Early Look - Cleric Domains

[DeltaBravo]

I think the domains are a fun little twist on clerics. None of em i see as really that great or powerfull myself. But its a bonus and i like cookies..

but what about updateing the heal spells emself.??? people have ALOT more Hp then what the heal spells was designed for and i personally find that the biggiest issue i have on my cleric is that keeping other people alove that dont get 1 shotted or insta killed. Is haveing to spam heal spells on those that actully can take a hit or two before they die.. In end game content. The healing spells are simply not powerfull enough.. An upgrade to the heal spell would proberly make ALOT of people very happy.. and frankly its about time.

After all playing a healing toon. sould give you more healing power then playing anybuild with Cocoon, LOH, or similar.. But as it is now. LOH and cocoon will out match alot of the healing spells-

Cheers Deltabravo

[Captain_Wizbang]

On skype w/ a few fellow D&D and DDO people yesterday, the new domains came up in conversation.

One fellow asked a great question.......

"Given the state of power creep in DDO, isn't this going to put clerics over the top as OP?"

"If we take a druid/cleric build even without knowing the core abilities and stats as of yet, it is easy to assume this type of character will make warlocks look cheesy and blah."

He made a great point, it's not so much about the cleric class, it's (opinion) about how these new domains help other classes and clerics again will be a so-so class in DDO.

*he is one of the players I know taking a break from game till the cleric pass happens. And Ravenloft wont bring him back, he wants to play his 3 clerics again.

[Steve_Howe]

Good Domain

Level 2: You gain +2 Light Spell Power (Radiance) per Cleric Level. You gain +1 to the Heal skill for every 2 Cleric levels.

Light Power?? Since when does the Good Domain have anything to do with Light??

I can see the Glory Domain doing so but there is no Glory Domain. If any Domain you've listed is going to add to Light power, it's the Sun Domain....which it does. I think if the Good Domain is only going to add a single spell power, it should add Devotion Spell Power, not Radiance.

Speaking of the Sun Domain...

Sun Domain

Level 2: You gain +2 to Fire (Combustion) and Light Spell Power (Radiance) per Cleric level.

When you use Turn Undead you and your allies gain True Sight. in addition, for 20 seconds enemies in the radius of the Turn Undead have their incorporeal miss chance negated and will be inflicted with 10% vulnerability to Light damage.

Level 5: You gain Searing Light as an SLA.

Level 9: You gain Sun Beam as an SLA

Level 14: You gain Sunburst as an SLA

I like the SLAs and also the fact it adds to Light and Fire spell power.

The Domain Power (True Sight for 20 seconds to allies) is absolutely TERRIBLE. Better to enhance the chances of turning than this steaming pile of "power."

The negation of Incorporeal miss chance is kinda sucky (most people can already negate that via several means via Equipment, Enhancement, Feat, or Epic Destiny power) and the extra 10% Light Damage isn't terrible.

The Sun Domain definitely needs some work.

See, this is where I think understanding the finer points makes a difference. If you just hand out Holy Sword at lvl 14, a level earlier than you can get it as a pally, it kills a lot of pallies.

Nope. Pallies can get Holy Sword as their first 4th level spell at 14th level. Check their table yourself.

http://ddowiki.com/page/Paladin

[Krelar]

Light Power?? Since when does the Good Domain have anything to do with Light??

I can see the Glory Domain doing so but there is no Glory Domain. If any Domain you've listed is going to add to Light power, it's the Sun Domain....which it does. I think if the Good Domain is only going to add a single spell power, it should add Devotion Spell Power, not Radiance.

Probably because "good" (and all alignment damage) is affected by radiance/light spellpower?

[Targal]

Light Power?? Since when does the Good Domain have anything to do with Light??

Light Spell Power is tied with Alignment Spell Power. They're same.

[ValariusK]

Ok, here are my comments. First off, let's be clear, there's no such thing as an overpowered ability really, only an overpowered build. So in that light, let's look at each of the domains in the context of what a powergamer would do with them in a build.

