Hi,
Me and a friend of mine started arguing about the famous wizard vs cleric debate and we decided to actually do it.
Rules are:
-Only allowed starting money of a 20th character to buy equipment, items, etc.
-Only allowed Pathfinder Core, and APG, no ultimate magic.
-No multi-classing.
-No prep time.
-Haven't decided on the arena yet.I picked the cleric, and i need help to make the character. It's only purpose is this duel. I always played low level characters like up to 10th-11th level. So all the options at 20th are a bit overwhelming for me. I've never been really good at making min/maxed characters so i actually need help on everything.... Equipment to get, stats, domains, spells, and i could use some kind of general idea on what to do when the fight starts.
I know this is alot to ask but i would REALLY love to pwn my friend at this, he's been playing for longer than me and he kind of acts all and mighty in our games which is a bit annoying.
Well, first we need either the point buy amount or the stats you rolled to help us.
Antimagic Field + beat the crap out of the insolent wizard works too.
UMD some Contingency scrolls and set up something to deny him his massive initiative advantage if he does go diviner. UMD'ing a scroll of Wish might be fun, too. Just because you're a cleric doesn't mean you can only use cleric spells ;)
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find out what alignment your friend favors, as a cleric, many good spells are alighnment dependent. Might consider going summoner route to make use of the cleric buffing ability. Also: Forbiddance, it seems good, have a look.
Yeah, there is a reason that D&D hasn't got an active PvP scene, it never works.
Frankly, if your friend knows his salt you have almost no chance because of the "no prep time" rule.
In this case he will go divination wizard, win his Ini roll, cast time stop and then has his prep time to set you up with prismatic sphere, 1-2 x gate and, icing on the cake, wishing you a -10 to your con score for 1 Minute. This is followed up during the next round by personal buffs if you survive against the two gated Demons (or Angels if you are evil) inside your prismatic sphere.
You could try banishment/holy word but frankly your chance to beat two gated outsiders at melee range with it are frankly close to zero.
Hi,
Me and a friend of mine started arguing about the famous wizard vs cleric debate and we decided to actually do it.
Rules are:
-Only allowed starting money of a 20th character to buy equipment, items, etc.
-Only allowed Pathfinder Core, and APG, no ultimate magic.
-No multi-classing.
-No prep time.
-Haven't decided on the arena yet.I picked the cleric, and i need help to make the character. It's only purpose is this duel. I always played low level characters like up to 10th-11th level. So all the options at 20th are a bit overwhelming for me. I've never been really good at making min/maxed characters so i actually need help on everything.... Equipment to get, stats, domains, spells, and i could use some kind of general idea on what to do when the fight starts.
I know this is alot to ask but i would REALLY love to pwn my friend at this, he's been playing for longer than me and he kind of acts all and mighty in our games which is a bit annoying.
I would go with the Protection and Luck (Fate Domain) for Tugging Strands or maybe Magic for Mage's Disjunction. Make a few Mage's Disjunction scrolls as they're pretty cheap and they auto remove all buffs no matter level. You also save money on a resistance item and he can't take your resistance bonus to saves away with a Mage's Disjunction.
The main thing you need to to do is survive round 1. If you do that, you're golden. You have better spells for getting yourself back in action. It's too bad you can't use Thanatopic Spell, that would nearly guarantee you a win.
You have a major advantage in that Miracle costs no expensive material component, so you won't have to use money to buy expensive material components. Don't bother wasting time buying tomes to build up your wisdom, the Wizard starts with 6 less on his fortitude saves. You can screw him easy.
If you survive round 1, which you have a good chance of doing if you invest in Con and possibly Contingency a Restoration for if you go below 8 lvls.
Now keep a Prismatic Sphere scroll just in case you need time to remove negative levels. Though I think a Miracle spell should be able to allow you to remove all negative levels with a standard action. Depends on your GM though.
Now invest in a Greater Metamagic Rod of Quicken. Make sure you get True Seeing up or Invisibility Purge. Have at least a Quickened Invisibility Purge memorized just in case.
The key is that when you do finally get to hit the wizard. You use a Mage's Disjunction to make sure his buff's are clean. Then you use your Greater Quicken Metamic Rod and smash him with an Energy Drain. They key is to keep hammering his caster level. Then when you put up a Spell Resistance, it will make his spells fairly useless.
