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Priest of Lathander > Fighter (or F/C)

It's not so hard to be better than a pure fighter, specially since the fighter kits' perks start losing edge once your casters come up with better counters to disabling spells (I'm looking at you, berserker!).

The only real contender here is the fighter/cleric multi, and honestly the PoL can buff himself to be WAY more effective than the F/C. Sure, it's on a timer, but for its duration (long enough in mid levels to handle most tough fights, and goes on for minutes in higher levels) you're a God. 5 APR (boon+haste) , a better thac0 than F/C (Holy Power+faster leveling), better saves sooner (assuming dwarf both cases), more spells (buffs, debuffs, cc, dmg), better turn undead, better everything.

Convince me otherwise.

The one thing going for F/C is greater whirlwind, and it's a one-trick pony. Also, subjectively better stronghold (castle > temple). Totally unrelated but: I think Priest of Tempus should get the castle instead (pls, Beamdog).
gorgonzola
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Comments

  • jsavingjsaving Member Posts: 1,083
    FC and PoL are both useful party members but they don't fill the same role in the party. You take a fighter/cleric for high sustained DPS and solid utility casting. You take a PoL for high burst DPS and super-strong dispels/turns. Sort of like the difference between FMT and blade, they don't do exactly the same thing but they're both effective at what they do.
    gorgonzolamonico
  • Lord_TansheronLord_Tansheron Member Posts: 4,211
    Isn't the real problem here that you can't use swords if you've got Cleric in there, and that means you can't use a +1 APR offhand?

    To offset that loss, you'd need a lot more meat on the Cleric side, which probably means dualing into Cleric rather than from it, or going multiclass.
    gorgonzola
  • VolatileVolatile Member Posts: 81
    +1 apr off-hand? You don't need it. Pff.

    With only one dot in each proficiency (and one dot in two weapons style), cast boon 2x, holy power (fighter thac0 and 18/50 str), righteous magic (+str, max damage) and DUHM (25 str). Have your mage cast haste. Your PoL should have 5 apr doing MAX damage per hit guaranteed and with a better Thac0 than F/C could ever dream of.

    At mid to higher levels, the burst can last from a little over a minute to more than three whole minutes. Do you know any fight take takes more than three minutes?

    Fighters can have 10 apr once a day via HLA, but it's a one trick poney. By the time the fighter has the ability to do it, PoL is able to buff himself to Godhood several times over.

    So yeah... If we're talking raw power: arcane casters (sorcerer, conjurer, mage) > PoL > the rest. And I'm not 100% sure sorcerers are better. If we had a one-on-one fight, considering all the buff, debuffs, protections etc each class has, I think PoL has a good chance of eating the sorcerer alive (if PoL manages to pull off his buffs and prots before the fight. Arcane casters have time stop and alacrity which is the reason they're so OP).
    gorgonzola
  • ithildurnewithildurnew Member Posts: 273
    edited December 2019
    Volatile wrote: »
    Fighters can have 10 apr once a day via HLA, but it's a one trick poney [sic].
    That's a quaint notion. What makes you think Fighters can get 10apr only once a day? You can GWW more than once a day, and you can also Improved Haste to double the 5apr, as well as use Ring of Gaxx, the IH bracers, etc etc., while Critical Attacking to hit on all 10 attacks.

    Obviously someone that can buff themselves with Holy Power/Righteous Magic/DUHM can buff up to godlike power (as long as they have spell slots to spare), but Fighters do have an edge in overall sustained fighting effectiveness. Aside from Fighter/Mage types (which in this game wipe the floor with F/C's face), pure warrior types can get buffs from party members (not everyone runs solo).

    One more thing: if you play with SCS (only way an experienced BG veteran can expect to be challenged), unless you play with IWD Spells component, cleric buffs tend to evaporate in tougher fights. At that point, the fighter guy is still a fighter with great THAC0, grandmastery and GWW, while the cleric impersonating a warrior turns out to be a guy in armor swinging a blunt object with mediocre skill.
    Post edited by ithildurnew on
    gorgonzolamonico
  • Lord_TansheronLord_Tansheron Member Posts: 4,211
    Volatile wrote: »
    +1 apr off-hand? You don't need it. Pff.

