DnD has 13 playable classes. Clerics had 12 subclasses. With TCE, Clerics have 14 subclasses.
Clerics can now use their channel divinity as a bonus action to: - Turn Undead - Something subclass specific - Regain a spent spell slot Wizards, to compare, have to spend a short rest to use their Arcane Recovery to regain spell slots, and Arcane Recovery has no other uses other than that.
Clerics now get access to the Aura spells that were exclusively Paladin spells. Paladins had to be level 9 to use the first one, Aura of Vitality, which gives 20d6 healing over a minute. Clerics get access to this at level 5. Paladins would get the 4th level Auras at level 13. Clerics get them at level 7.
Clerics also got their Divine Strike and Potent Spellcasting combined into 1d8 for every subclass for some reason? This isn't just for Cleric cantrips, but allcantrips.
Hmmm. I'd want to see empirical evidence of Clerics being least played before I agreed or disagreed with that.
But I get what you're saying that they, at one time, believed they needed to compensate lower player numbers of clerics by buffing them. But at some point, more power doesn't equal more fun (especially for the rest of the party that has to sit in their shadow). When does it stop?
DnD has 13 playable classes. Clerics had 11 subclasses. With ToC, Clerics have 14 subclasses.
Clerics can now use their channel divinity as a bonus action to: - Regain a spent spell slot Wizards, to compare, have to spend a short rest to use their Arcane Recovery to regain spell slots, and Arcane Recovery has no other uses other than that.
Clerics also got their Divine Strike and Potent Spellcasting combined into 1d8 for every subclass for some reason? This isn't just for Cleric cantrips, but allcantrips.
Channel Divinity is certainly more flexible than Arcane recovery, but Arcane Recovery is arguably better at recovering spell slots. Channel Divinity tops out a 3 lvl 3 spells vs Arcane Recovery's 10 spell levels up to lvl 6.
The new Blessed Strike is a bit of a sidegrade. It loses out on the second D8 that Divine Strike gets at 14th, and it's single target so less useful with Word of Radiance than Potent Spellcasting. I have an Arcana Cleric who uses Green Flame Blade and I'm not sure I'd want to change to Blessed Strikes over Potent Spellcasting.
Cleric players were supposed to be healbots, is what was a big part of the reluctance to play one. Particularly in older editions, which offered less flexibility in terms of swapping or recovering spells, you were more or less expected to dial down whatever else you really wanted to do in order to save your resources for healing. In my experience at least the Cleric class has been one of the more played ones since 3rd edition though.
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If you take one of the 7 subclasses that gives you Heavy Armor, they are more Paladin than Paladins. They just get level 9 spells rather than smites, which includes the OP Spiritual Weapon and Spirit Guardians (exclusive to Clerics, if you ignore subclasses and stuff).
Hmmm. I'd want to see empirical evidence of Clerics being least played before I agreed or disagreed with that.
While we're at it, how about some empirical evidence of clerics being OP?
I googled '5e OP' with Paladins, Wizards, Artificers, and Fighters, and found as many discussions as cleric. Last time there was a "which class is strongest" poll here, I'm pretty sure clerics didn't make the top 3. I don't have a problem with the adjustments here.
While we're at it, how about some empirical evidence of clerics being OP?
I googled '5e OP' with Paladins, Wizards, Artificers, and Fighters, and found as many discussions as cleric. Last time there was a "which class is strongest" poll here, I'm pretty sure clerics didn't make the top 3. I don't have a problem with the adjustments here.
Yeah I'd be interested in a citation for that as well, as personally I think they're pretty balanced, and the OP's links doesn't seem to make the case they claim. Clerics are casters first and foremost, Wizards and Sorcerers will generally beat them on raw magic potential, especially later on. What balances them is that Clerics can also be reasonably durable and can be quite fighty up close which is never a bad thing, and with the right spell choices they can play like a martial class in many ways, while still having a bank of "just in case" spells to draw upon.
The problem I always have when people say one class is "stronger" than another is; how the hell do you even begin to compare that? To boil it down into combat figures you strip out huge parts of the game that do actually matter, often including parts of combat to try to boil it down to numbers that don't really tell you anything at the end of the day. Ultimately the best class is always the one that lets you create the character you want; that's the only attribute that has ever mattered, and ever really will.
I'm personally a big fan of Clerics as a primary class, but they're also great for multi-classing into when you combine other Wisdom based classes, since you get a really good mix of bonuses for just a single level dip thanks to immediately choosing a domain. War Domain really shines in multi-classing (though I like it for a plain build as well), and while the spell list is limited in some ways, it has a lot of options you can't easily get otherwise. I'm also a big fan of Dexterity and Wisdom as high scores in general as they give you a good mix of skill bonuses.
