Also I will put here that we are playing in D&D 5E since IK that the version can make a difference.
Sorry if this is on the wrong place, if it is I would appreciate it if someone could point me in the proper direction.
-DBGreeceFirst off, I hope you have access to the phb or at least the basic rules and not just the online character maker. A level 1 cleric starts with 3 cantrips known.
The standard attack cantrip is Sacred Flame. It's a reflex save, which makes it handy if you're fighting armored targets.
The best utility cantrip is Guidance.
That leaves one cantrip to choose. Normally I would recommend light because Variant Humans are so popular, but given that you're a half elf already anything will work. Thaumaturgy is useful for roleplaying. Spare the Dying is handy if your party members fall over a LOT. It's hard to go wrong if you've taken the suggestions above.
At first level, he would have three cleric Cantrips, and one Wizard Cantrip.
Which ones he wants might depend a bit on his stats and how he wants to play.
Bear in mind that the Wizard Cantrip is cast using Intelligence, not Wisdom, which is probably a lower stat.
Is he going to be a caster-type cleric, one who wades in and fights in melee, or a mix? Or something else?
-DBGreecethis is just my opinion, but pretty much every cleric ever will want guidance and spare the dying as cantrips. after that you might go sacred flame to have a ranged atk option, but since you have a wizard cantrip you can chose to take your damage cantrip from the wizard list and opt for utility from your last cleric cantrip. or you can just skip damage cantrips altogether and just use melee attacks when you need to dps.
if it were me I would go
Cantrips: Spare the dying, guidance, minor illusion(from wizard), and mending (or sacred flame if you want ranged dps)
1st level spells: bless, cure wounds (pick up guiding bolt as your nest 1st level spell)
To help you find your way around the PHB:
High Elves start on p23. At the very top of p.24 it explains how they get a Wizard cantrip as a bonus. This doesn't count against the three that 1st-level Clerics get, it's extra (although it doesn't say so anywhere).
For Clerics, read the second paragraph on p.58, which explains that 1st level Clerics get three. Or look in the "Cantrips Known" column in the big table on p.57 which has the same information.
The cantrips lists for Wizards and Clerics overlap slightly - Light and Mending are available to both and it wouldn't make sense to take the same one twice. Clerics don't have as many cantrips as Wizards, so choosing three is not so hard. You can't really go wrong, because they are all equally useful but in different circumstances and you don't know beforehand what situations you will be up against but a healing Cleric should definitely have "Spare the Dying".
Elves can see in the dark, so LIght is less useful to them than it would be to a human Cleric, say, but if the rest of the party is mostly human, it could be helpful to them if the Cleric can cast Light for them in dark dungeons. Unless you have a Wizard in the party who knows Light anyway. It depends on the rest of the party.
For the Wizard cantrip, there's much greater choice. Don't go for the attack cantrips unless the character has high Intelligence (nearly as high as his Wisdom, maybe) because they won't be so effective. The other ones are all fun in different ways. Dancing Lights, Friends, Mage Hand, and Message are my favourites, You can do awesome things with those sometimes. Pick whatever seems to suit the personality of the Elf - it will have been something he learnt to do in childhood and it will be part of who he is.
Basically, do what seems fun and don't worry too much about getting things "wrong".
the back third of the book is all spell descriptions. from page 211 to like 290 are the descriptions of every spell in you can get.
a word about minor illusion (and really all illusion spells) before you commit fully to it though. It's an amazingly versatile spell for someone who can think creatively in various situations, but it can be useless if you dont think outside of the box to get good effects out of it.
Yag007 wrote:
this is just the optimizer in me talking but with that stat array I would swap out the 14's you have in INT and CHA for your CON stat and whichever stat you're using to attack with. so for instance if you're using a finnesse weapon like a rapier and need dex as your atk stat the ideal array here would be STR 9, DEX 14, CON 14, INT 10, WIS 15, CHA 13.
and so with 15 WIS, that means your modifier is +2 right? so your prepared spells per day is your WIS modifier (+2 in this case) and half your cleric level (1). this means that you may prepare 3 spells per day. cantrips dont count towards this total.
but yeah, the cleric spells you get from your domain are ALWAYS prepaired. 100% of the time, and they dont count against the WIS modifier+1/2 level spells you can prepare. so you are correct in saying you can (technically) prepare 5 spells each day.
in which case I would leave Bless and Cure wounds from your domain, and for your 3 prepared spells take healing word, guiding bolt, and probably command or detect magic.
so once all is said and done, you have bless, cure wounds, healing word, guiding bolt, and detect magic all prepared for the day. You can only cast two of them, but those are the ones you can chose from.
as a side note, are those ability scores before or after racial bonuses? that could greatly change what you would want to allocate where. but just as a general rule with clerics, your highest stats should be WIS > STR or DEX (depending on what weapon you're using) > INT/CHA/whichever stat you didnt choose between STR and DEX.
as for making or breaking how you play your cleric...if you have really high WIS, and a low attack score (STR or DEX) then you'll likely rely in cantrips and saving throw spells. if you have mediocre WIS but your attack score (STR/DEX) is high you'll want to rely on weapon damage and use spells that dont require saves or attack rolls.
the last thing to note as any caster, is to be mindful of how many concentration spells you prepare at one time. you can only have one concentration spell going at once, so prepareing a ton of them is generally not optimal.
Those scores are after his racial bonus. And his main weapon is a light crossbow with a mace +1 as his backup melee weapon. And so I think what I'm going to go with are the two Domain spells, healing word, guiding bolt. And detect magic. And reading through the phb after what you guys have said it's starting to make a little more since. Thanks :)
And if anyone has any other pointers I will gladly take them.
-DBGreece
Having a magic weapon already is pretty unusual for a low level character: its something even high-level characters can't assume.
If you have one, its probably going to be a major focus for the character and the rest of the party, and might be worth being able to use it better.
(The +1 is pretty powerful in 5th ed's bounded accuracy system, but the major part is the ability to go through a lot of monsters' resistances. Unless the DM's campaign is a bit on the Monty side, the cleric is going to be the frontline for beating those things down until whenever the warrior types manage to find something similar. Which might not happen until high levels.)
DBGreece wrote:
He didn't start with it, when he joined we were at a shop and he had enough to purchase the +1 weapon there as did my rogue, the two fighters and thr paladin in our group. And he has been starting easy on us with small cobals but this coming week now that 4 of us are at level 3 he's bringing out some stronger stuff. And from what ive heated he is tweaking the campaign some just because there is already a few groups at the venue that have already played through the exact same campaign.
And thank you all so much this has been a huge help.
-DBGreece
If there was a shop that just happened to have 5 magical weapons for sale (or probably more if the PCs had enough choice to pick ones that fit their capabilities), that is pretty nuts. Either the DM is going very easy on you, or he is giving you monty haul access because what he has lined up for you is going to be so brutal that you'll need way more power than expected for your levels to survive.
Keep us posted. I'd be interested to know how it goes.
Yeah it was a shop that carried all the weapon types and If we had the basic version we could upgrade it to a +1 weapon for 1 gold coin off, still expensive but it sounds like we are going to be facing some hefty stuff now. And if I have any questions you guys are deffinatly helpful.
-DBGreece