doc roc's page

Another personal fave of mine, on most campaigns this ability will get some serious use and has some great bonuses.

CAVES SUBDOMAIN
Tunnel Runner (Su): At 8th level, you can move through tunnels and caves with ease. Activating this ability is a standard action. You can move across any stone surface as if under the effects of spider climb. You can also see very well in darkness, gaining darkvision out to a range of 60 feet. If you already possess darkvision, extend the range by 60 feet. While underground, you also gain an insight bonus equal to your cleric level on Stealth skill checks and an insight bonus equal to your Wisdom modifier on initiative checks. You can use this ability for 1 minute per day per cleric level you possess. These minutes do not need to be consecutive, but they must be spent in 1-minute increments.

CHARM DOMAIN
Charming Smile (Sp): At 8th level, you can cast charm person as a swift action, with a DC of 10 + 1/2 your cleric level + your Wisdom modifier. You can only have one creature charmed in this way at a time. The total number of rounds of this effect per day is equal to your cleric level. The rounds do not need to be consecutive, and you can dismiss the charm at any time as a free action. Each attempt to use this ability consumes 1 round of its duration, whether or not the creature succeeds on its save to resist the effect.

A great one here.... swift action and auto scale DC

Water/flotsam subdomain gives you free scrolls, potions or other consumables:
** spoiler omitted **

How would you calculate the value of a wand with only 10 charges?

Eg) Mage armour with a CL=1

I'm quite fond of the Liberation Domain's Freedoms Call power for support characters:

Freedom’s Call (Su):
At 8th level, you can emit a 30-foot aura of freedom for a number of rounds per day equal to your cleric level. Allies within this aura are not affected by the confused, grappled, frightened, panicked, paralyzed, pinned, or shaken conditions. This aura only suppresses these effects, and they return once a creature leaves the aura or when the aura ends, if applicable. These rounds do not need to be consecutive.

This is extremely powerful due partly to its synergy with the 1st level power.

As an 8th level cleric, you are in effect immune to anything that stops you from moving in the way that you would want.

As far as I can see a cleric can take druid domains too... although in fairness there aren't that that many that I'd consider worthy.

Why not change the thread title to "Best higher level domain powers"? I was going to create one anyone as a follow on... and this topic fits ion too.

Hmmm.... I've never interpreted the Ecclesitheurge as losing favoured weapon

Tragically the Elder Mythos Cultist actually is much less effective than even a vanilla cleric who worships GOO/OGs!

If you have a party with 2 casters having one with high initiative and the other low is optimal IMO.....one to get the ball rolling and the other to react or negate to what the enemy has done.

No, you're just a full caster with some 2k diferrent first party spells at your disposal, which, unlike the fighter, you're not locked into and can swap out when you change your mind.

Nope...not really

Lets say you build your cleric from the start to be say a summoning specialist with a secondary reach capability..... the 'Reach Herald Caller' seems to be a type that I've seen mentioned a lot.

You choose your race (prob human to get the bonus feat) and choose a deity that offers a good domain to enhance your role. Your feats are going to be invested in improving your summoning and things like Combat Reflexes to enhance your reach fighting. Your ability points aren't going to be heavily WIS based and will instead focus more on adding some STR and DEX.

Lets say you hit 6th level and have regrets and want to be more of a caster cleric...... tough s@@! too late, there's no way to turn things around as all your important choices have been made.The fact that the cleric has lots of spells to choose from isn't relevant since any spells that are DC dependent won't be a great choice since the initial stat and feat distribution wasn't focussed that way. Also your domain choice both in type and number is sub-optimal too... making the problem even worse.

The fighter on the other hand, irrespective of archetype or build is 90% of the time going to be geared towards DPR. The build differences are on average less meaningful. The fighter has a s!&# load of feats to steer himself more successfully in a new direction if he so wishes.

Things like this also illustrate why I never recommend a class like Alchemist to a newb since you have to think hard and know what you're doing to get the most from it. Once decisions are made at the beginning, its very awkward to change them around later.

There is a big difference between being harder to play, and being harder to build. A cleric is absurdly easy to build. Your only real choices are deciding on your stats, choosing your domains and picking a couple of feats.

Yes and no.... a cleric is only easy to build if you're going down the 'jack of all trades' path (which is the absolute worst path since you end up being mediocre/sub-par at everything).

In reality what type of cleric you want to be is what determines your build and you have to think about this very carefully because you're not for example, a fighter with a million feats with which to play around with and change your mind.

