D&D 5E What Should The 5E Cleric Look Like?

[Olaf the Stout]

Post here anything you would like to see included or not included in regards to the 5E Cleric.

So what would I like to see? I haven't really played much 4E, so I can't really comment there, but one thing that has always bugged me about 3E Clerics is that, other than a couple of minor mechanics, there isn't much to differentiate Clerics according to the god that they worship.

A Cleric of Pelor and a Cleric of Hextor are basically the same, apart from different holy symbols, control vs turn undead and spontaneously casting cure vs inflict spells.

What I would like to see is someting like 2E's spell spheres (or a similar mechanic). In 2E all Cleric spells related to a specific sphere, much like arcane spells and the various schools of magic. Depending on which god they worship, a Cleric gets either Major, Minor or no access to spells in that sphere.

Major access means you can cast all spells in that sphere (once you reach the appropriate level). Minor access means you can cast spells 3rd level or below in that sphere and no access means that you can't cast any spells in that sphere.

This creates a system similar to specialist Wizards and helps make Clerics of various gods different from each other.

I'm not suggesting that the 2E system be adopted wholesale, but at least some consideration be given to making your choice of god more meaningful a decision than what weapon your Cleric uses.

So what things would you like or not like to see part of the 5E Cleric?

Olaf the Stout

 

[DonTadow]

Post here anything you would like to see included or not included in regards to the 5E Cleric.

So what would I like to see? I haven't really played much 4E, so I can't really comment there, but one thing that has always bugged me about 3E Clerics is that, other than a couple of minor mechanics, there isn't much to differentiate Clerics according to the god that they worship.

A Cleric of Pelor and a Cleric of Hextor are basically the same, apart from different holy symbols, control vs turn undead and spontaneously casting cure vs inflict spells.

What I would like to see is someting like 2E's spell spheres (or a similar mechanic). In 2E all Cleric spells related to a specific sphere, much like arcane spells and the various schools of magic. Depending on which god they worship, a Cleric gets either Major, Minor or no access to spells in that sphere.

Major access means you can cast all spells in that sphere (once you reach the appropriate level). Minor access means you can cast spells 3rd level or below in that sphere and no access means that you can't cast any spells in that sphere.

This creates a system similar to specialist Wizards and helps make Clerics of various gods different from each other.

I'm not suggesting that the 2E system be adopted wholesale, but at least some consideration be given to making your choice of god more meaningful a decision than what weapon your Cleric uses.

So what things would you like or not like to see part of the 5E Cleric?

Olaf the Stout

I like it, my idea of choosing spells would be, you choose a spell block, grouped together, wit hspells related to one another.

So far, oddly enough, a lot of ideas are coming from 2nd edition. Which was a decent system that needed a ton of fine tuning and simplification.

Your idea has one thing that really stands out. Uniformity. I want a new player to finally play a cleric, or wizard and not be intimidated. 9 times out of 10, especially female players, new players want to play a wizard or priestess.

 

[Olaf the Stout]

2E also had a generic default "Cleric" which had major access to some spheres, minor access to others and no access to a couple of spheres.

This could still be used if a player just wanted to play a basic Cleric without having to think about spheres. That would also make things easier for new players (one less decision to worry about).

This system would also help new players in a less explicit way, by minimising the amount of spells that they had access to. The 3E Cleric, with its ability to prepare any Cleric spell that they had the ability to cast, could be quite daunting for new (and experienced) players.

Olaf the Stout

 

[RangerWickett]

I want armored warpriests who can pray their hammer deeper into the dragon's skull.

I want cloth-wearing miracle workers whom the gods protect from harm and whose words carry the force of the divine.

I want -- not necessarily via the 'cleric class,' but somehow -- to be able to recreate the travel & trickery domain cleric one of my players had in Eberron in 3e, who'd fly invisibly through Sharn casting healing spells on the rest of the party and never getting hurt.

Options, man! I want options!

 

[the Jester]

2e had the best priest system, but the one that was hardest to keep balanced and most prone to option overload.

I think the basic 5e cleric ought to represent a set of choices- say, 4 spheres or domains: War, Healing, Sun and Protection (or something). They'll have good armor (because they have the War domain) and medium weapon skills. A cleric without War will have medium armor and weapons.

 

[thedungeondelver]

I think it should be wholly incumbent on what the DM sets the dials to for his or her version of D&D: Original D&D or AD&D? Like "the Cleric". 2e? Specialty priests. etc.

I think the default should be a definition of what it is, what they can do, the basics of how they're created in each system, and a bank of switches and dials to make them fit the game you're gonna run them in.

 

[Raith5]

Agree with the OP. Preach on brother!

It always got me that in 4th ed a cleric had to pay a feat to get their religion defining power.

I hope the option of religion defining powers has both combat and social/skill aspects.

