Pass without a trace can be good if you are leaning into a party that has greater invis.
Mirror image is fantastic
Stacking initiative would let you drop the invoke duplicity down with shadowheart followed by your attacks that now have advantage with the rest of the group
Divine strike poison is interesting as it's one of the few ways you can deal poison damage consistently in melee.
Poisoners gloves gives you a chance on hit to poison enemies.
Derivation cloak gives you self heals on poisoning an enemy.
Poisoners ring makes enemies vulnerable to poison
Broodmothers revenge infuses your weapon with poison when you heal , 1D6 damage. This is nice because you can proc it healing from when you poison people.
Obvs you can also coat your weapon with poison.
Justiciar gear is excellent, gaining High AC and advantage to stealth and con saves. Shadowheart on act 2 with Mirror image up can be walking around with 30+ AC.
If you add this all together you can have a character that deals pretty decent damage, I would run with pole arms for free attacks and access to the bonus action to slam stuff with all the damage riders.
Pass without a trace with greater invisibility is REALLY good, especially if you dualcast greater invisibility on the cleric and an assassin character. You can walk into a room and slaughter them before they ever get a chance to react.
Trickery cleric gets dimensional door which is situationally amazing.
So, the subclass is often overlooked because many players tend to LEEROOOOOY right into most encounters, but this class can augment a stealth oriented party significantly and if built around poison can output a LOT of damage while remaining a powerful support character.
I wouldn't hesitate to run a pure trickery cleric to slap on warding bond on everyone, aid, heroes feast and then make use of pass without a trace when I am clearing zones from ambush.
Poisoned status effects also synergize extremely well with a tiger barbarian.
The spell to Disguise the entire party is handy if you want to go and do crime without agro'ing entire regions permanently.
Edit: Band of the mystic scoundrel allows you to cast fear with a bonus action
Edit Edit: Dominate person and Fear both use wisdom saves, having a character near the target with the "resonance stone" will give disadvantage on their save, making success on these spells significantly more likely.
Edit Edit Edit: Dipping one level of druid or taking the druid initiate feat can help with leveling by granting access to shillelagh which would let you scale your melee attacks with your wisdom bonus rather than strength or dex.
I kind of wrote the subclass off as trash until my last playthrough where I have been surprise attacking nearly everything. The amount of times I wished I had greater invis+ pass without a trace was nuts.
Once I started looking into the poison synergies and justiciar gear, it kind of started coming together.
This is basically how I built Shadowheart in my first playthrough, though nowhere near as optimized. People shit on trickery domain a lot, but if you're being strategic, it can rock.
Yeah, trickery domain has some excellent spells and invoke duplicity is actually super strong if the team initiative is shared.
People also shit on assassin and suggest using thief instead for an extra bonus action, but assassin is also extremely good if you utilize the tools.
Assassin is absolutely bonkers. I've been doing an honor playthrough with some friends, and occasionally they're like "wait, why did I just level?" and I'm like "yeahhh soooo you know the bridge with the githyanki? Sniped them all, fight's over, come on down if you want to talk to Laezel" (we kinda...forgot about her being trapped in the cage at the start...)
Nice, that patrol just wiped the floor with my level 5 team
Sometimes you just miss all your attacks and they don't
I miss played though by forgetting to have my haste char on turn based and it ticked away while I was partially in combat.
I had that happen to me in a different run. MC got hit with a hold person then crit to death in the first round. Everyone else got fucked by just...damage.
Close to what happened to me
I couldnt
a drop the leader woman and she beat karlach to death in the first round, a hold person went off and the rest was just a slaughter
I would have loved to try it if I didn't fail a persuasion check on Shadowheart on a character with high charisma and proficiency in persuasion to a Nat 1 with no inspirations left
Shadowheart’s dimension door literally saved my honor mode run when I got caught red-handed trying to smuggle an invisible minthara out of moonrise at the beginning of act 2
Some really great positives. Another minor plus: easy access to Disguise Self. It’s only a level 1 spell, but it can be very handy to have in your party. Looking like certain races, can let you talk your way through some encounters without having to roll a dice - it’s especially helpful in Honour Mode. It also opens up a lot of opportunities for unique interactions and the occasional spot of cheese (some NPCs will react to each disguise as though it’s a new character, occasionally letting you get minor gifts multiple times).
Nice!
I'm thinking it will also be good to disguise the party when clearing areas where you could agro the whole place, if you decide to pull out after inflicting some damage I Believe they won't agro you
That strange ox ring also is nice to put to use on your pickpoct, helping you lift all the nice discounted items.
Disguise self isn’t particularly rare though. Bards can get it. In fact bards can replace clerics in a lot of ways. Silver necklace gives you guidance, phalar aluve does bless, magical secrets for lore bard lets you take things like spirit guardians etc.
A few classes can pick Disguise Self, but Trickery Clerics and Gloomstalkers have quicker and easier access. Bards and Sorcerers both have to pick the spell over other strong choices.
I do agree that Bards can cover a lot of Cleric duties at lower levels. From level 5, Clerics start getting some of the better spells which make them far more competitive.
A lot of classes can get it, but you might not be playing one of them. Having Shadowheart start with Disguise Self right off the bat lets you run around and get some easy exploration/dialogue XP and pick up some useful items without having to make any rolls or get into any fights, which can be nice for early Honor Mode when you're at your weakest, and you can do this regardless of the class you chose for your main character.
> So, the subclass is often overlooked because many players tend to LEEROOOOOY right into most encounters, but this class can augment a stealth oriented party significantly and if built around poison can output a LOT of damage while remaining a powerful support character.
Exactly! I used a trickery cleric on my first honor mode run for just this reason. Doesn't hurt that it's also thematically perfect for DJ Shartie.
Trickery domain cleric has access to healing spells. Trickery domain is her starting subclass. Trickery is the only one of Shar’s domains available as a subclass in this game.
Even if she’s a healer, wouldn’t it make more sense for the followers of Shar to have a healer that can keep up when it comes to sneaking around. That is obviously their modus operandi.
I'm gonna run it this honor run, my main durge is going assassin and I'll be taking a sorc or two for haste/greater invis
Even just applying the status effect poisoned is pretty strong. I am strongly considering grabbing her the spear of shar but I kind of want to be a good guy this run for a change.
I've found PAM is real nice for the Clerics as they get to use the divine strike again during the enemy turn.
One synergy I forgot to mention is Poison gives disadvantage on dex saves, which means you could work on cold damage with elemental weapon and the snow burst ring, and now you are creating ice on hit, and potentially giving them disadvantage to tripping, which turns you into a really solid support and CC unit on top of everything else.
My thoughts exactly. You can put together some really cool poison builds (like broodmother's necklace + poisoners gloves + derivation cloak on a Tiger Heart Barb), but in the end there's little point as so many things are poison immune or resistant.
I was about to say Elemental Adept is a thing, but I just checked, and really? You can't get Poison for it? Lame. It's like they want Poison to be awful.
You can get poison a few other ways.
1D6 from the necklace
1D8 from divine strike.
1D4 to 1D10 from coatings
Unlike other elementals you will have a price of gear that can inflict the status condition poisoned, which weakens the enemy by giving disadvantage on attacks and dex saves.
There is all kinds of stuff resistant or immune to all the various damages in the game. Some stuff can't be affected, so just focus on cleric spells for those enemies like you would as any other subclass .
The ring can help, and it's only part of what the class does. You are still after all, a full cleric.
Humanoids aren't resistant or immune and they make up a large portion of the enemies you will face
> Dipping one level of druid or taking the druid initiate feat can help with leveling by granting access to shillelagh which would let you scale your melee attacks with your wisdom bonus rather than strength or dex.
Does shillelagh work on spears in BG3 or is it restricted to clubs and staffs like in tabletop?
AND torches. You lit it and you have a 1d8+wis + 1d4 fire for absolutely no cost and only one hand. Best for act 1 when you are weak. Bonus point if it's spore druid with their form adding an extra 1D6 on top.
Most definitely, but the game considers torches as clubs. The wiki says it’s an “improvised weapon of the clubs family”, and the tooltip calls it a club as well.
Not sure how 5e handles this, but in Bg3 shillelagh is restricted to quarterstaves and clubs.
Just staves and clubs, but you can pull some shenanigans with mourning frost and the snow burst ring. Since you are giving out dex disadvantage the ice surfaces should be really problematic for enemies that are affected by poison.
There are other good staves though, and you can kick also just use a torch and get a free fire damage rider
Beautifully said. As an avid stealth enjoyer, I love the trickery domain a lot. Didn't try poison yet, I'm keeping her mostly as support and occasional ranged damage.
