Berserker -> Cleric or Ranger -> Cleric?
lessthanjake
Member Posts: 10
I am interested in making a cleric main character for SoA/ToB. I basically want it to be a frontline fighter who is also super useful in providing immunities to status effects for the party, healing, general divine spell casting etc. And while I do care about endgame power, I don't value it any more than early game power. I want my character to feel powerful throughout. This has led me to not want a multi class character. I know they become more powerful eventually since they get fighter HLAs. But for a really long time (i.e. like all of SoA), their spell casting is notably far behind in many ways. They will have many fewer spells per day, often be one spell level behind dual classes, and many spells will be worse (for instance, you get level 15 Animated Dead much later, Holy Power starts lagging way behind in THAC0 bonus, Holy Smite is worse, DuHM lags behind, etc.) For Fighter DC/MC, the multi class loses out on grand mastery, so it will be a worse warrior too. And Turn Undead becomes useful WAY later.
So I want to dual-class, and since I want to feel powerful throughout, I just plan on dualing at the beginning of the game (i.e. level 7). I'll have both classes activated just out of Irenicus' Dungeon, so there's no downtime. For a Fighter -> Cleric dual, I think Berserker is clearly the best option. So my question is basically whether I should do Berserker -> Cleric or Ranger -> Cleric.
It seems to me that Berserker -> Cleric provides more damage and gets Rage immunities while the Ranger -> Cleric gets Druid spells (the dual DOES get druid spells like the multi class, right?) and various little things like Favored Enemy bonus. Which is better?
The damage bonus for Berserkers is pretty significant. Grandmastery provides an extra 1/2 APR and 3 extra damage. Meanwhile, Rage gives another 2 damage. Lets assume I am using FoA +3 and DoE with the weapon specialization gauntlets. That gives me 4 attacks a round. And lets also assume I am buffed up to 25 strength (realistic for a cleric) and have Righteous Magic on (which is fairly realistic AND also just makes the calculations easier). Assuming Rage is active, the Berserker will do 34 damage a hit with FoA and 31 damage with DoE. That comes out to 133 damage a round. The Ranger will only have 3.5 attacks a round due to no grandmastery and will only do 29 damage a hit with FoA and 26 with DoE. That is 98.5 damage a round. So the Berserker will do about 35% more damage a round. That is significant. And it doesn't even quite tell the whole story regarding damage because the Berserker's THAC0 will be better too. It gets -2 THAC0 from grandmastery and another -2 when using Rage. So for instance, let's say there's an enemy the Ranger would hit 75% of the time. He would average 74 damage a round (98.5*0.75). The Berserker would hit 95% of the time, and therefore average 120 damage a round. That's a 62% damage boost for the Berserker in that scenario. Of course, this is all assuming Rage is on (and I am dual classing at level 7, so I've only got 1 per day so that's not entirely realistic) and that its not an enemy my character would hit 95% of the time anyways. So many times the damage boost would be notably lower. For instance, without Rage and against an enemy I'd hit with either character unless there's a critical miss, the Berserker would only do 27% more damage. That's still a lot, though, and the effect is larger the harder the enemy is to hit (which generally correlates with which fights are toughest).
Furthermore, of course, Rage also provides a really nice set of immunities (and an AC bonus to boot). With that said, it won't always be active because I will only have 1 use a day. And those immunities are probably least useful on a cleric, because it can largely imitate those immunities with long-lasting spells. It is still really nice though.
Meanwhile, the Ranger -> Cleric gets Druid spells. I have never played a Druid (or used Jaheira/Cernd much), but I understand that some of these are super awesome, and I am basically wondering whether it is worth losing out on a lot of damage and Rage immunities in order to get them. Iron Skins is basically Stoneskin, allowing the character to tank pretty well. Not as well as a Fighter/Mage, but definitely much better than the Berserker -> Cleric. Insect Plague apparently destroys spell casters, so it is a big deal. Nature' Beauty is apparently really good, and Call Woodland Beings and the Elemental conjuring spells are very nice summons. Lastly, of course, the Ranger has Favored Enemy, which is not a big deal, but still a nice perk. And I guess Rangers get stealth as well, but at level 7 stealth won't be high, and the character will have Sanctuary anyways, so I'm not sure that's useful.
What do you all think? Are druid spells and the little Ranger perks worth the loss of Rage and grandmastery?
So I want to dual-class, and since I want to feel powerful throughout, I just plan on dualing at the beginning of the game (i.e. level 7). I'll have both classes activated just out of Irenicus' Dungeon, so there's no downtime. For a Fighter -> Cleric dual, I think Berserker is clearly the best option. So my question is basically whether I should do Berserker -> Cleric or Ranger -> Cleric.
