Looking for Cleric Options [Archive] - Wizards Community

Looking for Cleric Options [Archive] - Wizards Community

Post/Author/DateTime Post
Dahil
05-08-06, 02:12 AM Greetings All,

I am hoping that i can enlist your help in tracking down some new material. In my group, i always seem to end up playing the cleric (sometimes by choice, sometimes not so much). After a while, i am starting to search for cleric variants. Literally, anything and everything that you can use to make a cleric different than the PH version. Reasonable house-rules, variant options, racial substitution levels, anything! I don't have access to a lot of books right now, but if you mention something that sounds interesting, i'll buy the book for it. (Planning on buying PHII and UA tomorrow, if i can). If you can think of anything that would help to customize a cleric, i would greatly appreciate the help.

Things I am already aware of:
-Cloistered Cleric from UA (Much love, awesome concept)
-Favored Soul/archivist (Cool, but not quite what i want)
-Raptorian racial substitution level (Nice mechanics, dislike the race)
-Dwarf racial substitution level (Horrible options. *Shudders*)
-Heard about a PHII option to spontaneously cast domain spells instead of Cures ( :D , plain and simple)
-Various prestige classes (though it seems there are very few cleric PrCs)

Things I have no access to (yet):
-Any of the 'Heros of...' books
-Dragon magazine
Fireclave
05-08-06, 03:15 AM Your simplest option would be to just multiclass. A cleric/rogue and cleric/fighter builds can synergize nicely. And you can get really wild with magic by taking the mystic thurge prestige class.

Of course, if you're always stuck playing a cleric because your party needs a healer, just play a different class that can do healing. Druid's is high on that list, but you could also make decent healers with paladins, bards, and artificiers (Ebberon campaign setting).

But if you prefer to stay cleric, I suggest paging through the Complete Divine for prestige classes, feats, etc. The like the look of the divine fist (monk/cleric prestige class), but I'll let someone more knowledgable elaborate more on that particular book's content.
Dahil
05-08-06, 01:57 PM Thanks for the reply! I actually have multiclassed before, but it's unfortunately true that giving up caster levels is almost never a good idea. I try to stay away from that (like the plague). However, the Thurge does look like fun, and i'll probably play one someday (though with the emphasis on the arcane half).

That said, yeah, i usually have to be the healer. I'm the only one that "knows how to play a cleric well" they tell me. I've tried the druid before, but it never happened to be in a campaign that lasted more than a level or two.

As for Complete Divine, I own it. My friend Matt is borrowing it, so i can't read it right now. Still it has lots of good stuff. Thanks for the suggestion. What i'm looking for is less feat-prestige class type stuff, and more like racial substitution levels-alternative rules/class abilities. Ways to make a cleric radically different.
Platonix
05-08-06, 03:47 PM Have you ever tried the CodZilla combo? Pick up the feats Extra Turning, Extend Spell, Persistant Spell and Divine Metamagic (Persistant). In the morning, when you prepare your spells, you can spend seven uses of turn undead and cast the fourth-level spell Divine Power to give yourself a Fighter's BAB, a +6 bonus to strength and the equivalent of the Improved Toughness feat...all day long. When battle starts, cast the fifth-level spell Righteous Might on your first round and your melee ability gets just plain ridiculous (I don't advise giving yourself Righteous Might all day long because that spell makes you twelve feet tall, which can be awkward.) This is still a straight PHB cleric, but if you've never tried playing this way it could give the class a completely different feel.
AvaronGansdell
05-08-06, 04:29 PM I personaly think clerics should spontainusly swap for there domain spells not Cure or inflict spells and I belive clerics should be able to blow turn undead attempts to heal. either something fixed like blow a turn attempt to lay your hand on someone and cure them of 1d6 points of damage per caster level +Charisma modifier.

to balance out the cure spells I suggest giveing them a range of short instead of touch. makeing it worth memorizeing them.
Findail
05-10-06, 08:15 AM If homebrew is acceptable, you could check out my Brahmin (http://boards1.wizards.com/showthread.php?t=553105) variant.