Air domain, effectively +4 DC to evo, SLAs are good, using light sp for your electric sp is nice from a gear perspective. Lightning and chain lightning are good slas (cooldowns and sp costs are yet TBD). This would synergize well with a 41 Divine Disciple, tier 5 radiant build that I've posted elsewhere. Turning elementals is meh, but might be fun in heroics if they don't change turn undead. The evo bonus will help with implosion and your light spells that have saves (sun bolt and sunbeam, which are your bread and butter dps) and also blade barrier. This is a pretty good domain IMO, since it substantially improves a decent build.

Animal domain, big bonus on spot/listen and reflex saves. Reflex save bonus is nice, as its often a sticking point for clerics. ALso a huge bonus to hit points and special effect of bonus to constitution for your party when you turn undead. Dire-charge like ability may be nice, but we'll have to see the implementation. Almost I wonder whether this one might be a good fit for a cleric/rogue, say something like 14 cleric/6 rogue, with dagger specialization and probably Vol as deity for the dagger thing. Find traps plus bonus on spot from cleric levels would make the rogue part work better, and evasion. Its also a decent candidate for the self-healing tank build

Chaos domain, Will save bonus (meh, its already your strong suit), turn undead special is pretty nice, parties will appreciate it.. But overall I'd say meh. No real reasons to build for it.

Death domain, always popular in my experience. +4 DC to necro. This is pretty huge. Necro dcs matter more than evo dcs. Immune to energy drain is nice, minor bonuses to turn undead (likely meh), destruction and necrotic ray are awesome slas. This is a very good domain, it has synergy with a standard DC caster cleric build.

Destruction domain, +5 MP/RP, turn undead has an up to 10 MP/RP effect on your party (very good), some other minor stuff and, you can cast spells while raging.
There's something decent in here but I'm not sure how to build it. It seems to want to be a barbarian shaman kind of thing but I'm not sure what it really buys you. Put this one as dunno as yet.

Earth domain, effectivlely a plus to your light sp (since it is equal to your corrosion sp). turn elementals (meh), fort save and acid resist bonus on turn (meh), but earthquake SLA. That earthquake SLA takes this domain from lame to pretty decent. I can see people building for that. Earthquake is good CC that's usable almost anywhere.

Fire: Wouldn't bother. Firestorm is crazy buggy in its implementation.

Good domain: Gets more light sp, which is good, small bonus to heal skill, which is positive sp, temporary hp (5x level) on turn use---THIS is very good, especially in reaper.
blade barrier SLA, that's pretty nice too. I'd say this one will be popular in support builds aimed at reaper.

Healing, +2/level positive SP, this is fairly nice, but usually you have no shortage of this. Can help a little I suppose in powering through reaper self-heal penalties. Heal amp on your party when you turn undead (useful, especially stacked with heal aura). SLAs are good, free empower is pretty nice on heals. I'd say this one is OK. Not great, but ok

Knowledge domain. +2 dcs to all, +4 spell penetration (very nice), and a somewhat bizarre +level/2 to int to your party when you turn undead. Supporting a bunch of wizards and artificers and int to damage types? I think this one would be good in a built static group. At least ok, maybe good.

Law, +4 dcs on enchantment (ie greater command) plus greater command sla. Big on turn save bonus. I'd say OK, not good, but ok

Luck domain: bonus to all saves (+4) that's good, on turn save bonus, +2 dcs to all spells, displacement SLA (huge), no autofail saves on 1 (**** that's nice)
This is a very good domain, suitable for a generalist cleric.

magic: bonus on evo +4, on turn 2x level USP, very nice especially with more casters in the party, lots more SP, +2x level USP, chain missle SLA (which isn't shabby)
At least ok, maybe even good.
Protecction: bonus to prr/mrr/ac, big on turn bonus to same, shield permanent (meh as you have nightshield), Radiant forcefield SLA(damned nice), yet more PRR.
This one works with a cleric tank build pretty nicely.