It seems to me that Berserker -> Cleric provides more damage and gets Rage immunities while the Ranger -> Cleric gets Druid spells (the dual DOES get druid spells like the multi class, right?) and various little things like Favored Enemy bonus. Which is better?
The damage bonus for Berserkers is pretty significant. Grandmastery provides an extra 1/2 APR and 3 extra damage. Meanwhile, Rage gives another 2 damage. Lets assume I am using FoA +3 and DoE with the weapon specialization gauntlets. That gives me 4 attacks a round. And lets also assume I am buffed up to 25 strength (realistic for a cleric) and have Righteous Magic on (which is fairly realistic AND also just makes the calculations easier). Assuming Rage is active, the Berserker will do 34 damage a hit with FoA and 31 damage with DoE. That comes out to 133 damage a round. The Ranger will only have 3.5 attacks a round due to no grandmastery and will only do 29 damage a hit with FoA and 26 with DoE. That is 98.5 damage a round. So the Berserker will do about 35% more damage a round. That is significant. And it doesn't even quite tell the whole story regarding damage because the Berserker's THAC0 will be better too. It gets -2 THAC0 from grandmastery and another -2 when using Rage. So for instance, let's say there's an enemy the Ranger would hit 75% of the time. He would average 74 damage a round (98.5*0.75). The Berserker would hit 95% of the time, and therefore average 120 damage a round. That's a 62% damage boost for the Berserker in that scenario. Of course, this is all assuming Rage is on (and I am dual classing at level 7, so I've only got 1 per day so that's not entirely realistic) and that its not an enemy my character would hit 95% of the time anyways. So many times the damage boost would be notably lower. For instance, without Rage and against an enemy I'd hit with either character unless there's a critical miss, the Berserker would only do 27% more damage. That's still a lot, though, and the effect is larger the harder the enemy is to hit (which generally correlates with which fights are toughest).
Furthermore, of course, Rage also provides a really nice set of immunities (and an AC bonus to boot). With that said, it won't always be active because I will only have 1 use a day. And those immunities are probably least useful on a cleric, because it can largely imitate those immunities with long-lasting spells. It is still really nice though.
Meanwhile, the Ranger -> Cleric gets Druid spells. I have never played a Druid (or used Jaheira/Cernd much), but I understand that some of these are super awesome, and I am basically wondering whether it is worth losing out on a lot of damage and Rage immunities in order to get them. Iron Skins is basically Stoneskin, allowing the character to tank pretty well. Not as well as a Fighter/Mage, but definitely much better than the Berserker -> Cleric. Insect Plague apparently destroys spell casters, so it is a big deal. Nature' Beauty is apparently really good, and Call Woodland Beings and the Elemental conjuring spells are very nice summons. Lastly, of course, the Ranger has Favored Enemy, which is not a big deal, but still a nice perk. And I guess Rangers get stealth as well, but at level 7 stealth won't be high, and the character will have Sanctuary anyways, so I'm not sure that's useful.
What do you all think? Are druid spells and the little Ranger perks worth the loss of Rage and grandmastery?
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Comments
But yeah, definitely point taken. With a cleric, Berserker's rage immunities go from being amazing to merely being super useful in certain situations (i.e. if you might be imprisoned) and otherwise just saving you a couple spells slots. It's nice, but not incredibly important. I think the damage difference, which can be quite large, is the more important thing.
Also, you mention enabling druid spells in the ini file. Do ranger -> cleric dual classes not automatically get druid spells like ranger/cleric multiclasses do?
I think you need to decide between being a better fighter and having a couple of very good extra spells.
Honestly I don't think the damage difference will be that important because you'll still be a character fairly shortly with (if dual wielding) with 21-25 strength and 6 APR (with Improved Haste). Between your strength bonuses and the blunt weapons you'll have at your disposal you could easily be doing 100 crushing damage/round (and a lot more with good weapons and high strength), which is way more than the vast majority of enemies can handle (especially when you consider that the majority of enemies will have 2 to 3 attacks per round so they may not even be able to get through your Iron Skins).
You'll have to change a setting in the ini file if you want all druid spells as its currently set to the IWDEE default (which in this case means only up to level 3 druid spells).
When I looked at the different options for a front line divine character I considered a few things:
1. Thac0 will never be a problem due to buffs
2. Cleric spells cap at 7th and the highest ones aren't that great anyway
3. Racial bonuses and kit immunities aren't a big deal considering cleric buffs
4. The protagonist always has an edge on other characters anyway
Eventually I concluded that the best warrior/cleric build is, in fact, a fighter/Mage/cleric.
I've loved this character as it's simultaneously incredibly potent but also allows other party members to shine.
With the full set of tomes from bg1 she has plenty of spell slots from 21 wisdom and is very resilient with Mage buffs.
