Help making a broken character

I need help making either a character that is either broken or really strong. I've been playing Pathfinder for half a year now and the character I'm playing now is surprisingly very weak. I'm a level 4 Half-elf Cleric with no chosen archetypes. My other party members are the same level as me or level 5. In my party is; a Tengu Monk (5), Druid Gnome (5), Human Sorcerer (4), and Elf Bard (4). They're all either Chaotic Good, Chaotic Neutral or Neutral. While I'm Lawful Neutral. I'm tired of healing them constantly, putting out their grease fires and them stealing my items even though I have high perception but not able to stop them. (I get healing is part of being a cleric, that's why I signed up for the job)

I'm now trying to figure out what is the best class and race to make a broken character. I realize you can make any character broken if you do some research, but seeing as I'm new to this I need some help. I like magic-based characters but I wouldn't mind trying anything more physical based.

They're all either Chaotic Good, Chaotic Neutral or Neutral. While I'm Lawful Neutral. I'm tired of healing them constantly, putting out their grease fires and them stealing my items even though I have high perception but not able to stop them. (I get healing is part of being a cleric, that's why I signed up for the job)

Why are you not letting them die, again?

As for broken character, level 5 is when Wizards get Fly.

Stop healing them. If they're actively stealing your things just don't heal them until the item is returned or start charging for the service. From the information provided it seems that they're taking advantage of you and your character that issue needs to be dealt with. A Cleric can be plenty broken without too much work by focusing on the spells you're preparing each day.

Is the issue only in game with the characters only or is there an issue out of game with the players as well?

don't heal them if they are being dumb.
Also what are your stats like and what are your domains?

If they are stealing your items, talk to them out of character. That ain't right, perception and stealth rolls be damned. As for Cleric, ask GM to switch alignment to CG or hope you worship a good god.

Summon Good Monster > Summon slightly better monsters, monsters have diehard so they have a ton more HP (they go away at -con instead of 0)

Summon Neutral Monster > Summon slightly better monsters, good monster is slightly better here

Summon Sacred Monster > Summon monsters as a standard action instead of a round (you are the only class that can do this IIRC). Monsters must be same alignment of you (You need summon neutral or good monster depending alignment)

Augment Summoning > All summons get +4 Str/Con

Evolved Summoned Monster > Summons become more powerful, gaining lots of unique options

Quicken Channel > Use 2 uses of channel energy to do it as a move action. This means you can Summon > Channel > 5foot step in one turn.

Selective Channeling > Remove up to CHA people from your Channel every time you channel. Useful to exclude a$#+~#& allies or enemies.

How about an absurdly efficient healer, like a kitsune wrecking mysticism dual life spirit guide oracle or an oradin?

The problem with healers is that bad ones are terrible, not that good ones aren't fun.

Summon good monster is broken as in doesnt work. It doesnt remove the general summon rule that they disapear at 0 hp. So it does nothing.

Summon Sacred Monster > Summon monsters as a standard action instead of a round (you are the only class that can do this IIRC).

anyone who can summon can do this if they're evil with summon evil monster

http://paizo.com/paizo/faq/v5748nruor1gh#v5748eaic9qli

Half-Orc can give summoners Ferocity and the FAQ says that it works, letting summons go below 0 HP.

Diehard and Ferocity are basically the same thing in this case, letting the summon act and keep fighting past 0 HP.

How about an absurdly efficient healer, like a kitsune wrecking mysticism dual life spirit guide oracle or an oradin?

The problem with healers is that bad ones are terrible, not that good ones aren't fun.

I'm currently beginning pathfinder for the first time not doing random homebrew and am trying to make an oradin. Mind shooting me some tips on effective building of it? It's half elf and lvl 1 (only played one session).

PossibleCabbage wrote:

How about an absurdly efficient healer, like a kitsune wrecking mysticism dual life spirit guide oracle or an oradin?

The problem with healers is that bad ones are terrible, not that good ones aren't fun.

I'm currently beginning pathfinder for the first time not doing random homebrew and am trying to make an oradin. Mind shooting me some tips on effective building of it? It's half elf and lvl 1 (only played one session).