Strength: If I was doing a light splash of cleric (2 or 6 levels), with some melee class, I'd consider this, I'd say poor to ok in the right splash.

Sun: Sounds better than I think it'd be. Sunburst you can already get through DD. I'd say this one is poor to ok (ok only if you're fighting a ton of undead and light-weak opponents).

Trickery, bonus to enchantment +4, nice SLAs (mass charm and mind fog) Big bonus to charisma on-turn. This one is lame to ok if you can find a good use for the charisma in your party (sorceror support bulid?)

War domain, minor damage bonus (+4), on turn bonus to mp/rp (very useful), proficiency in everything (meh, but it does mean you can go khopesh, repeater or bastard sword/dwarven axe). Tactical dc's bonus (meh, maybe you can afford stunning blow and your base trip). holy sword (very good). This lets you basically act as a paladin with better spellcasting and inferior damage output (pally damage enhancement line is alot better than yours). Not a bad domain, probably some THF clerics will take it. Good synergy with Sword of Shadows.
Water domain, good slas, I'd say this one is at best ok though.

[Matthey]

Clerics in heavy armor are nothing like a Fighter or Paladin in heavy armor. I don't think armor training enhancements can explain the difference in protection. The system which gives PRR of BAB*armor_type_rating was an improvement but maybe we can do better by also adding a bonus PRR and MRR which reflects the magical enhancement bonus of the armor and shield.

robes/outfit PRR/MRR = enhancement bonus *.5
light armor PRR/MRR = enhancement bonus * 1
medium armor PRR/MRR = enhancement bonus * 1.5
heavy armor PRR/MRR = enhancement bonus * 2

buckler/orbs PRR/MRR = enhancement bonus * .25
small shield PRR/MRR = enhancement bonus * .5
large shield PRR/MRR = enhancement bonus * .75
tower shield PRR/MRR = enhancement bonus * 1

For example, robes +5 would give 2 PRR/MRR, plate armor +5 would give 10 PRR/MRR and a large shield +5 would give 3 PRR/MRR. This should help re-balance the game mechanics without giving crazy amounts of PRR/MRR in enhancement trees. Also, fix mithral armor to give the bonuses of the original armor type (example: mithral Calvary Plate should count as heavy armor for all PRR and PRR/MRR bonuses). The game will continue to deteriorate unless re-balanced and more bugs are fixed than new ones added (I can name many bugs which have gone unfixed for years). Please don't add a bunch of domains either if it is just going to be a bug fest and difficult to maintain.

Turn undead could at least make more undead shaken and/or frightened. Perhaps undead of the same CR or less in turning range of other undead successfully turned should have to make a fear save vs the turning characters charisma (save=shaken, missed save=frightened). The Cleric class will suffer if turn undead is used for "buffing" instead of "turning undead".

Smite Foe by itself is really lame. The base damage should scale like an additional +1 damage per 3 levels. Also, how about a +2 hit and damage bonus against creatures of opposite alignment (+2 good vs evil and +2 lawful vs chaotic for example) and make damage type that of the cleric (good and lawful for a lawful good cleric)?

I would like to see a new spell for Cleric, Favored Soul and Paladin.

Name: Resist Death
School: Abjuration (or Necromancy?)
Level: Cleric 2, Favored Soul 2, Paladin 2
Spell Point Cost: 15 (Cleric 10)
Components: Verbal, Somatic, Focus
Metamagic: Enlarge, Extend, Quicken
Range: Standard
Target: Friend, Self
Duration: 1 minute/cast level
Saving Throw: None
Spell Resistance: No
Cooldown: 2.5 seconds

The targeted creature gains negative resistance of 10 to be increased to 20 at 7th level and 30 at 11th level. The creature's range of unconsciousness is also extended by 2 HP/level. Some creatures may be immune to either or both effects.

[Niminae]

Some of these look interesting and fun. Overall, I don't hate what I'm seeing.

