Clerics: What is your favorite pure/multi/dual combination?
Philhelm
Member Posts: 473
I really want to play through the entire trilogy as a Cleric (or variant). When I first played Baldur's Gate almost twenty years ago, I had very little understanding of the D&D spell system, and mostly used the Cleric for healing. Furthermore, I (foolishly) thought of Clerics as being weak, since my initial exposure to "healers" was from the white mages in the Final Fantasy series. It wasn't until Neverwinter Nights that I realized how badass Clerics are, not to mention having a greater understanding of the spells. Also, I would later discover that the class was actually conceived by the game designers as an undead hunter to combat another player's vampire PC, and was inspired by Peter Cushing from the Hammer Horror movies (which is awesome, and hence, Turn Undead has always been a signature ability).
Anyway, I recently started a LG Human Priest of Lathander (16/9/16/13/18/15), and am considering taking him up to level 40 throughout the trilogy. However, a Fighter 6/Cleric 39 would certainly be more powerful with 2 APR (Although Boon of Lathander stacks...), better HP, a better THAC0, weapon mastery, and more items to use. That's a lot for only the loss of one Cleric level. This got me thinking of other potential characters, such as:
Swashbuckler/Cleric
Thief/Cleric
Priest of Lathander/Fighter
Priest of Lathander/Thief
Priest of Lathander/Mage
Mage/Cleric
Stalker/Cleric
Archer/Cleric (slings, obviously)
Etc.
So for you Cleric lovers, what was your favorite build, and if you dual class, at what levels have you done so? If you played a pure Cleric, did you later regret not incorporating other class benefits?
Anyway, I recently started a LG Human Priest of Lathander (16/9/16/13/18/15), and am considering taking him up to level 40 throughout the trilogy. However, a Fighter 6/Cleric 39 would certainly be more powerful with 2 APR (Although Boon of Lathander stacks...), better HP, a better THAC0, weapon mastery, and more items to use. That's a lot for only the loss of one Cleric level. This got me thinking of other potential characters, such as:
Swashbuckler/Cleric
Thief/Cleric
Priest of Lathander/Fighter
Priest of Lathander/Thief
Priest of Lathander/Mage
Mage/Cleric
Stalker/Cleric
Archer/Cleric (slings, obviously)
Etc.
So for you Cleric lovers, what was your favorite build, and if you dual class, at what levels have you done so? If you played a pure Cleric, did you later regret not incorporating other class benefits?
3
Comments
i Know an Actual Kit would ofc be Better granting 2 Free Skills , but i don't care for any of the 3 Gods offered(Hail Tiamat) so i go with a Plain one.
Your Start is Dirt Easy with heavy Armor good HP Rolls and a Decent Weapon Selection.
with the 3 Tomes you hit 21 wisdom get a silly amount of bonus spells. Bless and Chant and some other spells are with Set Fixed Duration's so the "Low" Cleric Level does not affect them. in general the spells give great Support.
My most favourite Cleric is the cutest cleric of the Realms, Finch Bloomwhiffler the gnome librarian, but the second cutest is Ohrlinka, who left Candlekeep with Armour, Sleep, Cure Minor Wounds, Command and Strenght of Stone memorized (the last is a Divine Remix spell, a mod to be found on Gibberlings 3). At the final battle (not yet at level-cap) she had attained cleric level 7 and illusionist level 6 and could cast 16 priest spells (after using a single WIS tome to give her 18 Wisdom) and 11 mage spells. If you're a powergamer, start off with 18 WIS, use all 3 tomes and go for the level-cap before the final fight, the number of spells gets even higher.
Of course the number of spells does become a problem in BG2, where a high level cleric-mage has such a bewildering number of spells, that scrolling through them to find the prober spell to cast can be a chore. In BG2 I had a cleric-mage with a Blackadder voice courting Saerileth and I didn't make him a gnome because the number of spells is that high already.
http://www.gibberlings3.net/cleric/
There's another one:
https://forums.beamdog.com/discussion/46717/mod-fg-cleric-kits-updated#latest
cleric/mage in bg
A Wizard Slayer/Cleric could make for an intriguing witch hunter type of build, but the Wizard Slayer's penalty is far too steep for my liking.
Kensai/Cleric would be a solid "no" from me, since the Kensai doesn't have good synergy with the Cleric due to the armor restriction, and due to its "Eastern" flair.
The second one has a Priest of Clangeddin. So it has my blessing. Even though the dwarven priest's benefit is to cast armor of faith...which is a cleric spell. Though Ehontar is awesome enough to make up for that.
There's a lot to choose from but my favorite Is a Chaotic Evil Priest of Talos turned mage. It fits perfectly into the Forgotten Realms atmosphere because many Talonians become mages for the destructive power. Their priest powers are superb and useful from start to finish. I like the ethos too, basically siding with the violent side of nature. Plus you get to wear a cool eye patch AND a black doom cloak!
Tactically it's very powerful build. And since evil NPCs are magically limited (you basically only get 1 cleric and 1 mage) you compliment the party nicely, eliminating any weaknesses to an all evil run. The big question is when to dual, I suggest a minimum of level 9 and a maximum of level 13.
I really like a Fighter/Mage/Cleric multi to play as a Fighter/Cleric but better (who needs shorty saves when you have Mage spells???).
Swashbuckler 25+/Cleric is an awesomesauce solo build.
Illusionist/Cleric is a definite favourite.
Overall I dislike any build that is stuck with crappy attacks per round. Luckily mixing Mage with cleric gives you access to APR boosts in the form of Polymorph and similar spells. Whirlwind isn't ideal as it denies any other action in the round that it's used.
As of late-game maces, there's Storm Star +4 which can be upgraded to +5 IIRC.
Seeking Sword is another tool I suspect is going to be really useful, since it's technically not a spell it can be cast with Champion's Strength on top of Righteous Magic and DuHM. I've already had to use it once or twice taking down Mustard jellies or the Doomsayer or any enemy where his cleric spells are less than useful or flat out of spells, and I guess I'll be experimenting at higher levels on how this ability scales.
I am curious to know how people divide their stats when creating a cleric/illusionist.
Is strength useful? And should you go with 15 con (16 after the tome) to get max hp bonus (but not the +5 shorties save)?
I have this weird thing that I always want to give my chars max charisma and with a cleric/mage it feels like you want basically everything maxed out then, which of course isn't possible .
I will probably reroll my stats a lot, until I have a high number since I want to play on a very high difficulty setting. But then again, I might just go with a totally different character when the time comes to actually start playing .
On that note: Is a dual class Priest of Lathandar (and what level?) -> mage any good?