After playing around with multi-class as a relative newb, I can see no reason why every martial style cleric wouldn't dip at least 2 lvls into Paladin.
Because it pushes back access to all your cleric abilities (including the asi where you take warcaster) and higher level spells by two levels?
Because smiting is good, but you’ll have much better ways to use your spell slots — clerics get a much wider variety of spells than paladins. Even a melee cleric will probably be the party’s main healer. A melee cleric will likely have a domain that gives them access to some AoE/battlefield control effects that will help a combat. You’ll want to cast spells instead of burning them for a little extra damage. Leave the single target damage to the rogue.
But you'd never be terribly far behind pure Cleric spellcasting, and having lay on hands as a free 1st level casting of cure wounds makes up for it somewhat, especially at lower levels. Meanwhile, you're smiting harder than a Paladin of the same level, and the best condition you can impose on an enemy to help your allies is always "dead."
I'm not saying it's a bad choice, it's perfectly viable and has some good synergies. But you asked why someone might not want to. For me, I prefer single class. Two levels isn't much at low levels, but typically levelling slows dramatically as you get higher, so it will matter more and more. And two levels means you will always be one spell level behind a pure cleric. And there's a lot of powers beyond spellcasting that clerics get, and all of them would be pushed back also (to say nothing of the level 19 and 20 powers, which you simply don't get, if your campaign goes that high). And absolutely, smiting is good, but damage output is far from the only criteria to consider. Clerics have lots of out of combat spells that can help the party tremendously (speak with dead, zone of truth, create food and water, sending, tongues, and those are just the low-level ones off the top of my head).
And from the paladin side, while you're smiting harder than a pally, and have a small lay on hands pool (not only for healing, but also poison and disease without needing to use a lesser restoration). But compared to a straight pally, you're not buffing ally saves, or giving them any of your other auras, and you don't get your mount, which is pretty fun little addition, even if its not always useful, or any of the other paladin abilities.
It's the same as any multi-class, you get a few more options, but you're not quite as good at any of them as a single class would be. Again, for some people, its worth the trade off (and objectively, it's not a poor choice, it can work), but you asked why someone wouldn't want to.
The class feature variants give clerics access to a handful of smite spells, if you really want to smite. And if you want that bonus healing, go magic initiate: druid and pick up Goodberry, which nets you 10 HP, also distributable amongst multiple allies, like Lay on Hands (and you get to level 2 spells and Protection from Poison faster). Or heck, a 1-level dip into Druid will get you the same (if you're cool on missing Cleric level 20), plus Shillelagh for those melee attacks, and it uses your same spellcasting stat, though there aren't really any level 1 Paladin spells that need you to have a high CHA.
I mean, do it if you want to, but I wouldn't want to delay level-ups on my Cleric, especially at low levels. I'm racing to get to Revivify.
Level delaying, which is not insignificant. There might be a certain level that it could make more sense, but you really don't want to delay spikes like level 5.
Paladin 2 is very nice, but Paladin 1 is a pretty dead level for multiclassers. One of the worst, IMO. So you have one entire level where your character gets basically nothing but a very minor heal, while the rest of your party is generally getting a lot more.
You need 13 Charisma, which is also a bit of a cost. You already want Str, Wis, and Con. to be high. In Standard Array, 13 Cha means you have to drop one of your stats (probably Con) to 12, which means you can't easily push it to 14 with a half feat like resilient or half an ASI. You also are forced to put Dex at 10 instead of 12.
With point buy, the sacrifice is even greater.
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After playing around with multi-class as a relative newb, I can see no reason why every martial style cleric wouldn't dip at least 2 lvls into Paladin.
Because it pushes back access to all your cleric abilities (including the asi where you take warcaster) and higher level spells by two levels?
Because smiting is good, but you’ll have much better ways to use your spell slots — clerics get a much wider variety of spells than paladins. Even a melee cleric will probably be the party’s main healer. A melee cleric will likely have a domain that gives them access to some AoE/battlefield control effects that will help a combat. You’ll want to cast spells instead of burning them for a little extra damage. Leave the single target damage to the rogue.
But you'd never be terribly far behind pure Cleric spellcasting, and having lay on hands as a free 1st level casting of cure wounds makes up for it somewhat, especially at lower levels. Meanwhile, you're smiting harder than a Paladin of the same level, and the best condition you can impose on an enemy to help your allies is always "dead."
I'm not saying it's a bad choice, it's perfectly viable and has some good synergies. But you asked why someone might not want to. For me, I prefer single class. Two levels isn't much at low levels, but typically levelling slows dramatically as you get higher, so it will matter more and more. And two levels means you will always be one spell level behind a pure cleric. And there's a lot of powers beyond spellcasting that clerics get, and all of them would be pushed back also (to say nothing of the level 19 and 20 powers, which you simply don't get, if your campaign goes that high). And absolutely, smiting is good, but damage output is far from the only criteria to consider. Clerics have lots of out of combat spells that can help the party tremendously (speak with dead, zone of truth, create food and water, sending, tongues, and those are just the low-level ones off the top of my head).
And from the paladin side, while you're smiting harder than a pally, and have a small lay on hands pool (not only for healing, but also poison and disease without needing to use a lesser restoration). But compared to a straight pally, you're not buffing ally saves, or giving them any of your other auras, and you don't get your mount, which is pretty fun little addition, even if its not always useful, or any of the other paladin abilities.
It's the same as any multi-class, you get a few more options, but you're not quite as good at any of them as a single class would be. Again, for some people, its worth the trade off (and objectively, it's not a poor choice, it can work), but you asked why someone wouldn't want to.
The class feature variants give clerics access to a handful of smite spells, if you really want to smite. And if you want that bonus healing, go magic initiate: druid and pick up Goodberry, which nets you 10 HP, also distributable amongst multiple allies, like Lay on Hands (and you get to level 2 spells and Protection from Poison faster). Or heck, a 1-level dip into Druid will get you the same (if you're cool on missing Cleric level 20), plus Shillelagh for those melee attacks, and it uses your same spellcasting stat, though there aren't really any level 1 Paladin spells that need you to have a high CHA.
I mean, do it if you want to, but I wouldn't want to delay level-ups on my Cleric, especially at low levels. I'm racing to get to Revivify.
Birgit | Shifter | Sorcerer | Dragonlords
Shayone | Hobgoblin | Sorcerer | Netherdeep
Level delaying, which is not insignificant. There might be a certain level that it could make more sense, but you really don't want to delay spikes like level 5.
Paladin 2 is very nice, but Paladin 1 is a pretty dead level for multiclassers. One of the worst, IMO. So you have one entire level where your character gets basically nothing but a very minor heal, while the rest of your party is generally getting a lot more.
You need 13 Charisma, which is also a bit of a cost. You already want Str, Wis, and Con. to be high. In Standard Array, 13 Cha means you have to drop one of your stats (probably Con) to 12, which means you can't easily push it to 14 with a half feat like resilient or half an ASI. You also are forced to put Dex at 10 instead of 12.
With point buy, the sacrifice is even greater.