Author Topic: Weird clerics?  (Read 1895 times)

Offline Nanashi

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Weird clerics?
« on: January 29, 2020, 11:19:17 PM »
Other than Murlynd with their exclusive access to guns and Shar's knock-off weave, are there any deities in a DnD campaign setting with clerics (or equivalent classes) that have special rules that make them stand out from others?  Any edition or setting is fine. Looking for stuff that's distinct about all (or most) their divine casters, not just being better at something clerics can normally do in exchange for being worse at other, or some generic magic ability that could come from other sources.
« Last Edit: January 29, 2020, 11:25:18 PM by Nanashi »

Offline awaken_D_M_golem

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Re: Weird clerics?
« Reply #1 on: January 30, 2020, 04:29:44 PM »
Golarion Cleric acf Holy Warrior
(which is a duplicate name of something wotc official, even though it's different)
http://minmaxforum.com/index.php?topic=2342.msg315577#msg315577
2 feats better than a dmm persist divine power build, until it falls behind on spells level 10+.
Very decent paladin replacement, or cleric archer.

Monastic Servant of Auppenser prc, cut from Lost Empires of Faerun.
http://www.candlekeep.com/library/articles/leof_msoa.htm
Cleric + Psi + Monk , but 3.0-ish and well before Tashalatora.
UrPriest entry is cheesy on alignment and conversion experience fluff.

Divine Agent prc, is 5/10 suckage but double secret probation with dmfiat early 9s.
Early entry with Mystic Ranger or the Golar acf above.  Not great, thin but not boring.
Your codpiece is a mimic.

Offline Nanashi

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Re: Weird clerics?
« Reply #2 on: January 30, 2020, 06:02:50 PM »
Holy Warrior and Divine Agent isn't deity specific and really falls into "could come from other sources" (There's dozens of ways to make a divine caster capable of using weapons). I'm looking for things where you can give a short description of abilities without a stat block and easily determine "That's a cleric of ____". Being inherent to being a cleric of that deity (rather than a prestige class or feat that only some of them take) is ideal. If it's mechanically good is irrelevant.

Auppenser's prestige class seems valid enough since it's such a weird combo with a prohibition on an iconic ability, but I'd rather homebrew from scratch than touch 3.0 Psionics.
« Last Edit: January 30, 2020, 06:06:20 PM by Nanashi »

Offline Samwise

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Re: Weird clerics?
« Reply #3 on: January 31, 2020, 06:09:14 PM »
"Any edition" opens up a slew of specialty priests in AD&D, expanded but somewhat subverted by Revised AD&D (2nd edition).

Greyhawk had such specialty priests appearing in the various articles by Gygax and Lakofka in Dragon Magazine, later appearing in the setting boxed sets.
Forgotten Realms specialty priests appeared in their setting book for deities.
"Monsters" had them in Monster Mythology.

Most of them required the cleric to gain additional xp in exchange for alternate powers.
In 2nd edition this concept was expanded with the cleric in the PHB being a "generic" cleric, and every deity assumed to have "specialty priests". The additional xp was mostly gone, but the alternate powers did everything from completely changing accessible spells, including cutting off healing spells, to delaying turn undead similar to paladins, to all sorts of alternative abilities. As such, becoming such a "specialty priest" could invite a significant amount of suck into your character.

A lot of that wound up being turned into Domains and Feats, particularly the late appearing Initiate Feats, in D20.

I think some FR sites have for the specialty priest versions of the deities, but I do not know if such is available for the Greyhawk deities.
Otherwise you would have to scrounge every sourcebook directly for the details on each.

Offline awaken_D_M_golem

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Re: Weird clerics?
« Reply #4 on: February 02, 2020, 01:57:07 PM »
Yathrinshee is only a smidge better than Wizard 11 / Cleric 9
Your codpiece is a mimic.