Brilliant Gameologists Forum
The Thinktank => Min/Max It! => : ImmortalSoul July 17, 2010, 09:28:08 PM
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Hi everyone!
We are going to play "The Shackled City" and currently create a group for it. We are 4 players, though I believe that the number of people actually attending the gaming sessions is rather going to be three. Starting level is 1, of course.
Right now we have:
Human Paladin (probably doesn't optimize at all)
Dwarf Fighter (same for him)
Halfling Rogue (is likely going to optimize)
Well, and me. I expect that most of the sessions only either the paladin or the fighter will be present, so there's one tank-guy, one skillmonkey/trapfinder/glasscanon and a whole lot of interesting roles yet to cover somehow.
I figured I'd go with a Cloistered Cleric - first of all, I never played a cleric (or a divine caster of any sort, actually) before, moreover, I expect the buffing/healing will come in handy. I'll try and pick a lot of knowledge-skills and play a scholar, because I guess I just like the concept of possessing a whole bunch of knowledge-skills and obscure languages. :D
Anyway, as I don't have any experience with clerics at all, I am not sure where to go from there if I manage to survive the first few levels. I read the cleric handbook and considered Divine Oracle as well as Contemplative, and I found a lot of threads concerning cleric builds of some sorts.
But they all seem so assume that I start at level 7 or later, am allowed to pick up any domain I like and already possess DMM and Extra Turning/Nightsticks when the game starts.
Now nothing of that is actually the case. I already chose (and may not change anymore) my race (Lesser Aasimar), my god (Amaunator, whom I'll be allowed to serve even though he is considered a dead deity - his Domains: Law, Nobility, Sun, Planning, Time), the class (cloistered cleric) and the general concept of the character (scholar, not going to be a frontliner, rather running around buffing, healing and throwing powerful divine magic at everything that looks vaguely like an enemy). Most of the books are allowed (no Eberron, though). No flaws, pb32. Setting is Forgotten Realms. Stats, Domains, Feats and the like may still be changed.
Right now I'm thinking about this:
LG Lesser Aasimar CC of Amaunator 1
Stats after racial adjustments:
Str 8
Dex 12
Int 14
Con 14
Wis 18
Cha 16
Feats: Improved Initiative (Time Domain), Extend Spell (Planning Domain), Knowledge Devotion (Feat 1).
And now, there is a number of questions I still have:
1) I want to grab DMM, even though Nightsticks won't stack. Would you, considering the generally rather low powerlevel of the group, rather get persitent or quicken spell?
2) While we have enough melee in my opinion, the group clearly lacks the spellcasting. Again considering the group-setup, how would you proceed class-wise? Which PrCs would you take, and why? Try to not utterly smash the other players' fun and my DM's patience, please :)
3) Should I try to acquire arcane spellcasting, too, or do I spread myself too thin, then? We are using an alternative Sorcerer variant that gets spells as fast as a wizard and may apply metamagic feats without an increase in casting time. Maybe that's an option with the rather high cha?
4) How do I make whatever concept I choose viable at lower levels - that is, before DMM actually pays off and I get some offensive spells?
Additionally, I'd really appreciate any advice you may have on how to play this character effectively, especially at lower levels. I really fear that I won't actually be able to contribute a lot in battles early on.
Thanks in advance,
ImmortalSoul
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Seeing as how you are trying not to smash, I would recommend leaning towards party buffing. Makes the other guys stronger without putting the limelight on yourself. If no one has posted suggestions on this by the time I get to work later (on my phone, atm), I'll throw some stuff up.
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I've played a cleric in The Shackled City and I can definitely say that Church Inquisitor will work well for you, at least up to pierce illusion. Also, Divine Oracle is nice for Evasion. For a mostly not optimized group, Shackled City will not be easy. I'd recommend you make your Cleric as effective as possible and you try to rely on the Rogue's Use Magic Device for some of the Arcane Spells (e.g. Fly). Buffing, Debuffing, Healing is a good role for you in that campaign. As a cloistered cleric, make sure to play your cleric in a careful and cautious way. You can really shine with Summon Monster spells if you need some arcane offensive power in certain situations.