Remember, your main advantage is you can more easily heal damage, heal ability damage, and defend yourself.
Some useful buffs:
1. Greater Spell Immunity: Any 8th or lower spells that don't allow saves if low on hit points like Power words and enervate or calcific touch.
2. Survive the initial onslaught.
3. Let him build up as many buffs as he can before you cast Mage's Disjunction and completely destroy all his preparation including summoned creatures.
4. If traits are allowed take Magical Lineage Heal, Preferred Spell Heal, and Spell Perfection Heal. This will allow you to Quicken Heal while casting other spells without using your rod.
5. Remember to memorize a few Quickened Dispel Magic spells. You want to use these to strip off certain spells he is using defensive while you set up attacks. Though if you make enough Mage's Disjuctions and with judicious use of your Greater Quicken Metamagic Rod, you might be able to end the fight quickly.
6. Also, you can cast Mind Blank with your protection domain and then use Miracle to cast Greater Invisibility if you really need to turn invisible say if he is attempting to stay out of range of your Invisibility Purge. Not sure how your DM runs, but if Mind Blank prevents True Seeing from seeing the wizard if he is invisible, you may need to use the same tactics.
The key is landing a quick killing blow. So if you get the opportunity unload on him with your Quicken Rod followed up with a hammer spell like Energy Drain or Destruction.
You should have a slight hit point advantage, a save advantage, and a to hit advantage. What you'll lack is attack versatility, which you'll slightly make up for with a defensive spell advantage.
If you win initiative, unload on him as hard as you can.
Don't forget Tugging Strands to make him reroll a lucky save against any of your more dangerous spells.
There are countless iterations and strategies for both sides. Clerics are extremely potent and have a considerable defensive advantage over the wizard. So make sure to use it.
It's too bad you're not allowed to be a Life Oracle. Now that class is a caster killer if you build it right.
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The problem is round one is time stop.
Roll 1D4+1 = 3 rounds average.
Energy Drain 2D4 Neg levels
Energy Drain 2D4 Neg levels -10 levels average -10 to all saves -50HP
Then any SoS spell you want.
After that your not casting. Thats why initiative is so inportant in this set up. Your just going to nova and the wizard can do it realy well. Clerics can to but takes alot more planing.
If your allowed oracle time is how you kill wizards.
1. They get time stop as a spell. See above as to what to do. Divine casters have energy drain as well.
2. They are rolling 3 dice for init. keaping the best one.
The problem is round one is time stop.
Roll 1D4+1 = 3 rounds average.
Energy Drain 2D4 Neg levels
Energy Drain 2D4 Neg levels -10 levels average -10 to all saves -50HP
Then any SoS spell you want....
Quite true, Time Stop combined with ungodly Ini is what breaks this.
But your tactic doesn't work because:
Time Stop: "While the time stop is in effect, other creatures are invulnerable to your attacks and spells; you cannot target such creatures with any attack or spell."
Go with 2x Gate + 1x Prismatic Sphere and 3 quickened buffs (Imp Invi, Mind Blank, Fly) then move out of the sphere and let the two Balors dish it out with the hapeless Priest.
Also mind that gate is not a Summoning Spell and thus the two outsiders are not summoned creatures!
Level 20? Wizard takes Divination specialisation, wins initiative without rolling, and the match.
Scarab of Protection would help a lot.
Really, PvP isn't the best way to determine whether wizards or clerics are better. So many factors. For example, a cleric is almost definitely better for soloing, but a wizard is practically necessary in the average party, whereas clerics are a nice luxury, with UMD wands of cure being the go to for healing.
These classes have tons of resources at high levels, and very few at low ones. Their effectiveness isn't about brute force, it's about careful management over the course of each day. A fighter v. fighter for a one encounter bout makes sense. But not v. rogue, barbarian, or anything like that (rogue relies on special situations for damage, bbn relies on novaing rage/having time to recover from fatigue after)
This goes one of two ways. Either it's one or two spells and a Save or Lose, or it's a supernova. The second one is worse, because even though the classes have nova potential, it's almost always a bad idea.