Another thing to point out is that the wizard and cleric are possibly the 2 hardest classes to play well. They both want the best spells, but have a HUGE list to choose from. They also have to prepare spells in advance, which is complicated to learn and requires player prep - not just character prep.

Yes I agree - however, I would go further to say that a cleric is harder to play than wizard due to:

Interplay of the spells and abilities between the 2 given domains which can vary widely in strength

The impact of race which I believe is more significant than the effect on the wizard and the direction it can go.
With the cleric - dwarf, human, half-elf, half-orc, aasimar and samsaran are all completely viable but will have a differing impact on the type of cleric it produces.

The fact that out of all the classes, clerics lose relatively little by PrCing.

The impact of the deity chosen in terms of bonus spells for clerics which can again make a significant impact on the impact of the cleric. There are some real hidden gems out there..... a good example is Shizuru which as a cleric now enables you to spam Colour Spray and become a very effective battlefield controller at low levels, alongside whatever else you are doing.

But how many people have the time to sift through all the deity bonuses?

Clerics feel like they ought to be a jack of all trades type, but in practice you have to focus on something (combat, debuffs, healing) or you end up being mediocre at everything. Not that anyone will recommend specialising in healing.

This is the #1 mistake people make when playing clerics, although it looks like you can be a good jack of all trades, to be successful you MUST specialise.... and with a cleric that takes system mastery.

Hence why I don't recommend cleric as a starter class for newbs. A druid is a better bet for a caster jack of all trades.

And IMO focussing on being a combat cleric or a healbot are the LEAST effective specialisms.

The funniest thing about this thread is all the people who:

a) ask for things that were covered by quality 3PP over the last 10 years
b) refuse to use 3PP because, I dunno, they think it's still 2000 and 3PP are all crap

talk about shooting yourself in the foot, wholesale :)

No the issue is far simpler....

Many tables flat out don't allow 3pp as they understandably see it as an enormous tin of worms. As a GM I have trouble keeping up with all the normal content let alone the 3pp stuff!

And before you naively say... "Well you need to find a better table" or some other flippant advice.... for a lot of people just finding a PF1 group is hard enough, let alone one permissive to 3pp.

One very effective party would be an inquisitor, magus, warpriest and bard. All the characters are 6th level casters, all the characters have medium BAB. You have two divine casters and two arcane casters so should be able to cover an magic needs. Since the bard can attack while maintaining inspire courage all the characters benefit from it. You also have two characters with decent stealth and scouting skills. Between the characters all important skills should be easily covered. No characters have weak will saves and most of them have good fortitude saves.

Oh yes potentially very powerful with some good archetype choices...

Monster Tactician, Bladebound, Arsenal Chaplain, Court Bard

Would do very well in any AP I can think of!

You have to bear in mind that an arcane 9th (wiz/sorc) and a divine 9th (cleric) can to a reasonable degree stand in for each others role with sensible archetype choices... not in the early days of PF1 but certainly at the end.

To such a degree, I quite like to run 3 man APs as a GM.... I've been a player and a GM on the receiving end of 4 man parties with both a Wizard and Cleric and as long as the PCs know what they're doing, APs can become trivialised by 7-8th level.

I flat out do not GM 5 man parties.....

The only big "divine cloth caster" I can think of from the 3pp market is the priest, which to be fair is a really fun class,

In fairness, I wasn't just talking about standalone 3pp products, dealing with a specific class only but also 3pp products that amongst other things contained a "divine cloth caster".

Over the years several publishers (eg Rogue Genius, Kobold Press..etc) have written up cloth caster variants.

And that's leaving aside the many homebrewed versions that have been put out.

That there is a commerical, mechanical and thematic gap to fill is beyond any doubt.

A guy in my current campaign is running an UC Rogue and doing some great stuff with it... he is pretty experienced though.

Got any data on this?

I remember reading posts by some of the 3PP authors on which of their books/compendiums were selling well. Nothing more complicated than that!

They did a couple different archetypes for this, like the ecclesitheurge and the cardinal.

And both of these received widespread criticism as to "not properly filling the pure caster cleric role"

The Cardinal in particular was put into the same category of bin as the Cloistered Cleric, which is about as damning as is possible.

The Ecclesitheurge when really analysed heavily can just about scrape into the pure caster role..... but to analogise its like hammering a square brick through a round hole.... yes you did it but its made a real mess, was very hard work and far simpler approaches were available.

Not only was the D6 divine, the most glaring mechanical gap, but it was a glaring thematic gap, since in reality 'Holy men/prophets' in history are overwhelmingly unarmoured and dont walk around with a mace and shield!