You may want to pick up the Skill Trick Collector of Stories (Complete Adventurer) to further boost your combat knowledge against certain creatures
There will be dead PCs, unless you all play extremely well as a team and are sort of lucky, so you may have a Wizard companion before long :D
Have fun!
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Thanks for you input :)
I can see why Church Inquisitor is good, kinda missed that PrC before. Would you be so kind as to give me an idea on how to progress this character class-wise until, say, level 7?
Moreover, some of the question have not been answered yet, so I'd really appreciate anything you have concerning strategies and the like!
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Your next two feats should be Persist Spell and Divine Metamagic.
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Cloistered Clerics get the Knowledge domain in addition to 2 others allowed by their diety.
Knowledge devotion requires 5 ranks in a knowledge skill... which means you can't take it at 1st level.
Answers to your questions:
1. Persistent
2. With the homebrew sorcerer ruling, I'd play something like a Cloistered Cleric 3/ Sorcerer 3/ Mystic Theurge 10/ xx 4.
Mystic Theurge advances both divine and arcane spellcasting levels. The downside is that you'll be feat starved.
3. It really depends on the DM. A creative one can 'handle' not having the traditional roles covered in an adventuring group. In my group, I try to fill in any gaps that are needed (and thus typically make my character last of everyone).
4. You can have DMM by 3rd level, but with your CHA score you probably won't be able to use it until 6th.
Here's a possible build for you using the above suggestions:
1: Cloistered Cleric (Time(Improved Init), Planning(Extend), Knowledge), Persistent
2: Cloistered Cleric
3: Cloistered Cleric DMM(Persistent), Convert Knowledge domain to devotion (don't forget your bonus KS skill)
4: Sorcerer
5: Sorcerer
6: Sorcerer: Extra Turning (DMM needs 7 turn attempts per spell that gets persisted)
7: Mystic Theurge (since you get spells as fast as wizard, you can qualify for this PrC now)
8: Mystic Theurge
9: Mystic Theurge: Sculpt
10: Mystic Theurge
11: Mystic Theurge
12: Mystic Theurge: Arcane Thesis (Wings of Flurry)
13: Mystic Theurge
14: Mystic Theurge
15: Mystic Theurge: Practiced Spellcaster
16: Mystic Theurge
17: xx
18: xx: [Open Feat]
19: xx
20: xx
If you want more Persisted goodies, then take more Extra Turning feats, and less arcane ones.
You could also take Heighten and Fiery Burst to always have some blasting power.
An alternative to this build would be to take Cloister Cleric 5/ Crusader 1/ RVK 10 / xx 4
Cheers.
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Once again, thank you very much!
This looks like I might really enjoy playing it - I've always liked not being a one-trick-pony. Just to clear things up for me: I won't be able to DMM(Persist) my Sorcerer spells, will I?
3. It really depends on the DM. A creative one can 'handle' not having the traditional roles covered in an adventuring group. In my group, I try to fill in any gaps that are needed (and thus typically make my character last of everyone).
I've always felt my DM was good at adapting challenges to the players, but we don't want to change the adventure too drastically so I'm fine with "filling in the gaps".
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Shackled City, if run correctly, will kill your characters. A few times. With the group you have, you are going to die a lot.
See if you can get the Paladin to go Crusader, and the Fighter to go Warblade. It will improve your overall group's performance by over 9000.
As for your cleric, there's no wrong way to do it if you're going to use persisted spells. I don't really know the optimization level of your group so it's harder to suggest a build that will be acceptable for your table.
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Once again, thank you very much!
This looks like I might really enjoy playing it - I've always liked not being a one-trick-pony. Just to clear things up for me: I won't be able to DMM(Persist) my Sorcerer spells, will I?