With 19 strength from the tome in bg1 she got 25 strength from cleric 9, what more do you need?
One thing that I don't think anyone has mentioned yet is the bonus points in "two weapon fighting" that rangers get. It's not much but it' still a bonus.
Also, stealth + turn undead is an amazing combo. I usually dual class the ranger at level 8 to get the extra hp and stealth bonus and wear the armor of the night (from ranger stronghold quest) so I can use stealth more effectively. Hit stealth and walk into a group of undead then pop your turn undead and watch them all gib (I think you'll need a turn undead level of around 12/13+ to wipe out the bigger undead guys). Turn undead makes some fights against undead in late SoA/ToB a breeze.
Overall, I think you'll only miss out on a little bit of damage if you choose the ranger at the start. The bonuses from rage can easily be covered by other items/scrolls and the combination of Druid and cleric spells can make you amazingly tanky while letting you dish out good damage at the same time.
Just remember not to drop your reputation too much or chose the evil options in hell otherwise you'll lose your ranger status and bonuses (no more stealth or racial enemy!).
If you play solo blind or have the SCS mod and play solo, the Berserker's immunities, available "right away" by one mouse-click cannot be compared to anything. Clerics and druids are very fragile against debuffing spells - they are not mages and don't have spell protections. Shield of Archons is a decent spell though but still it won't be enough to keep all your buffs against a pack of enemy spellcasters long.
But basing my vote on the OP's main incentive: "I basically want it to be a frontline fighter who is also super useful in providing immunities to status effects for the party, healing, general divine spell casting etc." I would vote for a ranger->cleric. You have a party to protect you additionally, so you don't need the Berserker's immunities in order to survive. You want "general divine spell casting" so with druidic spells you'll get all the spells from the divine pool. You will be a good fighter from the damage point of view, your buffs will be enough here. And Ironskins. This spell will help you greatly.
Given this, I would base my choice on the question of which combination sounds more FUN. And to me, that would be berserker -> cleric. In fact, that's precisely what my current PC is.
If you want Ranger->Cleric go for Ranger/Cleric multiclass. Fighter's HLA are far more precious then a few spell slots and stronger Turn Undead/Dispell. You also get the best THAC0 and very good saves.
With Berseker->Cleric dual you get temporary immunity to imprisonment. Cleric is able to defend against imprisonment only with Shield of the Archons (7th level spell). But still Range/Cleric multi looks stronger to me.
Personally I see little wrong with it since the end-result is that Ranger/Clerics are insanely fun to play, though entirely broken with what they can do.
IWD:EE ranger/clerics are closer to what they're supposed to be like, but I digress, they're still good regardless.
Either way, though I concede the class is all powerful, I still lean towards the FMC as it's more interesting and gives greater variety of party compositions.
So let's say we are at 1.2 million xp. The dual class will be at cleric level 13, while the multi class will be at cleric level 10. At that point, the dual class will be able to memorize 2 more level 1 spells, 2 more level 2 spells, 3 more level 3 spells, 1 more level 4 spell, and get to memorize two level 6 spells, while the multi class cannot even access level 6 spells yet. And, of course, beyond having more spells, the dual class' spells will also be more effective. For instance, DuHM will provide an extra strength, dexterity, and constitution point. Holy Smite will average 32.5 damage instead of 25. Holy Power will set the dual class THAC0 to 8 instead of the multi class' 11. Dispel will work 15% more.
Lets say we are at the original SoA xp cap. The dual class will be at cleric level 20, while the multi class will be at cleric level 14. The dual class will have 3 more level 1 spells, 3 more level 2 spells, 3 more level 3 spells, 3 more level 4 spells, 4 more level 5 spells, 3 more level 6 spells, and 1 more level 7 spell. And the gap in power will be even wider than before. DuHM will provide 2 more strength, dexterity, and constitution points. Holy Smite will average 50 damage instead of 35 damage. Holy Power will allow the dual class to outstrip the multi class' THAC0 by 6. The dual class will long since have gotten the super powerful version of Animated Dead, while the multi-class still will not have it. Dispel Magic will work 30% more.
Sure, once one gets past 5.4 million xp, the multi class is at cleric level 20, so the difference is greatly diminished. But you have already played the vast majority of the game by then. My whole point was that I do not value the end game result over the character's power throughout, because most of my time with the character will not be spent at end game power.
While you're adding damage per hit at the end of the day any scenario in which you're character gets to hit more often due to APR boosts is a better scenario than one with less.
For all of SoA your ranger-> cleric will be capped at a measly 3 APR (3.5 for berserker variant) while your companions should have 4, 4.5 or 5 (when considering the availability of speed weapons and bows).
