Shepherd Druid versus Twilight Cleric

[Snig]

So do you do campaign and having a really tough time deciding between these two classes. I understand that they have quite different play styles with the shepherd druid being mainly a summoner build, but I'm curious what you guys would consider the more powerful and effective class?

[strangebloke]

As a class, I would say twilight is more power. The THP it grants refreshes constantly and the twilight cleric also has ridiculous darkvision and flight. Better options for boosting AC as well.

The reason shepherds is arguably better comes down to the spell list. While clerics have a couple truly amazing spells (spiritual weapon, spirit guardians) most of their spells are healing or utility, and their list REALLY drops off hard in the late game.

Druids for contrast have some of the best spells in the game. Spike Growth, Pass Without Trace... but most particularly they have one spell: conjure animals, which is a contender for the msot busted spell in the game, and shepherds druids excel at using it. I ran the numbers recently and you can drop something like 90 damage in a single turn with elk and a kobold druid, and if that druid is a shepherds druid they can make those elk tanky enough to survive a fireball (though admittedly not on the same turn they summon the elk.)

[Hael]

So do you do campaign and having a really tough time deciding between these two classes. I understand that they have quite different play styles with the shepherd druid being mainly a summoner build, but I'm curious what you guys would consider the more powerful and effective class?

If you put Chronurgist and Peace cleric there, you have the who’s who of the most busted classes in the game. They are all so powerful its kinda not even clear how you would be able to rate them against each other. How do you win more in DnD?

The Shepherd in particular is sensitive to how your DM runs combat and the conjure animal/fey spells.

As far as playstyles. I personally find Shepherd druids to be really fun to play, especially if you get to pick your animal (and then you self police yourself from picking elks, velociraptors and other broken combos).

[sithlordnergal]

I prefer Shepard Druid, mostly because I find Clerics to be pretty trash. They have a horrible spell list, their abilities are subpar and unimpressive...I've just never been wow'd by them. Sure, Twilight Cleric can give a lot of Temp HP, but that's not enough to make up for the core class' shortcomings. Meanwhile Shepard Druid takes one of the most OP spells in the game, and makes it even stronger. While keeping all the power of the Druid spell list to boot.

[strangebloke]

I prefer Shepard Druid, mostly because I find Clerics to be pretty trash. They have a horrible spell list, their abilities are subpar and unimpressive...I've just never been wow'd by them. Sure, Twilight Cleric can give a lot of Temp HP, but that's not enough to make up for the core class' shortcomings. Meanwhile Shepard Druid takes one of the most OP spells in the game, and makes it even stronger. While keeping all the power of the Druid spell list to boot.

Weird take tbh. Clerics don't have great spells at high levels but at lower levels they've got some great hits, along with solid abilities and extra spells from their subclass. Even if you consider druid/wizard/bard/warlock to be better, it seems very strange to call clerics 'trash'.

As for Twilight clerics, the thp is only part of what makes them nutty. For their spell list they get moonbeam, sleep, aura of vitality, greater invisibility. They get advantage on initiative. They give 300 foot darkvision to the whole party. That's all by level 2. They get flight without concentration at level 6.

Its a bit.... yeah. Its a bit much.

[Petelo4f]

So do you do campaign and having a really tough time deciding between these two classes. I understand that they have quite different play styles with the shepherd druid being mainly a summoner build, but I'm curious what you guys would consider the more powerful and effective class?

Harengon Twilight Cleric 1/Shepherd Druid X.

-Full spell slot progression
-Advantage and Proficiency Bonus to Initiative
-Stupid Dark Vision
-Conjure Animals/Conjure Woodland Beings

It all seems like a win/win to me.

[Eldariel]

Harengon Twilight Cleric 1/Shepherd Druid X.

-Full spell slot progression
-Advantage and Proficiency Bonus to Initiative
-Stupid Dark Vision
-Conjure Animals/Conjure Woodland Beings

It all seems like a win/win to me.

Eh. The big broken part of Twilight is the level 2-6 Twilight Sanctuary. I don't think this is really all that amazing; straight Shepherd is generally stronger on many levels (though certainly Druid is one of the classes that can multiclass with other full casters since they have probably the strongest upcastable spells in the game in Conjure Animals and Conjure Woodland Beings). If I wanted to dip, I'd just get Peace Cleric instead. Emboldening Bond is pretty darn strong on a party level and you only need 1 level.

[Miele]

I think druids are more fun. Simple as that.

