is good.

So how does this all compare to the War Cleric CD? Well...

- Both CDs are resolved post-roll, meaning you can nigh guarantee that both aren't ever 'wasted'. If you're spending the CD slot, you're getting the damage. How many opportunities they have to trigger may differ (War Domain requires someone to miss first, Death requires the Cleric to hit an attack first), but you aren't wasting resources unless they trigger.

- War Cleric's CD takes more action economy than the Death CD for the ally-assisting version, and it won't help you pile on the nova if the party's already hitting everything (instead contributing more to damage consistency), and it takes 2 class features instead of 1 (L2 and L6). Death Cleric's CD requires the Cleric to actually be making attack rolls (though these attack rolls can totally be things like Spiritual Weapon).

- In order for War Domain's CD to be worth more damage than Death Cleric's, the attack it's turning from a miss into a hit needs to deal damage worth more than 5+twice cleric level.

So for example, if we're level 8, the attack that you're making into a hit would need to have an average damage roll (not average DPR, average damage roll) of 21+. So for instance, a Sharpshooter War Cleric with Blessed Strikes might do 1d10+13+1d8 (23) damage with their own attack. A Blessed Strikes Booming Blade cleric at the same level would do about 3d8+3 (16.5) + rider (potentially another 9). A Booming Blade Arcane Trickster at that level would be getting something like 4d6+2d8+4 (27) + rider (potentially another 9).

If we're at level 16, the comparison gets harder, since the damage to beat is now 37, which is a lot for an individual attack. But that BB Arcane Trickster is still holding up okay, dealing something like 8d6+3d8+5 (46.5) + rider. Maybe more, especially if magic weapons and such are coming into play. But an awful lot of other things are falling short of 37 damage per landed attack, including the Sharpshooters and such. One might have "paladins" leap to mind, but Paladins aren't blowing their smites when they miss, so it's not quite fair to say that the War Cleric CD is saving all that smite damage (it's just making said damage more immediate).

So yeah, War Domain's CD has at least some potential in the right party composition. But it's definitely party comp dependent, especially at higher levels.

It was your post about Death Cleric and ToD that got me playing one in a recent campaign, so thanks for that. That's why it's front of mind for me as a comparison.
The AT definitely stacks up well with scaling of both cantrip and SA, so yeah I can see where War Cleric starts to look pretty good in the right circumstance.

[Witty Username]

The big problem that I have heard for death cleric is that most of its abilities are necrotic damage, which is a liability within certain adventurers and against certain monsters. Outside of that, as far as I am aware it does pretty well.

[Yakk]

My stab at it.

War Priest
From 1st level, your god delivers bolts of inspiration to you while you are engaged in battle. Once on your turn you can make one melee weapon attack as a bonus action when you take the Attack action or when you cast a Cleric Spell.

You can use this feature a number of times equal to your Wisdom modifier (a minimum of once). You regain all expended uses when you finish a long rest.

Starting at 6th level, you can use this feature without expending a bonus action, but still only once per turn.

[CTurbo]

My stab at it.

War Priest
From 1st level, your god delivers bolts of inspiration to you while you are engaged in battle. Once on your turn you can make one melee weapon attack as a bonus action when you take the Attack action or when you cast a Cleric Spell.

You can use this feature a number of times equal to your Wisdom modifier (a minimum of once). You regain all expended uses when you finish a long rest.

Starting at 6th level, you can use this feature without expending a bonus action, but still only once per turn.

I seriously considered the idea of War Priest being an attack with the Bonus Action no matter how you spent your Action. It's definitely a power boost over the official.

[5eNeedsDarksun]

The big problem that I have heard for death cleric is that most of its abilities are necrotic damage, which is a liability within certain adventurers and against certain monsters. Outside of that, as far as I am aware it does pretty well.

That's fair to a point, though you ignore resistance at 6th and beyond, so it's only immunity that's an issue. I did have to go with Plan B with mine a few times, but I can't say it was more often than most of the other casters I've seen.

[Bosh]

A Str-based Monk/Cleric build that ignores MA? Doesn't this just work with really high stats?

I've swung it with standard array. Here's your starting stats before racial mods:

15 Strength
14: Wisdom
13: Dex
12: Con
10: Int or Cha
8: Int or Cha

I like (v)Human for this since you want GWM and Eldritch Adept for darkness shenanigans. It's not the most CharOp character in the world but it's perfectly functional.

[Psyren]

War Cleric should definitely have Extra Attack. As long as they get it later than the martials do that's fine. For the One Cleric, that would make it either the 6th or 10th level feature, preferably the former.

If just giving them Extra Attack is seen as unbalanced, they could gate it behind some kind of "battle trance" mode that's activated via your Channel Divinity and lasts 1 minute.

[LudicSavant]

The big problem that I have heard for death cleric is that most of its abilities are necrotic damage, which is a liability within certain adventurers and against certain monsters. Outside of that, as far as I am aware it does pretty well.

Death Cleric bypasses Necrotic Resistance, and immunity is relatively uncommon (and the things that are immune tend to be vulnerable to Clerics in other ways)

[Dork_Forge]

War Cleric should definitely have Extra Attack. As long as they get it later than the martials do that's fine. For the One Cleric, that would make it either the 6th or 10th level feature, preferably the former.

If just giving them Extra Attack is seen as unbalanced, they could gate it behind some kind of "battle trance" mode that's activated via your Channel Divinity and lasts 1 minute.

I mostly think it's boring, martial subclass = Extra Attack leads to a lot of samesy design when it could be more interesting.

But on the balance side of things, the War Cleric is a bit of a stand-out for not getting Extra Attack because of Divine Strikes and access to stuff like Divine Favor on top of normal weapon optimisation. Melee Clerics get Divine Strikes because they're not supposed to get Extra Attack and if you've gone 5 in another class and 8 into Cleric, then you're probably not contending for high damage anyway.

[Zuras]

The idea that Touch of Death is always superior to Guided Strike/War God’s Blessing is just white room nonsense. For ToD to even come into play, the Death Cleric needs to be attacking, rather than casting spells not using attack rolls. WGB can trigger the first turn of combat, even if you spend your turn casting Bless or Spirit Guardians.

Assuming you weren’t surprised, it can also be used to generate damage far ahead of your actual place in the initiative order, and regardless of your positioning. The only case where ToD is clearly superior is in a party where the other players never have significant riders on their attacks, and a player never misses an attack that would KO an enemy right before the enemy’s turn in initiative order.

In my experience, what makes the war domain feel so disappointing is how badly it falls off at higher levels. The extra BA attack is gold in Tier 1, and turning a miss into a hit is far more significant when that attack is the only thing you’re doing that turn. Additionally, both the good attack roll spells on the cleric list (Guiding Bolt and Inflict Wounds) are very strong at 2nd level, and Guided Strike basically guarantees that you won’t waste them unless you roll a 1.

There are no higher level equivalent attack roll spells, though, and the up-cast scaling isn’t great, so your effectiveness tapers off.

[stoutstien]

The idea that Touch of Death is always superior to Guided Strike/War God’s Blessing is just white room nonsense. For ToD to even come into play, the Death Cleric needs to be attacking, rather than casting spells not using attack rolls. WGB can trigger the first turn of combat, even if you spend your turn casting Bless or Spirit Guardians.

Assuming you weren’t surprised, it can also be used to generate damage far ahead of your actual place in the initiative order, and regardless of your positioning. The only case where ToD is clearly superior is in a party where the other players never have significant riders on their attacks, and a player never misses an attack that would KO an enemy right before the enemy’s turn in initiative order.

In my experience, what makes the war domain feel so disappointing is how badly it falls off at higher levels. The extra BA attack is gold in Tier 1, and turning a miss into a hit is far more significant when that attack is the only thing you’re doing that turn. Additionally, both the good attack roll spells on the cleric list (Guiding Bolt and Inflict Wounds) are very strong at 2nd level, and Guided Strike basically guarantees that you won’t waste them unless you roll a 1.

There are no higher level equivalent attack roll spells, though, and the up-cast scaling isn’t great, so your effectiveness tapers off.

Well to be fair you are comparing one subclass feature versus two.

[Mongobear]

I mostly think it's boring, martial subclass = Extra Attack leads to a lot of samesy design when it could be more interesting.

But on the balance side of things, the War Cleric is a bit of a stand-out for not getting Extra Attack because of Divine Strikes and access to stuff like Divine Favor on top of normal weapon optimisation. Melee Clerics get Divine Strikes because they're not supposed to get Extra Attack and if you've gone 5 in another class and 8 into Cleric, then you're probably not contending for high damage anyway.

I have quite literally house rules the War domains level 8 is Extra Attack instead of bonus dice, and it worked perfectly fine. It shows up a bit later than other Martial Casters like Bladesinger and the various Bards, but the player was happy, and they were still a Cleric with full spell progression up until then. (I think I also gave them a Fighting Style at 1st level too.)

[Dork_Forge]

I have quite literally house rules the War domains level 8 is Extra Attack instead of bonus dice, and it worked perfectly fine. It shows up a bit later than other Martial Casters like Bladesinger and the various Bards, but the player was happy, and they were still a Cleric with full spell progression up until then. (I think I also gave them a Fighting Style at 1st level too.)

I don't personally like how late it comes online, and have already said I prefer more varied features, but yeah replacing the 8th level feature addresses the balance concern pretty well.

[CTurbo]

I like the flavor of a melee focused Cleric. There are a lot of Cleric subclasses and I wish one of them really stood out as the obvious choice for such playing style, but sadly there really isn't. It seems like one titled "War" would fit the bill, but it just doesn't.

I think War should be THE only domain that gets both heavy armor and martial weapons. (side not I'd consider allowing every domain to get prof with the Warhammer.... maybe) My thinking is that if every subclass were limited to simple weapons + Warhammer, War would stand out as the only option for a user who wants a 2 handed weapon. It's also possible that allowing them all access to the Warhammer would take away from the allure of having martial weapons in the first place. I mentioned earlier how I think heavy armor should be way more exclusive too. This would also help War stand out a bit more.

Then we have the War's domain spells. First of all I hate when the domains' spell list is full of Cleric spells and 5 out of 10 of them are already on the Cleric's list for War, and even though that is about on par with other domains, some definitely have it a lot better than(Forge, Arcana, Light, Trickery to name a few) The 5 spells War gets from other classes aren't bad per say, but aren't great specifically for the War Cleric. Last but not least, another thing NOT in the favor of this spell list is that most of them require concentration and several of them end up being completely wasted at higher levels.

1. Divine Favor: Not terrible, but would be better if War had 2 reliable attacks. Completes with other concentration spells and becomes obsolete once you get Crusader's Mantle.
2. Magic Weapon: Could be useful at low levels, but competes with other concentration spells, and becomes obsolete once you get your hands on an actual magic weapon.
3. Crusader's Mantle: Other than the fact it competes with other concentration spells, this one I actually like.
4. Stoneskin: another spell that really isn't that bad, but of course it competes with other concentration spells and becomes obsolete once you hit level 17.
5. Hold Monster: This one is great except for, you guessed it, it completes with your many many other concentration spell options.

It's a little ironic that Shield of Faith and Spirit Guardians in included as you're likely using those less than normal unless you're largely ignoring your extra domain spells. I get it though. The War domain is not the only subclass in the game that suffers from too many concentration options, and now that I'm looking at it, most of the spells that I'd probably replace on this require concentration too lol. At the very least, War should have gotten a few of the Paladin Smite spells.(I really always hated how all of them require concentration too lol) Several of them are really fitting for what I think War should do.

I'd also be fine with giving War a Fighting Style from a more limited list. At least GWF, Dueling, Defense, and Protection to choose from, but if you wanted to throw in Blind Fighting, Archery, and TFW, I'd be ok with that too.

[Theodoxus]

I'm pretty much with you, CTurbo. If I could rebuild the 5E Cleric domains, I'd probably have War get both Heavy and Martial; Life and Tempest get Heavy, Death and Grave get Martial, and the less blaster-y domains could choose either Heavy or Martial; but ones like Knowledge, Light, Peace, and Twilight would be stuck with Medium and Simple.

I'd be ok with granting Tempest proficiency in warhammer... but otherwise, if you want to wield a warhammer, do like I do and play a Hill Dwarf :smallbiggrin:

Now, saying that, I do like what D&DOne is proposing, splitting up Cleric proficiencies off of Domains and as a choice unto itself. I am ALL in favor of more choices that are independent of any other. If War is one of the theoretical '4' to be first upgraded, I'm curious to see if they'll grant Extra Attack at some point. Seems like a no-brainer upgrade given the plethora of EA casters that came out after the PHB.

