Omar is my 3rd level Cleric of Shelyn in PFS that I've been running as a reach cleric. Some bad luck on the most recent adventure caused him to have to sell off most of his equipment and he has less than 100 gp currently -- some of which needs to go back into weaponry.
Male human (keleshite) cleric of Shelyn 3
NG Medium humanoid (human)
Init +1; Senses Perception +2
Aura deflection aura (2 ft.)
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Defense
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AC 17, touch 11, flat-footed 16 (+6 armor, +1 Dex)
hp 24 (3d8+6)
Fort +6, Ref +3, Will +6; +2 trait bonus vs. charm and compulson
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Offense
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Speed 30 ft. (20 ft. in armor)
Special Attacks channel positive energy 4/day (DC 12, 2d6)
Domain Spell-Like Abilities (CL 3rd; concentration +7)
5/day—bit of luck
Cleric Spells Prepared (CL 3rd; concentration +7)
2nd—aid, barkskin[D], spiritual weapon
1st—bless (2), shield[D], shield of faith
0 (at will)—detect magic, guidance, mending, stabilize
D Domain spell; Domains Protection (Defense subdomain), Luck
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Statistics
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Str 16, Dex 12, Con 14, Int 10, Wis 14, Cha 13
Base Atk +2; CMB +5; CMD 16
Feats Combat Reflexes, Power Attack, Selective Channeling
Traits birthmark, focused mind
Skills Acrobatics -3 (-7 to jump), Craft (painting) +2, Diplomacy +5, Heal +6, Knowledge (history) +4, Knowledge (nobility) +4, Knowledge (planes) +4, Knowledge (religion) +6, Linguistics +4, Sense Motive +6, Spellcraft +4
Languages Celestial, Common, Kelish
Combat Gear scroll of lesser restoration, lesser restoration, lesser restoration, lesser restoration, lesser restoration, wand of cure light wounds (50 charges), acid (2); Other Gear breastplate, backpack, bedroll, belt pouch, blanket, flint and steel, ink, black, inkpen, parchment (5), signal whistle, spell component pouch, waterskin, wooden holy symbol of Shelyn, 84 gp, 20 sp
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Special Abilities
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Birthmark +2 save vs. charm & compulsion
Bit of Luck (5/day) (Sp) Target takes the higher of 2d20 for a d20 roll.
Cleric Channel Positive Energy 2d6 (4/day, DC 12) (Su) Positive energy heals the living and harms the undead; negative has the reverse effect.
Cleric Domain (Defense)
Cleric Domain (Luck) Granted Powers: You are infused with luck, and your mere presence can spread good fortune.
Combat Reflexes (2 AoO/round) Can make extra attacks of opportunity/rd, and even when flat-footed.
Deflection Aura (3 rounds, 1/day) (Su) 20'r aura grants +2 AC and +2 CMD
Focused Mind +2 to Concentration checks
Power Attack -1/+2 You can subtract from your attack roll to add to your damage.
Scroll of lesser restoration, lesser restoration, lesser restoration, lesser restoration, lesser res Add this item to create a scroll with spells on it.
Selective Channeling Exclude targets from the area of your Channel Energy.
Wand of cure light wounds (50 charges) Add this item to create a wand of a chosen spell.
He has a normal Breastplate, Luck Domain, and Defense Domain.
With one good adventure he should be able to re-equip and start rebuilding.
I'm now trying to figure out the most efficient way to upgrade his gear.
Going through the big six:
Weapon: I want an Adamantine Glaive, may have to go for a magical normal or Mithral Glaive before that just because of cost. I will likely buy an Alchemical Silver Light Magic and some sort of Cold Iron weapon as well.
Armor: Have Breastplate, want Mithral Agile Breastplate
Cloak: I don't need a cloak of Resistance because of my domain power.
Ring of Protection: I can get a better protection bonus from my Shield of Faith
Amulet of Natural Armor: I can get Barkskin via domain spell, but that is only once a day.
Stat Boosters: Original plan was to go for Wisdom and Dex. May want Dex earlier.
So the challenge is to figure out an upgrade path that gives the best early benefits with minimal wasted resources.
