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I'll be honest. I'm not a huge fan of clerics. I've always found them a bit boring. But as part of my personal project, I endeavored to make one in PFS. I'd like some advice about the state of the character. This is as I've had it laid out, but the character is pretty liquid. The only constant is that the character will be a Varisian Tiefling.
Hungerseed Tiefling Cleric of Shelyn 4
CG Medium Outsider (native)
Init +5, Senses darkvision 60 ft; Perception +10
AC 20, touch 12, flat-footed 18(+6 armor, +2 Dex, +2 Natural Armor)
hp 31(4d8+4+4)
Fort +6, Ref +4, Will +8
Resist cold 5, electricity 5, fire 5
Speed 20 ft
Melee +1 Glaive +8(1d10+7)
Ranged Sling +5(1d4+4)
Special Attacks Bit of Luck (6/day, Touched rolls two dice and takes better)
Special Abilities-Resistance, Deflection Aura
Spell-Like Abilities(CL 4th); 1/day-Alter Self
Spells Prepared (CL 4th) (Domains are Luck and Defense)
2nd-Bear's Strength (2), Lesser Restoration, BarkskinD
1st-Divine Favor (3), Shield of Faith, ShieldD
0-Detect Magic, Guidance, Create Water, Read Magic
Str 18, Dex 14, Con 12, Int 12, Wis 16, Cha 5
Base Atk +3; CMB+7; CMD 19
Feats Combat Reflexes, Armor of the Pit
Skills Heal+9, Knowledge: Religion+7, Perception+10, Perform Wind+5, Sense Motive+7
Languages Common, Infernal
SQ Aura(Good)
Traits; Reactionary, Magical Lineage(Barkskin)
Gear +1 Glaive, Lesser Extend Metamagic Rod, Four-Mirror Armor, Cracked Dusty Rose Prism Ioun Stone, Resist Energy Scroll, Silence Scroll, Wand of Cure Light Wounds 46/50, Wand of Bless 50/50, Healing Kit, Masterwork Piccolo, 410 GP
Reach Cleric, has a decent to hit and damage, particularly after buffing. Decent Initiative. A couple utility options. Good AC and saves as far as I can tell. Can still swap up cure spells. Can buff allies AC, and has a fairly spammable small to hit buff with wand of Bless. Bit of Luck definitely comes up, especially for skill checks. Gave up channeling but oh well, need to lose something as a cleric. Can't Enlarge is definitely a shame, but besides that I think I'm okay with it. But I haven't yet played it.
My next couple levels I'm planning to get a mithral breastplate, and pick up extend spell followed by power attack I think. Also planning to grab a fortuitous enchant on my glaive at some point, obviously grab some stat items, and grab improved initiative at some point. Maybe retrain out of armor of the pit when my cleric ac buffs get a bit longer lasting/more effective. Also thinking about picking up a buckler at some point just for shield enchants. That's far in the future at this point though.
Any obvious issues or consumable suggestions for me?
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Lv 3 power attack.
stock up a few potions of enlarge person. Normal condition removal scrolls.Extend spell is better done with a lesser rod of extend which only costs 3k.
I'm really worried about my to-hit with power attack, but 3 damage is a lot. I cannot enlarge, I'm an outsider. Remove Paralysis/Disease/etc., yeah. I already have a Rod of Extend. Maybe I should wait to pick up the MM feat and swap my trait, but I really like having access to turning short duration buffs into multiple combat buffs in PFS. It will allow me to prepare with less redundancy as I get into higher levels.
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It looks like you've done everything to be a really efficient Reach Cleric. Have you considered your character's backstory or what his/her personality and drive is? It seems like you're picking everything based on statistical means which may just end up as a stat block that rolls high numbers but isn't particularly fun to play because it has no "life" to it.
I don't think you really need any advice, there's not much to improve on here. Power Attack is a good pick and the trait Fate's Favored is IMO better than what you'd gain from Reactionary. Fate's Favored will work for Jingasa of the Fortunate Soldier and Divine Favor / Divine Power buffs.
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It looks like you've done everything to be a really efficient Reach Cleric. Have you considered your character's backstory or what his/her personality and drive is? It seems like you're picking everything based on statistical means which may just end up as a stat block that rolls high numbers but isn't particularly fun to play because it has no "life" to it.
I don't think you really need any advice, there's not much to improve on here. Power Attack is a good pick and the trait Fate's Favored is IMO better than what you'd gain from Reactionary. Fate's Favored will work for Jingasa of the Fortunate Soldier and Divine Favor / Divine Power buffs.
I'm planning to have my role play build out of an ugly, uncharismatic "monster" doing her best to protect beauty and love.
She's been tossed around a lot of her life in Varisia, an outsider in a culture of wanderers and free spirits, looking for something to latch on to. A priest of Shelyn takes notice of her inner beauty and strength, and tells her that she could do good work using those qualities to protect those in need, particularly those who are laboring for their loves, whether that love is a person or a passion for an ideal or craft. She endeavors to find beauty where others wouldn't expect it, and that's why she's joined the Society, to continue to defend the passionate(of whom may be coincidentally useful to the society, and thus come up often), or find new sources of beauty.(Adventure Time!)
