Cleric changes explained (Podcast)

[Prism]

The cleric in our group had none of these powers anyway. Not sure what all the fuss is about

 

[MrMyth]

I agree. I thought the "table doesnt get any bigger" was a strange thing to say and contradicts my experience. That said close burst 8 is still too big!

Yes and no. Epic battles are definitely a place where I would love to have vast and sprawling scenic battlefields - but I'm still gaming on the same physical table, with various books and character sheets cluttering up the sides. I think that's what they mean by saying the "table doesn't get any bigger" - the DM is still working with the same physical space for running combats, and bigger AoEs are definitely more effective.

Overall, I get why they reduced the potency of some of the big bursts. Turn Undead itself, as well, was problematic - it was basically a free encounter attack power, which no other class gets (aside from other Divine Channelers). Limited by only working against undead, the fact it was also more potent than most dailies and could be expanded to work against several other types of foes... meant something needed to be done.

I agree that some of the Errata may have gone too far - or, rather, they could have bolstered the Leader aspect of the Cleric while reducing the unintended Controller features. As it is, I think the Cleric is still perfectly playable, but I think they could have done a much better job with the decisions here overall.

 

[SteveC]

You know, if your group thinks the errata is overdone, you can just ignore it.

While this is true, it's no excuse for bad rules or updates. Rather than ignore the updates, I'd prefer they were actually well designed.

I play in a high level paragon campaign at the moment, and the cleric is gonzo good at healing, but besides that I haven't seen him bring anything above average to the game. I play a lot of LFR and I don't recall a cleric ever being the overpowered character. Heck, I don't recall any threads online about how the cleric is broken or even overpowered. If anything, he could use some better design over the MAD issues.

This errata stinks to me of being someone's houserules to address an issue in their home game, which is a sad thing because of how much I had trusted the designers previously. Still, I'm waiting to see how the cleric ultimately shapes up given this criticism.

There are a lot of leader choices at the moment, so a less effective cleric isn't that big a loss for the game. It is one of the original classes, though, so it is something of a loss.

Perhaps these changes are designed to put the cleric back to the role of the class that few people want to play (i.e., the pre 3E era).

 

[renau1g]

I don't disagree this can be true, but it depends completely upon the party. My warlord trained out of such powers because the battlemind, charisma paladin, ardent, and wizard he runs with are useless for MBAs.

I'm not arguing that some warlords (maybe even most) have more effective at-wills than their cleric bretheren, but I don't think it's a universal truth. The effectiveness of the warlord in many cases is dependent upon the effectiveness of his friends; clerics don't have that "limitation."

Your group lacking a striker is probably an aberration. Those combats must be incredibly grindy without anyone really having damage output.

 

[the Jester]

Frankly, some of the "better control than wizard powers of equal level" stuff was pointed out to me by my players way back when our first group of characters was about 2nd level, so I think these changes are prolly overall for the good.

That said, the podcast made one unfortunate thing clear: they haven't fully worked out all the errata, so this is not the final word on the PH cleric. There were a lot of hems and haws and "We're still looking ats" in that podcast.

 

[Incenjucar]

From the podcast, it sounds like they're open to giving the cleric a power boost - just not as a controller. I found it extremely interesting that they were revising assumptions about the nature of epic battles.

The fact that they didn't give them a boost while nerfing them is standard practice - you let the players figure out the new median before you start boosting it. It's understandably frustrating for people who want to play now, as it basically puts the cleric back into "beta," but this is how these things work.

--

Jester: Yeah, I clearly recall a lot of people saying that the cleric was a better controller than the wizard when 4E first came out.

 

[Chzbro]

There are a lot of leader choices at the moment, so a less effective cleric isn't that big a loss for the game. It is one of the original classes, though, so it is something of a loss.

"A loss for the game" implies that the cleric is no longer playable, which is in no way true. Even with these changes, I don't think anyone can convince me that the cleric isn't still better than the artificer, ardent, runepriest, or e-druid as a leader simply because of the number of options the class has available.