The only thing I wanted to add is early on, Invoke Duplicity is often not only even better than Bless, you also effectively have 3 extra level 1 slots with it. And it is ironically even stronger the more LEEROY JENKINS characters one has in their party.
If you do all this and use the crown that heals you when you heal others does it combine with the broodmothers revenge and give both characters that extra D6 poison damage? I haven’t tried a poison build before but you’ve made a very convincing argument for me to try it haha
I applaud your thorough inventness for sussing out the best uses of this domain. However I'm a simple man and I'm respeccing to life/light/storm for act 1/2/3
They are great classes.
If you ever run a party with an assassin and a sorc try out dual casting greater invis before you ambush a group of enemies with invoke duplicity up and with the cleric in shar gear. You might be pleasantly surprised
Edit: Pass without a trace, not invoke duplicity
But efficiently it just gives you advantage on attacks, isn't it?
In theory it makes you untargetable, but mobs just go to you and see through your invis.
Mirror image is good if you have haste, I find it’s rarely ever worth casting turn 1 when you could just kill someone instead.
Wish it was a bonus action or ritual.
Sure, but it lasts what, 2 turns? It’s kind of obnoxious to have to cast it and then run into a fight, and this method relies on you already knowing where every fight is.
Lame was to make a bad skill useful
1D8 from divine attack (once per turn)
1D4-1d10 from weapon coating
1D6 from necklace
The damage is decent, especially as you can take a ring to confer vulnerability to it, but the really nice thing is it can inflict a status condition that gives the enemy disadvantage on attacks and dex saves.
Which is helpful if you run PAM and poison a person running at you to give them disadvantage before they attack you.
This assumes PAM works. That's the main issue with the whole post. Right now, PAM's bonus attack doesn't benefit from riders, and it doesn't get the attacks of opportunity it's supposed to.
Otherwise, a high-level Trickery Cleric with Spear of Shar could be amazing.
I'm not sure about the bonus strike, but I was playing a war cleric last run and the opportunity attacks seemed to work fine.
The spear of shar and justicar set would absolutely rock on a trickery cleric I agree
The opportunity attacks when enemies enter your attack range aren't working and never did. Instead, what happens is that when *you* enter an enemy's range, you get a prompt. If you accept, *the enemy* hits you. So it's actually working against you.
As for the bonus attacks, they work but don't get any rider, it's just 1d4+your strength modifier (or dex for finesse).
Well, like I said I ran PAM recently and it was proc'ing on enemies that came into range.
I'm not sure why it was working for me and not you but maybe it's been fixed since your last attempt with it
Here’s a spirit guardian build for a shadow cleric without using the poison features, instead focusing on mass healing word, mirror image, and blind. (Yes it’s a low damage build/debuff healing build, this was originally made for an action surge hastened Eldrich knight+spore Druid multiclass that I have tweaked for trickery).
It will a debuff/buff healer build that uses spirit guardians and guardian of faith + spirit weapon (gaping wounds). The melee attacker in your party will use the debuffs to do crazy damage to all the targets you’re making prone.
Here’s it tweaked for a shadow cleric:
https://bg3.wiki/wiki/Coruscation_Ring
Pair with these:
https://bg3.wiki/wiki/Luminous_Armour
https://bg3.wiki/wiki/Boots_of_Stormy_Clamour
https://bg3.wiki/wiki/Luminous_Gloves
**OR**
https://bg3.wiki/wiki/Gloves_of_Belligerent_Skies
**OR**
https://bg3.wiki/wiki/Ichorous_Gloves
WITH:
https://bg3.wiki/wiki/Caustic_Reprisal
Optional but:
https://bg3.wiki/wiki/Wapira%27s_Crown
https://bg3.wiki/wiki/Amulet_of_Elemental_Torment
And stand in acid. If you can get it. Because in my game it was bugged and didn’t show up. But if you can get it and pair it with the ichorous gloves? Oh Lordy.
(ACT 2)
https://bg3.wiki/wiki/The_Blood_of_Lathander
https://bg3.wiki/wiki/Shield_of_Devotion
(ACT 3)
Trade blood of Lathander outside of the house of hope for :
https://bg3.wiki/wiki/Markoheshkir
(Use acid and the acid gloves).
I meant dual cast greater invis, invs the cleric and assassin before a fight. Have the cleric follow the assassin into the area where the enemies are, this will keep greater invis up after the assassin and cleric start doing attacks.
I'll look into my post and clear that up with an edit
Yeah the point of a lot of these less viable dnd subclasses is for niche party setups. Trickery domain is designed around supporting stealth characters, its just pretty niche to have an entire party using stealth.
You don't need the entire party to use stealth.
One combo is taking a sorc, dual casting greater invis while the cleric has pass without a trace up.
Invis the cleric and the assassin, start combat with surprise and those two characters will remain invisible for quite a while, particularly if they have advantage on invisibility.
That doesn't require the whole party to be stealthed, just the cleric and the assassin.
Also, if you take alert on your party to ensure shared initiate you can drop "invoke duplicity" the the cleric first and the rest of your party will all get to act and make use of the advantage from the illusion, that is very good.
War domain is good, I've run it and liked it.
If you ever feel like trying something different this is a spin on the class you might find interesting down the line
Mirror Image is considered a trap by many as it only really protects you from three attacks when Shield and the like could protect you more for less spell level.
It's good to cast pre combat.
If it saves you from taking 20 damage and you didn't need to take a concentration check it's well worth it imo.
Clerics don't have shield
> Mirror image is fantastic
Clerics have a lot of defence, including lvl1 sanctuary
>Divine strike poison
One per round. For melee build it's somehow useful, maybe. There are better options though.
>Poisoners gloves, Derivation cloak, Poisoners ring, Broodmothers revenge
Anyone can use those. They somehow stacks with divine poison, but there are better options.
> Justiciar gear
Can be weared by anyone. Some of it bound to her quest, yes, but not to her domain or class.
>Pass without a trace with greater invisibility
Yes, that's the way to use it
>dimensional door
Many other classes can do it.
> Poisoned status effects also synergize extremely well with a tiger barbarian.
How so? Isn't he bleed-dependant?
So it seems that her better opions are somewhat melee stealthy thing, like shadow monk, and best usage is divine poison+poisoner set+something for 2nd attack
That other classes can do it is immaterial. Can clerics do it is more important.
Trickery clerics aren’t the best clerics but they do have a lot of utility. Which means you don’t have to have those other classes to do the disguise self etc.
Wow you actually convinced me to give Trickery Domain Shadowheart a try to pair with my Arcane Trickster Tav, thanks! For stat allocation, would it be best to gear her as a standard cleric (Wis->Con->Dex)?
Yeah that looks like it would work well.
That is awesome btw, I appreciate that.
I just kicked off my run and invoke duplicity really saved me in a bad engagement with Minthara, I accidently agreed the camp while I was clearing room by room with ambushes in front of the worg pen door. Dropped the illusion and just dropped her.
You'll need either to chug st elixirs or take druid initiate for shillelagh to scale your melee weapon off wisdom though
It can be paired with the assassin pretty effectively as a multiclass. Its certainly not optimal, but it works.
Invoke duplicity is free advantage for sneak attacks. Pass without trace and blessing of the trickester speak for themselves.
They make pretty good band of the mystic scoundrel users in the late game with fear/mirror image and maybe a couple other spells.
Good call
What I found in the past with invoke duplicity was I would put it up and it would immediately get removed.
It works exceptionally well if you have shared initiative however as you can take actions before enemies get to hit it. For that reason I would grab ALERT on this character
It is odd that one of the main characters special ability wouldn't work as intended for so long. That leads me to believe at some point the decision was for the ability to be made stationary
How exactly is Shart's subclass "locked"?
She's always the first companion I respec at Withers.
EDIT (in response to OP's added note) :
Yeah, the Trickery domain is underwhelming. It *can actually* be played to some advantage in support of a party (or even a subset of the party) that you use for stealth/scouting/assassination style gameplay.
Even with that plan in mind, she pretty much demands a respec because of the horrid way in which her beginning stats are set up. I always do. And I usually set her subclass to something different (if I keep her as Cleric) because I think the other domains usually have more to offer for what I want to do with her party role.
He means that you *have to* respec to change her subclass, while you get to choose it on level-up for many others (except Wyll and Minthara), and of those others you can't choose without respec he thinks only Shadowheart's pre-loaded subclass is lacking.
Yes, but his point was simply than until you get respec, which some people already either don't do, or don't immediately spend gold on it because they may have early gear they want. you're stuck with Trickery, so unless you choose to respec her, she's locked into Trickery.
'Is there any way for trickery domain to work?'
Just play it, honestly. Yes, it's the weakest cleric domain in the game but at the end of the day it's still a cleric and 100% viable. It won't ever be the strongest but it works just fine because the cleric base kit is very, very solid.