One concern I have is the War domain. I dig "proficient with all weapon types" in a vacuum, but that doesn't synergize at all with deity feats, which grant proficiency for favored weapons, and the Warpriest tree which boosts damage with favored weapons.

Instead of proficiency with all weapons, how about the level 2 (or whatever) War domain feat is a selector where you choose your favored weapon. That way you still get proficiency with any (one) weapon, and you also get to use the deity feats and warpriest enhancements.

The problem with that, as I see it, is that a Cleric who doesn't think that their deity weapon is a good option is left without the proficiencies which would allow them to make a free choice.

I'm not sure you're using "synergize" in the right context here. If it were a synergy then there would be some bonus for using the deity weapon on top of simple proficiency, and favored weapon proficiency already comes at Level 1.

[Niminae]

From what I have seen in the past, there is usually very little change to what they show as early and the final version, I do hope they tone it down just a little.

There's already been a fair amount of nerfing from what they showed early. But hey, keep calling for nerfs and you might be successful in making the cleric pass leave them in the dust as has been their position for the past ~6 years.

Good job!

[Grace_ana]

There's already been a fair amount of nerfing from what they showed early. But hey, keep calling for nerfs and you might be successful in making the cleric pass leave them in the dust as has been their position for the past ~6 years.

Good job!

I'd rather they nerf now before live than nerf 6 months down the road when they realize what they've done but people have already build toons. It's gonna be either one or the other.

[Dungeoner49]

As much as I like to see healers getting some love from the devs, this is not the right kind of love that I think they need. Sure, more damage and/or spell options for a healer so they can defend themselves better is certainly a good idea, but it's not great as it could mean that more people are going to use this increase in power for another offensive spell-casting self heal build rather than the intended purpose of a healer. I believe that something that helps strengthen the weaknesses that healers (and other supports) in online multiplayer games have is without removing the . (I am more than willing to help others when it doesn't take too much on my part, but it gets frustrating at times). Improving/adjusting stealth and monster AI certainly helps benefit back-liners in general, but more can be done for people who want to help their group, but don't want to be practically idle or unable to survive and/or defend themselves if they get do somehow targeted even when they let others who are competent do the dirty work well.


My idea is that Clerics and/or FvS get a choice between two toggled (or passive) feats that benefit ether a passive healer, or an aggressive one. You gain one (or both) for free (if not both you can exchange them with Fred with no worries of other feats as prerequisites)

Humble Healer:

(ether improves the Pacifism toggle from Radiant Servant or grants new toggled or passive feat that has similar benefits)

Improves/adjusts the Pacifism toggle so that when active to reduce threat generated by healing, and improves your durability by increasing your defensive qualities (such as HP, saves, AC, and % damage reduction or MRR & PRR) as well as improved Diplomacy, Concentration, and DC's (your inaction grants you greater social grace and more focus when you do act), but at the cost of damage output whether it be spell based or not, and increased cooldowns (2X-3X?) for offensive spells. However, if harmed physically or magically (must take damage or be affected by a negative effect such as a CC or reduced status), the attacker receives damage vulnerability and Pacifism's penalties are negated for a short time (10-16 seconds?). All bonuses/penalties related to Pacifism should scale properly with level, and while in reaper mode the self heal penalty is also reduced (to help negate the penalty as it's to encourage dedicated healers, which is what you'd be if you took this).


And for those that would prefer to be an offensive healer that supports their group with damage and some healing:

Divine Destroyer (separate melee and spellcasting versions?):

A new toggled or passive ability that increases offensive capability (and possibly boost intimidation and balance) at the cost of healing output and longer cooldown times for healing abilities (2X?)

[gabbatastic]

Does the empower healing feat stack with the empower healing from the healing domain?