It's telling that a lot of the complaints point out that clerics can't do as much damage as other leaders; why is that an issue? If you're upset about the changes because you want to do the most damage to the most creatures, perhaps leader isn't the role for you in the first place. If you're upset about the changes because they went slightly too far (i.e. burst 2 turn undead even at epic), that's understandable, but hardly something to have an aneurism over.

Most of the changes seem reasonable to me, and the unreasonable ones are easy to houserule or for WotC to fix.

 

[Talok]

The fact that they are still messing with the core classes three years after they were released and are going way too far with some of the changes, makes me doubt that the designers really have a clue as to what they are doing.

 

[Nullzone]

Even with these changes, I don't think anyone can convince me that the cleric isn't still better than the artificer, ardent, runepriest, or e-druid as a leader simply because of the number of options the class has available.

And I don't think you'll convince anyone that a Templar is worth playing over a Warpriest, Marshal, or Shaman because all three of them provide enabling leader effects with virtually every action they take, while the Templar is wasting turns whiffing with Lance of Faith because he took Leader feats, or isn't as good a Leader because he took feats to not miss with LoF.

Most of the changes are reasonable, but they're also half-baked. They nuked the niche that the Cleric had without giving the Templar a new one.

I was disappointed by the defensive approach to the podcast answers and that they spent the whole time addressing their nerfs without even considering the request for compromise: give the Templar an effective action economy by providing them with leader riders, and move their support powers to minor actions. The lack of these things combined with the reduction in controller capabilities is what ultimately hurt the Templar; reasonable people don't care that they lost a few damage dice.

Edit: You should also really look at the Sentinel again if you doubt their effectiveness, their support capabilities are pretty huge.

 

[SteveC]

"A loss for the game" implies that the cleric is no longer playable, which is in no way true. Even with these changes, I don't think anyone can convince me that the cleric isn't still better than the artificer, ardent, runepriest, or e-druid as a leader simply because of the number of options the class has available.

It's telling that a lot of the complaints point out that clerics can't do as much damage as other leaders; why is that an issue? If you're upset about the changes because you want to do the most damage to the most creatures, perhaps leader isn't the role for you in the first place. If you're upset about the changes because they went slightly too far (i.e. burst 2 turn undead even at epic), that's understandable, but hardly something to have an aneurism over.

Most of the changes seem reasonable to me, and the unreasonable ones are easy to houserule or for WotC to fix.

I'd certainly say that a cleric is still playable, but then any class is 4E is playable. I would just expect that a lot fewer people will choose to play them as a result of all of this. In other words: go team warlord! It wasn't that the cleric was this uber class and now it's been reduced to ruin, rather this was a class that was pretty much in the middle of the pack, and it's been moved downward, and significantly so.

I'd ratchet the hyperbole back a bit if you don't mind: this is hardly the end of the world as we know it, but it does represent a head-scratching change to the game. Of all the classes in the PHB, the one in most significant need of a nerf was... the cleric? Really? Right after the warlord got pass in the updates?

Each of the leaders heals, but then they also bring something else to the table. That was the design choice for 4E which was intended to make the role more appealing to a broader base of players. The cleric minored in control, and had decent area damage. By cutting that back, they're being left with more of the "healbot" persona, which is not something that's a good design decision. If you look back at WotC's own design notes on the leader role, that's exactly what they said when the edition was launched.

What troubles me is that, perhaps in a desire to evoke a more "classic" cleric image, they're ignoring the notion that a leader should do more than just heal.

I want to take just a moment to address the issue of "when 4E launched, the cleric was a better controller than the wizard," argument. I can see an argument for that (I'd disagree, but I can see that argument). What I'd like to ask is if anyone would say the cleric is a better controller than the wizard today. I think the cleric does have some controller-esque features (especially turn undead with feat support) but have you actually seen what the wizard can do these days?

Just last week I helped a player join our campaign with a new high paragon wizard. I hadn't seen all of the powers released in the last few months in depth, but when I did, I realized that it's definitely been the beneficiary of the most attention recently. I'd recommend that anyone who thinks the un-nerfed cleric competes in this category had best consult the character builder and come back to us with a report.