My current thoughts are:
* Wand of Shield (2pp) -- allow me to have it every battle
* Masterwork Cold Iron Glaive (316) -- get a masterwork weapon to use
* Amulet of Natural Armor +1 (2K), -- upgrade AC, use Barkskin in boss fights for more
[ 4th level ]
* Ring of Protection +1 (2K) -- upgrade AC, will sometimes use his Shield of Faith spell to improve it more
[ 5th level ]
* Jingasa of the Fortunate Soldier (5K) -- improve AC
[ 6th level and beyond ]
* Dex stat booster (4K) -- upgrade AC, AoO, and reflex save
* Mithral Agile Breastplate (4.4K) -- improve movement
* +1 to armor (+1K, total 5.4K)
* Handy Haversack (2K) -- No more moderate encumberance
* +2 to armor (+4K, total 8.4K)
* Start looking at Adamantine Glaive (3K) or Amulet of Natural Armor +2 (8K).
This is looking really late to get the better armor and weapon. I'm hoping someone can suggest a better plan.
Interesting. The page says cleric, but the shopping list says fighter. I'm trying to explain that to myself. Any feedback would be great.
Thoughts:
I want to play a fighter who can heal people?
I like the combat side of the game a lot more?
I don't know what high level cleric gear would be?
Feedback:
It's tough to give great advice, because i don't understand 'gear to do what?', but here's a first shot.
1) you don't need an adamantine weapon. The fighter needs one. You need to heal and support the fighter.
2) clerics are just slow. Accept it, and enjoy the +1 agile breastplate over the mithril agile breastplate.
3) MW cold iron glaive is a great choice. Add in two oils of magic weapon, and one oil of bless weapon, and you're good for a long time.
4) the absolute best item for a reach weapon person is a potion of enlarge person. Have a few handy.
5) someday, you will need a ranged attack. Be ready for that day.
6) you're a cleric, and you will be expected to fix people. Selective channeling and lesser restoration are a great start. But as you gain levels, you'll need to expand your scroll colection to include 'calm emotions, delay poison, remove paralysis, remove curse, cure blindness,' and possibly a few more
7) no pearls of power? Whyever not?
8) i'd go dex over wisdom, if you plan to heal and buff. If you plan to cast spells on enemies, go wisdom.
9) wand of shield is a poor choice. You need two hands for the glaive, and if you use the wand, no more AOs. Then another action to put the wand away? It's not ever going to work well.
Buy a pack animal for 8gp if you must, and forget the haversack. You're strong enough to carry your gear as is. And the weight won't matter if you already move 20'
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Interesting. The page says cleric, but the shopping list says fighter. I'm trying to explain that to myself. Any feedback would be great.
You... don't understand the point of the Reach Cleric, do you? Cast spells and use reach weapons for AoO's. It isn't the run of the mill "stand around and channel energy" every turn types of clerics.
My first suggestion to try to get your moneys is to be very picky with what you play and look for unique chronicle sheets. I do not know if it was a boon sheet or something from an adventure, but there was a gentleman at a convention I GM'd at that had a treasure map chronicle sheet. In place of a day job, every couple of sessions, he gets a huge chunk of gold based on his level. It was pretty nifty and I forgot to ask where he got it. Probably a convention boon, but you never know.
Or you could play in a higher tier module with higher level players, then taking the out of tier money. You just have to be much more defensive and careful. Older season adventures are also usually easier, so maybe try to find a game a few seasons old and reduce the danger while generally still receiving decent loot and cash.
Don't forget that you can spend prestige for a limited amount of money too. Assuming you weren't forced to use it all on bringing yourself back to life, you can trade 2 prestige for something up to 750g. You could buy some Master craft weapons and armors for a couple prestige and sure, they aren't big fancy fire spears or anything, they should do for a while.
Edit: Looking back, I noticed that you did indeed know this, but you only thought about using it for the wand. You could also trade in 2 prestige for that Masterwork, Cold Iron spear.
I know my suggestions aren't exactly "OMG, I NEVER THOUGHT OF THAT" but honestly, I don't think you have to super worry. After a few more games, you will have a ton of gold and will be better off. A lot of my friends and I have more gold and prestige than we would ever need. But then again, there are also those who despite being seasoned adventurers, can't scrape two copper together, so who knows.
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Sounds like you two should get a friend to run you both through an in-tier PFS adventure to get you some out of tier gold. Line up a few lvl 7 allies for a Tier 3-7 or Level 5s for Tier 1-5, to form a well balanced sturdy team to help carry you through this time of hardship ;-) It could be online. Do this once or twice, and Omar will be back on his feet after that importunate death.
As far as gear, I'd stick with super cheap stuff until I could afford the good stuff. Seems like you have the right track. A reach cleric doesn't need a lot of gear, and can get by for quite a while on just polearm, chain shirt, club, and sling. The masterwork cold iron glaive is a wise start, considering how common demons are in PFS.
