Cleric help.

[Gapenator]

I'm rejoining the D&D fold after a 20 year hiatus. I didn't see a newb area so I'm going to post this here. If it needs to be moved, that's cool.

I'm getting to know the 4e system and want to roll a cleric, always a favorite of mine. I like the idea of a charismatic battle leader that can still get some healing done and dish out some 2-handed justice.

Is this just too much to get done?

How would you tackle that character idea?

All thoughts are very much appreciated.

 

[drothgery]

Given that description, you might want to consider thinking outside the box a bit, rather than building a cleric. You can certainly build a charismatic melee cleric, but it's difficult to do it well because you'll almost certainly want to have Strength or Constitution and Wisdom as your highest stats (ranged clerics can get away with Wis primary/Cha secondary).

If healing is a complete sideline, but being a divine character is important, consider a Paladin (particularly a charisma-based paladin).

If you want to be a charismatic melee guy with a two-handed weapon capable of functioning as a party's primary healer, you might want to consider a Bard (spend a feat to gain proficiency in a two-handed heavy blade, then get a songblade when you need a magic weapon/implement) or an Ardent (the psionic leader from PH3 is a charisma-based melee class and proficient with two-handed military weapons out of the box).

But I really think your description -- other than saying you want to play a cleric -- sounds like you want an inspiring or bravura warlord (strength primary, charisma secondary). They're not quite as good as clerics (or artificers) at healing, but they're certainly competent. And diving into the melee fray with a two-handed weapon is what they do.

 

[Riastlin]

Aye, I agree with drothgery. The warlord best fits your description of what you want to do, though the warpriest might also work (don't have essentials so not positive on that one).

The base cleric (i.e. non-essentials) in 4e doesn't really lend itself all that well to being both melee-centric and charismatic.

Of course, that being said, there's absolutely nothing holding you back from building a Str-cleric (for melee) who is also charismatic. The only real problem you might run into is that your Wisdom will suffer a bit, which will also affect a number of your class abilities.

A final alternative (though less ideal than the warlord imo) would be to build a runepriest. They are strength based, do well with two-handers, and can heal (though not as well as the other leaders). The downsides to the runepriest are a) there are a lot of conditional modifiers to their powers which can make for a bunch of bookkeeping and b) charisma does absolutely nothing for them; however, you will probably do better on the Strength side than with a cleric since they are a strength-based class.

Still though, from what you are saying, the warlord sounds like the way to go, but if you are dead set on a cleric, you can go Str-based for the melee aspects and simply boost your Cha more than wisdom. The biggest impact on your character will be that he won't heal quite as well.

 

[Gapenator]

Thanks Drothgery & Raist.

I guess I need to tweak that PC idea then. I very much want to heal, but I still wanted to lend a hand, melee-wise. I also envision somewhat of a diplomat/leader role for him, so I'm looking at Cha. So far I've had this idea...

Dragonborn Cleric of Bahamut
Level 1

I rolled...

16
14
14
12
12
10

With Dragonborn Racial adjustment... +2 Str & Cha
Str: 16
Con: 12
Dex: 10
Int: 12
Wis: 16
Cha: 16

Think I could balance the prayers with buffs and heals and find a way to be somewhat productive in Combat?

 

[Gapenator]

Just thinking, is there some where I could look at Cleric builds?

 

[Riastlin]

Forgot Dragonborn were Str/Cha,

That should actually work fairly well for you. The idea here is that you concentrate on Str-based attacks (though you can even sprinkle in a few Wis-based ones). At 16 Will you will effectively be about 1 point of healing per spell behind the average cleric (as 18 in Wis is usually the standard), but the cleric also has a ton of healing available.

Frankly, I think those stats could make for a pretty decent Str-Cleric that also has good heals and good diplomacy, etc. Combine it with a background that gives a bonus to Diplomacy and you're really rocking.

As for builds, the CharOp forum on the WotC site has a lot of builds. Many of those will be "optimized" as opposed to background-centric but you can still get a good idea as to what powers/feats are good, etc. As I said, I think you could make that particular build work fairly well. I'm not real familiar with the clerics Str powers myself, but I think you should be fine.

 

[Gapenator]

So, the next question I'll ask, as I have so very many is this...

Weapon Proficience. It says Clerics are limited to simple melee/ranged. Does this mean he couldn't carry a Maul (military melee) around with him? I envisioned a BIG hammer.

Thanks again for the help.

 

[gjnave]

Two words: Leviathan Longbeard. That is our defacto Cleric. He spanks down the healing, and does some wicked radiant damage. WHile not bad with a weapon, a lot of cleric damage gets done with "prayers".

We focused on healing with this cleric, but then as we got to higher levels, retrained some things we had taken as healing (you really dont need to be ALL about healing). Our cleric ends up killing as many people as anyone else in the power.

Heres some spanky powers to look at:

Sacred Flame
Lance of Faith
Healing Strike
Command
Bastion of Health
Cure Light Wounds
Consecrated Ground (zomfg)

 

[Mentat55]

If you want to play a divinely-powered dragonborn battle leader, why not a runepriest? If you play a wrathful hammer runepriest, you would get the following:

Str-based powers
Proficiency in military hammers (including that maul)
Scale armor proficiency (better than clerics)

With the ability scores you rolled, you could go this setup: Str 18, Con 14, Dex 12, Int 10, Wis 12, Cha 16. Charisma is not an important score for runepriests, but you could leave Charisma at 16 (nothing to sneeze at, plus you qualify for the really nice Superior Will feat) and boost Str/Con at every opportunity. Eventually you could invest in plate armor, making you more survivable in close combat.

The downside of the runepriest is the lack of extensive feat and power support, compared to the surfeit of options available to the cleric.

EDIT: Oops, didn't see that Riastlin already suggested the runepriest. I echo Riastlin's sentiments, then

 

[Gapenator]

Thanks for the Runepriest tip, I'll definitely look into it. I forgot to mention I only have the first PH, so I'm not totally up on the other races/classes.