[Psyren]

I mostly think it's boring, martial subclass = Extra Attack leads to a lot of samesy design when it could be more interesting.

I see it as the opposite, having that common thread for the martials and martial-equivalents makes designing interesting goodies for them that much easier. For example, something like the new Shield Master or the new Grappler get added utility when combined with Extra Attack, making it easy for them to put those in the "for martial builds" column.



But on the balance side of things, the War Cleric is a bit of a stand-out for not getting Extra Attack because of Divine Strikes and access to stuff like Divine Favor on top of normal weapon optimisation. Melee Clerics get Divine Strikes because they're not supposed to get Extra Attack and if you've gone 5 in another class and 8 into Cleric, then you're probably not contending for high damage anyway.

Blessed Strikes is, at best, a minor consolation for the divine list having weaker attack spells/cantrips and for clerics having weaker martial capability. I don't see it as a replacement or obviation of War Clerics' gish capabilities specifically.

[LudicSavant]

I like the flavor of a melee focused Cleric. There are a lot of Cleric subclasses and I wish one of them really stood out as the obvious choice for such playing style, but sadly there really isn't. It seems like one titled "War" would fit the bill, but it just doesn't. There are melee cleric subclasses, War just isn't really it past low level.


I think War should be THE only domain that gets both heavy armor and martial weapons.
These things are largely aesthetic/ribbons on Clerics. The real thing that differentiates the melee cleric subclasses is the features, not the proficiencies.

[Theodoxus]

If you want to be a melee cleric why not take one of the subclasses with more melee features? War isn't it.


These things are largely aesthetic on Clerics. The real thing that differentiates the melee cleric subclasses is the features, not the proficiencies.

So, Arcane and Tempest? Just wondering what other domains you think are decent melee options. Nature for Shillelagh perhaps? The other thematic one is Forge, but it doesn't get martial weapon proficiency, and its features scream 'tank' more than 'striker' to me.

[LudicSavant]

So, Arcane and Tempest? Just wondering what other domains you think are decent melee options. Nature for Shillelagh perhaps? The other thematic one is Forge, but it doesn't get martial weapon proficiency, and its features scream 'tank' more than 'striker' to me.

Martial weapon proficiency is largely irrelevant to how good you are at being a melee Cleric. Nature, Forge, Arcana, Death, Life, and Tempest are all solid options for a frontliner Cleric.

[Chronos]

The biggest problem, in my experience, with War Cleric is that, even with the bonus action attack and Divine Strikes, swinging a weapon just doesn't compare very well with casting spells. So often, you just end up being the guy holding a longsword while casting Spirit Guardians, Sacred Flame, Spiritual Weapon, and Guiding Bolt, instead of being the guy holding a mace while casting Spirit Guardians, Sacred Flame, Spiritual Weapon, and Guiding Bolt.

[Dork_Forge]

I see it as the opposite, having that common thread for the martials and martial-equivalents makes designing interesting goodies for them that much easier. For example, something like the new Shield Master or the new Grappler get added utility when combined with Extra Attack, making it easy for them to put those in the "for martial builds" column.

I'd rather not consider One D&D for 5E discussions.

And Extra Attack has already been a common thread, every other martial subclass uses Extra Attack and that hasn't lead to them having interesting features based off of it. College of Valor doesn't interact with it at all, College of Sword's Blade Flourish explicitly works once per turn.

Bladesinger adds damage at 14th level to each attack, but that's late and arguably not interesting either. The newer version of their Extra Attack is pretty irrelevant, seeing as it's unique and, imo, an abomination.



Blessed Strikes is, at best, a minor consolation for the divine list having weaker attack spells/cantrips and for clerics having weaker martial capability. I don't see it as a replacement or obviation of War Clerics' gish capabilities specifically.

An additional d8 at 8th level is nothing to sneeze at, if they were to have Extra Attack on top of that at 6th like the others, then their progression would outpace the other martial subclasses and arguably outpace actual martials who usually have to wait until tier 3 for that kind of uplift.

Given that a War Cleric makes a pretty decent user of GWM and SS, then a hypothetical War Cleric that gets EA at 6th and Divine Strike at 8th would be able to do something like:

4d6+2d4+1d8+8 = 31.5 using Divine Favor for easy combats

This goes up to 6d6+3d4+1d8+12 = 45 if dropping a War Priest

With Divine Favor being a 1st level spell, using it for easier fights seems reasonable, with Spirit Guardians and Spiritual Weapon taking damage to the next level. This isn't considering using SS or GWM, which they can basically get a guaranteed hit on twice per short rest.

Barbarian Zealot:

4d6+12+1d6+4 = 33.5

Hunter Ranger with Hunter's Mark up using a longbow:

3d8+8+2d6 = 28.5

Rogue with a shortbow:

5d6+5 = 22.5

Just throwing EA in at 6 alongside Divine Strike enables the War Cleric to hang with actual martials with minimal investment, with a powerful surge. Removing it drops their damage out of spitting distance from the heavy weapon Zealot and back down below the Ranger that's investing more.


The biggest problem, in my experience, with War Cleric is that, even with the bonus action attack and Divine Strikes, swinging a weapon just doesn't compare very well with casting spells. So often, you just end up being the guy holding a longsword while casting Spirit Guardians, Sacred Flame, Spiritual Weapon, and Guiding Bolt, instead of being the guy holding a mace while casting Spirit Guardians, Sacred Flame, Spiritual Weapon, and Guiding Bolt.

This kind of argument tends to come up and is really not that simple. If a simple martial subclass took a fullcaster to the point where it was as good as using their entire mainclass (the spellcasting), then they would basically have a martial character and fullcaster and be swapping between them. It makes absolutely no sense balance wise to create that, especially when a caster subclass looks like a 1/3 caster.

But I also disagree with some other stuff here:

- Cleric cantrips suck, unless you want the range or a rider effect, using a weapon is going to be better damage, especially on a Cleric with Divine Strike.

- If all you do with martial weapon prof is upgrade to a longsword, then you're sacrificing damage potential for AC. There's no reason a War Cleric shouldn't be using a bow or two handed weapon unless they're prioritising AC. And a character that prioritises AC has no right to moan about their damage output.

- A lot of what you mentioned isn't exclusive, Spiritual Weapon works great with weapon users and being capable in melee makes Spirit Guardians even better since it's just an aura effect centred on you. War Clerics should be using spells to enhance their weapon use, which goes beyond just standing there and casting Guiding Bolt.

[Psyren]

I brought up One because, outside of houserules, it's the only way we'll see War get changed; after 9 years it is what it is at this point.

Regarding Swords, I disagree - sure, the flourishes are 1/turn, but Extra Attack still lets you trade an attack to set one up e.g. with a shove, or hit a foe you think is near death and save your valuable flourish for a healthier second target etc. Bladesinger goes a step further by letting you swap one of the attacks for a cantrip, likely a SCAGtrip. Even when the feature itself only applies to one attack, more attacks still mean more options.

As for War Cleric, I'm not denying that they can burst pretty high, but in practice the limited uses of both War Priest and Guided Strike encourage players to hoard those resources in case they might be needed for a tough fight. Can they excel in spite of that, sure, but I don't think it needs to be that way either.

[Dork_Forge]

I brought up One because, outside of houserules, it's the only way we'll see War get changed; after 9 years it is what it is at this point.

I get it, but that kind of thinking also just abandons discussion of 5e, even if people don't want to house rule it it's still interesting to talk about and the edition we're actually playing.


Regarding Swords, I disagree - sure, the flourishes are 1/turn, but Extra Attack still lets you trade an attack to set one up e.g. with a shove, or hit a foe you think is near death and save your valuable flourish for a healthier second target etc. Bladesinger goes a step further by letting you swap one of the attacks for a cantrip, likely a SCAGtrip. Even when the feature itself only applies to one attack, more attacks still mean more options.

I didn't say that the Sword's Bard gets no benefit at all from Extra Attack, I said that it has no synergy with Flourish and that's true. Everyone benefits from Extra Attack in the same way you mentioned, but besides utterly botching it with Bladesinger, there's nothing interesting being done with it.


As for War Cleric, I'm not denying that they can burst pretty high, but in practice the limited uses of both War Priest and Guided Strike encourage players to hoard those resources in case they might be needed for a tough fight. Can they excel in spite of that, sure, but I don't think it needs to be that way either.

Eh I rather it that way, they're still full casters with a decent single smack and all the weapon and armor options. Having to weigh up when to be particularly good at smacking things around isn't a bad thing, whereas reducing more subclasses to Extra Attack narrows down player choice from a character build perspective. One of the joys of 5e is being able to tackle the same concept with multiple avenues, I think this feeds into that.

[Psyren]

Agree to disagree on Bladesinger.


I get it, but that kind of thinking also just abandons discussion of 5e, even if people don't want to house rule it it's still interesting to talk about and the edition we're actually playing.

I don't see it as "abandoning 5e" at all. If people do want to houserule, knowing what the designers are considering or have changed their thinking on is a useful data point, especially if the goal is to convince their DM to allow something. We've been referring people to 5e UAs for ideas for years now.



I didn't say that the Sword's Bard gets no benefit at all from Extra Attack, I said that it has no synergy with Flourish and that's true. Everyone benefits from Extra Attack in the same way you mentioned, but besides utterly botching it with Bladesinger, there's nothing interesting being done with it.

"No synergy" is what I disagree with; it may be indirect but it's there. The only real way for it to have no synergy at all would be if Flourishes were their own action instead of using the Attack action and thus truly mutually exclusive.



Eh I rather it that way, they're still full casters with a decent single smack and all the weapon and armor options. Having to weigh up when to be particularly good at smacking things around isn't a bad thing, whereas reducing more subclasses to Extra Attack narrows down player choice from a character build perspective. One of the joys of 5e is being able to tackle the same concept with multiple avenues, I think this feeds into that.

I think it expands player choice rather than narrowng it. Their martial ability not tying up your bonus action means you can be a War Cleric who dual wields, or uses a polearm, or shield bashes, or uses Spirit Shroud or Shield of Faith or works in Cunning Action or any number of racials like Orc or Hobgoblin or Shadar-kai etc etc.

[Witty Username]

I didn't say that the Sword's Bard gets no benefit at all from Extra Attack, I said that it has no synergy with Flourish and that's true. Everyone benefits from Extra Attack in the same way you mentioned, but besides utterly botching it with Bladesinger, there's nothing interesting being done with it.


I think the disconnect here could be best described with rogue. The core benefit, as I have been informed, of two-weapon fighting on a rogue is its interation with sneak attack in comparison to ranged fighting. Because while sneak attack is once per turn, landing it more consistently is very important to a rogue's damage.

Things that effect attacks, synergize with extra attack, becoming more consistent and reliable.

I grant that it is not particularly insightful and war cleric is fine without it, I just am trying to understand the disconnect.
--
I don't get the bladesinger hate, cantrips are generally weaker than attacks on a wizard, especially on a bladesinger.

[Snails]

The extra BA attack is gold in Tier 1, and turning a miss into a hit is far more significant when that attack is the only thing you’re doing that turn.

You are not wrong, but I think these abilities pale in comparison with Tempest's Wrath of the Storm in Tier 1. Sure, getting hit is not good news, but if you are not getting hit, you are probably not in any hurry either. The result though is an auto-hit, which is effectively BA attack + CD rolled into one. I find that Tempest is simply a better war cleric than War Cleric, by a lot.

My inclination is to go a very different direction, and allow the War Cleric to cast Bless as a Bonus Action (or Action). Friends just fight a bit better with a War Cleric around, and this happens pretty reliably (unless there is urgency to cast a bigger spell round 1).

[RogueJK]

I don't get the bladesinger hate, cantrips are generally weaker than attacks on a wizard, especially on a bladesinger.

Sorry, no.


Most Bladesingers are going to be making melee weapon attacks, and swapping in a Booming Blade or Green Flame Blade cantrip in place of a base weapon attack via their special Extra Attack is a straight upgrade to a Bladesinger's melee damage. It's free additional damage. Even without triggering any of the rider damage, it's demonstrably better than simply making two standard melee attacks.