So, want to tell us how Omar died?
I would have guessed that 'reach cleric' referred to use of the reach spell metamagic feat, to be honest. I was surprised when i read the details.
If being good in melee is the priority, i would expect to see some levels of fighter or barbarian thrown into the mix to allow all weapons and heavy armor. Alternately, both inquisitor or warpriest allow for a self-buffing fighter with better action economy. Didn't see that mentioned.
If the AOs are just a bonus to a full spellcaster, then it should be clear that as levels are gained, the spellcasting becomes more important and the AOs become less important. But the gear doesn't reflect that either.
So, no, i don't quite understand how this cleric works in action.
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He's only 3rd level. He doesn't need fancy gear just yet.
A reach cleric is effective at melee while usually casting a spell each round. Dipping a full-BaB class isn't required or even advisable, since you're starting with a 3/4 BaB chassis with excellent self-buff options.
For comparison, if you equip the 1st level iconic cleric, Kyra, with a longspear and have her use reach tactics, her damage output roughly doubles and she probably takes less damage in the bargain.
You're absolutely right that spellcasting becomes more important as you level up. The nice thing about a reach build is that you don't have to choose between casting and melee. Reserve your standard action for casting a spell, and control the battlefield, as best you can, with your threat of AoOs. It doesn't always work, but sometimes you can do two things at once.
Every class can fish for AoOs, but it works especially well for clerics. Some variations focus on martial arts, others just skim a little free extra damage on top of their main thing. It's possible to play a thoroughly fearsome martial combatant who hardly ever bothers to attack on their own turn.
Thanks for the advice, everyone.
I am thinking of GMing a scenario and crediting it to Omar in order to get through that first adventure and have money to re-equip. I can recover the equipment I had in just one session. At least then he could pull his weight in the group.
The shopping list is mostly about defense. Yeah, it is the same things that a fighter would be interested in, but it is mostly about improving my ability to defend.
I'm not sure how practical it would be to get a table set up so I could play out of tier for the better gold. I'll have to think on this and ask around with some of the people I've played with, see what can be arranged there. My thinking had been playing down so I wasn't so much of a burden, but playing up to help recover money may make more sense in the long term.
Fitting the Handy Haversack in was one of the things I was really unsure of. The idea of a pack critter isn't a bad one, especially to fill in between the time that I get the armor and the time I get the Haversack. I need both the Mithral Agile Breastplate and light encumbrance in order to get the 30' movement. I really don't want to waste ~500 gp by enchanting some armor just to replace it later with Mithral.
Fitting in a Pearl of Power would be nice. I just re-read the description, they made it much more useful than it had been in previous editions -- you don't have to waste an action having to immediately recall the spell. I hadn't realized that until just now. I'm just not sure where I would fit it in right now. Perhaps drop out the Ring of Protection in order to get it either before or after the Jingasa? The Ring of Protection gives Deflection AC -- which helps when flat footed -- but my Shield of Faith does it better.
As for how Omar died, he had to take on the front line against a flood of zombies. The group was badly unbalanced as well. Two wizards, a sorceress, bard, archer inquisitor that wasn't willing to fight in the front line, and my cleric. I think my cleric was the only one with a slashing weapon. Although it was rough going, Omar was holding his own until the final battle. There he had bad footing so he couldn't retreat or withdraw. Omar took two hits and was badly injured -- only still up because of some healing -- when he got hit twice as hard as normal. Pretty embarrassing when you get outmaneuvered by zombies...
This was in a season 0 scenario. I found that not all those are so easy...
There are a few things I learned from the experience. It was a very dramatic demonstration of how much lack of maneuverability hurt my character. It also showed me that my AC and hit points are just too low to front line alone against a boss. I'm still trying to decide which spells would be best for this sort of situation.
For the most part I hadn't included expendables in my list. Silversheen seems worthwhile. A potion of fly is necessary -- will probably use PP to get that. I'll have to look at the oil of Bless Weapon. A scroll or wand of Magic Weapon may be better than oil of magic weapon. I do intend to get the 2PP pack of Delay Poison x5 scroll. Not sure on some of the others. May need to keep Spiritual Weapon on my spell list, since that may be my only way to hurt constructs for a long time.
I suppose I could pick up a sling and some sling bullets. Honesty, when it has come to ranged combat so far it has been more effective to use my Luck Domain power to give an archer a Bit of Luck instead. Part of that is that dice hate me.