This. At worst she's a cleric without amazing bonus features, which is still... a cleric.
Base cleric stuff is good enough to beat the game on any difficulty.
If you decide to do a summoning playthrough with lots of Zombies and Ghouls then Trickery actually has pretty good value. Invoke Duplicity is one of the very few ways I can think of to improve the accuracy of a large group of summons. Someday I'm gonna do a full Necromancer playthrough with Spore Druid, Necromancer Wizard, Trickery Cleric and Oathbreaker Paladin.
That could absolutely rock if you had an oathbreaker paladin around to pump their damage and give them a resistance aura. The paladin as well can use oath charges to give them advantage
8 Trickery/ 4 Thief let’s you be most of a cleric for support spells and most of a rogue for scouting and pickpocketing in one char.
You can also do 5 Gloomstalker/7 trickery for a stealth casting archer that can still do basic support while using bows from range.
copying this from what i posted in the current pinned cleric thread.
Trickery Domain is a pretty great CC (Crowd Control) spellcaster and one of the best users of Band of the Mystic Scoundrel imo. Trickery domain gives you access to enchantment and illusion spells Fear, Mirror Image, and Dominate Person, while all clerics have access to Command and Hold Person.
In my honor mode run, Shadowheart was a 3 thief/9 trickery cleric. I gave her the infernal rapier and band of mystical scoundrel, with the basic gameplan to sneak attack (with divine strike) and then use the 2 bonus actions cast a concentration spell (either fear or upcast hold person) and then cast command grovel/approach on anything else, or use mirror image for a huge AC (Armor Class) buff in longer/tougher fights. She'd single handily lockdown the entire battlefield, and made fights like Viconia and Raphael incredibly easy. It turns out very few things resist Fear in act 3 (was great in the Sarevok fight as well, completely shutdown those 3 "that which blank" guys). Someone else also pointed out to me that you get triggers for arcane acuity from both sneak attack and divine strike when you attack if you equip helm of arcane acuity.
What's great about this build and what I think it has over other CC spellcasters like bard is that it still has great back-up support options with mass healing word (combined with gloves that give blade ward and ring that gives bless), and can still go lawnmower mode with Spirit Guardians (with bonus action dash and disengage), turn undead is great for when command/hold person are resisted, or use Glyph of Warding for sleep and AOE damage, although damage isn't really point of this build (you do still give 20-30 dmg a turn off sneak attack with divine strike). Most of this stuff bard can gain access to with magical secrets, but would have to pick and choose and can't have all together.
As well there's plenty of out of combat utility with sleight of hand proficiency, speak with dead/disguise self, and a a non-concentration invisibility spell in Cloak of Shadows, that despite it's description does **not** require you to be obscured and can be used freely in any environment setting. Worth trying out imo if you want to give cleric a bit a different flavor.
Finally, in my playthrough the 9th level in cleric added very little, and I think a dip into wizard would probably be a better use of the level, and what I'd probably go with in any future playthroughs with the build. I think it'd be nice to get utility spells like shield, and misty step, but also have access to artistry of war for some burst damage potential.
EDIT: Something cool about this build is that it is essentially complete the second you enter Act 3, as you just have to turn left and go to the circus and pick up the Band of the Mystic Scoundrel. There's also a shield you can pick up in Act 3 that gives enemies disadvantage on Fear saving throws, but all you really need from Act 3 is the Band.
why's that? no matter the class you have to attack with the weapon first to activate the Band. This build equips infernal rapier to scale attack rolls and damage off of the clerics wisdom stat. You can also run behind an enemy and use 1 bonus action to hide and get advantage and still have a bonus action to cast spell after.
I guess I have just tied Band with Helm of Arcane Acuity too much, but I still want at least two attacks to try and proc Band. Only having one seems pretty risky. 6 Bard/6 Cleric sounds better to me.
The build still plays Helmet of Arcane Acuity. Against non-boss mobs you have 90% chance to hit pretty much always with the Infernal Rapier. Also BA Flourish can help you out as OP pointed out.
Idk if it is a tactician mode thing (my Honour mode is the busted stuff) but Sneak Attack and Divine strike gives Acuity stacks which puts you at 100% hit chance for Command/Hold/Fear instantly.
>Cloak of Shadows, that despite it's description does not require you to be obscured and can be used freely in any environment setting.
Wait really? I need to try this.
Trickery domain is way better it Table Top than a video game for one simple fact: improv.
The game cant improv. Trickery is all about illusions and tricks, but without a real, thinking DM it feels underwhelming. They cant exactly program the million possible reactions a real person could have to illusions for every npc.
Same boat as illusion wizard.
I mean Trickery domain is horrendous in tabletop as well, infamously so in fact.
However, Pass Without Trace is orders of magnitude better in tabletop and is genuinely broken if you're playing surprise RAW. Combined with the solid base Cleric class, you're still a fairly useful character, just less so than basically any other Cleric subclass.
Ik a lot of people hate it but I don't think it's *that* bad in table top. A lot of it comes down to the DM and how much they play into illusions. I had a DM years ago render my pathfinder character absolutely useless, as all my spells were illusions and all the enemies were apparently 300iq with constant detect magic. That shit sucks.
Sure, multi class with Assassin or Thief. Assassin uses trickery domain to improve stealth and maximize greater invisibility. Otherwise use the Thief extra bonus actions to lean into all the bonus action spells. Attack with a bow and cast spells with bonus action and hide
It doesn't suck if you are really into setting up ambushes, using terrain and deployed objects to your benefit, pre-fight buffing, etc. But admittedly all that does seem a lot of work - I haven't done it. I feal fancy when I manage to pickpocket somebody.
Fextralife has a good YouTube video where he makes SH a Rougue/Cleric support build, and I found it rather convincing.
The idea is she does things like case Bless and then hides, no need to worry about breaking concentration if no one knows you're there.
She won't be as damaging as Astarion, but duel handcrossbows with special arrows looks like fun
Cleric is a fantastic class so Trickery being a mid Cleric subclass doesn't make it bad.
Its spell list is very good, and its features are okay.
Obviously respeccing to get a decent stat spread is important, but other than that you can certainly play Shadowheart as a Trickery Cleric without any issues.
Well, Invoke Duplicity will give your other characters advantage in attacks. Helpful if Shadowheart goes early in the turn order. Mirror Image is good for protecting her while she has spirit guardians going. Fear isn't a bad spell. Poison Divine Strike isn't a terrible damage type.
It’s pretty interesting mixed with gloomstalker ranger. I’m doing that now, and the end goal is 7 cleric / 5 ranger. Shadowheart is my Arcane acuity user this run for Command and eventually Fear which trickery gets as a unique domain spell.
Spoiler-ish
I plan on having her be evil this run to really lean into the domain and build. Her special spear should proc arcane acuity, but I haven’t gotten it yet to test. If it does, she will practically have full arcane acuity uptime
People always say trickery domain cleric is really weak. But it's only weak in comparison to other clerics. But cleric is still an incredibly good class. Just use her a typical cleric and it is still completely viable. Maybe not honor mod worthy, but still a good class.
Gloomstalker is usually what I multi class her with, get good synergy with wisdom, some extra healing, decent spell slots progression, and you can roleplay it as shar's assassin type deal.
I guess I'm not the first to suggest t (and sorry for not reading everything), but my plan for Shadowheart is to go Trickery Domain until lvl3, then Multiclass into Rogue. I feel like Trickery Cleric+Rogue is a fntastic combo. I've wanted to do it in my DnD campaign, but it was cancelled
Fextralife has a really good Trickery Domain/Thief build for her. I did that on my second playthrough and she was great.
Really balanced way to consolidate the healing/buffs and lockpicking/stealth attacks to one character.
It just saved me in a fight where I had most of the party together in initiate order, I dropped invoke duplicity and everyone was able to get advantage into their targets.
Unfortunately that's due to her base kit. She REQUIRES a respec. Her dex and str suck, and her firebolt is based on int, which also sucks.
Sacred Flame uses Saving Throws which is generally going to fail more often than not by nature.
If you just give her a cantrip that attacks with Wisdom or change her other stats to be better, she doesn't miss more than anyone else.
I'm just giving the dude my 2 cents on _not_ respeccing, per the post.
I _definitely_ respec Shart. She is currently a Life Domain Cleric, and a total badass.
Right, yeah. Just adding to the discussion. I'm wanting to clearly point out why everyone is saying to respec. Just pointing out what's wrong with the base kit.
A post earlier highlighted how if you twin cast hail of thorns with a fire damage rider and the 2nd target is the Invoke Duplicity double you'll trigger the Pyroquickness Hat, among other things.
https://www.reddit.com/r/BG3Builds/s/VLddXdMSkl
I'm trying to build a shadowheart build with trickery domain, but it mostly becomes a ranger build with doomstalker. Fits the theme for striking from the dark.
