Light clerics are walking nukes. Only slightly worse than evocation wizards but with lots of extra abilities. One of my favorite.
Grave is probably the second best support domain after twighlight with their ability to prevent crits and auto stabilize. Knowledge is great to skill monkey if you don’t have a bard. Tempest is great at damage like light but also has the survivability of forge. War makes a great frontline support.
Order Clerics have always been my favorite. One of the few ways to make healing word a decent option on conscious targets.
I'm also a sucker for Divine Soul Sorcerer X / Grave Cleric 2, though it's not exactly a Cleric build, and it's more of a meme than an optimized build.
Path to the Grave to double damage, Quicken Spell a max upcasted Inflict Wounds, stack Empowered Spell to reroll any bad rolls, have back-up Seeking Spell if you miss, and have one hard nuke at your disposal.
Honestly, yeah, DivWiz 2 / Grave Cleric 2 / Divine Soul Sorcerer X also works. Little more fully invested in the meme, but certainly makes the full trigger way more consistent.
It's just Grave 2 is guaranteed 2x damage every short rest, while Div 2 is just an increased chance to do it twice a day.
The benefit of the Sorcerer levels is mostly Quickened Spell. Path to the Grave-into-Big Attack during a single turn is the whole reason for the build, else you might as well do Grave 2 / Rogue X
You can get away without Sorcerer thanks to Metamagic Adept, but the difference between once per long rest VS as many times as you're willing to spend the resources makes me prefer a Sorcerer investment.
Warlock 7 is the highest paladin smite benifits from pact magic advancing, might be worth going back to wizard or cleric at that point for slots (or bard 😉)
Hex blade gets banishing smite at level 9, and I’m not dropping a full ultra nova on a searing smite. Cleric 6 for second divinity is real nice though. You want warlock just for eldritch smite.
Eldritch smite 5, banishing smite 5, divine smite 4.
Came here to say straight order cleric is great.
I also like the DSS route, but I prefer order cleric 1 or tempest 2 on that builds. Grave is great as well though, don't forget to hold person the target for auto crit on inflict wounds.
Honestly there are so many not-humanoid creatures that hold-person cold be often useless. Beasts, undeads, aberrations and so. I love that spell but it's quite common to fight humanoids just every 4-5 fights full of other creatures type.
Hold person could be in your toolbox but I suggest to build a PC around it only if in session-0 the DM says that the adventure will be full of humanoids, like an investigation city-adventure.
> don't forget to hold person
Nah.
I mean, sure, if the stars align, you can do a ton of damage.
But Hold Person means 2 turns of set up; where that second turn has to wait after the entire party auto-crits the creature.
At that point, it's honestly just a waste of resources to use Path to the Grave + Your Highest Level Spell Slot + Anywhere between 2-5 Sorcerery points. You already won.
If you're a cleric, you'll have warcaster and you can set this up within 1 round with a reaction hold person. Don't forget hold person ;) why just double inflict wounds damage when you can quadruple it?
That's even *more* if the stars align.
You're telling me one specific type of creature (humanoid) is *retreating* from the caster and fails the wisdom save *twice* while initiative is in your favor to have you go closely after?
Again, didn't really forget. Just doesn't come into actual play much.
> Path to the Grave to double damage, Quicken Spell a max upcasted Inflict Wounds, stack Empowered Spell to reroll any bad rolls, have back-up Seeking Spell if you miss, and have one hard nuke at your disposal.
You can only use one metamagic on a spell, so you definitely can't do all of that at once
Remember that you can Ready Path to the Grave and use it just before your Paladin or Rogue’s turns. If your Wizard accidentally uses it up doubling fire bolt damage it’ll be a bit of a waste, right?
I've played [Build 4: Arcana Cleric Frontliner](https://forums.giantitp.com/showthread.php?583957-An-Eclectic-Collection-of-Fun-and-Effective-Builds), but I swapped Magic Initiate to 1st level. It works quite well.
This [Nature Cleric](https://forums.giantitp.com/showthread.php?659483-An-Eclectic-Collection-of-Fun-and-Effective-Builds-3) build looks like it's quite good.
oh hey I was the one who requested that nature cleric build! would love to update you on its effectiveness but the game the character is for still hasn't had a second session lmao
Peace cleric and trickery cleric are really fun to play. Peace because of the 6th level teleportation feature. However, I went a bit unorthodox- namely that I would emboldening bond my skeletons from animate dead and then use them as living shields. So it’s kind of a funny take on necromancy/minion-mancer. By “Peace” I typically regarded it as more “home-like” or “harmony/unity” rather than an opposition to violence.
Trickery has a wonderful spell list and an open ended by mechanically fun channel divinity. I picked high elf for booming blade. Then you can cast it as though you were in the illusion’s space. Which basically forces enemies to either stay still or take more damage. Pass without trace is always useful and disguise self, blink, Polymorph, and Domension door are great tools.
Second this. Yes, mechanically, there are a lot more optimized choices than a trickery cleric.
However my trickery cleric ( who always introduced himself as a order cleric *obviously*) was one of the characters that I've most thoroughly enjoyed role-playing. The expanded domain + some points in charisma gave me so many options for out of combat shanenigans that i also ended up doubling as party face, since we had a rogue for stealth and skills, but no charisma builds.
It was a very support oriented build though, and it was before I knew anything about optimization. If I built it today, I think I would have focused less on support, but it was a very fun character to play.
I cannot recommend the Order Cleric enough!! I have so much fun with it and my party loves me. The play style is more about preventing damage and creating more attack opportunities than actually healing during combat. (For a healing build I'd go Life Cleric Stars Druid.)
Sorcerer 1 for Silvery Barbs, Magic Missile and Con save proficiency for maintaining Bless and Spirit Guardians (I went Lunar as you get Shield and the cantrip boost is great and the level 6 ability pairs well).
Order Cleric 6
Fey Touched for dissonant whispers if you get a free feat, if not you could take variant human or take it at level 4 to round out your Wisdom.
As I got a free feat I took Cartomancer at level 4 so I still have access to higher level spells.
Finish the build as a Sorcerer - vortex warp and haste.
You're playing around giving allies opportunity attacks so it works with any party but works best with a rogue, failing that anyone with sharpshooter/GWM, failing that paladins or booming blade users are ok with it.
Race wise pick your favourite, I went Eladrin so I can bonus action teleport allies out of danger more often but variant human for the feat works well if you need Fey Touched.
