Good feature/ability for a high level evil cleric's melee weapon?

[NewJeffCT]

The party is going to be running into some powerful foes coming up - a death knight, a frenzied berserker type and also an evil cleric of a racial purity deity (pro human, hates anything that is not human, but especially elves)

The death knight & FB already have their standard weapons... but, what would a good feature be for a level 18 N/E cleric with the domains of Hatred & Strength? His weapon is a 2 handed flail, and with his Strength domain bonus (+18 to Str for 1 round), he is going to Divine Power/Righteous Might himself and wade into melee combat... rather than just the standard "bane" weapon attuned to elves, what are some other ideas I could use for this weapon?

Was thinking something like the flail is coated with elf blood from fallen elf foes that does something besides just the extra 2d6 against elves that a normal bane weapon does. Any ideas?

 

[Theroc]

Not sure how much of a bonus you can apply to your flail yet, but the unholy quality is another idea. Bane+Unholy would really nail any elves in the party, most probably.

As for other effects, the blood thing you mentioned could sicken those struck by it (either elves or non-elves), or perhaps those that are not elves hit by the blood briefly count as Elves for effects the cleric might use.

Sicken and Fear are two effects I could see immediately. Rage perhaps another. Have it have a variable effect based on a D3 roll or other appropriate die?

 

[Shin Okada]

Not particularly powerful, but Fiercebane weapon property (MIC) is an upper version of bane weapon. It detects creatures of appropriate type (or subtype) automatically and inflicts extra damage when scored a crit. Maybe not so bad on the hand of heavy flail wielder, especially if he has Improved critical feat and can cast Corrupt Weapon spell.

Another option is to use a weapon with both Elf Bane and Magebane (MIC), if elves in your world are following the traditional fluff (elves love arcane magic). Unfortunately, you tend see few PC elven mages on gaming table due to their -2 con.

Against living things, Wounding is one of the most effective and nasty weapon property, especially at higher level tier.

 

[Runestar]

Another idea is to take the smiting spell feat (PHB2) and use it to channel harm spells or other touch attacks through your attack to simulate smites vs your hated racial enemies.

Weapon wise, you could just use a normal weapon and rely on greater magic weapon to augment it to +5 (unless you expect the party to be dispel-happy). Be sure to throw in an animated shield while you are at it.

So tactics-wise, your cleric buffs with persistent divine favour, power, righteous might and wades into battle? Then tripping might be a viable tactic.

 

[NewJeffCT]

Another idea is to take the smiting spell feat (PHB2) and use it to channel harm spells or other touch attacks through your attack to simulate smites vs your hated racial enemies.

Weapon wise, you could just use a normal weapon and rely on greater magic weapon to augment it to +5 (unless you expect the party to be dispel-happy). Be sure to throw in an animated shield while you are at it.

So tactics-wise, your cleric buffs with persistent divine favour, power, righteous might and wades into battle? Then tripping might be a viable tactic.

What is persistent divine favour, may I ask? And, in the battle against my lich a few sessions back, the party cleric, psion and sorcerer each took cracks at debuffing my lich - I think the cleric and psion both did it twice.

I'll have to look at the animated shield as well.

 

[Runestar]

What is persistent divine favour, may I ask?

It is basically divine favour augmented with the persistent spell feat (which improves the duration of certain spells to 24 hours). Though on second though, such a long duration does not seem so vital from the POV of an npc. Extend spell would probably do the trick.

If you expect your PCs to dispel aggressively, then you may want to work around that with high caster lvs, spell turning or ring of counterspells.

Alternatively, if you are willing to worship weejas (you can be LE, IIRC), consider rebuilding it as a ruby knight vindicator (tome of battle).

 

[Dragonwriter]

You could also tweak the "Life-Drinker" weapon from the DMG. Make it a heavy flail instead of the usual greataxe and have the Cleric cast Death Ward on himself just before the fight (1 min/lvl duration) so he doesn't suffer the negative levels. The cash value of the ability should be around 36,000 GP, since Life-Drinker is only +1, but costs about 40,000.

Could turn really nasty, since it's two negative level per hit, no save.

 

[NewJeffCT]

It is basically divine favour augmented with the persistent spell feat (which improves the duration of certain spells to 24 hours). Though on second though, such a long duration does not seem so vital from the POV of an npc. Extend spell would probably do the trick.

If you expect your PCs to dispel aggressively, then you may want to work around that with high caster lvs, spell turning or ring of counterspells.

Alternatively, if you are willing to worship weejas (you can be LE, IIRC), consider rebuilding it as a ruby knight vindicator (tome of battle).

Ruby Knight Vindicator sounds interesting, but I don't really have the time to do a complete rebuild before Friday night... plus, I don't really know the Tome of Battle stuff all that well.

 

[Jeff Wilder]

I always thought the idea of disease could be pretty horrifying, but D&D neuters the concept quite a bit.

Still, you could play with the idea that the weapon inflicts a nasty, nigh-incurable disease; something with a long incubation period, so they don't make the connection immediately, and something with seriously brutal effects, so that it actually scares them.

 

[NewJeffCT]

I always thought the idea of disease could be pretty horrifying, but D&D neuters the concept quite a bit.

Still, you could play with the idea that the weapon inflicts a nasty, nigh-incurable disease; something with a long incubation period, so they don't make the connection immediately, and something with seriously brutal effects, so that it actually scares them.

That's an interesting idea... the party's elf fighter makes extensive use of Combat Expertise & Improved C.E. to really ratchet up his AC to near unhittable in melee levels (+17 at level 17). If his INT was dropped even 1 point to 12, those feats would be useless to him until he was cured. (And, before you say "touch of idiocy" - he is a C/G paladin of freedom, which makes him immune to mind-affecting compulsions like Touch of Idiocy)