Some of the biggest selling 3PP classes of all were ones dealing with D6 1/2 BAB variants.... that by itself is proof enough of the demand.

I'll save you some trouble....

Channeling is a innately sub-par ability and thus a complete waste to focus on.

D6 HD, 1/2 BAB divine caster.... ALL DAY LONG

Nothing short of criminal that one was never done! It was THE absolute glaring mechanical gap in PF1. The fact that many were successfully homewbrewed or 3PPed makes it even more bizarre/ridiculous.

They could have put it in a book release and surrounded it with complete junk and it still would have sold a bombload.

There is only one true banned build...

Pact Wizard (Haunted Heroes).... NO. NO AND HEEEEELLLLL NO!!!!

Chained Summoner is also off the table

No, they are very much right that this does not work. Divine Paragon gets its boons from Deific Obedience. It is granted it as a bonus feat at level one. The archetype’s class feature just accelerates the rate you get the boons and lets you pick from the three types. If you take levels in one of the prCs you’re boons still get swapped over to the type provided by the class as per the rules for Deification Obedience. Nothing in the archetype says you stop following the rules of the feat other than the rate you get your boons and being able to choose which group to pull your boons from. The feats line about changing if you take a prC that grants boons still applies.

Just because you get them at an even faster rate from the archetype doesn’t mean you suddenly get to double up. That would be like if you waited and took Evangelist at 11th then tried to claim that because the feat grants them a level earlier you should get an extra boon at each level that Evangelist normally grants the boon. It doesn’t work that way, if your getting boons faster than the prC grants them for you, then the prCs boon feature is just a dead feature for you other than locking your boon type.

No as is ALWAYS the case....SPECIFIC > GENERAL

Divine Paragon immediately alters the key feature of Deific Obedience by not only allowing a choice of any of the sets of boons but also giving them at an advanced rate.

It is a SPECIFIC case and does not follow the usual rules of Deific Obedience and invalidates most of the associated text (eg ".....you lose access to the exalted boons and gain access to the new boons appropriate to your class""..... since it is a SPECIFIC case as it can choose any of the sets (not just Exalted which is the only option with Deific Obedience) straight off the bat and at a different rate.

The boons are a class feature.... as you 100% cannot opt out of them. And thus PrC into Evangelist would advance them.

By RAW it works... no ifs, buts or maybes. I have not read anything that states otherwise....

SPECIFIC > GENERAL

(But hey if the PFS or Dev people say otherwise then that's another story!!.... Maybe you go and ask them!)

Feels like a case of ask your GM.

very much a potential case of "repeated abilities don't work unless they say they do"

Looks at Monk taking Dodge and then going into Spear Fighter to get Dodge, does the character now benefit from Dodge once or twice?

*************
btw, those PRC don't give you the boons, they just allow you to unlock them faster than a regular character. Also they don't say their progression stack, just "at X level [of this class] get Y boon".

You misunderstand, I'm not talking about repeating the boons, I'm talking about taking different sets of boons (ie Exalted + Evangelist)

In the words of The Simpsons, 'Comic book guy'.....

"Worst Pathfinder class ever."

Deific Obedience says "Certain prestige classes (see page i98) gain access to these boons at lower levels as a benefit of their prestige class. If you have no levels in one of these prestige classes, you gain the boons marked as exalted boons. If you later take levels in sentinel or evangelist, you lose access to the exalted boons and gain access to the new boons appropriate to your class." ISG pg. 210

Divine Paragon still uses the feat, although strictly RAW, selecting sentinel or evangelist with Divine Paragon and going into one of the prestige classes would work, I think.

That is, if you think trying to trick a deity into granting you more power than you're supposed to have is a good idea.

The boons are a class feature of Divine Paragon - you get them and the feat automatically. And you get the boons at an improved rate (5-11-14 vs 12-16-20).

The wording of the archetype specifically states you can choose which boons out of Ex/Ev/Sen to take.

What you are talking about is for someone taking the feat separately..... which is very different as they auto have to take the Ex boons and they get them at the slower rate which is HD dependent and not class level dependent like Divine Paragon.

There is nothing RAW preventing a Divine Paragon gaining 2 sets of boons if they PrC.

As always SPECIFIC > GENERAL

I am pretty sure that doesn't work. The prestige classes in Inner Sea Gods have language preventing you from getting extra boons or extra uses of the same boons.

I'm not aware of any such language existing.

