I have an upcoming Emerald Spire campaign coming up, and the way we generated our characters was left pretty much completely to the dice. Essentially, we rolled our class, our alignment, race, stats and so on. We even had a chance to roll a random drawback for extra trait, leading to some interesting RP results. To sum up all the used houserules neatly, here's a little spoiler tag to keep the post from overbloating...
Houserules used in the game:
- Class, Race, Gender, Alignment are rolled randomly from available options. Races used ISWG reincarnation table.
- Stats are rolled randomly from 4d6 keep everything.
- You may roll a random drawback for an extra trait that can stack from same category (Two social traits etc.), and can be a campaign trait from other campaign if asked early on (Mummy's Mask Trap Finder trait IS available!)
- All characters receive a free bonus feat at 1st level.
- All classes have a minimum of 4 skill points per level (affected by INT naturally, so 8 int cleric has 3 skill points). This is to let people to participate outside the combat more easily. In addition, we are using background skills for an additional 2 skill points.
- You may freely choose any archetypes available, as long as it's not 3rd party.
- Your initial alignment is allowed to change overtime. Likewise, your starting class is only for 1st level, and you can multiclass away from it, and potentially retrain it.
The result of these rules is an assortment of wildly different characters. Most people rolled fairly well, but I seem to have gotten the luckiest (or second luckiest) rolls statwise. The character I rolled is a NG Male Half elf Cleric, and the stats I have are following, to be freely allocated wherever.
21, 18, 16, 10, 9, 9.
For a cleric, that is almost absurdly powerful, and while I want to make an effective character, I also want to avoid overshadowing the party at all costs. The rest of the group rolled a LE Arcanist, a CE female dwarf Skald (will multiclass to become a Barbarian), and a TN Inquisitor. Don't remember the races from the top of my head for the other two players, just the skald. While the starting alignments are set, they are allowed to change overtime, and the Skald will change the characters alignment towards neutral as the character, a female dwarf, rolled a lovesick drawback, and my male half-elf cleric wound up the romantic interest, which we are now incorporating to the RP side of things.
Back on the topic of the mechanical side, as I'm probably the most optimizing type of the group, and well aware of this, I promised myself to do what I can to avoid overshadowing the rest. As such, I ruled out Save or Suck builds that would go crazy with that high wisdom score. On the other hand, the strong rolls allow for previously unconventional, like a full on caster/blaster cleric. However, due to certain mad issues from having such lopsided stats, I'm not sure what kind of cleric I could build.
Builds I'm currently thinking of include:
- Support Cleric: I love supporting, what can I say. Oradin is one of my favourite builds overall, and wouldn't mind being a healy/buffer type either mentally! Medicine Subdomain interests me a lot in RP side of things, too.
- Blaster Cleric: Theologian, 23 wisdom and Ash subdomain or Sun domain would make for a very unconventional cleric build! Other
- Summoming cleric: One I worry might be a little too strong, but doubles as support with Evangelist and Heroism Subdomain benefits.
- Reach Cleric: Aside for Skald/Barbarian, we might need a second frontliner. The problem is the very skewed rolls, but perhaps there is a way to make this work?
My main goal is to make a fun, but not overpowering character with what I've been given, and to avoid over optimizing this which I have a bad habit of doing naturally. Weird builds, multiclassing and prestige classes are available, as long as I remain a full divine caster the group will need. Could even grab the aforementioned trapfinder trait to make a sneaky cleric if it's actually a thing. Dwellers of the forums, please aid me in this endeavor!
Is the inquisitor melee or ranged? If ranged, you should definitely go for a melee build. If the Inquisitor is melee, however...
How about a pure support/caster cleric? Ecclesitheurge of Sarenrae. Fire as primary domain for some blasts, Heroism-Domain for nice support spells (Heroism, Bless Weapon) and Healing (or maybe Restoration or Medicine) as domainpower-only domain for auto empowered heaing spells.
Get Greater Spell Focus Evocation. There's surprisingly many good evocation spells on the cleric's spell list. Toppling (or Dazing) Spiritual Weapon, Sound Burst, Holy Smite, Cold Ice Strike, Flame Strike, Blade Barrier, Destruction. The fire domain adds more.
And of course you have evry bit of buffs, protection spells, heals and status removal like any other cleric.
For the melee-ish build, just go with Sword and Shield to keep yourself safe and your damage in check. A cleric of Iomedae with the Heroism and Tactics domains and heavy armor is a pretty solid frontliner. Get Combat Casting so you can do your spellcasting duties while keeping the enemies away from the more fragile party members.
