Half-elf pure cleric arcane archer

[eachna_gislin]

Having discovered I have a surplus of half-elf pure clerics with Pinions, and December freebie ETR tokens, and that ranger dilly grants a limited version of bow strength, and already knowing helves can unlock AA, and clerics can choose the Silver Flame for a teeny bit more bow damage, it occurs to me there may be a way to build a pure helf cleric AA that isn't totally gimp.

This will be a level 28 character ETRing. Pure cleric. Half elf. Will probably otherwise be mostly DC-casting specced as none of my warpriest builds had a Pinion dumped on them (and I tend to use gswords with Warpriests anyway as you can't use the healing smite with a bow). Also probably won't have any _other_ good bows besides Pinion.

Here's a 1st lifer who can afford to swap around a few feats and still keep most of her casting power. She's also already farmed some tomes.

(32 point char)
Str 13 (+3 tome)
Dex 8 (+3 tome)
Con 14 (+2 tome)
Int 9 (+3 tome)
Wis 18 (+4 tome)
Cha 12 (+2 tome)

Feats
1-Power Attack ( + Fighter Dilettante)
3-Toughness
6-Empower Healing
9-Maximize
12-Quicken
15-Mental Toughness
18-Improved Mental Toughness
21-Spell Focus: Evocation
24-Greater Spell Focus: Evocation
26-Epic Spell Focus: Evocation
28-Epic Spell Power: Positive

The Power Attack and Toughness are leftover from pre-enhancement-pass heroic levels, and the two Mental Toughness's are leftover from grinding out her destinies and not having gear. She has her +150, +200, +250 spellpoint augments and most of her destinies ground out now so it's time to ETR and put on the big girl pants.

As far as casting feats go, I want to keep Empower Healing and Quicken, and the three Focus feats. I have been on something of a necromancy kick with all my clerics so I wouldn't mind switching from Evocation to Necromancy (however there may not be enough skill points to unlock AA, get the Radiant burst, _and_ get a viable necromancer from DD). I'm just throwing it out as an option. Maximize would be nice if there's a free slot after whatever bow feats are necessary.

What sort of AA can I build with this framework (and what pointers might be offered as far as statting and feat selection)? When searching the boards I mostly come across dedicated multi-class AA builds.

edit: Posted in the helf boards because the helf AA is the part I need help with, not the cleric part .

[unbongwah]

Feat-wise this is still really tight; even if you skip Bow STR for rgr dilly, you still want PBS, Rapid Shot, Manyshot, and IC:Ranged at a bare minimum, IMHO. So for metamagics you want, what, Quicken, Maximize, Heighten, Spell Focus for DC Twists, maybe Empower Heal? Perhaps with Ruin as your lvl 27 feat?

APs are tight too: you need to spend at least 14 APs in HE tree just to unlock AA tree (more if you wish to max out rgr dilly); 11 APs to pick up RS bursts; 41 into DiDi if you want capstone + tier-5s (that's what I infer from your "mostly DC casting specced" comment, anyway). That leaves just 14 APs to spread between AA & Warpriest.

It's feasible, but that doesn't make it a good idea.

[eachna_gislin]

Feat-wise this is still really tight; even if you skip Bow STR for rgr dilly, you still want PBS, Rapid Shot, Manyshot, and IC:Ranged at a bare minimum, IMHO. So for metamagics you want, what, Quicken, Maximize, Heighten, Spell Focus for DC Twists, maybe Empower Heal? Perhaps with Ruin as your lvl 27 feat?

APs are tight too: you need to spend at least 14 APs in HE tree just to unlock AA tree (more if you wish to max out rgr dilly); 11 APs to pick up RS bursts; 41 into DiDi if you want capstone + tier-5s (that's what I infer from your "mostly DC casting specced" comment, anyway). That leaves just 14 APs to spread between AA & Warpriest.

It's feasible, but that doesn't make it a good idea.

So it looks like I'd have to drop DD and put most of my points into the helf tree and AA. Whatever leftovers I had would have to either go into DD (maybe for a couple SLAs) or Warpriest (whatever extra damage I could eke out of the weapon line). I agree that it's not ideal or optimal, but, I don't think it's necessarily a bad idea. I've been having a lot of fun running multiple clerics in DD, but at the same time I feel I'm in a bit of a rut. And I have three divine disciple helf clerics who all have Pinions. At some point you have to run with what the RNG gives you and see where it takes you.

With an ETR, if I "hate" it at least I can just nanny/spam light spells in raids and eHard quests till I hit 28 and ETR out of it. But if I _like_ it, well, then, it opens up the possibility for a deliberate build change in the future.

Thanks for the feat suggestions, I'll see what I can shoehorn into the build .