Divine Paragon cleric (select Exalted boons) then PrC into Evangelist for no feat cost (and thus gains Evangelist boons too)..... BOOYAH!!!

Grandmother Spider is another great cleric option - as an observation in many of these cases the Divine Paragon archetype seems like a natural fit ...

Great Exalted Boons and very useful bonus spells

@doc roc

Pairs well with the Aura of Madness, no?

I hadn't thought of that.... that's nasty!!

Although at about that time you would probably thinking about laying down a Holy Word as your follow up spell

For any Cleric interested in the powerful debuff of the Madness domain, the Second Evangelist Boon of Tsukiyo (LG) makes it even stronger by changing it from single to multi-target and increases the range from melee touch to 30 ft. With the Divine Paragon archetype you don't even lose cleric class levels.

Collective Vision (Su) wrote:

When using the vision of madness granted power from the Madness domain, you can target creatures within 30 feet of you instead of having to touch a single target. You can target a maximum number of creatures equal to 1 for every 4 Hit Dice you have (maximum 5). If you don’t have access to the Madness domain, you instead gain the ability to use the basic version of the vision

...

An amazing boon....

The basic Visions of Madness is one of the best 1st level domain powers out there, this advanced version is one of the Top 5 cleric boons available.

Clerics can already make very good de-buffers.... this boon makes you one of the absolute best in the game IMO.

FWIW here is my version of what the Ecclesitheurge SHOULD have been, since it seems similar to what you're aiming for.... instead of the half baked, just-about viable archetype that we got...

Eschewing physical armour for protection via the strength of his faith, an ecclesitheurge focuses on the miracles his deity bestows and the breadth of that deity’s dominion.

Weapon and Armour Proficiency

An ecclesitheurge is proficient with the club, dagger, light crossbow, and quarterstaff, but he’s not proficient with any type of armour or shield. This replaces the cleric’s weapon and armour proficiencies.

Ecclesitheurge’s Vow

At 1st level, an ecclesitheurge makes a vow to his deity to be protected solely by his faith, not by armour or shields. An ecclesitheurge who wears armour or uses a shield is unable to use his blessing of the faithful ability, use cleric domain powers, or cast cleric spells.

Bonded Holy Symbol (Su)

At 3rd level, an ecclesitheurge forms a powerful bond with a holy symbol of his deity, which functions identically to a wizard’s bonded object.

Channel energy

The ecclesitheurge does not gain the channel energy ability

Blessing of the Faithful (Su)

As a standard action, the ecclesitheurge can bless one ally within close range (25 ft. + 5 ft./2 levels). A blessed ally gains a +2 sacred or profane bonus (depending on whether the ecclesitheurge channels positive or negative energy) on attack rolls, skill checks, ability checks, or saving throws or to AC until the ecclesitheurge’s next turn. If the ecclesitheurge uses the ability on themselves, the duration is ½ class level (minimum 1). The ability may be used 3+ WIS modifier per day.

Domain Mastery

An ecclesitheurge does not get a bonus domain spell slot for each spellcasting level. Instead starting at 1st level the ecclesitheurge, can each day when he prepares spells, select any 2 spells from their deity’s domains for each corresponding level of spell that he can cast and prepare them in their normal spell slots. In addition, each day he can select any 2 1st level domain abilities, and if at the appropriate class level, any 2 higher level domain abilities. This ability alters the normal domain ability.

Grim I'm afraid.....

Gives up too much for what it gets.... ironically this puts your one in good company with 90% of cleric archetypes!!

The ironic thing is that all a 'Priest' is in the general sense of the word is a worshipper of a deity who has a specific function within the church (as opposed to just a member of the masses).....but in PF the class of 'Priest' is often mentioned as being the hypothetical pure caster (aka D6 1/2 BAB) version of the cleric.

In reality though a 'Priest' can come from any class and can fill any role.... someone who handed out temple leaflets in the town square could correctly be described as a 'Priest' of Deity X....

In short.... all clerics are priests but the majority of priests are not clerics.

People look at the cleric too simplistically sometimes...

In terms of a caster cleric you have to remember that you have your domain spells which can provide some good additions and also that some gods provide some very nice bonus spells for clerics

A quick example... for clerics of Shizuru you get Colour Spray (spontaneously) and Scorching Ray as bonus spells.... makes those lower levels more interesting!

Pretty much the only way I would even vaguely consider casting GC is if I were dealing with a single target, but then as a 5th level spell slot there are more cost effective single target SoS/SoD options out there any way, so the point is moot.