That would be really awesome, if you could. Maybe your DM would let you, but by RAW it's divine spells only.
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You can replace the Knowledge Domain Powers or the Inquisition Domain Powers (I'd recommend the Inquisition Domain which you'd get from Church Inquisitor) with Knowledge Devotion. Then, you won't have to fulfill any prerequisites.
(Inq. Domain also trades to Knowledge Devotion, according to the Complete Champion list - then, you will have all Knowledge Skills, a ton of skill points, and Knowledge Devotion (concentrate on Nature, Religion, The Planes, Arcana and Dungeoneering for maximum effect of Knowledge Devotion). If you won't take Church Inquisitor, take Knowledge Devotion and pick Knowledge Nature - a nice bonus against humanoids and animals is always great.
Afaik, you have to trade or keep Domain powers as soon as you get them.
I'd also recommend Solo's input. After that, extra turning will be great for you :)
Black Knight's build is a good one, but I'm not sure about a Mystic Theurge in Shackled City, you may be too far behind in Spell Levels.
I'd probably go Cloistered Cleric 3 / Church Inquisitor X / Divine Oracle (at least 2) / Cloistered Cleric (up to lvl 9) / Contemplative at least 1 for another Domain. I cannot look it up atm :/
Feats will be Persist, Dmm:Persist, Extra Turning (probably multiple times). Take a reach weapon for additional safety if you want to have some impact in fights. You don't have shield proficiency as a Cloistered Cleric, so, pick up a Longspear and a Crossbow.
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You can replace the Knowledge Domain Powers or the Inquisition Domain Powers (I'd recommend the Inquisition Domain which you'd get from Church Inquisitor) with Knowledge Devotion. Then, you won't have to fulfill any prerequisites.
(Inq. Domain also trades to Knowledge Devotion, according to the Complete Champion list - then, you will have all Knowledge Skills, a ton of skill points, and Knowledge Devotion (concentrate on Nature, Religion, The Planes, Arcana and Dungeoneering for maximum effect of Knowledge Devotion). If you won't take Church Inquisitor, take Knowledge Devotion and pick Knowledge Nature - a nice bonus against humanoids and animals is always great.
Afaik, you have to trade or keep Domain powers as soon as you get them.
But that would mean I couldn't get knowledge devotion at all if I didn't go Church Inquisitor. I don't have the CC with me right now, but I'll have to look that up.
See if you can get the Paladin to go Crusader, and the Fighter to go Warblade. It will improve your overall group's performance by over 9000.
I'd love to do that, but that's likely not going to happen, they feel that ToB is way too complicated anyway. Maybe I can get the fighter to go Deepwarden, but nothing ToB'ish.
Concerning the difficulty of the adventure:
I really think my DM will be able to make the adventure at least easy enough to not ruin our fun completely. Sure, someone is likely going to die once in a while, but that's what I ask for here: Help me build a character that, if played correctly, survives and helps people survive. :)
And concerning the Mystic Theurge:
I lack the experience to know if that build is good before, say, level 10, or if the lost casterlevels cripple it until at least the midgame. Of course, a straight divine caster as MorgenTao suggested likely loses less strenght early on. Any additional thoughts on that?
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I've played in Shackled City a few times and gotten to mid-levels (8-10).
Mystic Theurge sucked terrible ball sack. Getting no class abilities sucks and you will find yourself wishing you were a straight single classed caster all the time. That is what I saw at the table in actual gameplay when we had a Mystic Theurge playing. Terrible HP/saves and no spell oomph when you really need it.
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After scanning over the spell choices and the like I fear you might be right. It'll be awesome if I survive until the midgame, but probably rather annoying before, all with getting the useful spells so very late.