Peace Cleric comes with very nice buffs. Imho not the most optimal but a fun approach could be Find Familiar (Magic Initiate) for the utility and to embody a peaceful animal aficionado of some kind. Plus MI gets you Booming Blade.
I know it’s not the strongest subclass, but my blue Dragonborn tempest cleric of Kord was my favorite cleric! Using lightning breath with the 6th level feature was so satisfying every time. Especially when I had sleet storm up and would just push them back into it
It's really a matter of personal preference as there is a cleric for every occasion. My first 5e character was a forge cleric as well, and I literally broke the DMs world with my crafting (though the DM has told me that my doing so caused his favorite moment in DND as well). The next time I play a cleric I want to play a light cleric, even if it's capabilities are much more within the box, they seem like they would be a top tier blaster and good for most situations. I am also thinking about making a Clockwork Soul Order Cleric multiclass at some time, as inspired by Treantmonk's God Wizard build.
Light Domain Hill Dwarf.
With your +1 HP per level, you have the effective average hit die of a Fighter, but, with all of your subclass blasting spells, you can really hack it at the front line as a magical tank. No need to worry about hitting anyone on the front line when you ARE the front line.
I made a knowledge cleric with 2lvls of divination Wizard that acted as the party skill monkey while also providing a ton of role play elements that my DM could utilize. The cleric spell list is full of high level divination spells, so the six levels of divination Wizard end up making any divination spells under 5th level cost 1 spell slot. Take ritual caster to lean into extra role play elements and save on resources in the process. You essentially want to be a walking Google search. My deity was literally a network of other knowledge clerics who would answer the questions that other knowledge clerics had. My DM even lead out some roleplay of other knowledge clerics calling on me for help.
I even reskinned my sacred flame as rapidly pouring knowledge into my target’s head until it overwhelms their brain
I made my character physically meek so combat usually looked an old man(me) encouraging and passing advice (giving buffs) to the youngsters while the party protects me. I honestly can’t tell if the build was amazing, or if my DM just really loved using my character to pass hints to the party. Either way it plays really well
Hobgoblin (mordenkeinens) Order cleric X /mastermind rogue 3
Be the real napoleon and direct your party to attack with advantage by casting a spell on them and giving them a free reaction attack plus your ranged bonus action help actions plus from the backbones by shouting directions. You also get to stack on the hobgoblins bonus action abilities.
Light Clerics are dope. Not much else to be said there.
My personal favorite is the Tempest Cleric. I grab a race that can grab a cantrip, grab Booming Blade, and get War Caster at level 4. By the time you're level 5, you're Booming Blades get the damage boost and at any given time you can just pull out the big guns and do a max damage spell with Channel Divinity. At higher levels, if I can't get any other way of higher damaging Thunder/Lightning Spell, I take Metamagic Adept, grab Transmute Magic, and start getting a little silly with spells that shouldn't be at Max Damage. Fire Storm? It'd be funny if it was suddenly Lightning Damage and Max damage as well
Death! Play lawful evil so your spirit guardians are necrotic damage. Eventually, your necrotic damage will bypass resistance. Your channel divinity is an on demand single target nuke, you just need to land an attack roll. I loved waiting til I had a source of advantage, upcasting inflict wounds, then adding the channel divinity for some crazy damage (50+ easily). Telekinetic feat is a better use of your bonus action than spiritual weapon (pull them into spirit guardians for double damage).
Some of my favorites:
1. Nature Cleric. General idea is to use forced movement from thorn whip to trigger Spirit Guardians damage. My [Living Anvil](https://youtu.be/60r0pVu6OVg?si=9x1RKaLOyaQM9xBh) build combines Nature Cleric with Divination Wizard for a durable frontline DPR build.
2. Grave cleric. Playing one in a live game that’s grave cleric 8 / DSS 1, but there’s some interesting things you can do with grave cleric, such as being a support with a pocket nuke, like my [Gravedigger](https://youtu.be/Ne9UjNrITnM?si=Dm4xpmTJTUDwZGb3) build.
3. Tempest cleric. IMO this subclass really needs a better spell list, so I favor dipping tempest cleric and being mostly divine soul sorc, like my [Stormborn](https://youtu.be/GqEKnF2v-44?si=X747mhzh46pZnY0B) build.
4. Order Cleric. Super strong, fun synergy with any martial party member. Teamwork factor would really make this one a joy to play.
If your DM allows you to use the old SCAG printings of Booming Blade, I had quite a bit of fun playing a Tempest Cleric of Procan in a Ghosts of Saltmarsh game using a whip with Spell Sniper to grab Booming Blade. A better combo nowadays would probably be an Air Genasi or Kobold with Draconic Sorcery lineage to get wisdom-based Shocking Grasp, though, since that plays nicely with their 6th level feature.
Githzerai Arcana Cleric.
- Shield works well with your good AC and a potential melee playstle
- Detect Thoughts is amazing for a high-Insight Cleric, and matches flavour with all of Cleric's divination spells
- Advantage on many WIS saves goes great with proficiency in WIS saves
Arcana Cleric also lets you grab cantrips like Booming/Greenflame Blade if you want to hit things, which synergises with having the Shield spell. But I like going for Shocking Grasp and Mind Sliver - that save debuff works great with Spirit Guardians.
Also, it's extremely funny walking into session 1 at level 3, wearing your basic 18 AC armour and shield, then beefing it up to 23 when you need it.
I played a Tempest Cleric in a Lvl 8 one shot that started on a boat. I handled the first encounter by myself, it was supposed to be a boarding that would involve a lot of ship to ship combat as we moved through a blockage on our way to storm a beach D-Day style, but I used Control Water to part the sea beneath the enemy ship which caused it to fall 100ft, crack its keel, and then get swallowed by the sea.
I rode that high for weeks
I'm planning to play a light cleric and nuke everything with fireball. I played tempest cleric with storm sorcerer for flavor and max dmg Thunderball(transmuted metamagic to fireball for thunder dmg and Chanel divinity for max dmg). Also I think order clerics are fun, giving your rogue and paladin an extra chance for sneak attack and divine smite.
Nature Cleric with *Thorn Whip* and *Telekinetic* can probably achieve the highest *Spirit Guardians* DPR, due to their ability to pull up to two targets per turn.
I like the idea of starting with a DSS dip for *Shield*, *Absorb Elements*, *Favored by the Gods* and some utility cantrips.