The problem you face is that your stats are going to dictate your choices or you just waste the opportunity you have. You are good alignment so you can't take a hangover cleric, summoning doesn't need much wisdom beyond just being able to cast your highest spell, healing isn't strong enough for a cleric, and support clerics don't need massive attributes either. So your stats are strongly encouraging you to either take high wisdom for blasting or bad touch (attributes give high DCs) or put your best stats into your martial skills.
I would take debuff or blaster as they can splash support very well. Go debuff if you need the melee. Honestly my own build would be a cleric of Sarenrea (spelling) as she has both fire and glory/heroism with scimitar as a favored weapon. She effectively lets you switch hit between dex to hit, support role, and blaster all in a single package. You will be feat starved as a half elf but it can be done. Be sure to take ecclisitheurge archetype.
For roleplay and debuff go take Tsukiyo and a theologian cleric of using madness domain to the max. Use your traits for wayang spell hunter and other matamagic reducers for bestow curse and laugh at the boss at each level as he curls into a ball. When you get to the point where you can swift cast bestow curse and touch with vision of madness you can't be stopped as long as you go first.
Just asked about the inquisitor, he will be ranged type, as expected. Thus a secondary melee frontliner would be preferable. Arcanist is going to be fairly generic from the sounds of it. Blasting is an attractive option to me for the oddball factor, tho I still like the idea of supporting. Sarenrae would make the idea of hanging out with evil PCS in an effort to redeem them suitable RP wise, too
I'd rather avoid going for save or die/suck variants, though debuffing is a valid choice. I'm playing with the group for the first time, so I don't want overly cheesy options. Regardless, a lot of good suggestions already, keep em coming!
You could make a really powerful hybrid battle/caster Dex-to-damage Cleric with those stats. With 21+2 starting DEX, attack, damage and AC shouldn't be a problem at all. You could even do the Monk1/Cleric thing where you take Dervish Dance and then use Crusader's Flurry to flurry your Dervish Dance scimitar, and you add your WIS to your DEX AC.
Is the inquisitor melee or ranged? If ranged, you should definitely go for a melee build. If the Inquisitor is melee, however...
How about a pure support/caster cleric? Ecclesitheurge of Sarenrae. Fire as primary domain for some blasts, Heroism-Domain for nice support spells (Heroism, Bless Weapon) and Healing (or maybe Restoration or Medicine) as domainpower-only domain for auto empowered heaing spells.
that with 1 level of monk for AC ....
or trade the healing for feather for super animal bodygaurd (i love Ape with a long spear).
You could make a really powerful hybrid battle/caster Dex-to-damage Cleric with those stats. With 21+2 starting DEX, attack, damage and AC shouldn't be a problem at all. You could even do the Monk1/Cleric thing where you take Dervish Dance and then use Crusader's Flurry to flurry your Dervish Dance scimitar, and you add your WIS to your DEX AC.
Now that is a Very interesting build for melee! I guess I'll have you swift towards Law on my character ingame. The question is, chained or unchained monk? Archetypes for cleric/monk? And since weapon focus needs bab +1, I can't get it on level 1. Otherwise, that AC would make me annamme amazing tank for the group!
You could make a really powerful hybrid battle/caster Dex-to-damage Cleric with those stats. With 21+2 starting DEX, attack, damage and AC shouldn't be a problem at all. You could even do the Monk1/Cleric thing where you take Dervish Dance and then use Crusader's Flurry to flurry your Dervish Dance scimitar, and you add your WIS to your DEX AC.
Now that is a Very interesting build for melee! I guess I'll have you swift towards Law on my character ingame. The question is, chained or unchained monk? Archetypes for cleric/monk? And since weapon focus needs bab +1, I can't get it on level 1. Otherwise, that AC would make me annamme amazing tank for the group!
The Martial Artist Archetype doesn't have an alignment restriction, but Unchained Monk is probably the better 1-level dip (except for Will saves, but those aren't a problem here). For Cleric Archetypes, Separatist is pretty interesting - you get to pick a Domain that your deity doesn't normally have, so even though you would need to worship a scimitar deity (probably Sarenrae), you would be able to cherry-pick a Domain like Travel or Deception or whatever else, probably along with Sarenrae's Heroism. You don't get free scimitar proficiency with Separatist... but then, you can use the Half-Elf Ancestral Arms racial to grab it for free anyhow.
The feats are kind of annoying unless you're allowed to use the Retraining rules; otherwise, you have to wait until level 7 to take a level of Monk and Crusader's Flurry. If you could start with a level of Unchained Monk it would work out better, but oh well.