Bladesinger 6+ with Extra Attack with Rapier and 18 DEX: 1d8+4 and 1d8+4 (17)

Bladesinger 6+ with Extra Attack with Rapier and 18 DEX, swapping in BB/GFB in place of one of the normal attacks: 1d8+4 and 2d8+4 (21.5), plus potential rider damage.

And that BB/GFB damage goes up by another 1d8 in Tier 3, and then another 1d8 in Tier 4, plus the scaling rider potential damage too. While the base rapier attacks won't scale, and have no potential rider damage.


Even if you happen to be running a ranged Bladesinger using a Hand Crossbow, the cantrip is only noticeably weaker if you happen to using Sharpshooter or your DEX is significantly higher than your INT. Without Sharpshooter and with a similar DEX and INT leading to a similar to-hit probability, a second base hand crossbow attack will be doing something like 1d6+3 to 5 (6.5 to 8.5), while tagging in a ranged cantrip will be doing 2d8-2d10 (9-11) in Tier 2, then the gap widens even further to 3d8-3d10 and 4d8-4d10 in Tiers 3 and 4.


(And those are just better from a damage standpoint. The Bladesinger's special Extra Attack also allows you the flexibility to do things like tag in Blade Ward, for additional weapon damage resistance in exchange for reducing your damage output that turn by some, rather than all. Or tag in a utility cantrip to manipulate the environment mid-combat in exchange for reducing your damage output that turn by some, rather than all. Or set up an alley-oop via Mind Sliver for a pending save-or-suck while still getting most of your normal damage in. Etc.)

[Mongobear]

Lots of Bladesinger Math.


This is part of the reason I love the BS so much, especially combined with EK 7. when getting through Tier 3 play. BS gets to cantrip as part of Extra Attack, then a standard attack, then because you cast a Cantrip you get a BA Weapon Attack from EK 7. It takes minimum 13 levels to come online, but it is still extremely functional the entire time you're leveling.

[Dork_Forge]

I don't see it as "abandoning 5e" at all. If people do want to houserule, knowing what the designers are considering or have changed their thinking on is a useful data point, especially if the goal is to convince their DM to allow something. We've been referring people to 5e UAs for ideas for years now.

We'll disagree on this, but I think there's a big difference between 5e UAs and pointing to One D&D, they have clearly shifted design philosophies in a big way.


"No synergy" is what I disagree with; it may be indirect but it's there. The only real way for it to have no synergy at all would be if Flourishes were their own action instead of using the Attack action and thus truly mutually exclusive.


Okay, then I will reword it: They get no synergy with Extra Attack that anyone else getting Extra Attack would have.


I think it expands player choice rather than narrowng it. Their martial ability not tying up your bonus action means you can be a War Cleric who dual wields, or uses a polearm, or shield bashes, or uses Spirit Shroud or Shield of Faith or works in Cunning Action or any number of racials like Orc or Hobgoblin or Shadar-kai etc etc.

It's Wis mod per long rest, it isn't tying up the bonus action at all? A War Cleric is actually a decent argument for why you would want to carry around different weapons. They could don a shield for AC tanking or TWF for damage in combats where they aren't likely to need the damage. Heck, they could still use PAM (which is what I'm assuming you're alluding to) since the PAM bonus attack is strictly inferior to theirs, it doesn't conflict at all.


I think the disconnect here could be best described with rogue. The core benefit, as I have been informed, of two-weapon fighting on a rogue is its interation with sneak attack in comparison to ranged fighting. Because while sneak attack is once per turn, landing it more consistently is very important to a rogue's damage.

Things that effect attacks, synergize with extra attack, becoming more consistent and reliable.

I grant that it is not particularly insightful and war cleric is fine without it, I just am trying to understand the disconnect.

I get the consistency argument, though obviously it's nowhere near as strong as on the Rogue, I just don't think it's anywhere near enough to really consider it synergising with it, which it actually could have if they got a later feature that tied into it, or the flourish restriction was lifted later on.



I don't get the bladesinger hate, cantrips are generally weaker than attacks on a wizard, especially on a bladesinger.

RogueJK illustrated it pretty well, my own thoughts to add on:

- Extra Attack is a feature that has existed since the PHB and is very pervasive in the game. What they retconned the Bladesinger to be is not Extra Attack.

- From a design perspective it makes zero sense to make them stand out and they certainly didn't need the straight power or utility buff it granted.

- SCAGtrips are a straight buff to damage with additional riders. Mixing in other cantrips can allow for using riders along with attacks. Like Shocking Grasp to skirmish, Chill Touch to shut down healing, Fire Bolt to compliment a handcrossbow etc.

There was no sane reason to suddenly change what Extra Attack did and I'm not convinced there's any feedback behind that change either. Changes to Bladesong? Sure, but I can't see anyone complaining about getting Extra Attack normal on a Bladesinger, especially when they get that bonus damage later on to each attack and have access to spells like Shadow Blade.


This is part of the reason I love the BS so much, especially combined with EK 7. when getting through Tier 3 play. BS gets to cantrip as part of Extra Attack, then a standard attack, then because you cast a Cantrip you get a BA Weapon Attack from EK 7. It takes minimum 13 levels to come online, but it is still extremely functional the entire time you're leveling.

I mean, it certainly has appeal in sheer power, especially since cantrip scaling is completely unhindered by MCing. That combo would be able to Action Surge for two cantrips and three attacks, which is utterly ridiculous.

I don't, however, think that sheer power is at all good for the game. Especially since of all places it ended up, it ended up on the Wizard for some reason.

[Psyren]

I see value in highlighting their design evolution and will keep bringing it up, especially when discussing options that will likely be common between both.

RogueJK illustrated that Bladesinger is strong and effective, but going from there to "abomination" is a pretty big leap. If you're allowing wizards at all then Bladesinger is fine.

As for War Priests, Wis mod attacks per long rest can be burned through in a single combat. And if you're falling back on PAM anyway... why not be something else?

[Witty Username]

There was no sane reason to suddenly change what Extra Attack did and I'm not convinced there's any feedback behind that change either. Changes to Bladesong? Sure, but I can't see anyone complaining about getting Extra Attack normal on a Bladesinger, especially when they get that bonus damage later on to each attack and have access to spells like Shadow Blade.

Well, given that bladesinger was the worst subclass to use blade cantrips with (because they don't synergize with extra attack), it makes sense that they would think of changes to smooth that out.

And it is not like their hasn't been unique versions of extra attack before.

[Dork_Forge]

I see value in highlighting their design evolution and will keep bringing it up, especially when discussing options that will likely be common between both.

Yeah we'll never really agree on this, it's like pointing to previous editions to me.


RogueJK illustrated that Bladesinger is strong and effective, but going from there to "abomination" is a pretty big leap. If you're allowing wizards at all then Bladesinger is fine.

I thought we'd agreed to disagree on this, apparently not. It's an abomination that it's called Extra Attack, it's an abomination that it's unnecessary, unasked-for power creep in arguably the class most subject to power creep due to how they publish spells.


As for War Priests, Wis mod attacks per long rest can be burned through in a single combat. And if you're falling back on PAM anyway... why not be something else?

Yeah, no this logic doesn't hold up at all:

'I want to be a Paladin, Smites are cool!' 'You can burn through all of your smites in a single combat, why not be something else?'

'I want to be a Fighter, Action Surge sounds cool!' 'Yeah, but one combat per short rest, so why not be something else?'

'I want to be a Cleric of a war god, able to hang in combat when I want to!' 'That's nice, but you would have to do resource management, why not play something completely different?'

A War Cleric is not just the BA attack: Their CD is a short rest resource, they always have access to their armor and weapon profs, and they always have their domain spells prepped.



Well, given that bladesinger was the worst subclass to use blade cantrips with (because they don't synergize with extra attack), it makes sense that they would think of changes to smooth that out.

This doesn't follow:

- They're the only Wizard subclass to get a martial weapon prof, combined with Bladesong and later their other features, they were arguably one of the more potent users of them out of the Wizard subclasses.

- Why on Toril would they ever need to rework a subclass printed years ago to work better with cantrips that are not only not Wizard exclusive, but are entirely optional? There's no reason to make sure they can use them alongside normal attacks and their version of Extra Attack doesn't even limit them to the blade cantrips.


And it is not like their hasn't been unique versions of extra attack before.

...when? Every single other instance of Extra Attack in 5e does the same thing: It gives you another attack. The closest thing to an exception is that Fighters get more at higher levels, but that's at higher levels and still just adds normal weapon attacks.

[Witty Username]

...when? Every single other instance of Extra Attack in 5e does the same thing: It gives you another attack. The closest thing to an exception is that Fighters get more at higher levels, but that's at higher levels and still just adds normal weapon attacks.

So, fighter has an entirely unique way of how extra attack progresses, which is their class defining trait. And it doesn't count as different?

[Dork_Forge]

So, fighter has an entirely unique way of how extra attack progresses, which is their class defining trait. And it doesn't count as different?

Every single instance of Extra Attack at level 5 or 6 gives one additional attack. That is uniform across everyone else that gets it and is what you would expect from the name. So no, I don't consider the Fighter getting more attacks much later than this standard behaviour to be different.

It's called Extra Attack, not Extra Attack or Cantrip, afterall.

Was the Fighter the justification you were thinking of?

[Mongobear]

So, fighter has an entirely unique way of how extra attack progresses, which is their class defining trait. And it doesn't count as different?

...no considering they cant replace an attack with something as powerful as a spell, even if it's just a cantrips.

All they do is swing basic attacks again. If they got to do weird stuff in place of a swing, maybe, but just "swinging more than twice" doesnt make them anywhere near as unique as a Bladesingers cantrip EA.

[Psyren]

Yeah we'll never really agree on this, it's like pointing to previous editions to me.

That's fine, we don't have to.


I thought we'd agreed to disagree on this, apparently not.

We did, that's why I didn't quote you up there. I was speaking to a general audience.



Yeah, no this logic doesn't hold up at all:

'I want to be a Paladin, Smites are cool!' 'You can burn through all of your smites in a single combat, why not be something else?'

'I want to be a Fighter, Action Surge sounds cool!' 'Yeah, but one combat per short rest, so why not be something else?'

'I want to be a Cleric of a war god, able to hang in combat when I want to!' 'That's nice, but you would have to do resource management, why not play something completely different?'

This logic doesn't hold up. Smite and Action Surge aren't competing with any alternatives from either an action-economy or subclass standpoint, while War Priest does both. Specious comparison is specious.

[Dork_Forge]

We did, that's why I didn't quote you up there. I was speaking to a general audience.

Referring to what I said and using a word (I'm pretty sure) that only I've used before now. Quoting isn't mandatory for replying, and even if it was unintentional, surely you can see how that looks.


This logic doesn't hold up. Smite and Action Surge aren't competing with any alternatives from either an action-economy or subclass standpoint, while War Priest does both. Specious comparison is specious.

Smites consume spell slots that could otherwise fuel spells, whether they be spells prepared for the day or spells granted as a part of their subclass.

And as you've pointed out, War Priest can be consumed in a single combat, and as I already pointed out, something so limited is not actually competing with the things you suggested. Kind of like suggesting you shouldn't play a Samurai Shadar Kai because Second Wind competes with Fighting Spirit competes with Blessing of the Raven Queen. Or that you shouldn't prepare both Healing Word and Shield of Faith because they both consume slots and can only be used one at a time. Saying what's the point if you take PAM doesn't hold water either.

Though you don't seem to have grasped the point I was making from my comparisons, based on your reply. Just because something can be consumed in a single combat doesn't mean that it either must be or that the fact disqualifies the entire subclass. The subclass consists of more than just War Priest. Nor did you address that telling someone to play something else entirely when it's what they want to play, though I'm guessing you didn't want to argue that since you omitted it from the quote.

[Witty Username]

It's called Extra Attack, not Extra Attack or Cantrip, afterall.

Was the Fighter the justification you were thinking of?

Yes it was,
I will file away that 1 + (1 × 3) = 1 + 1, not the same math classes I went too but that's fine.

[Dork_Forge]

Yes it was,
I will file away that 1 + (1 × 3) = 1 + 1, not the same math classes I went too but that's fine.

If you choose to see more attacks at later levels the same as substituting attacks for spells then that's your choice.

[diplomancer]

Yes it was,
I will file away that 1 + (1 × 3) = 1 + 1, not the same math classes I went too but that's fine.