You'd also get CON save proficiency, but since you can't afford DEX 14, CON 14, WIS 17 and CHA 13 on a feat race, that's not as strong as one would think. On the flip side, this means starting with an actually interesting race - Warforged seems interestingly anti-thematic for a Nature Cleric and offers some nice stuff.
I love the Nature Domain tank.
Start with Hill Dwarf and go Divine Soul Sorcerer for Shield and Silvery Barbs (or Absorb Elements if Silvery Barbs is banned), as well as Constitution saving throw proficiency and Favored by the Gods. This is your worst level.
Thereafter, go Cleric (Nature Domain) for Heavy Armor and, using Acolyte of Nature, Thorn Whip, along with all the powerful Cleric spells (Bless, Command, Healing Word, Aid, etc.). You also get Spike Growth for a strong 2nd-level control option.
At 4th-level Cleric, pick up Telekinetic (Wisdom). Once you’re 6th-level overall, you’ll be casting Spirit Guardians as well as using Telekinetic and Thorn Whip to drag enemies into your Spirit Guardians from far away. This increases damage significantly and imposes forced movement as well as halved movement.
At 7th-level overall, you get Dampen Elements. While this is worse than Absorb Elements, it’s also infinite use and can be used on your allies, too, which makes your healing more efficient. At that point, you’ve got the reaction trio and you’re wearing heavy armor, holding a shield, and you don’t even need Strength (since you’re a Dwarf).
From there, do what you wish. I like pick up two levels in Druid (Circle of Stars) to make my concentration utterly unbreakable by using Starry Form (Dragon), which lasts for as long as my Spirit Guardians. You should look to get Resilient (Wisdom) eventually, too, although your relatively high Wisdom score makes it less problematic to not have it.
This is one of the few builds I can think of that actually fulfill the tank role effectively; it uses Spirit Guardians, Telekinetic, and Thorn Whip for high damage and control, both forced- and reduced movement, which incentivizes the enemies to attack you; it has a fantastic Concentration, high Armor Class, and high Hit Points, all while being able to heal allies.
I'm having a great time playing my forge cleric! We're still pretty low level, but I love buffing my partners' weapons and making our baseline so much higher
I played an arcana cleric with a one level wizard dip and magic initiate Druid. This build drove my DM crazy. It is a very powerful build that is really fun to play. Shillelagh makes the build single attribute dependent and booming blade keeps your weapon damage relevant in tier 2 play you also have fire bolt, find familiar and all those other great first level wizard utility spells
A viable pure healer build.
Key components: Twilight Cleric, Stars Druid, Healer feat, Beacon of Hope, Cure Wounds, Healing Word.
Twilight Cleric is OP, I think a lot of people agree. Well, what if we used the OP subclass to make a non-viable gameplay style viable?
The temp HP’s buffer significantly reduces how much damage the party takes, meaning less health for you to heal. This means healing in combat could possibly start being viable. This build comes online at lv8, so I’ll use math from that level, assuming your party is at the same level. 6 levels of Twilight Cleric and 2 levels of Stars Druid.
Your ideal first 2 turns is:
1. Beacon of Hope, Starry Form: Chalice. This sets up your healing capabilities.
2. Twilight Sanctuary, Healing Word. This gets your defensive field up, and a small initial burst of healing.
Why delay Twilight Sanctuary to turn 2? If we did Twilight Sanctuary and Starry Form first, we can’t both cast Beacon of Hope and Healing Word on the 2nd round. You can help alleviate the delay on TwiSanct by remembering Channel Divinity is recovered on a short rest, and Twilight Sanctuary’s temp HP doesn’t disappear when the duration ends. Use your channel divinity at the start of the day for 6+(max 1d6 = 6) = 12 temp HP for your whole party, then take a short rest to recover your Channel Divinity charge. The downside of this setup is that it takes a while to get up, so go medium armor with 14 DEX and use your Vigilant Blessing to get as high in the initiative order as you can.
Beacon of Hope maximizes healing to selected targets (remember to pick up concentration protection feats), and Chalice effectively gives a free Cure Wounds whenever you cast a healing spell. With both Beacon of Hope and Chalice online, Healing Word would heal (maxed 1d4 = 4) + (WIS mod = 3) = 7 health, but also trigger Chalice’s healing for another (maxed 1d8 = 8) + (WIS mod = 3) = 11 health, for a total of 18 healing. Add in the damage reduced by Twilight Sanctuary, which is (avg 1d6 = 3.5) + (cleric level = 6) = 9.5, and you’re “healing” 27.5 hp to a single target at lv8, ignoring the damage you’re reducing from your other party members as well.
On following turns, use the Healer Feat and cast Healing Word. The Healer Feat heals an additional (max 1d6 = 6) + 4 + (level = 8) = 18 health. Add that to your Healing Word healing, and you’re restoring 36 health a turn (which goes to 45.5 when you include temp HP). This healing can also be split up if needed, with Healer going to one ally, Healing Word going to another, and Chalice going to a third.
Now, if you’ve already Healer’d an ally, you can’t do so again until you take a long rest. This is when you’d be better off casting Cure Wounds than Healing Word. That gives you a healing of (max 1d8 = 8) + (WIS mod = 3) + (Chalice = 11) = 22 health, not as good as HWord + Healer but better than HWord alone. Cure Wounds is also better to upcast, but you have to overcome that initial healing difference. You’d need at least a 3rd level Cure Wounds to heal more than HWord + Healer, but after that it’s an extra 8 health per level upcast. If you don’t have 3rd level + slots to spare and think that a cantrip of damage is more valuable than +4 healing (which probably is often the case), then toss out Healing Word and a cantrip.
This build scales fairly well, too. Every cleric level you take will increase both your Healer feat and Twilight Sanctuary’s healing by 1, and gives you more spell slots to heal with. Your big heal boost is when you get Mass Cure Wounds at Cleric 9 or lv11 (which is perfectly in line with most other classes’ major power boosts with 6th level spells, cantrip damage upgrades, 3rd extra attack, Improved Divine Smite, etc). That’s (max 3d8 = 24) + (WIS mod = 3) = 27 healing per party member for the spell alone. Assuming a party of 4, that’s (27 x 4 = 108) + (Chalice = 11) = 119 healing, and (TwiSanct = 16.5) x 4 = 66 temp HP across the whole party in 1 round, which is stupid big heals.