Okay, going with what MorgenTao suggested:
Cloistered Cleric 1 - Imp. Init. (Time), Extend (Planning), Persist (Feat)
Cloistered Cleric 2
Cloistered Cleric 3 - DMM(Persist)
Church Inquisitor 1 - Inquisition Domain (give up for Knowledge Devotion)
Church Inquisitor 2
Church Inquisitor 3 - Extra Turning
Right now I'm facing a problem though: I need skill focus[knowledge(religion)] for Divine Oracle, but don't want to delay Extra Turning any further as I need it direly for DMM. What could I fit in here? More levels of Church Inquisitor don't look so strong to me. Neither do 3 more levels of Cloistered Cleric, though. Technically, I could go Divine Oracle at level 10 (after I got the skill focus at 9) and 11 and move on into Contemplative then. Still, there has to be something more effective than that.
Any thoughts? :)
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You can get a Nightstick first, take Skill Focus Know. Religion, and take Extra Turning later. It will net you only one persisted spell anyways at that level. Ok, maybe two if you have a Cloak of Charisma :) You could also skip Divine Oracle, but Evasion is sort of useful in my eyes, it adds safety to your somewhat feeble existance as a Cloistered Cleric.
And now I know why it all seemed to fit so perfectly for my characters - I always took Human as my race :D
You're right, you could always take Div Oracle later, some Skill Points of your Cl. Cleric put into your Knowledges are really a good thing if you have Knowledge Devotion. So there may be better choices, but you can always take some extra Cl. Cleric levels, it will certainly not be a bad decision.
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I'm a bit late to the party, but I'd say:
1) Run away from any ideas of Mystic Theurge as fast as possible. Your DMs house rules make the sorcerer decent, but the MT still sucks donkey balls.
2) How about a "Wannabe Wizard"? You can pretty easily enter Shadowcraft Mage with a cloistered cleric, and with the Divine Magician ACF you can add quite a few wiz/sorc spells to your spell list. In the end, you can wind up as a very versatile caster able to cover both the divine and arcane roles in your party without sacrificing any spellcasting levels at all. Example builds with varying levels of cheese can be found here (http://brilliantgameologists.com/boards/index.php?topic=346.0)and here (http://brilliantgameologists.com/boards/index.php?topic=4524.msg186556#msg186556).
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I second Shadowcraft mage consideration if your DM will allow you to play it without being a gnome. I'm playing a Cloistered Cleric/SCM right now and it is great.
Divne Magician is a nice ACF and there is also the Spontaneous Domain from PHBII I think that would allow you to cast your Silent Images spontaneiously. That would mean a Domain change for Silent Image though :)
Church Inquisitor is also a very good option for filler levels and you can do it and SCM if you go high enough level.
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Gnomes aren't so bad...
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Gnomes are fine, but I chose to play a Lesser Aasimar and won't be able to change that now. Moreover, I don't think the Shadowcraft Mage fits my character fluffwise at all (lawful good CC who is all about learning and justice and the like... no, doesn't seem such a good idea).
Divine Magician looks cool though. I found your thread on it a while ago, but just sort of scanned it - gonna give it a more detailed look tomorrow. Would you recommend taking it over Knowledge Domain? If I go Church Inquisitor, I won't need that any more if I'm not missing something. I don't have the book at hand (where is Divine Magician, tome of magic?), so I'm not certain on whether I understood correctly how it works.
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Gnomes are fine, but I chose to play a Lesser Aasimar and won't be able to change that now. Moreover, I don't think the Shadowcraft Mage fits my character fluffwise at all (lawful good CC who is all about learning and justice and the like... no, doesn't seem such a good idea).
Divine Magician looks cool though. I found your thread on it a while ago, but just sort of scanned it - gonna give it a more detailed look tomorrow. Would you recommend taking it over Knowledge Domain? If I go Church Inquisitor, I won't need that any more if I'm not missing something. I don't have the book at hand (where is Divine Magician, tome of magic?), so I'm not certain on whether I understood correctly how it works.
Yeah, if you've already started I could see how retooling to enter SCM might not work...
