first time cleric needs to survive

[Zaruthustran]

I would like to keep the melle ability as much as possible but it is secondary to being able to save the day with those heals. most games we end up haveing to camp in the middle of a dungeon because we have no more healing available... it annoys me...

Seriously, take a good long look at the Dragon Shaman. It's designed to fix that specific problem.

Just one level will give you an aura that gives everyone Fast Healing 1 (so long as they're under 1/2 hp). That means that whenever you rest, everyone heals 1hp per round until they're 1/2 full. There's no limit to the amount of healing you can provide this way.

The aura is also good because it auto-stabilizes any dropped party members.

At higher levels, Dragon Shamans can heal bulk hit points (kind of like Lay on Hands) or trade some of that bulk healing for Cure Poison, Remove Disease, and so on.

Plus they can melee. They've got a d10 hit die, cleric's BAB, decent armor (mithril full plate and heavy shield ). Best part is they don't need a free hand to do their thing--unlike a cleric, who has to drop their weapon (or shield) whenever they want to cast a spell.

Take a look. The class is designed for people who want healing, but don't want hassle.

-z

 

[Vague Jayhawk]

I played a cleric of that level recently. We had only one front line warrior, a barbarian. I developed a tactic of just following the barbarian around and healing her. My opinion is that Shielded casting is a must for a cleric.

Every round she would give great amounts of damage and take great amounts of damage. I would just follow behind and poke her with healing every round. It worked for our game because we normally fought just one or two uberbig opponents instead of many lesser ones.

As long as the barbarian was alive and between me and the enemy, I survived.

 

[kelson]

thanks for the help guys. I'll have to ask the dm about some of it. especialy the bit about the persistant spells. he usualy doesnt allow us to have cool stuff like that. i dont have the heros of battle, so I'll have to borrow that one from the dm before I make my character. apparently this is all a lot more complicated than the groups old cleric made it seem! (We rocked until he moved to japan...) I'm glad we havent had a session in 2 weeks, or I would never have been able to get this together in time.

 

[shurai]

Good lord, folks, he needs simplicity. No need to optimize him for a freakin' smackdown thread.

Kelson, just play a straight and basic cleric and you'll be fine; straight clerics in D&D are good at melee by default because they're assumed to be "priest-warriors." Here's how:

Play a Dwarven Good-aligned cleric and take the Healing and Protection domains (some deity in your setting should allow that). High Wisdom, Constitution, and Strength in that order. Skills don't matter except for Concentration, Spellcraft, and Knowledge: Religion, in descending order of importance.

For feats, you need to pick five. I suggest Combat Casting, Improved Initiative, Lightning Reflexes, Weapon Focus (your melee weapon), and Quickdraw. None of these force you to make decisions at gametime.

Assuming you get the normal wealth for your level, just split your funds between a good melee weapon (say a Heavy Mace), armor, and shield (all three will be magical, ask the DM for details on that). Just get straight bonuses, you don't need all that fancy stuff. With any leftover funds, buy magic crossbow bolts and a masterwork crossbow, but otherwise take the starting package for your class; it's in the PHB.

Bonus languages: Celestial, and Abyssal if your wisdom is high enough.

For prepared spells, you want:

* Half your preparation for agressive combat bonuses.
* A quarter your preparation for defensive combat bonsues.
* A quarter for removing bad conditions & protection from magical dangers.
* whatever you want for the two domain spells per level.

This won't be optimal but it'll be good and most importantly simple: Not too many decisions to make at the gaming table, which is what you want. Your cleric will be good at three things: Protection/defense, healing/restoration, and beating the crap out of things. : D

 

[nittanytbone]

Combat Casting

If you go this road, take Skill Focus (Concentration) instead. Combat Casting provides a +4 bonus sometimes whereas Skill Focus gives +3 all the time.

 

[Mistwell]

Good News: Clerics are Uber Powerful.
Bad News: They are somewhat complex, but not TOO bad.

