Axel's THF Melee Cleric Build

[axel15810]

(Updated 12/2/22)

Hey everyone! The build has now been updated as of Update 57. Below is what I'm running currently, and an up to date write up giving my thoughts on playing this build in today's meta. *Shameless plug* I'm also a DDO youtuber and have been forever, I upload DDO content regularly over there so please do me a favor and subscribe to My Youtube Channel. You can also Follow me on Twitter and Twitch.





Build Goal

Melee Cleric with as much DPS as possible while still remaining a fully capable main party healer in Reaper and in Raids. Using Falconry with WIS to hit/damage and CC with a focus on Two Handed Fighting utilizing Silvanus with Mauls. This build is not a top tier build but is plenty viable at any reaper skull level with proper gear and smart play.

Split

20 Cleric

Why pure?

We’re spending all of our enhancement points in Falconry, Radiant Servant and Vistani so there’s no extra points to spare for other class trees. Pure cleric gives the radiant servant capstone - not amazing but solid. Also, pure cleric gives more caster levels and more spell points which is a nice perk.

Splashing pally or fighter can certainly be a great alternative but again, we don’t have points to spare for those trees with this build. The fighter level isn’t a must with haste boost being available in Vistani as opposed to just Kensei - plus Vistani has some great low hanging fruit like deflect arrows and negative absorption. Also, be aware that if you splash Paladin you must be lawful good so you won't be able to be chaotic as I recommend in this post.

Running something like 17cleric/3 pally is a good split for a more defensive focused shield using healbot build. But while this build is a healer it is not only a healer, it is much more offensive focused so we’re not going to be investing in tanky trees. This build in comparison to a healbot brings some solid melee DPS. However, this build is giving up survivability in return for that DPS while still maintaining all the healing ability you’ll need for any situation. So in reaper and higher difficulties this build is going to be more inherently difficult to play as a result in comparison to a healbot. You can heal plenty well enough for any difficulty but won’t be as survivable as a healbot so your margin of error is lower. You’ll be able to take fewer hits so you need to play smarter.

The big payoff though is this build when utilized well is much more useful to the vast majority of parties than a healbot since not only can you bring all the heals the party will need, just like a healbot, but unlike a healbot you’ll add DPS to the party on top of it. It’s kind of like playing a THF fighter and a healbot all in one.


Race

Purple Dragon Knight or Aasimar Scourge

Please note, this build is only intended to be played with a race that has access to the Silvanus diety feat, or else it doesn’t make sense to use mauls. This religious feat gives bonuses to crit range and to hit/damage with mauls and is only selectable by a small number of races, and they are all iconics. The only races with Silvanus access are PDK, Scourge, Shadar-kai and Deep Gnome.

Of these four races, PDK and Aasimar Scourge are the two best choices. Both require you to purchase a +1 Lesser Heart of Wood from the DDO Store to remove the forced first iconic level if you want to follow the build as I’ve put it together. However, for PDK you could optionally choose to leave the fighter level if you don’t want to spend the DDO points for it. You’d miss out on the radiant servant capstone and 1 caster level but gain an additional feat. You’d also gain the option to access haste boost in tier 1 Kensei instead of tier 2 Vistani.

Which is better, PDK or Scourge? It's a toss up, they're about equally viable. The biggest difference is PDK gets an extra feat while Scourge gets +2 extra WIS. Take your pick which you prefer. It's worth noting Aasimar Scourge I'd argue also has a slightly better racial enhancement tree overall for this build in addition to the inherent +2 to WIS. So if you have a lot of racial past lives, and therefore a lot of extra racial tree only enhancement points, Scourge could be better since you’ll have an arguably better tree in which to spend those points. If you go Scourge you’ll have to either drop one of the feats I’ve listed below (I’d recommend dropping Empower) or splash a fighter level to get another feat. I don’t spend any points in racial trees, I don’t have any racial past lives at the time of this post and I utilize radiant servant burst a lot so I opt for PDK for the free feat which allows me to take Empower for even better bursts.

Note you can also use Deep Gnome with this build, another WIS based race just like Scourge, but since Scourge’s tree fits this build better than Deep Gnome’s and Deep Gnome gets -2 STR and -2 CHA inherently there's no reason to choose it over Scourge unless you just want it for flavor or that particular past life. Same goes for Shadar-kai. You technically could choose it since it has access to Silvanus but again, there’s not any reason to pick it other than flavor or unless you want that particular past life.

