TOPIC: 2021 Cleric Relic & Legendary Feedback

Fiddy wrote: Holy Smite makes an interesting case for Clerics to switch to FoP:Panther.

Shhhh... You switch from Cleric to Wizard and I will take your spot as Cleric.

Flik wrote: I agree the relic is in a good place now and strong. I think that is also the reason the upgrade to legendary doesn’t seem worth it, especially with holy smite instead of divine intervention.

Some of the jumps just aren't that good. Ranger and Druid both stick out.

Fiddy wrote:

Daniel White wrote:

Flik wrote:

Daniel White wrote: I am concerned that this will take us back down the path of LoDS, where healing was too plentiful. No problem with FA prayer and bless, but this seems a bit much...

I wasn't here for the entire time LODS was rampant, but adding one mass heal and the ability to attack and heal doesn't seem to be nearly equivalent.

With a free action heal you can heal twice in the same round. Either by casting a second spell, drinking a potion, or reading a healing scroll. That's a lot of potential healing output.

There's a pretty big difference between this and the old LoDS behavior. This requires burning an extra spell to get that healing output. The old LoDS did not. Being able to FA heal doesn't increase overall healing amount, just how quickly you might be able to deliver it.

Free actions do increase the overall heal amount in combat because you can use your non-free action to heal another way, with a scroll or a potion. It is not as bad as LoDS in that it is not adding free out of combat healing.

Edit: However, I don't really worry too much about of of combat healing because you can already do an unlimited amount of it with consumables.

Fiddy wrote:

Wade Schwendemann wrote:

Flik wrote: How many times have we fought non-evil characters in a dungeon? The first fight of N1? I cant think of many over the past three years.

Constructs, animals, and plants are generally neutral.

If Cletics are excited by this, I'm happy for them..

I felt like the previous version with divine intervention was much better.

Also, Holy Smite seems like a Paladin Ability, while Divine Intervention definitely feels clerical.

Yeah, we actually fight non-evil things pretty regularly. And some things that you might assume are evil actually aren't (they're just misunderstood).

True that - you could have knocked me over with a feather when the skull monstrosity at the end of Abyssal Swamp wasn't evil.

At this point it's hard for me to see a cleric legendary I want to make, especially with these abilities none of them really sell it for me.

With tweaks coming up, I would probably make this legendary just to use Holy Smite and equip mostly rares and below for other slots.

James wrote: At this point it's hard for me to see a cleric legendary I want to make, especially with these abilities none of them really sell it for me.

You must really not be wowed if you made the legendary plate for +2 ac, but the upgrade here isn’t enticing.

Endgame wrote:

James wrote: At this point it's hard for me to see a cleric legendary I want to make, especially with these abilities none of them really sell it for me.

You must really not be wowed if you made the legendary plate for +2 ac, but the upgrade here isn’t enticing.

I spent like 600 upgrading due to a good deal, and yeah I am really underwhelmed.

Fiddy wrote:

David Zych wrote: Would it help if Divine Intervention was an upgraded form of the relic mass heal, i.e. replacing it rather than in addition to it?

Relic:
cast Lv1-2 as FA (this is the best thing ever please don't change it!)
1/game heal all others 5hp (number subject to change)

Legendary:
cast Lv1-2 as FA (or maybe Lv0-2 as I think Fiddy suggested)
+1 RP, +1 RS
1/game call for Divine Intervention

This is based on the previous draft of Divine Intervention as an unevenly-randomized all +5 / all +10 / all +18 & one raise / all raised and healed. The part I like best (and the part that would entice me to actually craft a legendary rather than stopping at relic) is the overall ~50% chance of getting at least one raise; it won't bother me if the specific healing numbers need further adjustment.

I did in this example reduce the relic mass heal to match the lowest tier of Divine Intervention, so the legendary can never perform worse. That's not an absolute requirement for me personally to be happy, but I consider it a nice design feature.

Also: it's unclear to me whether or not the relic mass heal receives the Cleric's spell +healing bonus (as a pool of course), and also whether it counts as a spell for Linked Shirt of Healing / Key of Healing / etc. At this moment I lean toward Divine Intervention NOT being a spell, and so for parity the relic mass heal also NOT being a spell, so the number-balancing can be done based on fixed values instead of having to take into account "what if the whole party is already kitted to max out Soothe Wounds?" We'll see if this opinion gets me branded as a heretic by my fellow clerics.

Honestly though, if a party is already kitted out to max Soothe Wounds, would one more spell really make that much difference? This party has clearly made some tradeoffs in order to do that maximizing. No Eldritch Kilts, gave up a Charm slot, I forget what else...

Fair point. Maybe it's not a big deal, but I guess I'm trying to anticipate the objection that "healing everyone +X is way OP because in a lot of circumstances +X might actually be +Y, and Y is way too much, so in order to keep Y under control we'd better make X tiny, or else not have Divine Intervention at all" because either of those outcomes would make me sad.

I'm excited about Divine Intervention, and I want it to be inherently awesome on its own merits!

Questions of heresy aside, I'm curious what you think of the general concept of bringing back Divine Intervention as a drop-in replacement upgrade for the relic heal? Would it help with your sense of being underwhelmed?

If that was an issue, then you should also hope the extra Restore Spell doesn't get used on Soothe Wounds.

I see what you mean, but I'm far less concerned about that, for the very simple reason that if TPTB did decide that 2xRS:SW was OP, none of the solutions to that problem would require getting rid of Divine Intervention.

I would also say that:
1. using RS this way is an additional tradeoff (opportunity cost of not using it for a damage effect) on top of the equipment tradeoffs you already mentioned above
2. if someone feels RS:SW is OP, then I think someone's real beef is with SW and not with RS
3. if we did nonetheless want to prohibit 2xRS:SW, just require the extra RS use to target a new ally (I had proposed this at one point for an earlier draft of the Cleric Rare, because it also encourages more variety of teamwork)

In PUGs at normal and hardcore soothing wounds is a saver with puzzle failures and combat damage. Being able to keep new players active throughout the run is important for their enjoyment of spending 2 hours together.

While I play a bard in this type of group, I wil use items that allow me to cast the spell more or as a scroll to give me a handful of soothing wounds for the run. Any healing bonus for casting as a spell is use to apply extra healing to those players that need it.

I leave it up to the group on what the cleric should restore because another characters ability may be more enjoyable/vital to the groups success.

I'm sure my group will have a legendary eventually.

I love the idea of being able to cast spells as a FA on the relic, and being able to use restore spell/power as a FA on the legendary (or vice versa). Ultimately I like the Cleric as a "how do I want to best help the party?" character.

Let them cast bless, prayer, heals, Spiritual Hammer, Searing light, turn undead, RP, and RS as *either* a FA or SA.

Attacks are always a SA, of course.

Divine intervention feels and sounds better than Holy Smite, but that's probably because I want a paladin to do that.

Wade Schwendemann wrote: I'm sure my group will have a legendary eventually.

I love the idea of being able to cast spells as a FA on the relic, and being able to use restore spell/power as a FA on the legendary (or vice versa). Ultimately I like the Cleric as a "how do I want to best help the party?" character.

Let them cast bless, prayer, heals, Spiritual Hammer, Searing light, turn undead, RP, and RS as *either* a FA or SA.

Attacks are always a SA, of course.

Divine intervention feels and sounds better than Holy Smite, but that's probably because I want a paladin to do that.

Just want to point out that in this version restore power and spell are no longer free actions.