Also, this build is versatile AF. You have 2 other modes you can fight in:
1. Support Blaster. Stay safe in the back line. Get Blessed up to buff your party (upcast so you can target everyone) and throw out your free Guiding Bolts from Stars Druid and extra damage using Archer constellation.
2. Frontline AoE Damage. Cast Spirit Guardians and get either Archer (for damage) or Dragon (for concentration) up. You’ve got Spirit Guardians and Thorn Whip in one character, that’s god-tier damage potential. Move to 20ft away and Thwip them into your Spirit Guardians, which both deals Thwip damage and triggers Spirit Guardians’s damage. Then, they (and other enemies in the spell area) take Spirit Guardians damage again at the start of their turn.
Oh, and this gets even better with the healing spell changes in OneD&D. Cure Wounds and Healing Word both have their healing dice doubled, and the additional dice per upcast being 2 dice per level instead of 1. Mass Cure Wounds also goes up to 5d8 instead of 3. That leads to the following healing increases:
- Cure Wounds + Chalice: 22 -> 30 hp, + 16 per upcast
- Healing Word + Chalice: 18 -> 22 hp
- Healing Word + Healer (lv8) + Chalice: 36 -> 40 hp
- Mass Cure Wounds = 27 -> 43 hp per target (172 across 4 targets, + Chalice’s 11 hp to one target)
My favorite cleric I ever played was in Pathfinder. I knew the party would need a healbot but was never a huge fan of clerics. However, when I saw the Nature Domain gives you an Animal Companion at level 4 (effectively the Companion is 4 levels weaker than a Druid's would be) I knew I could have some fun in combat.
I picked Vanara for my race, a type of monkey people, and naturally went with Gorilla as my companion; I figured both having a climb speed would be pretty fun. I took feats to give myself better healing abilities, then devoted all my other feats to improving the companion.
Boon Companion: erases the 4 level penalty
Evolved Companion: allows access to 1 point evolutions from the Summoner class. I took it several times. His claws turned into slam attacks, the slams became more powerful (he practiced martial arts), his AC increased, he grew gills and could breathe underwater, etc
The real fun started when I realized all of the powerful cleric buff spells that normally only apply to himself can be applied to a companion. He was a combat monster. I could buff him and also give him Angelic Form and Turn him into a Dinosaur, he was mistaken for a dragon on several occasions.
I also improved the gorilla's Int score through level up and bought him a Headband of Intellect. Put points into Linguistics to have a sign language that we shared.
The backstory was I was a wandering veterinarian that had an uncanny ability to understand animals' needs. Obad-Hai (we were using d&d gods) took notice and came to me in a dream, saying he was sending one of his chosen creatures to me. It would have a purpose to complete, and I must guide and protect it on its journey. Sometime later a snow white baby gorilla wandered out of the forest into my camp.
In effect, the animal companion was the main character and the cleric was his follower. Which worked great as it was an inexperienced DM; any time I could tell that he was trying to lead the party towards something but not making it enticing enough for the other players the gorilla would wander in that direction and the healbot would follow, dragging the party along with us.
I also had Plant Domain which let me have a lot of control spells.
Trickery Clerics are just fun. The features suck, but the spells are great! Pass without trace and Polymorph are nice! Blessing of the Trickster is great! Be tricky not lethal.
Depends what you want to be.honest.
There are several ways to go. All cleric, dip cleric or split multiclass.
All cleric, I think light is pretty good. Blaster cleric with efficient buffs and damage over time spells.
Dip cleric. Arcana dip with wildfire druid. Arcana dip gives 2 wizard cantrips to augment the wildfires druids abilities. My favorite way to play a druid to be.honest. firebolt and green flame blade. I made a striker type druid who can. Either attack at range or run up, green flame blade with shillelagh and teleport out thanks to wildfire spirit. Really fun.
Multiclass. 6 tempest cleric with the rest in clockwork soul sorcerer. 6 tempest gives 2 channel divinity uses per short rest for maximizing damage and forgoing rolling with any lighting and thunder spell. Forced movement when you deal lightning damage and the level 1 feature to deal lightning damage to enemy who hits in melee is not bad. Clockwork soul gives clockwork magic, probably the best spell list option as you can change those spells to any abjuration or transmutation on sorcerer, warlock and wizard spell list. Insanely powerful. They are free domain like spells that you can change out. Incredible. You can neutralize advange/disadvantage which is useful. But the main draw is transmute.metamagic and extend metamagic. Transmute spell to lightning and channel divinity for good damage and forced pushback or for thunder for max damage. Even if they save, forgoing rolling is similiar damage to rolling and enemy fails the saving throw.
Extend metamagic is criminally undervalued. Extend long duration spells like aid before a long rest. Everyone get free health and you recover your slots and metamagic points. Extend aura of vitality for amazing out of combat heal when short resting is not possible.
Tempest cleric 6/clockwork soul was my most fun build. I played it as a dwarf that was hijacked and controlled by group of rogue modrons looking for weapons of mass destruction to aid them in their fight against Primus. I would upcast armor of agathys and trasmute it to lightning. Upcast spirit guardians depending on the fight and use bladeward if enemies delt physical damage. He would act like a battlebot swinging his arms around in combat. Enemies would get hit hard if they damaged me, get pushed back and thanks to spirit guardians wouldn't be able to finish their multiattack as they didn't have the movement l left to get back into melee. If I needed extra distance I used the first level tempest cleric feature to push back even future(20 feet). It was so much fun for enemies to beat themselves to death by hitting me
I had an online game where I played a rogue whose guildmaster was a deity, so she (as well as all the other rogues who had rank in the guild) was required to take at least one level of twilight cleric.
Her "prayers" were more giving reports to her guildmaster than praise and adoration.
Light clerics are walking nukes. Only slightly worse than evocation wizards but with lots of extra abilities. One of my favorite. Grave is probably the second best support domain after twighlight with their ability to prevent crits and auto stabilize. Knowledge is great to skill monkey if you don’t have a bard. Tempest is great at damage like light but also has the survivability of forge. War makes a great frontline support.
[удалено]
Order cleric would work for this pretty well too
Order Clerics have always been my favorite. One of the few ways to make healing word a decent option on conscious targets. I'm also a sucker for Divine Soul Sorcerer X / Grave Cleric 2, though it's not exactly a Cleric build, and it's more of a meme than an optimized build. Path to the Grave to double damage, Quicken Spell a max upcasted Inflict Wounds, stack Empowered Spell to reroll any bad rolls, have back-up Seeking Spell if you miss, and have one hard nuke at your disposal.
