About the War Cleric......

[Paul Farquhar]

Again, that is why the suggested bonus attack on casting a spell is good design - it displays understanding of exactly this.

Only if you give it to all clerics. And wizards for that matter.

They aren't any worse off than any other cleric subclass - indeed they are all virtually indistinguishable at high level.

 

[Warmaster Horus]

Lots of power creep ideas in this thread. I find the War Cleric fine - they're not primary combatants, they're support while being able to stand in the front line. War God's Blessing is the key to this. Being able to toss out a +10 to hit as a reaction at a key point in the battle is a great buff.

Yeah, we could make the War Cleric an awesome holy fighter, but isn't that the Paladin's job?

 

[CapnZapp]

Only if you give it to all clerics. And wizards for that matter.

They aren't any worse off than any other cleric subclass - indeed they are all virtually indistinguishable at high level.

If you believe war clerics aren't underpowered I can't expect you to see the design deficiency of the War Priest feature.

My point is that any power that makes a cleric choose Attack over Cast Spell is fundamentally misjudged.

I have already stated I don't vouch for the suggestion's balance. It is the design idea I laud.

 

[Rossbert]

Part of the issue is this forum's general value structure.

On the whole people on here evaluate based on a full 20 level progression, as well as for a fairly focused optimization.

This is exactly the type of ability that fails those criteria. It is fairly strong when you get it if you have a decent wisdom, but becomes strictly situational at best by between levels 4 and 6. On top of that it is less of a central ability and more of a one-off to give an extra option in what will probably be uncommon situations.

On the whole neither of those are viewed terribly well on here, especially compared to a wider audience (a lot of AL characters never see level 8).

On a personal aside, my AL tempest cleric is strongly considering a respec to war to better use the Greatsword of Wounding he found.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

Exactly. And below level 8 a cleric (or other caster) may well prefer an "attack" action (or cantrip) to casting a spell, since they may otherwise run out of spells before the end of the game day. For that reason most of the cleric domain powers become not very useful (e.g. nature domain Shillelagh) at high level. But by then it doesn't matter.

 

[pogre]

I am having a lot of fun with my War Cleric. However, I am kind of regretting choosing the domain now that I have hit level 8. I'm not changing or multi-classing as my PC is deeply enmeshed in temple politics, but I would be tempted if I were just doing AL or the like.

 

[Rossbert]

I am having a lot of fun with my War Cleric. However, I am kind of regretting choosing the domain now that I have hit level 8. I'm not changing or multi-classing as my PC is deeply enmeshed in temple politics, but I would be tempted if I were just doing AL or the like.

Of course you can't respec in AL once you have hit level 5. I think of war cleric like dragon sorcerer, you get that little boost at the beginning to help get you to the point you don't use it anymore (a high level sorcerer probably shouldn't be taking many attacks vs their AC)

 

[Gladius Legis]

Only if you give it to all clerics. And wizards for that matter.

That makes no sense. You want to give the War Cleric specifically the bonus action attack after a spell because that's a War Cleric type of thing to do. No other Cleric should get that because their specialties are different.

Otherwise you may as well argue that all classes should get Extra Attack, or all classes should get Sneak Attack, or Cunning Action, or Action Surge, or ... you get the idea, right?

 

[Paul Farquhar]

That makes no sense. You want to give the War Cleric specifically the bonus action attack after a spell because that's a War Cleric type of thing to do. No other Cleric should get that because their specialties are different.

Otherwise you may as well argue that all classes should get Extra Attack, or all classes should get Sneak Attack, or Cunning Action, or Action Surge, or ... you get the idea, right?

The point is, if you gave war clerics that ability it would make them substantially superior to all other full casters.

The War cleric is a priest serving a god of war. He is not a full warrior who is also a full caster. If you want to play a holy warrior that's what paladins are for.

 

[Gladius Legis]

The point is, if you gave war clerics that ability it would make them substantially superior to all other full casters.

No, it really wouldn't.

The War cleric is a priest serving a god of war. He is not a full warrior who is also a full caster. If you want to play a holy warrior that's what paladins are for.

A bonus action attack after casting a spell with a limited resource (e.g. spell slots) hardly turns the War Cleric into a full warrior, nor does it let him do anywhere near the single-target damage of the Paladin.