    With only one dot in each proficiency (and one dot in two weapons style), cast boon 2x, holy power (fighter thac0 and 18/50 str), righteous magic (+str, max damage) and DUHM (25 str). Have your mage cast haste. Your PoL should have 5 apr doing MAX damage per hit guaranteed and with a better Thac0 than F/C could ever dream of.
    Doesn't Holy Power use the Cleric's level to determine what level Fighter you become, so you're not gaining anything if you're already a Fighter of higher level? And isn't the STR basically irrelevant if you're using DuHM? Also, just when exactly is this dualing to Fighter if DuHM is to put you at 25 STR, given it's 3 levels per +1 STR?
    gorgonzola
  • Lord_TansheronLord_Tansheron Member Posts: 4,211
    I've experimented with PoL->F duals before, and while they're definitely interesting, they proved to be generally worse than both F/C multi and Ber->Cler dual. Not by a huge margin, though, so if that's your jam and you're not grinding hard against difficulty mods like I do, you'll probably do fine.

    The biggest problem is that the Boon of Lathander, while great, is also a little unreliable for a dual. While Clerics are generally weak to dispels, the fact that you don't have the maximum array of divine spells to make up for a lost Boon like you do in F/C or BerCler puts a bit of a damper on things. Though of course it becomes less of a problem the shorter your fights are, so if you're good at metagaming your encounters and aren't in LoB mode, it works better.
  • sarevok57sarevok57 Member Posts: 5,975
    Volatile wrote: »

    At mid to higher levels, the burst can last from a little over a minute to more than three whole minutes. Do you know any fight take takes more than three minutes?

    in bg2 all spells are capped at level 20 so boon of lathander would last 2 minutes at most, but since you have to cast multiple spells for this godly combo, you are going to lose some time on that ( DuHM will no doubt be the last spell cast, and that spell only lasts a minute period )
  • SouplesseSouplesse Member Posts: 131
    Better than a bersk13/mage ? Are sure of that?
  • ithildurnewithildurnew Member Posts: 273
    edited December 2019
    Souplesse wrote: »
    Better than a bersk13/mage ? Are sure of that?

    I don't think anyone would embarrass themselves that badly; where do you see someone making such a claim?
  • Lord_TansheronLord_Tansheron Member Posts: 4,211
    edited December 2019
    13 you say? I guess it's just a troll post.

    The OP seems to be about PoL-F vs. pure F (kitted) which seems like a weird comparison because who'd run a pure Fighter when dualing is clearly on the table.

    The dualing level breakpoints of interest would probably be 3, 6, 7, and 9. Either one of those gives a single use of Boon.

    3 gives you a +1 stat DuHM and some useful utility. You get most hit dice from Fighter.
    6 gives you a +2 stat DuHM, but the rank 3 divine spells aren't all that good. You get most hit dice from Cleric.
    7 gives you a +2 stat DuHM, but adds rank 4 spells which have some interesting picks. Only two Fighter hit dice.
    9 gives you a +3 stat DuHM and rank 5 spells that include powerful melee tools like RM. No Fighter hit dice.

    Personally, I'd probably go with either 6 or 9. They seem to be the best balance between cost and benefit. Clerics get a lot of extra spell slots from WIS so you can still cast a decent amount even at low levels, but of course you'll primarily be a fighter and not a caster.