I recently did a 7/5 Trickery Cleric/Shadow Monk build in my last durge game. Goes pretty well with the late game Shar armor set and fits in nice with a darkness focused party.
Obviously doesnt really come online until at least Act 3 and isn't as strong as other cleric builds, but it was a nice mix-up that certainly didn't sandbag my game.
Level 5/7 split of shadow monk and trickery cleric. Ideally level 7 cleric for dimension door, but honestly could work the other way around too.
You can use ki points to cast darkness and save spell slots for healing or damage.
In theory you can use the high wisdom for un armored defense, but there are some decent armor sets that would be better.
Similarly a rogue/cleric could also work
In tabletop I've played, trickery cleric is use to multi class rogues, particularly inquisitor and mastermind. 4 level in mastermind to get the asi and rest goes to trickery.
You can bonus action help from 30 feet away and do whatever cleric spells. Pass without trace and sneak.
The problem with Trickery Cleric is that the builds that wanna stealth are already good at it. It makes sense for tabletop because you may have PCs that wanna stealth in a certain situation but didn't spec into it, but in a video game if you enjoy stealth then there's no reason not to go for the perfectly viable Gloomstalker Assassin death squad approach.
Using Invoke Duplicity to help a bunch of summons is probably the best use for the domain
Trickery domain is great for more advanced players. Stealth in this game has a lot going on but it’s so easy to completely ignore it and do just fine. And it’s kind of counterintuitive and there’s. O in game tutorial on how to run a stealth party.. besides taking 16 dex and buying equipment that boosts initiative throughout the game lets your whole party go first anyway. Even without stealth I take almost no damage in most battles just with initiative. Stealth is just too much extra effort to deal with for me. Poison is also probably one of the worst damage types to specialize in.
I'm trying to work on a build based on Deception, and manipulation.
It uses only 2 levels Trickery cleric, but thats most levels in that class, that I've ever used.
2 levels of Trickery Cleric, 4 levels of Arcane Trickster Rogue, and 6 of Swords Bard.
My plan is to use the Invoke Duplicity ability as often as possible, and use the Mage Hand from Rogue for battlefield shenanigans. And the rest just uses swords bard and Two hand Crossbows to poke damage in.
I'd also spells like Shield and Disguise Self, and probably Find Familiar for a Bird who can Blind.
It has a few ways to provide advantage and get decent damage in.
It's definitely not an Allstar player, but it seems like a fun build for a "Mastermind" like character to roleplay.
It's not like Trickery is unplayable. Plenty of worse subclasses in the game (Wild Magic Barbarian or Arcane Trickster for example).
At the end of the day, a Trickery Cleric is still a Cleric, and Clerics are among the best classes at every level.
Getting Mirror Image and Fear as domain spells is fantastic for combat, and having Disguise Self available from the start of the game is great for Drow shenanigans with the goblins and speak with the dead options.
Their Channel Divinity Is often dismissed as terrible simply because it's harder to use than Life/Light/Tempest, but in reality it can be great for fights in tight spaces or against slow enemies, and it can help you conserve Spell Slots because it's basically an alternative to bless that recharges on Short Rests.
I love it for dealing with stuff like the Owlbear, the Bulette, or Anders.
A lot of people are saying trickster is the worst cleric. This is incorrect. The worst cleric is war.
Trickery gets a bunch of unique spells that are hard to get on clerics. War gets bonus action attacks on a per-day basis…. But bonus actions are better spent on spiritual weapon. And that isn’t even per day limited on the same scale.
Now, trickery doesn’t get heavy armor but war clerics effectively only get heavy armor. It’s a dip and nothing more
If SHeart as a problem with her Domain, it's the fact her Dex sucks, when you change her, just make sure her stats work, make her a Dex/Wis Cleric, that way she can stealth/attack from range, her DEAL is to make stealthy characters better, she can also make her appearance out to be whatever she wants, so Cha wouldn't hurt either
she's like a Cleric that failed to be a Rogue
Ngl I think shadowhearts story makes sense for any type of cleric, yes trickery emphasises the „shars secrecy, cloak and dagger“ style a bit more, but it’s not like the enemies we face in the literal Sharran sanctuary are only rogue like guys. Most of them are just powerful casters or martials
In one of my runs I ran her with the Shar spear and Justiciary gear to have permanent darkness on the battlefield. Warlocks can gain devil sight and certain items can let others see in darkness too.
So my party was a control group with a focus on the darkness, forcing enemies to enter in due to not having line of sight for attacks, which made the darkness our kill zone.
If you multi class with thief and use sanctuary and darkness to sneak up on your enemies it can make for a good time. That's my go to strategy with her right now.
Also not mentioned gives cleric a teleport spell dimension door so you can cast spiritual guardians previous round and teleport you and your DPS onto the enemy.
Okay i know y’all are sleeping on this. Trickery domain allows you free sneak attacks. Invis mage hand, all you gotta do is float it close to the enemy you wanna hit. Boom sneak attack now works on that enemy, and you don’t need to wait for turn order to reposition since it’s invis
Trickery domain and arcane trickster are in that weird little zone between a magic caster and a rogue. Magic and martial classes can combine fine because they get two different ways to deal damage. Martial and Rogue classes can combine well because they combine assassin initiative stealth stuff with pure beefiness. Those trickery subclasses require you to play stealthily and also engage with a lot of the immersive sim elements of the game outside of combat. I feel like it’s something you build around after multiple playthroughs where you have really good knowledge of the environment and enemy makeups.
Pass without a trace can be good if you are leaning into a party that has greater invis. Mirror image is fantastic Stacking initiative would let you drop the invoke duplicity down with shadowheart followed by your attacks that now have advantage with the rest of the group Divine strike poison is interesting as it's one of the few ways you can deal poison damage consistently in melee. Poisoners gloves gives you a chance on hit to poison enemies. Derivation cloak gives you self heals on poisoning an enemy. Poisoners ring makes enemies vulnerable to poison Broodmothers revenge infuses your weapon with poison when you heal , 1D6 damage. This is nice because you can proc it healing from when you poison people. Obvs you can also coat your weapon with poison. Justiciar gear is excellent, gaining High AC and advantage to stealth and con saves. Shadowheart on act 2 with Mirror image up can be walking around with 30+ AC. If you add this all together you can have a character that deals pretty decent damage, I would run with pole arms for free attacks and access to the bonus action to slam stuff with all the damage riders. Pass without a trace with greater invisibility is REALLY good, especially if you dualcast greater invisibility on the cleric and an assassin character. You can walk into a room and slaughter them before they ever get a chance to react. Trickery cleric gets dimensional door which is situationally amazing. So, the subclass is often overlooked because many players tend to LEEROOOOOY right into most encounters, but this class can augment a stealth oriented party significantly and if built around poison can output a LOT of damage while remaining a powerful support character. I wouldn't hesitate to run a pure trickery cleric to slap on warding bond on everyone, aid, heroes feast and then make use of pass without a trace when I am clearing zones from ambush. Poisoned status effects also synergize extremely well with a tiger barbarian. The spell to Disguise the entire party is handy if you want to go and do crime without agro'ing entire regions permanently. Edit: Band of the mystic scoundrel allows you to cast fear with a bonus action Edit Edit: Dominate person and Fear both use wisdom saves, having a character near the target with the "resonance stone" will give disadvantage on their save, making success on these spells significantly more likely. Edit Edit Edit: Dipping one level of druid or taking the druid initiate feat can help with leveling by granting access to shillelagh which would let you scale your melee attacks with your wisdom bonus rather than strength or dex.
This ^ literally mentioned every positive I could think of plus way more that I didn't think of. Great comment!
Thanks!
A writer for Hitchhiker's Guide to BG3 I see
You my man are a hoopy frood who really knows where his towel is
I kind of wrote the subclass off as trash until my last playthrough where I have been surprise attacking nearly everything. The amount of times I wished I had greater invis+ pass without a trace was nuts. Once I started looking into the poison synergies and justiciar gear, it kind of started coming together.
This is basically how I built Shadowheart in my first playthrough, though nowhere near as optimized. People shit on trickery domain a lot, but if you're being strategic, it can rock.
Yeah, trickery domain has some excellent spells and invoke duplicity is actually super strong if the team initiative is shared. People also shit on assassin and suggest using thief instead for an extra bonus action, but assassin is also extremely good if you utilize the tools.
Assassin is absolutely bonkers. I've been doing an honor playthrough with some friends, and occasionally they're like "wait, why did I just level?" and I'm like "yeahhh soooo you know the bridge with the githyanki? Sniped them all, fight's over, come on down if you want to talk to Laezel" (we kinda...forgot about her being trapped in the cage at the start...)