Here's a quick sample level 13 melee cleric build using elite array:

STR 13 (Boost to 14 if possible)
DEX 10 (Boost to 12 if you can for wearing full plate and maxing AC)
CON 14
INT 8
WIS 15+3 from level ups
CHA 12

Race: Human

Domains: Luck & Travel (The best core domains, arguably; Luck has an awesome ability and Travel has great spells and a decent ability)

Feats:
Human Bonus - Extend Spell
1 - Persistent Spell
3 - DMM Persistent Spell
6 - Extra Turning
9 - Extra Turning
12 - Power Attack

Classes:
If you can get the Radiant Servant of Pelor PrC from Complete Divine, take that; otherwise, just max out your Cleric Levels. There is no need to multiclass: Multiclassing just weakens your character! If you REALLY like the flavor, you could take the Church Inquisitor PrC from Complete Divine as well. The Inquisition Domain is handy for resisting Dispel Magics...

The Trick:
Persistent Spell allows you to make many spells last ALL DAY LONG. Divine Metamagic allows you to spend Turn Undead attempts instead of increasing the spell's level to fuel the metamagic. Each spell you Persist requires 7 turn attempts. You have 3 attempts for being a cleric + 1 from high charisma + 8 from Extra Turning + 2 from casting Eagle's Glory. That means you can persist two spells. If you take the RSoP PrC like I suggested you'll have even more and might be able to dispense iwth the Extra Turning Feats.

I'd suggest persisting Divine Power and Righteous Might.

If your DM thinks this is broken, replace with DMM Quicken Spell. Throwing off a quickened Buff is almost as helpful, as it means you can get into the fight sooner.

Key Items:

Nightsticks (7500 GP from Libris Mortis; Grant +4 turn attempts... Which you use to fuel more Persistent Spells!)
+1 Heavy Shield (No need to make it higher -- just cast Magic Vestment)
+1 Full Plate (No need to make it higher -- just cast Magic Vestment)
+1 Melee Weapon of Choice (I'd suggest Morningstar; if RSoP, ditch the shield and get a Greatsword; cast Magic Weapon Greater on it rather than paying for more pluses)
+1 Bane Ammunition for your missile weapon
Wand of Lesser Vigor or CLW (Healing out of combat -- make your party members chip in for it)
Scrolls of spells that aren't used often but are potentially lifesavers: Neutralize/Slow Poison, Remove Disease, Lesser Restoration, Raise Dead, and so on...
Potions of Enlarge Person (for when Righteous Might is dispelled)
Item to boost WIS
Item to boost DEX (if you don't have 12 dex)
Bead of Karma (to up your caster level)
Don't bother with STR boosting items -- they won't stack with Righteous Might.

No offense, but I think that is the worst possible idea for a relatively new player. It's one of the the most broken, most twinked builds in the game. Divine Metamagic, Persistant Spell, and Nightsticks? Come on man, you KNOW that most sane DMs will ban it, and if they don't it's because they either don't realize what they are letting into their game or they have something so powerful, so terrifying, that no matter what build you go with the DM is planning on crushing you. And either way, it's a bad idea.

 

[Mistwell]

Good lord, folks, he needs simplicity. No need to optimize him for a freakin' smackdown thread.

Kelson, just play a straight and basic cleric and you'll be fine; straight clerics in D&D are good at melee by default because they're assumed to be "priest-warriors." Here's how:

Play a Dwarven Good-aligned cleric and take the Healing and Protection domains (some deity in your setting should allow that). High Wisdom, Constitution, and Strength in that order. Skills don't matter except for Concentration, Spellcraft, and Knowledge: Religion, in descending order of importance.

For feats, you need to pick five. I suggest Combat Casting, Improved Initiative, Lightning Reflexes, Weapon Focus (your melee weapon), and Quickdraw. None of these force you to make decisions at gametime.

