Post/Author/DateTime	Post
#1 PhyrexianKitsune Aug 03, 2015 17:06:10	As the title says. How much of each should I take if I want a cleric- heavy build? I'm thinking of either warlock 3/cleric 17  or warlock 5/cleric 15. The first would net me 9th level cleric spells, but would only net me level 2 short rest spells as well as some warlock stuff including possibly agonizing blast+ eldritch blast for dps if I actually focus on cha and wis instead of just wis. The other would net me only 8th level cleric spell, but also all the stuff of the first split plus short rest casting up to level 3 plus more warlock stuff. Of special note is the fact that if I get up to 3rd level slots I can use warlock slots to cast Animate Dead. Imagine...Animate Dead that refreshes with a short rest. I've seen a thread in the past about the potentinal math of short-rest, warlock-casted animate dead and it's absolutly silly. 200+ undead minion armies are very possible, here. If I where to go for a "necromancer" kind of build, the pain of  losing 9ths and the leveling process may be worth it just to crap out undead like a mass-production factory! Also, if I stick with the necromancer theme and go with the death domain, it is very possible that I can have the warlock spell Hex ignore necrotic resistence if cast with a cleric slot. I'm not 100% sure if this would work, since I don't know if casting a warlock spell in a cleric slot makes it count as a "cleric" spell for the death domain features or not, but if it does, then this becomes even more so a reason to go the necromancer route, so some clarity on this would be great!   Even further, path of the book, with shelilgeha as a cantrip gives me the ability to "melee" effectively while focusing my stats on charisma/wis instead of strength/wis or dex/wis, meaning that I can still make use of that touch of death channel divinity I get! Finally, unlike wizards, 9th level cleric spells are not as impressive(but still powerful), but at the same time the delayed casting may hurt during the leveling process...so I have no idea if the rewards of warlock 5/cleric 15 are worth the pain while leveling, even if I do go the necromancer short rest animate dead route and can, in fact, make Hex ignore necrotic resistance by casting it in a cleric slot while having death domain features.  So yeah, for the shelighela-using, death-domain cleric/warlock, what split would be better? Warlock 3/Cleric 17 or Warlock 5/Cleric 15 for short rest animate dead shenanigans?     Likewise, would perhaps going with a domain other than death and going warlock 3/cleric 17, such as, say the tempest domain for moar blasting, knowladge domain for versaility with skills, be more useful for this character? Knowladge cleric + Great Old One patron would be paticularly fluff-fitting, and could forgoe melee entirely, perhaps picking up a familiar instead of the tome for shenanigans. Likewise, tempest would be fluff-fitting for fiend if an evil god was chosen, and the heavy armor could make a nice pair with shelilgeha(which I still can't spell) along with the nice thunder-blasting power to supliment your eldritch-blasting. Finally, would it instead be worth it to go more warlock-heavy then cleric-heavy, perhaps going warlock 14/death cleric 6 for animate dead shenanigans, short-rest healing and possible resistence breaking on hex while still being mostly a warlock? Any and all clarity/advice on this would be great!
#2 WizardV Aug 03, 2015 21:06:15	There are implications in most game worlds to walking around with an undead army.   You seem very mechanics focused here so I'll stick to that for the rest of the post. Cleric DPR sustain isn't top tier, generally you get more out of bless with your team than you do out of hex given the concentration limit and your number of attacks. Without an invocation, EB isn't much different than sacred flame in just DPR. What clerics do for damage is burst, same as wizards. You can inflict with your biggest slot to burst when it counts and just use sacred flame + spiritual weapon for sustain damage. As long as you are primarily a cleric, that's going to be your life, you don't want to end up Warlock X Cleric X as you are playing.   Here's the pros of each level of Warlock: 1) EB cantrip, 1 short rest slot. Warlock lvl 1 spells (armor of agathys and hex are pretty good). 2) EB upgrade, +1 invocation, 2'nd short rest slot. 3) Short rest slot level upgrade. Pact boon (ritual cast everyones spells is rather compelling), so is the shillelagh point. Warlock lvl 2 spells (Invisibility, Misty Step, and Darkness all have potential) 4) ABI 5) Short rest slot level upgrade. +1 Invocation   Here's the cons of losing each level of Cleric: 1) Divine Intervention, random spell slot 2) ABI, random spell slot 3) Channel Divinity, random spell slot 4) 9th level spell, domain feature 5) ABI   If you don't really value the cleric level 9 spell list, and you don't really care about that lost ABI then warlock 5 seems quite good. However, you give up a lot less taking warlock 3. The answer to this really depends on how much you want to define your character by those repeatable level 3 slots. Many of the most useful spells from the social and exploration pillars of the game are low level.   As for leveling, if you are planning on relying on Warlock for sustain damage you are going to pay for it, especially sub 10. If you are starting above 10 you can get Warlock 2 without feeling the slowdown as much. Otherwise I advise against relying on either EB or Shillelagh for damage.   What I would personally do is to take Cleric 5->Warlock 1->Cleric 9. This gets your animate dead theme going early enough to enjoy it. At this point you can be a cleric tank walking around with armor of agathys in your big slots. By the time you are Cleric 9 you can cast a 25 THP, 25 cold damage shield. None of this takes charisma but you'll need 13 to MC anyway. While you are on the front line tanking you are pretty much a full cleric otherwise. You can be meleeing, using inflicts, spiritual weapon, blessing allies, etc. After 10 your options open up alot. Play it to 10 and evaluate. Do you want to take your character further down the Necromancy road? Then you can buy Warlock to 5. Are you enjoying being a combat beast? Keep at Cleric until 15 then decide again. This will, IMO, be far more playable than trying to go Cleric1->Warlock1->Cleric3->Warlock2->Cleric 5->Warlock 3 etc and it eliminates needing to reserve a large CHA score at character creation.