[AMADHA]

One of the points of the Domains in PnP D&D was that they were restricted in availability based on the God that you worshipped.
A God's portfolio could be quite broad (someone with only a partial interest in War might offer the War Domain among others), but there was common sense involved (A LN God of Guardians would not offer Chaos or Destruction among others).
In order to ensure that Domain implementation makes some sort of sense, can the Domains please be implemented and restricted based on Deity choice (and his/her portfolio) and Character Alignment, rather than being a random free-for-all, thereby preventing Domain/Deity/Alignment/Multi-Class combinations that might result in uber-power, but would have any sane Deity saying "no way am I going to let you do that!"?
This may already be the Devs intention, but it's not mentioned in the listing of Domains at the start of the post.

Totally agree. If you're going to add stuff like this (which makes the game more complex and why I stopped playing PnP D&D) tying these changes to the deity makes a boatload more sense than arbitrary selection. Pick the god you follow, get the perks! Not that committed... well, you're a cleric... tough love baby. God's be jealous folks so only one at a time and penalties if you switch since you've just 'angered' one and the new one probably won't trust you so much.

[Kuunkukka]

Greetings.

*SNIP*

Sev~

I love the domains, mostly a good job. I can't see myself using most of these domains, but probably my wife will hop on those with glee. I'm a great proponent of the Air domain personally. Demigod of lightning and thunder, here I come (can we get a warhammer proficiency feat added, pretty please?)

However, implementation of these domains still leaves me a bit baffled; How do the domains interact with existing deity feats?
- Do they co-exist? (You choose either Sovereign Host or Healing domain)
- Remove old deity feats and replace with selection of domains?
- Overlap? (as in you can be a Cleric of Amaunator with the Sun domain? Or The Maul Monster of Silvanus(TM) with Destruction domain frothing in the mouth Raging Ravager Barbarian?)

This will affect my perception of the cleric pass greatly, some clarification is needed.

[edrein]

Totally agree. If you're going to add stuff like this (which makes the game more complex and why I stopped playing PnP D&D) tying these changes to the deity makes a boatload more sense than arbitrary selection. Pick the god you follow, get the perks! Not that committed... well, you're a cleric... tough love baby. God's be jealous folks so only one at a time and penalties if you switch since you've just 'angered' one and the new one probably won't trust you so much.

The problem with this is DDO's deity selection isn't diverse enough to enable all of the domains listed. Let alone certain domains would be iconics only. In the case of the Earth Domain, Sylvanus is the only god in DDO that fits (because he is a Druid Deity) which forces you to be an iconic. That also means the Death Domain is only accessible to Lady Vol. Do you see the issue here? Everyone would start griping and complaining about why certain gods that they may deem useless get the best domains.

[AMADHA]

Greetings.

As we work on a Divine pass, we want to add in our version of Domains for Clerics. Rather than having them simply be a series of spell options, we wanted players to pick a Domain that gave the Cleric interesting build options that worked with enhancement trees.

That said, we wanted to give the players a preview of how Domains work in DDO, and want options would be available for Clerics.

Domains
Starting at level 2, a Cleric will pick one Domain which will provide additional (free) class feats as they level.

Sev~

Did I count right... 19 domains? REALLY? I don't think there are even that many Gods in DDO, but I could be wrong. I think that this is way too many domains I also think that these should be tied to the God followed. (See post relating to this.) If not God based then how about philosophy based domains like Warrior, Healer, Destroyer, Undead Hunter, and Sharlatan? Warrior affects battle cleric abilities; Healer affects healing and self protection; Destroyer affects stuff that destroys life and creates undead; Undead Hunter kind of a paladin flavour in killing, well, the undead (and Destroyers technically); and Sharlatan represents a kind of fake cleric that gets some rogue skills like open locks and stronger disable trap spells but are weaker spell casters since they kind of follow their God or Gods depending on where the wind blows.