BTW, the way I was planning to use the Wand of Shield is in a spring loaded wrist sheath. Check with the GM before each game to confirm they allow it. Swift action to get the wand, standard to use it, move action to put it away in a wand case at my belt. Free action to grip my weapon again so that I can get AoOs. Completely consumes the first round of combat. When the GM doesn't allow that, I don't use the wand as much.
Align weapon or bless weapon gets you around DR, which i find handy.
A scroll of Hide from Undead can do wonders as well.
Spell resistance stops spiritual weapon, just so you know. Might be better to go with bull's strength instead.
A level of barbarian would also give you 30' movement, right now. Or you could buy magic boots. The only benefit I see to light armor is that it allows you to fail an acrobatics check.
Positioning is important if you're based on AOs and reach. I'd probably just suck up the AO, and get to where I wanted to be instead of halving my movement to tumble poorly.
Instead of trying to buy gear on a shoestring budget, suggest playing We Be Goblins Too, or GMing a game so you can apply one or two credits without actually playing with him.
I'm not sure what PFS GM would not allow that action series to activate the wand. That's exactly how each piece of that works and the wrist sheath is legal.
The spring loaded wrist sheath doesn't specifically mention wands as being something that fits. I haven't seen it, but some GMs may not allow it.
I'd suggest pairing your equipment down to the pieces that are necessary to function, because you really don't have the 2000 gp to spare if you're going to get mithral armor and an adamantine weapon before lvl 7.
Are you suggesting I skip the Ring of Protection +1 and/or Amulet of Natural Armor since I've got spells (Shield of Faith and Barkskin via domain) that provide those? That would allow me to get to the armor quicker.
Zombies hit hard and crit harder.
Yeah, I was surprised by that final hit. It wasn't even with the weapon (our sorceress had used Grease to get rid of the weapon) and wasn't a critical hit -- just near max damage.
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When I was running my now-retired melee cleric, my biggest money-saver was greater magic weapon. Carry a mere masterwork weapon for the lower levels (with a couple of scrolls/oils of magic weapon in case you face DR/magic or incorporeals, just like a fighter would), then once GMW comes online, you've got a magic weapon all day without dropping the cash for it. Starting at 8th level, that's saving you 8,000gp.
You can do something similar with magic vestment, but it saves you a little less money since armor is cheaper.
An Extend rod for your shield of faith and barkskin is much cheaper than rings and amulets.
By "spelling" those four gear slots, you can save a LOT of money.
Hope that helps!
When I was running my now-retired melee cleric, my biggest money-saver was greater magic weapon. Carry a mere masterwork weapon for the lower levels (with a couple of scrolls/oils of magic weapon in case you face DR/magic or incorporeals, just like a fighter would), then once GMW comes online, you've got a magic weapon all day without dropping the cash for it. Starting at 8th level, that's saving you 8,000gp.
You can do something similar with magic vestment, but it saves you a little less money since armor is cheaper.
An Extend rod for your shield of faith and barkskin is much cheaper than rings and amulets.
By "spelling" those four gear slots, you can save a LOT of money.
Hope that helps!
Omar is still only at 3rd level, but that does make me feel better about not upgrading the weapon until really late.
The lesser extend rod is 3K and would only change the Barkskin from 30 minutes to 1 hour at my level. Shield of Faith only has a duration of 1 min/level so it would go from 3 minutes to 6 minutes. Once I get to 5th level, it would work well with Greater Magic Weapon where the duration would go from 1 hr/level to 2 hr/level -- basically all day.
One thing I did come up with is getting Muleback Cords instead of the Handy Haversack, save about 1K gold. That would put me at light encumbrance and a cloak of resistance isn't needed because of my domain power.
The easiest way to deal with losing gold is just to dump AC as hard as possible. You really have to be above WBL to have good AC.
Dumping AC would allow me to get headband of Wisdom and other items much earlier, but i'm not certain how it would help survival for the next couple of levels.
At 5th level, I'm strongly considering getting the Quick Channel feat so I can stall an extra round or so. I'm somewhat concerned since that would make two channeling feats but being able to heal the group as a move action seems worth it.
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When I was running my now-retired melee cleric, my biggest money-saver was greater magic weapon. Carry a mere masterwork weapon for the lower levels (with a couple of scrolls/oils of magic weapon in case you face DR/magic or incorporeals, just like a fighter would), then once GMW comes online, you've got a magic weapon all day without dropping the cash for it. Starting at 8th level, that's saving you 8,000gp.
You can do something similar with magic vestment, but it saves you a little less money since armor is cheaper.