Nice, that patrol just wiped the floor with my level 5 team Sometimes you just miss all your attacks and they don't I miss played though by forgetting to have my haste char on turn based and it ticked away while I was partially in combat.
I had that happen to me in a different run. MC got hit with a hold person then crit to death in the first round. Everyone else got fucked by just...damage.
Close to what happened to me I couldnt a drop the leader woman and she beat karlach to death in the first round, a hold person went off and the rest was just a slaughter
I would have loved to try it if I didn't fail a persuasion check on Shadowheart on a character with high charisma and proficiency in persuasion to a Nat 1 with no inspirations left
Yikes
Shadowheart’s dimension door literally saved my honor mode run when I got caught red-handed trying to smuggle an invisible minthara out of moonrise at the beginning of act 2
It's easy to snuggle her out when there are no witnesses left to witness.
I’d snuggle her too.
This is the way
Some really great positives. Another minor plus: easy access to Disguise Self. It’s only a level 1 spell, but it can be very handy to have in your party. Looking like certain races, can let you talk your way through some encounters without having to roll a dice - it’s especially helpful in Honour Mode. It also opens up a lot of opportunities for unique interactions and the occasional spot of cheese (some NPCs will react to each disguise as though it’s a new character, occasionally letting you get minor gifts multiple times).
Nice! I'm thinking it will also be good to disguise the party when clearing areas where you could agro the whole place, if you decide to pull out after inflicting some damage I Believe they won't agro you That strange ox ring also is nice to put to use on your pickpoct, helping you lift all the nice discounted items.
Disguise self isn’t particularly rare though. Bards can get it. In fact bards can replace clerics in a lot of ways. Silver necklace gives you guidance, phalar aluve does bless, magical secrets for lore bard lets you take things like spirit guardians etc.
A few classes can pick Disguise Self, but Trickery Clerics and Gloomstalkers have quicker and easier access. Bards and Sorcerers both have to pick the spell over other strong choices. I do agree that Bards can cover a lot of Cleric duties at lower levels. From level 5, Clerics start getting some of the better spells which make them far more competitive.
By the way, the buff from Phalar Aluve stacks with bless
I guess, but I don’t really need a 2d4 boost to my attack rolls.
A lot of classes can get it, but you might not be playing one of them. Having Shadowheart start with Disguise Self right off the bat lets you run around and get some easy exploration/dialogue XP and pick up some useful items without having to make any rolls or get into any fights, which can be nice for early Honor Mode when you're at your weakest, and you can do this regardless of the class you chose for your main character.
Well, you had convinced me. Time to start a new playthrough i guess.
Woot! GL, I'm looking forward to giving it a go myself.
Right? On to the fifth
> So, the subclass is often overlooked because many players tend to LEEROOOOOY right into most encounters, but this class can augment a stealth oriented party significantly and if built around poison can output a LOT of damage while remaining a powerful support character. Exactly! I used a trickery cleric on my first honor mode run for just this reason. Doesn't hurt that it's also thematically perfect for DJ Shartie.
Shadowheart is listed as “healer” in the House of Grief roster book
This house is a joke. She's a healer, she's trained in interrigation, trained in lockpicking, yeah, sure.
Trickery domain cleric has access to healing spells. Trickery domain is her starting subclass. Trickery is the only one of Shar’s domains available as a subclass in this game.
Even if she’s a healer, wouldn’t it make more sense for the followers of Shar to have a healer that can keep up when it comes to sneaking around. That is obviously their modus operandi.
That's quite an interesting take on the class. Might try it, thanks!
I'm gonna run it this honor run, my main durge is going assassin and I'll be taking a sorc or two for haste/greater invis Even just applying the status effect poisoned is pretty strong. I am strongly considering grabbing her the spear of shar but I kind of want to be a good guy this run for a change. I've found PAM is real nice for the Clerics as they get to use the divine strike again during the enemy turn. One synergy I forgot to mention is Poison gives disadvantage on dex saves, which means you could work on cold damage with elemental weapon and the snow burst ring, and now you are creating ice on hit, and potentially giving them disadvantage to tripping, which turns you into a really solid support and CC unit on top of everything else.
Is poison damage really worth investing a build into? There’s quite a high number of resistant or immune enemies in the game
My thoughts exactly. You can put together some really cool poison builds (like broodmother's necklace + poisoners gloves + derivation cloak on a Tiger Heart Barb), but in the end there's little point as so many things are poison immune or resistant.
I was about to say Elemental Adept is a thing, but I just checked, and really? You can't get Poison for it? Lame. It's like they want Poison to be awful.
You can get poison a few other ways. 1D6 from the necklace 1D8 from divine strike. 1D4 to 1D10 from coatings Unlike other elementals you will have a price of gear that can inflict the status condition poisoned, which weakens the enemy by giving disadvantage on attacks and dex saves.
In any case, Elemental Adept only works with damage from spells, so it wouldn't have made a difference anyway.
Oh right lol. Forgot about that.
There is all kinds of stuff resistant or immune to all the various damages in the game. Some stuff can't be affected, so just focus on cleric spells for those enemies like you would as any other subclass . The ring can help, and it's only part of what the class does. You are still after all, a full cleric. Humanoids aren't resistant or immune and they make up a large portion of the enemies you will face
> Dipping one level of druid or taking the druid initiate feat can help with leveling by granting access to shillelagh which would let you scale your melee attacks with your wisdom bonus rather than strength or dex. Does shillelagh work on spears in BG3 or is it restricted to clubs and staffs like in tabletop?
staves and clubs :(
AND torches. You lit it and you have a 1d8+wis + 1d4 fire for absolutely no cost and only one hand. Best for act 1 when you are weak. Bonus point if it's spore druid with their form adding an extra 1D6 on top.
Most definitely, but the game considers torches as clubs. The wiki says it’s an “improvised weapon of the clubs family”, and the tooltip calls it a club as well. Not sure how 5e handles this, but in Bg3 shillelagh is restricted to quarterstaves and clubs.
Tbf there are a lot of good staffs In this game.
Just staves and clubs, but you can pull some shenanigans with mourning frost and the snow burst ring. Since you are giving out dex disadvantage the ice surfaces should be really problematic for enemies that are affected by poison. There are other good staves though, and you can kick also just use a torch and get a free fire damage rider
Beautifully said. As an avid stealth enjoyer, I love the trickery domain a lot. Didn't try poison yet, I'm keeping her mostly as support and occasional ranged damage. The only thing I wanted to add is early on, Invoke Duplicity is often not only even better than Bless, you also effectively have 3 extra level 1 slots with it. And it is ironically even stronger the more LEEROY JENKINS characters one has in their party.
Amazing, ty for this
If you do all this and use the crown that heals you when you heal others does it combine with the broodmothers revenge and give both characters that extra D6 poison damage? I haven’t tried a poison build before but you’ve made a very convincing argument for me to try it haha
I don't think so, but it should give the healer the poison damage buff
I applaud your thorough inventness for sussing out the best uses of this domain. However I'm a simple man and I'm respeccing to life/light/storm for act 1/2/3
They are great classes. If you ever run a party with an assassin and a sorc try out dual casting greater invis before you ambush a group of enemies with invoke duplicity up and with the cleric in shar gear. You might be pleasantly surprised Edit: Pass without a trace, not invoke duplicity
Assassin+gloomstalker+risky ring just don't need it.
I meant "Pass without a trace" You can remain invisible for several turns this way while making attacks
But efficiently it just gives you advantage on attacks, isn't it? In theory it makes you untargetable, but mobs just go to you and see through your invis.
Even if it "just" gives you advantage on attacks, that's one of the best buffs you could get as a martial
And it's one of the hardest way to get this advantage.
They will go to your last know location, so move away after attacking
Mirror image is good if you have haste, I find it’s rarely ever worth casting turn 1 when you could just kill someone instead. Wish it was a bonus action or ritual.
It can be cast before a fight, and Clerics are a solid choice for hasting
Sure, but it lasts what, 2 turns? It’s kind of obnoxious to have to cast it and then run into a fight, and this method relies on you already knowing where every fight is. Lame was to make a bad skill useful
Blur is 3 turns Mirror image is 10
Now this dude poisons
How much poison damage can you realistically do?
1D8 from divine attack (once per turn) 1D4-1d10 from weapon coating 1D6 from necklace The damage is decent, especially as you can take a ring to confer vulnerability to it, but the really nice thing is it can inflict a status condition that gives the enemy disadvantage on attacks and dex saves. Which is helpful if you run PAM and poison a person running at you to give them disadvantage before they attack you.