Mister Sinister just made a new Divine Magician Handbook (in the handbooks section). It is probably better than the half-assed thing I made. :P The ACF is from Complete Mage, IIRC. I think I replaced the Knowledge domain with that on my Wannabe Wizard character in the 2nd link above.
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Not started, but written a looong background story (which I rather enjoyed so I feel I should stick to it :D ). Okay, new question:
Yes, I could delay Extra Turning and get a Nightstick (should be possible, even though my DM is rather sceptical about them, but just one ought to be fine). Or I get both and enter Divine Oracle 3 levels later, which delays Evasion though.
As I expect the adventure to be full of deadly traps after what I read here, the first options looks better. Or is there any class to fill in this 3 levels that really shines as a dip for me?
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Honestly, Crusader 1 helps a lot to keep you alive. Delayed damage pool and healing strike/aura. Very useful. Could lead into Rubyknight later on.
You're right about the traps. Each one can potentially kill a PC if the DM is playing them as written.
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That would mean changing the general concept rather drastically imho. And as you will have noticed, I'm hesitant about that. Right now, my character is explicitly _not_ a melee cleric, otherwise I'd have chosen very different stats, but a caster/buffer/healer with the option of beating stuff up as soon as persist really starts to help. Until then? Not so much.
A third melee-guy doesn't seem all that clever to me, anyway.
You're right about the traps. Each one can potentially kill a PC if the DM is playing them as written.
So you say I should go Divine Oracle as early as possible? Maybe I should try to convice my DM of allowing one flaw for the skill focus (choosing something more drastic, like having only one arm or something :D ).
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Divine Oracle is great if you can get into it very early and with that whole Skill Focus feat requirement for a minimum expenditure of resources.
If you have to actually burn a feat on it, the entire PrC is still super great and everything, but you're behind another Persisted Spell, more or less.
I get not wanting to go into Crusader as thematically it doesn't fit, but mechanically it would help you not die. All I can offer here is, hope bad stuff happens to someone else or that your DM fudges the module.
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Not started, but written a looong background story (which I rather enjoyed so I feel I should stick to it :D ). Okay, new question:
Yes, I could delay Extra Turning and get a Nightstick (should be possible, even though my DM is rather sceptical about them, but just one ought to be fine). Or I get both and enter Divine Oracle 3 levels later, which delays Evasion though.
As I expect the adventure to be full of deadly traps after what I read here, the first options looks better. Or is there any class to fill in this 3 levels that really shines as a dip for me?
There are ways to deal with traps other than being/having a rogue. I haven't read or played the adventure, but long duration summoned things can set off most traps. Hell, an Unseen Servant dragging around a "scarecrow" can both be "bait" to draw out hidden opponents, and also set off non-magical traps. For magical traps, there is always Detect Magic... Non-magical traps shouldn't be able to tell the difference between a 100 lb sack of sand and a 100 lb adventurer.
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Well, we have a rogue, so chances are the "normal" traps are going to get him first. I'm not the heaviest in our party nor the lightest, so that's all fine. If we stick to some sort of plan (like rogue going first, me not going last), we should be fine. After what I read here it's probably not going to be that easy, though, so I might need Evasion once in a while.
Even more so as my summons only last a round/level if I don't miss something entirely there.
Hell, an Unseen Servant dragging around a "scarecrow" can both be "bait" to draw out hidden opponents, and also set off non-magical traps.
I totally love this idea and will come back to it the second I find a way to do it. Looks like it's not a cleric spell, though - any simple way to still acquire it? :D
Btw, I still appreciate any additional ideas concerning the character! :)
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Not to sound too pessimistic, but... play in an extremely careful way. In Shackled City, almost every encounter is dangerous and can potentially be deadly :D Play like you are paranoid. That also fits well with Church Inquisitor, treachery is everywhere! :)
Other than that.. get Winged Boots, or at least Slippers of Spider Climb, they're extremely useful to save yourself. And if you are relatively safe, the other party members will be a lot safer for sure.