I'm seeing two things out of this post. The first is a group issue. This hopefully can be resolved out of game. The GM shouldn't be allowing the party to steal your stuff like they are. It could be nothing more then them giving your character a hard time, it could be more. Talking out of game could resolve all of this. I a meeting before the game starts and talk about it. Make it clear this bothers you and why. If these guys are reasonably mature they will get it and stop.
The second issue I'm seeing is you seem a tad upset playing the group's healer. That issue is easier to fix. Either switch to something you want to play and let the party adapt to this or change how you play. I have read post after post after post of people complaining because they play a cleric and the party assumes they are the group's healer and that's all they can do. I have played and have seen played clerics that never heal or that is secondary. I have played clerics who tank up and get into melee next to the fighters and hammer out as much damage as them. A good or neutral cleric can change any memorized spell for cure spells so don't memorize cure spells. I always memorize two spells usually multiple times they are Bless and Shield of Faith. Bless helps everyone and Shield of Faith gives me a +2 armor boost. At higher level the spells are just as deadly as a wizard.
It's not the class it's how people perceive how the class should be played. I see it with this class more then any other. It's your character and you should play it the way you want as long as it doesn't disrupt the game. Don't let the GM tell you how to play it either. Had a GM once do this to me twice before I told him never again.

Tell the Druid and Bard to buy a wand of CLW and heal themselves and everyone else who gets a little cut.
Clerics are only healers if you play them that way.

However...this sounds like a Player/GM problem not a PC issue.

I'm seeing two things out of this post. The first is a group issue. This hopefully can be resolved out of game. The GM shouldn't be allowing the party to steal your stuff like they are. It could be nothing more then them giving your character a hard time, it could be more. Talking out of game could resolve all of this. I a meeting before the game starts and talk about it. Make it clear this bothers you and why. If these guys are reasonably mature they will get it and stop.

The second issue I'm seeing is you seem a tad upset playing the group's healer. That issue is easier to fix. Either switch to something you want to play and let the party adapt to this or change how you play. I have read post after post after post of people complaining because they play a cleric and the party assumes they are the group's healer and that's all they can do. I have played and have seen played clerics that never heal or that is secondary. I have played clerics who tank up and get into melee next to the fighters and hammer out as much damage as them. A good or neutral cleric can change any memorized spell for cure spells so don't memorize cure spells. I always memorize two spells usually multiple times they are Bless and Shield of Faith. Bless helps everyone and Shield of Faith gives me a +2 armor boost. At higher level the spells are just as deadly as a wizard.
It's not the class it's how people perceive how the class should be played. I see it with this class more then any other. It's your character and you should play it the way you want as long as it doesn't disrupt the game. Don't let the GM tell you how to play it either. Had a GM once do this to me twice before I told him never again.

I have a pretty good GM and he's surprisingly well prepared for just about everything that you would expect and unexpect. I don't know how to increase my melee. I don't mind healing people if they weren't being a jerks. The only one who isn't rude is the wizard and I'm constantly healing him because monsters like to attack him.

Tortured Crusader paladin with on level of dual-cursed lame/tongues or lame/haunted oracle. Broken mind, Broken leg. Fall from grace as soon as you can to have a broken spirit and broken faith as well. Might replace on of your curses with Wrecker to have broken gear.

The first thing you need to do is tell the other players that you aren't having fun playing a heal bot they treat as their personal item bank. If one of them claims they're just roleplaying their character, remind them that, as a Lawful Neutral character, it's well within your character's personality to either charge for healing to recoup the losses you're suffering and/or turn them into local law authorities. Make sure the GM is aware of both these things. If anyone claims that's PVP, point out it's the same as stealing, so either way they're gonna pony up.

Secondly, Clerics can be very powerful, depending on how your stats have been arrayed, whether you want to take an Archetype or Prestiege Class (Evangelist is both fitting and powerful, giving you all of the bonuses listed at the cost of a single level of your own Spellcasting and Channel Positive Energy) and which God you worship (some tactics, weapons and abilities are only open to certain deities). Being able to heal is good - being able to rain the nightmare fires of hell down while summoning a horde of creatures and then healing on round three is better.

Can you give us your current stats, feats and gear?

don't heal them if they are being dumb.

Also what are your stats like and what are your domains?

My domains are Earth and Protection.