[Pildion]

So do you do campaign and having a really tough time deciding between these two classes. I understand that they have quite different play styles with the shepherd druid being mainly a summoner build, but I'm curious what you guys would consider the more powerful and effective class?

Lets see, the Twilight Cleric will make your DM hate you, the Shepherd Druid will make everyone hate you =D

For real though, I would play what ever one sounds more fun. Both classes are very powerful and you wont be disappointed or a drag on the team. If your group has alot of melee, I would lean more Cleric, if your melee light, I would lean more Druid.

[Bobthewizard]

If you know the rest of the party, I would recommend a twilight cleric if you have at least two melee characters in the party. The THP will keep them up forever and they can protect the rest of the party.

If you have a squishier party, the shepherd druid can summon tanks for the party to keep the enemy off of all of you.

[Waazraath]

Weird take tbh. Clerics don't have great spells at high levels but at lower levels they've got some great hits, along with solid abilities and extra spells from their subclass. Even if you consider druid/wizard/bard/warlock to be better, it seems very strange to call clerics 'trash'.

As for Twilight clerics, the thp is only part of what makes them nutty. For their spell list they get moonbeam, sleep, aura of vitality, greater invisibility. They get advantage on initiative. They give 300 foot darkvision to the whole party. That's all by level 2. They get flight without concentration at level 6.

Its a bit.... yeah. Its a bit much.

+1. Circle of power (pally 5 spell normally) on the spell list is also very, very strong.

In respons to the OP: personally, I consider both subclass so much above the curve that I wouldn't recommend playing them (and I think the Shepard Druid is boring to boot: https://forums.giantitp.com/showthre...ty-darn-boring ) - but if you want power, they both do fine.

[Sigreid]

Do you want to be a broody edge lord or a Disney Princess?

[sithlordnergal]

Weird take tbh. Clerics don't have great spells at high levels but at lower levels they've got some great hits, along with solid abilities and extra spells from their subclass. Even if you consider druid/wizard/bard/warlock to be better, it seems very strange to call clerics 'trash'.

As for Twilight clerics, the thp is only part of what makes them nutty. For their spell list they get moonbeam, sleep, aura of vitality, greater invisibility. They get advantage on initiative. They give 300 foot darkvision to the whole party. That's all by level 2. They get flight without concentration at level 6.

Its a bit.... yeah. Its a bit much.

I've played a few clerics now, and I've never been impressed by them. They do have decent low level spells, but that's all they have going for them. Their subclass abilities tend to be hit or miss, usually a miss for me. Personally when I play a full caster, I have very little interest in low level spells, and only start becoming interested in the caster when they get 3rd, 4th, and 5th level spells. Though personally I adore playing with 6th, 7th, 8th level spells. And Clerics just don't have anything of note at that level. At least not compared to the Druid, and certainly not compared to the Wizard. This is especially true since I prefer to apply debuffs, damage, or battlefield control...where as all the Cleric does is buff and cast Divination spells. Two types of spells I don't often use and, in the case of Divination, rarely see a use for.

As for the subclass abilities...again, hit or miss, mostly miss for me. The only cleric subclass I've played that I enjoy has been the Death Cleric thanks to the Season 7 AL rewards. Now, they're not all bad. Death Domain is fun, and I usually dip 2 levels into Tempest Cleric for its Channel Divinity when I go Order of Scribes Wizard. But on their own? There's just nothing there that impresses me, or is fun for me.

As such, I view them as a lesser class. Why bother with a Cleric when a Druid or Bard can do their same thing, but have better spell lists and class abilities? Or have a Paladin, which can do everything the Cleric does with a better buff to the party via their aura?

[Chronic]

Wow the fact that you consider that a paladin can do everything a cleric does is fairly telling on how far from reality your opinion is.

[Snig]

I think I've decided to play a druid, but the more I think about it the more I'm leaning toward playing circle of the land. All of the Shepherd Druids features seem geared towards boosting conjure animals, which is already a great spell? Why not get the improved spell casting features of the land Druid becoming more versatile although a little less specialized, and still be able to upcast conjure animals (all of slightly less powerful)?

[Keravath]

I think they are both good. The druid is more dependent on the DMs rulings regarding summoned creatures and how it works. However, the shepherd druid takes good summoning spells and makes them better while also aiding the party.

In addition, depending on which totem the druid drops - the benefits are quite substantial. At level 6, the increased hit points and magical damage for summoned creatures are also a great help (summoned creatures can drop off in effectiveness at higher levels since they don't do magical damage usually).