Starting Stats

1st priority WIS, max it. Next priority is CON. The only other stat that really matters is STR (This build is WIS based but needs some STR to meet feat requirements). CHA gives extra turns, but we have plenty regardless so just dump CHA.

I’m not listing an exact split because your starting stats depend entirely on what STR tome, if any, that you have. This is because you’ll need enough base STR (points invested in the stat + STR tomes) to meet feat requirements.

You must have a total of 13 base STR to take Power Attack, 15 to take the THF feat and 17 to take the ITHF and GTHF feats. This is very important to not overlook. Be sure you have this amount of STR at each level you plan to take these feats. You should end up with base STR of 17 and no more.

Skills

Heal, UMD, Jump

Heal boosts positive spellpower so is a no brainer, UMD is invaluable for convenience - mainly teleport scrolls but also various other buffs via wands/scrolls. Jump you should take enough to hit the cap of 40 after applying any jump items/buffs. Going over 40 doesn’t help you. Any extra points can go wherever you’d prefer. Diplomacy (to hit various skills checks in quests) and Haggle (for more plat) are my top 2 choices. But the 4th choice really doesn’t matter much.

Alignment

True Neutral or Chaotic Neutral

It doesn't matter much. However, being Chaotic means we would get +2 extra imbue dice from the Harbinger of Chaos feat if we had access to an imbue toggle. But since we don't currently have access to a toggle under the enhancement tree split of radiant servant tier 5 and falconry tier 4 we can't benefit from this dice. Our only possible toggle is in Warpriest tier 4. You may wish to just go True Neutral in order to be immune to any alignment based damage.

PDK Feat Selection by Level

**Important Disclaimer** The below feat selection order assumes you are starting as an Iconic character at level 15. This feat order will not make sense if you’re starting at level 1.

I take the melee feats later in order to give STR tomes time to kick in to assist in meeting feat requirements (I have a +8 STR tome here). And since the lowest I’m ever starting is at level 15 it doesn’t matter if I take them later. Doing this allows me to start with a lower STR at character creation, wasting less points in a useless stat.

If you’re playing this build on the hardcore server where you’ll start at level 1 as an iconic you’ll want to take the melee feats earlier obviously and take more STR to meet their requirements.

(Again, you need a total of 13 base STR to take Power Attack, 15 to take the THF feat and 17 to take the ITHF and GTHF feats)

If Scourge race, drop Empower.



Class and Feat Selection
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Level Class · · · · · ·Feats
· · · · · · · · · · · ·Level 1 Requires a +1 Heart of Wood to switch out of Iconic Class
1 · · Cleric(1) · · · ·Standard: Maximize Spell
· · · · · · · · · · · ·Purple Dragon Knight Bonus: Empower Healing Spell
· · · · · · · · · · · ·Follower of Faith: Favored by Silvanus
2 · · Cleric(2) · · · ·Domain: War Domain Tier I
3 · · Cleric(3) · · · ·Standard: Quicken Spell
4 · · Cleric(4) · · · ·Wisdom: +1 Level up
5 · · Cleric(5) · · · ·Domain Feat: War Domain Tier II
6 · · Cleric(6) · · · ·Standard: Power Attack
· · · · · · · · · · · ·Deity: Blessing of Silvanus
7 · · Cleric(7) · · · ·
8 · · Cleric(8) · · · ·Wisdom: +1 Level up
9 · · Cleric(9) · · · ·Standard: Two Handed Fighting
· · · · · · · · · · · ·Domain Feat: War Domain Tier III
10· · Cleric(10)· · · ·
11· · Cleric(11)· · · ·
12· · Cleric(12)· · · ·Standard: Improved Critical: Bludgeoning Weapons
· · · · · · · · · · · ·Wisdom: +1 Level up
13· · Cleric(13)· · · ·
14· · Cleric(14)· · · ·Domain Feat: War Domain Tier IV
15· · Cleric(15)· · · ·Standard: Improved Two Handed Fighting
16· · Cleric(16)· · · ·Wisdom: +1 Level up
17· · Cleric(17)· · · ·
18· · Cleric(18)· · · ·Standard: Greater Two Handed Fighting
19· · Cleric(19)· · · ·
20· · Cleric(20)· · · ·Wisdom: +1 Level up
21· · Epic(1) · · · · ·Epic Feat: Overwhelming Critical
22· · Epic(2) · · · · ·Epic Destiny Feat: Perfect Two Handed Fighting
23· · Epic(3) · · · · ·
24· · Epic(4) · · · · ·Epic Feat: Intensify Spell
· · · · · · · · · · · ·Wisdom: +1 Level up
25· · Epic(5) · · · · ·Epic Destiny Feat: Doublestrike
26· · Epic(6) · · · · ·
27· · Epic(7) · · · · ·Epic Feat: Empower Spell
28· · Epic(8) · · · · ·Epic Destiny Feat: Crush Weakness
· · · · · · · · · · · ·Wisdom: +1 Level up
29· · Epic(9) · · · · ·
30· · Epic(10)· · · · ·Epic Feat: Beloved of the Divine
· · · · · · · · · · · ·Legendary: Scion of Arborea
31· · Legendary(1)· · ·Epic Destiny Feat: Harbinger of Chaos
32· · Legendary(2)· · ·Wisdom: +1 Level up



