D&D 5E What is the Deal with the Twilight Cleric?

[mellored]

Automatically ending any fear or charm is another biggie- at best, it should only be able to help one PC per turn.. or maybe it allows a reroll instead of auto ending. And you need to reduce the aura range.
The spell list and armor proficiencies... I don't know.

Yea, but I really nerfed the THP, so removing effects is the main benefit of using channel divinity. Especially at higher levels.

Also, it only ends effects at the End of your turn. So getting hit with Hypnotic Pattern or Fear will still cost your allies a turn. Just not multiple of turns.

And heroism is a level 1 spell that does similar.


I don't want to nerf it too hard.

 

[SlyFlourish]

One thing people typically miss is how disruptive twilight sanctuary is to implement. It triggers a thing that happens on everyone’s turn but isn’t any type of action. So every turn the cleric has to remind each character to take their temporary hit points. It added a whole extra thing to do onto every turn.

I’ve banned it at my table.

 

[Staffan]

Also, in the Tasha's era forward, the designers seem in love with temporary hit points, and the 2024 rules embrace them even further. I pretty much hate temporary hit points and don't understand why ways to get them keep multiplying.

I think it's because it's a way to provide healing/protection in a way that's self-limiting. If you had something that healed everyone for 1d6 per round for a minute, like pre-errata healing spirit, that would allow the party to heal the whole party for 10d6 over the course of a minute, which is a little much for a 2nd level spell. But something that gives recurring temporary hit points only helps if the target is taking damage right now, making it more proactive than reactive.

 

[Distracted DM]

One thing people typically miss is how disruptive twilight sanctuary is to implement. It triggers a thing that happens on everyone’s turn but isn’t any type of action. So every turn the cleric has to remind each character to take their temporary hit points. It added a whole extra thing to do onto every turn.

I’ve banned it at my table.

When I was running it, I had the cleric roll the die for their turn so only 1 roll was necessary. but youre right, it's still a "remember to take your temp hp" every player turn.

 

[Deset Gled]

One thing people typically miss is how disruptive twilight sanctuary is to implement. It triggers a thing that happens on everyone’s turn but isn’t any type of action. So every turn the cleric has to remind each character to take their temporary hit points. It added a whole extra thing to do onto every turn.

You're not wrong. But that's how tons of area effects work. The fact that it gives temp HP instead of deals damage was never more or less disruptive than any other AoE for my group. As far as slowing play down, I'd say this ability was about equal to issues keeping track of Bardic Inspirations, IME.

I agree there issues with the Twillight Cleric, but this is extremely far down my list.

 

[Horwath]

Silvery Barbs is somewhere between overpowered and broken but always annoying fun suck. Espicially for the DM. It's banned in my games.

I like silvery barbs as an idea, but I hate re-rolls, just slows down everything.
just make silvery barbs gives -5 to the roll, the spell wont be wasted when it cannot do anything and it's faster

Sone things are just anti social even if they're mechanically fine. Twilight cleric, silvery barbs and the old frenzied berzerker fit into that category

beserker was just awful.

Summoners can also fit into that category. That's more of a RL time issue. For example I had a player who wanted to consult the MM every round and read the entries.

we houseruled that you can only summon s SINGLE monster with 2014 PHB, tasha's summons are great.

Eventually I told him to buy his own MM and use that and copy out his summoned stats. He stopped doing it after that as it involved money (he was really cheap). And effort (photocopying the pages money and time required).

seven hells, some people...
everyone has a smartphone, just take a photo of that page from MM and have at it.

What's anti social varies of course but in the DM generally. I played with Silvery Barbs as a player and asked DM can I swap it out (I got it via feat) and it was banned after that.

Order cleric.

order cleric seems fine, did you mean peace cleric?

 

[pukunui]

• I think the ability to grant darkvision to everyone in the party is a non-issue, though, since most of us already have it. The massive range of darkvision is pretty impressive, though; I can see that would be very frustrating to our DM. (He was pretty tired of my warlock's Devil's Sight invocation a couple of years ago, this might bring up some bad memories.)

Others have addressed the mechanical issues already. I would like to focus on this issue, which is more of a genre / gameplay issue in my mind. I acknowledge that you are not the DM in this situation. However, I would like to share my opinion that I think darkvision on all the PCs will lessen your enjoyment of Curse of Strahd ... and therefore, having easy access to long distance darkvision will exacerbate that gameplay issue.

I think having even one character that can see in the dark is not conducive to the horror genre. The fact that even one PC can see the vampire lurking in the corner of the basement and can alert the rest of the party to its presence takes away that vampire's ability to jump scare the party. Being able to see in the dark means your characters won't be afraid of the dark ... and being afraid of the dark is an important aspect of the horror genre.

I would argue that Leomund's tiny hut will also have a negative impact on your Curse of Strahd experience (and since a twilight cleric gets it for free that again exacerbate the gameplay issue). Sometimes the party might find itself needing to sleep out in the wilds of Barovia, which ought to be a scary and stressful thing. But Leomund's tiny hut will make it so you can sleep blissfully anywhere in Barovia. No need to seek out shelter in the few towns with walls and guards!

Next time I run Curse of Strahd, I am going to make it so darkvision is hampered in Barovia. Its range may be limited to 5 or 10 feet. Spells like Leomund's tiny hut may be banned. I can't scare my players at the table, but I will do what I can to make Barovia scary for their characters.

 

[Horwath]

darkvision

thinking of reducing darkvision to 40ft,
same range you get with a torch, and shorter than a lanters.

drow, duergar and some other underdark native races can have 80ft

same with everything that gives darkvision. it's +40ft, even warlocks devil sight.
gain darkvision of 40ft or improve current by 40ft

might also improve short weapon ranges to unified 40/120ft to match darkvision/torch distance

Leomund's tiny hut

Leomunds tiny hut should summon a physical building 20ft on a side.
sure, it can have a magic fireplace or AC unit or what not, but it should be destroy-able by mundane means, might take a battering ram, but if someone is determined, they should be able to get few people and tear it down.

give it arrow slits that you can shoot through(+5 AC) so that is easier do defend, but do not make it immune to attacks.

higher levels might give more HP to walls or make hut "cloaked", you must be withing 30ft to atempt Survival DC equal to spell DC to notice that hut is there and not part of landscape

 

[pukunui]

thinking of reducing darkvision to 40ft,
same range you get with a torch, and shorter than a lanters.

drow, duergar and some other underdark native races can have 80ft

same with everything that gives darkvision. it's +40ft, even warlocks devil sight.
gain darkvision of 40ft or improve current by 40ft

might also improve short weapon ranges to unified 40/120ft to match darkvision/torch distance

The issue I have with darkvision in a horror game is that there's no way to defeat it (short of using magical darkness). A torch or lantern can be snuffed out in a variety of ways. The light cantrip and other such spells can be dispelled. You can drop your torch, magically lit rock, etc. Light also has the effect of making you visible to the monsters hiding in the dark.

 

[Zardnaar]

I like silvery barbs as an idea, but I hate re-rolls, just slows down everything.
just make silvery barbs gives -5 to the roll, the spell wont be wasted when it cannot do anything and it's faster

beserker was just awful.

we houseruled that you can only summon s SINGLE monster with 2014 PHB, tasha's summons are great.

seven hells, some people...
everyone has a smartphone, just take a photo of that page from MM and have at it.



order cleric seems fine, did you mean peace cleric?

Nope I ran the order cleric. Rogue in party and silvery barbs.

I swapped SB for something else.