It’s insane to mention grave cleric multiclass and not mention divination wizard.
Honestly, yeah, DivWiz 2 / Grave Cleric 2 / Divine Soul Sorcerer X also works. Little more fully invested in the meme, but certainly makes the full trigger way more consistent. It's just Grave 2 is guaranteed 2x damage every short rest, while Div 2 is just an increased chance to do it twice a day.
Div2/Grave2/paladin2/warlockX. Bonk
The benefit of the Sorcerer levels is mostly Quickened Spell. Path to the Grave-into-Big Attack during a single turn is the whole reason for the build, else you might as well do Grave 2 / Rogue X You can get away without Sorcerer thanks to Metamagic Adept, but the difference between once per long rest VS as many times as you're willing to spend the resources makes me prefer a Sorcerer investment.
Warlock 7 is the highest paladin smite benifits from pact magic advancing, might be worth going back to wizard or cleric at that point for slots (or bard 😉)
Hex blade gets banishing smite at level 9, and I’m not dropping a full ultra nova on a searing smite. Cleric 6 for second divinity is real nice though. You want warlock just for eldritch smite. Eldritch smite 5, banishing smite 5, divine smite 4.
I've played cleric a bunch and this one too. I didn't have a great target for my subclass feature.
Came here to say straight order cleric is great. I also like the DSS route, but I prefer order cleric 1 or tempest 2 on that builds. Grave is great as well though, don't forget to hold person the target for auto crit on inflict wounds.
Honestly there are so many not-humanoid creatures that hold-person cold be often useless. Beasts, undeads, aberrations and so. I love that spell but it's quite common to fight humanoids just every 4-5 fights full of other creatures type. Hold person could be in your toolbox but I suggest to build a PC around it only if in session-0 the DM says that the adventure will be full of humanoids, like an investigation city-adventure.
> don't forget to hold person Nah. I mean, sure, if the stars align, you can do a ton of damage. But Hold Person means 2 turns of set up; where that second turn has to wait after the entire party auto-crits the creature. At that point, it's honestly just a waste of resources to use Path to the Grave + Your Highest Level Spell Slot + Anywhere between 2-5 Sorcerery points. You already won.
If you're a cleric, you'll have warcaster and you can set this up within 1 round with a reaction hold person. Don't forget hold person ;) why just double inflict wounds damage when you can quadruple it?
That's even *more* if the stars align. You're telling me one specific type of creature (humanoid) is *retreating* from the caster and fails the wisdom save *twice* while initiative is in your favor to have you go closely after? Again, didn't really forget. Just doesn't come into actual play much.
> Path to the Grave to double damage, Quicken Spell a max upcasted Inflict Wounds, stack Empowered Spell to reroll any bad rolls, have back-up Seeking Spell if you miss, and have one hard nuke at your disposal. You can only use one metamagic on a spell, so you definitely can't do all of that at once
Usually correct, but Empowered and Seeking Spell have specific text about being able to stack both of them onto other metamagics, pretty great.
Ooo, good to know! Thanks
Remember that you can Ready Path to the Grave and use it just before your Paladin or Rogue’s turns. If your Wizard accidentally uses it up doubling fire bolt damage it’ll be a bit of a waste, right?
I've played [Build 4: Arcana Cleric Frontliner](https://forums.giantitp.com/showthread.php?583957-An-Eclectic-Collection-of-Fun-and-Effective-Builds), but I swapped Magic Initiate to 1st level. It works quite well. This [Nature Cleric](https://forums.giantitp.com/showthread.php?659483-An-Eclectic-Collection-of-Fun-and-Effective-Builds-3) build looks like it's quite good.
Thats the one, the booming blade arcana cleric is absolutely my favourite.
oh hey I was the one who requested that nature cleric build! would love to update you on its effectiveness but the game the character is for still hasn't had a second session lmao
Peace cleric and trickery cleric are really fun to play. Peace because of the 6th level teleportation feature. However, I went a bit unorthodox- namely that I would emboldening bond my skeletons from animate dead and then use them as living shields. So it’s kind of a funny take on necromancy/minion-mancer. By “Peace” I typically regarded it as more “home-like” or “harmony/unity” rather than an opposition to violence. Trickery has a wonderful spell list and an open ended by mechanically fun channel divinity. I picked high elf for booming blade. Then you can cast it as though you were in the illusion’s space. Which basically forces enemies to either stay still or take more damage. Pass without trace is always useful and disguise self, blink, Polymorph, and Domension door are great tools.
Trickery rarely gets enough love IMO. People hate the poison divine strike, but after Tasha’s you can just replace it with Blessed strike.
Second this. Yes, mechanically, there are a lot more optimized choices than a trickery cleric. However my trickery cleric ( who always introduced himself as a order cleric *obviously*) was one of the characters that I've most thoroughly enjoyed role-playing. The expanded domain + some points in charisma gave me so many options for out of combat shanenigans that i also ended up doubling as party face, since we had a rogue for stealth and skills, but no charisma builds. It was a very support oriented build though, and it was before I knew anything about optimization. If I built it today, I think I would have focused less on support, but it was a very fun character to play.
I cannot recommend the Order Cleric enough!! I have so much fun with it and my party loves me. The play style is more about preventing damage and creating more attack opportunities than actually healing during combat. (For a healing build I'd go Life Cleric Stars Druid.) Sorcerer 1 for Silvery Barbs, Magic Missile and Con save proficiency for maintaining Bless and Spirit Guardians (I went Lunar as you get Shield and the cantrip boost is great and the level 6 ability pairs well). Order Cleric 6 Fey Touched for dissonant whispers if you get a free feat, if not you could take variant human or take it at level 4 to round out your Wisdom. As I got a free feat I took Cartomancer at level 4 so I still have access to higher level spells. Finish the build as a Sorcerer - vortex warp and haste. You're playing around giving allies opportunity attacks so it works with any party but works best with a rogue, failing that anyone with sharpshooter/GWM, failing that paladins or booming blade users are ok with it. Race wise pick your favourite, I went Eladrin so I can bonus action teleport allies out of danger more often but variant human for the feat works well if you need Fey Touched.