It should work in a typical non-Hindu world, if you can have intellectual theologian-types (prime casting attribute is Intelligence) rather than those who worship one specific deity in a pantheon as Clerics do.
JulesCARV
05-10-06, 08:31 AM I should note that the Divine Metamagic CoDzilla is not a PHB cleric, because the Divine Metamagic feat is from the Complete Divine, not anywhere in the core.

Anyway, the Miniatures Handbook healer is probably underpowered, but it would give a different feel.
Adam Smite
05-10-06, 10:46 AM One of the Dragon Magazines from this year has the Rage Cleric. I think they gave up domains, turning, or both, but they gain all of the Rage features of the Barbarian.
Ryuu_Tenshi
05-10-06, 10:48 AM I'm a huge fan of the spontaneous cleric variant from Unearthed Arcana. I really, really, REALLY hate Favoured Souls, since they're essentially "DIVINE SORCERERS OMGOMGOMG! WITH WINGZOR! TEHKEWLIEZLOL!" No flavour, pointless wings, just... blurgh.
My DM decided to try it out one day, and so I played one and I LOVED it.

Now, it's hard for me to remember -exactly- how it works in Unearthed Arcana, or how we run it (I have to look it up every time) but I'm pretty sure it runs like this:

You get the Sorcerer's number of spells known, but keep the Cleric's "spells per day". No longer can you just cast every damn spell on the Cleric list, you are now under the same restrictions as a sorcerer. However, you have fewer spells per day (if I'm remembering this right). To make up for this, you also automaticaly know the spells from your two domains and add those to your list. So you cast fewer times per day, but you do know a few more spells.

So, what does this do? It actually makes the cleric -less- powerful! However, it gives the cleric a far better flavor. Why the hell would all clerics be able to cast every single divine spell, ever, even if they get spells from their gods? Surely their deites wouldn't allow them to have certian spells. Thus, my idea is that their gods bless them with a certian selection of spells, and that's what they get. Then they get spell slots.
This whole setup makes for clerics who are vastly different from each other, especially since they can't just swap out for healing all the time now. I have an undead-hunting cleric who relies on wands for healing, because almost all of his spells are related to buffing, removing negative levels and disease, and making the lives of undead very unhappy. He's a damage machine, but not much of a healer. On the other hand, one of my friends is a cleric of Pelor, who took the Healing domain, meaning he "spontaenously" casts healing spells and is more like a normal cleric... but he can also spontaneously cast whatever else he has.

We run archivists in addition to these clerics, and NEVER favorued souls since the favoured soul is doubly redundant now (not to mention just plain silly)
Millenia
05-10-06, 07:09 PM ... I personally like Favored Souls myself, though I never played one. >.>

You might also want to try an Egoist coupled with a Sangehirn (found in the Third Eye article series on the site), but I suggest getting rid of the "you may only choose Sangerhirn powers" restriction.
Atirakis
05-12-06, 05:46 AM Be a Wizard/Cleric/Mystic Theurge and then take the feat that allows you to cast Divine spells as Arcane Spells (one of the completes I think, help me out guys) You now have an ungodly amount of healing per day, your PCs can thank me later.
AvaronGansdell
05-12-06, 07:25 AM Actualy the Arcane deciple feat out of compleat divine isent all that great it requires you have the same alignment as and worsihip a god that has healing as a domain (if you want healing) and you get to add healing domain spells to your list of spells knowable then you can learn them when you level up. after that you can only memorize one at each spell level 1st-9th and you still bace the spells off wisdom.

if you want ungodly amouts of healing and a twist try the psion(Egoist)/cleric/psyionic thurge. the class is somewhere on the site.

for roleplaying reasons take like the mind and healing domains. your character belives in the unity and power of the mind body and soul.

it grabs psyionc healing and magical healing plus with a few feat choices you can get energy misstles or other good psi powers too.
Greg K
05-12-06, 09:55 AM WOTC freelancer Ari Marmell, a.k.a Mouseferatu, has a small company called Lion's Den Press. One of his products is Classes of Legend: Priest of the Celestial Spheres. The product presents a replacement for the the phb cleric and is focused on making priests abilities and spell lists reflect the deity worshipped. While I haven't seen it (yet!), I have heard some good things over at ENWorld.