They are both good picks.

However, one aspect of this thread I consider interesting are the reactions regarding how OP these classes are. So far, that isn't my experience. They are good, they do a few things better than other options and the twilight clerics source of temp hps is pretty cool. However, some or most of these abilities just boost the capabilities of the party. A Twilight cleric just giving themselves a few extra hit points doesn't make much difference. In addition, the encounters are usually somewhat adjusted to make them interesting for the party so having a more powerful party just means more powerful opponents and has nothing to do with individual characters being "OP". In my opinion, none of these are OP.

The only time individual character power becomes an issue is for a party where one character is optimized (like a smiting paladin/sorcerer/warlock with great saves, great spells, smites, and agonizing blast to cover ranged damage) and then the others are not - lower stats, lower DCs, no coordination or team work, attacking 3 targets instead of focusing on one. The DM is then faced with the challenge of scaling an encounter to make it interesting for the optimized character while not killing off the less "optimized" characters.

Shepherd druid might play into this issue if the player isn't efficient and running the summoned creatures takes up more time than the rest of the party together. THAT is the problem with a shepherd druid - not any intrinsic difference in class capabilities. However, I've watched folks efficiently play summoned creatures by rolling color coordinated to hit and damage dice simultaneously after declaring the targets of the attacks and the summoned creatures are done in less time than it takes to play a typical player's turn. So - it comes down to the player running the druid and not the class itself.

Anyway, bottom line for me, I haven't found any of these classes to be "OP" or outshine the party or cause similar issues in actual play.

[Eldariel]

I think I've decided to play a druid, but the more I think about it the more I'm leaning toward playing circle of the land. All of the Shepherd Druids features seem geared towards boosting conjure animals, which is already a great spell? Why not get the improved spell casting features of the land Druid becoming more versatile although a little less specialized, and still be able to upcast conjure animals (all of slightly less powerful)?

Well, first of all, the level 2 Totem is decidedly not just for your summons. E.g. Unicorn totem is a ridiculous amount of healing for the whole party; level 5 Druid healing 1d4+8 and 5 to every other PC with a single Healing Word is Efficient with a capital E. And it works for the whole party; others healing spells are empowered too. OTOH Bear can just dump ~10+ temporary HP on the whole party as a bonus action and let your grapplers wreck people in the face a bit more efficiently.

Second, the big part in Shepherd is magical attacks for your monsters. The single limitation making minionmancy only the strongest option in the game in lowercase as opposed to The Strongest Option In The Game™ is that most summons do halved damage to most of the relevant enemies and are unable to damage some. Shepherd conveniently removes the whole thing while also making the summons durable against their other "counter"; the HP buff from Mighty Summons coupled with Bear Totem as needed suddenly means you have a pack of animals able to take surprising amount of AOE (e.g. a level 9 Druid with Bear Totem can summon 31 HP Elks, which are Fireball proof even on failed save most of the time and can survive pretty brutal breath weapons and such and you can get 16 of them).

It's true that Conjure Animals is really good anyways but Shepherd almost eliminates the few limitations it has making it from "an insanely good spell almost always" to "Option A for every circumstance".

[Hael]

The only time individual character power becomes an issue is for a party where one character is optimized (like a smiting paladin/sorcerer/warlock with great saves, great spells, smites, and agonizing blast to cover ranged damage) and then the others are not -

Shepherd druid might play into this issue if the player isn't efficient and running the summoned creatures takes up more time than the rest of the party together..

While the usual assortment of cha multiclass can be quite strong. They are still within normal martial damage and tanking ranges. Maybe 10-20% better at certain levels.

A shepherd druid with a full assortment of summons might be doing 200-300% better than that. They have just added multiple characters worth of new hitpoints.. Enormously shifted the action economy in their favor. Likely changed the entire map into difficult terrain (a form of CC, nonwithstanding potential CC from the summons). And of course their dpr and nova capabilities are second to none in this game (again a factor of 2-4 better than what martials are producing). Most of the shepherds i’ve played with know how to speed things up for combat, but yes an average player might really bog things down.

From a DMs perspetive, the entire game now becomes how to deal with that problem (so think aoes, and damage auras and open terrain where summon movement becomes a liability). The rest of the party now have only a few known problems left to solve.

A twilight cleric on the other hand, greatly reduces resource attrition. It becomes almost impossible to tax a party with a twilight cleric with anything but extreme deadly encounters. Everything else is a speedbump.