I'm not sure what your point is.

Basically.... if you read your original post is states that GC is the stronger spell!!

I have never cast GC and wouldn't even cast it if it were a level lower ...thats how obvious the power difference is.

Saying that GFA is only stronger because of the save difference is a bit like saying Wizards are only better than Fighters because of their spells...... well duuuuuuuhh!!

You're right, it handily defeats martials. But casters can still buff, summon, cast wall-spells, heal, or even cast something like Black Tenticles (provided they don't include an enemy in the AoE). Or they could simply retreat for ~1 minute and come back when they can attack again.

The problem is that you're assuming that a caster would have these spells available to them at that specific time.

Any caster, especially a full caster do not generally hang around when they have a massive proportion of their abilities shut down for the duration of the combat.

Having used this spell successfully a great many times on casters, I can say with complete confidence that the caster experiences death very quickly afterwards. If they run, send someone to run after them and kill them...or just blast/arrow them in the back.

And lets not forget, if you did use it against a 'caster heavy' group of enemies and you wanted to be triply sure you could just...

Cast: Target cannot cast spells or use spell-like abilities.

I have never used Greater Command in my gaming career.... the power difference is that obvious.

Yes it's rounds per level, and no you don't get a new save every round.

Greater Command is the same level of spell (and Command is the partner to Forbid Action). Command is stronger since the people who fail their save can ONLY do what you command them to, whereas if you Greater Forbid someone to attack they can still cast spells or whatever. To balance this out Greater Forbid Action doesn't allow subsequent saves, while Greater Command allows a new save every round.

You are wrong

GFA is unquestionably the better spell.... not only doesn't it allow additional saves, turning this into an almost multi-target SoD, but as well..

Attack: The target cannot take any action that involves an attack roll, or uses a spell or ability that targets a foe or an area that includes a foe.

It invalidates martials and massively impacts on the effectiveness of any caster - in all probability invalidating them too as they will only be of use if they have prepared SM/SNA or some kind of wall effect. Any caster affected by this spell will in all probability either leg it or die!

Holy Warrior (Ex): A cleric with this ability is proficient with
her deity’s favored weapon. In addition, her base attack
bonus as a cleric equals her cleric level, and her cleric Hit Die
becomes a d10.

Class Abilities: Some clerics think of themselves more
as holy warriors than proselytizers or shepherds. For these
clerics, the ability to fight trumps all
other concerns. Taking the above ability
requires a cleric to give up both of
her domains, including her
domain powers.

Interestingly IMO this is no way near as OP as is widely thought. In fact I view it as being a bit UP or at best an even trade.

D10 HD equivalency is gained very easily via 1 feat.

Obviously having fighter BAB is a step up, but then you are giving up both domains... including all powers and spells and thusly your extra domain spell slot too.

Now bearing in mind you don't receive any other fighter-esque perks, unless you are determined to go down a very niche path and sacrifice a lot of interesting powers, this IMO is an overall step down in power.

Fudging should be avoided at all costs IMO....

Its far better to modify monster behaviour as a way of preventing PC deaths.... a BBEG wastes a round laughing at the PCs inadequacy, a monster runs instead of fights... etc

Anytime I've GMd Ive always rolled in the open and without exception my players appreciated it. I once had a PC die on Session 2 due to unforseen crit and the player didnt bat an eyelid... took it straight on the chin. And show me a PC who doesn't like the glory of the occasional 1 shotting of a bad guy?

Dice fudging (aka guided story telling) is a complete waste of time and IMO robs the entire thing of excitement. With rolling in the open, the players start operating far more tactically, and thus realistically, in my experience. The only exception I make is that I roll certain monster skill checks behind screen, and even then the rolls aren't fudged.

As a player, I dont do tables with GMs who only roll behind screen.

Mirror image isn't a divine spell. You'll have to decide what class you want first to take these spells from, itll make this decision a lot easier for you

Yes and no...

Use of Adept as your class enables you to take mirror image.

Its obviously too late to change but I do feel that the definition of 'Power' is off when I look at the ratings...

All of these archetype ratings are (or should be!) based on the concept that the base vanilla class is standardised at:

Power = 0
Versatility = 0

A 'Power = +1' rating is stating unequivocally that the archetype is better at doing the majority of the same roles as the base class.

Yes I should quantify this by stating that it means being better at a primary feature of the base class and without a corresponding balancing loss of power in another primary feature.

If Class X has 2 primary features, A and B, and archetype XY is better at A but proportionally worse at B then overall still:

Power = 0