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Life Oracle feels like a trap given the campaign parameters. Free Reach and Maximize on all spells, why would you ever need to specialize more in healing?
Use your mystery to add flavor, power, and options instead. If you're interested in Nature, if recommend Lunar instead. Half-elf if possible. You can pump your favored class bonuses into the Elf oracle option to increase the power of one mystery. I suggest the mystery that grants the animal companion. Riding around on a Roc that is 1.5x your level solves a lot of your maneuverability problems. Dual cursed is great, as is blackened curse. Giving your -4 to attacks with a weapon to a melee-BBEG is very handy. I might progress the Blackened curse though for the bonus spells. But also remember that with a half-elf, Paragon Surge spell with Expanded Arcana feat gives you a ton of versatility. More so if you also go the Improved Eldritch Heritage (Arcane) route. And being Hal-elf also means a racial +2 to Cha with no penalty stat. Add in the mystery that replaces Dex with Cha for AC and Reflex, maybe also the Noble Scion of War to replace Dex with Cha for initiative, and you have a very strong PC. For the curse you don't progress, I'd favor legalistic. Careful phrasing ("we'll see what we can do" vs. "we'll do it") keeps you out of binding obligations and it adds flavor. You are high Cha so you are the party face most likely (although the Sorc may have that covered), why not add to it by always being at risk if your word is given and broken? It's a lot more fun for conversations.
Just my advise anyway.
A wand of cure spell, how will it works in your campaign?
with a witch in party, i would surely play a caster who uses Spell DC (like charmers, illusionists, save or die etc...)
about oracles i can say nothing.. i don't really like so much divine magic...but you can find something here: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1WdtrZCESRmVfljXY196wMrMLTnS8Uzk4DEk3oQd VZok/edit?hl=en_US
1) DM have to balance fight... if he wants have you fighting Big-Fat-A*s Monster, he maybe better give you more Point to buy stats...
2) My party is dealing without a buffer/healer, we buy wands, potion etc.. and life continue without NPC... yes sometimes fight are dangerous and plenty of risks.. but we came out :)
3) Healing Hex=how to waste a Hex...witch role is the Debuffer aka troublemaker...so..
4) Save drainers are pretty useful...especially for witches... and also Intimidating is one :)
I wanna say that: Don't make a PC specialized on DM choices... make what you really want to play, what amuse you!
CR must be balanced by Dm... i don't think he wants to kill you all, or maybe i'm wrong?
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I did not know of your hate for prepared casters. Well oracle is good and so would a Bard.
If you want power I recommend eldritch heritage+paragon surge. Gift yourself with a familiar wand abuser to double your action economy and puts arcane spells on your divine spell list. You pick the spells when you cast paragon surge so you can grab spells that will be of use that day.
If you just want to be a heal and buffer bot go with the ordain build. As its heals are already good you will never run out.
I also recommend bard for your group. Skills would be nice and you can use wand of cure. Performances are great buffs and bards get the spell good hope and haste.
But also remember that with a half-elf, Paragon Surge spell with Expanded Arcana feat gives you a ton of versatility. More so if you also go the Improved Eldritch Heritage (Arcane) route.
I strongly recommend you look up this trick. At sixth level, you cast a 3rd level spell and gain ANY spell off the cleric/oracle spell list as a known spell for CL minutes / day. At 11th level, you cast a 3rd level spell and gain ANY spell off of the Wizard/Sorcerer spell list as a spell known for CL minutes / day.
A party member gets hit with a poison/disease/effect but you didnt waste your precious spells known on Neutralize Poison/Remove Disease/Break Enchantment? cast a 3rd level spell and handle it.
You can do this with any oracle mystery so long as you are half-elf (possibly with human with racial heritage (half-elf) feat). So you could be a Life oracle, but again I consider it a trap. Most of the revelations are all but useless to you:
Safe Curing: doesnt matter when you are curing at short range
Life Link: only moves the damage from someone to yourself, again rendered all but useless with ranged heals
Enhanced Cures: really not worth wasting a revelation when your heals are aready maximized(ex. it adds +10 to a CMW at level 20, the free maximize is worth +7 when you get the spell at level 3)
Revelations are a precious commodity. I'd pick a mystery where I get more mileage from them.
Or an Oradin as suggested above. At least then you can reliably swift action heal yourself and standard action heal another. This route makes Life Link a valid revelation once again.
i'm always on the way to prevent damage instead of heal it...
heal is an extra (that's what i think...)
maybe play a bard different from those you've been playing?
if you are looking for a support role, maybe you still see you as useless.. i think (as you write) you want to be the indispensable one..
I would also take a look at the Inquisitor. That class is at best a mediocre healer but could work very well given your expressed preferences and party composition.
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Modicasolis-
I still don't know your reasons for hating Prepared casters.