Recovering a spell slot is nice, but I don't think it's a major boost; frontline Clerics won't usually need it (as they don't cast every round) so it's really a sweetener for the casting focused Clerics which I don't think is a bad thing. Wizards and Sorcerers still get far more in terms of spell longevity.
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Clerics now get access to the Aura spells that were exclusively Paladin spells. Paladins had to be level 9 to use the first one, Aura of Vitality, which gives 20d6 healing over a minute. Clerics get access to this at level 5. Paladins would get the 4th level Auras at level 13. Clerics get them at level 7.
While the Aura spells were mainly for Paladins, there were other subclasses that gain access to them outside of the Additional Cleric spells feature added, and the issue here is less about Clerics gaining Paladin spells but more that Paladins are only considered half spellcasters so any spells they share with a full spellcasting class Paladins will always get later. For example, Summon Celestial is a new spell that Clerics and Paladins get. As a 5th level spell, Paladins don't gain access to it until 17th level as it is the highest level spell they can cast; Clerics on the other hand gain access to it at 9th level. Pointing out the level disparity as a reason that Clerics are OP just ignores the fact that Paladins are not as strong spellcasters.
Clerics are one of my favorite classes to play -- I know DDB has released stats a couple times on what are the most commonly picked race/class combinations; I could only find the original 2017 listing on a quick search, but that had clerics as I think the 4th most popular class. So solidly in the middle.
To be fair to wizards (who, though it wasn't noted in the OP, now have 13 subclasses), I keep wanting to play them because they get such a wide variety of spells, the most number of unique spells, and most of the fun magic items. But nearly all of the class descriptions put me to sleep.
The best selection of offensive and defensive spells (shield, absorb elements, misty step, mirror image, blink, counterspell...)
A large number of non-cleric utility spells across all levels (mage hand, alarm, message, sending, knock, magic weapon, invisibility, see invisibility, fly, teleport circle, tiny hut, secret chest, illusion magic in general...)
The best ritual casting feature in the game
A bunch of unique and useful subclass features (portent, bladesong, arcane ward, sculpt spells, transmuter's stone...)
Paladins still have better damage output options with Divine Smite + Extra Attack + Improved Divine Smite, and permanent auras that clerics can't easily replicate. Aura of Protection is extremely useful. Plus Paladins got new fighting styles and access to Warding Bond which is perfect for them.
Harness Divine Power is actually really smart because sometimes your Channel Divinity just isn't relevant to today's adventure. With Harness Divine Power you can always do something with it.
The best selection of offensive and defensive spells (shield, absorb elements, misty step, mirror image, blink, counterspell...)
A large number of non-cleric utility spells across all levels (mage hand, alarm, message, sending, knock, magic weapon, invisibility, see invisibility, fly, teleport circle, tiny hut, secret chest, illusion magic in general...)
The best ritual casting feature in the game
A bunch of unique and useful subclass features (portent, bladesong, arcane ward, sculpt spells, transmuter's stone...)
Paladins still have better damage output options with Divine Smite + Extra Attack + Improved Divine Smite, and permanent auras that clerics can't easily replicate. Aura of Protection is extremely useful. Plus Paladins got new fighting styles and access to Warding Bond which is perfect for them.
Harness Divine Power is actually really smart because sometimes your Channel Divinity just isn't relevant to today's adventure. With Harness Divine Power you can always do something with it.
Pretty much. If we’re looking at Clerics to see if they’re getting too many new shinies, Wizards and Paladins are not really the classes that have grounds to take offense. I’m not going to disagree if somebody submits a few other classes should really have been first in line for a spot of polish, but I don’t think this allows Clerics to lord it over all the rabble either.
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For me personally, I like healers and view the Cleric mechanics as a great gish.
However I hate the polytheism, and strongly dislike the idea of being a slave or a brown-noser to a "god".
I will never play a Cleric as long as that kind of offensive religious coercion remains official.
Some of my players are on the same wavelength, but then it's really a game, and religion, polytheism and all these relations are a staple of the genre...
When someone voluntarily chooses it, it is fine.
When someone is involuntarily coerced, it is problematic.
For me personally, I like healers and view the Cleric mechanics as a great gish.
However I hate the polytheism, and strongly dislike the idea of being a slave or a brown-noser to a "god".
I will never play a Cleric as long as that kind of offensive religious coercion remains official.
I don’t think the “ “ are really appropriate here. In the game, these are - for all intents and purposes - gods. Fully and completely. And evil deities and comparable entities aside, there’s no coercion (and certainly no enslavement) involved in being a cleric.