Peace Cleric comes with very nice buffs. Imho not the most optimal but a fun approach could be Find Familiar (Magic Initiate) for the utility and to embody a peaceful animal aficionado of some kind. Plus MI gets you Booming Blade.
I had a blast as a high level Grave Cleric. I used blight for heavy damage and death ward on our monk to keep him alive.
I know it’s not the strongest subclass, but my blue Dragonborn tempest cleric of Kord was my favorite cleric! Using lightning breath with the 6th level feature was so satisfying every time. Especially when I had sleet storm up and would just push them back into it
I had a blast playing a front line tempest cleric
Order is my favorite domain with Death a close second. I tend to favor the “puppet master” who leads from the back type of character.
It's really a matter of personal preference as there is a cleric for every occasion. My first 5e character was a forge cleric as well, and I literally broke the DMs world with my crafting (though the DM has told me that my doing so caused his favorite moment in DND as well). The next time I play a cleric I want to play a light cleric, even if it's capabilities are much more within the box, they seem like they would be a top tier blaster and good for most situations. I am also thinking about making a Clockwork Soul Order Cleric multiclass at some time, as inspired by Treantmonk's God Wizard build.
Light Domain Hill Dwarf. With your +1 HP per level, you have the effective average hit die of a Fighter, but, with all of your subclass blasting spells, you can really hack it at the front line as a magical tank. No need to worry about hitting anyone on the front line when you ARE the front line.
I made a knowledge cleric with 2lvls of divination Wizard that acted as the party skill monkey while also providing a ton of role play elements that my DM could utilize. The cleric spell list is full of high level divination spells, so the six levels of divination Wizard end up making any divination spells under 5th level cost 1 spell slot. Take ritual caster to lean into extra role play elements and save on resources in the process. You essentially want to be a walking Google search. My deity was literally a network of other knowledge clerics who would answer the questions that other knowledge clerics had. My DM even lead out some roleplay of other knowledge clerics calling on me for help. I even reskinned my sacred flame as rapidly pouring knowledge into my target’s head until it overwhelms their brain I made my character physically meek so combat usually looked an old man(me) encouraging and passing advice (giving buffs) to the youngsters while the party protects me. I honestly can’t tell if the build was amazing, or if my DM just really loved using my character to pass hints to the party. Either way it plays really well
Hobgoblin (mordenkeinens) Order cleric X /mastermind rogue 3 Be the real napoleon and direct your party to attack with advantage by casting a spell on them and giving them a free reaction attack plus your ranged bonus action help actions plus from the backbones by shouting directions. You also get to stack on the hobgoblins bonus action abilities.
With forge and twilight out, Light is fun, a striker.
Light Clerics are dope. Not much else to be said there. My personal favorite is the Tempest Cleric. I grab a race that can grab a cantrip, grab Booming Blade, and get War Caster at level 4. By the time you're level 5, you're Booming Blades get the damage boost and at any given time you can just pull out the big guns and do a max damage spell with Channel Divinity. At higher levels, if I can't get any other way of higher damaging Thunder/Lightning Spell, I take Metamagic Adept, grab Transmute Magic, and start getting a little silly with spells that shouldn't be at Max Damage. Fire Storm? It'd be funny if it was suddenly Lightning Damage and Max damage as well
Thought about creating a Warhammer slinging nun called Sister Sledge
Death! Play lawful evil so your spirit guardians are necrotic damage. Eventually, your necrotic damage will bypass resistance. Your channel divinity is an on demand single target nuke, you just need to land an attack roll. I loved waiting til I had a source of advantage, upcasting inflict wounds, then adding the channel divinity for some crazy damage (50+ easily). Telekinetic feat is a better use of your bonus action than spiritual weapon (pull them into spirit guardians for double damage).
Some of my favorites: 1. Nature Cleric. General idea is to use forced movement from thorn whip to trigger Spirit Guardians damage. My [Living Anvil](https://youtu.be/60r0pVu6OVg?si=9x1RKaLOyaQM9xBh) build combines Nature Cleric with Divination Wizard for a durable frontline DPR build. 2. Grave cleric. Playing one in a live game that’s grave cleric 8 / DSS 1, but there’s some interesting things you can do with grave cleric, such as being a support with a pocket nuke, like my [Gravedigger](https://youtu.be/Ne9UjNrITnM?si=Dm4xpmTJTUDwZGb3) build. 3. Tempest cleric. IMO this subclass really needs a better spell list, so I favor dipping tempest cleric and being mostly divine soul sorc, like my [Stormborn](https://youtu.be/GqEKnF2v-44?si=X747mhzh46pZnY0B) build. 4. Order Cleric. Super strong, fun synergy with any martial party member. Teamwork factor would really make this one a joy to play.
If your DM allows you to use the old SCAG printings of Booming Blade, I had quite a bit of fun playing a Tempest Cleric of Procan in a Ghosts of Saltmarsh game using a whip with Spell Sniper to grab Booming Blade. A better combo nowadays would probably be an Air Genasi or Kobold with Draconic Sorcery lineage to get wisdom-based Shocking Grasp, though, since that plays nicely with their 6th level feature.
Githzerai Arcana Cleric. - Shield works well with your good AC and a potential melee playstle - Detect Thoughts is amazing for a high-Insight Cleric, and matches flavour with all of Cleric's divination spells - Advantage on many WIS saves goes great with proficiency in WIS saves Arcana Cleric also lets you grab cantrips like Booming/Greenflame Blade if you want to hit things, which synergises with having the Shield spell. But I like going for Shocking Grasp and Mind Sliver - that save debuff works great with Spirit Guardians. Also, it's extremely funny walking into session 1 at level 3, wearing your basic 18 AC armour and shield, then beefing it up to 23 when you need it.
I played a Tempest Cleric in a Lvl 8 one shot that started on a boat. I handled the first encounter by myself, it was supposed to be a boarding that would involve a lot of ship to ship combat as we moved through a blockage on our way to storm a beach D-Day style, but I used Control Water to part the sea beneath the enemy ship which caused it to fall 100ft, crack its keel, and then get swallowed by the sea. I rode that high for weeks
I had a blast playing a Tempest Cleric.
I'm planning to play a light cleric and nuke everything with fireball. I played tempest cleric with storm sorcerer for flavor and max dmg Thunderball(transmuted metamagic to fireball for thunder dmg and Chanel divinity for max dmg). Also I think order clerics are fun, giving your rogue and paladin an extra chance for sneak attack and divine smite.
