Tune up a ignorant cleric?

[Allisade]

Hi all - this is just a "any advice for a not-as-experienced-as-you player?" post =) All thoughts very welcome =)

I have a rich-ish lvl 15 dwarf cleric in a high magic campaign (srd and complete books, magic item compendium and spell compendium, and DM allows 2 flaws with feats, and magic items and money are plentiful in this campaign)

I would truly appreciate thoughts and suggestions on what to do with him - I knew nothing when I started and while I've learned a lot from the handbook and from reading here recently... well - you guys know more than I do =)


The Character so far:
12 cleric / 1 contemplative / 2 divine oracle.  True Neutral.
Domains: Trickery, Travel, Creation and Oracle
Feats: All the Craft Magical item/armor/ring/whatever feats, wild talent and psionic strike (I was young...) and skill focus religion (for the prestige class =P), my last feat will be create portal for story line reasons

Gear
Weapon: Longsword +3
Head:    Hat of disguise                 
Neck:     Prayer Beads (for the +4cl)
Arms:     Custom Bracers +10 ac (sacred and luck I think)
Armor:    +5 Adamantine Full plate, w/ invulnerability and calling
Waist:    Belt of magnificence
Hands:   Gauntlets of Energy Protection (30pnts/round all energy types)
Feet:      Boots of Teleportation
Cloak:     of Arachnidia   
Glasses:  of Adaptation (like the necklace but off slot)
Shield:    +5 buckler --> eventually going to be an animated heavy shield
Rings:      Counter Spell (greater dispell)
                Sustenance (allows him 8 hours to craft even while traveling)
Chest:     Winged Vest (fly 60' ... not sure how he wears this and full plate, but dm is ok with it...)
Ion stone:  the +1 ac one  --> (I plan on getting the orange one that adds 1 Caster Level when I can)
Other:   Metamagic Rods of Extend for buffing (superior resistance, longstrider, Magic weapon (greater), Magic Vest at all times - the usual divine power, divine favor and righteous might before battle.)

I just learned about prestige classes and went with contemplative to get the travel domain and immunity to disease, and divine oracle to get oracle domain and the evasion skill - I lost some turn undead (not big in our campaign) but kept full caster levels.

I learned about Divine Metamagic too late and didn't go that way - but that's life. Doing this all over again I would have gone with a cloistered cleric, DMM and some different domains but this isn't too bad =) All my feats were... well kind of wasted from a min/max point of view - when I started I was just clueless, and then I made the character a tinkerer / crafter personality so I kept taking new  craft magical (whatever) feats from then on.  It makes him money (and why he can afford what's he's bought / enchanted) but I missed out on some opportunities there too probably.

I want to build basically an invincible, handle anything, do everything guy, and after 2 years, 15 levels, a million gold or so - and just being a cleric - he's certainly getting there but...

I would love to hear:

Recommendations for prestige classes / how to class for the next 5 levels?  (pure cleric? more contemplative for that 6th level domain? something else?)

Gear to look for / make / upgrade / replace ?
   Enchantments for the shield? sword? different ones for the armor?
   Better hats / cloaks / etc - the disguise and arachnidia are fun and I truly enjoy the utility - but - well I'm open to upgrades =)
   Magic / enchantment to stack on the rings / anything else?

Buff recommendations - I literally just learned about superior resistance last night when reading another post - which allowed me to sell my cloak of resistance. What else am I missing? or that you like very much?

I would also like to hear Warnings - things that'll kill me, things to be extra careful with, etc. Just stuff to watch out for...

Any tricks for helping reflex saves? His isn't bad (+15 right now) but it's my weakest and since I just got evasion I'm interested in strengthening it =)

Basically... I think I'm doing good (I'm definitely spoiled with the level of magic / money available) but... Help? oh wise and generous elders? I wish to benefit from your wisdom!

Please and thank you in advance!