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Want to start playing but don't have anyone to play with? You can try these options: [link].
For me personally, I like healers and view the Cleric mechanics as a great gish.
However I hate the polytheism, and strongly dislike the idea of being a slave or a brown-noser to a "god".
I will never play a Cleric as long as that kind of offensive religious coercion remains official.
Maybe intent is the real problem for you here, but I'll note that there are zero hard rules about a cleric's ties to a god. It is 100% flavor and thus 100% mutable. You're just someone with powers and you can work with your DM to determine where those powers came from. Or don't even do that. It's not like wizards and druids need an excuse as to how they can do magic.
DnD has 13 playable classes. Clerics had 12 subclasses. With TCE, Clerics have 14 subclasses.
Clerics can now use their channel divinity as a bonus action to:
- Turn Undead
- Something subclass specific
- Regain a spent spell slot
Wizards, to compare, have to spend a short rest to use their Arcane Recovery to regain spell slots, and Arcane Recovery has no other uses other than that.
Clerics now get access to the Aura spells that were exclusively Paladin spells.
Paladins had to be level 9 to use the first one, Aura of Vitality, which gives 20d6 healing over a minute.
Clerics get access to this at level 5.
Paladins would get the 4th level Auras at level 13.
Clerics get them at level 7.
Clerics also got their Divine Strike and Potent Spellcasting combined into 1d8 for every subclass for some reason? This isn't just for Cleric cantrips, but all cantrips.
Clerics were already strongly debated as being OP. Why do they keep getting all this power??
Hmmm. I'd want to see empirical evidence of Clerics being least played before I agreed or disagreed with that.
But I get what you're saying that they, at one time, believed they needed to compensate lower player numbers of clerics by buffing them. But at some point, more power doesn't equal more fun (especially for the rest of the party that has to sit in their shadow). When does it stop?
Channel Divinity is certainly more flexible than Arcane recovery, but Arcane Recovery is arguably better at recovering spell slots. Channel Divinity tops out a 3 lvl 3 spells vs Arcane Recovery's 10 spell levels up to lvl 6.
The new Blessed Strike is a bit of a sidegrade. It loses out on the second D8 that Divine Strike gets at 14th, and it's single target so less useful with Word of Radiance than Potent Spellcasting. I have an Arcana Cleric who uses Green Flame Blade and I'm not sure I'd want to change to Blessed Strikes over Potent Spellcasting.
Cleric players were supposed to be healbots, is what was a big part of the reluctance to play one. Particularly in older editions, which offered less flexibility in terms of swapping or recovering spells, you were more or less expected to dial down whatever else you really wanted to do in order to save your resources for healing. In my experience at least the Cleric class has been one of the more played ones since 3rd edition though.
Want to start playing but don't have anyone to play with? You can try these options: [link].
If you take one of the 7 subclasses that gives you Heavy Armor, they are more Paladin than Paladins. They just get level 9 spells rather than smites, which includes the OP Spiritual Weapon and Spirit Guardians (exclusive to Clerics, if you ignore subclasses and stuff).
While we're at it, how about some empirical evidence of clerics being OP?
I googled '5e OP' with Paladins, Wizards, Artificers, and Fighters, and found as many discussions as cleric. Last time there was a "which class is strongest" poll here, I'm pretty sure clerics didn't make the top 3. I don't have a problem with the adjustments here.
My homebrew subclasses (full list here)
(Artificer) Swordmage | Glasswright | (Barbarian) Path of the Savage Embrace
(Bard) College of Dance | (Fighter) Warlord | Cannoneer
(Monk) Way of the Elements | (Ranger) Blade Dancer
(Rogue) DaggerMaster | Inquisitor | (Sorcerer) Riftwalker | Spellfist
(Warlock) The Swarm
Aren't all of those class options.... optional? If they seem OP to you, don't use them?
Yeah I'd be interested in a citation for that as well, as personally I think they're pretty balanced, and the OP's links doesn't seem to make the case they claim. Clerics are casters first and foremost, Wizards and Sorcerers will generally beat them on raw magic potential, especially later on. What balances them is that Clerics can also be reasonably durable and can be quite fighty up close which is never a bad thing, and with the right spell choices they can play like a martial class in many ways, while still having a bank of "just in case" spells to draw upon.
The problem I always have when people say one class is "stronger" than another is; how the hell do you even begin to compare that? To boil it down into combat figures you strip out huge parts of the game that do actually matter, often including parts of combat to try to boil it down to numbers that don't really tell you anything at the end of the day. Ultimately the best class is always the one that lets you create the character you want; that's the only attribute that has ever mattered, and ever really will.
