Boring, because at the end of the day it doesn't really change anything besides saying "but I'm not ACTUALLY wearing armor!" I can already describe away the armor as being divine protection, there doesn't need to be an additional rule about it. It's not an interesting decision to make, mechanically. Give them an actually interesting offset for being armorless.

>>44050531
>I can already describe away the armor as being divine protection

Not by RAW. Armor matters a lot. It has weight, Strength prerequisites, proficiencies, can't sleep in it, gets affected by metal-affecting spells, etc.

>>44050531
Its not meant to entertain (though maybe it should). The decision is mainly because I'd just like to just run a setting for once where priestly healers aren't armoured. Perhaps they can discharge the magic bonus for additional spell(s), and don't get it back until a short rest has been completed, something like that.

>>44050531
This anon is pretty much saying he is not impressed with your fluff.

I would 'balance' it out by letting them make a 'religeon check' to regain a spell slot.

>>44050605
magic bonus being the Wisdom bonus to AC, I mean

http://dndtools.pw/classes/Cloistered-Cleric/

Here's a 3.5 class that's basically what you're looking for. Can be tinkered with as needed.

>>44050649

Huh, so this is the white mage class, eh?

>>44050649
>http://dndtools.pw/classes/Cloistered-Cleric/
Not quite what I pictured but its interesting

>>44050613
do you think something like >>44050605
could work?

>>44049868
I have a question concerning 5E, since I've never read the rulebooks.

Is BAB still a thing, and do clerics still have Mid BAB?

>>44051527
BAB isn't a think. BAB, Saves, and Skill Ranks have been wrapped into a single modifier called "Proficency Bonus". For character of a same level, Prof. Bonus is the same across the board, but to what things they apply to depend on the class (and background) of the character you're playing.

>>44050564

Do you even roleplaying games?

Have you bullied your healer today?

I like how you think OP, but I still kind of like the old fashioned cleric. So I split them into two seperate classes, one is more of a support religious fighter that can turn monsters, give temp HP, and pray for miracles. Then there is a much softer cultist healer, who can give others their life energy or anoint someone with blood to protect against magic and more.

>>44050531
Make it a use activated ability. Can only be used for a few hours total each day.

Seriously though, drop the spells per day, let them spontaneously cast domain spells, +1 turn attempts.

>>44052114
OP here, not sure what posts like this are getting at, but I am guessing its a resounding "NO" to the idea of a robed, faith-healer archetype for the cleric.

I don't see the harm in exploring different options based on the flavour or feel you want, why should D&D always needs to be vanilla or stereotypical in its class options? Sorry if I'm misunderstanding, but I've been scolded before for trying to at least brainstorm variants based on fluff-wants as a thought-excercise.

I'm not even trying to be hard on the cleric. Giving the option of not having to pay for good armour seems pretty decent to me. Sure, once we get into magical armour it might be kind of shitty, but other things can be done to temper this. Seeing how a cleric can work without armour could be emergent to other new mechanics.

>>44049868
In 3.5 there was a class for the Dragonlance campaign setting that was like that. They were called Mystics.

>>44049868
I've actually thought of this for pathfinder.

- Drop your bab from 3/4 to 1/2. you're not for the front range, you don't need this.
+ Take 4+int skills over the regular 2. You're going to be doing things out of combat more often. alchemy, herbs, that regular heal.
+spending two uses on the heal option on channel energy now buffs either ac or one save by 1/5 points for 1/5 class level turns (that's 4 points to whatever you need for 4 turns at lvl 20.)

>>44052224
The healer bullying idea comes from this old D&D misconception that Clerics can't do anything except cast curative magics, so that their function in a party is exclusively to wait around until someone else needs their healing due to having made some kind of mistake.
To counteract that concept, Clerics were given the opportunity to also use buff spells and get engaged in melee so that they had something else to do and wouldn't just be pushed around by the bigger classes and told when and where to heal.
However, Clerics didn't really require that specific type of gameplay. They could have just had a bunch of damaging spells, and healing. Or a bunch of summons, and healing. But they ended up with buffs and melee, and healing.
Many people have tried to turn Clerics away from Clerics and into Priests by way of taking away their melee option. Some people have good reasons, and some people have shitty reasons, but regardless, an onlooker's kneejerk reaction is to think that you're doing this because you don't want Clerics to be able to do anything else other than be a little healbitch for the other, more alpha classes.
That's not necessarily true, I know, but that's the first thing people tend to think.

>>44051907
Not that anon but you can't just fluff your suit of full plate as no armor, that shit is fucking retarded. You can fluff your full plate as samurai armor, or sleek field plate, or big mclargehuge pauldrons and plate, or whatever - because these things do not fundamentally change what the armor is. Wearing armor and roleplaying as not having armour lacks verisimilitude and is high grade faggotry. I'm all for using fluff to avoid autismo statting of everything but come on

>>44052403
>old D&D misconception that Clerics can't do anything except cast curative magics
That sounds like a new misconception to me.

>>44052495
Oh, yeah, bad wording.
I meant it's a misconception about old D&D. An old D&D misconception.
You get it.

>>44052403
That makes sense. If I was to go through with designing something like this I would try and keep it interesting, and take the opportunity to make the cleric a little more interesting. I don't like that D&D's other traditionally devoted "healer" (the druid) is basically also a wizard in comparison to the cleric. And that's before even mentioning the coolness that is wildshape.

If I was to do the no-armour cleric, I would definately like to spice him up with some additional magic or supernatural abilities that ad versatility. Although, having not mentioned this in my OP, I can understand why some people would have thought I just want to typecast the cleric into a more specific role.

>>44051907
"Refluffing" doesn't apply when you're trying to make your GM change how it works mechanically.

>>44052224
It's a meme.