Btw. Too bad there's no prestige classing. A lore master would be great for a div. specced wizard, and holy vindicator is really damn good for "Antimagic field -> Beat the crap out of insolent wizard"
yeah, at lvl 20, a wizard ends up with an initative result of 30+dex mod+misc without rolling. So I think winning initiative is out of the question. You might want to focus on surviving the first round instead.
Though you are not too screwed. I mean if the wizard goes the option of time stop, he will be mind blanked, invisible + you will be surrounded by multiple summoned or called creatures.
But there is a bright side. The wizard is hardly a winner if he goes the time stop route because this just turns the battle into a stalemate. See once he completes his time stop, you get to start your turn and do exactly the same thing.
If your cleric has the trickery domain, then on your turn you cast time stop and basically do everything he did. Then the battle recommences with both of you being mind blanked/ invisible/ flying with a bunch of called/ summoned creatures at your command.
Now if he tries to take you out in 1 turn, then he will instead do a quickened enervation + a save or die. So then your other contingency should be an item of spell turning so that he eats his own enervation.
Spell turning doesn't work against enervation because it is ranged touch attack, but he could have a contingency with spell immunity for enervation up. But since there is no prep, might not be able to have such spells up.
So best to get lucky on your saves. Wizard going to die quick if he isn't invis by the time you get to attack. You may have trouble making a save. But if you're having trouble, the wizard is most likely dead.
It should be an interesting battle. Clerics are no pushovers. But wizards have a lot of options.
Nice thing if he uses that whole Time Stop and two gate spells, that's three of his 6 9th lvl spell slots. A cleric has more spell slots than a wizard. Might be able to outlast him.
death ward will make you immune to energy drain and +4 save against any death effects he has lined up for a 4th level spell.
restoration removes all temporary negative levels for a 4th level spell (don't forget the 100g components)
greater spell immunity spell gives you immunity to 5 spells level 8 or lower for 200 minutes.
building for physical damage and antimagic field could be an interesting gambit but if he memorizes one of the couple things that goes through that it could be risky.
That's just it, if he's building the wizard to fight a cleric, he knows spell immunity, antimagic field, and death ward can go up and foil him. Which is why he'll have maybe 2 disjunctions memorized. Or just scrolls.
Cool deal, make sure you take notes and let us know what happens. I'm interested in how it all turns out.
Going Dwarf Cleric means he is unlikely to fail his save throws regardless.
A dwarven cleric can easily have save throws that will outstrip what the wizard can throw at him DC wise. It will really come down to if the wizard summons or not and what he summons (or gates) if he does.
Don't forget that in pathfinder when it comes to spell casting Miracle is better than wish due to the lack of expensive components for most 'normal' uses. That means if you should prepare a few -- after all you get to choose from any spell list with them giving you quite the advantage in versatility.
Don't forget to have freedom of movement available in some way, several wizard spells can put you in a nasty grapple check (eg grasping hand +33 grapple mod) that you probably won't be able to beat if you spent all your stats on con and wis.
Also the wizard could use maze spell as a poor mans time stop depending on your int.
What are the rules regarding how big the fighting arena is and how far you can go away from it during the fight? Teleport? Planeshift? If he could trap you in a cloudkill using forcecage or some other method that would be dangerous and only really escapable in a few ways.
I can't figure out what he is planning to do with 5 hours of prep time aside from maybe animate dead and contingency stuff but none of that takes hours. He doesnt even need time stop now to start the battle with a huge hoard of summons though.
It is probably worth having some energy resistances up just in case he decides to go a nuking route rather than debuffs. 3 maximized delayed blast fireballs out of timestop is enough to kill you if you make 1/3 saves. And if he rolls well on timestop it could be 4 fireballs.
I won't give you advice on class optimization.
If you are in a 10x10x5 room, you got initiative = win
My advice is to have a large room with a lot of visual impairments (pillars, walls) and high enough to fly over an antimagic sphere.
At the start, don't let them see each other or have line of effect. After that it will be a question of who moves first in each others line of effect, or can a quickened magic help?
Perhaps it would be fair to ignore initiative and have pairs of matches, he starts, you starts, he starts, until their is no more tie (after a full pair).
Btw. I once had a pvp match (no class restriction), my paladin/sorcerer killed the barbarian in 2 rounds. The other person wasn't very tacticly talented :)
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standard high level buffs.