    I'd basically never dual above lvl 9 on anything except Druid and Thief. It's just not worth the steep XP increase.
  • gorgonzolagorgonzola Member Posts: 3,864
    @Lord_Tansheron
    i suspect you have misinterpreted the thread's title
    "Priest of Lathander > Fighter (or F/C)" that if i get it right means PoL is better/more powerful then pure fighter or FC multi
    reading it as
    "Priest of Lathander -> Fighter (or F/C)" so dual from PoL into fighter.

    the difference is all in that > instead of -> that is used often in the forums as a sign for first class dualed into second class.
    the OP is about PoL vs fighter or vs the multi FC.
    the fact that the OP tells about stacking boons make clear that the PoL has to reach a high level, he needs at least 11 levels to stack 2 of them and he talks also about the duration of the boost (1 round level) in a way that leave no doubt, he intend the PoL going very high on levels, even if as @sarevok57 correctly told the duration is capped at lev 20, so lasting at best about 2 minutes.
    so he is surely not talking of a dual from it into something other.

    anyway having to dual from PoL, thing that is not the topic of the thread, i would go at least at lev 11, and dual into mage, not into fighter.
    to have an aerie like toon that has 2 stackable boons, enough cleric spells, a semi decent thac0 when buffed for combat and that will reach end game much higher mage levels.
  • [Deleted User][Deleted User] Posts: 0
    edited December 2019
    The user and all related content has been deleted.
  • Lord_TansheronLord_Tansheron Member Posts: 4,211
    gorgonzola wrote: »
    @Lord_Tansheron
    i suspect you have misinterpreted the thread's title
    "Priest of Lathander > Fighter (or F/C)" that if i get it right means PoL is better/more powerful then pure fighter or FC multi
    reading it as
    "Priest of Lathander -> Fighter (or F/C)" so dual from PoL into fighter.

    the difference is all in that > instead of -> that is used often in the forums as a sign for first class dualed into second class.
    I see, that makes sense yes. That's even worse for the PoL's case, unfortunately.
    chimaera wrote: »
    I'd run a shorty berserker over a dual. >:) With SCS/Ascension I've found Korgan to be a reliable tank against spellcasters due to the combination of shorty saves & rage immunities. With the addition of (modified) IWD spells in the newest version of SCS you can protect priests against dispels, but frankly it's just quicker to send the dwarf ahead.
    There's very little reason imo to run a pure Fighter over a dualed one. Berserker->Cleric should be almost unequivocally superior to a pure Berserker in BGII. Now, of course this varies with your mod setup. I haven't tested the new IWD spell option in SCS (I prefer the Spell Revisions mod), but it seems to me that would only widen the gap in favor of a dual.
  • ithildurnewithildurnew Member Posts: 273
    edited December 2019
    chimaera wrote: »

    With the addition of (modified) IWD spells in the newest version of SCS you can protect priests against dispels, but frankly it's just quicker to send the dwarf ahead.
    This is an interesting tweak, potentially a game changer. To be precise they're still vulnerable vs Dispel Magic (found out the hard way I can't just freely unload Keldorn's dispels into the thick of combat expecting to get rid of only enemy buffs), but can now be as immune to Remove Magic (which SCS foes favor naturally) and Breach as arcane casters are.

    I think I like it; SCS in particular exposes just how superior well utilized BG2 arcane casters are to their divine brethren. This might help bridge the gap some and lend more weight to the OP's argument.

  • The user and all related content has been deleted.
    Grond0monico
  • Lord_TansheronLord_Tansheron Member Posts: 4,211
    chimaera wrote: »
    Shorty saves is reason enough for me.
    F/C multi then? +0.5 APR vs. the full array of Cleric spells seems like a good trade-off to me.
  • The user and all related content has been deleted.
  • jsavingjsaving Member Posts: 1,083
    If you are willing to take the time to fully buff, and if you aren't facing foes who can eliminate or outlast those buffs, and if your playstyle involves resting early and often to replenish usage of your buffs, then PoLs can be very solid contributors to a party. However PoLs aren't for everyone and there are many advantages FC multis bring to the table, especially at high levels when fighter HLAs come into play.
  • gorgonzolagorgonzola Member Posts: 3,864
    edited December 2019
    there is no need to fully buff if not in the boss battles, cleric's thac0 is not bad and a simple duhm at high levels and starting with good str or a good str setting item give a very good str, up to 25 for that 14 dmg and 7 thac0 boost.

