[3.5] Cloistered Cleric 20 - Emulating Arcane Caster

[Thurbane]

So, a character I want to play in a future camping: I want to build a single classed Cloistered Cleric, who can emulate a Wizard or other arcane caster as much as possible without multiclassing or PrCing.

Will be starting at level 1, standard PC generation methods, standard WBL, playing right through to 20 with any luck.

By emulate an arcanist, let's assume I mean the character will be filling the role in the party traditionally filled by a Wizard or Sorcerer.

So far, I'm looking at Magic and Spell domains, and swapping the Knowledge domain out for the Divine Magician ACF.

What else would you suggest, in terms of feats, skills, gear etc.

Usual restrictions for my table: no PF, no Kalamar, no Ravenloft, no other 3rd party; no home brew; Dragon and Dungeon only material frowned on, apart from the Compendium; no artificers, psionics or incarnum.

And again, no multiclassing or PrCing, for reasons...

Also, no infinite loops or extreme cheese, please.

[Biffoniacus_Furiou]

Try to get the Raiment of the Four set in MIC, which gets you Magic Missile, Fireball, and Teleport.

UMD a (custom) Runestaff maybe?

Get plenty of wands, or even something like an Ancestral Relic Staff, which you can activate thanks to the Magic domain.

Take Magical Training feat for a spellbook that you can add more spells to per the Rules Compendium, then you won't need to borrow a spellbook for Anyspell and Greater Anyspell. Being able to cast those 0-level arcane spells also makes Eternal Wands available to you.

You can use pearls of power to recover Anyspell and Greater Anyspell and use them again, but probably only after you've cast the spell you prepared with it. You can also use pearls to recover the arcane spells you've prepared and cast using those.

Actually, going back and re-reading what a Pearl of Power does, it doesn't specify that it must recover a spell you'd cast today. So prepare and cast a dozen different spells using (Greater) Anyspell over as many days, then a 2nd/5th level Pearl of Power can recover any one of those and make it immediately available again.

[Ramza00]

This is the frown upon section, and may not be worth a feat. But the customize domain feat from Dragon 325 has this power for users of the magic domain.

Magic: Any kind of spell, but you must select a spell one level lower than normal.

[Anthrowhale]

Apprentice[Spellcaster] + Channel Charge + partially charged staffs allows you to fake it. Essentially, off-list spells can be spontaneously cast as a spell one level higher. This also potentially frees up the Magic domain, although I'm not sure what you would use it for. Maybe Transformation? Or Demonic? Those have several nice wizard spells.

You might consider the spontaneous domain ACF, which enables casting Anyspell multiple times.

Some time ago, I looked into Divine Magician and came up with this list to pick from.

Spoiler: Divine Magician Spells

Show

Level 9
Srinshee's Spellshift
Disjunction
Absorption
Elminster's Effulgent Epuration
Foresight //Never Surprised
Wail of the Banshee //Mass Fort-or-die

Level 8
Mind Blank
Moment of Prescience
Avascular Mass
Mystic Shield

Level 7
Antimagic Ray //If you are an Initiate of Mystra
Righteous Glare
Avasculate

Level 6
Kyristans Malevolent Tentacles // Draining black tentacles
Probe Thoughts //Will-or-reveal
Starmantle

Level 5
Magic Jar
Telepathic Bond
Duelward // counterspell as immediate action
Shard blessing aura // mobile lesser globe

Level 4
Ray Deflection
Otiluke's Suppressing Field
Finger of Agony Fort-or-lose
Enervation

Level 3
Undead Lieutenant //increase control pool
Anticipate Teleportation
Nondetection //difficult to divine

Level 2
Spectral Hand //L4- touch spells at range medium
Command Undead //Charm for day/level against undead
Arcane Turmoil //Targeted Dispel
See Invisibility
Scintillating Scales // natural armor -> deflection

Level 1
True Strike //+20 to hit
Instant Locksmith //disable device as a swift action
Guided Shot //no range penalty

The frowned-by-your-table approach is the Arcane Disciple cleric variant in Dragon #311. It's more straightforward, but plausibly no more powerful.

[Saintheart]

From cleric level 3: Initiate of Mystra, from PGtF. Explicitly, no dodgy RAW required, adds Anyspell and Greater Anyspell to the cleric list, it's no longer just a domain spell. Fill up all your level 1-6 slots with arcane spells, not just the domain slots. Likely frees you up from having the Spell domain at all if you don't want the extra domain slot. 7th level spells and above, I think you're down to staves and the Magic domain.