Assuming you get the normal wealth for your level, just split your funds between a good melee weapon (say a Heavy Mace), armor, and shield (all three will be magical, ask the DM for details on that). Just get straight bonuses, you don't need all that fancy stuff. With any leftover funds, buy magic crossbow bolts and a masterwork crossbow, but otherwise take the starting package for your class; it's in the PHB.

Bonus languages: Celestial, and Abyssal if your wisdom is high enough.

For prepared spells, you want:

* Half your preparation for agressive combat bonuses.
* A quarter your preparation for defensive combat bonsues.
* A quarter for removing bad conditions & protection from magical dangers.
* whatever you want for the two domain spells per level.

This won't be optimal but it'll be good and most importantly simple: Not too many decisions to make at the gaming table, which is what you want. Your cleric will be good at three things: Protection/defense, healing/restoration, and beating the crap out of things. : D

I think your advice is the better advice for this situation.

I would change some small things here and there. Like if you are playing a dwarf, then use an axe or a hammer instead of a mace. And ditch quickdraw, as it's not very helpful for that kind of character. I'd maybe replace it with the single "advanced" feat of Ranged Spell, so he can heal his allies from a distance if he needs to.

 

[shurai]

If you go this road, take Skill Focus (Concentration) instead. Combat Casting provides a +4 bonus sometimes whereas Skill Focus gives +3 all the time.

Wow, good idea. Arguably as powerful, and simpler.

I think your advice is the better advice for this situation.

I would change some small things here and there. Like if you are playing a dwarf, then use an axe or a hammer instead of a mace. And ditch quickdraw, as it's not very helpful for that kind of character. I'd maybe replace it with the single "advanced" feat of Ranged Spell, so he can heal his allies from a distance if he needs to.

Thanks, and thanks also for the suggestions. My call for Quick Draw was based on my experience playing a cleric in an Eberron game as run by the most knowledgeable DM I've ever played with. He knew all sorts of ways to make in-game choices tougher, just by adhering to the RAW. This is how I came to believe that Quick Draw is good for Clerics.

While wearing a large shield, you can't transfer your weapon to your shield-hand momentarily while you cast spells with the other hand, which means you have to sheath it. Assume you've just cast a spell and want to melee afterwards; your weapon is sheathed and you want to draw it again. Reducing that to a free action with Quick Draw allows the next round to be a Full Attack, which will double the number of attack rolls in this case.

It can matter in other situations too, such as mixing wand usage with melee. Anyway, what do you think? Worth it in that context?

Kelson, if you like my build for your character, Mistwell's advice about the axes or hammers is right, in a way: They're good flavor for dwarves, but ruleswise they're about as good as any of the other weapons you'd have to spend a feat for. Go ahead and do it if you want your character to be more smashy than spelly. : ]

I'm not familiar with non-core material; where's Ranged Spell? Also, how does it work?

 

[moritheil]

No offense, but I think that is the worst possible idea for a relatively new player. It's one of the the most broken, most twinked builds in the game. Divine Metamagic, Persistant Spell, and Nightsticks? Come on man, you KNOW that most sane DMs will ban it, and if they don't it's because they either don't realize what they are letting into their game or they have something so powerful, so terrifying, that no matter what build you go with the DM is planning on crushing you. And either way, it's a bad idea.

Dissenting opinion: DMM Persistent is a typical build. At this point, everyone who isn't new knows of it and uses it (barring DM forbiddance.) There are many more powerful builds. That said, it is a little complicated for a beginner.

 

[shurai]

Dissenting opinion: DMM Persistent is a typical build. At this point, everyone who isn't new knows of it and uses it (barring DM forbiddance.) There are many more powerful builds. That said, it is a little complicated for a beginner.

Excuse me for outright contradiction but you're wrong. I've been playing 3rd Edition since the week it came out, and I've never heard of it. Not everyone plays with noncore books, not everyone is a powergamer. Powergaming is a perfectly valid and fun way to play D&D, I'm sure, but there are many other perfectly valid and fun ways to play, and lots of people do so.