    for the boss battles stacking 3 boons, full buff, DW and receiving an improved haste the >lev 21 PoL goes in battle with fighter like thac0, 25 str, something like 55 more hp, some damage reduction stacking the flail and AoF, in some battles also some other items, and 10 apr, that will last a long time.

    having a single class cleric makes also all the undead battles very easy, some parts of the unseeing eye and firkraag dungeons, the temple ruins, the 2 battles in the bodhi's dungeon, liches and even demiliches and a bunch of other situations become so easy with a high enough cleric. he just walk in and everything explodes.

    maybe it is not the best choice for those that play with scs, but there is a lot of people that does not, and in vanilla is not difficult to avoid to have the buffs dispelled.

    imo CM > F7Cdual > FCmulti > PoL, if you want to go for the real power, as the CM end game can pull off way more then the puny GWW rounds the FC can, ie having a simulacrum with BBoD and FoA OH, calling a deva and 4 elementals or if he is lucky a deva and an elemental prince and buffing himself in no time, it is not a problem to get all this in a couple of rounds (contingency and CC ignore the 1 spell/round limit).
    while he is protected by his arcane magic, untouchable and not dispellable.
    and this is only 1/2 of what he can do as he can also use his spells to fight, to do actual damage or take down the enemy in other ways, instead of buffing and summoning...

    but for players that don't mind if they win a couple of rounds later, don't mind if they have to buff for the boss battles, don't mind if they have to sleep some times more PoL is a fantastic class to play, RP wise, but with its own power.
    it is somehow similar to a blade, not mechanically, but because you have to put some effort in make it shine, then can be very rewarding, while players not used to it can find it a very weak choice.
  • gorgonzolagorgonzola Member Posts: 3,864
    edited December 2019
    by the way the most damaging version of a high level PoL is when he uses the best sling and best bullet stacking 4 boons and being improved hasted, 10 apr, with the damage from str, bullet and sling enchantment stacking, impressive thac0 thank to the fighter like one and the dex boost from duhm.

    ranged he can focus on every enemy in no time, does not have to actually reach it, has way less risk to be dispelled and can easily compete with the best fighters as damage dealer.
    stacking only 2 boons still gets 6 apr (I.hasted) for probably around 180 dmg round, but he can do it twice a rest, while stacking all the boons can do it only once, for about 300 dmg/round.

    it is the perfect setting to take down a certain fallen solar in ascension as he can also equip the shield that reflects his ranged attacks, the solar should fall in no time (i did not actually test it).
  • ithildurnewithildurnew Member Posts: 273
    edited December 2019
    gorgonzola wrote: »
    imo CM > F7Cdual > FCmulti > PoL, if you want to go for the real power

    You'll need to get into late SoA/ToB for CM to really shine, but eventually, yes. I might give F/C multi the edge over dual in ToB because Fighter HLA/melee power starts to become prominent again, while half of the spellbook starts to become useless.
    To summarize/assess the OP's points: PoL is good, but probably not quite as good as OP seems to feel, especially compared to a F/C or F>>C at higher levels.
    Volatile wrote: »
    It's not so hard to be better than a pure fighter
    Being better than a pure fighter is not something to write home about; people have known for decades that casters, whether single class or some variety of multi or dualclass, leave pure warriors behind in the dust eventually.
    Post edited by ithildurnew on
    gorgonzola
  • gorgonzolagorgonzola Member Posts: 3,864
    also in early and mid soa the CM has ways to become powerful.
    just one of the examples is when he uses the troll form from the cloak of the sewers, with a good oh weapon equipped, using some sequencer to buff himself.
    good thac0, good apr and an impressive regeneration if improved hasted, and good enough if not for the enemies you find before your main mage reaches the needed level to cast IH.
    but yes, in the early game his power is more in how he can cast, having 2 pools he has a lot of spells/day to cast and can use the RoV to cast divine spells fast, so his heal spells or other spells that can save a companion in peril actually reach him before is dead.
    or he has some combos like holy power, duhm and MMM, fighter like thac0 and a boost in dex make him a very competent ranged attacker, while a mage often misses against well armored enemies.