Ability Score:
Str. 17; Dex. 15; Con. 17; Int. 14; Wis. 17; Cha. 15;

Initiative-2; Fort. Save-7; Ref. Save-3; Will Save-7; BAB-+2; CMB-5; CMD-17;

Armor:
AC-18; AC-17; Touch AC-12; Flat Foot AC-16;
Scale Mail Armor, Light Steel Shield

Weapons:
Attack Value-5
Light Crossbow, Light Steel Shield, Longsword

Skills:
Acrobatics-7; Appraise-7; Bluff-2; Climb-8; Craft(none chosen)-5; Diplomacy-8; Disable Device-2; Disguise-2; Escape Artist-2; Fly-2; Handle Animal-2; Heal-7; Intimidate-6; Know.(Arcana)-7; Know.(Dungeoneering)-2; Know.(Engineering)-2; Know.(Geography)-2; Know.(History)-6; Know.(Local)-2; Know.(Nature)-2; Know.(Nobility)-6; Know.(Planes)-6; Know.(Religion)-6; Linguistics-6; Perception-11; Perform-2; Profession(none chosen)-7; Ride-2; Sense Motive-10; Slight of Hand-2; Spellcraft-6; Stealth-2; Survival-3; Swim-11; Use Magic Device-2

Feats:
Extra Channel, Point-Blank Shot, Bloodline feat."Alertness",

Stop healing them. If they're actively stealing your things just don't heal them until the item is returned or start charging for the service. From the information provided it seems that they're taking advantage of you and your character that issue needs to be dealt with. A Cleric can be plenty broken without too much work by focusing on the spells you're preparing each day.

Is the issue only in game with the characters only or is there an issue out of game with the players as well?

The problem is that I don't know how to make the cleric broken. Like I said, I'm hoping to make another character just in case my half-elf dies because of my party's stupidity. I don't entirely know which spells would be good at this level with the cleric.

I don't have an issue with any of them outside of the game except one of them is my ex but that's a different story.

I guess cold you clarify for me what specifically you mean when they are stealing your items/ being stupid. Iv'e seen enough "Just because I'm a cleric and the only one who can cast cure spells, should I have to heal the barbarian who is face tanking for us?" Posts to know that if I don't ask I can't actually get a fair read on what is going on. No offense intended, just heard one too many crying wolf.

Your stats are fine for melee in fact better then for ranged. Buy Breastplate and heavy shield. That would improve armor by 2 points. I'd switch out Point blank Shot for Channel Smite. At fifth if you are neutral take Versatile Channel. With that you can channel both positive and negative energy. I'd also switch out Extra Channel for Selective Channel.
If you have time read the spells you can access them online if you don't have the books. Shield of Faith and Bless are two I always pick at first level. Bless helps the party and Shield helps you by boosting AC by 2 for now, at sixth level it becomes 3. Your character looks pretty solid otherwise.

Well first, drop the crossbow and pick up a longbow. You'll do more damage with it and to apply your str to damage if you buy a more expenaive one. And unless your GM has been ignoring the rules, using a crossbow sick because of the actions needed to reload and shoot it.

Second, feats are precious. You claim to not care about healing, but picked up extra AoE healing and better ranged combat. Extra channel isnt that amazing.

Either retrain your feats normally or ask your GM if you can swap them out this once. Also how are you getting a bloodline feat?

Your current character has very high stats and could be good at any direction you wish to go.

I'm uncertain of your definition of a 'broken' character but my assumption is a character so powerful that it 'breaks the game' by making every other character obsolete. Don't pursue this. It detracts from the fun of the party and in the end it is not fun to play a character which can do everything.

My impression is that you do not wish to play a support character. Your character could pretty easily be a front liner, especially with the lineup you described as your party mates, which may be more fun for your playstyle.

I guess cold you clarify for me what specifically you mean when they are stealing your items/ being stupid. Iv'e seen enough "Just because I'm a cleric and the only one who can cast cure spells, should I have to heal the barbarian who is face tanking for us?" Posts to know that if I don't ask I can't actually get a fair read on what is going on. No offense intended, just heard one too many crying wolf.

My party burnt down an entire field. None of them knew anything to put out the fire that wouldn't drown us except for me and the room was filling up with smoke and we haven't explored the entire room yet. So I put out the fire and found seeds. I took the seeds and put it in my inventory. My party got mad that I pocketed it and decided to take them from me. I'm only mad because this isn't the first time they did something stupid that I had to fix.

Well first, drop the crossbow and pick up a longbow. You'll do more damage with it and to apply your str to damage if you buy a more expenaive one. And unless your GM has been ignoring the rules, using a crossbow sick because of the actions needed to reload and shoot it.

Second, feats are precious. You claim to not care about healing, but picked up extra AoE healing and better ranged combat. Extra channel isnt that amazing.

Either retrain your feats normally or ask your GM if you can swap them out this once. Also how are you getting a bloodline feat?