I'm personally a big fan of Clerics as a primary class, but they're also great for multi-classing into when you combine other Wisdom based classes, since you get a really good mix of bonuses for just a single level dip thanks to immediately choosing a domain. War Domain really shines in multi-classing (though I like it for a plain build as well), and while the spell list is limited in some ways, it has a lot of options you can't easily get otherwise. I'm also a big fan of Dexterity and Wisdom as high scores in general as they give you a good mix of skill bonuses.
Recovering a spell slot is nice, but I don't think it's a major boost; frontline Clerics won't usually need it (as they don't cast every round) so it's really a sweetener for the casting focused Clerics which I don't think is a bad thing. Wizards and Sorcerers still get far more in terms of spell longevity.
Former D&D Beyond Customer of six years: With the axing of piecemeal purchasing, lack of meaningful development, and toxic moderation the site isn't worth paying for anymore. I remain a free user only until my groups are done migrating from DDB, and if necessary D&D, after which I'm done. There are better systems owned by better companies out there.
I have unsubscribed from all topics and will not reply to messages. My homebrew is now 100% unsupported.
While the Aura spells were mainly for Paladins, there were other subclasses that gain access to them outside of the Additional Cleric spells feature added, and the issue here is less about Clerics gaining Paladin spells but more that Paladins are only considered half spellcasters so any spells they share with a full spellcasting class Paladins will always get later. For example, Summon Celestial is a new spell that Clerics and Paladins get. As a 5th level spell, Paladins don't gain access to it until 17th level as it is the highest level spell they can cast; Clerics on the other hand gain access to it at 9th level. Pointing out the level disparity as a reason that Clerics are OP just ignores the fact that Paladins are not as strong spellcasters.
Clerics are one of my favorite classes to play -- I know DDB has released stats a couple times on what are the most commonly picked race/class combinations; I could only find the original 2017 listing on a quick search, but that had clerics as I think the 4th most popular class. So solidly in the middle.
To be fair to wizards (who, though it wasn't noted in the OP, now have 13 subclasses), I keep wanting to play them because they get such a wide variety of spells, the most number of unique spells, and most of the fun magic items. But nearly all of the class descriptions put me to sleep.
Birgit | Shifter | Sorcerer | Dragonlords
Shayone | Hobgoblin | Sorcerer | Netherdeep
Wizards still have:
Paladins still have better damage output options with Divine Smite + Extra Attack + Improved Divine Smite, and permanent auras that clerics can't easily replicate. Aura of Protection is extremely useful. Plus Paladins got new fighting styles and access to Warding Bond which is perfect for them.
Harness Divine Power is actually really smart because sometimes your Channel Divinity just isn't relevant to today's adventure. With Harness Divine Power you can always do something with it.
The Forum Infestation (TM)
Pretty much. If we’re looking at Clerics to see if they’re getting too many new shinies, Wizards and Paladins are not really the classes that have grounds to take offense. I’m not going to disagree if somebody submits a few other classes should really have been first in line for a spot of polish, but I don’t think this allows Clerics to lord it over all the rabble either.
Want to start playing but don't have anyone to play with? You can try these options: [link].
For me personally, I like healers and view the Cleric mechanics as a great gish.
However I hate the polytheism, and strongly dislike the idea of being a slave or a brown-noser to a "god".
I will never play a Cleric as long as that kind of offensive religious coercion remains official.
he / him
Fortunately, I love the 5e Bard.
But the Bard still lacks the choice to be a powerful healer, to truly replace the Cleric healing monopoly.
he / him
When someone voluntarily chooses it, it is fine.
When someone is involuntarily coerced, it is problematic.
Especially with regard to religion and sexuality!
he / him
I don’t think the “ “ are really appropriate here. In the game, these are - for all intents and purposes - gods. Fully and completely. And evil deities and comparable entities aside, there’s no coercion (and certainly no enslavement) involved in being a cleric.
Want to start playing but don't have anyone to play with? You can try these options: [link].
Maybe intent is the real problem here
Maybe intent is the real problem for you here, but I'll note that there are zero hard rules about a cleric's ties to a god. It is 100% flavor and thus 100% mutable. You're just someone with powers and you can work with your DM to determine where those powers came from. Or don't even do that. It's not like wizards and druids need an excuse as to how they can do magic.
My homebrew subclasses (full list here)
(Artificer) Swordmage | Glasswright | (Barbarian) Path of the Savage Embrace
(Bard) College of Dance | (Fighter) Warlord | Cannoneer
(Monk) Way of the Elements | (Ranger) Blade Dancer
(Rogue) DaggerMaster | Inquisitor | (Sorcerer) Riftwalker | Spellfist
(Warlock) The Swarm