We're getting in some early prep for the Wrath of the Righteous AP (very excited about it except for the Epic rules requirement - we're going to try and play it straight instead). So far one member of the party has put together this really great Paladin with a killer backstory and I wanted to make a cleric (my first) as a sort of partner/side-kick for him.
She's going to be a Cleric of Iomedae weilding longsword and shield and she's going to be an Evangelist who takes the Glory domain/Heorism subdomain. All of that I'm totally comfortable with. What I'm stuck on it how to make her useful in combat after the opening salvo of buffs? Power attack isn't really an effective feat for a sword and board'er, I'm not looking to get into the whole two-weapon fighting/shield bash thing. I thought maybe Dazzling Display in round 2 as a follow up to my initial buffs before moving in to help flank/aid another? But there's got to be some options I'm missing.
This was my first stab at feat selection, taking a single level of Fighter at 1st - the character is MAD enough that she won't have very impressive physical stats though I've not yet decided exactly how my 20 points will be allocated...
Human Cleric of Iomedae
Focused Study racial option
Feats:
1st - Weapon Focus: Longsword
1st - Dazzling Display
1st - Skill Focus: Intimidate
3rd - Lingering Performance
5th - Selective Channel
7th - Extra Chanelling
8th - Skill Focus: Perception
9th - Extra Chanelling
11th - Discordant Voice
13th - Quicken Spell
15th - Extra Chanelling
16th - Skill Focus: Sense Motive
17th - Extra Chanelling
I took the level of Fighter to get heavy armor and to help out a little with my feats. I'm still considering a feat to boost my Initiative so that I can get my buffs out early enough to make that key difference...
Should I give up on being an effective combatant and simply plan Round 1: Buffs, Round 2: Dazzling Display or a big spell, Round 3: Heals/Channelling/Condition removal?
Instead of going the martial route which, in my opinion, is a bit sub-optimal for the evangelist, have you considered just going heavy spells or summoning? Summoning + evangelist has a lot of synergy...
Consider the Leadership sub-domain for even more synergy. There's no limit to the number of times you can use that 1st lvl power per day...