The thing about Clerics you need to know is:
You can leave spell slots open to fill them later in the day when you know what is about to come your way.
You get your Entire spell list unlike a wizard who has to learn his spells and place it in a spell book. You can just open the cleric list and cherry pick any spell you want for your list. No need to take Remove X because in 15 minutes you can prepare it and cast it.
You can Spontaneously Drop spells for Others. Normal clerics can do Cure spells and evil can do Inflict. The Evangelist bard gets a set list that he can spontaneously cast.
Unlike a Arcane caster you do NOT need 8 hours of sleep to re-prepare your spells. You can go 3 days without sleeping but still recover your spells.
Clerics meditate or pray for their spells. Each cleric must choose a time at which she must spend 1 hour each day in quiet contemplation or supplication to regain her daily allotment of spells. Time spent resting has no effect on whether a cleric can prepare spells.
A Cleric is my Main class. I like you typically like the support/arm role. I also dabble into Crowd control/Anvil role. But by far I Have only played 1 melee character I liked and that is the Mounted Halfling I am playing in PFS. I have tried fighter, Barbarian, and rogue. Dealing damage is cool but helping people do things they couldn't without appeals to me more.
Allow me to give you my Evangelist Cleric Build for PFS I will be playing next. I have affectionately named him the Jedi Cleric.
Human Evangelist Cleric (Aasimar can work as well)
20 point Buy:
Str 10, Dex 14, Con 13 Int 10, Wis 18, Cha 12
(if you don't mind "dump" stat then drop Str to 8 and up Int to 12.)
Traits: Magical Lineage- Spiritual Weapon
Reactionary
Deity: Cayden Cailean
Domain: Travel (teleporting and 50ft movement Level 1 while ignoring difficult terrain)
Feats:
Human- Lingering Performance
1- Spell Focus- Enchantment
3- Toppling Spell
5- Greater Spell Focus- Enchantment
7- Persistent Spell or Bouncing Spell
9- Spell Penetration
11- Divine Interference
Skills:
Perform Oratory (for PFS this is $ too)(Mandatory for Performing)
Diplomacy (Social Skill of the Gods)
Know Religion (can alternate between religion, planes, arcane)
Spellcraft (can be alternated for more Knowalages)
The goal of this Character is both to Buff and to prevent damage. You come online at Level 3. Toppling+ Spiritual Weapon is great crowd control as is your enchantment spells that you can spontaneously cast. You can now do minor damage and trip people around the battle field. Since spiritual weapon is a force spell this is one of your "Force powers"
Notice most your spontaneously cast spells are enchantments. Language dependent but you can spontaneously cast Tongues so no biggy there. These are your Jedi Mind Tricks. =)
If your ever forced into combat I recommend never drawing your weapon...Hell don't waste money on a weapon just take a cheap drop.
You will cast the spell Divine Trident. It is a lightning Blade that attacks on Touch attack for decent Damage. This is your "Light Saber" lol. Lasts 1 minute /level.
You have a spell Forceful Strike. Use your Light Saber and Forceful strike+toppling spell you have your "Force Push and Knockdown"
At higher levels you can Do the ever cheesy Toppling spell+Blade Barrier at 7th level spells. Pure Hilarity.
If you get your hands on a Ring of Telekinesis then your really set with force powers.
Just play as a mediator first but when you are forced to fight you do so like a Jedi using force powers, mind tricks, and light-saber play.
maybe i know: he hasn't never lack on versatility XD!
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Your party also doesn't appear to have a trap monkey. If you take the Seeker archetype, you'll be able to pick up Trapfinding and Disable Device. If you also take the Eldritch Heritage line of feats, you can pick up the Destined bloodline arcana powers for a hefty bonus to your skill checks (Disable Device) so that you won't really need an especially high DEX to succeed on them.
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Summoning is a very strong path. It is regardless what class you are.
I have played a summoning Cleric and Wizard before and have gotten tired of summoning so much and focusing on the Spell focus conj + Augmented summoning + Superior Summoning + (for clerics)Sacred summoning. I just hate dumping into those feats even though they are optimal feats.
The heroism Domain is a solid choice with the double buffs. I just really favor the Travel, Luck, Trickery, and Madness domains on clerics. Everyone knows how strong teleporting is and he is having trouble with what he described as movement issues so I defiantly Recommend the travel domain. 50 feet of movement that can ignore difficult terrain @ level 1 is amazing and then growing up a little into Teleportation abilities is just gravy.
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It just feels limiting and I hate being caught without the right spell for the situation.
In essence that is exactly what is bad about Spontaneous casters. they have set spells and sometimes you meet a monster that kind of just spits on your spell list selection.
You can prepare yourself via Know checks. Maybe someone mentioned a creature to you and you do the right Know check to gain info about what he is strong and weak against.
