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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Elder-Basilisk" data-source="post: 3228443" data-attributes="member: 3146">Some good and some bad in these comments: Let's go through them:While, if it were my character, I would have a wisdom 15, and a lower dex, I don't think that the lower wisdom is all that bad in this case.A. With craft wondrous item, access to periapts of wisdom is pretty much guaranteed.B. Ending up with an odd stat is not all that suboptimal.b1. Inherent bonuses go up to +5. An odd statted character can get an extra +1 bonus out of that. An even statted character cannot.b2. Without considering inherent bonuses, starting with an odd stat (and thus ending with an even stat) is advantageous at levels 4-7, 12-15, and 20. That's nine levels. Starting with an even stat (and thus ending with an odd stat is advantageous at levels 1-3, 8-11, and 16-19). That's eleven levels. Assuming an campaign from levels 1-20, I don't see how that is a disadvantage. [My specific reasoning for usually wanting a 15+ is so as to have bonus 3rd level spells at 5th level without a stat-boost item].Having seen the character in action, I disagree with pretty much all of this. It is true that the barbarian level entails serious sacrifices, but it also does come with significant advantages.Martial weapons are not the big selling point. Instead, Rage is the selling point. (And fast movement doesn't suck either). It is good for several reasons:A. In general, a melee cleric will spend one round buffing and then go at it. More than that and you end up as a character who really kicks ass (the round after the last bad guy goes down), but did nothing useful during the fight. Thus the opportunity cost for rage isn't nearly as great as you seem to think. Round 1 cast your buff and move. Round 2, cast a quickened buff, rage, and full attack. That's generally good enough.B. As alluded to in the previous reason, rage is a no-prep time buff. A battle cleric needs to be ready to go as soon as possible and can't afford more than one (or at most two) rounds of buffing. Rage adds to combat power but doesn't add to the prep time.C. Rage seems to tip a lot of characters over an important break point in terms of power. These break points are something you observe a lot in the D&D minis game. A character with 65 hit points is light years tougher than a character with only 60 hit points. Why? Because any opponent dealing either 5, 10, 15, 20, or 30 points of damage per hit needs an extra hit in order to drop him. Similarly, a mini that deals 15 points of damage is much better than one that deals 10 points and dealing 30 points of damage is signficantly better than dealing 25 points of damage. The math just works out much better with that little bit extra. Rage is that kicker. If you convert it into Power Attack, it works out to 7 points of bonus damage with a two handed weapon and 5 points with a one-handed weapon. (although you probably won't convert it to Power Attack with a one-handed weapon). That's enough that the math starts to change quite significantly.Kord doesn't have the war domain....Well, when damage bonuses are high, a falchion is better against crittable foes, but in general I agree. On the other hand, Well, as I said, there are a lot of sacrifices involved in the half-orc cleric. Having no skills to speak of is one of them. On the other hand, unless you do the persistent divine meta-magic (and I will never recommend that to anyone for the simple reason that it is so ridiculous as to make the game less fun), you're not likely to get the same raw damage output from charisma and divine feats as you will from strength.Divine favor isn't really a minor buff. Like rage, it's a kicker that pushes you past attack and damage breakpoints. At high levels (15+) you can also quicken Divine Power. It's not as stupid good as DMM Persistent divine power, but it is very good within the confines of a game that is not pushing all of the mechanical boundaries.Well, as a DM, I wouldn't allow Divine Meta-magic within five miles of my game so I'm not about to recommend it to other people. You're right, that Divine Meta-magic Quicken is more powerful than normal quicken spell (though you should note that it requires Quicken Spell). As for Cleave, though, it retains its usefulness at high levels for this character (having seen the character in action). High level characters still find a lot of use for cleave if they are, like this character damage optimized. It also has very good synergy with Righteous Might since the increased damage and reach make Cleaves happen more often and put more foes within reach of them.Not in the campaign this character is from. However, it's worth pointing out that if all players follow this school of character creation thought, the wizard won't have Craft Wondrous Item either. The bonus feats can, of course, be metamagic feats instead of crafting feats and the wizard is likely to just go straight to a prestige class after 5th level anyway and thus won't have a lot of bonus feats anyway.For straight-up damage, maybe. On the other hand, tactical feats are not for the feat starved. Shock Trooper or Combat Brute really cost two feats since you need to take Improved Bull Rush and Improved Sunder (respectively) in order to get them.</blockquote>

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