An Extend rod for your shield of faith and barkskin is much cheaper than rings and amulets.
By "spelling" those four gear slots, you can save a LOT of money.
Hope that helps!
Omar is still only at 3rd level, but that does make me feel better about not upgrading the weapon until really late.
The lesser extend rod is 3K and would only change the Barkskin from 30 minutes to 1 hour at my level. Shield of Faith only has a duration of 1 min/level so it would go from 3 minutes to 6 minutes. Once I get to 5th level, it would work well with Greater Magic Weapon where the duration would go from 1 hr/level to 2 hr/level -- basically all day.
One thing I did come up with is getting Muleback Cords instead of the Handy Haversack, save about 1K gold. That would put me at light encumbrance and a cloak of resistance isn't needed because of my domain power.
First, note that for clerics, GMW is 4th-level, not 3rd-level. Fortunately, you don't really need to extend your hour/level buffs.
For barkskin and SoF, I wasn't meaning for you to extend them right now, at 3rd level. But around 5th-6th or so, Extending barkskin when you're expecting trouble (like at the front door of a dungeon) will easily last multiple encounters. And then since you would have the Extend rod anyway, the ability to potentially stretch a SoF into two encounters is just gravy.
so you can cast a summon spell/save or suck before they go
A summon spell takes the entire round, so there's no such thing as casting that "before they go". And a melee cleric is not opening combat with a SoS spell.
Even so, Improved Initiative is solid for a different reason: you're going to want a buff spell in most combats: usually divine favor. Getting that off fast is important. In fact, if you can find room for Additional Traits to pick up Fate's Favored, even better.
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Even so, Improved Initiative is solid for a different reason: you're going to want a buff spell in most combats: usually divine favor. Getting that off fast is important. In fact, if you can find room for Additional Traits to pick up Fate's Favored, even better.
Improved Initiative also gives you a better chance of being in the right place to threaten AoOs. It's slightly less important if your team maintains good movement discipline, but that's rare.
Like Jiggy says, +2 +2 Divine Favor with Fate's Favored is great. It gives a typical 3rd level reach cleric about a 25% attack power increase. Bull's Strength gives give the same character about a 29% (stacking) attack power increase, which is also the same bonus as a barbarian's rage.
Like Bret says, though, no collection of buffs can make a lightly armored D8 HP martial PC able to stand up to a tough melee boss in a 1 on 1 slugfest.
First, note that for clerics, GMW is 4th-level, not 3rd-level. Fortunately, you don't really need to extend your hour/level buffs.
For barkskin and SoF, I wasn't meaning for you to extend them right now, at 3rd level. But around 5th-6th or so, Extending barkskin when you're expecting trouble (like at the front door of a dungeon) will easily last multiple encounters. And then since you would have the Extend rod anyway, the ability to potentially stretch a SoF into two encounters is just gravy.
Gah! I'm much more used to arcane casters. I hadn't realized GMW was 4th level for clerics.
Perhaps it is just the luck of the draw or something about how we've been playing, but in most cases I don't think I've had fights that were within 5-10 minutes of each other. A fair number of them would have been within an hour of each other -- making the extended Barkskin useful.
Looks like in addition to studying up to GM a scenario, I need to study the cleric spell list a bit more.
First priority, GM a scenario so Omar has cash.
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In case it helps, I was a melee cleric who also started with 16 STR, so my experience may be useful:
At lower levels, my go-to buff spell was bull's srength, to take me from 16 to 20. That's +2 to attacks and damage (in your case, since you're two-handing, add another +1 to damage). I'd cast that on my first turn unless I either desperately needed to do something else on Round 1 or the fight looked easy enough to handle without it.
Once I hit 6th level (I didn't have Fate's Favored), my divine favor's bonus reached +2, making it equivalent in power to bull's strength but for just a 1st-level slot. Thus, I started preparing about 3/day of that, and never prepped another bull's strength. (It was also about this time that I picked up my STR belt.)
Now, I also had the advantage of having the Heroism domain: this means I had heroism as a 3rd-level domain spell, and starting at 8th I could also get it as a swift action aura. So I'd either have it pre-cast (10min/level duration is nice) or if I was caught unprepared I could dip into my aura rounds. Either way, I was getting another +2 to hit without spending another round buffing.
You won't have that.
As a result, I highly recommend putting your level-based stat bumps in STR so you can take it higher than I did. You probably don't want to spend 2 rounds buffing, and you don't have heroism on your list anyway. Thus, you'll want higher STR, and probably Weapon Focus if possible.
