The only time Clerics have had some life in them was 3.5..... and Paizo stomped that out double quick.
The word on the ITK grapevine is that Paizo has no intent on doing anything of significance with the class.
I'm always suprised that people are surprised by this..... look at the plethora of archetypes and options over the last 5 years that many classes have had.... Cleric has been made functionally redundant!
The vast majority of the cleric stuff released is just that.... stuff.
Look at Divine Anthology... classic example.... was there anything significant in there?... Noooo
So when a book called 'Divine Anthology' cant produce anything, you know the writing is on the wall!
Cleric = cob web collector
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Clerics aren't weak, a well played one is actually very powerful.
Clerics can be very, very boring, especially since a great many tables demand that they be so. If your table demands a heal-bot and wonders why they have to twist people's arms to play one, you might have a problem, or you might even be the problem.
If you demand an optimal, sole focused healer, you darned well better be the one playing it.
D&D 2nd Edition actually had cool ideas for Clerics, with Specialty Priests. The implementation left something to be desired in terms of balance . . . actually in a way not unlike that of modern Pathfinder Cleric/Druid Domains, which don't give as much flavor.
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Clerics aren't weak, a well played one is actually very powerful.
Clerics can be very, very boring, especially since a great many tables demand that they be so. If your table demands a heal-bot and wonders why they have to twist people's arms to play one, you might have a problem, or you might even be the problem.If you demand an optimal, sole focused healer, you darned well better be the one playing it.
Even if they demand a healbot, there are better ways of accomplishing this than by playing a Cleric, such as Oracle or Shaman, and they have more/better tools for the job than a Cleric does.
So really, even if their argument is "Cleric is a Healbot, and we want a Healbot," the problem stems from Clerics still lacking very boring options that other classes with identical roles aren't symptomatic of.
Even if they demand a healbot, there are better ways of accomplishing this than by playing a Cleric, such as Oracle or Shaman, and they have more/better tools for the job than a Cleric does.
And here in lies the truth... the cleric is basically obsolete in PF.
Even the much maligned Rogue and Fighter are more relevant IMO... a well played fighter is worth their weight.
a cleric is far more than a healbot, even though it excels at healing, roughly on the same level as the oracle, though channeling is an excellent feature too, I think only life oracles are better healrs.
Even if they demand a healbot, there are better ways of accomplishing this than by playing a Cleric, such as Oracle or Shaman, and they have more/better tools for the job than a Cleric does.
And here in lies the truth... the cleric is basically obsolete in PF.
Even the much maligned Rogue and Fighter are more relevant IMO... a well played fighter is worth their weight.
I think that's actually quite untrue? I've always considered clerics to be invaluable, even over other spellcasters and in ways other than healbots. While some of their mechanics are a bit 'boring', the same argument could be levelled at wizards for much the same reason. They have extremely similar mechanics with similar class features. The difference is only their spell lists, which generally have similar power with differences mostly down to what each one does in extreme corner cases.
I think a fighter or rogue is only ever worth their weight if there is a cleric or another spellcaster keeping them up and running. There are innumerable instances in my time playing where it was the cleric who ended up saving the day and ensuring our victory or just making sure our adventure is a success. It was only a cleric that could do it, as well, since their niche spell preps were how we managed at all.
So, This is just a random thread of no great matter. But, Do you ever feel jeallous of the other people in your party during level up when you hear what stuff they get on their class feature list? I kind of got today after our session. We leveld up and everyone was getting all these awesome class features every level! And I look at my Cleric and go "I get a 1d6 increase in Channel Energy every other level.."
I know I get spells and other stuff, And I like the class. I just got slightly jeallous of their class feature per level list.. xD
This sounds like a very odd question to me. Anyone who spends a few minutes can check all the class features. If I'm "envious" of something, I can just decided to pick that class. If I didn't pick that class, I did that on purpose.
Sure I wish alchemist or another class had a thing or two but that's what archetypes are for. "I want x but I picked y" is just odd.
^Arcanist and Witch let you pick quite a lot of options as you level up, in addition to all those spells . . . Until the Weapon Master's Handbook came out, a Fighter didn't have all that many more choices even if you give 0 weight to the spells, and even after the Armor Master's Handbook came out, the Fighter has only about 2X more choices even if you give 0 weight to the spells. And for practical purposes it is often less than 2X, because so many martial feats come in chains (sometimes anastomosing) that nickel and dime you to death. Granted, some magical feats do this as well (the summoning chain being the most obvious example), but those are easier to avoid if you want to.
It's an eay feeling to get. You're looking at your BAB and Fort going up one, and the GM's going through all the spells and bardic performances that the bard gets now.
Then you remember that there's that rage power you're dithering on while your bard's getting two mercy rerolls on his d8 HP that came up 1 ...