If you choose to see more attacks at later levels the same as substituting attacks for spells then that's your choice.

I agree with Dork_Forge. Not necessarily about the power of the feature, but the simple fact that the Bladesinger's Extra Attack at Tier 2 is substantively different from all other Extra Attacks at Tier 2. If the feature had come online at level 10 or 14, and called "Improved Extra Attack" or "Magical Extra Attack", then it would be an issue of debating whether it was too powerful or not (though I don't think it would be; by levels 10 or 14, Bladesingers are not attacking as much as before, in my experience).

As it is, it feels simply weird that the class with the best Extra Attack at level 6 is... the Wizard.

[Saelethil]

Doing some quick mental math (so I may be a little off) but it looks like BB/GFB are more of the problem than Bladesinger’s special version of Extra Attack. A regular tier 2 cantrip is 2 dice vs a weapon attack of 1 die +modifier. Looks reasonable to me even if it should have a different name.

[stoutstien]

Doing some quick mental math (so I may be a little off) but it looks like BB/GFB are more of the problem than Bladesinger’s special version of Extra Attack. A regular tier 2 cantrip is 2 dice vs a weapon attack of 1 die +modifier. Looks reasonable to me even if it should have a different name.

That WoTC design in a nut shell. They have always had issues when introducing new options. It's either make past ones obsolete or creating unintended combinations that fall outside the curve.

[Snails]

As it is, it feels simply weird that the class with the best Extra Attack at level 6 is... the Wizard.

While perhaps not the most satisfying balance counterargument to some, there are significant downsides to being a d6 hit point die character that runs towards danger. Even though our party Bladesinger is often using Mobile + Expeditious Retreat + Longstrider to successfully distance himself from threats, he is still the most likely PC in the party to get dropped, as a practical matter. I do not think the Vengeance Paladin or Moon Druid in the party find their contributions on the frontline are being outshone.

As a matter of general principle, I do agree with the criticisms of the BS. My subjective experience is that I do not perceive a problem here.

[5eNeedsDarksun]

I agree with Dork_Forge. Not necessarily about the power of the feature, but the simple fact that the Bladesinger's Extra Attack at Tier 2 is substantively different from all other Extra Attacks at Tier 2. If the feature had come online at level 10 or 14, and called "Improved Extra Attack" or "Magical Extra Attack", then it would be an issue of debating whether it was too powerful or not (though I don't think it would be; by levels 10 or 14, Bladesingers are not attacking as much as before, in my experience).

As it is, it feels simply weird that the class with the best Extra Attack at level 6 is... the Wizard.

For sure. It's debatable that full casters should get the same Extra Attack feature as martials, just one level delayed. To have it be even better makes me wonder what the designers were thinking of. If that feature had been applied to EK then it would have made some sense.

[LudicSavant]

While perhaps not the most satisfying balance counterargument to some, there are significant downsides to being a d6 hit point die character that runs towards danger.

Until you realize that a spell slot can generate more HP than the difference between HD sizes can.

[verbatim]

Interesting how perceptions are with some of these abilities. I've often seen Death Cleric's Touch of Death (2nd level CD) panned when it's more damage than if every Paly spell slot was used for (non crit) Divine Smite. It scales at 4 points / 2 levels and has no impact on the action economy and 100% success rate, while War Cleric's War God's Blessing (6th level CD) if applied to a Rogue's SA (which is a fairly optimal situation for regular play) scales at 3.5 points / 2 levels, uses a reaction, and has less than 100% success rate. Even under optimal conditions War God's Blessing is worse in almost every way.

This is kind of orthogonal to the ongoing discussion, but I DM'd a 1-20 game with a Death Cleric where we found out that it has kind of an interesting niche in tier 4 of being able to guarantee an unpassable concentration check in certain circumstances with upcast Spiritual Weapon.

SW is normally kind of a meh spell at high optimization, and the spell slot cost is somewhat heavy, but there were a couple of situations where a 4-6th level slot and Channel Divinity stopped a really crucial spell at a pivotal moment.

[5eNeedsDarksun]

This is kind of orthogonal to the ongoing discussion, but I DM'd a 1-20 game with a Death Cleric where we found out that it has kind of an interesting niche in tier 4 of being able to guarantee an unpassable concentration check in certain circumstances with upcast Spiritual Weapon.

SW is normally kind of a meh spell at high optimization, and the spell slot cost is somewhat heavy, but there were a couple of situations where a 4-6th level slot and Channel Divinity stopped a really crucial spell at a pivotal moment.

Yeah, I agree on the SW. Particularly now with Telekinetic being available it's a pretty iffy use of a spell in most cases (Death Cleric being the exception). While SW looks good on paper the fact you're likely not getting it going until round 2 + limited movement of the thing means the actual amount of damage in a combat is often limited. We started doing more combat on a grid, and I was surprised how many times the SW couldn't get where it needed to go. On Death Cleric though it seriously brings the pain.

[RogueJK]

This is kind of orthogonal to the ongoing discussion, but I DM'd a 1-20 game with a Death Cleric where we found out that it has kind of an interesting niche in tier 4 of being able to guarantee an unpassable concentration check in certain circumstances with upcast Spiritual Weapon.

SW is normally kind of a meh spell at high optimization, and the spell slot cost is somewhat heavy, but there were a couple of situations where a 4-6th level slot and Channel Divinity stopped a really crucial spell at a pivotal moment.

Another route to consider to achieve something similar could be a Death Cleric grabbing the Spell Sniper feat to learn Thorn Whip and double its range. This would allow you to combo your 60' WIS-based melee attack cantrip with Touch of Death, and at 4d6+ToD it'll be doing similar damage to an upcast 4-6 level Spiritual Weapon, without costing a spell slot and without being limited by SW's usual 20' movement per turn. (Which as noted, sometimes leaves SW lagging behind the action.)

The trade-offs are that it requires a feat to set up, and it's not a Bonus Action.

But Thorn Whip is a great option for Clerics in general, since it works so well with Spirit Guardians. Even more so on a Death Cleric as it expands their melee attack options.

[LudicSavant]

Another route to consider to achieve something similar could be a Death Cleric grabbing the Spell Sniper feat to learn Thorn Whip and double its range. This would allow you to combo your 60' WIS-based melee attack cantrip with Touch of Death, and at 4d6+ToD it'll be doing similar damage to an upcast 4-6 level Spiritual Weapon, without costing a spell slot and without being limited by SW's usual 20' movement per turn. (Which as noted, sometimes leaves SW lagging behind the action.)

The trade-offs are that it requires a feat to set up, and it's not a Bonus Action.

But Thorn Whip is a great option for Clerics in general, since it works so well with Spirit Guardians. Even more so on a Death Cleric as it expands their melee attack options.

Yeah. Not only thorn whip but attack-roll cantrips in general are good adds for Clerics, since 1) they don't have them on their list natively, and 2) Blessed Strikes can boost it (even if it's not a Cleric Cantrip).

[Psyren]

Referring to what I said and using a word (I'm pretty sure) that only I've used before now. Quoting isn't mandatory for replying, and even if it was unintentional, surely you can see how that looks.

I did use the word you used, but I still wasn't directing that post at you specifically. There's more people reading this thread than the two of us.



Smites consume spell slots that could otherwise fuel spells, whether they be spells prepared for the day or spells granted as a part of their subclass.

That's still not a build choice though; you get both smites and spells by dint of being a paladin. The choice to use one vs the other impacts your moment-to-moment play, but not your character as a whole. Choosing to be a War Cleric for the BA attacks or rely on something like Shield Master or Polearm Master or TWF while being a different subclass entirely is a much more defining decision, that's my point.



Though you don't seem to have grasped the point I was making from my comparisons, based on your reply. Just because something can be consumed in a single combat doesn't mean that it either must be or that the fact disqualifies the entire subclass. The subclass consists of more than just War Priest. Nor did you address that telling someone to play something else entirely when it's what they want to play, though I'm guessing you didn't want to argue that since you omitted it from the quote.

My point wasn't "don't play War Cleric." My point was "the DM deciding to houserule War Cleric, or the designers choosing to overhaul it, are both reasonable." It was designed at a time when bonus action attacks were considered very premium abilities that should be heavily restricted (see also Berserker Barbarian.) The game has evolved since those days of yore, and a houserule is exactly what the OP is trying to evaluate.

[LudicSavant]

Death Cleric with spell sniper can walk around with Spirit Guardians, Thorn Whip someone behind 3/4 cover right into their SG (for two procs of SG), and then Spiritual Weapon them, and activate Touch of Death twice. It's an easy opener that deals well over 100 damage and pierces resistances (including working just fine against Legendary Resistance, Magic Resistance, etc). Just say you're Scorpion and worship Mortal Kombat.

The 'slowness' of Spiritual Weapon is also less of an issue when you're pulling people into things.

[Dork_Forge]

While perhaps not the most satisfying balance counterargument to some, there are significant downsides to being a d6 hit point die character that runs towards danger.

I can see why you'd think that, but the d6 trade off is meant to balance against their core class, not one specific subclass. Even then, arguably balancing the d6 would fall to the AC increase of Bladesong, not the damage/versatility boost of their unique Extra Attack.



That's still not a build choice though; you get both smites and spells by dint of being a paladin. The choice to use one vs the other impacts your moment-to-moment play, but not your character as a whole. Choosing to be a War Cleric for the BA attacks or rely on something like Shield Master or Polearm Master or TWF while being a different subclass entirely is a much more defining decision, that's my point.

You don't consider what class to play a build choice?

Other subclasses don't get the same domain spells or Guided Strike, and a lot of them don't get the same proficiencies. Your approach only starts to make sense if you reduce the subclass to only one part, when it's actually several.



My point wasn't "don't play War Cleric." My point was "the DM deciding to houserule War Cleric, or the designers choosing to overhaul it, are both reasonable." It was designed at a time when bonus action attacks were considered very premium abilities that should be heavily restricted (see also Berserker Barbarian.) The game has evolved since those days of yore, and a houserule is exactly what the OP is trying to evaluate.

The OP wanted feedback on some options, but they also expressed confusion and wondered if they were missing something. The conversation has been mostly on point, bar a little detour to the related Bladesinger discussion.

You can't point to the PHB as being a time of bonus action attack restrictions when it also gave us:

- Polearm Master
- Spiritual Weapon
- Two weapon fighting (specifically open to everyone and open to a few at full power)
- Arguably GWM, seeing as the bonus attack can happen pretty frequently
- The EK's bonus action attack when casting

The Beserker is an anomoly of badly thought out design, not the shining example of PHB design philosophy.

There's plenty of space to tweak the War Cleric upwards, but it's also easy to overstep the mark (like straight adding EA at 6th). Given that the War Cleric as a whole package performs just fine at what it's meant to do, the discussion that has come up around it seems perfectly valid.

As for the house rules specifically asked about, 1 and 2 seem the most appropriate.

[Psyren]

You don't consider what class to play a build choice?

Not in the same sense as subclass or feats - generally class is a part of broad concept, something people decide on, or at least drastically narrow, before they even sit down at the table and we start thinking about build. For example, if someone wants to be a frontline character that can heal their allies, several classes can fulfill that concept, but a good chunk are ruled out right off the bat; you wouldn't consider the ruled-out ones to be an opportunity cost, because they were never in the running to begin with. Build is more about the "how" than the "what."


Other subclasses don't get the same domain spells or Guided Strike, and a lot of them don't get the same proficiencies. Your approach only starts to make sense if you reduce the subclass to only one part, when it's actually several.

Uh, the OP is the one focusing on that specific aspect of War (i.e. is it not fair for them to simply get Extra Attack like other gish subclasses instead of this limited bonus attack, or can the bonus action attack be buffed further in some way), not me. I'm operating within the parameters of the thread; you're the one turning it into a referendum on every domain feature.


You can't point to the PHB as being a time of bonus action attack restrictions when it also gave us:

- Polearm Master
- Spiritual Weapon
- Two weapon fighting (specifically open to everyone and open to a few at full power)
- Arguably GWM, seeing as the bonus attack can happen pretty frequently
- The EK's bonus action attack when casting

The Beserker is an anomoly of badly thought out design, not the shining example of PHB design philosophy.

PAM requires a specific subset of weapons that require multiclassing or build resources to obtain. Spiritual Weapon is weaker than weapon attacks unless you burn high spell slots on it.