Fortunately retraining is an option for us, thus I have the two feats at lvl 1, with weapon finesse and toughness for 1st level survival to be retrained, or something else equally interesting.. Thus Dex/Wis/Con for the high stats. 10 int probably so if I picm trap finder trait, I'll probably need all of the 4 skill points I'm getting (at least background skills helps with perform!)
Also, I see despite trying to be careful waiting on an autocorrecting phone, night time writing slips some weird words in...
As for separatist, I think I'll keep the sarenrae's regular domains. I like the idea of medicine subdomain (really feels like a doctor there!), so heroism and medicine are my probably choices. Travel and deception are strong certainly, but I think I'll can ease up on optimizing side there if everything else clicks into place :).
Thus, the plan at moment is, Sarenraen Cleric, 23 dex, 18 Wis, 16 con, either 10 int or str, rest 9. Feats are Weapon Finesse, bonus filler feat to retrain at second level, them dervish dance. I have 3 traits, with trap finder being a likely choice, rest either magical knack to keep multiclasse from damaging CL too much. Still unsure what levels 2 and 3 will be, and how I fight till I have Dervish Dance, but at least Monk seems Juicy for that AC bonus.. With retraining an option, any other particular tricks to get dervish dancing online by lvl 3? Thanks for the tips so far!!
Honestly, I've never been a huge fan of Dervish Dance, especially for a Cleric that won't have a lot of dex-based skills to go with and considering that your Skald will be boosting strength. If I were you, I'd go for a reach cleric, someone who can back up your Skald on the front lines while keeping enemies away from your squishy & caster (by virtue of killing them first).
Looks like Emerald Spire is a superdungeon, so I'm drawn toward a deity like Cayden Cailean, who would totally send his clerics into danger for sweet loot and epic tales of glory.
21 Str, 18 Wis, 16 Dex will make you a monster in combat. Go with Toughness and Combat Reflexes at 1st, Power Attack at 3rd, and whatever feats you want thereafter since you'll be pretty badass from that. Throw in a few divine buffs and you'll be kicking ass in no time. Having low Con and Cha is unfortunate, but Toughness will help, and you'll have extra spells to turn into healing since you'll mostly be whacking things with your actions.
The skald is interested in spell warrior for his obligatory skald level before barbarian, but str build is certainly another considerable option. Bonus points on Cayden, lots of choices.
I agree that going dex is not optimal at all. Spells are your biggest strength with Sarenrea so I would suggest building around that. The point made about a reach clerics advantages are valid. Blasting has much more power to give you than dervish does.
I agree that going dex is not optimal at all. Spells are your biggest strength with Sarenrea so I would suggest building around that. The point made about a reach clerics advantages are valid. Blasting has much more power to give you than dervish does.
With a reach cleric, summoning also becomes a good option.
I agree that going dex is not optimal at all. Spells are your biggest strength with Sarenrea so I would suggest building around that. The point made about a reach clerics advantages are valid. Blasting has much more power to give you than dervish does.
With a reach cleric, summoning also becomes a good option.
Very true. And the beautiful thing about summoning is that it doesn't require any feats to make it good, just better.
With a starting DEX of 23, typical Cleric buffs, and Crusader's Flurry, an Unchained Monk 1/ Cleric using Divine Favor/Power and Heroism (Sarenrae) is going to dish out multiple extremely accurate attacks that each do very solid damage. Dervish Dance has it's limitations, but with those stats and a bonus attack/round it has the potential to be very dangerous.
There are, of course, other options; you could also do a Cleric/Monk1 melee with STR/WIS and rely on high WIS, free Monk Dodge and other Cleric/Monk bonuses for defense. Something like:
The Hand of Vengeance
Half-Elf (Ancestral Arms): 18/20STR, 9DEX, 16CON, 10INT, 21WIS, 9CHA
Unchained Monk 1/ Separatist Cleric of Ragathiel
Domains: Anger Inquisition, (Separatist) Fire/Ash
With very high STR and Ragathiel granting Rage by level 7, you can Power Attack flurry a Furious bastard sword in two hands for brutal damage when attacking on your turn, then switch grip to defend with high WIS and the Crane chain (and make any AoO's with one hand). The damage you can do with high strength, Cleric buffing, Rage, Power Attack, and two-handed Unchained Flurry of Blows is pretty extreme, and accuracy is powerful enough that taking an attack penalty to grab a huge +8 chunk of AC isn't a problem.
Fire/Ash grants fire spells for blasting fun, though there are endless other possibilities with Separatist - Heroism, Revelry, Deception, Defense, Travel, etc.
