I consider myself pretty "well-read" regarding Pathfinder, but inexperienced when it comes to play. I could use some advice regarding a herald caller cleric I'm creating, including some commentary regarding if the build is likely to work well with the rest of my party members.
Brief Background
I'm in a Serpent's Skull campaign that is at the very end of Book 2. The party is level 7. The only really experienced player in the group is the Urban Skald (see below). Unfortunately, we had a near-TPK on what I assume is the book's BBEG and my previous character (a druid) has died. While the character could possibly be raised, I've chosen to change to a new character for a few reasons that I won't bore you with going into.
The other existing party members are:
Gunslinger 7 (Musket Master) - Currently the only free and living member of the party. Escaped the battle at the very end and is finding help to mount a rescue (the help will include my new character)
Grippli Mouser Swash 1/Vexing Dodger Rogue 6 (essentially this, but less tanky and without monk levels) - Alive, but in need of rescue. A semi-frontline that functions by climbing medium+ size enemies and debuffing their attack bonus (and other things), but needs flanks and help when facing multiple enemies.
Urban Skald 7 - Unconcious and tied up, but stabilized. Typically uses Controlled Inspired Rage to buff Dex (most likely eventually providing +6 DEX), with Reckless Abandon and Strength Surge as current rage powers. Occasionally enters melee, but is squishy.
Build Idea
Up until very recently, I've been definitely planning to include reach tactics in the build (however, see below section regarding some possible changes I'm considering). Here's what I was thinking so far:
NG human herald caller cleric of Sarenrae (Heroism domain)
20 Point buy: 14/14/14/10/14+2/10
1H: Combat Reflexes
1: Improved Initiative
3: Power Attack
4: Augment Summons (B)
5: Summon Good Monster
7: Sacred Summons
8: Superior Summons (B)
9: Quicken Spell? Reach Spell?
11: Divine Interference
After 11, I'm not sure what to get. Perhaps 2 other metamagic feats and Spell Perfection for something like Wall of Stone?
Build Commentary
A cleric is appealing for a few reasons. Since our party is somewhat inexperienced, we seem to need a bit more healing than is "optimal", and having channeling (for after combat) and spontaneous healing (for dire emergencies) seems like it could help. Without going into possible spoilers, our ability to shop in a timely manner has been somewhat limited so far in this AP, so there has been concerns about running out of charges on our wands of CLW. Based on what we've encountered so far, the cleric buffs seem likely to be more useful than most of the druid spells I was able to contribute as well.
Aside from the bonus feats, Herald Caller is appealing due to the 4 skills/level and spontaneous summon monster. Sacred Summons is appealing because I can quickly summon creatures as flank buddies and help on the front line. My standard Sacred Summon options are Foo Dog (SM3), Foo Lion (SM4), and the various Devas at SM7-9. There's also 1-2 agathions that wouldn't typically be used in combat. I realize that the Foo creatures might not stay useful for as long as Lantern Archons if I chose a LG diety, but for RP purposes I prefer for this character to be NG (which also allows me to summon CG creatures normally, should I need to). Note that I considered Monster Tactician Inquisitor as well, but it didn't seem to have the healing/support capability that I was looking for.
I plan to primarily focus on summoning, buffs, recovery, and reach tactics. However, since I am starting at level 7 and anticipate going up to level 17, I'm not entirely sold on the standard reach cleric advice to pump STR and get just enough WIS to cast my highest level spells (ie. start with 14 WIS and eventually get a +6 headband). Assuming eventually a +6 WIS headband, the difference between 20 and 26 WIS is an extra 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 6th, 7th, and 8th level spell per day. Is a +3 to attack and ~+4 damage worth giving up those bonus spells? Not to mention that with higher WIS I'd have the option of casting spells with saves, if I chose.
Possible Changes
I asked for feedback on another site, and based on some of the suggestions there am considering some changes.
Since I'm starting at level 7 and (hopefully) going to 17, I'm a little less certain if investing feats in reach tactics is worthwhile compared to focusing more on summoning and casting. At higher levels, I'll need to buff my attacks in order to keep up with the scaling ACs, and except for a few long-lasting ones, they will take up spells and actions that could be used for summoning and other spells during combat. Aura of Heroism will help, but having to use Divine Favor constantly would delay summons, group buffs, or possibly control spells. Also, it's my understanding that summoning potency starts to taper after around level 11. It seems likely that I'll want to ensure that my caster ability remains solid long-term, since both reach attacks and summons start to wane.
