Prepared Casters

[ElementalofCuteness]

I am looking to play a cleric and I need advice on how to prepare a spell-list. How would you go about preparing a spell-list for a cleric, how do you play a prepared caster vs a spontaneous caster?

[Dragonhearthx]

As a cleric, you have continous access to your spell list.
During your daily preparations, you choose which spells you want to cast.

Here's how to remember how it works. Each spell you choose to can only be cast once. In order to cast a spell multiple times you must choose it multiple times.

At level one you have 2 spell slots. If you want to cast "admonishing ray" twice you have to put that spell in both slots. This does mean however, that you cannot cast any other spell for the day.

Think of your spell slots like cartridges and bullets. You make each bullet during your daily preparations and you choose what kind of bullet it is. Once you fire the bullet, it is gone and you are left with an empty unuseable cartridge.

[Lia Wynn]

Also, a lot can depend on the theme of your character and what you expect to run into. Spells that might be good if you are facing undead might not be as good if you were fighting giants.

The advantage of a prepared caster is that you can customize your loadout each day. This is very useful, especially if you run into an encounter that forces the group to retreat. When you return, you can have a spell load out set up specifically for that encounter.

[SuperBidi]

Preparing a spell list on a prepared caster is definitely a tough exercise. In my opinion, you'll have very different answers to your question, many being contradictory.

When I prepare the spell list of my prepared casters, I tend to stick to the most usable and efficient spells. As I can't switch spell on the fly like a Spontaneous caster does I don't take any spell that may not be cast during the day, using scrolls if necessary to cover niche and less niche cases (I have many of them on my prepared casters, more than on my Spontaneous casters).
At low level, I often end up with a single spell prepared all over my slots. At higher levels there are more choices but I still stick to a very limited number of spells in multiple slots. Unlike many advice you'll find all around, I don't care of covering all defenses nor having multiple types of spells. It's all about efficiency and, most of the time, specialization.

I do the complete opposite on my spontaneous casters who are all about versatility (but still end up using the same spells again and again, because that's what they do well).

[shroudb]

I do the opposite.

I tend to prepare wide. Although I still don't prepare "reactive" spells (like restoration and etc) (that's why I love feats in the cleric that allows font to deal with conditions).

But I like the flexibility of having different tools for every occasion, maximizing my chances of having a "silver bullet" prepared.

That does mean though, at the end of the day, that my chances of having suboptimal spells left as well are a bit higher.