[Nefariis]

Has anyone played a Twilight Cleric 2 / Unicorn Shepard Druid X before?

Healing your druid level AND adding 1d6+2 temp HP every round to EVERY ally within 30 feet of you seems pretty insane.

(Ohh plus you get 300ft darkvision, cleric spells, heavy armor, incredible summons, all that sweet Druid CC, etc. etc. etc.)

I'm curious how it would work in practice, or if the DM would kill you immediate from an arbitrary lightening bolt from the heavens.

[Snig]

While the usual assortment of cha multiclass can be quite strong. They are still within normal martial damage and tanking ranges. Maybe 10-20% better at certain levels.

A shepherd druid with a full assortment of summons might be doing 200-300% better than that. They have just added multiple characters worth of new hitpoints.. Enormously shifted the action economy in their favor. Likely changed the entire map into difficult terrain (a form of CC, nonwithstanding potential CC from the summons). And of course their dpr and nova capabilities are second to none in this game (again a factor of 2-4 better than what martials are producing). Most of the shepherds i’ve played with know how to speed things up for combat, but yes an average player might really bog things down.

From a DMs perspetive, the entire game now becomes how to deal with that problem (so think aoes, and damage auras and open terrain where summon movement becomes a liability). The rest of the party now have only a few known problems left to solve.

A twilight cleric on the other hand, greatly reduces resource attrition. It becomes almost impossible to tax a party with a twilight cleric with anything but extreme deadly encounters. Everything else is a speedbump.

Is this not partially true though for any Druid casting conjure animals? Yes Shepherd Druids do it better, but how much better? Is overcoming magical resistance and a bit better hp for your summons worth taking it over a land Druid?

I'm thinking I'd rather be a more versatile caster and use conjure animals sometimes, rather then feeling like I'm being sub optimal if I'm not using it.

[sithlordnergal]

Wow the fact that you consider that a paladin can do everything a cleric does is fairly telling on how far from reality your opinion is.

I mean, lets look at their spells: Paladins and Clerics have a lot of overlap with a lot of similar buffs and healing. In terms of combat spells, Paladins and Clerics are pretty much equal. The Smite spells, Command, Compelled Duel, they're on par with things like Sacred Weapon and Spirit Guardians. The only thing Clerics really have over Paladins are their ranged attacks, but then again Paladins beat out Clerics in melee fights.

Next up, how are they in combat: Well, this is pretty easy. Clerics do better at range, but Paladins dominate in melee. I'm sorry, but not even Sacred Weapon and Divine Strike help the Cleric make up for their loss. It just gets more pronounced when Paladins gain Improved Divine Smite.

Buffing the party? While they both can buff the party in their own ways, the different Paladin Auras are on par with the majority of Cleric class abilities. Now, there are some standout Cleric abilities like the Peace Cleric's Emboldening Bond and Protective Bond...but then we also have standout auras like the Ancient's Resistance to all spell damage.

Channel Divinity? Once again, looking over all the channel divinity options, I feel like Paladins and Clerics are on similar levels here. Now, I will say that the Paladin's Channel Divinities don't really buff the party that often, but in exchange they tend to provide a debuff to whatever they're targeting that is equivalent to a buff. Now, Twilight Cleric does have that massive Temp HP Channel Divinity, which is an edge over most Paladins...buuuut Redemption has the ability to reflect damage with their Channel Divinity.

Healing? Gonna be honest, every single class with access to Cure Wounds and Healing Word is just as good at healing as the Cleric is. The only standout healer for Clerics is the Life Cleric. Paladins have access to Cure Wounds and Lay on Hands, they're equal to Clerics.


That's pretty much everything a Cleric can do. They don't have any outstanding, game changing spells like Wish, Simulacrum, or Forcecage. They're not skill monkies with Expertise or Jack of All Trades. They aren't front-line combat classes, like Fighters, Paladins, or Barbarians. And they aren't strikers like Monks and Rogues. Paladins are able to cover all of those things that I mentioned above. The only thing Clerics are better at are Divination spells...and I've never found Divination spells to be useful.

Are they a bad class? No, I wouldn't call them bad. But I will say that every time I've played a campaign or one shot, be it as a DM or as a player, Clerics tended to feel like a second fiddle if there was a Bard, Druid, or Paladin in the group.

