Hello, before i present my case, I'll give a bit of a background.
I'm playing a 3rd level CN human cleric in a Neutral-evil party. We have an orc barbarian, a drow alchemist, a halfling bard, a human wizard, and a gnome warlock. Currently I have to function as a secondary fighter to the barbarian as well as standard party healer. I rp my character as an insane cleric who often forgets his name, his god's name, mumbles and yells in his sleep, and spell preparation includes walking off randomly from the party who shortly hear me screaming. (in order to have silence in his head, he sub consciously lets the voices in his head outside his head) Anyway, we just hit 4th level.
My question is this. Is it a good idea (in this instance) to multiclass in a level or two of fighter? or would that hurt my divine spellcasting by too much to be worth it?
TL;DR: Does a cleric as a secondary fighter get a good benefit from multiclassing into a melee class?
Hello, before i present my case, I'll give a bit of a background.
I'm playing a 3rd level CN human cleric in a Neutral-evil party. We have an orc barbarian, a drow alchemist, a halfling bard, a human wizard, and a gnome warlock. Currently I have to function as a secondary fighter to the barbarian as well as standard party healer. I rp my character as an insane cleric who often forgets his name, his god's name, mumbles and yells in his sleep, and spell preparation includes walking off randomly from the party who shortly hear me screaming. (in order to have silence in his head, he sub consciously lets the voices in his head outside his head) Anyway, we just hit 4th level.
My question is this. Is it a good idea (in this instance) to multiclass in a level or two of fighter? or would that hurt my divine spellcasting by too much to be worth it?
TL;DR: Does a cleric as a secondary fighter get a good benefit from multiclassing into a melee class?
IMO a cleric doesn't Need to multiclass into fighter to be a viable melee.
It Can compliment fine, but it isn't Needed.
Stay the course, maintain your Spell Level advancement. It's far more worthwhile.
To answer your question, you have to ask yourself if you are feat starved or not.
- If you have plenty of feats to take the ones you need + heavy armor proficiency, then stay 100% cleric.
- If you need a few extra feats, dip into fighter for the extra feat + free heavy armor proficiency + free use of all martial weapons. If you dip into fighter take ONLY one level. You can lose one level of cleric and still be 100% effective as a cleric.
Personally i'd consider looking at the Holy Vindicator in the APG.
There're two question of paramount importance:
1. Does it fit your character concept?
2. Do you want to multiclass?
If the answer to either is "No" then don't multiclass.
Ok I looked at the holy vindicator prestige class. From what i can tell, it would fit nicely into this situation without slowing my spellcasting too much, while providing more combat viability. My question is if the holy vindicator is worth maxing out or just 4-6 levels of it? Also, as a straight cleric I'd have to wait till 8th level to take this due to medium BAB of the cleric, would a 2 level fighter dip be worth it to speed this along?
You only want to lose one casting level.
Options:
1) take one level of fighter [heavy armor proficiency, martial weapons]
2) take 4 levels of Holy Vindicator [heavy armor proficiency, martial weapons, some extra abilities]
But don't sacrifice more than one caster level...they get more and more difficult to make up.
What are your stats? If you have 10 Str, then a level of fighter isn't going to magically transform you into a melee monster. :-)
My tolerance for multiclassing is generally at most one level of lost spellcasting, for a spellcaster.
My stats are as follows-
3rd level cleric
STR 15
DEX 13
CON 14
INT 14
WIS 18
CHA 16
Took proficiency for bastard sword to help up my damage, Eschew materials because i cast with a shield, and selective channel because i channel in combat.
Also picked the luck and travel domains, luck for spell variety and travel for increased mobility for combat.
Thoughts?
I think that with those stats and the feats you have, you should just stay a cleric. As you level up, your magic will do more for your group than any levels you take in fighter. The travel domain will help you be an effective fighter when you need to be, and having teleport is a great lifesaver when all else fails.
Stay a cleric!
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I'd stay full cleric, or maybe take 4 levels of Holy Vindicator as Dos Cosmic above mentioned. The benefits of staying full cleric really outweigh any other features you might hope to gain.
If it fits your concept, or if you were the primary melee combatant, maybe. But as it is you should be fine.
I'd also stray away from the "healer" role and focus more on general support. Treantmonk's guide explains it best:
Why isn't the Healer useful in combat? There are two ways you can live your "pretend" life - "reactively" or "proactively". The God Wizard will alter reality to prevent damage, a healer will try to do "damage control" (pun intended) after the damage has been taken. Simple truth: The mechanics of the game make preventing damage more efficient then healing damage after the fact. That's not to say a well placed "Heal" or even "CLW" never has use in combat - but if you're doing your job - it should never be required as a primary role.
Most good Vindicator builds want to get to Cleric 8 anyway, because some of the sexiest Domain powers open up there. Particularly any striker builds that channel Neg_Energy for Death Domain's ability... :)
From what it sounds like, taking the 4 levels of Vindicator or going straight Cleric will be best.