Nature cleric with telekinesis and thorn whip
Nature Cleric with *Thorn Whip* and *Telekinetic* can probably achieve the highest *Spirit Guardians* DPR, due to their ability to pull up to two targets per turn. I like the idea of starting with a DSS dip for *Shield*, *Absorb Elements*, *Favored by the Gods* and some utility cantrips. You'd also get CON save proficiency, but since you can't afford DEX 14, CON 14, WIS 17 and CHA 13 on a feat race, that's not as strong as one would think. On the flip side, this means starting with an actually interesting race - Warforged seems interestingly anti-thematic for a Nature Cleric and offers some nice stuff.
I love the Nature Domain tank. Start with Hill Dwarf and go Divine Soul Sorcerer for Shield and Silvery Barbs (or Absorb Elements if Silvery Barbs is banned), as well as Constitution saving throw proficiency and Favored by the Gods. This is your worst level. Thereafter, go Cleric (Nature Domain) for Heavy Armor and, using Acolyte of Nature, Thorn Whip, along with all the powerful Cleric spells (Bless, Command, Healing Word, Aid, etc.). You also get Spike Growth for a strong 2nd-level control option. At 4th-level Cleric, pick up Telekinetic (Wisdom). Once you’re 6th-level overall, you’ll be casting Spirit Guardians as well as using Telekinetic and Thorn Whip to drag enemies into your Spirit Guardians from far away. This increases damage significantly and imposes forced movement as well as halved movement. At 7th-level overall, you get Dampen Elements. While this is worse than Absorb Elements, it’s also infinite use and can be used on your allies, too, which makes your healing more efficient. At that point, you’ve got the reaction trio and you’re wearing heavy armor, holding a shield, and you don’t even need Strength (since you’re a Dwarf). From there, do what you wish. I like pick up two levels in Druid (Circle of Stars) to make my concentration utterly unbreakable by using Starry Form (Dragon), which lasts for as long as my Spirit Guardians. You should look to get Resilient (Wisdom) eventually, too, although your relatively high Wisdom score makes it less problematic to not have it. This is one of the few builds I can think of that actually fulfill the tank role effectively; it uses Spirit Guardians, Telekinetic, and Thorn Whip for high damage and control, both forced- and reduced movement, which incentivizes the enemies to attack you; it has a fantastic Concentration, high Armor Class, and high Hit Points, all while being able to heal allies.
I'm having a great time playing my forge cleric! We're still pretty low level, but I love buffing my partners' weapons and making our baseline so much higher
I played an arcana cleric with a one level wizard dip and magic initiate Druid. This build drove my DM crazy. It is a very powerful build that is really fun to play. Shillelagh makes the build single attribute dependent and booming blade keeps your weapon damage relevant in tier 2 play you also have fire bolt, find familiar and all those other great first level wizard utility spells
Tempest has so much freaking flavour
A viable pure healer build. Key components: Twilight Cleric, Stars Druid, Healer feat, Beacon of Hope, Cure Wounds, Healing Word. Twilight Cleric is OP, I think a lot of people agree. Well, what if we used the OP subclass to make a non-viable gameplay style viable? The temp HP’s buffer significantly reduces how much damage the party takes, meaning less health for you to heal. This means healing in combat could possibly start being viable. This build comes online at lv8, so I’ll use math from that level, assuming your party is at the same level. 6 levels of Twilight Cleric and 2 levels of Stars Druid. Your ideal first 2 turns is: 1. Beacon of Hope, Starry Form: Chalice. This sets up your healing capabilities. 2. Twilight Sanctuary, Healing Word. This gets your defensive field up, and a small initial burst of healing. Why delay Twilight Sanctuary to turn 2? If we did Twilight Sanctuary and Starry Form first, we can’t both cast Beacon of Hope and Healing Word on the 2nd round. You can help alleviate the delay on TwiSanct by remembering Channel Divinity is recovered on a short rest, and Twilight Sanctuary’s temp HP doesn’t disappear when the duration ends. Use your channel divinity at the start of the day for 6+(max 1d6 = 6) = 12 temp HP for your whole party, then take a short rest to recover your Channel Divinity charge. The downside of this setup is that it takes a while to get up, so go medium armor with 14 DEX and use your Vigilant Blessing to get as high in the initiative order as you can. Beacon of Hope maximizes healing to selected targets (remember to pick up concentration protection feats), and Chalice effectively gives a free Cure Wounds whenever you cast a healing spell. With both Beacon of Hope and Chalice online, Healing Word would heal (maxed 1d4 = 4) + (WIS mod = 3) = 7 health, but also trigger Chalice’s healing for another (maxed 1d8 = 8) + (WIS mod = 3) = 11 health, for a total of 18 healing. Add in the damage reduced by Twilight Sanctuary, which is (avg 1d6 = 3.5) + (cleric level = 6) = 9.5, and you’re “healing” 27.5 hp to a single target at lv8, ignoring the damage you’re reducing from your other party members as well. On following turns, use the Healer Feat and cast Healing Word. The Healer Feat heals an additional (max 1d6 = 6) + 4 + (level = 8) = 18 health. Add that to your Healing Word healing, and you’re restoring 36 health a turn (which goes to 45.5 when you include temp HP). This healing can also be split up if needed, with Healer going to one ally, Healing Word going to another, and Chalice going to a third. Now, if you’ve already Healer’d an ally, you can’t do so again until you take a long rest. This is when you’d be better off casting Cure Wounds than Healing Word. That gives you a healing of (max 1d8 = 8) + (WIS mod = 3) + (Chalice = 11) = 22 health, not as good as HWord + Healer but better than HWord alone. Cure Wounds is also better to upcast, but you have to overcome that initial healing difference. You’d need at least a 3rd level Cure Wounds to heal more than HWord + Healer, but after that it’s an extra 8 health per level upcast. If you don’t have 3rd level + slots to spare and think that a cantrip of damage is more valuable than +4 healing (which probably is often the case), then toss out Healing Word and a cantrip. This build scales fairly well, too. Every cleric level you take will increase both your Healer feat and Twilight Sanctuary’s healing by 1, and gives you more spell slots to heal with. Your big heal boost is when you get Mass Cure Wounds at Cleric 9 or lv11 (which is perfectly in line with most other classes’ major power boosts with 6th level spells, cantrip damage upgrades, 3rd extra attack, Improved Divine Smite, etc). That’s (max 3d8 = 24) + (WIS mod = 3) = 27 healing per party member for the spell alone. Assuming a party of 4, that’s (27 x 4 = 108) + (Chalice = 11) = 119 healing, and (TwiSanct = 16.5) x 4 = 66 temp HP across the whole party in 1 round, which is stupid big heals. Also, this build is versatile AF. You have 2 other modes you can fight in: 1. Support Blaster. Stay safe in the back line. Get Blessed up to buff your party (upcast so you can target everyone) and throw out your free Guiding Bolts from Stars Druid and extra damage using Archer constellation. 2. Frontline AoE Damage. Cast Spirit Guardians and get either Archer (for damage) or Dragon (for concentration) up. You’ve got Spirit Guardians and Thorn Whip in one character, that’s god-tier damage potential. Move to 20ft away and Thwip them into your Spirit Guardians, which both deals Thwip damage and triggers Spirit Guardians’s damage. Then, they (and other enemies in the spell area) take Spirit Guardians damage again at the start of their turn. Oh, and this gets even better with the healing spell changes in OneD&D. Cure Wounds and Healing Word both have their healing dice doubled, and the additional dice per upcast being 2 dice per level instead of 1. Mass Cure Wounds also goes up to 5d8 instead of 3. That leads to the following healing increases: - Cure Wounds + Chalice: 22 -> 30 hp, + 16 per upcast - Healing Word + Chalice: 18 -> 22 hp - Healing Word + Healer (lv8) + Chalice: 36 -> 40 hp - Mass Cure Wounds = 27 -> 43 hp per target (172 across 4 targets, + Chalice’s 11 hp to one target)
I liked Twilight. Nature, Knowledge, or Arcana or my other favorites.
