Spontaneously Casting Cleric

[moritheil]

I have no desire to gainsay anyone's creativity, but for a simple solution, you might consider simply granting something like domain spontaneity + customize domain as bonus class features (or declaring that your player must take them.) This has the benefit of being mechanically nearly identical to the standard cleric.

 

[Alisair Longreach]

As I stated earlier in the thread one of the reasons for creating my Cleric was for ease of play. Two major design problems with the Cleric class is spell list bloat and lack of class features.

I dealt with the spell bloat problem by cutting half of the basic cleric spells list and adding only a handful of specific spells from the Spell Compendium. Clerics then only has access to these basic spells and if they want more they must expend precious resources like time and gold for spell research or a valuable feat. Remember that the basic spells can be cast spontaneously without preparation.

I know that the spell bloat problem now has been shifted to the Domain spell list but that I think is an advantage because now there is differentation between the basic spells and the Domain spells as well as there is a greater selection of Domain spells to choose from. By the standard rules you only get one single Domain spell at each level and access to two Domains. This means you get to choose between two spells to prepare in the Domain slot and both spells might appear on the basic spells list. This I think is kind of boring.

By expanding the Domain lists I give the Cleric player a choice between at least two funky themed Domain spells and maybe few more from a feat with a houseruled suite of spells. It is easier and faster to choose one spell from a selecetion of two to maybe ten spells instead of a handful from a selection of up to one hundred spells at any spell level spread among twenty or more books.

As for the featureless Cleric class, that I consider a feature, not a bug as the spells are class features. Yes, Nifft, I know this might be a problem in relation to Prestige Classes. One extreme solution is to just ban all Prestige Classes from play. Or just ignore it.

I haven't posted my reworked Domain lists because I don't want to spam the thread with this very long list but if anyone want to discuss them I could post a couple at time for analysis.

 

[Nifft]

I know that the spell bloat problem now has been shifted to the Domain spell list but that I think is an advantage because now there is differentation between the basic spells and the Domain spells as well as there is a greater selection of Domain spells to choose from. [...] By expanding the Domain lists I give the Cleric player a choice between at least two funky themed Domain spells and maybe few more from a feat with a houseruled suite of spells. [...] I haven't posted my reworked Domain lists because I don't want to spam the thread with this very long list but if anyone want to discuss them I could post a couple at time for analysis.

Why not? Seems like you think the Domains are important, and like you changed them.

If they're too long, you could put them in a [sblock]spoiler block[/sblock] or something.

Cheers, -- N

 

[Alisair Longreach]

That spoiler bloc sounds like a good idea, Nifft but how do I create one?

 

[Nifft]

That spoiler bloc sounds like a good idea, Nifft but how do I create one?

Quote my text and you can see exactly what I typed.

Also, you can hit the "edit" button on your previous posts to fix up the comma issue.

Cheers, -- N

 

[Alisair Longreach]

I have attached my house rules document to this post.

 

[Plane Sailing]

I used my own spontaneous casting cleric-like class in my first D&D campaign, and it worked really nicely (even while being much more limited than yours).

Basically it was called the Prophet class, and it had two domains, cleric BAB and saves, but learnt spells and cast spells just like the sorcerer (and used Cha as key ability, just like the sorcerer too).

The 3-4 spells known each spell level were called the 'faiths' of the prophet... the things he had faith to call upon. Frankly, giving them such a restriction was no worse than giving sorcerers that many spells known each spell level. I can't see why your example (or the favoured soul example) layer so many other benefits over and above what the poor spontaneous casting sorcerer gets!

My prophets were, like sorcerers, relatively weak until about 6th level, but once they reached 9th level or so they seemed like powerhouses that never ran out of spells (just like sorcerers).

I'd play one in someone elses campaign in a heartbeat!

Cheers