Domain

War Domain

This is the domain you should take because it gives the Holy Sword SLA, giving a +1 competence bonus to critical damage range and critical damage multiplier. That makes this is our clear choice of domain because it's easily the best for increasing our melee DPS. As a bonus, you also buff yourself and anyone near you +10 melee and range power every time you use Radiant Servant Burst or Aura. Please note, we don't need to give up DPS for even more healing by taking a domain like the Healing Domain. The healing abilities this build has is already plenty sufficient to serve as a party healer. And Holy Sword is way too much DPS to be worth giving up for the extra survivability a Domain like Animal offers. There aren't any viable alternatives to War Domain for this build.

Heroic Enhancements



As a party healer I want tier 5 radiant servant for the no max caster levels on cure spells most of all, but also for aura.

Falconry gives us WIS to hit/damage (be aware the tier 3 is bugged and gives both to hit and damage with WIS so as shown in the image, do not take the tier 2 Killer Instinct 1). The tier 4 in Falconry is amazingly good. -50% fort debuff on Falconry attacks, An AoE blind for our go to CC, 30% extra helpless damage and a WIS based trance for extra damage. There's also all kinds of other goodies to grab in the cores and in tiers 1, 2 and 3 as shown in the image.

Vistani is super important, haste boost is so good that it is absolutely mandatory to get it either here or in Kensei (by splashing fighter). Vistani can be unlocked on a per character basis by running all the regular Ravenloft quests on elite or higher, or by buying the tree outright in the DDO store. If you don't have the tree unlocked already I would highly recommend running the heroic Ravenloft saga on Elite or higher be the first thing you do after creating your level 15 character so you can get haste boost. You can also get a good starter maul for free by talking to the NPC in the Barovian wilderness right after finishing the Into the Mists quest.

Why don't you use the Warpriest tree?

Short answer, Falconry is just an objectively better tree. It’s a better option in basically every area that matters. Warpriest is very weak in its current state and no melee cleric should ever use it as a primary tree. It fails to be worth putting a substantial investment in on any kind of melee cleric compared to spending those points in Falconry. You could certainly justify a small investment, but nobody should invest as high as tier 4 or tier 5 except in some niche use situations for Divine Intervention (such as if you wanted to solo the Strahd raid and need it to deal with grip). SSG, if you’re reading this please consider giving Warpriest a much needed overhaul so it can be competitive as a primary tree.

Epic Destiny Enhancements



I've spent considerable time experimenting with all the relevant destiny trees at this point and this is what I feel is the most optimal tree split for this build.

Fury of the Wild (Adrenaline in particular) is way too good to pass up. Adrenaline bonuses throughout the tree and the tier 5 being amazing for two handed fighting make it a clear choice for our tier 5. Note that you should not take any of the enhancements in this tree that give or provide extra benefits for barbarian rage, as we can't rage since that would prevent us from casting any spells (we are a party healer after all). The primal rage buff in tier 2 is fine to use though, that buff does not prevent spellcasting.

Sentinel is really important because of renewal, which is just invaluable to have. It gives us another cheap healing SLA to go alongside our cure moderate wounds SLA, and our only good source of pre-healing. Renewal is pretty much mandatory if you’re healing a tank as well, since you can hit them with this preheal/healing over time effect to go along side whatever else you’re healing the tank with. There’s also a lot of nice offensive and survivability stuff in Sentinel such as extra to hit and the Into the Fray enhancement in tier 3. It’s also another melee tree so that means 15 more melee power from the cores.