So in a nutshell:
• Get used to 1-round buffing as SOP (BullSTR thru 5th level, then DF)
• Pump your STR (level bumps, belt by 6th level)
• Take Weapon Focus
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I have a "Reach Cleric" in PFS, but he's 100% cleric; he has high wisdom and charisma, and uses reach spell to avoid melee. Thanks to his domains he's made more than a few maximized, empowered, reach touch of idiocy attacks on bad guys to pretty much halt casting (it sure can ruin your day when your primary casting stat is reduced by 7 or more). He also has a greater reach metamagic rod he uses for times when he needs to cast an emergency heal, breath of life, or freedom of movement and just doesn't wanna get in melee.
My personal advice is this: If you want someone to be in melee using a reach weapon while still casting spells, I'd recommend paladin or warpriest. I'm not going to say making a melee cleric is a bad idea, but at this point in time other classes can perform that role better and have cooler features as well.
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Jiggy --
Thanks for posting the strategy that Thomas used in combat. It's interesting to see how others use self-buffing.
Off topic, I'm curious about something.
Yeah, the dice roll probably reflects my actual knowledge of how the forums work, so I'll just ask. Blue must be a person's main forum identity, right? Are green names PFS character aliases, and maroon names other character aliases (like those from the play-by-post forum?)
Hmm
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Blue must be a person's main forum identity, right? Are green names PFS character aliases, and maroon names other character aliases (like those from the play-by-post forum?)
Yep, blue is your actual account name, green is PFS characters, and purple/maroon/whatever you call it is any other alias you make (whether for PbP games or just for fun).
Blue must be a person's main forum identity, right? Are green names PFS character aliases, and maroon names other character aliases (like those from the play-by-post forum?)Yep, blue is your actual account name, green is PFS characters, and purple/maroon/whatever you call it is any other alias you make (whether for PbP games or just for fun).
wait u mean im not real???
wait u mean im not real???Blue must be a person's main forum identity, right? Are green names PFS character aliases, and maroon names other character aliases (like those from the play-by-post forum?)Yep, blue is your actual account name, green is PFS characters, and purple/maroon/whatever you call it is any other alias you make (whether for PbP games or just for fun).
NO WE ARE A STEALTH PATCH FOR THE CORE JIGGY, HE WAS TOO UNDERPOWERED
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My point wasn't that the wand of shield was illegal. My point was that the opportunity cost was really high.
On round one, do you:
Position yourself to maximize AO's with a reach weapon?
-or-
Cast shield from a wand, and move 5ft closer to enemy?
It's nice when you expect conflict, when your group is about to kick down the door. But it's less useful when surprised. So, I'd be inclined to go with the +1 buckler that always works instead of the shield wand that works some of the time.
That said, it's TOTALLY worth spending 2PA on. I find far too many players hoard their PA in case they die, instead of buying things that will keep them alive in the first place.
And Bret, I'd humbly suggest that one of the reasons you were killed by zombies is because the other players standing behind you didn't get enough done to help you.
In case it helps, I was a melee cleric who also started with 16 STR, so my experience may be useful:
[snip]
So in a nutshell:
• Get used to 1-round buffing as SOP (BullSTR thru 5th level, then DF)
• Pump your STR (level bumps, belt by 6th level)
• Take Weapon Focus
Thanks, I think it is always useful to compare notes with others.
I had been doing first round Bless, it was my first time playing at 3rd level when I got squashed so I hadn't figured out what to switch over to now.
Given the bad experience, I was going to change over to:
* First round buff, Shield if I'll be up front, Shield of Faith or Bless otherwise
* Pump Cha (+1 Channel/day, +1 select), then Wis (shift to more spell casting)
* Feats are still very open. Given my experiences, I am still seriously considering Quick Channel for in-combat healing but concerned that might be too many feats towards channelling.
Boss fights would be where Barkskin and other spells would come forth, especially if we can anticipate when we are about to enter the big battle so we can pre-buff.
With my domains of Luck and Defense, I think that I'll be better off buffing the primary melee people and taking the 'free' AoO than trying to be the principle damage dealer myself. Notice that the focus of the items is on defensive capability rather than offense.
I have a "Reach Cleric" in PFS, but he's 100% cleric; he has high wisdom and charisma, and uses reach spell to avoid melee. Thanks to his domains he's made more than a few maximized, empowered, reach touch of idiocy attacks on bad guys to pretty much halt casting (it sure can ruin your day when your primary casting stat is reduced by 7 or more). He also has a greater reach metamagic rod he uses for times when he needs to cast an emergency heal, breath of life, or freedom of movement and just doesn't wanna get in melee.