[sithlordnergal]

While the usual assortment of cha multiclass can be quite strong. They are still within normal martial damage and tanking ranges. Maybe 10-20% better at certain levels.

A shepherd druid with a full assortment of summons might be doing 200-300% better than that. They have just added multiple characters worth of new hitpoints.. Enormously shifted the action economy in their favor. Likely changed the entire map into difficult terrain (a form of CC, nonwithstanding potential CC from the summons). And of course their dpr and nova capabilities are second to none in this game (again a factor of 2-4 better than what martials are producing). Most of the shepherds i’ve played with know how to speed things up for combat, but yes an average player might really bog things down.

From a DMs perspetive, the entire game now becomes how to deal with that problem (so think aoes, and damage auras and open terrain where summon movement becomes a liability). The rest of the party now have only a few known problems left to solve.

A twilight cleric on the other hand, greatly reduces resource attrition. It becomes almost impossible to tax a party with a twilight cleric with anything but extreme deadly encounters. Everything else is a speedbump.

I'm not seeing how a Twilight Cleric can reduce resource attrition that much. Their only ability that reduces resource consumption is their channel divinity. The rest of it is a shared darkvision, which won't change any resource use, and a personal fly speed that they have limited uses of. Unless your party is taking a Short Rest after every encounter, which they shouldn't, they shouldn't be changing resource attrition that much.

[Nefariis]

@sithlordnergal

lol I like that you pretty much glossed over that clerics get 9th level spells.

Also Arcana Clerics do get Wish, Simulacrum, or Forcecage AND Knowledge Clerics are absolute skill monkeys with "Knowledge of the Ages" at level 2 AND Peace Cleric get's a mini Paladin's Aura at level 1AND Twilight Clerics 2nd level buffing is better than anything Paladin has at level 2.

[sithlordnergal]

@sithlordnergal

lol I like that you pretty much glossed over that clerics get 9th level spells.

Also Arcana Clerics do get Wish, Simulacrum, or Forcecage AND Knowledge Clerics are absolute skill monkeys with "Knowledge of the Ages" at level 2 AND Peace Cleric get's a mini Paladin's Aura at level 1AND Twilight Clerics 2nd level buffing is better than anything Paladin has at level 2.

Lol, I'd have mentioned their 9th level spells if they were worth mentioning, at all. 9th level spell slots aren't worth much if you have nothing useful to cast with them. Druids have a similar issue, but at least they have Shapechange and Foresight. All Clerics get are Power Word Heal, Mass Heal, True Resurrection, and Gate. Out of those Gate is the only thing even close to being impressive, and is pretty dangerous to use if you're trying to summon an ally. The rest? Not very impressive if you ask me. True Resurrection has too high of a cost to really be used, Mass Heal and Power Word Heal are nice, but lose their charm when you realize a level 1 Healing Word or level 3 Mass Healing Word can work just as well since being knocked out and being at low HP have no penalties.

Arcana Cleric's final ability is nice, but as someone who has played an Arcana Cleric to level 15, the rest of their abilities are extremely lackluster and niche to make up for it. Their Domain spells are also pretty horrible, with the exception of Detect Magic, Magic Missile, and Dispel Magic. Knowledge Clerics can get proficiency in any skill...for 10 minutes with a short rest resource. They also lack expertise for anything except two Int based skills, which they likely dumped Int anyway because, ya know, Cleric.

And finally the Twilight Cleric. Am I reading the wrong Twilight Cleric or something? Do I have a misprint? The only party buffs Twilight Cleric has is a Darkvision they can share with multiple people, and a Channel Divinity that, while strong, is still a limited Short Rest resource. What exactly am I missing here? Are people always using Channel Divinity in every single combat encounter? How!?! Are you guys taking a Short Rest after every single encounter or something? Their Channel Divinity is strong, but not even close to an always on Paladin Aura.

[Nefariis]

you are also completely glossing over that you can upcast things like Inflict wounds, spiritual guardians, and spiritual weapon - and clerics get access to Toll of the Dead which Paladins do not.

Also, if Smite is one of your arguments for Paladins, a Paladin 2 / Cleric 18 smites better than a Paladin 20.

