Arelith

Hi everyone!

I may or may not be working on domains in the near or far future, and I would like to hear some of your ideas.

1. What changes would you like to see for current domains?
2. Which domains would you like to see added?
3. What features would you like to see on added domains?

Thanks for your input!

I would love a domain more focused on guarding/defense. At the moment you do have protection, but I mean... something that's more focused on the protection of other people. Like a temporary mass shield or something. That'd be so neat! *A girl dreaming*. Or a stronger -guard ability or something. Or allowing you to -guard like up to 3 people or something. Something like that.

Chaos and Law domains for sure, then we have the four essential alignment domains represented on the server, Luck domain would also be nice.

Secrets Domain
Adds once per day use of Legend Lore Darkness, or a bonus to Bluff and Lore.

Level 2: Knock
Level 5: Dominate Person (or Charm Monster)
Level 6: Nightmare

Would like to see more spells to every domain. Not powerful spells like missile storms, but much more variety, such as Tasha's hideous laughter, ironguts, sleep, etc.

More lightning spells on air domain (Such as ball lightning)

Good domain should have some kind of PfE style 1/day ability, or some other vs evil buff. Same for evil domain but the other way around.

Animal domain shouldn't have true seeing but some extra zoo spells if anything, or charm animal, etc. Perhaps a 1/day transform into animal ability.

Travel domain could have an X/day movement speed buff (Like expeditious retreat)

Magic domain should have a bunch more spells.

Destruction, fire, earth and Water domains are just terrible.

What would be really cool would be if Deity selection provided spell buffs. For instance, casting disease on a priestess of Talona had extra DC, or lightning from a Talos cleric was more dangerous.

Elemental domains should grant the appropriate summoning stream on creation.

Fire domain could grant fire immunity 10% or something. And the combustion spell, fireball, etc.

In general, I feel the current domains don't really have any character to add to roleplay. There's barely any difference between one cleric and another.

If some of these suggestions are too powerful balance-wise, the domains could also prevent use of certain spells that don't make sense for clerics of that persuasion to use.

I'd like to see most of the active domain abilities put on a (10 minute?) cooldown.

Also, perhaps some of the domains could be more focused on spellcasting (the elemental and magic domains come to mind here) with infinite spells like a mage's GSF abilities, while other domains (strength etc?) could grant permanent, passive bonuses.
Strength domain could grant the cleric a +1 (hard) strength bonus every 14 levels, for example, but lose its domain ability.

I'll give this some more thought and if I figure out any more examples or interesting ideas, I'll post them here.

I really wish there was a way for the protection domain to get a mass sanctuary spell.

Either working like invisibility sphere or casts a sanctuary on each person within range that works like individual sanctuaries. It seems thematic for an "oh heck" moment, as well as, it would still be under the condition that if someone attacks, it breaks

Turn Undead is near useless on Arelith due to the high level of NPCs.

Thusly all the Domains that allow you to turn something that isn't undead are also pretty poor and could stand an upgrade.

Eira wrote: Tue Feb 18, 2020 12:42 pm I really wish there was a way for the protection domain to get a mass sanctuary spell.

That would be overpowered, especially in PvP.

I'd like to see certain domains to be extended thematically even if they are already decent ones.

-Elemental domains get their respective stream for free and they summon their respective elementals one tier higher (stacking with animal domanin or GSF:conj!), also gaining 10//- DR to their respective elements

-Animal domain gets animal language as a bonus, and can use -tracking command and can take totem animals (like rangers just cosmetic)

-Death domain clerics have reduced ressurect piety costs and have shorter death penalties

-Destruction domain clerics attacks have all meele physcial damage types (blunt, piercing and slashing) and they can cast slow

- Evil/good domain clerics planar bindings summon 1 tier higher when summoning an evil/good stream(similar to a warlocks), when using gate it acts like as if they are 6 levels higher than it is.

-Sun domain clerics get bless weapon spell

And well I could write more but I eel like I'm running out of ideas right now... Perhaps next time!

Note : I will be going into additions and potential changes to every domain that I think could use it.