>>44050564
Not to mention availability and cost at early levels.

Personally though I think clerics shouldn't of gotten have armour proficiency to begin with. They're overpowered is it is compared to fighters

>>44049868
I like the concept. I'd recommend limiting weapon and armor proficiency, maybe down to just simple weapons and no armor. The wandering friar 'armed' with only his staff and a plain robe really evokes an image to me.

Make him follow a mendicant order, with a vow to donate all his earnings, except small living expenses. Give him a modified version of the Monk's unarmored defense to make up for the lack of armor. He's gonna be a support character, but not one that goes down as easily as a squishy wizard.

More spells, maybe some divine gifts of some kind can make up for his lack of weapons training. The more I think about it the more he becomes like a Druid. Give him something of equivalent power to the Druid's shapechange, like he can invoke miracles of some sort, and you can work out a caster/warrior hybrid with focus on the casting and his divine abilities.

>>44049868
3.5 had the cloistered cleric. That might be a good leaping off point

>>44054490

Saying something's overpowered compared to fighters ain't saying much.

>>44052224

Now, understand this is meant to be taken rather generally because I haven't updated since 3.5 and I don't plan to get on the 5e train.

I suggest you talk with the people at your gaming table who usually play clerics about why they play clerics, look into how they usually play their clerics, etc. I'm not saying it's a shitty idea, but I will say I wouldn't play it, despite usually playing clerics. Remember, if nobody's willing to play it, then it's a concept that is utterly irrelevant and wasted effort.

>>44049868
The 3.5 cloistered cleric (Not the shity pathfinder version)
You don't need wis to ac as a cleric you already get shield of faith, magic vestment, and a slew of other defense options.
Wis to AC would be like giving wizards Int to ac because swashbucklers get it.

If memory serves correctly, the playtest cleric had no armor proficiencies, and gained them depending on domain. A couple had no armor, but I don't remember how they compensated.

>>44049868
Why do those little white people have the hands of giant black people? Seriously, those things are huge.

>>44049868
my 3.5 Cleric would do this, all of them would, because usualy i make two-weapon fighting clerics with minimum to no armour at all. so no lost here.

>>44055588
For AD&D, 4E and 5E it is, you twit. Not every D&D is 3.shit.

>>44056589
Have you never heard of gloves?

>>44057578
That might account for the fact why they're black, but fingered gloves don't normally make your hands huge. The index and little fingers are too far apart for little hands stuffed in gloves.

>>44057637
Have you ever worn work gloves before? Like, real leather work gloves? The fingers on those things are huge. They make your hands move move up like a size category and a half.

>>44057653
They don't change the spacing between your first set of knuckles. If they make your fingers fatter they necessarily have to splay out because the spot where they attach to your hand can't get any wider.

>>44052403
You know it would be cool if clerics were turned into scholars from FF14. I loved having a summon that did light healing and I got to focus on dps during those parts where everyone wasn't getting raped.

That would be neat if there were any healing cantrips, just throw it on the summon and every turn they shit out like 1d4+cleric level ranged healing.

Other way around, they don't wear armor because because getting hurt fuels their martyr complex. The more you hurt they the better they work.

>ctrl+f Invoker
>0 results

You people should really take your head off your 3.5 books and take a look at 4e.

In my 5E game, we made this a uniform change across the board but we didn't really change anything. Instead of armor, Clerics basically perform lesser sanctuary rituals that don't require concentrating and take a time equivalent to the Donning time to cast.

After that, basically everything stays the same aside from swapping the Strength requirement of some heavy armor into a Wisdom requirement. The disadvantage on stealth that some armors get still applies, but it's because you're covered by such a powerful divine ward that it is visible shimmering and swirling about you.

>>44057935
That's pretty decent.

Isn't the Favored Soul subclass for Sorcerer something like this? A pure-magic user that can heal and doesn't have anything heavier than light armor or mage armor?

>>44058099
No, favored souls still use medium armor, shields, and melee weapons.

You're gonna hate hearing this, but that's pretty much Oracle in Pathfinder

>>44049868
Unarmored Defense is too good. It puts clerics on par with Monks and Barbarians. There are some clerics that could get access to that. (War, Life, ie; anything that can rock heavy armor.) But for the lighter clerics that wear medium armor and have potent cantrip instead of a melee buff, consider giving them the same AC as the Dragon Sorceror. A flat 13+DEX.

>>44052310
You've basically re-invented the Cloistered Cleric from 3.0. They had 1/2 BaB, 6+Int skills per level, and the Knowledge domain in addition to their regular domains.

>>44057903
Literally no one cares about 4e. It's like wotc pays people to post about 4e. A lot of people think 4e sucked cock, just let it go it's dead.

>>44059905
>Literally no one cares about 3.5/Pathfinder/4E/AD&D. It's like WotC/Paizo/WotC/TSR pays people to post about 3.5/Pathfinder/4E/AD&D. A lot of people think 3.5/Pathfinder/4E/AD&D sucked cock, just let it go it's dead.

>>44059975
Someone's mad that their system isn't popular.

I think 3.5 had a healer class that didn't use armour

>>44060529
They do. It's called the Healer.

>>44060538
Good thread everyone, lets call it here.

>>44059905
It's fun because 3.xfags are still to this day making threads about the exact same issues they had 10 years ago, issues that were mostly solved in 4e.
But of course, better keep memeing about edition wars.

>>44060584
>being THIS fucking mad.
People would rather play with a system that has a few flaws than a gigantic pile of shit that was 4e.

4e had some blatant flaws that affected the overall quality of the system and maDE it undesirable to play compared to the flaws 3.x had.

You can keep trying to say 4e was good, because it fixed a few problems but it caused more than fixed. You just wanted to plug about your edition like it had any relevance when we are talking about 5e.