But even putting the unique badness of Berserker aside, all of those do have material restrictions/opportunity costs, that's exactly my point. Specific martial weapons without shield use, different stats, class or feat tax to enable, reliant on triggers etc. War Priest at least has the benefit of working with any weapon, but you're still at best on par since they don't get EA and would need it from somewhere else, and that "somewhere else" likely entails redundant features since most sources of EA get martial weapons, armor, and shields anyway.



There's plenty of space to tweak the War Cleric upwards, but it's also easy to overstep the mark (like straight adding EA at 6th).

That's indeed the point we disagree on. Nobody thinks Valor or Swords Bard is over the line, and they get theirs at 6 too.

[Theodoxus]

Given that the War Cleric as a whole package performs just fine at what it's meant to do, the discussion that has come up around it seems perfectly valid.

I'm curious what you think the War Cleric is meant to do. Because I don't see it fulfilling the purpose everyone I've seen who's tried it out thought it would do... it is not the gish Cleric. It's not the tank Cleric...


That's indeed the point we disagree on. Nobody thinks Valor or Swords Bard is over the line, and they get theirs at 6 too.

To be fair, Bard doesn't get Blessed Strikes, which I think is the general contention that 2d6+2d8 twice a round (at 14th level) is too strong. Where 2d6+2d8 twice a round for a max of 5 rounds is apparently just fine.

I personally don't see if as such an amazing difference to state one is OP over the other, but that's what the discussion is for.

[diplomancer]

I'm curious what you think the War Cleric is meant to do. Because I don't see it fulfilling the purpose everyone I've seen who's tried it out thought it would do... it is not the gish Cleric. It's not the tank Cleric...



To be fair, Bard doesn't get Blessed Strikes, which I think is the general contention that 2d6+2d8 twice a round (at 14th level) is too strong. Where 2d6+2d8 twice a round for a max of 5 rounds is apparently just fine.

I personally don't see if as such an amazing difference to state one is OP over the other, but that's what the discussion is for.

Bards also can't wield the heavy weapons very well (which are usually the best melee weapons), since they don't have Heavy Armor proficiency. I'd say it would be balanced to let the War Clerics have it at will, or maybe recovering on a Short Rest (which is almost at-will with Wis 20), either from level 6 or from level 8, as long as it is costing the Bonus Action. Iirc, there is currently no full caster gish that has, simultaneously:
a- Heavy Armor Proficiency
b- Proficiency in all Martial weapons ("a" and "b" together means access to the best melee weapon options)
c- Extra Attack.

I would hesitate before creating one, and the balance point I would consider to do so would certainly not be the other gish casters, but the heavy weapon martials.

[Psyren]

I'm curious what you think the War Cleric is meant to do. Because I don't see it fulfilling the purpose everyone I've seen who's tried it out thought it would do... it is not the gish Cleric. It's not the tank Cleric...

Indeed.



To be fair, Bard doesn't get Blessed Strikes, which I think is the general contention that 2d6+2d8 twice a round (at 14th level) is too strong. Where 2d6+2d8 twice a round for a max of 5 rounds is apparently just fine.

I personally don't see if as such an amazing difference to state one is OP over the other, but that's what the discussion is for.

At 14th, Divine Strike is 2d8 once per round, not twice, no?
And Blessed Strikes I don't think increases at all, it just stays at 1d8 all the way up (still being 1/round.)
Valor and Swords both exceed that by having Extra Attack and their bonus action free, but they're not considered OP (especially straight-classed.)

[RogueJK]

Iirc, there is currently no full caster gish that has, simultaneously:
a- Heavy Armor Proficiency
b- Proficiency in all Martial weapons ("a" and "b" together means access to the best melee weapon options)
c- Extra Attack.


Doable via a Hexblade Bladelock or Valor Bard with the Heavily Armored feat, or any Extra Attack caster with a Fighter 1 or Tempest/Twilight/War Cleric 1 dip. And mostly doable with a Mountain Dwarf with any Extra Attack caster class and the Heavily Armored feat (which has 3x martial weapon proficiencies selectable at character creation, but not proficiency in all).

Granted, you're giving up things to get that, namely a feat or a single level multiclass dip, but my point is that it's a pretty low bar for entry if those three factors are the things you're after.


Fighter or Cleric 1/Bladelock X works well for this, as they still get their Extra Attack at Level 6 just like the other Extra Attack casters. I personally love Fighter 1/Undead Bladelock X in particular, as the combo makes for a great heavily armed/armored frontline melee gish Warlock with solid damage output, and it's a nice change of pace from the usual EB-centric caster Warlock. Consider a 2nd level of Fighter after Warlock 6, to snag Action Surge.

[verbatim]

Another route to consider to achieve something similar could be a Death Cleric grabbing the Spell Sniper feat to learn Thorn Whip and double its range. This would allow you to combo your 60' WIS-based melee attack cantrip with Touch of Death, and at 4d6+ToD it'll be doing similar damage to an upcast 4-6 level Spiritual Weapon, without costing a spell slot and without being limited by SW's usual 20' movement per turn. (Which as noted, sometimes leaves SW lagging behind the action.)

The trade-offs are that it requires a feat to set up, and it's not a Bonus Action.

But Thorn Whip is a great option for Clerics in general, since it works so well with Spirit Guardians. Even more so on a Death Cleric as it expands their melee attack options.


Death Cleric with spell sniper can walk around with Spirit Guardians, Thorn Whip someone behind 3/4 cover right into their SG (for two procs of SG), and then Spiritual Weapon them, and activate Touch of Death twice. It's an easy opener that deals well over 100 damage and pierces resistances (including working just fine against Legendary Resistance, Magic Resistance, etc). Just say you're Scorpion and worship Mortal Kombat.

The 'slowness' of Spiritual Weapon is also less of an issue when you're pulling people into things.


well I know what I'm playing next. Thanks all around!

[diplomancer]

Doable via a Hexblade Bladelock or Valor Bard with the Heavily Armored feat, or any Extra Attack caster with a Fighter 1 or Tempest/Twilight/War Cleric 1 dip. And mostly doable with a Mountain Dwarf with any Extra Attack caster class and the Heavily Armored feat (which has 3x martial weapon proficiencies selectable at character creation, but not proficiency in all).

Granted, you're giving up things to get that, namely a feat or a single level multiclass dip, but my point is that it's a pretty low bar for entry if those three factors are the things you're after.


Fighter or Cleric 1/Bladelock X works well for this, as they get their Extra Attack at Level 6 just like the other Extra Attack casters. I personally love Fighter 1/Undead Bladelock X in particular, as the combo makes for a great heavily armed/armored frontline melee gish Warlock with solid damage output, and it's a nice change of pace from the usual EB-centric caster Warlock. Consider a 2nd level of Fighter after Warlock 6, to snag Action Surge.

Well, yes. But, as you said, there's an opportunity cost. The War Cleric wouldn't have that opportunity cost. I wouldn't call a feat or a dip "a low bar", but YMMV.

For instance, this "single level" means you're now waiting for extra attack at character level 7, which is a significant delay, you'll be horrible at level 5 both as a gish and as a caster, no extra attack and not even 3rd level slots, let alone spells, and you'd get by at level 6 as a caster, but still a bad gish. If you decided to get a dip in Cleric instead of Fighter you have to have 13 Wis (not trivial at all in a melee gish character!). Warlock can scrape by at level 5 because of Agonizing Blast+Eldritch Blast, but then you are building a gish and then not playing the gish when you'd want to.

If you go the Feat route (apart from the big opportunity cost), except for the Hexblade Bladelock, you're MAD from levels 1-3, having to put a 14 in your Dex, together with high str, high casting stat, and high Con. You could dump Dex, but then you have very awkward levels 1 and 2 (and a slightly less awkward level 3).

[Arkhios]

I wholeheartedly concur. War Domain should gain Extra Attack at 8th level, instead of Divine Strike. There's absolutely no excuse why they shouldn't get it, especially since Divine Strike itself is actually an 8th level Domain feature anyway (that just appears to be in like half of the domains); in other words, Divine Strike isn't a default feature for all clerics, so swapping it for Extra Attack with the War Domain wouldn't even be considered as an alternative feature or anything like that.

Oh, and before I forget, War Priest feature should be redesigned, entirely (not only because of this proposal about getting the actual Extra Attack).

[RogueJK]

For instance, this "single level" means you're now waiting for extra attack at character level 7, which is a significant delay, you'll be horrible at level 5 both as a gish and as a caster, no extra attack and not even 3rd level slots, let alone spells, and you'd get by at level 6 as a caster, but still a bad gish. If you decided to get a dip in Cleric instead of Fighter you have to have 13 Wis (not trivial at all in a melee gish character!). Warlock can scrape by at level 5 because of Agonizing Blast+Eldritch Blast, but then you are building a gish and then not playing the gish when you'd want to.

A) Dip 1/Bladelock X gets Extra Attack at Character Level 6 just like the other Extra Attack casters.

B) This Warlock gish can lean on BB/GFB at Level 5 - just like most other single attack gishes at Level 5, including a Bladesinger Wizard - before getting Extra Attack next level. And then swap it out for a more useful cantrip at Warlock 8 via Eldritch Versatility.

Hence why it's likely the best option for this "heavily armored full caster with EA gish" concept.



If you go the Feat route (apart from the big opportunity cost), except for the Hexblade Bladelock, you're MAD from levels 1-3, having to put a 14 in your Dex, together with high str, high casting stat, and high Con. You could dump Dex, but then you have very awkward levels 1 and 2 (and a slightly less awkward level 3).

Not all games start at Level 1...

[RogueJK]

especially since Divine Strike itself is actually an 8th level Domain feature anyway (that just appears to be in like half of the domains); in other words, Divine Strike isn't a default feature for all clerics, so swapping it for Extra Attack with the War Domain wouldn't even be considered as an alternative feature or anything like that.

All Clerics get either Divine Strike or Potent Spellcasting at Level 8, depending on whether they're designated as a "weapon cleric" or a "caster cleric". All domains get one or the other.

TCOE's Blessed Strikes replacement feature further renders that distinction moot, as it applies to both weapons and cantrips.

So yes, that 8th level "added damage" feature is default for all Clerics.

[diplomancer]

A) Dip 1/Bladelock X gets Extra Attack at Character Level 6 just like the other Extra Attack casters.

B) This Warlock gish can lean on BB/GFB at Level 5 - just like most other single attack gishes at Level 5, including a Bladesinger Wizard - before getting Extra Attack next level. And then swap it out for a more useful cantrip at Warlock 8 via Eldritch Versatility.

Hence why it's likely the best option for this "heavily armored full caster with EA gish" concept.

Yes, and it gives up 3rd level slots at level 5 to achieve that, which is kind of a big deal. Opportunity cost, again. And spending at least two levels with a wasted cantrip; another opportunity cost.


Not all games start at Level 1...
Irrelevant. I could have discarded your objection by saying "not all games allow feats/multiclassing". I didn't do it because we are discussing a change to a class, and whether it would be balanced/a good idea. When you're doing that in abstract, you have to consider all games. If you're doing it for a specific table, then a lot of assumptions change.

I think you're nitpicking my point unnecessarily. Yes, you can have a Pal6/Sorc14, which is a wonderful Heavy-Armoured gish with 9th level slots. It still has nothing to do with my main point about War Clerics becoming an exception if you give them Extra Attack for free at level 6. That you can have specific builds that can achieve something similar at an opportunity cost is besides the point, War Clerics would not have that opportunity cost, and it would be unique in that regard. Would it still be balanced? Possibly, but my instinct is to say that it would be still one less reason to play a martial.

[Theodoxus]

Would it still be balanced? Possibly, but my instinct is to say that it would be still one less reason to play a martial.

Depends what you want from your melee combatant. Fighter/Paladins/Rangers still get Fighting Styles which make attacks either easier (archery) or hit harder (dueling), or other niche options that full casters don't (outside of those feats and dips you think are too pricy).

Having two attacks with a small boost to damage as a rider isn't something that would interest me as a full caster. The Thornwhip/Spirit Guardian combo would - although typically once I get to 5th level on my Cleric, I'll cast SG and then start dodging as I meander through the battlefield, casting HW if needed on fallen comrades. But, if I were ever going to play a melee focused Cleric, the TW/SG combo works on any of them (though probably best with Nature for the heavy armor and no need for dips or feats for TW - I get the desire for Spell Sniper, just saying it isn't mandatory).