If I decide to focus less on reach tactics, I'd likely change my starting attributes to something like 10/14/14/10/16+2/10, and replace Combat Reflexes and Power Attack with two other feats.
Summon Spirit Guardian looks pretty cool, especially from a flavor standpoint. A Silvanshee would work with Sacred Summons too. Would definitely be more of a utility or SLA option though, but would scale with level for a single feat. Also, could possibly work with Alter Summon Monster if my GM doesn't disallow it (at minutes/level instead of hours/level, so a little more reasonable). :p
Proxy Summoning was another possible recommendation for delivering touch spells and sharing personal spells with my summon, but I'm honestly not certain how the "share spells" part of that feat is supposed to work. It reads: "Once the spell is cast, you and any creature you summon gain the share spells ability."
Is "the spell" referring to a touch spell or a summoning spell? Based on the antecedent in the previous sentence, it seems like it's referring to the touch spell. If it's the touch spell, the "any creature you summon" part seems confusingly broad when it could have said "the summoned creature carrying the touch spell's charge" or something like that. Because of this, it seems a little vague in terms of if the share spells ability affects just a summon that has carried a touch spell's charge, all existing summons once you've used a touch spell on one of them, or just all summons created via a summoning spell in general. I suspect I'd have to confirm with my GM how they'll interpret the feat if I want to use it. ;P
My other concern is that Heroism domain aura seems great for summons and party buffing, but a few of the bonus spells are definitely battle-cleric oriented (Bless Weapon, Righteous Might, and Holy Sword) and cannot be spontaneously converted. Would you consider a different domain if I didn't invest in reach tactics? Some of these buffs I might be able to use on summons using Proxy Summons, but whether or not it's worth going through hoops to do so depends I think on GM interpretation.
Thank you for any advice!
When I was reading your party make up I immediately thought "Those guys really need a summoner!," so great minds think alike.
The archetype Herald Caller is exactly what you want, but you already knew that. It seems you've thought this through pretty thoroughly; the restrictions that your deity choice places on your summons can be dire but you seem to have it all planned out.
I'm not an expert on reach Clerics, but I thought combat reflexes was a near-required feat to pull it off. You mention it in mid-post but don't have it on your primary feat tree, so I'm a little confused.
I'm not a pro at character creation, so in answer to your mechanical questions, I'd say it depends on where you want this Cleric to go especially with the needs of your particular party involved. In other words there's no one or right answer that screams out.
Thanks! It's good to hear that I'm most likely on the right track.
EpicFail wrote: I'm not an expert on reach Clerics, but I thought combat reflexes was a near-required feat to pull it off. You mention it in mid-post but don't have it on your primary feat tree, so I'm a little confused. Sorry for any confusion there, when I listed it as "1H" I meant to indicate it was my 1st level human bonus feat. I'll see if I can edit the original post to make that clearer!
Edit: Too late to change my original post. At well.
Ohhh. My bad, though. It's really clear as day so oops on my part.
For feats to consider, you might want to read this Paizo advice thread about it.
The Silvanshee is a good choice for Spirit Guardian, but I think the Cassisian is generally superior. Its breath attack scales with Spirit Guardian and its small size lets it set up flanking.
Personally, I think you're focusing a little too much on combat feats that you won't get to use a lot, especially since you are starting at level 7, which is when the spellcasting has really kicked in. I'd recommend feats like Summon Good Monster and Evolved Summon Monster. Versatile Summon Monster can also be good for odd encounters, but by level 7 it's not as necessary.
In truth, the only thing that's required for a reach cleric is a reach weapon. Everything else just makes it a little better. But by level 7 the reach won't get to be used nearly as much since many of your melee threats will have their own reach.
I'm going to go a bit further and say that you need to sort out your ability stats!
Looking at your party, not only is a summon specialist useful but actually a solid spellcaster as well.