    it is true that he lacks of the extreme power and versatility he has late game, when he has access to tools like improved alacrity or CC, but if we consider his overall power, and not only what he can do when he is in mlee, i rate the CM among the most useful and powerful classes as soon as he start to gain some levels.

    maybe my opinion is biased as i usually run small parties, 3 or 4 people, so my characters are overleveled compared to a party of 6. but not so much if someone import from SOD, starting at 500k xp, as i start in bg2 with less then 100k.
  • SikorskySikorsky Member Posts: 402
    I made a case about PoL to Fighter dual here

    It's not, by all means, powerbuild but can be pretty powerful and fun to role-play. In my case, I'm trying to say that this dual is an alternative to Paladin. Is it better than Paladin? I think so, but it's up to you to decide. I think it's also better then pure PoL mentioned in this topic.
    Summarizing Paladin of Lathander build:
    Pros:
    - Can cast 7 level I, 7 level II, 5 level III, 7 level IV and 6 level V cleric spells*.
    - May cast Boon of Lathander once per day. BoL is an innate spell and is therefore actually cast at the average of your two class levels. This means that every 2 fighters levels you have more than cleric levels, Boon of Lathander will last another round
    - Fighter Thac0, ApR, Greater Specialization and HLA
    - 10 round Righteous Magic - Say hello to fully equipped Kensai :)
    - Fast class regain in SoA

    Cons:
    - Clerics hit Points
    - May use only Cleric weapons (not much of a con but still)
    - Weaker then Paladins Turn-Unded
    - You must defeat SoD final boss as 6 level fighter ;)

    *If we read all Tomes of Understanding in BG I, take the good path in hell, Deck of Many Things, Machine of Lum the Mad.





    JuliusBorisovmonicoLudwig_IIgorgonzola
  • monicomonico Member Posts: 571
    edited March 2020
    I agree, PoL dualed to fighter is a very interesting build.

    I did try one long time ago, and did not even notice that my Boon of Lathander was gaining duration as my fighter levels elevated :sweat_smile::sweat_smile:

    The difficult part is deciding at what level to dual. Ideally, if I had the patience, I'd go for lvl11 for moar spells but mainly for another cast of Boon of Lathander.
    Sadly, I don't have the patience, and my past character dualed at lvl9. Still fun and nice though.
    gorgonzolaSikorsky
  • SikorskySikorsky Member Posts: 402
    Also I like to mention that only in this case you can make fun, and pretty damn good, character when dualing from spellcaster. Do you have other ideas that make sense to dual from spellcaster to other class? I don't think so.
    gorgonzola
  • jmerryjmerry Member Posts: 3,822
    Sikorsky wrote: »
    Do you have other ideas that make sense to dual from spellcaster to other class?
    Mage 2, dual-classed to fighter. Forget about your spell slots, and wear heavy armor. You're basically a fighter that can use wands and scrolls, and the familiar hit point bonus compensates for the hit points lost on those two mage levels. A generalist mage is best here; specialists lose access to some of the scrolls, and you're not making use of the specialist's primary benefit of extra spell slots.

    OK, you also lose exceptional strength and are restricted to being a human.
    monico
  • gorgonzolagorgonzola Member Posts: 3,864
    jmerry wrote: »
    You're basically a fighter that can use wands and scrolls
    ............
    OK, you also lose exceptional strength and are restricted to being a human.
    and the SoTM, that is as good as carsomyr to dispel on hit and give a super useful very long lasting spell trap. that staff alone imo is a reason good enough to loose other races bonuses, about the exceptional str it is not grated to roll it, you need to roll a long time to get a meaningful exceptional str and at the same time a good overall stats score.
    and (as we are in the bg2 section) there are 2 cheap spells that give exceptional str and plenty of items, some of them are quite easy to get in chap 2, like the gauntlets and the belt that ribald sells.