Air : Gains Air-Stream, Gains Expedious Retreat on Cooldown, Gets Gust of Wind at L4, Same buff as Air-Genasi, Cannot be knockdowned by Gusts of Wind/Weather effects (Could also gain Air-stream book air-ele early 1/day)

Animal : Gains Shapechange at T9, Loses True-Seeing at 3, Gains Animal Companion at level 3 scaling at 1/3rd Cleric Level (L30 gets a L10 AC for RP purposes) - Gets Animal Empathy as Skill

Death : Gains PM Scaling for undead (Summons 2 w/animate dead, ect) Can cross-class into Palemaster w/scaling for Divine spells as well as Arcane. - Gains Enfeebling Ray (T1 spell) infinite/day as-if GSF necro-wizard/sorc
(BONUS) - Add Scaling to "Neg-Plane Avatar" Turning it into a worthwhile "Henchman" style Undead / Death Avatar

Destruction : Re-named to CHAOS Domain, Gain Slaad-Summon Stream + Red Slaad 1/day early-levels, Scaling as a semi-summon / "perma" Gate, though Weaker (SLAAD ONLY) - SUPER BONUS : Gains "Chaos Surges" for divine spells? (Wild-Clerics anyone?)

Earth : Gain Earth Domain - Gain Greater Stoneskin at T6, Stoneskin moved to T3, Gains Bombardment at T8, Gains Stonehold at T5 (Also could gain Earth-stream book Earth Ele early 1/day)

Evil Domain : Gain Infestation of Maggots at T2, Gain Blasphemy 1 Tier lower, Gains Yugoloth Stream, Planar Summons come out as 1T higher up to Gate w/gains slightly buffed stats

Fire Domain : Gains Fire Stream, Gets Flame Weapon T2, Incindiary Cloud, Fireball, Flame arrow/Firebrand, Inferno/Combustion, (Gets Fire-stream book Fire ele 1/day)

Good : Gains celestial Stream book summon, Gains Bless/Prayer turn/level (or hour/level, extended duration) Gains Good Hope 1 level earlier, Gains Planar-summons 1 Tier higher up to Gate, which gets slightly buffed stats

Healing : Great as-is, Would maybe say if anything, Gets SF Heal at like, level 5? and ESF Heal at 30

Knowledge : If SF Divination is taken, Gain GSF Divination for Free, Power Word Stun/Kill at T7/9 respectively? (Could also give SF/GSF Lore at certain levels)

Magic : Cleric levels count at 1/2 for Arcane caster CL, T1 Gain Shield. T2 Gain Magic Missile, T5 Replace Icestorm with LESSER isaac's missile. T9 Gain Isaacs Greater Missile Storm - Gain SF/GSF spellcraft? could be too strong.
(Bonus) Gain a Familiar at 1/3rd Class level (L30 has a Level 10 familiar for RP purposes)

Plant : Entangle at T1, Vine Mine at T5, Camo/Mass Camoflage at T1 and T4, Gain Natures Balance at T9 (Potential Re-name to Nature Domain, If possible add Animal to Turn list w/Vermin too)

Protection : Shield at T1, Premonition at T8, Gain "Divine Ward" Feat, allowing a +1 Guard akin to PDK. Mind Blank?

Strength : Scrapped, Added to War - REPLACED WITH
Law Domain - Hold Person, Hold Monster, Gains LAWFUL Stream, Summons planars at +1 Tier up to Gate which gains minor buffs, Gets a small-lawful esque summon for low-levels. Gets Outsider Turning. Possibly gains Bigby Spells

(PRAISE THE) Sun Domain : Turning strength increased (as normal) Gains Sunburst, Undeath to Death, at -1 Tier, DC for Sun-based spells increased by +4. Gets infinite Light /day. Gains Blindness/deafness and Mass Blind/Deaf, loses cleric status is putting on sunglasses

NEW DOMAIN : Darkness Domain : Gains "Free" Shadowdancer-crossclass As-if Shadowmage, HiPs at L20. Gets Darkness at -1 Tier, Shadow Conjuration spell-line, Sneak attack at every 5/levels? (so at 30 would have 5d6 sneak attack)

Travel Domain : Great as-is, Possibly get Ride as a Skill, or a 10% speed bonus like Barbarians. T9 Spell Mass-Haste maybe? (too strong?) Maybe just add Impossible to fail Rope-Checks and Climb-Checks -- Possibly a % bonus to language-Learning or A bonus language at level 10/20/30 (To learn) or 15/30 (to learn)

Trickery : Already great, I'd possibly say If SF Illusion is taken, gain GSF Illusion for Free. Possibly too strong. Perhaps SF/GSF Bluff or a bonus to Conversation Skills

WAR/STRENGTH : Battle Mastery is excellent, Gain Power-attack for Free (possibly) - gain a free Weapon-Focus?, Honestly this domain is strong as-is. I'd just possibly give some bonuses to animal-buffs, but possibly restrict summoning.