What with your bonus feats, SGM, SS and Heroism subdomain you are a very capable summoner but summoning does fade in power as you level up and you will want to still be a capable divine spellcaster.
I would change your stat distribution to that of a pure caster to get your DC and bonus spells maxed out. You don't need Combat reflexes or Power attack. A crafting feat and something more useful regarding your spells would be more appropriate IMO.
A crafty idea as a Sarenrae herald caller, is to take your domain as Fire, to get a few blasty spells and then use an Icon of Aspects to swap out Fire's fairly bad powers with that of Glory/Heroism, since Glory/Heroism spells aren't that great.
You'll find your group does better in the skald takes lesser celestial totem and path of glory. Between that and your channels, everyone will be a lot less squishy.
Thanks for all the advice! Definitely sounds like I should go with some of the changes I was considering, and some of the other ideas here.
Melkiador wrote: The Silvanshee is a good choice for Spirit Guardian, but I think the Cassisian is generally superior. Its breath attack scales with Spirit Guardian and its small size lets it set up flanking. Hmm, that's definitely something I'll have to consider. Sounds like the Cassisian might be better in combat. I had mainly been looking at the Silvanshee for its utility, since it has nice stealth/gaseous form, Speak with Animals (in a jungle campaign), and Cat's Luck (which starts as a +5 luck bonus to all saves, grows to +8, and is castable as a 10 minute buff on an ally once per day). I'd probably give it a few of the evocation SLAs and have it fly around invisible in combat if I used it that way.
Melkiador wrote: In truth, the only thing that's required for a reach cleric is a reach weapon. Everything else just makes it a little better. But by level 7 the reach won't get to be used nearly as much since many of your melee threats will have their own reach. Fair enough. Would you recommend keeping a reach weapon, or possibly swapping to something like scimitar + shield for the AC boost? Bonus would be that's a bit more thematic for a cleric of Sarenrae.
doc roc wrote: A crafty idea as a Sarenrae herald caller, is to take your domain as Fire, to get a few blasty spells and then use an Icon of Aspects to swap out Fire's fairly bad powers with that of Glory/Heroism, since Glory/Heroism spells aren't that great. I hadn't seen that item before, so thanks for the recommendation! Also, I only just realized that I didn't have to memorize each Domain spell, but could memorize multiple of a lower one. Interestingly enough, it seems like the Fire domain has crappy 7th and 9th level spells, which would line up perfectly with a Quickened Fireball and a Quickened Persistent Fireball, which were two metamagic feats I was considering. Speaking of which...
doc roc wrote: I would change your stat distribution to that of a pure caster to get your DC and bonus spells maxed out. You don't need Combat reflexes or Power attack. A crafting feat and something more useful regarding your spells would be more appropriate IMO. I'm in agreement on this now, but I'm a little uncertain which casting feats would be most useful for higher levels.
Here's what I'm thinking now, build-wise:
NG human herald caller cleric of Sarenrae (Fire domain, but get Heroism powers from Icon of Aspects)
20 Point buy: 10/14/14/10/16+2/10 or 8/14/14/10/16+2/12
Traits: Armor Expert, ??? (Magical Lineage? Reactionary? Birthmark? A class skill trait?)
1H: Summon Good Monster
1: Improved Initiative
3: Sacred Summons
4: Augment Summons (B)
5: Summon Guardian Spirit
7: ???
8: Superior Summons (B)
9: Reach Spell?
11: Divine Interference
13: Quicken Spell?
15: Persistent Spell?
17: Spell Perfection?
I'm a little hesitant to dump STR to 8, since I'll still be wearing medium armor and want to avoid encumbrance.
As far as traits, I like Armor Expert so I can wear Mithril Breastplate without penalty. Then again, if I'm not attacking that might not be necessary. For my other trait, I'm not sure which to go with now. I had originally been looking at Fate's Favored to benefit from Divine Power, etc. but those spells will likely get used less on a pure caster. Suggestions?
As far as feats, I'm thinking it's best not to focus too heavily on evocation since that's only part of my focus (since I'm not a Theologian), so I opted for some metamagic instead of Spell Focus. Do these metamagic feats seem pretty good? What about Spell Penetration/Greater Spell Penetration?
