Thoughts on Classes: Cleric Edition

[New Willinium]

Thoughts on Classes: Cleric Edition


So this has been something on my mind for a while now as something that might be fun for this forum and create some good discussion about a subject SO vital to the game itself. . .The classes. We have a LOOOOT of classes in this game, not including the Prestige Classes which will likely just get rolled into one thread, with four variations to each of these classes to build our characters in different ways.


So today's subject? Today's subject is the absolute classical Cleric class and it's varying archetypes . The Cleric has four variations: The Base line Cleric, The Crusader, The Ecclesitheurge, and the Herald Caller.


Now let's start with the Cleric shall we? Now everybody knows the Cleric, they are the decent fighters that mainly exist to heal and buff your party, and in DnD and Neverwinter, explode undead enemies instantly with Turn Undead. Now sadly the Pathfinder Cleric does not have that ability but they more then make up for it with their access to two domains. Now the domains that the Cleric can gain access to is limited to just what deity they worship. They and all Cleric archetypes also have the ability to channel Positive or Negative energy to heal or damage those around them.


The domains are:Air, Animal, Artifice, Chaos, Charm ,Community, Darkness, Death, Destruction, Earth, Evil,Fire, Glory, Good, Healing, Knowledge, Law, Liberation, Magic, Luck, Madness, Nobility, Plant, Protection, Repose, Rune, Strength, Sun, Travel, Trickery, War, Water, and Weather.

Now they all have their up and downsides.


Next up is the Crusader archetype that serves as a more martial Cleric that loses a Domain choice in favor of some more minor martial skills. They are decent but if you want to play a class like this just play a Paladin I think. Unless you are not a Lawful Good character then this will work I suppose.


Next is the Ecclesitheurge: Cleric's that abandon the use of armor and allowing their faith to protect them. What this means in practice is that they shall be extremely squishy but they do have *some* boons I will admit. From being able to prepare more of their Domain spells then normal and being able to target a ally with the "Blessing of the Faithful" ability that gives a +2 bonus to pretty much everything for a round. They are my least favorite of the archetypes in the game, sorry Tristian.


Finally there is the Herald Caller, The Herald Caller is basically the Summoner of the Cleric types, they lose a Domain choice in order to be able to change prepared spells to Summon Monster of the equivalent level on the fly, and as they level up their Summons proceed to get stronger and stronger. . . . .it's another alright class.

So that was the Cleric classes and archetypes and I thought that they were all pretty damned awesome, what about the rest of y'all? What do you think of this class and it's archetypes? Are a fan of one over the other? Do you think this is a good class to multi-class into? What are the positives and downsides of the class, and archetypes, in your opinion? What Domains do you like and dislike?


Personally I only really see the Cleric and Crusader classes as being viable for a PC.


Plus you get the added bonus of sometimes having the ability to have your choice of deity influence your dialogue with other NPCs. A good example of this is having Asmodeus changing your dialogue when you rescue Jhod.

[76561198249640122]

I can't remember the last time I made a Cleric that wasn't an Ecclesitheurge. Sure a standard Cleric is better in the frontline but why would you want a Cleric in the frontline in the first place?

Being able to access a great selection of arcane spells as an Ecclesitheurge is just great, and if you really want to cheese it to the max, you can go the Wizard/Ecclesitheurge/Mystic Theurge route and be one of the most versatile casters around.

As for the Crusader, being one spellcasting level behind regular Clerics just sounds like a terrible idea to me, might as well make a regular Cleric and take one level of Fighter (which instantly nets you heavy armor, tower shield and martial weapons proficiencies plus a bonus feat).

[Eonwe]

Originally posted by vicethevandal:

I can't remember the last time I made a Cleric that wasn't an Ecclesitheurge. Sure a standard Cleric is better in the frontline but why would you want a Cleric in the frontline in the first place?

I don't often play cleric, but when i do, they sh!t bricks i like having them on the front line. Either as an offtank or with a reach weapon.

[New Willinium]

Originally posted by Eonwe:

Originally posted by vicethevandal:

I can't remember the last time I made a Cleric that wasn't an Ecclesitheurge. Sure a standard Cleric is better in the frontline but why would you want a Cleric in the frontline in the first place?

I don't often play cleric, but when i do, they sh!t bricks i like having them on the front line. Either as an offtank or with a reach weapon.

Really? I tend to stick with the Mace and Heavy Shield Combo myself. There is a VERY good mace you can get in Trolbold that can last you for most of the game.

[Eonwe]

It's a good cleric weapon if you go the offtank route, but you need ot take the feat to be able to survive, like heavy armor, shield wall etc.

That's a lot of feats, so sometimes i just pick exotic weapon fauchard and let my cleric hit stuff from behind the frontline.

But usually just don't bring a cleric along.

[New Willinium]

Originally posted by Eonwe:

It's a good cleric weapon if you go the offtank route, but you need ot take the feat to be able to survive, like heavy armor, shield wall etc.

That's a lot of feats, so sometimes i just pick exotic weapon fauchard and let my cleric hit stuff from behind the frontline.

But usually just don't bring a cleric along.

I've always liked to have one along if I wasn't playing the Cleric myself. It's nice to have a dedicated healer and buffer that can actually survive a hit or two.

[InEffect]

Ecclesial is top dog, because Cleric either has no AC anyways or goes monk dip.
Abadar Protection+Nobility and Erastil Community+Animal are the best options.