Usually my PFS characters have skeletons of character and personality informed by mechanics, and as I play them they tend to naturally flow out from there. I think my initial root looks solid. I'm definitely still working on natural demeanor though, as I don't envision her as entirely good two shoes.
Fate's Favored is dubiously good. I'll consider it. I really like the high AC currently. If I do less damage I also don't one shot things and allow other people to shine. I think I can wait 3 adventures for power attack.
Yeah, with your high Strength, a THW, and Fate's Favored and divine favor, you don't need Power Attack until at least level 5. If you do go that route, just use a wand of divine favor until at least level 6, and save your spell slots for other stuff.
And ditto on using Rods for Extend Spell.
Since you said this is for PFS I assume you either have a boon or this is a GM Baby that was specifically listed as Tiefling.
Wand of Shield is nice as a defensive item.
As others said, Divine Favor takes care of the Power Attack penalty. That plus you just don't use it if the opponents AC is too high. In play you may want to swap at least one of those Divine Favors for Bless in order to buff the whole party.
As has already been suggested, swapping the Magical Lineage trait for Fate's Favored is about the only suggestion to really improve the character. Your cleric is a work of beauty.
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Since you said this is for PFS I assume you either have a boon or this is a GM Baby that was specifically listed as Tiefling.
Wand of Shield is nice as a defensive item.
As others said, Divine Favor takes care of the Power Attack penalty. That plus you just don't use it if the opponents AC is too high. In play you may want to swap at least one of those Divine Favors for Bless in order to buff the whole party.
I can cast Shield with my domain. I'm pretty happy with that, I'll consider the wand though..
This was created in the grace period era and I'm still figuring out where to with it.
I'm aware power attack is an option. I'll keep it in mind.
Got a Wand of Bless.
EDIT: Thanks for saying so Nick. Hopefully the roleplay shakes out as well as I'm thinking it will, and it should be fun. I initially had a dip in to fighter, but rebuilt into full cleric and I think I'm much happier with the results.
I cannot enlarge, I'm an outsider.
Although Enlarge Person won't affect you, Long Arm will. And without the -2 Dex penalty that Enlarge Person imposes, you will still have your full number of potential AoO's.
I cannot enlarge, I'm an outsider.Although Enlarge Person won't affect you, Long Arm will. And without the -2 Dex penalty that Enlarge Person imposes, you will still have your full number of potential AoO's.
Alas, Long Arm is a personal spell (so no potions), and not on the Cleric list, so you'd need UMD to cast it.
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My honest impression is that your a generalist. Your not a battle cleric, no healing beyond spells, low skills, and so on. Your domains are decent but we could do more. With respects, your a watered down inquisitor as you are now. The inquisitor could be a mouth, have judgements, the same luck domain, more skills, weapon, and be one level away from bane.
As I'm not sure what your intent was I can't make a suggestion on changes as yet.
I do submit that you have put a lot of resources into defense... Protection domai , barskin, armor of pit for someone that isn't on the front lines. Towards that end maybe a crusader cleric is worth a look as the. You have heavy armor prof and weapon focus for free.
Healing in combat is hugely overrated, clerics rarely have more skills/lvl than this, and if I wanted more there are archetypes suitable for a cleric to do so, or I could take the Evangelist PrC, delaying spell progression but getting a lot more skilly. I could technically get better domains by using Desna or something, but I don't think anyone would call Luck or Defense bad. Inquisitors have fewer spells, an enormous tax on their swift action economy, and this was built as one of my first eleven PFS characters, each of which is primarily a core class.
As I reach higher levels I will start to look less like an inquisitor. Everything you've said is basically, "You're not a healing cleric, and you're I think Inquisitors are better than Cleric's during early levels." Which is likely true, but as this character levels they will get access to more and more powerful spells. At 5th I'll get Magic Vestment, Invisibility Purge, Dispel Magic, etc., much earlier than said Inquisitor. I can also leave slots open and prepare from a large list of spells, whereas an Inquisitor is mostly stuck with his. I may give up some face ability, and maybe a bit of damage early. But the rest is traded for my superior spellcasting ability and flexibility, and I'm fine with that. It's not like I'm actually planning to prepare 3 divine favors if I don't know if I'm walking into a lot of fights that day.
So I've invested a domain and a feat. I'd say relegating about 1/5 of my character to defense is completely fine. I'll probably retrain out of Armor of the Pit later, but for now it's there so I don't have to cast Shield or Barkskin to get my AC high. Defense subdomain gives me lot of spells I'm happy to have access to, and I can use that cloak slot on something else. And I'd say I am a front liner, given that enemies will have to get past me to walk into the back line.
Crusader was a consideration, but later in the game even low Wisdom clerics have some really powerful spells to cast, and I think that the diminished spellcasting will really hurt throughout my whole career. The bonus feats are really nice, but giving up spells for feats just probably isn't worth it.
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You don't seem to be building toward the great strength of the Reach Cleric (especially the CG ones) - summoning. It may be a bit obvious and a little boring but it's just so powerful.
Sacred Summons alone is worth a feat. Spell Focus (conj), Augment Summoning & Superior Summoning are a very powerful chain but a heavy investment. All of those in combination are beastly.