Drow Battlecleric?

[Set]

Hi!

I would be tempted to try a Drow battlecleric...but i need some help with the build...is there anyone around who can help me a little?

[The1Kobra]

The big question in regards to a cleric is whether you will want to grab divine shield+divine might or just skip it. Grabbing both can give you significant bonuses to your melee combat capability, (+10 or so AC and damage) but there are plenty of costs, short duration, more buffs on a buff heavy build, and the big one is the heavy investment needed into CHA to make it work. Still, it can be done.

Right off the bat, you'll want the gift of the clergy (-2 DEX +2 WIS). I don't think you can take both that and the gift of the Magthere (+2 CON -2 CHA), so go with the gift of the Clergy. All in all that will make the stat adjustments: +2 CHA +2 WIS +2 INT -2 CON.

So, with that in mind,

You probably want to go 27/3 Cleric/Bard in either case. Divine power will allow you to get the 4th APR, plus a high caster level is needed for dispel resistance and buff duration. You'll want the feats: SF Conj, ESF Conj, and Extend Spell. A battle cleric can get a pretty nice summon too.

You'll only get 7 pre-epic feats, here's my recommendation with two builds:

Build 1: No Divine Might/Shield

Stats: 14/10/12/14(16)/16(18)/8(10)

Pre-epic(7): SF Conj, GSF Conj, Extend Spell, Weapon Focus, Blind Fight, IMPR Crit, Expertise (Or Craft Wand, or Scribe Scroll)
Epic(4+2C): EWF, Armor Skin, Epic Spell Focus Conjuration, Epic Spell Summon Dragon, ESF Discipline, Epic Prowess

End Stats: 20/10/12/16/19/10

Build 2: Divine Might+Divine Shield away!

Stats: 14/8/12/14(16)/14(16)/14(16)
Pre-epic(7): SF Conj, GSF Conj, Extend Spell, Power Attack, Divine Might, Divine Shield, Weapon Focus
Epic(4+2C): EWF, Armor Skin, Epic Spell Focus Conjuration, Epic Spell Summon Dragon, ESF Discipline, Blind Fight
End Stats: 14/8/12/16/19/20

Hope this helps!

P.S. In epic levels, you'll need to take ESF Conjuration and Armor Skin as your cleric bonus feats. The cleric list is rather restricted, alas.

[LIonGraphiK]

I'd make a necro drow battle cleric build. Go for EMD. Go spear. 27/3, absolutely good choice.

You do NOT need armor skin. You can live without it. EWF: Spear is more important. You can either go Conj or Necro but as a drow, I'd STRONGLY recommend necro for faster levelling and more utility in PvE and PvP. The summons are super useful if you can use them freely.

In my opinion you shouldn't need divine shield/might, your AB and AC will be plenty enough and you're already feat starved as it is... AB and AC will come from your spells primarily.

I won't give any stats or many feats as I don't really want to give anything away but here are a few suggestions:


You can fit ESF: Necro/Trans, grab EMD and then tailor some combat feats around that like blind fight/EWF: Spear and meta magic: extend spell (should be the only thing you need.) The rest I'm sure you can figure out.

A battle cleric with undead summons is a nice fit as you can use them as a distraction.

Take ESF: Discipline or EDK (find a pale master and get a dracolich) at level 30 and fully geared you should get up to 65-75ish+ discipline, provided you go war for AoV. If you go war you can put wis/cha on half of your gear to bump up your DCs and improve your war domain power.

[The1Kobra]

Going for Necro instead of Conjuration is a sound strategy, get Epic Mummy dust instead of the Epic Dragon in that case. You'll be a /bit/ slower on the very first few levels but having 3 summons at a time is really handy. Just be careful with your mass heals, you'll wreck your own summons if you do that! Also I do like the Conjure PC feature that ESF Conj gets you.

Getting ESF trans is good too, especially if you pick up the domain with aura of vitality (War Domain). It's a long lasting buff that gives +4 STR/DEX/CON that stacks with the other animals buffs. Obviously you're tight on feats, but if you ditch divine might and divine shield, it's a good strategy.

You probably want blind fight. You can get by on invis purge but it means you won't be able to use IMPR invis for concealment yourself, nor can your allies.

Also, last point, you definitely want the travel domain. It has haste. Other good picks are plant for barkskin, trickery for improved invis, and if you go for ESF trans, War for Aura of Vitality.

