May be playing a ranged cleric with the Travel and Liberation domain. Was hoping I could get some advice on what should be my preferred weapon of choice. Hopefully I won't need a feat to become proficient in it
Well....... You probably will need a feat costing weapon as simple weapons suck (for range). Unless you are playing an elf, or somehow worshiping erastil, you will need to pick up weapon proficiency longbow. You need a decent bow to do range and since you need to spend the feat, you might as well take the best longbow.
However if your GM will allow it take the exotic weapon proficiency orc hornbow, you are away to the races! Less range more damage, and otherwise functions as a normal longbow.
This is a reason why people rarely make ranged clerics. Your levels will look like this:
1 Weapon proficiency orc horn bow
3 Point blank shot
5 Precise shot
7 Rapid shot
9 Many shot
11 deadly aim.
or
7 something
9 vital strike
...
15 improved vital strike
This is something you would do with the hornbow
If you happen to be human everything after level 1 can be taken 2 levels earlier.
I would strongly advise against this, for two very good reasons.
First it takes all your feats, leaving nothing for spell casting, which is the real reason to be a cleric.
Second It makes you insanely MAD. You will need a good dex, a decent strength and con, a good wisdom, a decent charisma if you want channel energy to be meaningful at all, and some int if you want more than one skill per level.
In other words you have no stat that you can really ignore.
I would recommend reconsidering this course of action.
Bow is the best for ranged characters; though specific builds can make other options shine. Are you willing to dip into other classes or would you prefer to go with full spell progression by remaining with Cleric? If you remain with Cleric, Longbow is probably your best option; an Elf gets free proficiency or a half elf with the Ancestral weapons racial ability. Pick up a Composite Longbow as soon as you can and you are good to go. There are a ton of guides out there on how to build ranged characters (what feats to pick, etc.) just follow them.
If you don't want to play Elf or Half Elf, go for Human for the extra Feat; ranged classes are fairly feat intensive so an extra one is always useful.
Oh, normally are clerics melee? Should I go melee cleric then? Sounds like archer cleric is kind of weak.
Oh, normally are clerics melee? Should I go melee cleric then? Sounds like archer cleric is kind of weak.
It's not weak, just impractical.
For a melee cleric I with your domains (which don't directly contribute to damage dealing) I would first ask if you have the option of channeling negative energy.
There are positives and negatives to negative energy. The negative is your spontaneous casting becomes near useless, and you need to prepare cures, and finally you must have a decent charisma.
The advantage is you can take channel smite which takes a useless (somewhat) ability and turns it into a less powerful, but much much more useful one.
Next you need to decide if you will be reach or not. Generally speaking reach is better, but there are advantages to both, such as being able to wield a shield (you should always use a light shield if you decide to use one at all, trust me).
Finally you need to decide your feats, this is simpler if you are melee than ranged.
If you are sword and board
1 channel smite
3 power attack
5 sacred summons
if you are reach
1 combat reflexes
3 channel smite
5 power attack
7 sacred summons
Since you aren't pure caster you should have a middling high wisdom (say 16) a medium charisma ~14, at least 16 str, 12-14 dex if you are reach (you need more later), 10 if not, at least 14 con, and however much int you can afford after all that.
Desna worshipper? If so, you could try using Desna's Shooting Star.
Desna worshipper? If so, you could try using Desna's Shooting Star.
Indeed I am, but the damage isnt very Much it seems