Honorable mention to Herald caller for gods with awful domain selection.

[Finrod]

What do you think of the repose domain? (Power level 8: an area of deathward) Too situational for this campaign?

[InEffect]

Originally posted by Finrod:

What do you think of the repose domain? (Power level 8: an area of deathward) Too situational for this campaign?

problem is it's already very hard to justify anything but erastil due to how valued animal companion is compared to anything else and Gozreh can't really compete due to meh secondary domains(at least compared to community)
Other usable deities:
Abadar is ok-ish because of spell selection.
Asmodeus is the best pick for sloth mythic theurge(fire+Trickery)
Torag: Artifice+Protection
Irori is an interesting pick For Stength+Healing because he would be really cool armored tank if those worked. He even gets improved unarmed for free to go crane style cheaper. But those don't work and he will not reach anything approximating decent AC till level 20-ish(and even then touch AC will be trash).
Shelyn has Protection+Luck, so that's good as well.

What really hurts cleric in the current state of the game is no full-BAB prestige available. Cleric levels are not exactly valuable And we could be convinced to sell 2-3CL for a full bab prestige with bells and whistles.

On the topic: Death wards are situational and are even easily covered by scrolls with a bit of metagame knowledge. You don't need to waste a domain for that.

[Finrod]

Originally posted by InEffect:

Originally posted by Finrod:

What do you think of the repose domain? (Power level 8: an area of deathward) Too situational for this campaign?

Irori is an interesting pick For Stength+Healing because he would be really cool armored tank if those worked.

The healing domain power level 8 (instead of 6) I also found it does not empower the healing spells... That's what you mean?

Thanks for the reply

[Sotanaht]

Originally posted by InEffect:

What really hurts cleric in the current state of the game is no full-BAB prestige available.

What really hurts cleric in the game is the lack of ability to not be a cleric.

Unfortunately all the higher level cleric spells available pretty much suck. There are a few lower level spells that are nearly mandatory, Restoration for example, and a few lower level buffs that are very nice to stack along with wizard and druid buffs, but all of that can be done by an Inquisitor which also gives you a much stronger combatant.

If you are going to go with a cleric anyway, I can see why you might think to go Ecclesitheurge to double-down on the one unique thing they have, but unfortunately that unique thing is also the worst thing, so having more of it doesn't really help at all.

[haplok]

Chains of Light, Blade Barrier, Stormbolts, Mass Heal are all awesome high level spells. The first 2 are boss killers. The latter 2 easily solve some of the most annoying encounters in the game (hordes of ghosts).

[InEffect]

Originally posted by Finrod:

The healing domain power level 8 (instead of 6) I also found it does not empower the healing spells... That's what you mean?

Thanks for the reply

mainly cause of Strength domain and free improved uarmed for crane style/wing to fix at least some of that abysmal touch AC without spending a extra feat or monk dip. Healing is ok for spell conversion things. Could as well be a crusader if you are into that sort of things, I guess.

[Daidre]

I tried Gozreth Ecclesitheurge in Varnhold campaign and he was amazing. Stinking Cloud from Water alone worth choosing it as primary. Also Pet from Animal domain. With Alchemist and Haste it easily covers most important wiz spells until lvl 8-10.

But I kinda prefer build my Clerics and Druids as pure casters. Trying to make caster/melee hybrids often results in characters that a subpar at both and more of the liability in melee on low-mid levels (like Harrim) on Hard+. Even reach weapon does not make him completely safe from the things like cyclop's cleave.
Getting DC high enough, metamagic and spell penetration requires so many feats that anything spent on defense, teamwork or weapons detracts from char primary function - casting.

So when I want melee cleric I kinda make... Oracle from Eldritch Arcana. Battle Revelation or Arcane spells from subclass help him to rise above general meh comparing to original cleric.

[CHAO$$$]

I feel like their spell list just sucks.

In particular rank 2, 4 and 1. In that order in regards to level of awfulness.
Starting at rank 6 they get some really useful stuff like harm/heal , destruction, storm bolts nevermind they can get weird and sirrocco with certain domains.

Some of the domain powers are really good like trickery madness and ?glory? (the one that gives aoe heroism). But most of those just emulate things that other classes can do better.

They dont have anything uniquely useful before they get rank 6 spells. So in the end it comes up meh.

They get unique powerful self attack buffs but theyre terrible at attacking and multiclassing just delays their spell progression which as mentioned is really not what i would want for cleric.

Fire and madness domain somewhat fix the early poor spell list but the other domains those gods offer arent all that good and you miss out on the op stuff later on. I wish you could more freely combine domains overall.

Eccelsithurge is the only one worth playing.
Honorable mentions for Fey Druid because he gets good wizard spells at +1spellrank but unfortunately just ends up as a ♥♥♥♥♥♥ wizard instead.

Tried to go all in on Monster Tactician the other day on Hard difficulty but even with both summoning feats the summons just dont cut it and since that class doesnt allow you to stack endless summons its actually worse at summoning overall.

Meh

[Daidre]

Animate Dead at level 3 is imho one most overpowered spell in all game, and cleric gets access on lvl 5, also compatible with lesser rods. It makes Unfair into cakewalk and easily covers all tanking until ch4 at least.
With exp share off you can get it 2-3 hours into ch1.
All my free lvl 3-4-5 spellslots filled with it, with exceptions of buffs like party Delay Poison or hard CC like Vinetrap.