Really, I think it's fine either way. It's all about what you see your character doing.
The arguments for sticking with cleric all the way are strong. On the other hand, I have played a multiclass cleric/fighter before in 3.5, and found it very fun, very effective, and very worth while (though I would not call the character "optimized"). She would be even easier and more effective to play in Pathfinder due to class skills opening up and extra feats and the like.
General wisdom on the message boards is never to sacrifice caster level. Really, it depends on what you're trying to do, IMO. Caster level affects the following:
1. Duration, range, and damage of a spell (some, only to an extent)
2. Concentration checks
3. Dispel and Countermagic
4. Checks to beat Spell Resistance
I played my cleric as primarily a buffer/healer who was a second meleer/flanking buddy (she was in two parties; the first also had a full-class cleric; the second she was the only cleric but the party had fairly fragile meleers so they needed her support up close and they had a fire genasi sorcerer for hurting things magically). She could slide over and slap the primary tank with an easy healing spell and then get back to hitting things. This is how things worked out for her:
1. Her lower caster level did reduce duration, range, and damage, but never to a point where I felt, "Damn, if only I had one more caster level for that extra round!" Usually the spells lasted long enough, had the range they needed to, etc. Healing spells have no duration and a touch range so that's inconsequential; they are affected by your caster level but only to a point (so my Cure Critical Wounds spell did 4d8+10 points of healing instead of 4d8+14. Somehow the party survived). In PF she might be hurt by some of the changes to Cure Disease, etc; I'd have to see how that would work.
2. She generally could 5 foot step to get out of range to cast, and the only trouble she had in 3.5 was Concentration was Con based and she had a low Con. Wisdom's her highest stat, so it kind of evens out. With Combat Casting I doubt she'd have much trouble.
3. Seldom did either; left the dispelling up to the arcane caster.
4. Seldom did those, but the few times I needed to, to cast positive energy spells at undead usually, made the checks. I don't remember ever failing a caster level check actually, and I don't tend to roll high.
What her Fighter levels got her were more combat feats, making her more versatile in melee and in casting, a better BAB, and better weapon proficiencies. I never wore more than light armor to keep my 30' move but thanks to Fighter armor training, if I played her in Pathfinder, I would totally deck her out in some medium armor or mithril plate.
At higher levels I did take the 3.5 feat Practiced Spellcaster for a boost to Caster Level, which was nice but it made her only better at something she was already effectively good at. In Pathfinder, if you use the Trait system, Magical Knack serves that purpose.
Of course the other big thing is that she didn't have the highest level spells. For a buffer/healer type, that's okay. A lot of the best spells for that are around levels 4-7 anyway. Based on the campaign I was in, I was often glad to have some extra feats and BAB than an 8th level spell. But that all depends--on what you want to play and what your party needs.
Beyond losing some caster levels, think about stuff like whether losing a 20th level capstone is worth it to you (if you think you'll make it all the way to 20; if not it doesn't matter at all).
TL;dr: Cleric is a great class to stay full class in but a few levels of Fighter are good if you want to be in the thick of melee. The trade off of losing a few caster levels is, IMO, not the horrible thing some folks make it out to be--but IS a tradeoff you need to think about before doing it. Good luck and have fun.
My stats are as follows-
3rd level cleric
STR 15
DEX 13
CON 14
INT 14
WIS 18
CHA 16Took proficiency for bastard sword to help up my damage, Eschew materials because i cast with a shield, and selective channel because i channel in combat.
Also picked the luck and travel domains, luck for spell variety and travel for increased mobility for combat.
Thoughts?
I thought divine casters didnt need material componets to cast, just their divine focus? If so, you dont need eschew materials, and thats a spare feat slot.
I agree that the Holy Vindicator is a great class, and with the Magical Knack trait you can get away with losing two caster levels, allowing you to dip into the class for 8 levels. But, you will not gain any advantage in BAB between:
Cleric 12/Holy Vindicator 8
Cleric 10/Holy Vindicator 10
In fact, the ONLY difference between these two variations, is that the C12/HV8 has a higher caster level than C10/HV10.
The abilities of HV9 and 10 are really not that fantastic to be honest, not enough to make me say "That is worth 1 caster level".
What James says is absolutely correct. The Magical Knack trait can shore up most of the loss from multiclassing, but the fact remains that for each level you don't get a caster level for, you are losing one of your best spells (the magical knack trait won't help with this fact).
So...is losing one of your most powerful spells worth whatever you can get from the multiclass?
When it comes to the Holy Vindicator, it is not a bad sacrifice since it will significantly up your combat potential.
When it comes to fighter, it is only a good sacrifice when you absolutely, positively NEED the 3 extra feats from it (Heavy Armor Proficiency, Martial Weapons, 1st level fighter feat), but it is only a good sacrifice for one level.