Water : Gain Water-Stream, Gets Drown at T6, Iceburg, Cone of Cold, (Small water Ele from stream-book at early levels), Wall of Ice, Freeze

LUCK DOMAIN : Gain Luck of Heroes, Gain +1 Unisave at L 7/14/21/28 (+4 total), Chaos-Shield as-Wildmage spell, On-Summoning can do Nothing, Gain -1 Tier, gain +1 Tier (stacks with GSF Conj).

Commerce Domain : Gain Skill focus and ESF Appraise at Level 3 / 20, Charm Person/Monster, Dominate Person/Monster (paying them off) at T1/4/6/8 Gains 1K Gold per Month (Like old Gift of Wealth), Protection from Spells, Merchants always act like your favoured race.

That's all I can think of At the moment without it needing new/more Streams, Like if there was a "Wild-Beast/Magical Beast" Stream that Animal-Domain could get for free.

I think cleric domains are better off being completely redone to be simple fluff.

Mechanically I think clerics should gain haste and maybe a couple other spells. NWN doesn't really handle how cleric domains work in PnP, so the spells you add are just straight up gains.

Cleric domains should be instead focused around thematic things; small bonus in the form of a feat or an ability. Right now it's basically you take travel and war if you're a healer or travel and death if you're battle cleric. You can debatedly take plant, protection, or trickery.

I'd get rid of death domain's bonus to harm. Harm is already a very good spell for a b-cleric and doesn't need the insano-flex.

(basically how it currently exists; but instead of trying to hyper balance everything just gut their spells and give them minimal mechanical advantage. Give people free streams, feats, extra languages, etc. NWN doesn't even handle cleric domains correctly.)

oh, and maybe develop an in game way to change your cleric domains for when you convert / whatever (probably done with DM oversight like when you ask for a head change.)

It probably sounds boring but rather seeing them adding a bunch of new spells I'd rather see them give minor themes that will roughly fit towards the deities they're tied too and that clerics will be relatively the same and thus better balanced.

Give clerics haste by default. Set Harm on a DC ( Not so that it ignores the damage if you pass the check, but rather that it halves it ). Buff the domains that don't give barskin or imp invis in a way where they offer something desirable, but in a way where it would just overshadow Travel/Nature entirely. Don't listen to any of Tarkus the dog's suggestions. Do something about darkflame, honestly. That spell is pretty cool but as it is it's kind of whatever. Maybe make it so that fire domain lets you stack it with any other property ( the way bless weapon, blade thrist etc works ).

I could probably brainstorm a bunch of ideas, but whatever you do - make it so that every domain is desirable, and that it doesn't turn into another "Ok Travel is a must so I took that, now I need to choose between Death, Nature and Trickery".

Instead of simply buffing out the gills the cleric domains as some are suggesting, perhaps some domains could have strong boons but are somewhat balanced by having some sort of weakness. Others could just be boosted slightly in some way. Some basic possibilities as food for thought:

-Fire Domain: 75% DI to fire, 50% vulnerability to cold, and toss on some extra fire appropriate spells + fire stream.
-Water Domain: 75% DI to cold, 50% vulnerability to fire, and toss on some extra cold appropriate spells + water stream.
-Evil Domain: Insta-death/curses/inflict damage/protection from good spells auto empowered. No idea what would be a good weakness...maybe Healing spells always at lowest base strength, cannot cast Greater Restoration.
-Animal Domain: Keep the current boon of summon creature +1 tier, make all zoo buffs automatically empowered, start with animal language.
-Plant Domain: can cast Entangle, barkskin, spike growth, vine mine, creeping doom (basically same as vanilla with a few more "plantish" spells)

Clerics really are already a very strong class, so changing the domains should not be a crazy power increase. I am all for making them more diverse to help distinguish clerics from each other more, but if there is significant raw power boost, then significant weaknesses should also be present.


EDIT: Or do as Cowboy suggested, which was my first thought...but then I figured most would grump about it because of the thought that more cookies = better.

50% vulnerability to cold

No one is gonna be taking that, my homie. That's a disaster waiting to happen.

Tarkus the dog wrote: Wed Feb 19, 2020 2:59 am

50% vulnerability to cold

No one is gonna be taking that, my homie. That's a disaster waiting to happen.