You can find more information here (http://www.lionsdenpress.com/)
Kradlo
05-12-06, 12:03 PM Under "other class variants" on page 58, Unearthed Arcana lists a variant cleric that gains smite evil and aura of courage in place of turning undead. Evil clerics gain smite good instead.

Since UA had variant paladins, I made a further variant of this, in which the aura of courage was for LG, LN, or NG clerics. A CG, CN, or NG cleric could gain the Aura of Resolve. A CE, CN, or NE cleric could gain Debilitating Aura. A LE, LN, or NE cleric could gain Aura of Despair.

Those clerics that could have more than one aura available had to choose one and stick with it, like a standard neutral cleric did when choosing to turn or rebuke undead.

I also allowed the cleric a choice to smite Law or smite Chaos, since my campaign had some Law vs. Chaos conflict.

It makes for a fairly militant cleric, which can be a fun variant.

Kradlo
Atirakis
05-12-06, 02:16 PM Could always do a Vow of Poverty Monk/Cleric get 9-10 levels in monk so that you have ki strike, improved evasion, fast movement +30' and slow fall and maybe the lawful Ki strike (you need level 10 for that) You will need good scores in Wis, Dex and Con and if you can get something with a bonus in Str it will help with the damage output. You can join the party later in levels and be a major impact on their offensive and healing capablities. And before anyone starts in with the you cant turn undead cause you cant own a holy symbol, VoP states that you can carry 1 simple weapon, well this one opts to carry just his gods holy symbol wich could be made out of ordinary wood or clay, thus making it worthless as anything other than a symbol of faith. If that doesnt satisfy your rules nit picking I dont know what can.