I also hope there is support for the idea that clerics can worship multiple gods (ala Invoker)

Mechanically, I must say that I really liked the 4th ed practice of healing word with minor actions - that worked really well.

 

[FireLance]

I think the critical question is what clerics in 5e should have in common, otherwise what would be there to distinguish a cloth-wearing miracle worker from a wizard, or an armored warpriest from a paladin or a fighter-mage?

What do you see as the iconic cleric powers and abilities? I'm starting to think that any divinely-empowered character ought to have access to powers such as cure light wounds, bless and turn undead.

So maybe there shouldn't be a core cleric in 5e. Maybe there should just be a package of divine abilities that any character can gain access to through spending some character customization option (feats or a theme). After obtaining this basic package, the character may pursue further customization, gaining access to a specific domain or deity-specific special abilities.

 

[Raith5]

I think the unbundling of divine powers is an interesting idea. The line between paladin and warpriest is pretty fine

 

[Aldarc]

Clerics regardless of deity should share the same basic playstyle. This is not to say that clerics cannot be distinguished between deities or personalized to a particular playstyle, but that the cleric as a whole needs a clear vision for what it does well as a class.

The 5E cleric should be less about healing and more damage prevention. Their spells should be less reactive and more proactive. They should be given control and support options that allows the cleric to positively contribute to the flow of the fight and the well-being of allies in a way that amounts to more than simply restoring hit points.

Clerics should be also optional for parties, but not required. Clerics are too frequently used as a crutch mechanic for the rest of the party. The absence of a cleric or dedicated healer should not cripple parties any more than the absence of a fighter, wizard, or rogue.

Most importantly, the 5E Cleric should be fun to play!

 

[Sammael]

The cleric should have:

1. A narrow list of abilities/prayers common to all clerics, including your garden-variety healing and harming magics.

2. The ability to easily use ritualistic casting, with both generic rituals and deity-specific rituals (IMO, any spell/prayer with a casting time longer than 1 action should be classified as a ritual).

3. Only basic armor and weapon proficiencies.

4. Access to 5 vastly different spheres for each god; the spheres would define the rest of the cleric's magical abilities.

5. A special ability unique to each god. These abilities could include additional armor/weapon proficiencies, turn undead, and so on.

6. A massive 400-page volume titled Faiths of Faerun that will rival the 2nd edition trilogy in quality. NO GOD STATS OF ANY KIND WHATSOEVER, KTHXBYE.

 

[Argyle King]

I would like to see cleric become something akin to a template. I believe this would allow more freedom to make different religions feel different.

Bolting the template onto a fighter or warlord might create a paladin; this would suit gods of war, valor, and etc. Bolting it onto a wizard would make a more cloistered character who relies more on spells than other paths; this would suit gods of knowledge, healing, and etc.

 

[TwinBahamut]

I'm really not sure what to do with Clerics...

I'd like to see the Arcane and Divine magic get more cleanly differentiated than they have in the past. Traditionally they've been mostly identical except for spell lists, but it might be more interesting to have them be as distinct from each other as 3E Psionic power was distinct from Arcane and Divine magic. I'm not sure how that should be done, but it seems like it would be a good start.

I'd like to see Divine magic move away from its role as "the healing magic". Arcane spellcasters should be able to heal, and this should free up Clerics to work better with different concepts. If anything, giving Clerics a greater emphasis on something like summoned creatures or passive aura effects could be a nice change.

Also, while the heavily armored, mace-wielding Cleric is certainly iconic to D&D and needs to stay an option, I'd prefer to see it stop being the assumed default for the class. The default shouldn't necessarily swing over to the opposite end of the spectrum and leave the default cleric as a wizardlike character with no armor or weapon skills, though.

I'd like it if Clerics could move away from the whole "servants of a single deity in a polytheistic pantheon" assumption a bit, but it is such an ingrained part of D&D that might be too much to ask for... I do think, though, that if something like 3E's Domains were to exist, then Clerics of different Domains should be as thoroughly distinguished as the 3E Druid is from the 3E Cleric. I suppose it would not be unreasonable to say that every Divine caster is a "Cleric", but provide a number of divine caster classes that each represent very different religions/Domains and give each appropriate abilities.

 

[Jack99]

I want armored warpriests who can pray their hammer deeper into the dragon's skull.

I want cloth-wearing miracle workers whom the gods protect from harm and whose words carry the force of the divine.

Yeah, this is all I want as well. War-priests would have more hit points and better weapons/armor, but could cast fewer spells.

Oh, and spheres. That's something that has been missing since 2ed. But they need to be balanced somewhat, so that even if you optimize, you do not choose the same type of cleric every_single_time.

(Remember, balance /= same)

 

[Hassassin]

I think the 3e cleric is a solid starting point. Remove a lot of general cleric spells (especially broken ones), make all domains equally good (with domain spells more powerful than others), expand upon Cloistered Cleric as an alternative role.