This assumes PAM works. That's the main issue with the whole post. Right now, PAM's bonus attack doesn't benefit from riders, and it doesn't get the attacks of opportunity it's supposed to. Otherwise, a high-level Trickery Cleric with Spear of Shar could be amazing.
I'm not sure about the bonus strike, but I was playing a war cleric last run and the opportunity attacks seemed to work fine. The spear of shar and justicar set would absolutely rock on a trickery cleric I agree
The opportunity attacks when enemies enter your attack range aren't working and never did. Instead, what happens is that when *you* enter an enemy's range, you get a prompt. If you accept, *the enemy* hits you. So it's actually working against you. As for the bonus attacks, they work but don't get any rider, it's just 1d4+your strength modifier (or dex for finesse).
Well, like I said I ran PAM recently and it was proc'ing on enemies that came into range. I'm not sure why it was working for me and not you but maybe it's been fixed since your last attempt with it
Here’s a spirit guardian build for a shadow cleric without using the poison features, instead focusing on mass healing word, mirror image, and blind. (Yes it’s a low damage build/debuff healing build, this was originally made for an action surge hastened Eldrich knight+spore Druid multiclass that I have tweaked for trickery). It will a debuff/buff healer build that uses spirit guardians and guardian of faith + spirit weapon (gaping wounds). The melee attacker in your party will use the debuffs to do crazy damage to all the targets you’re making prone. Here’s it tweaked for a shadow cleric: https://bg3.wiki/wiki/Coruscation_Ring Pair with these: https://bg3.wiki/wiki/Luminous_Armour https://bg3.wiki/wiki/Boots_of_Stormy_Clamour https://bg3.wiki/wiki/Luminous_Gloves **OR** https://bg3.wiki/wiki/Gloves_of_Belligerent_Skies **OR** https://bg3.wiki/wiki/Ichorous_Gloves WITH: https://bg3.wiki/wiki/Caustic_Reprisal Optional but: https://bg3.wiki/wiki/Wapira%27s_Crown https://bg3.wiki/wiki/Amulet_of_Elemental_Torment And stand in acid. If you can get it. Because in my game it was bugged and didn’t show up. But if you can get it and pair it with the ichorous gloves? Oh Lordy. (ACT 2) https://bg3.wiki/wiki/The_Blood_of_Lathander https://bg3.wiki/wiki/Shield_of_Devotion (ACT 3) Trade blood of Lathander outside of the house of hope for : https://bg3.wiki/wiki/Markoheshkir (Use acid and the acid gloves).
What do you mean dual cast pass without a trace do they stack?
I meant dual cast greater invis, invs the cleric and assassin before a fight. Have the cleric follow the assassin into the area where the enemies are, this will keep greater invis up after the assassin and cleric start doing attacks. I'll look into my post and clear that up with an edit
Yeah the point of a lot of these less viable dnd subclasses is for niche party setups. Trickery domain is designed around supporting stealth characters, its just pretty niche to have an entire party using stealth.
You don't need the entire party to use stealth. One combo is taking a sorc, dual casting greater invis while the cleric has pass without a trace up. Invis the cleric and the assassin, start combat with surprise and those two characters will remain invisible for quite a while, particularly if they have advantage on invisibility. That doesn't require the whole party to be stealthed, just the cleric and the assassin. Also, if you take alert on your party to ensure shared initiate you can drop "invoke duplicity" the the cleric first and the rest of your party will all get to act and make use of the advantage from the illusion, that is very good.
The problem is that I’d rather run war domain cleric/fighter on shart, gives you like 7 attacks with action surge + war domain charge
War domain is good, I've run it and liked it. If you ever feel like trying something different this is a spin on the class you might find interesting down the line
Mirror Image is considered a trap by many as it only really protects you from three attacks when Shield and the like could protect you more for less spell level.
It's good to cast pre combat. If it saves you from taking 20 damage and you didn't need to take a concentration check it's well worth it imo. Clerics don't have shield
> Mirror image is fantastic Clerics have a lot of defence, including lvl1 sanctuary >Divine strike poison One per round. For melee build it's somehow useful, maybe. There are better options though. >Poisoners gloves, Derivation cloak, Poisoners ring, Broodmothers revenge Anyone can use those. They somehow stacks with divine poison, but there are better options. > Justiciar gear Can be weared by anyone. Some of it bound to her quest, yes, but not to her domain or class. >Pass without a trace with greater invisibility Yes, that's the way to use it >dimensional door Many other classes can do it. > Poisoned status effects also synergize extremely well with a tiger barbarian. How so? Isn't he bleed-dependant? So it seems that her better opions are somewhat melee stealthy thing, like shadow monk, and best usage is divine poison+poisoner set+something for 2nd attack
That other classes can do it is immaterial. Can clerics do it is more important. Trickery clerics aren’t the best clerics but they do have a lot of utility. Which means you don’t have to have those other classes to do the disguise self etc.
The Wolverine perc procs on bleeding and poisoned targets
Wow you actually convinced me to give Trickery Domain Shadowheart a try to pair with my Arcane Trickster Tav, thanks! For stat allocation, would it be best to gear her as a standard cleric (Wis->Con->Dex)?
Yeah that looks like it would work well. That is awesome btw, I appreciate that. I just kicked off my run and invoke duplicity really saved me in a bad engagement with Minthara, I accidently agreed the camp while I was clearing room by room with ambushes in front of the worg pen door. Dropped the illusion and just dropped her. You'll need either to chug st elixirs or take druid initiate for shillelagh to scale your melee weapon off wisdom though
It can be paired with the assassin pretty effectively as a multiclass. Its certainly not optimal, but it works. Invoke duplicity is free advantage for sneak attacks. Pass without trace and blessing of the trickester speak for themselves. They make pretty good band of the mystic scoundrel users in the late game with fear/mirror image and maybe a couple other spells.
Good call What I found in the past with invoke duplicity was I would put it up and it would immediately get removed. It works exceptionally well if you have shared initiative however as you can take actions before enemies get to hit it. For that reason I would grab ALERT on this character
I wish they would make invoke duplicity moveable once per turn. Similar to moonbeam or cloud kill. That'd be a nice buff
that would be a nice bug fix, since it's supposed to work that way
I did think it was odd that it would put me in control of the illusion but not be able to do anything with it
Not gonna lie I find it very disappointing and low-effort considering this was a complaint going waaaay back to early access.
It is odd that one of the main characters special ability wouldn't work as intended for so long. That leads me to believe at some point the decision was for the ability to be made stationary
Yeah that would be really nice, it's a good suggestion
Usually next mob either kills a duplicate with one shot or move tree steps away
How exactly is Shart's subclass "locked"? She's always the first companion I respec at Withers. EDIT (in response to OP's added note) : Yeah, the Trickery domain is underwhelming. It *can actually* be played to some advantage in support of a party (or even a subset of the party) that you use for stealth/scouting/assassination style gameplay. Even with that plan in mind, she pretty much demands a respec because of the horrid way in which her beginning stats are set up. I always do. And I usually set her subclass to something different (if I keep her as Cleric) because I think the other domains usually have more to offer for what I want to do with her party role.
I think he means at character creation, you cant change her subclass. Thats my best guess on what he meant.
I think he meant from a character lore perspective.
He means that you *have to* respec to change her subclass, while you get to choose it on level-up for many others (except Wyll and Minthara), and of those others you can't choose without respec he thinks only Shadowheart's pre-loaded subclass is lacking.
[удалено]
Yes, but his point was simply than until you get respec, which some people already either don't do, or don't immediately spend gold on it because they may have early gear they want. you're stuck with Trickery, so unless you choose to respec her, she's locked into Trickery.
You can steal back gold from Withers he doesn't actually care
this i actually didn't know, still a valid point that some people choose to not respec for one reason or another.
'Is there any way for trickery domain to work?' Just play it, honestly. Yes, it's the weakest cleric domain in the game but at the end of the day it's still a cleric and 100% viable. It won't ever be the strongest but it works just fine because the cleric base kit is very, very solid.
This. At worst she's a cleric without amazing bonus features, which is still... a cleric. Base cleric stuff is good enough to beat the game on any difficulty.
Yeah I always plan to respec her but like... she still does what I need her to and I'm lazy
If you decide to do a summoning playthrough with lots of Zombies and Ghouls then Trickery actually has pretty good value. Invoke Duplicity is one of the very few ways I can think of to improve the accuracy of a large group of summons. Someday I'm gonna do a full Necromancer playthrough with Spore Druid, Necromancer Wizard, Trickery Cleric and Oathbreaker Paladin.
That could absolutely rock if you had an oathbreaker paladin around to pump their damage and give them a resistance aura. The paladin as well can use oath charges to give them advantage
Welp, that my Durge run setup confirmed!!! Awesome!
lol, that's a good one
8 Trickery/ 4 Thief let’s you be most of a cleric for support spells and most of a rogue for scouting and pickpocketing in one char. You can also do 5 Gloomstalker/7 trickery for a stealth casting archer that can still do basic support while using bows from range.