My personal advice is this: If you want someone to be in melee using a reach weapon while still casting spells, I'd recommend paladin or warpriest. I'm not going to say making a melee cleric is a bad idea, but at this point in time other classes can perform that role better and have cooler features as well.
Sorry, this cleric isn't going to be doing the SoS spells. Too low a Wisdom. I'm also not trying to primarily melee with this cleric, but I do want to be able to do an adequate job as secondary melee.
One of my other characters is a Paladin that is currently using a Reach weapon. The Paladin will most likely switch around what weapons he uses as time goes on. I have no question that he will be more effective with his reach weapon than my cleric, especially when I get to use my smitey-goodness.
I approve of quick channel. It gives you better action economy, and that is incredibly important. You can also quick-channel, regular-channel, move, if the party is REALLY hurting.
I don't even really understand your counter-point. Too many feats tied up in channeling? Is there a quota?
The way I look at feats, the question is always: is this useful? And if the answer is yes, then you're done.
My standard reference, by the way, is improved initiative. If a feat isn't more useful than that, it's not worth taking.
My standard reference, by the way, is improved initiative. If a feat isn't more useful than that, it's not worth taking.The channeling feats are significantly worse (excluding variant dazing builds) than improved initiative because the action of channeling is worse than casting or attacking.
With Quick Channel, the action economy would be better since I could 5' step, quick-channel, and cast all in one round. Selective Channeling is pretty much a requirement if you are ever going to channel in combat.
I haven't done a lot of channeling in combat, but when the few times I did it probably saved a life. It can't keep up with the damage done, but it can give you an extra round of combat if done soon enough.
On the other hand, I'm interested in what you think would make a better feat than the Quick Channel.
Spring Loaded Wrist Sheath with a Wand of Shield is very nice. Why are people so averse to dropping wands as a free action? Yes there is the downside that occasionally you are somewhere you can't safely do this, but simply going without for that instance is a fair trade-off.
Second Level Pearl of Power would probably be better than an Amulet of Natural Armor +2 for the same price for you. It lets you get your domain spell back and as you level the bonus goes up without spending more money. Barkskin has a decent duration, two castings should be enough for most scenarios.
To solve your carrying capacity problems just cast Ant Haul, it is a first level spell that lasts 2 hours/level. Don't waste money on a magic item for this, you can fix it with a first level spell slot.
Since you already have Selective Channel getting Quick Channel is nice for action economy. If you don't need to move using your move action to channel will be nice for the whole team.
Around 9th you may want to look into Sacred Summons because Vulpinal Agathions are very nice and it is very nice to summon them as a standard action.
Is Shield a legal spell to place on a wand? It's a self only spell which means it should not be iirc. Also, how are you gaining access to the spell? It's not on the cleric list. Is it a domain spell for you? I apologize if this has already been covered, I admit I haven't read every reply, just your op. I'm more curious for my future clerics than I am trying to give you a hard time.
Spring Loaded Wrist Sheath with a Wand of Shield is very nice. Why are people so averse to dropping wands as a free action? Yes there is the downside that occasionally you are somewhere you can't safely do this, but simply going without for that instance is a fair trade-off.
Second Level Pearl of Power would probably be better than an Amulet of Natural Armor +2 for the same price for you. It lets you get your domain spell back and as you level the bonus goes up without spending more money. Barkskin has a decent duration, two castings should be enough for most scenarios.
To solve your carrying capacity problems just cast Ant Haul, it is a first level spell that lasts 2 hours/level. Don't waste money on a magic item for this, you can fix it with a first level spell slot.
Since you already have Selective Channel getting Quick Channel is nice for action economy. If you don't need to move using your move action to channel will be nice for the whole team.
Around 9th you may want to look into Sacred Summons because Vulpinal Agathions are very nice and it is very nice to summon them as a standard action.
Great comments, Gregory! Thanks!
Dropping vs putting away the wand would depend on situation. By default, I dislike littering the battlefield with valuable wands.
Given what everyone else has said, I'm going with your idea of Pearl of Power for Barkskin instead of an Amulet of Natural Armor. Gives a lot more versatility (can use it for other 2nd level spells if situation requires), frees up an item slot, and allows me to allocate the funds elsewhere.
Ant Haul! [FACEPALM] I've been looking at it for my Summoner but hadn't noticed it was on my cleric list. Thanks so much for pointing this out, Handy Haversack moves WAY down my list and I may never get it.