-Allisade 

[twoswords]

I learned about Divine Metamagic too late and didn't go that way - but that's life. Doing this all over again I would have gone with a cloistered cleric, DMM and some different domains but this isn't too bad =)

Pay a wizard to cast a couple of Wishes on you and you have that all sorted out.

[snakeman830]

Here is my immediate thought: if you can, replace your armor and shield.  You only need a +1 enhancement bonus on them for qualities and can use Magic Vestment to make up the difference (bringing them right back up to +5)

[Allisade]

Here is my immediate thought: if you can, replace your armor and shield.  You only need a +1 enhancement bonus on them for qualities and can use Magic Vestment to make up the difference (bringing them right back up to +5)

Does Magic Vestment not stack (making it effectively +9)?  ... I may have been doing things wrong =/

[Allisade]

I learned about Divine Metamagic too late and didn't go that way - but that's life. Doing this all over again I would have gone with a cloistered cleric, DMM and some different domains but this isn't too bad =)

Pay a wizard to cast a couple of Wishes on you and you have that all sorted out.

I really would sacrifice a ton of gold to redo my character... I'll talk to the gm about it - while he's very giving in a lot of ways I'm not sure he'd allow wish to do something that powerful (even multiple wishes) ... but you're right - it can't hurt to at least ask =)

Any thoughts working with what he has now?

[snakeman830]

Here is my immediate thought: if you can, replace your armor and shield.  You only need a +1 enhancement bonus on them for qualities and can use Magic Vestment to make up the difference (bringing them right back up to +5)

Does Magic Vestment not stack (making it effectively +9)?  ... I may have been doing things wrong =/

They're both Enhancement bonuses, so only the largest applies.  Likewise, Greater Magic Weapon is better than an actual enhancement bonus on a weapon due to how weapon and armor qualities are priced.  I suggest getting a Lesser Rod of Chaining for these two spells so you can buff the whole party with each spell instead of one piece of equipment.

[Allisade]

Here is my immediate thought: if you can, replace your armor and shield.  You only need a +1 enhancement bonus on them for qualities and can use Magic Vestment to make up the difference (bringing them right back up to +5)

Does Magic Vestment not stack (making it effectively +9)?  ... I may have been doing things wrong =/

They're both Enhancement bonuses, so only the largest applies.  Likewise, Greater Magic Weapon is better than an actual enhancement bonus on a weapon due to how weapon and armor qualities are priced.  I suggest getting a Lesser Rod of Chaining for these two spells so you can buff the whole party with each spell instead of one piece of equipment.

Oh that's very neat... I thought they stacked but I'll recoup some cash and downgrade the items... still the chaining - I really like that - thank you! What a cool idea =)

[Mooncrow]

What's your usual role in the party?  I know you said you wanted a do-everything type, but knowing how you usually mix it up would help^^

[Allisade]

What's your usual role in the party?  I know you said you wanted a do-everything type, but knowing how you usually mix it up would help^^

Sure sorry - I'm not a limelight seeker, so 90% of the time I play support and let the group members get the glory while I just do healing / buffs / etc.

However, when one or more of the group gets in over their heads (which happens somewhat often, as our tactics are non existent and the dm is crafty and likes surprises) - I like being able to do *something* to take care of things  - be it a surprisingly damaging full attack (due to buffs), or a wall of magma, a comet falling from the sky, instant death if you don't make your fort save spell, or whatever ... shutting down the dm's surprise big threat as quickly as possible as best I can.

Which has lead me to try to keep as many options as possible open with my spells ... even though (mostly) I just do heals and such so everybody can get their "moments of awesome" in each session.

[Maat Mons]

Weapon: Longsword +3

How are you proficient with a longsword? 

[snakeman830]

On top of my reccommendations earlier, I suggest you remove Invulnerability from your armor.  At level 15, DR/Magic is meaningless.