I'm sure there are some who think this domains stuff is great and I won't argue with them because they probably have many high level, multi-life toons so I don't know squat about how playing those toons and these changes will improve their clerics. But is this actually making DDO better? It's already pretty much **** near impossible to start playing this game with any degree of success knowing very little of how this game works, particularly since PnP D&D experience does not help. This change is adding yet another layer of complexity on top of the already tough process of building a "good" first life, level one character to play the game with as a zero experience player. How is this change going to make the game better for them? How is this going to convert FTP newbies to VIPs? I don't think it's going to. I think it's going to improve the game for the 'hard core' lot out there with multiple level 30 life 6+ toons but not for the truly newbie player. Hell, I've been playing for what would be considered quite a while casually and I have not seen many changes that would actually help to grow the player base. This is yet another one.

[Silverleafeon]

Dieties belong inside Domains, not the other way around.

Check out the first edition Deities and Demingods and other early books.

Each Deity had one or more categories that they belonged to.

They also had certain defined Deific Ability depending upon their classifications.


So, multiple Deity might reside/draw/domain from the Good Domain at the same time,
but hey, the Deity happens to be classified as Good.


As by the way, if watch the 2nd D&D Movie or read 3rd Edition Core Rule Book,
certain cleric can turn more than undead.

(The movie capitalized on using Turn Undead on a Dragon Via Massive buffs from
uber stuff, blah. If you don't believe look up the Oak Tree Symbols via that book or wiki:

Obad-Hai is the god of Nature, Woodlands, Hunting, and Beasts, one of the most ancient known. He is often called the Shalm. He is also considered to be the god of summer by the Flan. Originally a Flan deity, Obad-Hai is most favored by Rangers, druids and other nature priests. His holy symbol is a mask of oak leaves and acorns. Obad-Hai was first detailed for the first edition of the Advanced Dungeons & Dragons game in the article "The Deities & Demigods of the World of Greyhawk", by E. Gary Gygax in Dragon #69 (January 1983) with game statistics on page 29 and a description on page 30, including a black-and-white illustration by Jeff Easley.[17]

Unfortionately The SDR 3.5 D&D does not provided lists of domain features, but I recall looking that up long ago,
and it fit within the movie theme very well.


Or to be clear, each Deity might be within several domains, for example:
Chaos, Trickery, Magic,

[AAH]

This game is getting beyond ridiculous. Soon you'll need a DDO university for new players ...

[DarthBeckett]

This game is getting beyond ridiculous. Soon you'll need a DDO university for new players ...

I don't think so, really. I don't play a lot of MMOs or even video games, and I find DDO fairly easy to understand. People may not know exactly what something like Spell Power does, but they will probably have a pretty general idea, and I get asked all the time in chat, (to the general public) on advice.

These Domains are not nearly as complicated if you look at them from the way a lot of new players would. Oh, I can be a Fire Priest. Cool, Ill take the Fire Domain. Im not sure what ________ does, exactly, but sounds cool and it probably makes fire stuff better. Level 9/14 is a ways off, anyway.

[Sormiron]

This game is getting beyond ridiculous. Soon you'll need a DDO university for new players ...

This is what I like about the game. more stuff to think of and lots of fun stuff to build.

Myself I am looking forward to being able to use strength domain. it would give me a lot of extra reflext saves and a bit of strength. I am using a 8/6/6 fighter/monk/cleric build using scimitars wich I think is superfun. Also I love the Ameliorating strikes from the warpriest tree (please do not remove it=), stunning blow, trip, direcharge, cleaves and lay waste. Fun times and this aids with my survivability a lot.

There are some other domains I think I might be able to make fun stuff with. 2 splash of cleric for air domain, some of warlock and rest monk. stack up light damage and use stormrage in primal avatar might be fun. (if it scales with electric spellpower).

Animal domain looks like great fun at 14 with basicly another direcharge, then mb use Mass frog for the fun of it.

Destruction might be good for a tree build, I´ve died a lot of times not being able to heal while in Tree form and not getting out of it fast enough.

I see a lot of fun possibilities.

As for the "elementals are not undead" argument, just give a separate skill called turn elemental of whatever domain if it makes them feel better. I like the idea of Clerics specialized in air/fire/water having the upper hand on such thingies.