Unkitted Clerics

Papa_Lou

Hey dudes.

I've been looking through the classes very deeply lately, because I'm still not sure which one I want to play next. I felt like I could always weigh out some good positives and negatives for playing each class or kit, but when it comes to clerics, I couldn't quite see any bonuses to playing just a regular old cleric over a priest of Talos, Lathander, Helm, or Tyr.

Does anyone play unkitted clerics these days? Or is that a thing of the past?

Lord_Tansheron

There is no objective reason to play unkitted Cleric, as the kits don't have downsides.

You can, of course, still choose to do so for reasons of RP or personal preference, or whatever. But mechanically, a kit is strictly superior.

JumboWheat01

As Tansheron said, there is no reason to play a Cleric without choosing one of the kits or a dual/multiclass. And in the Forgotten Realms, you explicitly NEED to follow a god, its the only way you'll get access to Divine Magic. They're extremely stingy like that. So it takes some head-canoning to think that your Cleric/Mage is really worshiping some god of magic, like Azuth or maybe even Oghma, and your Cleric/Thief is going for one of the trickery gods of some sort, like Garl Glittergold or Tymmora.

Papa_Lou

I see, thanks for that!
What about priest spells? Am I right in thinking that you receive different spells depending on your alignment?

Gallowglass

Yes, the only mechanical reason for an unkitted Cleric is when it's part of a multi-class or (the second class of) a dual-class. If you're playing a single-class Cleric (or the first class of a dual), then you're always going to be better off with a kitted Cleric, because all of the Cleric kits have only advantages and no disadvantages.

This differs from all of the kits of all of the other classes, which each have some costs as well as benefits.

JumboWheat01

Papa_Lou said:

I see, thanks for that!
What about priest spells? Am I right in thinking that you receive different spells depending on your alignment?

That's true in Icewind Dale (and it's EE,) but as far as I know, that's not true in the Baldur's Gate games. Good characters in IWD got healing spells, Evil got harming spells, and Neutral got a mix-and-match set.

Gallowglass

Clerics get slightly different spell selections for Evil than for Good, but not nearly so different as in IWD.

In BG, Good Clerics get Holy Smite and Holy Word (which target Evil enemies) and the Summon Deva HLA, while Evil Clerics get Unholy Blight and Unholy Word (which target Good enemies) and the Summon Fallen Deva HLA. Neutral Clerics get both sets.

As an exception, Viconia

gets both sets as if she were Neutral, which is presumably because she can eventually convert to Neutral in ToB.

Lord_Tansheron

Should mention here that the VAST VAST VAST majority of enemies is evil, and among those who are not, most are neutral (like golems or animals). There are very few good-aligned enemies you will come across in a regular playthrough (i.e. without playing as a psychotic Sith overlord massacring the entire Bridge District because Rampah pissed you off).

Abi_Dalzim

Lord_Tansheron said:

Should mention here that the VAST VAST VAST majority of enemies is evil, and among those who are not, most are neutral (like golems or animals). There are very few good-aligned enemies you will come across in a regular playthrough (i.e. without playing as a psychotic Sith overlord massacring the entire Bridge District because Rampah pissed you off).

I resent that! I'm not psychotic, I just wanted to skip that annoying Neera cutscene by using Glyph of Warding on that little girl before she could start babbling about her knife, but that halfling Stennet was caught in the blast, and suddenly everyone was hostile and one thing led to another, you know?

brunardo

lol thats funny

brunardo

SO evil cleric spells differ for BG EE like in IWD, want to do a evil PC cleric but dont want the harm spells and giving up healing

Lord_Tansheron

brunardo said:

SO evil cleric spells differ for BG EE like in IWD, want to do a evil PC cleric but dont want the harm spells and giving up healing

Evil clerics can still heal, it's only a few spells that are different. I'm not even sure Harm is evil only, I think it's only the alignment-specific spells like Holy Smite/Unholy Blight, Holy Word/Unholy Word etc. But I could be wrong I guess, too many mods on my setup to check.

RelSundan

The only spells that differs from alignments are spells that hurt either good or bad creatures. (Evil spells versus Good spells) As mentioned already, Holy Blight, Holy word and Summon Deva spells are available only to good/neutral cleric while Unholy Blight, Unholy word and Summon Fallen Deva spells are available only to Evil Clerics. Pretty much same spells just with different nature and different specific targets

Harm is available for any alignment as it effects both good and evil characters.

Gallowglass

brunardo said:

SO evil cleric spells differ for BG EE like in IWD, want to do a evil PC cleric but dont want the harm spells and giving up healing

No, the only differences are the ones I listed earlier. Heal and Harm spells (etc.) are all available to all Clerics in BG, unlike IWD.

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Danacm

@subtledoctor dont you have some mod for that ?

Gallowglass

@Danacm - I think you fell for @subtledoctor's marketing cue!

Danacm

@Gallowglass i think @subtledoctor is a salesman in real

JumboWheat01

No, there was an epic fail there. There was no *wink wink* or . Sales pitch failure.

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