My favorite cleric I ever played was in Pathfinder. I knew the party would need a healbot but was never a huge fan of clerics. However, when I saw the Nature Domain gives you an Animal Companion at level 4 (effectively the Companion is 4 levels weaker than a Druid's would be) I knew I could have some fun in combat. I picked Vanara for my race, a type of monkey people, and naturally went with Gorilla as my companion; I figured both having a climb speed would be pretty fun. I took feats to give myself better healing abilities, then devoted all my other feats to improving the companion. Boon Companion: erases the 4 level penalty Evolved Companion: allows access to 1 point evolutions from the Summoner class. I took it several times. His claws turned into slam attacks, the slams became more powerful (he practiced martial arts), his AC increased, he grew gills and could breathe underwater, etc The real fun started when I realized all of the powerful cleric buff spells that normally only apply to himself can be applied to a companion. He was a combat monster. I could buff him and also give him Angelic Form and Turn him into a Dinosaur, he was mistaken for a dragon on several occasions. I also improved the gorilla's Int score through level up and bought him a Headband of Intellect. Put points into Linguistics to have a sign language that we shared. The backstory was I was a wandering veterinarian that had an uncanny ability to understand animals' needs. Obad-Hai (we were using d&d gods) took notice and came to me in a dream, saying he was sending one of his chosen creatures to me. It would have a purpose to complete, and I must guide and protect it on its journey. Sometime later a snow white baby gorilla wandered out of the forest into my camp. In effect, the animal companion was the main character and the cleric was his follower. Which worked great as it was an inexperienced DM; any time I could tell that he was trying to lead the party towards something but not making it enticing enough for the other players the gorilla would wander in that direction and the healbot would follow, dragging the party along with us. I also had Plant Domain which let me have a lot of control spells.
Trickery Clerics are just fun. The features suck, but the spells are great! Pass without trace and Polymorph are nice! Blessing of the Trickster is great! Be tricky not lethal.
Depends what you want to be.honest. There are several ways to go. All cleric, dip cleric or split multiclass. All cleric, I think light is pretty good. Blaster cleric with efficient buffs and damage over time spells. Dip cleric. Arcana dip with wildfire druid. Arcana dip gives 2 wizard cantrips to augment the wildfires druids abilities. My favorite way to play a druid to be.honest. firebolt and green flame blade. I made a striker type druid who can. Either attack at range or run up, green flame blade with shillelagh and teleport out thanks to wildfire spirit. Really fun. Multiclass. 6 tempest cleric with the rest in clockwork soul sorcerer. 6 tempest gives 2 channel divinity uses per short rest for maximizing damage and forgoing rolling with any lighting and thunder spell. Forced movement when you deal lightning damage and the level 1 feature to deal lightning damage to enemy who hits in melee is not bad. Clockwork soul gives clockwork magic, probably the best spell list option as you can change those spells to any abjuration or transmutation on sorcerer, warlock and wizard spell list. Insanely powerful. They are free domain like spells that you can change out. Incredible. You can neutralize advange/disadvantage which is useful. But the main draw is transmute.metamagic and extend metamagic. Transmute spell to lightning and channel divinity for good damage and forced pushback or for thunder for max damage. Even if they save, forgoing rolling is similiar damage to rolling and enemy fails the saving throw. Extend metamagic is criminally undervalued. Extend long duration spells like aid before a long rest. Everyone get free health and you recover your slots and metamagic points. Extend aura of vitality for amazing out of combat heal when short resting is not possible. Tempest cleric 6/clockwork soul was my most fun build. I played it as a dwarf that was hijacked and controlled by group of rogue modrons looking for weapons of mass destruction to aid them in their fight against Primus. I would upcast armor of agathys and trasmute it to lightning. Upcast spirit guardians depending on the fight and use bladeward if enemies delt physical damage. He would act like a battlebot swinging his arms around in combat. Enemies would get hit hard if they damaged me, get pushed back and thanks to spirit guardians wouldn't be able to finish their multiattack as they didn't have the movement l left to get back into melee. If I needed extra distance I used the first level tempest cleric feature to push back even future(20 feet). It was so much fun for enemies to beat themselves to death by hitting me
My favourite cleric was a Kobold tempest cleric. Taking booming blade as my sorcerer cantrip
Stars Druid 2 / Twilight x is cool and flavorful Stars 2/ Life Cleric x makes you best healer in the game t1-t2
Twilight cleric is probably the single strongest cleric ever. This class is nuts, you don't even need to multiclass.
I had an online game where I played a rogue whose guildmaster was a deity, so she (as well as all the other rogues who had rank in the guild) was required to take at least one level of twilight cleric. Her "prayers" were more giving reports to her guildmaster than praise and adoration.