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Hell, an Unseen Servant dragging around a "scarecrow" can both be "bait" to draw out hidden opponents, and also set off non-magical traps.
I totally love this idea and will come back to it the second I find a way to do it. Looks like it's not a cleric spell, though - any simple way to still acquire it? :D
Actually, Unseen Servant IS added to the Cloistered Cleric spell list.
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Heck, I absolutely missed that. You're correct of course. Thank you! :)
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Casting "Raise Thread"...
Okay guys. I had some more time to think about this character as, sadly, our adventure has not yet begun. In the meantime I considered two options I found interesting after reading the respective handbooks, mechanically as well as for roleplaying them.
The first is getting a familiar, possibly even a celestial or draconic one. That's two feats spent though, and I wonder whether this is worth it. Still, it would get me a way to deliver touch spells and possibly some nice skills, wouldn't it?
The second: As a flaw my GM sort of allowed me a combination of lightweighted and noncombatant (making me a rather small Aasimar without the actual benefits of being small, of course). This would possibly allow me to take a medium sized mount, though. How strong is the feat "Wild Cohort"? I mean, it sounds like a fun option, getting a riding dog companion that improves with me, but I don't quite see the advantage my character gets over simply buying a riding dog that's worth spending a feat on it. Or am I missing something obvious?
Any thoughts appreciated, again :)
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The DM is letting you have a familiar?
Wild Cohort is a lot better if you can take the caster PrC that goes along with it (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/re/20031209a), and lets you share spells and stuff with your mount. It is techincally an arcane PrC, but I don't see why it couldn't be adapted directly to a divine one. It basically turns you into a quasi-druid, at least as far as your animal companion is concerned. I don't know where the Mounted Casting feat it refers to is at, though.
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Oh dammit. It's "arcane caster level". Nevermind, then. :mad
Okay, forget that I ever came up with that. Still, is there any possibility to acquire a useful mount for The Shackled City? I've heard there's a lot of dungeons. The Prestige Class looks promissing, thanks, but I'm not sure if I want to spend 5 levels on that. How good are the various versions of leadership (including dragon cohort and the like) for getting a mount? My cha score is rather high, but I don't know the feats by heart and don't have my books with me right now...
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I've never played the Shackled City, but of course Leadership is the most powerful feat in the entire friggin' game, so...
I hear wildshaped druids make excellent mounts. :D
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When you are going cloistered cleric, remember to grab a level of prestige paladin sooner or later. It gives you armour profiency and weapon profiency and more spells. That way you can survive a bit easier.
A cloistered cleric with divine magician can be a decent god. That will help the other PCs in making them feel cool, but it might frustrate your DM.
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When you are going cloistered cleric, remember to grab a level of prestige paladin sooner or later. It gives you armour profiency and weapon profiency and more spells. That way you can survive a bit easier.
A cloistered cleric with divine magician can be a decent god. That will help the other PCs in making them feel cool, but it might frustrate your DM.
If you're going to dip PrPal, you might as well go in for two levels and get a decent mount, since it seems you want one. Ask if you can take the Drakkensteed mount alternate class feature, also. It's like a free upgrade to a much better mount. Tack on the Holy Mount feat, and you should be good to go.
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Hm, did someone mention Skill focus: Knowledge (Religion), and not mention it can be bought for 3000 gp from Fane of the Frog God?
BAD DOGGIE!
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Frog God's Fane is Complete Scoundrel, right?
On hearing it, it does not exactly sound like I'm gonna get it past my DM, but I'll try.
Concerning the idea of going Prestige Paladin:
I'm not sure about that. The concept I have now kinda puts emphasis on my character not being a strong melee combatant and I don't want to change that now, one reason being that the thing our group does not lack are, in fact, tanky melee characters. I'd rather be some sort of divine god, really. :D
Moreover, going two levels would be at the cost of one spell level. But it would give me divine grace... oh well.