    an other viable dual from a caster class to an other is cleric (PoL) into thief, best at 11, but also possible at 9.
    the 1 or 2 boons boost the apr and righteous magic grants a high damaging stab.
    a thief that can boost his stats, get maxed dmg roll, boost his apr, use sanctuary as backup when he fails to hide in shadows and has some other very useful cleric spells has some interesting advantages.
    using joshimo as thief before charname has enough thieving skills the dual is not a problem for the party, specially if in the party there is also jaheira or an other cleric as in the down time charname can not provide divine protections for the party.
    but as soon as you complete the dual you have a very good back stabber, better then a single class even if he still has only a x4 multiplier, as he rolls for maximum damage and stabbing the minimum damage is more important then the maximum one, and a decent divine caster that can go mlee with +1 or +2 apr depending on how much boons he have.
    is not a power game build but is more then viable.
    compared with the dual from thief to cleric gives the PoL boon bonus, x5 stab multiplier, even if a little late in the game, thief hla and the thief progression is the fastest, to reach lev 12 needs only 660k xp, by comparison to dual at 11 into fighter needs 1M xp to complete, into ranger even more.
    only to dual into mage is faster because you can learn scrolls.
    and holy power give you a thac0 that a single class thief reaches only at lev 21 if you dual at 11, thac0 that is boosted by the other cleric spells, buffed the C->T get it more then 1M xp earlier.
    the multi, both CT and FMT are better boosted thieves, no down time and overall more powerful, but wanting to dual from a caster class, as the power is not everything in this game, it is one of the few possibilities that have some sense.


    cleric->ranger is a weaker version of cleric->fighter, as you have longer down time, loose gm and get few advantages as compensation, but imo has a RP value that can make it an interesting choice.



    monico
  • ShangerooShangeroo Member Posts: 84
    edited March 2020
    So if I understand correctly the question is whether a pure cleric with the Priest of Lathander kit is better than either a pure Fighter or Fighter/Cleric?

    Don't see how it would be better than a Fighter/Cleric. Sure you level faster, but getting a F/C to a high level isn't hard. I usually run solo or solo plus romance (2 people parties) so levelling is never an issue.

    If I recall correctly, the PoL just gives that skill with +1 saves, +1 to hit, and 1 attack. But your base APR is always 1 throughout. So with improved haste, boon, and gauntlets you'll get 5 apr.

    Now a fighter/cleric gets the APR bonus's from fighter at 7 and 13. So with haste and gauntlets you get the same apr. However, you also get access to use all the good potions - Potion of heroism will give you that +1 to hit plus hp bonus, potion of invulnerability gives you +5 saves, and you can use potion of storm giant strength (but that's probably redundant as I'm assuming you'll be dual wielding Crom Faeyr and either Runehammer or Flail of Ages). Plus as other mentioned above, you can more HLA options
  • MichelleMichelle Member Posts: 549
    F/C hands down.
    I have used, I think, every variation of PoL and there are only two that stretch the boundaries of what a straight PoL can do and that is a PoL>Mage and a PoL>thief. Vanilla on core rules a PoL can solo the game. PoL>thief dualed at level 15 is perhaps more optimal, okay definitely more optimal. PoL>Mage is ridiculously overpowered. Level 15 is again the time to dual. I have done a PoL level 21 dualed to Mage but don’t bother, it is so powerful as to make the end game a joke and so underpowered before gaining back the cleric abilities that no one should bother. Not sure why I did but wow! When she was full strength, good googly moogly!
    PoL>Fighter doesn’t stack up to a F/C. I wish it did, clerics are my favorite class and any possibility to make them better would be awesome. Berserker>Cleric is also a powerful build. Ranger/Cleric has lost its edge, unfortunately.

    PoL is a solid class in it’s own right, F/C is better. Without the benefits of Improved Alacrity or Sequencers/Contingencies the buff time, or duration of buffs in ToB make the straight PoL lag behind the F/C.
    gorgonzola
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