The feat is apparently due to Fey bloodline. I don't know.

Your stats are fine for melee in fact better then for ranged. Buy Breastplate and heavy shield. That would improve armor by 2 points. I'd switch out Point blank Shot for Channel Smite. At fifth if you are neutral take Versatile Channel. With that you can channel both positive and negative energy. I'd also switch out Extra Channel for Selective Channel.

If you have time read the spells you can access them online if you don't have the books. Shield of Faith and Bless are two I always pick at first level. Bless helps the party and Shield helps you by boosting AC by 2 for now, at sixth level it becomes 3. Your character looks pretty solid otherwise.

I thought if you were lawful neutral, you can't channel negative energy.

Derek Dalton wrote:

Your stats are fine for melee in fact better then for ranged. Buy Breastplate and heavy shield. That would improve armor by 2 points. I'd switch out Point blank Shot for Channel Smite. At fifth if you are neutral take Versatile Channel. With that you can channel both positive and negative energy. I'd also switch out Extra Channel for Selective Channel.

If you have time read the spells you can access them online if you don't have the books. Shield of Faith and Bless are two I always pick at first level. Bless helps the party and Shield helps you by boosting AC by 2 for now, at sixth level it becomes 3. Your character looks pretty solid otherwise.

I thought if you were lawful neutral, you can't channel negative energy.

Neutral characters choose between channeling positive or negative energy at first level.

Without knowing more, this definitely sounds like something you may want to talk with your GM and maybe the other players out of character. None of them are evil so it doesn't make sense in character for them to steal your items. Not sure which items they're stealing though.

As for your build, those are some fine stats. Level 3 spells (which you get in a couple levels) have some really neat stuff. That said there are some nice spells for level 1 and 2. Part of it depends on what you're looking for. Do you want to be the Cleric putting out a lot of damage? Buff Spells are likely your best best. What I did when I started playing a cleric was I looked at a list of available spells and I made a document for myself with ratings for what I figured were the most useful. The beautiful thing about a Cleric is you can change your spells every day, so experiment. Just reading through quick descriptions of all the spells was a big help. There will be times you might get stuck healing instead of cutting stuff down but it won't be all the time unless you let it.

Derek has some great suggestions. Selective channel is fantastic if you are looking to get into the thick of things as it lets you throw down an aoe heal and then get back to business. Really though, talk to these people. Let them know what's bothering you and look for ways to resolve it.

The feat is apparently due to Fey bloodline. I don't know.

Fey bloodline doesn't give alertness and clerics don't get bloodlines.

It looks like you might have swapped out your half-elf's bonus Skill Focus feat for Alertness. I'm just guessing here, but that sounds like a house rule. Maybe a racial trait option of some kind? Pretty balanced, power-wise, in my humble opinion (IMHO).

It sounds like your group is a lot like a group I gamed with once. They had been playing for a long time and incorporated a bunch of house rules they never bothered to write down and/or simply mis-interpreted or ignored rules they didn't like. They were also pretty loose with the alignment system and the actions their characters did. I got the impression there was a history of player vs. player conflict in the group.

I would suggest talking to the group about your personal goals and expectations for playing in their group. Also, if you made mistakes in feats you've selected, ask if you can fix those mistakes.

If you're not having fun, something needs to change.

So I put out the fire and found seeds. I took the seeds and put it in my inventory. My party got mad that I pocketed it and decided to take them from me. I'm only mad because this isn't the first time they did something stupid that I had to fix.

Seeds? They got mad over you putting seeds on your inventory? I sounds like you're playing with a bunch of jerks or fools or both. Can that be fixed?

The group starts a fire then you pick up the seeds afterwards and they get mad? I said earlier talk to the group out of game with the GM. I wasn't trying to bad mouth your GM but clearly their are issues here that need to be resolved. Part of a GMs job is to attempt to resolve these issues both in and out of game.
You almost always get one jerk in the group. Depending on who he is he can make the game fun or grind it to a halt. I have heard and seen it happen a lot. I've seen one group and heard about another breaking up over that one jerk guy.
SorrySleeping unless he has a trait switched out half elves don't get Longbow proficiencies.

OtakuChan wrote:

The feat is apparently due to Fey bloodline. I don't know.

Fey bloodline doesn't give alertness and clerics don't get bloodlines.

Do half-elves get bloodlines? Because other than that, I'm confused.