Spells are nice, really really nice, not gonna lie, but they don't cover every aspect that a non or partial caster gets natively. And the spells that come close also come with a cost and can evaporate on a failed Conc save... YMMV.

[Psyren]

Would it still be balanced? Possibly, but my instinct is to say that it would be still one less reason to play a martial.

People who only care about playing martials because War Cleric doesn't get Extra Attack didn't want to play a martial anyway.

[diplomancer]

Let me try to make my point clearer. Currently, martials have some niches. They get rarer and rarer as the edition advances, but they still exist. One niche that they still have is "heavily armoured melee bruiser". You can't really do it with casters without dipping (the feat is way too expensive, and usually comes in too late). Giving War Cleric Extra Attack would be an invasion on that niche. No, this doesn't mean that no one will ever play a heavily armoured melee bruiser martial again, nor does it mean that if someone wants to try to play this boosted War Cleric then they hate martials and were only playing martials becasue they were forced to; but there will be less of them. Nor does it mean that some other builds can't have that niche at an opportunity cost, assuming common variant rules. A niche invasion does not necessarily lead to species' extinctions. But it still can unbalance an ecosystem, and should not be allowed lightly.

And the fact that you can play a good "heavily armoured melee controller" as a Cleric has really nothing to do with this, Clerics already have that option, and control is not the best niche for martials in general, so I really have no idea what Thorn Whip has to do with this. Obviously, if you're using Thorn Whip, you don't care about Extra Attack (unless you want War Clerics to not only have Extra Attack, but the Bladesinger's Extra Attack+)


People who only care about playing martials because War Cleric doesn't get Extra Attack didn't want to play a martial anyway.
I don't think any such person exists, nor does my argument require such a person to exist.

[Arkhios]

All Clerics get either Divine Strike or Potent Spellcasting at Level 8, depending on whether they're designated as a "weapon cleric" or a "caster cleric". All domains get one or the other.

TCOE's Blessed Strikes replacement feature further renders that distinction moot, as it applies to both weapons and cantrips.

So yes, that 8th level "added damage" feature is default for all Clerics.

Take a good look at the Cleric class feature descriptions and the table at 8th level. It is labeled as Divine Domain feature. There's nothing more than an implication to support the idea that it's either Divine Strike or Potent Spellcasting. That is, it's not written in stone (RAW) as such. Nothing, and I stress, nothing is preventing the 8th level Divine Domain feature to be something else entirely.

[Theodoxus]

Let me try to make my point clearer. Currently, martials have some niches. They get rarer and rarer as the edition advances, but they still exist. One niche that they still have is "heavily armoured melee bruiser". You can't really do it with casters without dipping (the feat is way too expensive, and usually comes in too late). Giving War Cleric Extra Attack would be an invasion on that niche. No, this doesn't mean that no one will ever play a heavily armoured melee bruiser martial again, nor does it mean that if someone wants to try to play this boosted War Cleric then they hate martials and were only playing martials because they were forced to; but there will be less of them. Nor does it mean that some other builds can't have that niche at an opportunity cost, assuming common variant rules.

what is your definition of 'heavily armored melee bruiser'? Because it sounds like the only criteria that matters to you is: heavy armor proficiency, martial weapon proficiency, 1 extra attack. If that's your definition, then sure, granting War at whatever level, an extra attack will fulfill that exceedingly broad and not particularly useful definition. BTW, only 2 classes natively fit that definition, and one, Paladin, gets nearly everything the Cleric gets, just a few more baubles at the cost of spell depth.

So, this really sounds more like 'if War gets extra attack, then what's the point of Paladin', but I would hope you'd realize the vast mechanical differences between a Paladin and a War Cleric with an extra attack bolted on... It's akin, to the difference between Nature Cleric and Druid. They overlap a LOT but not enough that people stop playing one or the other because they both exist. Paladins bring a lot of utility that a War Cleric doesn't. War Clerics bring a lot of spell depth that Paladins don't... both can exist quite happily, side by side, in the same party even, without really stomping on each other's niche.

[diplomancer]

what is your definition of 'heavily armored melee bruiser'? Because it sounds like the only criteria that matters to you is: heavy armor proficiency, martial weapon proficiency, 1 extra attack. If that's your definition, then sure, granting War at whatever level, an extra attack will fulfill that exceedingly broad and not particularly useful definition. BTW, only 2 classes natively fit that definition, and one, Paladin, gets nearly everything the Cleric gets, just a few more baubles at the cost of spell depth.

First, allow me to make a correction. Better (or more flexible) than "Heavily Armoured Melee Bruiser" would be just "Str Melee Bruiser"; this would include also Barbarians and the odd STRangers. But I mean just that; a character that goes into melee with a great big weapon and beats down the monsters. No full caster, except possibly the Hexblade Bladelock, at the cost of two invocations, (and they get a lot of flak), can really do this very easily, nor do I think they should be able to do it very easily. I really believe they should not be able to do that and then still drop a Spiritual Weapon on top of that for their Bonus Action, when Martials, if they want to have that bonus action, have to spend a feat.


So, this really sounds more like 'if War gets extra attack, then what's the point of Paladin', but I would hope you'd realize the vast mechanical differences between a Paladin and a War Cleric with an extra attack bolted on... It's akin, to the difference between Nature Cleric and Druid. They overlap a LOT but not enough that people stop playing one or the other because they both exist. Paladins bring a lot of utility that a War Cleric doesn't. War Clerics bring a lot of spell depth that Paladins don't... both can exist quite happily, side by side, in the same party even, without really stomping on each other's niche.

In a way, yes. It would be hard to justify not going straight to War Cleric 6, then just getting 2 levels of Paladin; notice that similar attempts with Swords Bard or Valor Bard, though less MAD, run into the problem of having to start with Paladin 1 for the Heavy Armor Proficiency; which is a bigger cost than I believe people tend to realize. It means sub-optimal levels 2-6... which is about half the game for most tables! Paladins would basically only be worth it for the Aura (which is a very powerful feature, but not, I believe, the only reason to play a Paladin), and maybe the steed.

[Amnestic]

Take a good look at the Cleric class feature descriptions and the table at 8th level. It is labeled as Divine Domain feature. There's nothing more than an implication to support the idea that it's either Divine Strike or Potent Spellcasting. That is, it's not written in stone (RAW) as such. Nothing, and I stress, nothing is preventing the 8th level Divine Domain feature to be something else entirely.

Honestly I wish they would add more variance 8th level features, because DS/PS are so boring.

Alas, we're a bit too late in the game's existence for that to happen now.

[5eNeedsDarksun]

Let me try to make my point clearer. Currently, martials have some niches. They get rarer and rarer as the edition advances, but they still exist. One niche that they still have is "heavily armoured melee bruiser". You can't really do it with casters without dipping (the feat is way too expensive, and usually comes in too late). Giving War Cleric Extra Attack would be an invasion on that niche. No, this doesn't mean that no one will ever play a heavily armoured melee bruiser martial again, nor does it mean that if someone wants to try to play this boosted War Cleric then they hate martials and were only playing martials becasue they were forced to; but there will be less of them. Nor does it mean that some other builds can't have that niche at an opportunity cost, assuming common variant rules. A niche invasion does not necessarily lead to species' extinctions. But it still can unbalance an ecosystem, and should not be allowed lightly.

And the fact that you can play a good "heavily armoured melee controller" as a Cleric has really nothing to do with this, Clerics already have that option, and control is not the best niche for martials in general, so I really have no idea what Thorn Whip has to do with this. Obviously, if you're using Thorn Whip, you don't care about Extra Attack (unless you want War Clerics to not only have Extra Attack, but the Bladesinger's Extra Attack+)


I don't think any such person exists, nor does my argument require such a person to exist.

You're aligning with my thinking with regards to this thread. There are a number of full caster subclasses that get very close to 'as good as a martial' with the proper build/ investment once level 6 rolls around. The issue with clerics is that they already have good armor options and good hp. Along with that they have solid combat spell selection through tier 2; I've found them consistently at the top of the heap at these levels (and this doesn't include twilight or peace which are banned at my table)
As much as it seems like it would be great to paste extra attack, or something close to it, onto a War Cleric, I think that feature alone would step on too many toes, more so with another damage bump at 8th.

[diplomancer]

You're aligning with my thinking with regards to this thread. There are a number of full caster subclasses that get very close to 'as good as a martial' with the proper build/ investment once level 6 rolls around. The issue with clerics is that they already have good armor options and good hp. Along with that they have solid combat spell selection through tier 2; I've found them consistently at the top of the heap at these levels (and this doesn't include twilight or peace which are banned at my table)
As much as it seems like it would be great to paste extra attack, or something close to it, onto a War Cleric, I think that feature alone would step on too many toes, more so with another damage bump at 8th.

As I've said, I'd be inclined to try out letting the bonus action attack become at-will at level 6; then he has a pseudo Extra Attack that takes up the bonus action, which makes him a good bruiser, but still behind the dedicated martial bruisers... which is where he should be (since he has other features to compensate for that).

[5eNeedsDarksun]

As I've said, I'd be inclined to try out letting the bonus action attack become at-will at level 6; then he has a pseudo Extra Attack that takes up the bonus action, which makes him a good bruiser, but still behind the dedicated martial bruisers... which is where he should be (since he has other features to compensate for that).

I think that would be a happy medium in a game with feats.

[Theodoxus]

First, allow me to make a correction. Better (or more flexible) than "Heavily Armoured Melee Bruiser" would be just "Str Melee Bruiser"; this would include also Barbarians and the odd STRangers. But I mean just that; a character that goes into melee with a great big weapon and beats down the monsters. No full caster, except possibly the Hexblade Bladelock, at the cost of two invocations, (and they get a lot of flak), can really do this very easily, nor do I think they should be able to do it very easily. I really believe they should not be able to do that and then still drop a Spiritual Weapon on top of that for their Bonus Action, when Martials, if they want to have that bonus action, have to spend a feat.

In a way, yes. It would be hard to justify not going straight to War Cleric 6, then just getting 2 levels of Paladin; notice that similar attempts with Swords Bard or Valor Bard, though less MAD, run into the problem of having to start with Paladin 1 for the Heavy Armor Proficiency; which is a bigger cost than I believe people tend to realize. It means sub-optimal levels 2-6... which is about half the game for most tables! Paladins would basically only be worth it for the Aura (which is a very powerful feature, but not, I believe, the only reason to play a Paladin), and maybe the steed.

Got it. Seems to me the best options would either remove Heavy Armor Proficiency (HAP) from Clerics, so they're gravitating towards Dex builds (which really is my 'problem' with Death, they become quite MAD if you're wanting to use strength weapons, especially if you're not grabbing HAP somehow.) or do something like D&DOne is, where the Cleric is granted HAP but only at the cost of not getting something else (and then, ideally, that something else is generally more useful to the class than just HAP), so the player, if choosing HAP, is actually building towards that, and is sacrificing better options (for Clerics) in the process.

I definitely agree that a blanket boon to the class shouldn't be granted. But a calculated (with WotC, that's definitely laughable) exchange of Better for less Optimal is exactly what I'd like to see.

[Mongobear]

I mentioned this earlier, but I have heavily house ruled the War Domain every time ive tried to DM for someone using it. Sometimes, they are fine with Level 8 just being Extra Attack, others they want a complete rework, so I have let them use the Battle domain from Solasta, Crown of the Magister. It does everything War domain wants to do, but better.


Domain Spels
1st - Magic Missile, Shield of Faith
2nd - Acid Arrow, Flaming Sphere
3rd - Fireball, Haste
4th - Stoneskin, Phantasmal Killer
5th - Hold Monster, Insect Plague

Level 1

Martial Weapons, Light + Medium and Shield Proficiency.

Battle Magic - You can perform somatic components for spells while wielding a weapon or shield in each hand.

Divine Fortitude - Use your action to gain 3 temp hp per Cleric level. Recharges on a Long Rest.


Level 2

CD: Turn Undead - (Same wording as every other version.)

Channel Divinity: Decisive Strike - When you strike with a melee weapon attack, you may deal +1d6 weapon damage, and the target must make a CON save or become stunned until the end of your next turn. The bonus damage increases by +1d6 every 3 levels beyond 2nd.

Level 6

Herald of Battle - Allies within 10 feet of you receive a +1 bonus to attack rolls, saves, AC, and weapon damage.

Level 8

Scholar of Battle - You gain the Extra Attack ability.