Knowing where your going can help. Let say the DM says your going to a buried tomb. You can assume a handful of creature types will be there. Undead being a big one.
Divination spells are also good to use. You know the name of the person your looking for then studying them via scrying and other means will help you prepare.
Sometimes you just pick spells that can catch all sorts of enemies. And not worry about those rarity monsters unless you know about them coming.
Being able to prepare a spell list specifically for a adventure can be strong when you take the time to get the information to prepare with. Just pump the NPCs with all sorts of questions. Maybe your DM never noticed how little info he was actually giving out and will begin to start offering a little more once he becomes accustomed to his players actually asking his NPCs questions about what is coming.
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Dude andreww we where discussing a cleric and his reasons for NOT liking Prepared casters.
I'm fully aware of Paragon surge as I recommended it to him to begin with. No need to defend it or mention it again. He made a statement about Liking the Evangelist Cleric but not liking Prepared spell casters.
I was making a Blanket statement about a Spontaneous caster without feats and without Shenanigans thrown in. As a Base class a prepared caster with access to a full spell list s+@~s on spontaneous casters with a few spells.
Everyone knows after you invest 2-3 feats and waste a spell casting paragon surge after level 11 a oracle becomes really good. But perhaps he doesn't want to wait till level 11 to become good and doesn't want to waste money on every remove X scroll under the sun. Or perhaps he doesn't want to take those feats to qualify for it. Or perhaps doesn't want to be a Half-elf or a human taking a extra feat to qualify. Heck he may even find the cheesiness of the whole combination to be not honorable at a Table. I know my Home group doesn't want that kind of thing as it can really break things in a game.
I'm just trying to get someone who hates prepared casters but loves to buff people and loves bards to give an evangelist a try. You never know he might play it and get over his dislike for them after he First hands sees the difference in play style and power.
One of the great strengths of the Oracle is being able to get access to Arcane as well as Divine spells that are not necessarily part of their God's domains.
A combination of Elven Ancient Lorekeeper and Arcane Heritage lets you cherry-pick a whole lot of Arcane spells to fill out your list with. Arcane Heritage/Improved Arcane Heritage may seem feat heavy, but you get hold of whatever 3 God-Wizard Spells you want. You need to be an Elf (or possibly half-elf) but when has that ever been a problem for a dedicated caster?
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@OP: So, you're considering an Evangelist Cleric for your next character. Evangelist clerics have the best buffs in the game. Your party will benefit from your many damage mitigation and protection spells. Here are a few of your options. Here are some roles you could fill, in no particular order:
* Traditional support cleric. Mostly hang back, buff & cast. Needs no high ability scores, viable with a 5 point build.
* Summoning specialist. With access to both Sacred Summons and Inspire Courage, your summons will be highly effective. Viable with a 5 point build & 2/3 of your feats, so can be combined with another approach.
* Melee Beast. Battle clerics are effective melee combatants. The reach cleric build optimizes action efficiency, so you can both cast and sometimes get melee attacks in the same round. Here's an example. Requires 15+ point build and 1/3+ of your feats.
* Debuffer, aka bad touch. Madness domain for the win. Requires most of your build.
* Offensive Caster specialized in Enchantment. Pump your DC and cast offensive spells. Works better for an arcane caster, but works for a cleric. Requires full build commitment.
* For about 25% of build resources, any cleric can get basic martial competence.
Roles deliberately not on the list: Primary Healer, Channeling Specialist (not for an Evangelist!), Party Face, Archer (great combat style but non-optimal for clerics), Scout, Two weapon fighter, Skill Monkey.
Once you've picked a role, choose a domain to make you better at what you already do. E.g. A Support cleric might choose Heroism, luck, or Healing for extra support, a melee beast might choose Plant(Growth) for extra reach, AoOs, and damage, while every cleric wants the excellent Travel domain.
People normally love to help others flesh out characters, but I think they need more than that to go on. Things that help:
*Point buy or rolls you are using.
*Books you are allowed to use.
*Relevant House rules.
*Things you "must have", that to you are non-negotiable.
Cure spells include channeling and lay on hands?
If so, and you really need a healer, I would suggest the ordain. Take life oracle to 4 and paladin/hospitaler 4 to get 2 channel pools. Take Fey Foundling if allowed. Get a Phylactery of Positive Channeling. I also recommend quick channel and selective channel.
The idea is that you keep shield other up on squishy targets taking half their damage. Keep life link on everyone to heal them 5 each round (the damage is moved to you) and lay on hands yourself and channel when needed.
Once you do this you can focus on whatever class you want. You can be 2 handed smiting machine or take oracle up to add to your support spell list. But you will have the ability to free action heal yourself for a lot while using a swift action to channel and still do whatever you want for your turn.
This all happens while wearing full plate, being immune to disease & fear, and having the best saves possible.