I would like to thank everyone for their comments. It has helped me a lot. Even in the cases where I haven't taken the advice, it has caused me to re-evaluate and double-check my assumptions.
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I have a "Reach Cleric" in PFS, but he's 100% cleric; he has high wisdom and charisma, and uses reach spell to avoid melee. ... He also has a greater reach metamagic rod ...
My personal advice is this: If you want someone to be in melee using a reach weapon while still casting spells, I'd recommend paladin or warpriest. I'm not going to say making a melee cleric is a bad idea, but at this point in time other classes can perform that role better and have cooler features as well.
You clearly don't understand what is a reach cleric, or how one works. This is pretty common. A reach cleric can be 100% cleric, it's just a different way to do things. The reach cleric build is all about action economy. I.e. Doing several things at once. Check out the Reach Cleric Guide to learn about this clever yet subtle build option:
There are a number of guides to various styles of Clerics, and they all possess the same inherent problem: Action Economy. Or more specifically, what to do with the Standard Action each turn.
At level 1, Clerics are completely martial. With only 3 or 4 non-cantrip spells per day, they're going to basically be a fighter that can cast Cure Light a few times. They simply can't cast enough spells to be any sort of "caster character". At level 1, there's not a problem with Action Economy: each action is being spent doing some sort of attack.
At level 20, Clerics are completely caster. They get far more value out of casting a spell than they do by attacking. Why do a standard attack if you can summon a Storm Giant that will do more damage over the course of a battle while soaking up damage? Why do a quickened Righteous Might when you can do a quickened Wall of Stone? At level 20, there's not much problem with the Action Economy either: you use magic if you've got a standard action to work with.
And in between those two levels? The Cleric is a strange mix between the two directions, which intersect in a very bad way: The Standard Action. Unless a Full Attack is involved, both the martial and spellcasting require the round's standard action, which means you have to choose which half of the character to use. It's especially bad if you play a character through a wide range of levels - all those martial feats and abilities you took early on have to look on sadly while your character spends most of their time in battle casting spells.
Fortunately, there's a build that gets around this limitation: a Reach Cleric
What's a Reach Cleric?
A Reach Cleric uses a Longspear and smart tactics to do full spellcasting while using Combat Reflexes and Attacks of Opportunity to deal out martial damage. One common example would be the Reach Cleric positioning themselves 15 feet away from the enemy and then casting a spell. If the enemy wants to close the distance, the Reach Cleric will get the attacks they didn't take during their own turn.
This means the martial aspect and the spellcasting aspect no longer conflict over the standard action. The spellcasting is done on the Reach Cleric's turn, while the damage dealing is done on the foe's turn. This will likely only work the first round or two; afterwards, the battlefield will probably be in a position where you can't back away and still have the enemy approach you on their turn. But that turn or two is all you need - you get off your spells during the most critical rounds of combat, and without sacrificing your martial abilities.
Here's an example of reach tactics for a cleric. Note how the example PC is often able to both cast a spell each round and also get multiple hard-hitting melee attacks. No other approach to building a divine caster can routinely accomplish this to such effect.
You don't need to be a 'battle specialist' to make effective use of reach tactics, you just need to be martially competent. E.g. STR 14+ and possibly one feat dedicated to martial arts. 'Martial competence' is a much lower bar than is 'martial specialist'. A specialized caster can also be martially competent. The 'reach cleric' build gives a reason to be martially competent, even for a primary spellcaster, since you'll get to inflict melee damage on the side while still doing your 'main thing'.
For example, if the 1st level iconic cleric, Kyra, acquires a longspear and uses reach tactics you will find that her damage output roughly doubles. She will also tend to take less damage, since she'll try to stay out of range of full attacks
This approach can work for a lot of other classes (e.g. Paladin, Warpriest, lots of others). It works best for classes that have both good martial ability and strong spell casting, such as Cleric and Oracle.
Is Shield a legal spell to place on a wand? It's a self only spell which means it should not be iirc. Also, how are you gaining access to the spell? It's not on the cleric list. Is it a domain spell for you? I apologize if this has already been covered, I admit I haven't read every reply, just your op. I'm more curious for my future clerics than I am trying to give you a hard time.
Only potions have the restriction that they must target a creature or creatures. Wands can be of any spell.
As for the second part, yes it is in the Defense domain. Same place I get access ro Barkskin. Being a domain spell, I can't take it multiple times but I can get a wand of it. By the rules, it would have to be a wand created by a divine caster but fortunately PFS skips those details.