Their last Domain features is at 17th, so not included since the game caps at 16th level, so you'd need to come up with something if/when your game gets that high.

[Theodoxus]

I mentioned this earlier, but I have heavily house ruled the War Domain every time ive tried to DM for someone using it. Sometimes, they are fine with Level 8 just being Extra Attack, others they want a complete rework, so I have let them use the Battle domain from Solasta, Crown of the Magister. It does everything War domain wants to do, but better.

Level 1

Martial Weapons, Light + Medium and Shield Proficiency.

Battle Magic - You can perform somatic components for spells while wielding a weapon or shield in each hand.

Divine Fortitude - Use your action to gain 3 temp hp per Cleric level. Recharges on a Long Rest.


Level 2

CD: Turn Undead - (Same wording as every other version.)

Channel Divinity: Decisive Strike - When you strike with a melee weapon attack, you may deal +1d6 weapon damage, and the target must make a CON save or become stunned until the end of your next turn. The bonus damage increases by +1d6 every 3 levels beyond 2nd.

Level 6

Herald of Battle - Allies within 10 feet of you receive a +1 bonus to attack rolls, saves, AC, and weapon damage.

Level 8

Scholar of Battle - You gain the Extra Attack ability.


Their last Domain features is at 17th, so not included since the game caps at 16th level, so you'd need to come up with something if/when your game gets that high.

I'm a fan of a lot of Solasta's subclasses. Though they are definitely built/modified for a CRPG more than a TTRPG, but most are quite fun, some are OP (Raven for Rogue and Moon for Warlock are definitely over the top - I went through the whole campaign using four Moonies, hiding in Darkness with Devil's Sight and being invisible meant the monsters just readied actions, but since they couldn't see into the Darkness, I had 4 unanswerable repelling blast EBs (8 at 5th, etc) that critted on a 19 (stupid powerful feats, like Cantrips crit on a 19)... Awesome fun playing solo against AI... broken at the table.

Given that the only Cleric domain that grants HAP is Life, I think Battle is fine - though you will be burning a feat or MCing for anything better than half-plate... which basically harkens back to the MADness issue of Big Weapons on a Medium Armor chassis...

[Mongobear]

I'm a fan of a lot of Solasta's subclasses. Though they are definitely built/modified for a CRPG more than a TTRPG, but most are quite fun, some are OP (Raven for Rogue and Moon for Warlock are definitely over the top - I went through the whole campaign using four Moonies, hiding in Darkness with Devil's Sight and being invisible meant the monsters just readied actions, but since they couldn't see into the Darkness, I had 4 unanswerable repelling blast EBs (8 at 5th, etc) that critted on a 19 (stupid powerful feats, like Cantrips crit on a 19)... Awesome fun playing solo against AI... broken at the table.

Given that the only Cleric domain that grants HAP is Life, I think Battle is fine - though you will be burning a feat or MCing for anything better than half-plate... which basically harkens back to the MADness issue of Big Weapons on a Medium Armor chassis...

Ive been playing it a lot recently with the new expansion coming out last week.

I use their options, as well as some of the mod additions for it for inspiration for my own games, usually with a bit of a tuning pass, never a straight port from game to table.

[5eNeedsDarksun]

I mentioned this earlier, but I have heavily house ruled the War Domain every time ive tried to DM for someone using it. Sometimes, they are fine with Level 8 just being Extra Attack, others they want a complete rework, so I have let them use the Battle domain from Solasta, Crown of the Magister. It does everything War domain wants to do, but better.


Domain Spels
1st - Magic Missile, Shield of Faith
2nd - Acid Arrow, Flaming Sphere
3rd - Fireball, Haste
4th - Stoneskin, Phantasmal Killer
5th - Hold Monster, Insect Plague

Level 1

Martial Weapons, Light + Medium and Shield Proficiency.

Battle Magic - You can perform somatic components for spells while wielding a weapon or shield in each hand.

Divine Fortitude - Use your action to gain 3 temp hp per Cleric level. Recharges on a Long Rest.


Level 2

CD: Turn Undead - (Same wording as every other version.)

Channel Divinity: Decisive Strike - When you strike with a melee weapon attack, you may deal +1d6 weapon damage, and the target must make a CON save or become stunned until the end of your next turn. The bonus damage increases by +1d6 every 3 levels beyond 2nd.

Level 6

Herald of Battle - Allies within 10 feet of you receive a +1 bonus to attack rolls, saves, AC, and weapon damage.

Level 8

Scholar of Battle - You gain the Extra Attack ability.


Their last Domain features is at 17th, so not included since the game caps at 16th level, so you'd need to come up with something if/when your game gets that high.

I've got to wonder though, if you give Extra attack at 8th (even in exchange for the current CD option and the existing cleric damage bump at 8th) how does this compare to some of the weaker martials? Say the weaker Ranger options, which are also Wis based; at 8th, 9th, and 10th is that Ranger a better martial than a Cleric with Extra Attack? If it's not substantially better then the Cleric is overtuned.

[Mongobear]

I've got to wonder though, if you give Extra attack at 8th (even in exchange for the current CD option and the existing cleric damage bump at 8th) how does this compare to some of the weaker martials? Say the weaker Ranger options, which are also Wis based; at 8th, 9th, and 10th is that Ranger a better martial than a Cleric with Extra Attack? If it's not substantially better then the Cleric is overtuned.

Ranger will have a more reliable BA attack going TWFing Style. They also have Hunter's Mark which in a day will likely provide more damage than the "baby smite" CD Battle domain gets.

The big difference will be the sort of shennanigans higher level spells, like Haste can bring vs Ranger's non-Concentration features.

[5eNeedsDarksun]

Ranger will have a more reliable BA attack going TWFing Style. They also have Hunter's Mark which in a day will likely provide more damage than the "baby smite" CD Battle domain gets.

The big difference will be the sort of shennanigans higher level spells, like Haste can bring vs Ranger's non-Concentration features.

By 8th a Cleric has 3 third and 2 forth level spells. If the Ranger is using their concentration for Hunter's Mark, by comparison that's at least 5 combats per day where the Cleric can wade in with Spirit Guardians if that's the priority. Many times at our table Clerics can get 2 combats out of one SG slot. The Cleric is also just as capable of taking a feat to provide a regular BA attack or Telekinetic to drag more enemies into the SG to double that damage in a round on top of the Extra Attack. I'm failing to see any reason to play a Ranger (besides maybe a Gloomstalkier) in a campaign at 8th and beyond where a Cleric can dish it out like this on top of full casting.

[Mongobear]

By 8th a Cleric has 3 third and 2 forth level spells. If the Ranger is using their concentration for Hunter's Mark, by comparison that's at least 5 combats per day where the Cleric can wade in with Spirit Guardians if that's the priority. Many times at our table Clerics can get 2 combats out of one SG slot. The Cleric is also just as capable of taking a feat to provide a regular BA attack or Telekinetic to drag more enemies into the SG to double that damage in a round on top of the Extra Attack. I'm failing to see any reason to play a Ranger (besides maybe a Gloomstalkier) in a campaign at 8th and beyond where a Cleric can dish it out like this on top of full casting.

Im replying to the Bolded part mainly.

Archery would be a big reason, Cleric doesnt get Fighting Styles, so assuming they're burning Feats on getting Archery and SS, they'd have at best a 17 Dex using normal array/point buy. Then that also kind of renders the SG damage very useless, so they'd likely focus on Haste for an extra chance at that -5/+10 hitting.

[Atranen]

I mentioned this earlier, but I have heavily house ruled the War Domain every time ive tried to DM for someone using it. Sometimes, they are fine with Level 8 just being Extra Attack, others they want a complete rework, so I have let them use the Battle domain from Solasta, Crown of the Magister. It does everything War domain wants to do, but better.


Domain Spels
1st - Magic Missile, Shield of Faith
2nd - Acid Arrow, Flaming Sphere
3rd - Fireball, Haste
4th - Stoneskin, Phantasmal Killer
5th - Hold Monster, Insect Plague

Level 1

Martial Weapons, Light + Medium and Shield Proficiency.

Battle Magic - You can perform somatic components for spells while wielding a weapon or shield in each hand.

Divine Fortitude - Use your action to gain 3 temp hp per Cleric level. Recharges on a Long Rest.


Level 2

CD: Turn Undead - (Same wording as every other version.)

Channel Divinity: Decisive Strike - When you strike with a melee weapon attack, you may deal +1d6 weapon damage, and the target must make a CON save or become stunned until the end of your next turn. The bonus damage increases by +1d6 every 3 levels beyond 2nd.

Level 6

Herald of Battle - Allies within 10 feet of you receive a +1 bonus to attack rolls, saves, AC, and weapon damage.

Level 8

Scholar of Battle - You gain the Extra Attack ability.


Their last Domain features is at 17th, so not included since the game caps at 16th level, so you'd need to come up with something if/when your game gets that high.

Battle cleric (and many of the Solasta sublcasses) seemed overtuned to me. (To reference the shield thread, I'm running a game now, with Paladin/Cleric/Rogue/Wizard, and every one of them has the shield spell).

Anyway, battle cleric seems to have a great spell list, a great channel divinity, and great additional abilities. The only lackluster one is the "cast without somatic components", and only then because most tables rightly handwave "you can cast VSM with a holy symbol on the shield" to include "you can cast VS with a holy symbol on the shield". The Solasta discussions I've seen rate battle very highly as well.

Does that hold true at the table?

[Kane0]

Id be careful of making even the worst of clerics better, lest we end up with more peaces and twilights. Ive witnessed trickery and nature clerics and they are perfectly fine, base cleric is just that good.

What i could be convinced of is changing up the bonus spells, or removing the requirement of the attack action on war priest.

[Theodoxus]

The War Domain contains this language: "The clerics of such gods excel in battle, inspiring others to fight the good fight or offering acts of violence as prayers."

It seems to me that personal glory isn't really the primary driver, but rather, they should be boosting their allies to make their entire side in a battle be more efficient. As such, the Domain's abilities match pretty well to that design goal.

I could definitely see where War might have had options at each subclass boon, that would allow a specific Cleric to boost on of the two defining points: "Excel in battle" might provide extra attack, but at the cost of War God's Blessing. "Inspiring other to fight the good fight" might provide a 'Twin Spell' option to their single target buffs (divine favor, shield of faith, magic weapon, freedom of movement, etc.) at the cost of War Priest and Divine Strike.

Sadly, Cleric domains aren't built that way (I could definitely see options like this for all the domains).

[Mongobear]

Battle cleric (and many of the Solasta sublcasses) seemed overtuned to me. (To reference the shield thread, I'm running a game now, with Paladin/Cleric/Rogue/Wizard, and every one of them has the shield spell).

Anyway, battle cleric seems to have a great spell list, a great channel divinity, and great additional abilities. The only lackluster one is the "cast without somatic components", and only then because most tables rightly handwave "you can cast VSM with a holy symbol on the shield" to include "you can cast VS with a holy symbol on the shield". The Solasta discussions I've seen rate battle very highly as well.

Does that hold true at the table?

Of the two times ive hinted at when I changed/buffed War domain, yes they excelled, but only in comparison to the normal class features, and not in a way that overshadowed a Paladin's or Barbarian's niche.

When all I did was given War domain Extra Attack at 8th instead of their normal bonus damage, the player was basically a "Paladin-esque" warrior, but with more focus on spellcasting and higher level buffs. Often times, they didn't rely on Extra Attack rounds, they usually tossed out stuff like Haste or other spells, but when it came time that nobody needed Healing or an enemy didnt need locked down, they could whip out their Polearm and go to town on the things hp bar directly, and they were quite satisfied.

When I flat out replaced War with Battle from S:CotM the player was much more of a true melee build. They still used their spells, but almost exclusively for buffs or big AoE like Fireball. They went with GWM + PAM, and usually used Haste as their primary Concentration spell. It reminded me in a lot of ways of a Sorcadin build, strong AC, lots of spells, and only ever so lacking in melee nova damage. They were also the only true melee character, so they didnt have anyone else to overshadow, but they did keep pace with the Gloomstalker and EB spamming Warlock quite well.

[5eNeedsDarksun]

Im replying to the Bolded part mainly.

Archery would be a big reason, Cleric doesnt get Fighting Styles, so assuming they're burning Feats on getting Archery and SS, they'd have at best a 17 Dex using normal array/point buy. Then that also kind of renders the SG damage very useless, so they'd likely focus on Haste for an extra chance at that -5/+10 hitting.