Trueseeing: Invisability of any kind will not work. Along with any illusion effect.
Freedom of movement: The only way to contane them in with force cage. Or other effects that do not hamper there movement but trap them in.
Thats why alot of high level fights start with Quickend Greater Dispel Magic. Removes up to 5 spells in effect starting with the highest. And then grapling spell with normal casting time. Now that your in one place and very hard to cast.
Love (Charms subdomain) and Fate (Lucks subdomain) are best for this I think.
Love makes him to get through will save with touch attacks. Fate gives you an ooprtunity to force a reroll for either of you 3 times.
standard high level buffs.
Trueseeing: Invisability of any kind will not work. Along with any illusion effect.
Freedom of movement: The only way to contane them in with force cage. Or other effects that do not hamper there movement but trap them in.Thats why alot of high level fights start with Quickend Greater Dispel Magic. Removes up to 5 spells in effect starting with the highest. And then grapling spell with normal casting time. Now that your in one place and very hard to cast.
True seeing doesn't auto-beat any illusionist who has survived to high levels.
You confer on the subject the ability to see all things as they actually are
It only beats sight based illusions.
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That only helps if you are close enough for melee. And Quickend Greater Dispel will remove 5 of your highest level buffs.-No prep time.
Cleric wins every time when spells arent prepared. Better weapon and armor profs, BAB, and HP.
Was this really that hard to figure out?
;)
By 'no prep time' I meant it as 'they didnt have time to prepre spells in the morning...', therefore, there is no quickened greater dispel prepared to cast.
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You confer on the subject the ability to see all things as they actually are. The subject sees through normal and magical darkness, notices secret doors hidden by magic, sees the exact locations of creatures or objects under blur or displacement effects, sees invisible creatures or objects normally, sees through illusions, and sees the true form of polymorphed, changed, or transmuted things. Further, the subject can focus its vision to see into the Ethereal Plane (but not into extradimensional spaces). The range of true seeing conferred is 120 feet.
Like what spell? scintillating pattern is the only one that I can find that is not sight base illusion. That's why you want a quickend greater dispel magic ready.
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By 'no prep time' I meant it as 'they didnt have time to prepre spells in the morning...', therefore, there is no quickened greater dispel prepared to cast.That only helps if you are close enough for melee. And Quickend Greater Dispel will remove 5 of your highest level buffs.-No prep time.
Cleric wins every time when spells arent prepared. Better weapon and armor profs, BAB, and HP.
Was this really that hard to figure out?
;)
Can you till I played alot of high level games. Arcane caster are just better at bursting power. Divine casters are better at contionus power. The longer the fight the more chance the divine caster hase. The problem is keaping alive that long.
If he's going transmuter he may be looking at enhancement sub-school, at 20th level it has fistfulls of bonuses to its stats that can crank up initiative and save DCs. its in the APG if you want to take a look.
He's giving you 5 hours of preparation time? Wow.
Maybe make your guy good. Go call a few Planetars, tell them this wizard is trying to make your god look weak. You want to show this wizard your god's power is supreme.
Don't forget, with Gate you may be limited to 20 HD that you can control. But if you call a Solar and you tell him this wizard is summoning Balors to destroy one of his masters high priests, chances are he will be willing to help you. Your not just some schlep that studied from books to become powerful, you are one of your gods most powerful servants. There is no reason to believe a Solar wouldn't gladly help against a wizard conjuring Balor demons to take you on.
That's another advantage of being a divine caster with the Gate spell. Your deities servants actually like you and you're not just some arcane caster making a bargain.
So Gate in a couple of solars if you make your guy Lawful Good. Let them play with the Balors and the wizard. See how much fun he has.
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Cast Gate. Orient the gate on the horizontal, twenty feet wide. Under the wizard. Allow gravity to do its thing.
Pick someplace nice. The negative elemental plane is pleasant, from what I hear.
Though, I have to say, the very nature of the duel invalidates it. This will determine nothing, because the characters are designed for the battle.
And frankly, with the amount of options available to a pathfinder character, the age old wizard vs cleric debate is pointless. There is no such thing as a "a wizard" or "a cleric." That's a relic of 1E, Basic and 2E, when the paucity of character options meant that (mechanically at least) all characters of a certain level were pretty much the same.