 

[Chris_Nightwing]

The things I figure all clerics have in common:

Since gods are real, they have contact with, or slight influence over, the most powerful beings in existence and ought to be taken seriously (no matter whom they worship).

That's it. Beyond that it's very hard to see why a cleric of a war god would have much in common with a cleric of an esoteric knowledge god. Even at the lowest level, the war cleric would be interested in arms and armour, spells that alter the sway of battle, whilst the knowledge cleric would be divining and have useful investigative spells.

The 2nd edition 'spheres' technique was pretty good, but it failed because one cleric in every party would need healing (which isn't that relevant to most gods really). Healing was made more available in 4th edition, but could still be powered down to bring it in line with other spheres that clerics might be interested in (healing is another discussion however).

 

[Danzauker]

I'd like to see 2 or 3 divine classes

- paladin: martial oriented, good weapon and armor, limited sphere selection

- priest: controller oriented, poor weapon and armor, lots of sphere selection

- cleric: in the middle of the two, leader type, lots of healing

 

[Ainamacar]

For me the basic success or failure of the 5e cleric will hinge on whether each character feels like it majors in "Devoted doer of my god's will in my god's way" and minors in "Doer of basic clericy things", and not the other way around. Dropping the minor might be even better! Both 3e and 4e fell far short here, so 2e with kits might have been the closest thing so far. Since totally unique per deity spell lists isn't practical for an entire system (something I spent a lot of time doing in 3.5), something like domains or spheres seems the obvious choice. I really did love the 3e domains, though, for tossing in some truly oddball spells and abilities.

Mechanically, I think the cleric should pretty much just be scaffolding on which to build spell casting and appropriate miscellaneous class abilities, all determined by sphere/domain and/or specific deity.

If there is to be a feature shared by all clerics (besides spell casting) I would go for the most iconic thing I can think of: miracles. Occasional (once or twice per adventure?) level-appropriate miracles, like access to a spell or inexpensive ritual not normally available, maybe even a minor arbitrary effect, could be hugely flavorful and helpful without making the class' intentional limitations pointless. Heck, maybe even larger effects if a permanent character resource were spent, like foregoing a class feature to create a relic, if we can avoid the problems of Wish. I'd probably require the cleric to risk some mechanical resource (this is petitioning after all) and, unless there were very convincing roleplaying, roll a "faith" check vs. a DC determined by the deity's basic attitude toward the requested miracle. Either way the risked resource is lost, but on a success the miracle occurs. Pelor causes just enough crops to grow in a single day, Kord grants his Righteous Might to a faithful layperson in an hour of need, and by Moradin's will you pull a stout and fully-formed stone hammer from the walls of your prison cell. And when it counts maybe even a high-level cleric of Ioun can raise the newly dead in battle, or use a massive earthquake to knock the enemy forces from a cliff, or any number of iconic effects that rightly aren't in his usual bag of tricks.

 

[Elf Witch]

Post here anything you would like to see included or not included in regards to the 5E Cleric.

So what would I like to see? I haven't really played much 4E, so I can't really comment there, but one thing that has always bugged me about 3E Clerics is that, other than a couple of minor mechanics, there isn't much to differentiate Clerics according to the god that they worship.

A Cleric of Pelor and a Cleric of Hextor are basically the same, apart from different holy symbols, control vs turn undead and spontaneously casting cure vs inflict spells.

What I would like to see is someting like 2E's spell spheres (or a similar mechanic). In 2E all Cleric spells related to a specific sphere, much like arcane spells and the various schools of magic. Depending on which god they worship, a Cleric gets either Major, Minor or no access to spells in that sphere.

Major access means you can cast all spells in that sphere (once you reach the appropriate level). Minor access means you can cast spells 3rd level or below in that sphere and no access means that you can't cast any spells in that sphere.

This creates a system similar to specialist Wizards and helps make Clerics of various gods different from each other.

I'm not suggesting that the 2E system be adopted wholesale, but at least some consideration be given to making your choice of god more meaningful a decision than what weapon your Cleric uses.

So what things would you like or not like to see part of the 5E Cleric?

Olaf the Stout

This is what I would lie to see as well. I would also like to see weapons and armor choices be different depending on what god you choose to worship.

I really dislike the cookie cutter 3E cleric.

I don't find that domain spells really give that much flavor.

 

[Ed_Laprade]

I want the cleric to be a representative of his god(s). A cleric of the Goddess of Magic should be able to cast any (level appropriate) spell. A cleric of the God of War should be an armored fighter using his diety's weapon of choice. And there ought to be a way for a panthieastic (sp?) priest/ess to be both. &Etc.

And I want to see the arcane/divine split in magic go away. I want the village hedge wizard to be able to cast healing magic and other usefull spells for the villagers.