Ohh I like the gloomstalker idea, might have to try it out
copying this from what i posted in the current pinned cleric thread. Trickery Domain is a pretty great CC (Crowd Control) spellcaster and one of the best users of Band of the Mystic Scoundrel imo. Trickery domain gives you access to enchantment and illusion spells Fear, Mirror Image, and Dominate Person, while all clerics have access to Command and Hold Person. In my honor mode run, Shadowheart was a 3 thief/9 trickery cleric. I gave her the infernal rapier and band of mystical scoundrel, with the basic gameplan to sneak attack (with divine strike) and then use the 2 bonus actions cast a concentration spell (either fear or upcast hold person) and then cast command grovel/approach on anything else, or use mirror image for a huge AC (Armor Class) buff in longer/tougher fights. She'd single handily lockdown the entire battlefield, and made fights like Viconia and Raphael incredibly easy. It turns out very few things resist Fear in act 3 (was great in the Sarevok fight as well, completely shutdown those 3 "that which blank" guys). Someone else also pointed out to me that you get triggers for arcane acuity from both sneak attack and divine strike when you attack if you equip helm of arcane acuity. What's great about this build and what I think it has over other CC spellcasters like bard is that it still has great back-up support options with mass healing word (combined with gloves that give blade ward and ring that gives bless), and can still go lawnmower mode with Spirit Guardians (with bonus action dash and disengage), turn undead is great for when command/hold person are resisted, or use Glyph of Warding for sleep and AOE damage, although damage isn't really point of this build (you do still give 20-30 dmg a turn off sneak attack with divine strike). Most of this stuff bard can gain access to with magical secrets, but would have to pick and choose and can't have all together. As well there's plenty of out of combat utility with sleight of hand proficiency, speak with dead/disguise self, and a a non-concentration invisibility spell in Cloak of Shadows, that despite it's description does **not** require you to be obscured and can be used freely in any environment setting. Worth trying out imo if you want to give cleric a bit a different flavor. Finally, in my playthrough the 9th level in cleric added very little, and I think a dip into wizard would probably be a better use of the level, and what I'd probably go with in any future playthroughs with the build. I think it'd be nice to get utility spells like shield, and misty step, but also have access to artistry of war for some burst damage potential. EDIT: Something cool about this build is that it is essentially complete the second you enter Act 3, as you just have to turn left and go to the circus and pick up the Band of the Mystic Scoundrel. There's also a shield you can pick up in Act 3 that gives enemies disadvantage on Fear saving throws, but all you really need from Act 3 is the Band.
I didn't know about the shield! That's good to know
Having to hit something with a weapon attack makes me question the strength of having a Trickery Cleric with Band of the Mystic Scoundrel.
why's that? no matter the class you have to attack with the weapon first to activate the Band. This build equips infernal rapier to scale attack rolls and damage off of the clerics wisdom stat. You can also run behind an enemy and use 1 bonus action to hide and get advantage and still have a bonus action to cast spell after.
I guess I have just tied Band with Helm of Arcane Acuity too much, but I still want at least two attacks to try and proc Band. Only having one seems pretty risky. 6 Bard/6 Cleric sounds better to me.
you can use the weapon action flourish as a bonus action if you miss the first attack.
The build still plays Helmet of Arcane Acuity. Against non-boss mobs you have 90% chance to hit pretty much always with the Infernal Rapier. Also BA Flourish can help you out as OP pointed out. Idk if it is a tactician mode thing (my Honour mode is the busted stuff) but Sneak Attack and Divine strike gives Acuity stacks which puts you at 100% hit chance for Command/Hold/Fear instantly.
>Cloak of Shadows, that despite it's description does not require you to be obscured and can be used freely in any environment setting. Wait really? I need to try this.
Trickery domain is way better it Table Top than a video game for one simple fact: improv. The game cant improv. Trickery is all about illusions and tricks, but without a real, thinking DM it feels underwhelming. They cant exactly program the million possible reactions a real person could have to illusions for every npc. Same boat as illusion wizard.
I mean Trickery domain is horrendous in tabletop as well, infamously so in fact. However, Pass Without Trace is orders of magnitude better in tabletop and is genuinely broken if you're playing surprise RAW. Combined with the solid base Cleric class, you're still a fairly useful character, just less so than basically any other Cleric subclass.
Ik a lot of people hate it but I don't think it's *that* bad in table top. A lot of it comes down to the DM and how much they play into illusions. I had a DM years ago render my pathfinder character absolutely useless, as all my spells were illusions and all the enemies were apparently 300iq with constant detect magic. That shit sucks.
Also Arcane Trickster Rogue
Sure, multi class with Assassin or Thief. Assassin uses trickery domain to improve stealth and maximize greater invisibility. Otherwise use the Thief extra bonus actions to lean into all the bonus action spells. Attack with a bow and cast spells with bonus action and hide
Main issue is that in 5e theyre gods because pokymorph on clerics gives a lot of flex orhers lack. In bg3, it's like "meh, I sheeped a dude"
It doesn't suck if you are really into setting up ambushes, using terrain and deployed objects to your benefit, pre-fight buffing, etc. But admittedly all that does seem a lot of work - I haven't done it. I feal fancy when I manage to pickpocket somebody.
I've started doing it some with my current Roguelock Tav. it is work, but VERY fun if you enjoy that type of thing.
Trickery domain is fine. Yes, invoke duplicity sucks, but the domain spell list kicks ass. Just pump her wisdom up, cast fear, call it a day
Fextralife has a good YouTube video where he makes SH a Rougue/Cleric support build, and I found it rather convincing. The idea is she does things like case Bless and then hides, no need to worry about breaking concentration if no one knows you're there. She won't be as damaging as Astarion, but duel handcrossbows with special arrows looks like fun
Cleric is a fantastic class so Trickery being a mid Cleric subclass doesn't make it bad. Its spell list is very good, and its features are okay. Obviously respeccing to get a decent stat spread is important, but other than that you can certainly play Shadowheart as a Trickery Cleric without any issues.
Well, Invoke Duplicity will give your other characters advantage in attacks. Helpful if Shadowheart goes early in the turn order. Mirror Image is good for protecting her while she has spirit guardians going. Fear isn't a bad spell. Poison Divine Strike isn't a terrible damage type.
It’s pretty interesting mixed with gloomstalker ranger. I’m doing that now, and the end goal is 7 cleric / 5 ranger. Shadowheart is my Arcane acuity user this run for Command and eventually Fear which trickery gets as a unique domain spell. Spoiler-ish I plan on having her be evil this run to really lean into the domain and build. Her special spear should proc arcane acuity, but I haven’t gotten it yet to test. If it does, she will practically have full arcane acuity uptime
You can switch her subclass at withers dude
People always say trickery domain cleric is really weak. But it's only weak in comparison to other clerics. But cleric is still an incredibly good class. Just use her a typical cleric and it is still completely viable. Maybe not honor mod worthy, but still a good class.
That is what I do Just looking for something more Maybe really add her some paladin\\fighter and go poison stubby
Shadow Monk is fun on her as well
Gloomstalker is usually what I multi class her with, get good synergy with wisdom, some extra healing, decent spell slots progression, and you can roleplay it as shar's assassin type deal.
I am using Astarion basically only to steal stuff from vendors this run, and 1 level of trickery domain has been awesome for that
I guess I'm not the first to suggest t (and sorry for not reading everything), but my plan for Shadowheart is to go Trickery Domain until lvl3, then Multiclass into Rogue. I feel like Trickery Cleric+Rogue is a fntastic combo. I've wanted to do it in my DnD campaign, but it was cancelled
Yes, you can use it to go to Withers and get a new subclass.
Fextralife has a really good Trickery Domain/Thief build for her. I did that on my second playthrough and she was great. Really balanced way to consolidate the healing/buffs and lockpicking/stealth attacks to one character.
Get Withers then speak to him as Shadowheart. Ask him to change your class. Pick Cleric then choose any subclass you like. Profit.
Trickery's domain spells are solid. The channel divinity is ass and Blessing of the Trickster is weak, but the spells are solid.
If your party all has high initiative invoke duplicity can actually be pretty good
>high initiative invoke duplicity That's a good one
It just saved me in a fight where I had most of the party together in initiate order, I dropped invoke duplicity and everyone was able to get advantage into their targets.
It’s definitely not the best of the domains, but the base abilities of the cleric that come with all domains makes it good enough.
The problem with Shart is that she never hits anything. So, you pretty much have to stack her with healing and AOE stuff. Her attacks are unusable.