True enough! I was just brainstorming about ways to differentiate without some crazy power increase for domains, which would make this entire exercise a terrible idea. I am all for the more subtle approach with domains, but that would not sate most people's desire for the domains to mean something.

I agree with cowboy in reducing mechanical advantage of domains, except I would like more of the domain-specific spells available to all clerics alongside Haste.

This would be easier to balance when you then are deciding what boons the domains DO give.

Here are some ideas for some of the existing domains:

First, all of the existing "domain powers" should be on a 10 minute cooldown, as Kalopsia sugested.

Air - Pulse: Knockdown on 10 minute cooldown. DC scales with caster level. Gust of Wind added to spellbook.

Fire - Aura of Flame on 10 minute cooldown. The aura lasts 5 rounds and does 1d12 fire damage + 1d6 fire damage per cleric level. Cooldown begins after effect expires.

Earth - The cleric gets access to a Greater Stoneskin spell whose damage absorption continues to increase after CL 15, to a maximum of 300, before collapsing. This is not a domain power but is cast via the spellbook. Earthquake spell is now empowered.

Magic - Add Magic Missile, Isaac's Lesser Missile storm, Spell Mantle, and Time Stop to the cleric's spell book. Some may argue that Time Stop would be overpowered on a cleric, but I don't think it would be. Spellswords already get it, as do Sorcerers and Wizards, who can cast much more devastating spells, and the physical damage taken during it is nerfed. I don't see any real balance issues here.

Sun - Similar to fire domain, the cleric gets an aura on 10 minute cooldown that lasts 5 rounds and does both fire and positive damage that scales with level. The effect should be weaker than the fire aura against regular foes but considerably stronger against undead foes.

Water - Drown once per day per 10 cleric levels. DC scales with caster level and should be higher than implosion DC.

Good/Evil - The cleric gets an Aura on Cooldown that provides defensive and offensive boons against evil/good foes to the cleric and her allies. The effects scale with level and should not last too long. Let's say +1 per 10 cleric levels to attack rolls, damage, AC, and saves for five rounds. Multiple auras don't stack.

I'm against giving out haste to all clerics. I'd rather see the other domains get cool, useful stuff instead. There's also a delicate balance to be struck here between overpowered and useless. The aim should be for the new domain powers to match the usefulness of those that are already commonly taken.

Have esf utility spread out across another class to share the wealth on these cool toys. Arguable if the domains need strengthening or not, but these feel like thematically appropriate boons. Yes, you can get esf on cleric already, but one or two compared to three or four on wizard; essentially covering a good deal of "essential" esf on wizard. I feel adding these cookies to domains would help close that gap. Have these activate @level 27 cleric.

Knowledge: scrying
Protection: ward
Magic: Abj +dispel -- consider making it work vs imbue/vestments/temp essence/stuff it doesn't usually work on
Trickery: gsf illusion message ( maybe change trickery domain spell to self only )
Travel: investigate bonuses of divination


Otherwise, stuff I've liked so far:

Mythic wrote: Tue Feb 18, 2020 9:47 pm
X domain: Gains spell... at Tx

Good : Gains Bless/Prayer turn/level (or hour/level, extended duration)

Love all the spell additions, including the new spells.

JustMonika wrote: Tue Feb 18, 2020 1:20 pm Turn Undead is near useless on Arelith due to the high level of NPCs.

Agreed, I've never seen a high level cleric turn in a dungeon or pvp. Could use a tweak to be more effective. Especially now that halt undead seems like a better pvp option.

Kalopsia wrote: Tue Feb 18, 2020 12:31 pm I'd like to see most of the active domain abilities put on a (10 minute?) cooldown.

Love this.

Almost all of these ideas seem like massive power increases, imbalancing the class structure and taking tools and benefits from other classes to stack onto the already powerful cleric.

I would instead prefer roleplay perks to be added to existing domains instead of making them "9th level wizard spells and epic spell perks, but better!"

Apokriphos wrote: Wed Feb 19, 2020 5:19 am Almost all of these ideas seem like massive power increases, imbalancing the class structure and taking tools and benefits from other classes to stack onto the already powerful cleric.

I would instead prefer roleplay perks to be added to existing domains instead of making them "9th level wizard spells and epic spell perks, but better!"

Well some of the suggestions may be too powerful but i believe the less used domains should be buffed so that they may compete with the popular domain choices.