Post/Author/DateTime	Post
Dahil 05-08-06, 02:12 AM	Greetings All, I am hoping that i can enlist your help in tracking down some new material. In my group, i always seem to end up playing the cleric (sometimes by choice, sometimes not so much). After a while, i am starting to search for cleric variants. Literally, anything and everything that you can use to make a cleric different than the PH version. Reasonable house-rules, variant options, racial substitution levels, anything! I don't have access to a lot of books right now, but if you mention something that sounds interesting, i'll buy the book for it. (Planning on buying PHII and UA tomorrow, if i can). If you can think of anything that would help to customize a cleric, i would greatly appreciate the help. Things I am already aware of: -Cloistered Cleric from UA (Much love, awesome concept) -Favored Soul/archivist (Cool, but not quite what i want) -Raptorian racial substitution level (Nice mechanics, dislike the race) -Dwarf racial substitution level (Horrible options. Shudders) -Heard about a PHII option to spontaneously cast domain spells instead of Cures ( :D , plain and simple) -Various prestige classes (though it seems there are very few cleric PrCs) Things I have no access to (yet): -Any of the 'Heros of...' books -Dragon magazine
Fireclave 05-08-06, 03:15 AM	Your simplest option would be to just multiclass. A cleric/rogue and cleric/fighter builds can synergize nicely. And you can get really wild with magic by taking the mystic thurge prestige class. Of course, if you're always stuck playing a cleric because your party needs a healer, just play a different class that can do healing. Druid's is high on that list, but you could also make decent healers with paladins, bards, and artificiers (Ebberon campaign setting). But if you prefer to stay cleric, I suggest paging through the Complete Divine for prestige classes, feats, etc. The like the look of the divine fist (monk/cleric prestige class), but I'll let someone more knowledgable elaborate more on that particular book's content.
Dahil 05-08-06, 01:57 PM	Thanks for the reply! I actually have multiclassed before, but it's unfortunately true that giving up caster levels is almost never a good idea. I try to stay away from that (like the plague). However, the Thurge does look like fun, and i'll probably play one someday (though with the emphasis on the arcane half). That said, yeah, i usually have to be the healer. I'm the only one that "knows how to play a cleric well" they tell me. I've tried the druid before, but it never happened to be in a campaign that lasted more than a level or two. As for Complete Divine, I own it. My friend Matt is borrowing it, so i can't read it right now. Still it has lots of good stuff. Thanks for the suggestion. What i'm looking for is less feat-prestige class type stuff, and more like racial substitution levels-alternative rules/class abilities. Ways to make a cleric radically different.
Platonix 05-08-06, 03:47 PM	Have you ever tried the CodZilla combo? Pick up the feats Extra Turning, Extend Spell, Persistant Spell and Divine Metamagic (Persistant). In the morning, when you prepare your spells, you can spend seven uses of turn undead and cast the fourth-level spell Divine Power to give yourself a Fighter's BAB, a +6 bonus to strength and the equivalent of the Improved Toughness feat...all day long. When battle starts, cast the fifth-level spell Righteous Might on your first round and your melee ability gets just plain ridiculous (I don't advise giving yourself Righteous Might all day long because that spell makes you twelve feet tall, which can be awkward.) This is still a straight PHB cleric, but if you've never tried playing this way it could give the class a completely different feel.
AvaronGansdell 05-08-06, 04:29 PM	I personaly think clerics should spontainusly swap for there domain spells not Cure or inflict spells and I belive clerics should be able to blow turn undead attempts to heal. either something fixed like blow a turn attempt to lay your hand on someone and cure them of 1d6 points of damage per caster level +Charisma modifier. to balance out the cure spells I suggest giveing them a range of short instead of touch. makeing it worth memorizeing them.
Findail 05-10-06, 08:15 AM	If homebrew is acceptable, you could check out my Brahmin (http://boards1.wizards.com/showthread.php?t=553105) variant. It should work in a typical non-Hindu world, if you can have intellectual theologian-types (prime casting attribute is Intelligence) rather than those who worship one specific deity in a pantheon as Clerics do.
JulesCARV 05-10-06, 08:31 AM	I should note that the Divine Metamagic CoDzilla is not a PHB cleric, because the Divine Metamagic feat is from the Complete Divine, not anywhere in the core. Anyway, the Miniatures Handbook healer is probably underpowered, but it would give a different feel.
Adam Smite 05-10-06, 10:46 AM	One of the Dragon Magazines from this year has the Rage Cleric. I think they gave up domains, turning, or both, but they gain all of the Rage features of the Barbarian.