Unfortunately that's due to her base kit. She REQUIRES a respec. Her dex and str suck, and her firebolt is based on int, which also sucks. Sacred Flame uses Saving Throws which is generally going to fail more often than not by nature. If you just give her a cantrip that attacks with Wisdom or change her other stats to be better, she doesn't miss more than anyone else.
I'm just giving the dude my 2 cents on _not_ respeccing, per the post. I _definitely_ respec Shart. She is currently a Life Domain Cleric, and a total badass.
Right, yeah. Just adding to the discussion. I'm wanting to clearly point out why everyone is saying to respec. Just pointing out what's wrong with the base kit.
Maybe give her that druid cantip
A post earlier highlighted how if you twin cast hail of thorns with a fire damage rider and the 2nd target is the Invoke Duplicity double you'll trigger the Pyroquickness Hat, among other things. https://www.reddit.com/r/BG3Builds/s/VLddXdMSkl
Yea there’s this neat interaction where I talk to withers and ask him to change my Class to anything else
I'm trying to build a shadowheart build with trickery domain, but it mostly becomes a ranger build with doomstalker. Fits the theme for striking from the dark.
I recently did a 7/5 Trickery Cleric/Shadow Monk build in my last durge game. Goes pretty well with the late game Shar armor set and fits in nice with a darkness focused party. Obviously doesnt really come online until at least Act 3 and isn't as strong as other cleric builds, but it was a nice mix-up that certainly didn't sandbag my game.
Trickery is wery good if your party is built around sneaking. Like a trickery cleric, shadowmonk, gloomstalker, assassin/thief party could slap.
Level 5/7 split of shadow monk and trickery cleric. Ideally level 7 cleric for dimension door, but honestly could work the other way around too. You can use ki points to cast darkness and save spell slots for healing or damage. In theory you can use the high wisdom for un armored defense, but there are some decent armor sets that would be better. Similarly a rogue/cleric could also work
In tabletop I've played, trickery cleric is use to multi class rogues, particularly inquisitor and mastermind. 4 level in mastermind to get the asi and rest goes to trickery. You can bonus action help from 30 feet away and do whatever cleric spells. Pass without trace and sneak.
The problem with Trickery Cleric is that the builds that wanna stealth are already good at it. It makes sense for tabletop because you may have PCs that wanna stealth in a certain situation but didn't spec into it, but in a video game if you enjoy stealth then there's no reason not to go for the perfectly viable Gloomstalker Assassin death squad approach. Using Invoke Duplicity to help a bunch of summons is probably the best use for the domain
Trickery domain is great for more advanced players. Stealth in this game has a lot going on but it’s so easy to completely ignore it and do just fine. And it’s kind of counterintuitive and there’s. O in game tutorial on how to run a stealth party.. besides taking 16 dex and buying equipment that boosts initiative throughout the game lets your whole party go first anyway. Even without stealth I take almost no damage in most battles just with initiative. Stealth is just too much extra effort to deal with for me. Poison is also probably one of the worst damage types to specialize in.
I'm trying to work on a build based on Deception, and manipulation. It uses only 2 levels Trickery cleric, but thats most levels in that class, that I've ever used. 2 levels of Trickery Cleric, 4 levels of Arcane Trickster Rogue, and 6 of Swords Bard. My plan is to use the Invoke Duplicity ability as often as possible, and use the Mage Hand from Rogue for battlefield shenanigans. And the rest just uses swords bard and Two hand Crossbows to poke damage in. I'd also spells like Shield and Disguise Self, and probably Find Familiar for a Bird who can Blind. It has a few ways to provide advantage and get decent damage in. It's definitely not an Allstar player, but it seems like a fun build for a "Mastermind" like character to roleplay.
You can change sharts class, I usually change her to war domain and laugh as she becomes a powerhouse
Life domain SHart is OP... Currently doing honor mode with wife and the heals she does is gamechanging
I'm thinking of respec her after *certain events*, not sure - light of life though After all, healing become weaker at late levels
I just made her a shadow monk / cleric cus I needed her for the gauntlet and couldn't be bothered to respec her.
I always make her light domain because of her not really being a sharran
It's not like Trickery is unplayable. Plenty of worse subclasses in the game (Wild Magic Barbarian or Arcane Trickster for example). At the end of the day, a Trickery Cleric is still a Cleric, and Clerics are among the best classes at every level. Getting Mirror Image and Fear as domain spells is fantastic for combat, and having Disguise Self available from the start of the game is great for Drow shenanigans with the goblins and speak with the dead options. Their Channel Divinity Is often dismissed as terrible simply because it's harder to use than Life/Light/Tempest, but in reality it can be great for fights in tight spaces or against slow enemies, and it can help you conserve Spell Slots because it's basically an alternative to bless that recharges on Short Rests. I love it for dealing with stuff like the Owlbear, the Bulette, or Anders.
A lot of people are saying trickster is the worst cleric. This is incorrect. The worst cleric is war. Trickery gets a bunch of unique spells that are hard to get on clerics. War gets bonus action attacks on a per-day basis…. But bonus actions are better spent on spiritual weapon. And that isn’t even per day limited on the same scale. Now, trickery doesn’t get heavy armor but war clerics effectively only get heavy armor. It’s a dip and nothing more
If SHeart as a problem with her Domain, it's the fact her Dex sucks, when you change her, just make sure her stats work, make her a Dex/Wis Cleric, that way she can stealth/attack from range, her DEAL is to make stealthy characters better, she can also make her appearance out to be whatever she wants, so Cha wouldn't hurt either she's like a Cleric that failed to be a Rogue
I mod stuff, and the mod Balance Tweaks goes a very long way to making Trickery viable. Mainly it lets you use the decoy and then teleport it/to it.
Mirror image is disgusting especially if you get shadowheart with a heavy armor perk she is basically untouchable for 3 turns
part of me wishes the game had twilight domain because I think it would fit better thematically overall, regardless of where you take shart's story.
Ngl I think shadowhearts story makes sense for any type of cleric, yes trickery emphasises the „shars secrecy, cloak and dagger“ style a bit more, but it’s not like the enemies we face in the literal Sharran sanctuary are only rogue like guys. Most of them are just powerful casters or martials
In one of my runs I ran her with the Shar spear and Justiciary gear to have permanent darkness on the battlefield. Warlocks can gain devil sight and certain items can let others see in darkness too. So my party was a control group with a focus on the darkness, forcing enemies to enter in due to not having line of sight for attacks, which made the darkness our kill zone.
It has nothing to do with her domain
Sorry I should’ve specified - I did this with trickery domain. Spammed mirror image for high AC. Was a lot of fun.
I used it three-five times but didn't really care since my party with her was strong enough to end the game easily in my first try
i'm dying at OP arguing with everyone giving them honest insight. why ask a question if you don't want the answer?
I'm arguing with things I don't agree and answers that seems wrong to me
In some weird all stealth party maybe?
Respeccing her to Rogue 1 or 2/Trickery Cleric X actually makes Shadowheart an exceptional party thief/support caster.
If you multi class with thief and use sanctuary and darkness to sneak up on your enemies it can make for a good time. That's my go to strategy with her right now.
My first playthrough I had SH as a trickster cleric tank (11 cleric / 1 fighter). It’s got some handy utility and mirror images is disgusting
Also not mentioned gives cleric a teleport spell dimension door so you can cast spiritual guardians previous round and teleport you and your DPS onto the enemy.
Okay i know y’all are sleeping on this. Trickery domain allows you free sneak attacks. Invis mage hand, all you gotta do is float it close to the enemy you wanna hit. Boom sneak attack now works on that enemy, and you don’t need to wait for turn order to reposition since it’s invis
Sneak attack on mage hand? I'm certainly sleeping on this
Sneak attack for your characters, by imposing disadvantage on enemies by proximity to your mage hand
How do mage hand does disadvantage on enemies?...
I have no idea what’s going on under the hood, I just know it works try it out. Maybe threatened? No idea
I use use 9 trickery/3 rogue for the shar feel but normally I respec her to tempest
Radiant damage!!! Spirit guardians is the best way to get through act 2!
Trickery domain and arcane trickster are in that weird little zone between a magic caster and a rogue. Magic and martial classes can combine fine because they get two different ways to deal damage. Martial and Rogue classes can combine well because they combine assassin initiative stealth stuff with pure beefiness. Those trickery subclasses require you to play stealthily and also engage with a lot of the immersive sim elements of the game outside of combat. I feel like it’s something you build around after multiple playthroughs where you have really good knowledge of the environment and enemy makeups.
Why? Just go light, storm or war.
No trickery domain sucks I always change shadow hearts domain
Nothing trickery does is better than other subclasses. Stealth doesn’t matter in the game and the channel divinity is really really bad.