Shadowdancer gives +6 DCs for Falconry attacks via the tier 1 assassinate enhancement which is the primary reason to take this tree. Though everything else there I take up to tier 3 such as doublestrike, sneak attack die and 3 more melee cores for 15 more melee power and other bonuses all synergize very well too. We also get a handy Ddoor clicky in the 2nd core.

Why not use Angel destiny? That aura from the mantle is amazing!

The other 3 trees I use are just more essential and giving up our mantle, 15 melee power from cores plus having to dip into tier 3 to get it is just too expensive and the synergy overall is not good enough for Exalted Angel to be worth it. And while I would love to have the aura from Angel on this build it’s not as essential as the other trees. Bottom line is we don’t need the extra healing SLAs and such from Angel, and the Epic Strikes would conflict with Adrenaline. We can already sufficiently serve as a party or raid healer and have enough healing SLAs and spells already so more doesn’t really matter that much. I heal R10s and any raid no problem with this build. Believe me, you don't need to sacrifice DPS in your destiny tree choices in order to get more healing. Radiant servant, being 17 cleric, proper gearing and taking Renewal make us already plenty capable enough of healing R10s and raids.

Why no Divine Crusader?

I don’t use Divine Crusader for many reasons. But the bottom line is Shadowdancer and Sentinel are just more essential for reasons I stated above, and we don’t use shields or have the hotkey real estate to bother with smite evil so it just doesn’t synergize with this build. And Adrenaline again, is far too good to pass up for Consecrated Ground even though I really like that ability. Crusader is now much more focused on shield users than it was prior to the Epic Destiny pass in Update 51, particularly shield user paladins, and doesn’t synergize particularly well with this build anymore.

Reaper Enhancements



Not a lot to say here. Just make sure you grab Reaper’s Strike from tier 1 Dread Adversary because it’s incredibly powerful for just 4 reaper points since it doesn’t share a cooldown with Haste Boost so you can use them together for some extremely good burst DPS synergy.

Remember second and higher cores in reaper trees apply even outside of reaper mode so the crazy amount of extra hitpoints you can get from Grim Barricade’s cores means I tend to plop most of my points into that tree since the melee bonuses outside of the aforementioned Reaper’s Strike in Dread Adversary are rather minor in comparison. Obviously the goal down the line though is to gain max reaper points so I can take both but I only have 43 reaper points as of the writing of this post.

Past Lives

Not required for this build, it is first life friendly, but they obviously help.

Epic past lives are your best bang for the buck when it comes to time vs. benefit gained. The most important being 3x Martial Doublestrike past lives for a 9% doublestrike toggle. This is what you should go for first if you want to jump on the reincarnation train. Primal past lives are very nice for extra hitpoints as are Divine past lives for more PRR. Epic past lives in general are helpful for more fate points and eventually more epic destiny points.

Paladin, Sacred Fist, Barbarian and Fighter are the most useful for heroic past lives. Paladin gives extra healing amp, Sacred Fist gives extra healing amp and positive spell power, Barbarian gives extra hitpoints and Fighter gives extra to hit.

The best iconic past life bonuses are the toggles from either Aasimar Scourge for extra doublestrike or from Razorclaw Shifter for extra to hit and damage.

Racial past lives are not required either but obviously are great for extra racial action points and extra stats. Human and Aasimar racial past lives for the extra rank of WIS is the most helpful of the races but extra racial enhancement points from 3x racial in any race are obviously amazing to have too.

Playstyle

In Reaper, focus on debuffing/CC’ing enemies with falconry attacks while healing the party. Do Melee DPS as well of course but healing is generally your first priority. Stay back and heal in Reaper when it gets too dangerous for you to be up front melee'ing. The most important skill you'll need to master when playing this build at higher difficulties is to know when to melee and when to step back and heal. You have to get a feel for the party and play accordingly. You don’t want to get too aggressive and die, but you also don’t want to be a liability and not contribute in terms of offense to your party when healing isn’t much needed. Some parties (in high Reaper mode particularly) will require you to play more cautiously and do more healing while lower difficulties and very self-sufficient parties may let you focus almost soley on CC and DPS.

Endgame Gearset

I don't have this updated yet as of Update 57, but am planning to add this at some point when I get it together.