Preventing myself from being clericzilla

[Breaw]

Just started a new campaign last night, looks like it should be fun. One thing I am a bit concerned about is shining a bit too brightly for the enjoyment of other members of the party.

The situation: Our party consists entirely of melee fighters. Not sure exactly why (most of us have played many characters of many types) but everyone is focused on melee combat, regardless of class. We have:

Full Wizard (wears armor casts fighting buff spells almost exclusively)
Dual Wield Ranger
Monk
Rogue (High Str)
Cleric of Kord/Barbarian/grappler guy (me)

First I'll go into a touch of detail on my character. I am far from optimized as I am a greatsword wielding barb/cleric whose talents are improved unarmed strike and improved grapple. Character concept is one of a followed of Kord who travels the world seeking to learn and teach strength in all the forms he finds it.

My friends character (also very sub optimal). Wizard who fancies himself a fighter. Wears armor, wields a greatsword, favorite maneuver is truestrike+powerattack. This is a very different approach for him as a player, since he pretty much exclusively plays ready-for-any-eventuality batman wizards. Anyone who complains about CoDzillas would change their story if they heard some of the ridiculous things he's pulled off with the wizard class. He does have the stats to pull off what he's doing. They are good, but not amazing.

The problem: My stats. I was blessed with stupid good stats (18/15/15/14/13/12). And want to hear some ideas on playing my character a bit toned down. I know it's not my 'fault' that I rolled really good stats, but I'm not interested in pissing off my friend because my significantly more optimized character is doing the same thing his would be, but better. I just want everyone to have a good time.

So far: We've had some missions that could be dealt with in a subdual manner (when it even required blows). As a result I put away my sword and grappled/punched people into submission. I'm quite effective at that with imp grapple and 18 str, but no where near as effective as if I had simply cut them in two with a 2d6+6 greatsword. (we're only level 2 atm) I also have taken on the role of something of a follower. I'll give input and suggest details that I'm familiar with, but in general I'm more brawn than brains and ask the coach to send me in, cause I'm ready!

All that said I was thinking I might multiclass even more for fun, while watering down my character a bit. I was thinking of taking 2 more levels of cleric, then continuing with the theme of learning a little bit from many different styles. Learn from the party ranger to pick up a favored enemy, learn from the party rogue to learn how to punch things in just the right place (I refuse to greatsword sneakattack). Not sure what else would be entertaining as 1 level dips, but the sky is the limit.

Another option is to just stick with the cleric/barbarian theme and go 2 levels of cleric then a few of barbarian, that could be fun too.

Anyway, I do understand that I can always simply play sub optimally (which is what I have been doing so far). I just don't want to pull my punches too much, as see this as an opportunity to try quite suboptimal builds while staying effective, since I have the stats to make up for less than ideal class choices.

Thoughts are appreciated.

[Skjaldbakka]

Avoid the following;

Divine Metamagic
Persistent Spell
Divine Favor
Righteous Might
Divine Power

and you should be fine. Cleric is not automatically 'zilla, it just can be.

[Breaw]

This is off topic, but based on that picture, and me finding you in a DnD forum... Are you Bumraz? If not that's cool (and I appreciate the advice, and yeah I had identified most of what you listed as unnecessary in my case). However, if you were Bumraz... that would be crazy.

[Keld Denar]

From the way it sounds, you don't have any worry about being "clericzilla" in the true definition of the word. Your feelings of overpoweredness atm are primarily due to your exceptional stats and level of barbarian. Keep watering yourself down past level 5, and you'll see a strong shift from powerful to pwned real quickly.

Really, if you aren't persisting Divine Power and Righteous Might, you aren't clericzilla. You won't have to worry about replacing the fighters, because by the time you cast those spells (if you even cast those spells) 80% of the fight should be over, or your party is in rough shape. If you don't cast those spells, you'll be a whole hand behind the other fighter types in 3-4 levels and you won't even have to worry about overshadowing anyone. Clerics are strong when done right, but its a lot easier to build a bad cleric than a bad druid.

Honestly, you know what would be a fun character to play with this group? A Dragonfire Inspiration Bard. With all these melee guys running around, you'll actually be WAY ahead of everyone else in total damage done if you track every d6 that your attacks actually add to everyone's attacks. Especially that TWF ranger and the monk. They need help, and this character will make them just as powerful as any other character should be. If you build your bard right, you can also be a strong combatant yourself. (See Bardadin, or Crusard, or Warblard).

[bosssmiley]

How to avoid Clericzilla like you mean it

Play the Cleric in the style of an earlier edition Healbot. You are a *secondary* combatant designed to heal and buff the front-liners (the full BAB types & rogues), and to protect the squishy wizard from pop-up attackers.

[The_Werebear]

Hrmm..

Well, you are on the right track by alternating cleric with Barbarian. I would spend spell slots on Frivolous, but thematic spells (like Summon Copious Amounts of Mead to Celebrate Victory, a level 1 custom made cleric spell that summons 1 bowl of mead per 3 caster level in the hands of everyone within 50 feet.)

Seriously, the best thing you can do is make a fairly crappy spell choice selection, so for every good spell you pick, select a thematic, but less powerful one. My suggested list for you at 20th (assuming that you split evenly between barb and cleric, not factoring domains)

1st
Doom -
Remove Fear -
Divine Favor -
Shield of Faith -

2nd
Bull's Strength
Death Knell
Spiritual Weapon
Shield Other
3rd
Prayer
Inflict Serious Wounds - (going into a grapple with that charged)
Magic Vestment
4th
Death Ward
Divine Power - (Won't be as effective for you, since you will have a higher BaB than normal)
Freedom of Movement
5th
Disrupting Weapon
Righteous Might

That's a list that has some useful and thematic stuff, and even the power trio. It has it's dead weight though. If you don't DMM, and don't stack Righteous Might, Divine Power, and Divine favor, then you will be ok.

[Telonius]

Further on in your career, you might look into the Warpriest PrC from Complete Divine. It's not a full casting PrC, so it's a nudge down in power. IIRC, it provides some benefits to melee combatants that you're leading.

[Renegade Paladin]

Divine power and righteous might aren't game-breakers by themselves; it's all in how you use them. Prepare them all you want; just don't use Persistent Spell and/or try to replace the fighter on the front line.

Actually, play it like Durkon does. He busts out Thor's might when the party's in dire need of it, not just to be better at Roy when it comes to laying the smack on their enemies. That's what it's supposed to be for.

[ShneekeyTheLost]

May I make a suggestion?

You want the party to shine, rather than outshine the party? I've got a solution for you: The BuffMaster(tm).

Basically, you pick up Chain Spell, then DMM Chain Spell. No, trust me, DMM isn't going to make you godly powerful, it just makes things easier to make the rest of the people powerful. Then you pick up a way to extend reach, which can be done through any number of methods (Divine Reach from Heirophant, and the feat Reach Spell, which increases SL by 1).

DMM Chain GMW.
DMM Chain Reach Magic Vestments
DMM Chain Freedom of Movement (when the party needs it, duration rounds/lvl)
DMM Chain Mind Blank (get from a domain)
DMM Chain Death Ward.

Your party is now immune to the majority of the 'save or screwed' set of spells, and are able to save themselves literally millions of gold by having you grant all their equipment a +5 enhancement bonus on top of whatever they were using.

Do you shine? Not any more than the rest of the party does. Do they shine? Heck yea.