[LIonGraphiK]

Nope you won't be a bit slower for the first few levels because you can use animate dead scrolls/summon creature scrolls, the level 4 ones sell at stores to keep you going until level 5 (with writs you can easily get your money back), which will go by really quickly. This speeds up leveling before you gain access to lv3 cleric spells and animate dead.

Death and Travel or War and Travel. For better harm or AoV. I'd go war and travel, it's the best combo for a battle cleric. Harm is still incredibly decent with or without the boosts. Yes, you CAN still take EDK, get a dracolich as the necro bonuses will apply as well as EMD. Don't bother with plant/trickery. You can get them as wands very cheap too. Sure it's a long wait before you get concealment but you won't need it. If you want imp invis that bad, you can always buy displacer cloaks.

Extended AoV at turns per level because of ESF: Trans on all your undead summons & yourself and all party members makes you a very worthy addition to any group.

ALWAYS take travel.

[The1Kobra]

I was under the impression that you could only get dracolich as a PM? You'd have to dip levels into bard or wizard and then PM to get it, which would wreck your casterlevel. Unless the prisms can transfer it, but I don't think they do? (I'd need to double check).

If you can get the Dracolich, then it's definitely worth it. I think summon greater undead can handle most things with the dracolich for a real pinch, if that's the case.

Naturally, if one prefers Conjuration focus, it's a moot point.

Speaking of which, if you want to go Necro/Trans or Conj/Trans, here's what I'd do:


Stats: 14/10/12/14(16)/16(18)/8(10)

Pre-epic(7): SF Necro, GSF Necro, Extend Spell, Weapon Focus, Blind Fight, SF Trans, GSF Trans
Epic(4+2C): EWF (Epic Weapon Focus), Armor Skin, Epic Spell Focus Necromancy, Epic Spell Summon Dragon, ESF Discipline, ESF Trans

End Stats: 20/10/12/16/19/10

P.S. For drow specifically, there's a very powerful crafted whip only drow clerics can use. Sparing a feat for exotic weapon proficiency though might be difficult, but it may be worth it given how strong that special whip is.

[LIonGraphiK]

You can get a dracolich prism, yes. You get your palemaster buddy to do it.

You don't need 10 dex if you're going war domain as you've got cat's grace. There should never really be a reason to have anything higher than 8 as you can buff it. Your max dex bonus is only ever going to give you +1 to your AC and with AoV, you'll get an additional +4 to dex to help with reflex saves. 10 isn't worth it. The extra hitpoints on the other hand is. Grab 14 con.


You could do this instead:

You'll buff up to 34 str with the soft cap and you can get around 30-32 wisdom when geared. You'll want four pieces to have Str/Con/Uni saves, +2 disc/sc and then have the rest as wis/cha. You won't need any more than four pieces because you can buff the rest with zoo spells. This gives you a reliable +12 soft cap, as with ESF: trans you'll always roll at least a 4 on the stats.

STR: 15 (+2 Gift) (22)
DEX: 8
CON: 14
WIS: 16 (+2 Gift) (20)
INT: 14
CHA: 8

Spear is the best cleric weapon for its X3 crit and more reliable damage output. You can 5% a masterly damask for a keen one late-game and get some essences on there. Otherwise, keep a bronze spear on hand to use GMW on against anyone who uses premonition. Wasting a feat on exotic proficiency is entirely up to you though. You will also get your damage from divine favour, divine power and the war domain power (albeit short burst but extremely effective, as it comes with DR too.)

[Sea Shanties]

The aesthetic of a drow cleric with a whip is so much cooler than a spear that may be worth the "wasted" feat. It's really up to what feels right to you, some people use whatever weapon and armor is most effective mechanically and others will take a little performance hit to make choices that just look or feel right or fit a theme.

You could drop necro focuses and take exotic and improved crit instead if you want to roll that way. Being a cleric you'll still do fine.

[Rockstar1984]

The problem is that battleclerics are super feat starved, and fitting in all the feats you need while keeping yourself dispel resistant (IE going 27 cleric/3 bard) is difficult for a drow without that bonus feat at level 1. For my 27/3 battlecleric I took animal as one of my domains which allowed me to get bolstered summons without spending feats on it, thus freeing up some feats so I was a wee bit less starved. She's worked wonderfully so far and as a cha cleric build she hits ridiculous amounts of ac.

[Ork]

Spear in the streets, whip in the sheets.