Also, to edit one of my suggestions earlier, you would need a method to turn Magic Vestment into a ranged spell instead of Touch to use it with Chain (Reach Spell works for this, but will take a feat.  There are some other methods, however).  Greater Magic Weapon has no such problem, though.

[Mooncrow]

OK then:

Equipment -
Ghost Ward on your shield and armor - now you get your armor enhancement bonuses to touch attacks as well
+1 armor spikes - add Defending and Warning, and when combined with Greater Magic Weapon, now you have and extra +5 AC and +5 to initiative for ~9000g

Prestige classes-
Sadly, unless you can convince your DM to let you dip from other books, or to let you do some edits on your character, there's not much else that's good =/  Dweomerkeeper would be fantastic, but it needs a different domain, and possibly a feat depending on how your DM interprets things =/  But, Contemplative up to 6th isn't bad by any means. 

[Allisade]

Weapon: Longsword +3

How are you proficient with a longsword?

Vergadain's favored weapon?

[Allisade]

OK then:

Equipment -
Ghost Ward on your shield and armor - now you get your armor enhancement bonuses to touch attacks as well
+1 armor spikes - add Defending and Warning, and when combined with Greater Magic Weapon, now you have and extra +5 AC and +5 to initiative for ~9000g

Prestige classes-
Sadly, unless you can convince your DM to let you dip from other books, or to let you do some edits on your character, there's not much else that's good =/  Dweomerkeeper would be fantastic, but it needs a different domain, and possibly a feat depending on how your DM interprets things =/  But, Contemplative up to 6th isn't bad by any means.

Thanks! And I'll look into Dweomerkeeper - even if I can't use it it's good to know about things =)

[Mooncrow]

OK then:

Equipment -
Ghost Ward on your shield and armor - now you get your armor enhancement bonuses to touch attacks as well
+1 armor spikes - add Defending and Warning, and when combined with Greater Magic Weapon, now you have and extra +5 AC and +5 to initiative for ~9000g

Prestige classes-
Sadly, unless you can convince your DM to let you dip from other books, or to let you do some edits on your character, there's not much else that's good =/  Dweomerkeeper would be fantastic, but it needs a different domain, and possibly a feat depending on how your DM interprets things =/  But, Contemplative up to 6th isn't bad by any means.

Thanks! And I'll look into Dweomerkeeper - even if I can't use it it's good to know about things =)

It's a web enhancement of Complete Divine (at least, the one you would want to use is) - you can find the PDF on Wizard's site here.

[Rebel7284]

Are there any psionics in your game? Because Psychic Reformation is specifically designed to let you pick different Feats.  http://www.d20srd.org/srd/psionic/powers/psychicReformation.htm

Only 4th level too, so a lot LESS expensive than trying to do multiple wishes.  Will cost some XP if you want to go all the way back to level 1 though.  Probably worth it.

[Allisade]

Are there any psionics in your game? Because Psychic Reformation is specifically designed to let you pick different Feats.  http://www.d20srd.org/srd/psionic/powers/psychicReformation.htm

Only 4th level too, so a lot LESS expensive than trying to do multiple wishes.  Will cost some XP if you want to go all the way back to level 1 though.  Probably worth it.

You know - I had even read about that - but I thought it was Self only as a target, I really missed the part where they can help anybody and split the exp costs... there's even an in game NPC who's mentoring our group's soulknife who'd be perfect in RP terms for going to about this...

Thank you!

[Maat Mons]

Weapon: Longsword +3

How are you proficient with a longsword?

Vergadain's favored weapon?

If you had the war domain that work. 

[Allisade]

Weapon: Longsword +3

How are you proficient with a longsword?

Vergadain's favored weapon?

If you had the war domain that work.

So for 2 years and 15 levels I've been using a weapon I'm not proficient with ... and no one noticed...

I apparently am not the only person who's unfamiliar with the rules in this campaign... well, I always liked the heavy mace... hmm...

[Gavinfoxx]

Morningstar > Heavy Mace. Look at the stats...