Let me go into some detail on why I thought about getting a mount. One of the points is, obviously mobility. But then I could buy a horse, after all. Second point is: It's way better if it offers me the possibility to fly. Third point, to me most important right now: as it's the Shackled City, it has to be able to follow me into dungeons and still be useful there.
Fact is, it would improve my survivability greatly if I was able to escape my opponents easier that way. Even if it really only helps on the first levels it's good, because I get stronger and a lot less squishy the more turning attempts i can acquire.
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Frog God's Fane is Complete Scoundrel, right?
On hearing it, it does not exactly sound like I'm gonna get it past my DM, but I'll try.
Concerning the idea of going Prestige Paladin:
I'm not sure about that. The concept I have now kinda puts emphasis on my character not being a strong melee combatant and I don't want to change that now, one reason being that the thing our group does not lack are, in fact, tanky melee characters. I'd rather be some sort of divine god, really. :D
Moreover, going two levels would be at the cost of one spell level. But it would give me divine grace... oh well.
Let me go into some detail on why I thought about getting a mount. One of the points is, obviously mobility. But then I could buy a horse, after all. Second point is: It's way better if it offers me the possibility to fly. Third point, to me most important right now: as it's the Shackled City, it has to be able to follow me into dungeons and still be useful there.
Fact is, it would improve my survivability greatly if I was able to escape my opponents easier that way. Even if it really only helps on the first levels it's good, because I get stronger and a lot less squishy the more turning attempts i can acquire.
Medium sized mount + mighty steed feat?
DotU has options for spider mounts that can cling to walls and stuff.
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Hey I'm currently playing in a Shackled City/Age of Worms campaign and recently hit level 14. I'm playing a Dragonblood Sorcerer, Focused Specialist Conjurar, Ultimate Magus and have had a lot of success early on in the campaign with glitterdust and Grease. I'm playing with 3 others (all melee oriented) which means my cloud spells (best available Conjuration spells currently) are often getting in the way (they get miss-chances due to concealment), so I'm relegated to throwing around Orbs and various buff spells - not really optimal. If I could redo my character I'd probably play a Transmuter instead and focus on buffing first and BC next.
In our group we have a Dwarf Fighter Tank, Half-Elf Rogue/Fighter Precision Damage Dealer, a Pelor CoDzilla Radiant Servant and me God Wizard type. The cleric has been invaluable so far, but then we've met a truck-load of undead due to our campaign being a mix of AoW and TSC, TSC normally doesn't have a lot of undead. Also, don't think you can get by with out-of-combat healing (vigor and whatnot), you really need to be able to do in-combat healing. Even if you had a BC God Wizard there are just too many encounters early on (first few dungeons) for him to negate damage consistently, and later on Glitterdust and Grease will have too low DC to be reliable (researching Kelpstrand helps, though ;)). A melee combat BC-machine (Fighter/Crusader/whatever) would be waaay better early on because he wouldn't be operating with a limited amount of BC-spells. Also, get a trapfinder. You won't regret it. This has been my experience with the campaign so far.
If you're going to play a Cleric don't lock yourself into one role (healing), you really need a lot of bodies taking damage in TSC so being able to take (or negate) and inflict damage is essentiel. Being a Cloistered Cleric is going to hurt you early on (like.. a lot) because of low hit points, bad base attack and only having light armor proficiency, regular cleric would be better until you can get Divine Power and better armor proficiency. Look into DMM persist, Divine Power and maybe even taking Divine Ward to be able to heal from a distance.
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Being a Cloistered Cleric is going to hurt you early on (like.. a lot) because of low hit points, bad base attack and only having light armor proficiency, regular cleric would be better until you can get Divine Power and better armor proficiency.
It might... if he were wanting to tank. But he's explicitly not.
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I know, but having played the campaign with 3 guys to tank for me and having Abrupt Jaunt, I still got beat on. Him standing behind 2 tanks won't help him a lot.
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Well, that's basically why I thought having one of these fancy mounts would help.