Ryuu_Tenshi 05-10-06, 10:48 AM	I'm a huge fan of the spontaneous cleric variant from Unearthed Arcana. I really, really, REALLY hate Favoured Souls, since they're essentially "DIVINE SORCERERS OMGOMGOMG! WITH WINGZOR! TEHKEWLIEZLOL!" No flavour, pointless wings, just... blurgh. My DM decided to try it out one day, and so I played one and I LOVED it. Now, it's hard for me to remember -exactly- how it works in Unearthed Arcana, or how we run it (I have to look it up every time) but I'm pretty sure it runs like this: You get the Sorcerer's number of spells known, but keep the Cleric's "spells per day". No longer can you just cast every damn spell on the Cleric list, you are now under the same restrictions as a sorcerer. However, you have fewer spells per day (if I'm remembering this right). To make up for this, you also automaticaly know the spells from your two domains and add those to your list. So you cast fewer times per day, but you do know a few more spells. So, what does this do? It actually makes the cleric -less- powerful! However, it gives the cleric a far better flavor. Why the hell would all clerics be able to cast every single divine spell, ever, even if they get spells from their gods? Surely their deites wouldn't allow them to have certian spells. Thus, my idea is that their gods bless them with a certian selection of spells, and that's what they get. Then they get spell slots. This whole setup makes for clerics who are vastly different from each other, especially since they can't just swap out for healing all the time now. I have an undead-hunting cleric who relies on wands for healing, because almost all of his spells are related to buffing, removing negative levels and disease, and making the lives of undead very unhappy. He's a damage machine, but not much of a healer. On the other hand, one of my friends is a cleric of Pelor, who took the Healing domain, meaning he "spontaenously" casts healing spells and is more like a normal cleric... but he can also spontaneously cast whatever else he has. We run archivists in addition to these clerics, and NEVER favorued souls since the favoured soul is doubly redundant now (not to mention just plain silly)
Millenia 05-10-06, 07:09 PM	... I personally like Favored Souls myself, though I never played one. >.> You might also want to try an Egoist coupled with a Sangehirn (found in the Third Eye article series on the site), but I suggest getting rid of the "you may only choose Sangerhirn powers" restriction.
Atirakis 05-12-06, 05:46 AM	Be a Wizard/Cleric/Mystic Theurge and then take the feat that allows you to cast Divine spells as Arcane Spells (one of the completes I think, help me out guys) You now have an ungodly amount of healing per day, your PCs can thank me later.
AvaronGansdell 05-12-06, 07:25 AM	Actualy the Arcane deciple feat out of compleat divine isent all that great it requires you have the same alignment as and worsihip a god that has healing as a domain (if you want healing) and you get to add healing domain spells to your list of spells knowable then you can learn them when you level up. after that you can only memorize one at each spell level 1st-9th and you still bace the spells off wisdom. if you want ungodly amouts of healing and a twist try the psion(Egoist)/cleric/psyionic thurge. the class is somewhere on the site. for roleplaying reasons take like the mind and healing domains. your character belives in the unity and power of the mind body and soul. it grabs psyionc healing and magical healing plus with a few feat choices you can get energy misstles or other good psi powers too.
Greg K 05-12-06, 09:55 AM	WOTC freelancer Ari Marmell, a.k.a Mouseferatu, has a small company called Lion's Den Press. One of his products is Classes of Legend: Priest of the Celestial Spheres. The product presents a replacement for the the phb cleric and is focused on making priests abilities and spell lists reflect the deity worshipped. While I haven't seen it (yet!), I have heard some good things over at ENWorld. You can find more information here (http://www.lionsdenpress.com/)
Kradlo 05-12-06, 12:03 PM	Under "other class variants" on page 58, Unearthed Arcana lists a variant cleric that gains smite evil and aura of courage in place of turning undead. Evil clerics gain smite good instead. Since UA had variant paladins, I made a further variant of this, in which the aura of courage was for LG, LN, or NG clerics. A CG, CN, or NG cleric could gain the Aura of Resolve. A CE, CN, or NE cleric could gain Debilitating Aura. A LE, LN, or NE cleric could gain Aura of Despair. Those clerics that could have more than one aura available had to choose one and stick with it, like a standard neutral cleric did when choosing to turn or rebuke undead. I also allowed the cleric a choice to smite Law or smite Chaos, since my campaign had some Law vs. Chaos conflict. It makes for a fairly militant cleric, which can be a fun variant. Kradlo
Atirakis 05-12-06, 02:16 PM	Could always do a Vow of Poverty Monk/Cleric get 9-10 levels in monk so that you have ki strike, improved evasion, fast movement +30' and slow fall and maybe the lawful Ki strike (you need level 10 for that) You will need good scores in Wis, Dex and Con and if you can get something with a bonus in Str it will help with the damage output. You can join the party later in levels and be a major impact on their offensive and healing capablities. And before anyone starts in with the you cant turn undead cause you cant own a holy symbol, VoP states that you can carry 1 simple weapon, well this one opts to carry just his gods holy symbol wich could be made out of ordinary wood or clay, thus making it worthless as anything other than a symbol of faith. If that doesnt satisfy your rules nit picking I dont know what can.