Also, as far as crafting feats go, I suspect I'd get the most value from Craft Wondrous Item, but I'm also considered Scribe Scroll since we so far have had limited shopping access, and that'd help keep me stocked with all those situational Cleric scrolls.
Thanks again for the suggestions so far!
Specifically about max carry capacity, I would say getting muleback cords and masterwork backpack and adding the Burdenless ability to the breastplate. For the saving throws just in case, there's the rings of resistance now
You don't need medium armour - you're a caster so light armour is fine, and the difference of 2 AC will quickly become irrelevant as you level.
Keeping your 30 ft movement is v.useful.
I'm not convinced by the worth of SGS either as a feat. Stick to normal summoning.
Craft wondrous is a great feat as I'm guessing no one else has it?
You need your WIS at 20. Str at 8 is not a problem, especially if you only have light armour.
Herald caller is a great opportunity to have fun with skills (something that clerics rarely get the opportunity to do!), so upping INT a bit at the expense of CON or DEX can be good.
Wisdom in the flesh is an excellent trait for a cleric looking for fun.... take it for stealth and get an instant +9 from 1st level! You can now do part time rogue stuff with your approximate +17 stealth at 7th level (assuming a +4 WIS headband)..... or +22 stealth if you've made yourself a Cloak of Elvenkind.
There are some useful MM reducing traits about as well, so spending a feat on extra traits can be good.
There are two usual benefits to summon guardian spirit. The first is simply familiarity. It is good to know what your creature can do quickly and most players can’t memorize the abilities of all of the potential summoned creatures. The second is that it lasts for minutes per level instead of rounds per level, which is kind of huge if you don’t have that ability otherwise.
And then as a cleric you have its big benefit from stacking with sacred summons, allowing you to have a good summon for every spell level. A summon that you can cast as a standard action and have last for minutes per level. Sure, there may be times where you’d want something else bad enough to spend a round and only have it last for rounds per level, but you can still do that too. The guardian spirit is just a strong option to have.
For some, the downside of the guardian spirit will be statting it up in the first place. It's not always easy to reverse engineer a monster so you can add stats and hit dice to it. Some of the skill bonuses in particular don't always make sense, leaving you wondering if a monster has a hidden racial +1 to a skill.
If you do stick with the Silvanshee for your guardian spirit, then you might consider just keeping it as a 3rd level spell. It’s abilities as a scout don’t improve as much from increased levels, and it’s not very suited to combat.
doc roc wrote: You don't need medium armour - you're a caster so light armour is fine, and the difference of 2 AC will quickly become irrelevant as you level. Fair enough. If I really want to, I can get Mithral Kikko armor for a 1 AC difference too without having to have Armor Expert.
doc roc wrote: Craft wondrous is a great feat as I'm guessing no one else has it? Correct. We've had some downtime so far, but it's mainly been because of travel. I believe we have some travel to go, but I'm not sure if we'll continue having long periods between encounters.
doc roc wrote: Wisdom in the flesh is an excellent trait for a cleric looking for fun... That does sound like a fun feat! Sadly, it's Irori only. :(
doc roc wrote: There are some useful MM reducing traits about as well, so spending a feat on extra traits can be good. Indeed, though right now I'm not 100% certain which spell would be best to use it for.
Melkiador wrote: For some, the downside of the guardian spirit will be statting it up in the first place. It's not always easy to reverse engineer a monster so you can add stats and hit dice to it. Some of the skill bonuses in particular don't always make sense, leaving you wondering if a monster has a hidden racial +1 to a skill. Indeed. Thankfully, our group has software available to use that helps with this, though it does have the occasional bug we need to manually fix.
Melkiador wrote: If you do stick with the Silvanshee for your guardian spirit, then you might consider just keeping it as a 3rd level spell. It’s abilities as a scout don’t improve as much from increased levels, and it’s not very suited to combat. I was considering eventually keeping it as a 4th level spell, since that's when it gets Fated Guardian (for when we really need the Gunslinger not to misfire :p) and could pick up Invisibility. If my GM allows me to use Alter Summon Monster, I might keep SGS maxed though regardless of which I choose, because who doesn't like Devas that stick around for 13-17+ minutes and can be swapped as needed?
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