No Cleric in my Group

[RandomPrecision]

My most recent D&D experience was with a party of only three characters, and out of those, two were clerics. I don't think playing with that high of percentage of the party being clerics is a good idea, but having one cleric is nice, largely because of their healing spells. Undead turning is also a useful ability (except one of our clerics never turns undead, and I don't know why, the other has remarkably low charisma, and won't turn undead because he doesn't feel that he'd do anything, so even though 2/3 of us are clerics, no one ever turns undead). Even beyond those abilities, having someone who can contact a deity could always turn out to be useful.

 

[fafhrd]

Our current campaign, set in Stephen R Donaldson's The Land

[Hijack]
How's that going for you? I created a thread a little while back inquiring about feasibility of running a game in that universe.
[/Hijack]

I generally prefer parties without clerics. Outside of Eberron they just reek of stooge. Still it's hard to ignore their utility.

 

[Keeper of Secrets]

In a standard setting clerics are vital. I think that the game is set up where it is critical that some of those healing spells and cleric abilities are essential. If the campaign is set up where there is low magic and the GM takes that into account then clerics may not be needed, I suppose.

 

[Saeviomagy]

I'd play, but I wouldn't want to be one of those classes that were expected to fill in for the cleric unless they were being given the advantages in that arena that the cleric has: ie - more spells per day, more spells known, spontaeneous conversion to healing.

The cleric has this neat advantage of always having healing magic available. Playing (for instance) a druid who's relied on as party healing sucks - because you basically never get to use your spells: They all get swallowed up as healing.

 

[Aus_Snow]

I would vote for the nonexistent 'other'.

 

[Kalendraf]

I've DM'ed groups with no clerics and played in a campaign with no cleric. While it does complicate the healing aspect, there are alternatives to consider.

First, any druids and bards in the party are going to need to cast more cure spells than usual, but that alone may not be enough.

A slightly more expensive route is to invest heavily in scrolls, potions and wands that provide healing. Alternately, the DM may allow you to buy or craft some items that can permanently cast cure spells some number of times per day. An item that cast cure light wounds 1 time per day is actually pretty cheap.

The 3rd option is to simply be more cautious and be willing to retreat and rest a lot more often.

As for the Undead stuff, you can have a paladin pick up some of the slack. You can also have the wizard take a few more undead affecting spells.

 

[Eremite]

One campaign I ran until 20th level didn't have a cleric until the party was about 15th level. It worked OK but largely because the party included a paladin, a druid and a bard.

The only reason the cleric joined at 15th level was that one player was tired of playing the world's crappiest elven fighter (um, 3.5E game and he built his elf with 2E rules in mind... and, yes, that's literally what happened) and so changed for a cleric.

 

[philreed]

I answered no but that's only because of an experience in a 1st edition game. We had no cleric and paid the price. Ever since then I've wanted a cleric in the party.

 

[jonesy]

Didn't have my option. The "I have played in games without clerics, with a single cleric, with all PCs as clerics, with another class representing the cleric (like a DL mystic), and it worked well in all cases; and have no problems playing any of the variations again later".

 

[Li Shenron]

I've played in groups without clerics and it always worked. Obviously a Cleric is the best healing "method" a group can have, but there are others that can cover the need. No cleric is not the same as no healing...