I'll be participating in a one shot, that may be continued into a full thing, for one of the hardcore dungeons. We're starting at level 4, level equivalent cash, and a 15 point buy. While I've looked over the guides I'm still not absolutely sure what I want to do. So far I know our party will likely have a paladin, some kind of necromancer build, a rogue, and one more that I don't know.
Our only restrictions are no guns, and by extension no gunslinger. I'm fairly sure I'll be doing the healing mostly with channel energy, however, I'm not sure where to start with my build. Should I just go straight up support and take the channel energy feats?
I've take. A liking to reach clerics, they can be fun, especially if ure not relying on super high wisdom for spell save DCs
If you're going to do that, play an aasimar Oracle of Life instead, and take the aasimar alternate favored class bonus to improve your channeling. With a 15 point buy, it's important to not be MAD and as a channeling cleric you will be. Oracle conveniently requires you only pump your Charisma. So that's a HUGE plus.
Drop a 12 in charisma and leave it at that. Get your Con and STR to reasonable levels. Focus on finishing the fights out before healing anyone. Remember you can always drop a spell for healing so don't pick the Healing domain. Buffs are your best friend. Go with the support build, channel builds are silly and pointless at high or low levels with weird feat requirements and a hefty limitation on how much you can do it.
Reach clerics can be really good.
Tark's Guide is a great place to start
I built my cleric for 100% for combat focusing on things like TWF and shield bash and she was an absolute wrecking ball, who still had plenty of healing power outside of combat. The War/Tactics subdomain worked well for me, and the DM let me homebrew a deity that offered that and the Plant/Growth subdomain for free enlarge persons, but someone else in the group can toss it on you. With a little buffing and forethought I could do pretty much anything, even at low levels.
I had so much fun with it another player rerolled to match my exact build.
Hmm alright, well ths gist of the session is that may be just a one shot deal, so I need to optimize with level 4 in mind, and only a possibility of going forward. I'll look more at the reach cleric I suppose, but when does that start reaching its full effectiveness?
At 4th lvl, the stadard battle cleric works best IMO. In these low lvls the reach cleric is essentially a battle cleric with a reach weapon. With 15 point buy you will straggle to raise your Dex though, that is why I reccomend a standard (greatsword) cleric. For an one-shot game I also recommend to start with one lvl of Armored Hulk Barbarian, so that you have higher BAB, damage boost, heavy armor proficiency and retain 2nd lvl spells. If you continue the game you can enter rage prophet with such a setup.
Human Armored Hulk Barbarian 1/ Cleric 3
Alterantive racial traits: Heart of the Fields (for ignoring fatigue 1/day)
Domains: Deamon (replacing Chaos), Destruction (for dealing lots of damage)
Stats: Str 20 (17+2 racial+1 from lvls), Dex 10, Con 14, Int 7, Wis 14, Cha 7
1 Power Attack, H: Raging Vitality
2
3 Furious Focus
4
XMorsX wrote: At 4th lvl, the stadard battle cleric works best IMO. In these low lvls the reach cleric is essentially a battle cleric with a reach weapon. With 15 point buy you will straggle to raise your Dex though, that is why I reccomend a standard (greatsword) cleric. For an one-shot game I also recommend to start with one lvl of Armored Hulk Barbarian, so that you have higher BAB, damage boost, heavy armor proficiency and retain 2nd lvl spells. If you continue the game you can enter rage prophet with such a setup.
Human Armored Hulk Barbarian 1/ Cleric 3
Alterantive racial traits: Heart of the Fields (for ignoring fatigue 1/day)
Domains: Demon (replacing Chaos), Destruction (for dealing lots of damage)
Stats: Str 20 (17+2 racial+1 from lvls), Dex 10, Con 14, Int 7, Wis 14, Cha 7
1 Power Attack, H: Raging Vitality
2
3 Furious Focus
4
EDIT: Corrected.
Huh, that's certainly quite the interesting idea! I'll be sure to look into this. Though will my healing be up there still? It's likely I'll be the main off healer.
Sgt.Sunshine wrote: Huh, that's certainly quite the interesting idea! I'll be sure to look into this. Though will my healing be up there still? It's likely I'll be the main off healer. You still have 2d6 channel energy. WIth 7 charisma you have only one channel per day, but with all this offensive power that you will have you will certainly reduce the need of healing. You lose a first lvl spell and a second level spell casting per day. Big deal. Buy a first lvl wand of cure light wounds and go to town.
Hmmm alright. Well hopefully it'll work out. So the first level of barbarian is for all the raging benefits right?
Sgt.Sunshine wrote: Hmmm alright. Well hopefully it'll work out. So the first level of barbarian is for all the raging benefits right? Not exactly. You also gain heavy armor proficiency and martial weapon proficiency and you start with +1 BAB, meaning higher attack bonus and (most improtantly) lets you qualify for Power Attack from lvl 1 and have the 3rd feat free for Furious Focus.
Wouldn't your BAB be the same anyways? If I recall correctly the cleric only misses one level for his BAB. I have to admit though power attack and furious focus right off the bat is pretty nuts.
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