D&D 5E Powergamer Cleric= Variant Human?

Psyzhran2357 · Jun 27, 2019

Zardnaar said:
Now the basic cleric is not actually that god at being a D&D cleric. That is even the war cleric is actually kind of bad being a traditional D&D cleric. This is assuming you are using the default array.Rolled sttas you can ignore this arguement.

What does this mean? What is a traditional D&D Cleric? Hitting stuff with a blunt implement? Are Clerics who get Potent Cantrip instead of Divine Strike not good D&D Clerics?

Dausuul · Jun 27, 2019

Psyzhran2357 said:
What does this mean? What is a traditional D&D Cleric? Hitting stuff with a blunt implement? Are Clerics who get Potent Cantrip instead of Divine Strike not good D&D Clerics?

I assume he is referring to earlier editions, when a cleric was a healbot with a mace. Most of your time was spent pumping hit points into your companions. On the rare occasion that your companions didn't need hit points, you bopped things with the mace.

If you wanted to be edgy and different, you could swap out the mace for a warhammer. (But not an axe. Axes were not cool. The gods frowned upon axes. Even the dwarf gods.)

Tony Vargas · Jun 27, 2019

Psyzhran2357 said:
What does this mean? What is a traditional D&D Cleric? Hitting stuff with a blunt implement?

The Traditional Cleric:

Stood at the back of the party, to be an armored rear guard and keep an eye on the Thief.
Used most of his spells for healing.
Maced the occasional orc.
Wished he had ranged weapons, anything better than a thrown hammer would be lovely.
Turned Undead, saving the party's bacon in encounters with way too many undead for the party to handle any other way - which was every encounter with Undead.
On rare, rare, occasions, collected a Girdle of Giant Strength, Gauntlets of Ogre Power, and Hammer of Thunderbolts and really gave the fighter a run for his money.

And the 5e Cleric doesn't do that, because he's a little too good to be doing that.

jgsugden · Jun 27, 2019

A prepared melee cleric that devotes his concentration to spirit guardians and also utilizes spiritual weapons (both possibly at elevated slots) can be an effective contributor to combat. In my experience, they also tend to be the PCs that get first crack at 'Strength' items like Gauntlets of Ogre Power, so the Shillelagh is not necessarily required.

If you want to really pump these guys up, consider taking a level of Warlock to gain access to Armor of Agathys. When you cast that with a 5th level slot it can often give you 25 tem hps, but also deal 50 or 75 damage as well. There was a lore bard in one game that pretended to be a priest. At 10th he had Armor of Agathys, Spirit Guardians, and Spiritual Weapon. He was a beast.

Radaceus · Jun 27, 2019

a note on Shilellagh, this cantrip is very handy if you do not have a magic weapon, so if you are a melee orientated cleric, this beats using a spell slot (Magic Weapon spell) to mitigate resistance to normal weapons.

now, regarding the 'classic/original' cleric versus it's 5E iteration, they didnt have an action economy other than 'move, attack, orcast a spell' so swinging a weapon and using a shield was mainstay, they were basically 'Main Assist' +'Main Heals'

FrogReaver · Jun 27, 2019

Zardnaar said:
So my arguement is should every cleric under the sun be using the magic initiate feat to pick up shillagh? At least from a min/max PoV.

Generally I don't see a lot of clerics being played, I am my parties healer (celestial warlock+ healer feat). Most people don't seem to know this cleric combo though.

The combo described isn't particularly good. Attempting to enhance a particularly subpar aspect of the cleric class to a decent level of output is worse than making them really good at something they are good at and ignoring the subpar aspect - optimizationally speaking

Dausuul · Jun 28, 2019

The damage numbers look decent (at least until 10th level), but consider that you are sacrificing the opportunity to take War Caster or Resilient (Con) and you are taking an Arcana cleric, who would normally stand in the back lobbing spells or ranged weapons, and putting them on the front line. That's a big hit to your ability to hold concentration spells, which is generally much more important than your at-will attacks for a primary caster. If you're holding bless on a couple of martial PCs, and you lose it to an enemy hit, you just sacrificed all of your bonus damage and then some.

I wouldn't dismiss this build out of hand, but I also don't feel like it stands head and shoulders above all other cleric options.

FrogReaver · Jun 28, 2019

Dausuul said:
The damage numbers look decent (at least until 10th level), but consider that you are sacrificing the opportunity to take War Caster or Resilient (Con) and you are taking an Arcana cleric, who would normally stand in the back lobbing spells or ranged weapons, and putting them on the front line. That's a big hit to your ability to hold concentration spells, which is generally much more important than your at-will attacks for a primary caster. If you're holding bless on a couple of martial PCs, and you lose it to an enemy hit, you just sacrificed all of your bonus damage and then some.

I wouldn't dismiss this build out of hand, but I also don't feel like it stands head and shoulders above all other cleric options.

The bigger problem with maximizing attack damage with a cleric is there are a number of rounds any given fight that you won't be attacking. All that optimization is wasted that turn if you cast spirit guardians like every other cleric. Or god forbid you need to use an action on a lesser restoration spell or a mass healing word or a control spell of some sort.

Besides, the basic cleric that takes booming/greenflame blade later and simply has a 16 str is only doing a little lower damage per attack than the one described right? I just don't get taking the feat for a little extra at will damage given the situation.

Zardnaar · Jun 28, 2019

My comment about being a traditional cleric was about them being an ok fighter thype but they are fairly mediocre at that in 5E due to MAD etc.

At higher levels the difference might be 14 vs 20 in terms of to hit and damage and one less AC over a cleric going strength and wisdom.

That cleric could buff strength I suppose but then you're not buffing wisdom. Wisdom is also buffing spiritual guardians.

Zardnaar · Jun 28, 2019

Mistwell said:
I think Forge Cleric still makes your best melee cleric. You don't need shillelagh. It's an overrated spell. It does not hold up well beyond low levels, because that d8 never goes up, and that just cannot keep up with expected damage outputs at higher levels regardless of your Wisdom.

You will need strength, but it doesn't need to be maxed because you can make a magic weapon. And by 4th or 8th level you take magic initiate and take booming blade. Go with this Forge Cleric for a fun, effective build. Either variant human (feat earlier) or hill dwarf (warhammer and shield, higher hit points).

It will scale via cleric levels or gfb.

I'm a big fan of cleric that don't melee, just wondering how to make them half decent at melee. Your build plus shillagh

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