There's also Initiate of Vecna from Dragon 342 which allows you to use staves level-for-level as a Wizard, but that's pretty much incompatible.

[Maat Mons]

Actually, even if you cast Anyspell from a non-domain slot, the result is still an arcane spell prepared in a domain slot.

[Saintheart]

Actually, even if you cast Anyspell from a non-domain slot, the result is still an arcane spell prepared in a domain slot.

I doubt it would be a giant leap of RAI - given the fact Initiate of Mystra outright says "The anyspell and greater anyspell spells also appear on the Spell domain list. With this feat, you can cast them as regular cleric spells, not just domain spells." - to conclude the arcane spell is prepared and comes from a cleric slot, not a domain slot.

[Ger. Bessa]

Too bad for PrC, prestige Paladin/Ranger + Sword of the Arcane Order would have done the trick relatively cleanly.

[Endarire]

Dweomerkeeper just seems right with this build and the feat Arcane Training.

[ThanatosZero]

From Dragon Magazine, we have the "Arcane Disciple" variant class from Issue#311, which is a specialist cleric.

In general, specialist clerics do not have spellslots for domain spells (except the evangelist, which is a much better Favored Soul), no ability to turn undead, the ability to spontanously cast any cure or inflict spells.
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They can add one arcane spell per level from the bard, sorcerer and wizard spelllists to their cleric spelllist, up to one level lower then the highest divine level they can cast at the moment. Also all spells from the magic domain are added to the cleric spelllist.

In addition they gain at 1st, 5th, 10th, 15th and 20th level a bonus feat, which must be either a metamagic or a item creation feat.
They have d6 HD, medium BAB, 4 skillpoints per level, proficient with all simple weapons, light- and medium armor, and with shields (except tower shields).
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In addition I recommend the metamagic feat "Alternative Source Spell" from Issue#325 of the Urge to Theurge article.
It converts a prepared spell, for the price of one caster level, from a arcane spell to divine spell and vice versa.
The only prerequisite is the ability to prepare spells and have access to both arcane and divine spellcasting.
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Combine this with the feats "Magical Training" (gain spellbook, can prepare and cast 0th arcane level spells with CL1)
and "Academic Priest" (INT is used for spellcasting, DCs and bonus spells)
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As a result you become a divine caster, which is sucessfull in emulating the wizard.
Instead of Arcane Disciple you can still use Archivist, which can learn any spell, which is converted to a divine spell.

[Telonius]

You could use the "phone a friend" option - if there's a particular Wizard spell you want, Summon or Bind something that can cast it.

[Ger. Bessa]

By emulate an arcanist, let's assume I mean the character will be filling the role in the party traditionally filled by a Wizard or Sorcerer.

While you could try to do everything (but should you?), could we get a list of what you want (roles and spells) ?

-Battlefield Control (BFC - fogs, tentacles, grease)?
-Summonning (SM I-IX) you already have those.
-Buffing (Haste/Fly/Polymorph)?
-Debuffing (Enervation/Glitterdust/Silence) ?
-Divination - you already have a lot of those.
-Minionmancy (Necro/Planar Ally/Binding) ?
-Enchantment (Charm/Dominate)?
-SoL - You have a ton of those.
-Blasting ?
-Logistics (Rope trick/Teleport) ?

How much of it do you want and for which of those do you feel the cleric spells aren't enough ?

Could you have all you want with cleric spells + a couple domains and a bag of scrolls or do we need to find a way to add the whole Sor/Wiz list ?

You could play a pious wizard and call him a cleric. Fills the role and single classed.

Also I've seen Runestaff suggested. It would be awesome with the magic domain (and Ancestral Relic is all that's needed) but they need to be powered by arcane spells :(

Would magical training, alternative source spell (or southern magician) and ancestral relic to fill the runestaff with spells you don't know work ? I don't really know ASS and SM that much.

EDIT : Alternative Source Spell works, you can prepare your normal spells as arcane so you can power up your relic runestaff (Dragon 325). Southern Magician doesn't as they are still prepared as divine. You can use the runestaff easily with the Magic Domain.