Edit: It may be worth noting that with retraining rules available, the Travel Domain can grant a Cleric access to Dimensional Dervish pretty early on...
I rather be evangelist with channeled smite and guided hand .
All out wisdom, than dex. 1 lvl of monk and ac is decent .
Yes , it's less damage , but great accuracy , and high caster fallback
There are even plenty of builds that can put a one-level Cleric dip or partial Cleric levels to good use, so the options really are pretty endless. I mean, an Unchained Rogue 3/ Cleric build can dual wield with DEX and still have pretty good spellcasting in the long run.
You can also go STR/DEX/WIS with the racial added to CON for passable HP, and have a really brutal dual-wielding Cleric. Like an Evangelist of Pharasma wielding two falcatas with Effortless Lace. Nothing like chanting a death-deity sermon while carving-up opposition with a pair of ridiculously-mean-criticals swords.
If dual wielding was of interest you being a half elf is interesting. Grab two wakizashi with your exotic weapon option and you can go to town with crit fishing and destruction domain.
Next, you consider which type of cleric you want to play and which deity is appropriate for that character: a support cleric may find Benorus, Bharnarol, Brigh, Nethys, or Ng as suitable choices, depending on the focus (underground exploration, alchemy/constructs, constructs/technology, magic, planar travel); a blaster cleric is very appropriate for Nethys (possibly with the Arcane Training alternate racial trait in wizard and the Magic domain, or multiclassing to wizard/mystic theurge); summoner cleric works with pretty much any deity; for a frontliner combat cleric, you can go with Desna and the Starry Grace feat to get Dex to damage with starknives (with a little switch-hitting in throwing using Startoss Style and Ricochet Toss) or you could go with with Soralyon, put the 21 in Str, and use a heavy pick with both hands (or go with Yamatsumi, take the Ancestral Arms alternate racial trait to pick up proficiency in the nodachi, and fight with nodachi or tetsubo as a Str frontliner/blaster). Any melee frontliner may want to pick up the War Blessing feat.
Personally, I'd probably go with the cleric of Yamatsumi frontliner/blaster (but I like having multiple options):
21 Str, 10 Dex, 18 Con (+2 race), 9 Int, 18 Wis, 9 Cha
Domains: Fire, Strength/Fist
Starting Gear: Four-mirror Armor, Sling, Nodachi, Tetsubo, Dagger, Wooden Holy Symbol, 12 gp other equipment
Lots of good suggestions, and truly a tough pick ahead. I've taken a liking to the reach cleric. Nothing says I can't use that +2 on poorly rolled stat to boost survival, and it'd fill an important role, too. Str build is a thing, and Bladed Brush feat would add interesting possibilities, tho Shelyn doesn't have heroism domain.. Evangelist is something I've was thinking of adding to the mix, but that needs decent charisma if I recall correctly.
As for dark vision, well... It would need me to be a half-drow.. Good one at that, and just steps away from being a Sarenraen Cleric dualwielding scimitars ;). But in all fairness, I guess it would partially explain CE dwarf's affection for my character, and I could spin a passable backstory, say, being a quarter drow or what not.
Deities are a tricky one, as my character does need a reason to delve into the depths, even with such a ragtag group short of dysfunctional, perhaps something like seeking a long lost relic, or a rare medicine/miracle cure for someone. The more common deities may be preferable, not sure about tian based ones. But with interesting enough a tale...
To sum up the current plan, I really like the reach cleric, and heroism domain power is pretty cool for a supporting cleric. Evangelist would be cool, but I don't know if that can be fitted in as neatly. Str build would please my inner loot manager (all that equipment WILL weigh you down...), but at dex reach build, if actually doable at early level, might be in the cards. I'm also likely to be a trap disarmer, so is trap finder enough, or would I need to dip?
Edit: just looked at Revelry Subdomain. Good Hope at lvl 3 on party who won't have it? Yes please!! Guess that's a domain I'm taking! And who happens to have that domain AND a slew of other good ones? Desna... I can either go crazy charisma cleric with the divine fighting technique of Desna o.o
As long as you have a source of Panache you can turn all kinds of one-handed weapons into reach weapons easily - taking the Amateur Swashbuckler or Amateur Gunslinger feats will grant a Panache pool, as will taking a level of Swashbuckler. You could even do two-weapon reach by wielding something like a rapier-and-cestus or rapier-and-spiked-light-shield combo, where you're holding the Blue Scarf in your offhand while attacking with it. Using Revelry Domain and Divine Favor (and maybe Evangelist) with a reach-sword-and-shield combo would be pretty devastating with all that bonus damage on two weapons.