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I am sure it has been suggested earlier, but I would hazard a guess when it comes to winning, it comes down to initiative.
Traits, Reactionary (+2 imitative) Feats: Improved initiative.
Domains: I would suggest Trickery and Travel Domain. The Trickery Domain gives the cleric access to Time Stop. The Travel domain gives you access to some nice mobility spells.
So which class is more powerful? The cleric or the wizard? That is what this duel is about? Yes?
Lets look at the basics of each class.
The Wizard gets
d6 hit points
Poor base attack bonus
Poor Fortitude Save
Poor Reflex save
Good will Save.
They get to specialize in a school of magic, which gives them some powers and an extra spell slot. These magic schools, however do not give access to “cleric only” spells like restoration and cure spells. They also get “full” spell casting. While he has the potential to cast every spell on the wizard/sorcerer spell list, he has to find them and put the spells in his spell book. The wizard can’t cast in armor
The cleric gets
d8 hit points
medium base attack bonus
Good Fort save
Poor Reflex save
Good will save
In addition to channel energy the cleric gets access to two domains and their powers. The Domains give the cleric access to “Wizard only” spells. The cleric gets full spell casting. The cleric has access to and can cast every (with alignment restrictions) spell on the Cleric spell list, as soon as he has access to it by level advancement. The cleric can cast in armor.
Now lets compare spells. On Page 130 of the Ultimate Magic, they have a section on designing new spells. Here is the maximum damage for arcane spells that affect a single target. Table 2-1
Spell level 1: 5 dice,
Spell level 2: 10 dice
Spell level 4: 15 dice
Spell level 5: 10 dice
Spell level 8: 25 dice
Spell level 9: 25 dice
Maximum Damage for divine spells single target
Spell level 1: 1 dice
Spell level 2: 5 dice
Spell level 3: 10 dice
Spell level 5: 15 dice
Spell level 7: 20 dice
Spell level 9: 25 dice
The arcane spells use a d6 and the Devine spells do a d8. The divine spells catch up to the arcane spells by level 9.
When I was at I-Conn, in 2003, I got to go to a panel discussion ran by Bill Slavisek, Monte Cook and Skip Williams. They were telling us about the new stuff that was coming out in 3.5 D&D., I remember when I asked Skip Williams if the Cleric class was more powerful then the other basic classes like wizard fighter and rouge, while I don’t remember Skip Williams exact words I’m pretty sure said something like “Yes, the cleric is more powerful. We thought that, since no one wants to play clerics, if we give them more goodies, players will want to play them more.” So in short giving the cleric more stuff then the other character classes, in order to make the cleric more attractive to play, has been part of the design philosophy for a while.
In my opinion the Cleric is more powerful then the Wizard. I know there are probably some people that disagree, hence this thread, but I have laid out some evidence, an I think that evidence supports my opinion.
One final thought about Class VS Class discussions.
Now I am not sure if this has been said elsewhere. The Pathfinder game isn’t designed as a Player VS Player game like say World of War craft. This game is designed to have a group of specialist working together as a team so they can solve the problems the GM puts in front of them, and exploring dungeons (whatever form they take) and defeating monsters. Oh did I mention taking the monsters loot and investing in better gear? So sticking two classes in an arena to “duel” is a fairly un-realistic situation when it comes to how the character classes actually function in the game. Just my two cents.
I hope this helps.
He's giving you 5 hours of preparation time? Wow.
Maybe make your guy good. Go call a few Planetars, tell them this wizard is trying to make your god look weak. You want to show this wizard your god's power is supreme.
Don't forget, with Gate you may be limited to 20 HD that you can control. But if you call a Solar and you tell him this wizard is summoning Balors to destroy one of his masters high priests, chances are he will be willing to help you. Your not just some schlep that studied from books to become powerful, you are one of your gods most powerful servants. There is no reason to believe a Solar wouldn't gladly help against a wizard conjuring Balor demons to take you on.
That's another advantage of being a divine caster with the Gate spell. Your deities servants actually like you and you're not just some arcane caster making a bargain.
So Gate in a couple of solars if you make your guy Lawful Good. Let them play with the Balors and the wizard. See how much fun he has.
I meant solars for the above post. Gate in a few solars.
I don't have anything to add... just curious to the outcome