So you are pretty much just left with Aura's - which again, Peace Cleric has access to Bond (which works with skills and initiative btw) at level 1 instead of waiting until level 6 for Auras AND it works within 30 feet of you instead of 10 until Paladin 18

[x3n0n]

And finally the Twilight Cleric. Am I reading the wrong Twilight Cleric or something? Do I have a misprint? The only party buffs Twilight Cleric has is a Darkvision they can share with multiple people, and a Channel Divinity that, while strong, is still a limited Short Rest resource. What exactly am I missing here? Are people always using Channel Divinity in every single combat encounter? How!?! Are you guys taking a Short Rest after every single encounter or something? Their Channel Divinity is strong, but not even close to an always on Paladin Aura.

To be fair,

• each Twilight Sanctuary leaves your whole party with a bunch of THP at the *end* of combat as well, assuming that it lasts fewer than 10 rounds, so you get one fully-supported combat plus a free pre-buffed combat after that, plus
• you get a second Channel per short rest at Cleric 6 (and a third at Cleric 18).

Multiple daily concentration-free flights is also pretty good.

That said, it seems a lot less exciting in the levels you're already disappointed in, which sounds like tier 3.

[Hael]

Is this not partially true though for any Druid casting conjure animals? Yes Shepherd Druids do it better, but how much better? Is overcoming magical resistance and a bit better hp for your summons worth taking it over a land Druid?

I'm thinking I'd rather be a more versatile caster and use conjure animals sometimes, rather then feeling like I'm being sub optimal if I'm not using it.

The answer is no in early tier2. However, by tier 3, your summons are routinely dying to AOE on the first turn and struggling to find opponents they can hit and damage. Even when you have 16 wolves out, if only 4 are left on turn 2 following a single enemy action the damage and tankiness stops to be worth. My experience playing non shepherd druids is limited in tier3, but I was basically casting other spells by that point.

Shepherds keep the spell relevant throughout the entire game.. At least until the deep endgame where things move too fast for the summons to catch. This is b/c most alpha strike aoes are insufficient to blow through the temphp cover to take them out in a single round and of course the damage remains absurd at all lvls, even against high AC targets.

[Witty Username]

Take 2 levels in twilight cleric and the rest in shepherd druid. Conjure all the animals and made them immortal.

[ATHATH]

While clerics have a couple truly amazing spells (spiritual weapon, spirit guardians) most of their spells are healing or utility, and their list REALLY drops off hard in the late game.

It depends on what you consider to be "late game" spells- if we're considering 4th and 5th level spells to be "late game", then yeah, I mostly agree. If we're considering 6ths and 7ths, though, Forbiddance (hm yes today I will start ritual casting Forbiddance, walk up to/teleport into a dungeon, and then fry every supernatural creature inside without expending a single spell slot) and Conjure Celestial (hm yes today I will summon Superman and have my full caster friend cast Planar Binding to let him stick around for a month) are pretty obscene. You don't get much after that, but you don't need much after getting Conjure Celestial.

Take 2 levels in twilight cleric and the rest in shepherd druid. Conjure all the animals and made them immortal.

Or just... have one person play a Twilight Cleric and have another play a Shepherd Druid? You don't need to have one character pull off the entire combo by themselves, especially since summoning an animal horde and buffing it with Twilight Sanctuary both require an action.

[Keravath]

you are also completely glossing over that you can upcast things like Inflict wounds, spiritual guardians, and spiritual weapon - and clerics get access to Toll of the Dead which Paladins do not.

Also, if Smite is one of your arguments for Paladins, a Paladin 2 / Cleric 18 smites better than a Paladin 20.

So you are pretty much just left with Aura's - which again, Peace Cleric has access to Bond (which works with skills and initiative btw) at level 1 instead of waiting until level 6 for Auras AND it works within 30 feet of you instead of 10 until Paladin 18

How is that exactly?

A paladin 2/cleric 18 has one attack they can smite on. A paladin 20 has at least two attacks and improved divine smite added to each.

Spell slot damage caps with level 4 slots at 5d8/smite. A level 20 paladin has 5 slots at level 4 or above while a 2 paladin/18 cleric has 11 slots of level 4 or higher (they have the same for level 3-). This does give the 2 paladin/18 cleric 6 more slots to use for smiting but if they are burning their 7-9 level slots doing an extra 5d8 damage - they are doing something wrong AND they only have one attack/turn to deliver these smites with AND a paladin is adding an extra d8 to every attack due to IDS.

So - on the single criteria of having 6 additional higher level spell slots the paladin 2/cleric 18 could smite for longer - but with 2 attacks and IDS - the paladin's target would be dead long before the cleric got there if they were only using smites. So I'd say that the 20 paladin is "better" at smiting though a cleric is better at a lot of other things.