While the above figures aren't massive the differences are exaggerated when using haste (if you have fractional APR) and improved haste.
It'd be a totally different story if there was blunt speed weapons but as it is I'd just be loathe to handicap your damage output so much for such minimal and temporary advantages.
Perhaps a pure Priest of Lathander could even work for you as I think the buff can be stacked to hit the APR cap that way?
(I have *never* calculated damage amounts. Despite that, I have *never* had difficulties completing anything in the game. Obviously, you don't want to go out of your depth - you don't aim to make Firkraag your first encounter after Chateau Irenicus.)
I wrote a really long thing about this on another website, and I'm hesitant to post the whole thing here, since it's a giant wall of text. But basically the upshot was this:
The Berserker -> Cleric has a few advantages over an APR-maximizing Berserker. First, DuHM and Righteous Magic allow the cleric to get to 25 strength. A normal Berserker will be left with just the DuHM Bhaalspawn power early on, and later, whatever is the best strength belt at the time. This hurts damage and THAC0 a lot compared to having 25 strength. Second, Righteous Magic is a nice damage boost. Third, the Cleric character can dual wield with the same weapon type in its off hand as its main hand (i.e. something like Flail of Ages and Defender of Easthaven). So it gets grand mastery damage and THAC0 bonuses on all its attacks, while someone putting Belm in the off hand could not get those bonuses until very late. Fourth, to keep APR maximizing, the normal Berserker needs to keep a +2 weapon in the off hand, while the cleric has a +3 DoE, allowing it to hit more stuff with its offhand attacks. Fifth, the dual class character will generally be slightly higher level than the single class Berserker, so Holy Power will actually make its base THAC0 better than the Berserker until late game when the THAC0 cap is hit. Sixth, the cleric character does not need to invest pips in a second weapon type, so it can get the third two weapon style pip much earlier. It's not a big deal, but that gives an extra two THAC0 on some hits for a large portion of the game.
The effects of each individual thing fluctuates throughout the game. But I calculated what damage would be at Berserker -> Cleric level 12, level 15, level 21, and near the end of ToB. At level 12, a buffed-up Cleric character actually was very slightly ahead in damage if every attack hit, and had a pretty significant THAC0 advantage. So it was definitely better. At level 15, the Cleric still has a slight damage advantage and the THAC0 difference is actually quite large. Moreover, Belm being only +2 starts to really matter. So the Cleric is clearly ahead. At Cleric level 21, the Berserker pulls ahead in damage by a little bit (like doing less than 10% more damage). However, the Berserker still has significantly worse THAC0 and, again, Belm being +2 is quite bad by this time. So the single-class Berserker is probably better against trash mobs at this level, but probably a little worse in the harder fights, which is more important anyways. At the end of ToB, the characters' damage is essentially equal, assuming the Berserker still is using an +APR off hand weapon. But the Cleric has slightly better THAC0 (which probably won't really matter at this point, I admit) and Belm is not going to hit much at all. So I would still take the Cleric at this level. To be fair, at this point, the single class character could drop the +APR off-hand weapon for something better (Crom Faeyr maybe) and just rely on GWW to get to 10 attacks. Or it could use Critical Strike for huge damage on non-crit-immune enemies. So the HLAs will probably leave the fighter ahead in damage in fights where they are used.
I was surprised by these results. I started calculating expecting the single-class fighter to be far ahead due to the APR. Of course, one cannot always be buffed up and in that case the Cleric is worse. But Righteous Magic and Holy Power last a decent amount, and DuHM is fast casting so you can renew it in a battle. So it's not unrealistic to assume all three are on. And the buffs could be dispelled (but NOT Breached btw). That's important, but I should note that the dual class cleric will level up pretty quickly, so its buffs are less likely to be dispelled than a multi-class character's buffs (or a mage's buffs, for instance). This can be really significant. Let's say we are at 3 million xp and facing a level 16 enemy trying to dispel your buffs. The multi-class character's buffs have a 60% chance of being dispelled. The dual class character's buffs have a 1% chance of being dispelled.
Anyways, I guess this ended up being a wall of text anyways, but I can provide the numbers behind the above stuff if you'd like.
Before that, the multi is a primary fighter and secondary cleric while the dual is a primary cleric and secondary fighter.
Anyway, as stated by xzar_monty, the difference is not very significant and both choices are completey OP (like almost all multis/duals)
Regarding berserker/cleric or ranger/cleric dual, i would rather choose the ranger/cleric.
The berskerer immunities are easily duplicated by some long duration buffs (prot from fear, chaotic command). The only thing that harder to protect against is imprisonment but there is so little foes in the game that cast it that this is not really significant in my mind.
On the opposite, some druid spells (iron skins, nature's beauty) are really great and cannot be "duplicated" by the berskerer.