OtakuChan wrote:

So I put out the fire and found seeds. I took the seeds and put it in my inventory. My party got mad that I pocketed it and decided to take them from me. I'm only mad because this isn't the first time they did something stupid that I had to fix.

Seeds? They got mad over you putting seeds on your inventory? I sounds like you're playing with a bunch of jerks or fools or both. Can that be fixed?

Yep. They got mad that I took seeds. I don't really know that thins could be fixed except talking to my GM but talking to him makes me nervous because I don't want to start something. The Gnome had to ask the bard to steal things because she doesn't have enough points in slight of hand.

It looks like you might have swapped out your half-elf's bonus Skill Focus feat for Alertness. I'm just guessing here, but that sounds like a house rule. Maybe a racial trait option of some kind? Pretty balanced, power-wise, in my humble opinion (IMHO).

It sounds like your group is a lot like a group I gamed with once. They had been playing for a long time and incorporated a bunch of house rules they never bothered to write down and/or simply mis-interpreted or ignored rules they didn't like. They were also pretty loose with the alignment system and the actions their characters did. I got the impression there was a history of player vs. player conflict in the group.

I would suggest talking to the group about your personal goals and expectations for playing in their group. Also, if you made mistakes in feats you've selected, ask if you can fix those mistakes.

If you're not having fun, something needs to change.

This is my first time playing with them. I guess it's good that they have some house rules because for some reason our Tengu Monk is "broken" with the fact they're a tank and apparently can learn 50 languages or something. So we limited him to 6 languages. I don't know but I don't think Tengus can be that broken.

SorrySleeping wrote:

OtakuChan wrote:

The feat is apparently due to Fey bloodline. I don't know.

Fey bloodline doesn't give alertness and clerics don't get bloodlines.

Do half-elves get bloodlines? Because other than that, I'm confused.

No race get bloodlines. That is a class feature of the sorcerer, making them draw there power from something seeing as they cast on a whim without magical training unlike Wizards.

There might be a few archetypes that give other classes bloodlines, none that I can remember, but the cleric has no such archetype. I'd talk to the DM about that.

...
Initiative-2; Fort. Save-7; Ref. Save-3; Will Save-7; BAB-+2; CMB-5; CMD-17;

Armor:
AC-18; AC-17; Touch AC-12; Flat Foot AC-16;
Scale Mail Armor, Light Steel Shield

Weapons:
Attack Value-5
Light Crossbow, Light Steel Shield, Longsword

...

Feats:
Extra Channel, Point-Blank Shot, Bloodline feat."Alertness",

I'm no genius. I build plenty of sub-optimal PCs, so read this with a grain of salt.

4th level cleric BAB should be +3.

I agree with posters above who recommend swapping Point-Blank Shot for something else. Your stats look better for melee, and, as mentioned above, if your DM clings to the crossbow RAW, you're not going to get enough use out of that crossbow to justify a feat anyway.

Keep the crossbow though! It might come in handy.

How'd you get the longsword proficiency? Your deity's favored weapon?

Your gear looks way light for fourth level. Is your GM running a low magic game?

Use that heal skill!

As for spells, bless is no longer the monster it was at first level, but it is still pretty solid. Summon Monster is starting to come into its own. As mentioned above Augment Summons is a great feat to pump up your summons, but you need the less stellar Spell Focus(Conjuration) first. You've tons of great buffs. Delay Poison, Remove Paralysis, and Lesser Restoration are situationally useful. I like Scribe Scroll as a feat, just so I can have these three on hand without preparing them.

Good luck.

I think tengu get 2 languages for every rank they put into Linguistics.

But knowing 50 languages isn't broken. Unless the campaign is all about breaking codes and speaking in cyphers.

Level 1 spell Comprehend Languages >> Learning 2 languages per rank in Linguistics.

Basically, if you want to be OP, play a spellcaster. Dump your healing abilities, it doesn't seem like a good investment of your time. Focus on Summon Monster and make everyone else there feel completely useless.

Strengthen your summons by taking the Evangelist Archetype for Inspire Courage (which keeps your allies happy, thus avoiding the nerfbat). If you want even more buffs for your summons, take the "Heroism" subdomain of the "Glory" Domain.

You give up a turn to summon your creatures, though if you want, you could take Sacred Summons and/or Summon Good Monster to help things out on that front. Try to scout things out ahead of time (Animal Domain for a scouting animal companion also works really will with your buffing) so that you can summon before combat.

There are few things as OP yet viable in almost every aspect in the game as proper usage of Summon Monster.