Many, many of these suggestions are very, very powerful. There's no need to throw around lots of free feats and strong wiz/sorc spells on an already strong class. Especially so if Haste is given as a base spell, which opens a the door for two other domains. Also, please don't put Battle Mastery on a 10min cooldown...

I'd strongly prefer any domain choice to be RP flavour (language, stream, skill bonus, 1/day specific but-not-strong spell)

Quidix wrote: Wed Feb 19, 2020 8:40 am Many, many of these suggestions are very, very powerful. There's no need to throw around lots of free feats and strong wiz/sorc spells on an already strong class. Especially so if Haste is given as a base spell, which opens a the door for two other domains. Also, please don't put Battle Mastery on a 10min cooldown...

I'd strongly prefer any domain choice to be RP flavour (language, stream, skill bonus, 1/day specific but-not-strong spell)

I agree with this and am a bit concerned about this thread. I'm currently playing a travel/war cleric and clerics are really, really strong right now. Probably the easiest class to level after druid, and second strongest class in pvp. Cleric does not need any domain changes in form of buffs and more arcane spells. They need things like Haste outright removed from Travel (for example) and replaced with increased weight capacity or (somehow) an additional inventory page. I think if we're updating domains, they should be more focused on utility and RP and not give as much raw power. I like the ideas with the languages and bonuses to social skills and such. I'd also like to see more scaling with Charisma on the domain abilities in general. Some domains are completely useless so they could use a buff to put them on par with the popular domains, just to create versatility, but I certainly hope not to see domains like war, travel and trickery being buffed rather than nerfed.

Anime Sword Fighter wrote: Wed Feb 19, 2020 3:58 am I agree with cowboy in reducing mechanical advantage of domains, except I would like more of the domain-specific spells available to all clerics alongside Haste.

This would be easier to balance when you then are deciding what boons the domains DO give.

*Tips hat.* Pardner.


The other thing to consider as well is that NWN was being created to emulate 3.0 and it seemed at the time they were trying to emulate the PnP rules about cleric domains giving you "extra spell slots" to reserve your cleric domain spells. All clerics receive two extra spellslots than they normally would because of this. (Druids and their spell slots if you're familiar with them are basically clerics w/o domain features. Tight lists.)

Likely due to time / or efforts these slots are not reserved for your cleric domains. (I am not entirely sure Arelith should even try to emulate this.)

I know the domain .2da allows you to give a feat/ability and you can put in spells from 0-9 but in doing this, without considering how clerics are basically the terminator, you may end up throwing the balance of the force out of whack. Which is why I think making domains less about spells and more about flavors is a better way of handling it.

I think clerics baseline should have the following spells: cat's grace, see invisibility, and haste. I'd keep cat's grace at 2, see invis at 2 or maybe 3, and haste at 5 like the domain.

Domains could then be set up something along these lines:

Domain gives you:
Small flavor bonuses: language, access to a skill (ie, give cleric more skills but you can only take the specific skills IF you have a specific domain), a minor feat, 1 infinite minor spell related to the domain.
Two-Three spells that are spontaneously cast like druid summon creature spells (monster abilities from the menu) in the range of 3/6/9. These would eat any spell you have at that level already prepped.


Not only does this keep clerics from being wild it allows cleric domains to represent the gods they are being put toward better, keeps most clerics on parity w/o making some necessarily better than others, and you could actually see things like a Cleric of Mystra who has a few arcane spells and insights, or a Cleric of Bane invoking fear or being immune to it or something.

i'm with what cowboy suggested above, entirely.

easing the disparity between optimal (travel/war, etc) domains and thematically appropriate but lesser domains (basically the others) will enable there to be more creative freedom among them, and for new ones to be added without it throwing existing clerics out of balance-whack (although, when amia went for lore-accurate and god-specific domains, they had a way to let people switch domains in a customisation room with DM help, which could also apply here). giving cleric baseline essentials like cat's grace, see invis, and haste would go a long way to allowing people the freedom to feel like they aren't gimping their character by choosing more appropriate and flavourful domains.

with that in mind i'd love to see the addition of undeath, law, chaos, elf/dwarf/drow/halfling/orc/gnome, craft, hatred, luck and cavern domains - these beings ones that would be applicable to a lot of gods and concepts. undeath domain would also allow death domain to be retooled to be closer to what repose domain is in P&P (i.e: not evil death, just death-death).

if this is a direction you feel you'd like to go, i can write up some more ideas in this angle.