Yes archery is the best fighting style by some margin, and it's one of the things that makes ranged attacks mostly superior to melee (exempting some Str builds with multiple feats), on top of being able to attack from relative safety. Haste is... an OK spell most of the time, unless you're a rogue and can generate a second SA or maybe a gish that is able to cast a spell and use the additional attack to trigger a BA attack. I'm also unconvinced that a character using ranged attacks as the primary option can't use SG, either by controlling the distance between you and enemies, and because XBE exists.

I'm still failing to see how lack of Archery style (and the 1 feat you'd have to spend to get it) compensates for being a full caster vs. a half caster. However you slice it a Cleric with Extra Attack is a really close melee combatant to many of the Ranger subclasses, and probably many subclasses from other martials (baring Paly) as well.

[Mongobear]

Ranger is also notoriously weak if it isn't doing Archery, TWFing suffers from action economy and there's no -5/+10 for them. I feel like you skewed this comparison intentionally to prove a point, when you shouldve used something in the decent to higher functional realm, like a single class Paladin or non-PAM Barbarian.

Just my opinion ofc, but ive never felt the Ranger was a proper representative of the "melee damage dealer" group, so using it as a measuring stick seems odd.

[Kane0]

Ranger is also notoriously weak if it isn't doing Archery, TWFing suffers from action economy and there's no -5/+10 for them. I feel like you skewed this comparison intentionally to prove a point, when you shouldve used something in the decent to higher functional realm, like a single class Paladin or non-PAM Barbarian.

Just my opinion ofc, but ive never felt the Ranger was a proper representative of the "melee damage dealer" group, so using it as a measuring stick seems odd.

Not so much ranger as TWF. Featless its alright (fewer direct competitors in the form of PAM and CBE) but that has been hashed out plenty before.

[5eNeedsDarksun]

Ranger is also notoriously weak if it isn't doing Archery, TWFing suffers from action economy and there's no -5/+10 for them. I feel like you skewed this comparison intentionally to prove a point, when you shouldve used something in the decent to higher functional realm, like a single class Paladin or non-PAM Barbarian.

Just my opinion ofc, but ive never felt the Ranger was a proper representative of the "melee damage dealer" group, so using it as a measuring stick seems odd.

They're both somewhat Wis based and Ranger is 1/2 caster, so it's the closest natural comparison from my point of view. Trying to assess other classes vs a Multi-Attack Cleric is going to be tougher. Monks are also based off Wis, and would fair worse because they're a weaker class. Yes, Barbs do more damage, but not really much of anything else. Fighters are going to be better at single target by 11th, but much like the Barb most of the subclasses don't have a lot going for them outside of combat; maybe an EK, being a 1/3 caster would be a decent comparison. So is EK that much better at single target damage to compensate for being a 1/3 caster vs full? I remain unconvinced. I did say "baring Paly" in my earlier post; I think that remains true. Paly's have Smite and Aura(s) that take them beyond other martials.

Sure there are classes, particularly some subclasses of Fighters and Barbs, that still do more sustained damage than a Multi-Attacking Cleric at tier 2, but those classes don't have much going for them beyond combat. To me Ranger is a fair comparison because, like the Cleric, they actually can perform out of combat and have decent single target damage.

[Mongobear]

They're both somewhat Wis based and Ranger is 1/2 caster, so it's the closest natural comparison from my point of view. Trying to assess other classes vs a Multi-Attack Cleric is going to be tougher. Monks are also based off Wis, and would fair worse because they're a weaker class. Yes, Barbs do more damage, but not really much of anything else. Fighters are going to be better at single target by 11th, but much like the Barb most of the subclasses don't have a lot going for them outside of combat; maybe an EK, being a 1/3 caster would be a decent comparison. So is EK that much better at single target damage to compensate for being a 1/3 caster vs full? I remain unconvinced. I did say "baring Paly" in my earlier post; I think that remains true. Paly's have Smite and Aura(s) that take them beyond other martials.

Sure there are classes, particularly some subclasses of Fighters and Barbs, that still do more sustained damage than a Multi-Attacking Cleric at tier 2, but those classes don't have much going for them beyond combat. To me Ranger is a fair comparison because, like the Cleric, they actually can perform out of combat and have decent single target damage.

I wasn't so much questioning their similarities, just that the measuring stick you settled on happened to not be a good representation of how the game is actually played--the metric you chose is one of the worst contenders for how 5e melee combat is actually done. Considering there are only 3x Wisdom based classes with spells in the entire game, one of which doesnt technically have a "Martial spec" (Moon Druid, while it does attack, it is nowhere near as similar to weapon based combatants). I would have just compared a "Melee Cleric" to the average range of damage output, or even find high Optimized charts and see how it ranks to those vs using one of the weaker options not many actually play.

[stoutstien]

How bout something like:
Domain spells
same as printed

Bonus proficiencies
same as printed.

War priest blessing
At 1st level, you gain the ability to inspire others with the will of your god. At the end of a long rest,you can use your action to touch a willing creature other than yourself to give them benefits of a one fighting style of your choice. This blessing last until the end of your next long rest

Once you use this feature, you can't use it again until you finish a long rest.


Channel Divinity: War God's Guidance

At 2th level, when a creature within 30 feet of you makes an attack roll, you can use your reaction to grant that creature a +10 bonus to the roll, using your Channel Divinity. You make this choice after you see the roll, but before the DM says whether the attack hits or misses.

Call To Arms

Starting at level 6, you can further inspire other who stand with you in battle. When you take the attack action on your turn choose one ally within 39 that can see or hear you, that target gains temporarily hit points equal to 5 +half your cleric levels. If that target is also benefiting from your war priest blessing they gain advantage on the next attack roll they make before the start of your next turn. These temporary hit points vanish if the target starts thier turn more than 30 feet away from you or at the end of thier next short or long rest.

Divine Strike

At 8th level, you gain the ability to infuse weapon strikes with divine energy. Once on each of your turns when the target of your war priest blessing a creature with a weapon attack, you can cause the attack to deal an extra 1d8 damage of the same type dealt by the weapon to the target. When you reach 14th level, the extra damage increases to 2d8.


Avatar of Battle- same as printed.

[Amnestic]

Looking at the big up the 'war leader' aspect instead of the 'martial' aspect:-

Keeping the proficiencies the same.


War Priest
From 1st level, your god delivers bolts of inspiration to you while you are engaged in battle. As a bonus action, you can command a willing creature you can see to strike. They may immediately use their reaction to move up to 30ft and make one weapon attack.

You can use this feature a number of times equal to your Wisdom modifier (a minimum of once). You regain all expended uses when you finish a long rest.

Channel Divinity: Guided Strike
Starting at 2nd level, you can use your Channel Divinity to strike with supernatural accuracy. When a friendly creature you can see makes an attack roll, you can use your reaction to use your Channel Divinity to add a +10 bonus to the roll. You make this choice after you see the roll, but before the DM says whether the attack hits or misses.

War God's Blessing
At 6th level, you no longer have a usage limit on War Priest. In addition, the creature you inspire adds your wisdom modifier to the damage roll.

Divine Strike
At 8th level, you gain the ability to infuse your weapon strikes with divine energy. Once on each of your turns when the creature you inspired with War Priest hits a creature with a weapon attack, you can cause the attack to deal an extra 1d8 damage of the same type dealt by the weapon to the target. When you reach 14th level, the extra damage increases to 2d8.

Avatar of Battle
At 17th level, you gain resistance to bludgeoning, piercing, and slashing damage from nonmagical attacks.

In addition, when you use War Priest, you can choose to transfer this resistance from yourself to the target ally, which lasts until the start of your next turn.

While it's not quite the Warlord of yore, it does evoke some similar aspects of it, while still being on top of the cleric chassis.

[Psyren]

I don't think any such person exists, nor does my argument require such a person to exist.

Neither do I, which is why I think that fears like "one less reason to play a martial" and "there will be less of them" are unlikely to be realized in practice simply by letting certain caster subclasses access Extra Attack.

I agree that martials should have niches at high levels, which is why I'm advocating for things like tier 3/4 Barbarians getting the ability to sunder or disrupt magical effects etc.

[Mongobear]

Neither do I, which is why I think that fears like "one less reason to play a martial" and "there will be less of them" are unlikely to be realized in practice simply by letting certain caster subclasses access Extra Attack.

I agree that martials should have niches at high levels, which is why I'm advocating for things like tier 3/4 Barbarians getting the ability to sunder or disrupt magical effects etc.

Tbh, Barbarian likely needs the least amount of help out of all the Martial only classes. (the ones that, in my opinion, are in the most need are non-Archery Ranger and Monks).

Barb has insane survivability and on-demand Advantage.

Fighters has weight of Dice and Action Surges, plus extra Feats/ASIs so they can grab those extra utility options of diversify their combat abilities.

Rogues can just one shot a lot of things, or at worst, make sure their single attack REALLY hurts. and have Cunning Action to always where they need to be.

Paladin is just Paladin, for every merit Barbarian has going for it's survivability, Paladin matches in offensive output, plus they have their Save aura.

Ranger has Archery going for it, but a well built Fighter or Rogue can match their output, if not surpass it, depending on level.

Monks though... yeesh. hits like a wet noodle, pretty lackluster archetypes, and just genuinely has never felt impressive, and I almost always have that 5th-6th party member show up as one 'trying to make it work with this cool build idea' and they just devolves in a shove/stun bot with almost meaningless damage output. Like, I know not everything can be the best, but there should at least be options that can get close in some way.

[Psyren]

Monk needs help, no question. Ranger... based on the playtests I think the base class is in a solid spot. The capstone needs to be buffed sure, and Tireless has crappy scaling, but the rest is a big step up from 2014 and that plus their spells (especially now that they're prepared) give them plenty of scaling to high levels imo.

[Theodoxus]

If monk is seen not as the big damage boom guy (we have plenty of those), but rather as the 'kill stealing, never going to overkill anything' guy, then build towards that, it would be a pretty unique place in the game.

I've been looking at options, and so far, the one I like the most is to grant Monks 'flurry of blows' dice like Rogue's sneak attack. A rogue gets 1d6 sneak every odd level, and a Monk should get 1d6 Flurry attack every odd level. Sure, they could go all '100 hands' on the boss, trying to get every attack to land; but the ideal is to spread the love around the battlefield. Tapping out baddies who've been softened up by the rest of the team.

Martial Arts would still scale in die size, but I'm not sure the Monk's flurry die should necessarily. On the one hand, if every attack hit, and Flurry was dealing a d10, then Rogues would be sad. OTOH, because not every attack is guaranteed to hit, the extra few points of damage offset that... so, I'm open to the idea - just didn't want to get flamed down with "OMG, at 20th, a Monk is dealing like 10d10 a round! That's too OP!"

[Kane0]

Monks are pretty great finishers, yeah.

[CTurbo]

I don't want to derail this thread too much talking about Monks, but I think they are better than most people seem to think. There are a few small tweaks I'd make, but I don't think they're in need of a major overhaul. If somebody wants to make a thread about Monks I'll happily join in.


After reading through peoples' thoughts on the War Cleric, I've decided that the War Cleric probably should not have a full time unrestricted Extra Attack at least not without making some other changes. I do think that the Cleric's defensive capabilities as well as the Paladin's existence is the reason why no Cleric domain was granted a full Extra Attack. However, I do still think War Priest needs to be better than Wis mod per long rest. Like I think I said in the first or post, we've long houseruled that War Priest's extra attack is now a part of the Attack Action instead of the Bonus Action, and this has been a pretty good success for us, BUT I don't think this idea would work 'officially' because it's too strong a feature when multiclassing is taken into consideration. I already think War is a decent 1 level dip for every martial class, but if the extra attack was attacked to the Attack Action, unless specifically worded to not combine with the normal Extra Attack, then War Cleric would become an amazing dip for Fighters, Rangers, Rogues, and even Barbs. I don't play with anybody that would exploit it so it's not a concern at my tables.

I was surprised to see so many votes in the poll thread for the extra attack. I'm actually leaning towards War Priest becoming a Short Rest resource.

[Amnestic]

Could crib from D&DOne and make it an LR resource that gets a partial recharge on an SR, whether that be 1 use or 1/2 wismod uses, or something similar.

Though at that point perhaps just making it an SR resource would work too, idk.