[Maat Mons]

If you've got Anyspell, you can use it to craft scrolls and wands of spells not on the Cleric spell list. And if you've got the Magic domain, you can also use those scrolls and wands. So Scribe Scroll and Craft Wand could be good choices. You don't strictly speaking need them. But if you don't have them, you'll need a steady supply of scrolls and wands crafted by someone else to make use of the Magic domain's granted power.

Since your effective Wizard level for activating scrolls is only half your Cleric level, you'll often find yourself in the position of needing to roll a caster level check to successfully activate a scroll of a level-appropriate spell. The Arcane Mastery feat (Complete Arcane, p73) lets you take 10 on caster level checks. This results in you getting a 100% success rate on any level-appropriate scroll. And depending on your level, it also guarantees success when activating scrolls way above your level. The errata for Complete Arcane even adds the ability to take 10 during combat to the benefits of Arcane Mastery.

If you decide to go with Arcane Mastery, you'll need either arcane spellcasting or a spell-like ability to meet the prerequisites. Gnome is an obvious way to get SLAs. Some spirit folk work too. And if you can use the "lesser" variants, many planetouched are options. Alternately, there's the Magical Training feat. Or there are quite a few feats that grant spell-like abilities. Though I'd say dragonmarks are overall better than those feats in Complete Arcane. In particular, mark of passage and mark of hospitality look good.

[Thurbane]

While you could try to do everything (but should you?), could we get a list of what you want (roles and spells) ?

-Battlefield Control (BFC - fogs, tentacles, grease)?
-Summonning (SM I-IX) you already have those.
-Buffing (Haste/Fly/Polymorph)?
-Debuffing (Enervation/Glitterdust/Silence) ?
-Divination - you already have a lot of those.
-Minionmancy (Necro/Planar Ally/Binding) ?
-Enchantment (Charm/Dominate)?
-SoL - You have a ton of those.
-Blasting ?
-Logistics (Rope trick/Teleport) ?

As many of these as possible (i.e. a generalist), but main priorities (on top of what a Cleric can already do) would be:

1. BFC
2. Debuffing
3. Blasting (and yes, I know it's not at all optimal)

[Ramza00]

Two nice cleric spells that are also sorc wizard are the 4th level spell Wall of Sand.

Sandstorm has a version, Spell Compendium has a version, they are very diffferent even if they share the same name, and both books came out in 2005.

The Spell Compendium version is like a solid fog except the wall of sand is creating a sand storm like effect. The wall makes you blind, deaf, you can not speak, and you suffocate, and you can drop it on someone with no save and they are suck for 1 full round. During that full round they can make a strength check to move. The Str check is 15 to move 5 feet, 20 to move 10 feet, 25 to move 15 feet, 30 to move 20 feet, and so on. But since it is a Str check that means a person with 10 Str needs to roll 15 or higher to move even 5 feet, a 10 Str character who rolls 14 moves 0 feet. A tiger with 30 strength by contrast needs only a 5 on the roll to move 5 feet. No one can take 10 or 20 for they are in combat.

Also the people in the Wall of Sand can not cast any spell with a verbal component, and other spells have a concentration check of 20+Spell Level.

Since the spell is shapable you can make any shape that is a straight line that is at least 10 feet thick, so feel free to create squares or rectangles to make it hard to escape this battlefield control spell. It is a temporary battlefield remove unless we are dealing with large creatures, or they have freedom of movement. Even if they are strong enough to walk through you traded your standard action for their full round action and likely affected multiple people. Also wind does not blow it away!

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Now the sandstorm wall of sand is a wall spell made out of actual sand and it has its own pros and cons for a 4th level walk spell. But once again a Cleric can cast it.

[Anthrowhale]

If you decide to go with Arcane Mastery, you'll need either arcane spellcasting or a spell-like ability to meet the prerequisites.

The Animal Domain is a natural approach for a cleric.

[lylsyly]

Perhaps a little outside the box you are looking in but how about generic divine spellcaster from UA p.77.
You would have to deal with the whole spells known thing but you would get casting in full armor without ASF. And get any spell from the Clc/Drd/Sorc/Wiz lists. Get more spells per day then the CC as well. Just a thought.

[Thurbane]

Perhaps a little outside the box you are looking in but how about generic divine spellcaster from UA p.77.
You would have to deal with the whole spells known thing but you would get casting in full armor without ASF. And get any spell from the Clc/Drd/Sorc/Wiz lists. Get more spells per day then the CC as well. Just a thought.

Appreciate the suggestion, but those variants simply do not exist at my table.