White Mage build

[paladinn]

Hey y'all,

I'm sure this has been asked many times, but here we go again. If I want a basically-wizard character with access to "real" healing spells (and maybe good against the undead), what is the best way to go about it? I'd like either a wizard who can heal or a cleric who can fireball. A light cleric might be good, but not as much healing; a life cleric has the healing but not the blasting. I don't think a bard would have either.

I'm thinking a theurgy wizard, an arcana cleric, or a divine soul sorcerer.

Any thoughts?

[firelistener]

I'd go with the wizard. Clerics are a bit beefier and intended for melee combat, so I'd say the theurgy wizard is what you want.

[ImproperJustice]

Unfortunately Heal spells don’t damage the Undead in this version of the game.

There are a few high end Cleric Spells like Sunburst, and Holy Aura that target the undead.
And of course you have Protection from evil and good.

Outside of that, direct offensive spells, especially fire and radiant are your best choice vs. Undead.

Either a Cleric or a Wizard (sickening radiance, wall of light, sunbeam, and crown of stars are good sources of high end radiant damage).

I think you can pick either and reach your intended goal.

[paladinn]

I'd go with the wizard. Clerics are a bit beefier and intended for melee combat, so I'd say the theurgy wizard is what you want.

I know the theurgy thing has never been made "official." Should I pick life domain?

I kinda like a lot of the light domain features, but there's not much healing

Oh, and I'm trying not to MC if possible

[Paeleus]

Divine Soul Sorcerer is what ya want.

[JackPhoenix]

I know the theurgy thing has never been made "official." Should I pick life domain?

I kinda like a lot of the light domain features, but there's not much healing

Oh, and I'm trying not to MC if possible

Light domain has full access to cleric's healing spells. You don't have any features making you better healer (no domain other than life does), but the baseline is still good. Similarily, DS can access all cleric spells, and still have all sorcerer blasting, but the spell knowns limit you a lot. Celestial warlock gets some healing spells (but not really the full complement), but compensates by bonus action, ranged version of paladin's Lay on Hands

[Captain Panda]

If you want to heal in combat effectively, life cleric 1/lore bard 6 gets you healing spirit that does 1d6+4. That adds up pretty fast, and you get medium or heavy armor, shields, and are generally a boss support caster.

[paladinn]

For in-combat healing, I was looking at Healing Word. Not a huge fan of bards in general.

So should I just go light cleric, or theurgy wizard with light domain? I don't think I'd get Warding Flare going theurgy, or would I?

[Aett_Thorn]

I am going to second Divine Soul Sorc. You can pick up healing and blasting spells to do a bit of both. And with metamagics, you’re able to use them in nice and different ways.

Otherwise, Light Cleric is probably the way to go.

[paladinn]

I am going to second Divine Soul Sorc. You can pick up healing and blasting spells to do a bit of both. And with metamagics, you’re able to use them in nice and different ways.

Otherwise, Light Cleric is probably the way to go.

Is there an advantage to one over the other? I know metamagic, but otherwise? Does a DS get better armor than other sorcs?

[Mortis_Elrod]

I'm going to Third the Divine Soul sorcerer. It's got all you need. Healing? Got it. Firepower? got it. And with metamagic you can do things the wizard and cleric couldn't with it.

Its like playing a Priest in WoW. Pick up Celestial Warlock levels for extra healing goodness.

Beacon of Hope + Healing Light from the back and thin Twin Healing Words with Pact Slots the next turn for some nice aoe group heals.

Alternatively you could even pick up all the best necromancy spells like this. Go from Holy to Shadow priest.
suddenly you deal damage with the best of them.

[redwizard007]

Is it worth it to take a level of Life Cleric and then go DS sorcery?

[Bjarkmundur]

Theurge seems pretty spot on

[paladinn]

Is it worth it to take a level of Life Cleric and then go DS sorcery?

Again, trying not to MC this time. And Cleric/DS would be pretty MAD

[paladinn]

Theurge seems pretty spot on

RAW, I wouldn't be able to grab "just any" cleric spell till I've taken all available domain spells. The question is, which domain? I guess since one of my goals is to heal, I'd have to take Life?

[Bjarkmundur]

RAW, I wouldn't be able to grab "just any" cleric spell till I've taken all available domain spells. The question is, which domain? I guess since one of my goals is to heal, I'd have to take Life?

Well, if your goal is to blast and heal the only thing you need from the cleric is the healing right?
I'll go brush up on my domains, but I think life is a pretty obvious choice.

*looks up the life domain*

Hm, no healing word. That's a bummer. If you put both Bless and Cure wounds into your spellbook, at 2nd level you can add Healing Word, right? If that's the case, then maybe Life Domain isn't ideal. Maybe you should be looking for a domain that has a channel divinity that uses your reaction, and has domain spells you don't mind putting into your spell book. Check out the subclass directory, and just look at the okay-est domain spells. That way you minimize the opportunity cost of getting the main healing spells: Healing Word and Aura of Vitality and that OP one I can never remember what's called. Healing Spirit? Spirit Guardian?

Preserve Life channel divinity specifies "Cleric Levels" but I'm pretty sure your Wizard levels counts. It's also a bummer that's an action, since the most effective combat healing is always going to be a bonus action.

[redwizard007]

Well, if your goal is to blast and heal the only thing you need from the cleric is the healing right?
I'll go brush up on my domains, but I think life is a pretty obvious choice.

It depends on what type of healing we are talking about. Full MMORPG healing where you try to keep everyone fully healed, Life is a must do. More reserved healing where you focus on preventing damage and just toss a few heals out to keep PCs upright can be any domain.

[Bjarkmundur]

It depends on what type of healing we are talking about. Full MMORPG healing where you try to keep everyone fully healed, Life is a must do. More reserved healing where you focus on preventing damage and just toss a few heals out to keep PCs upright can be any domain.

He already mentioned Healing Word.

Light gives you very good domain spells, after which you can take your preferred cleric spells. And the channel divinity is a reaction, which is definitely what you want for your channel divinity. I haven't looked at all the domains, but Light is definitely the main contestant. Life gives you spells you don't really need, and a channel divinity that heals, but uses your action. You don't get the improved healing from life domain through Theurge (unless I'm mistaken).

Remember, you are only going theurge because you gain access to the cleric spell list. The only way to gain that access is to add the domain spells into your spellbook. Therefor, you are only looking for the domain with the most relevant domain spells. Burning Hands and feaaiiearieaei Fire are top spells. Don't get me wrong, so is Bless, but you are mainly looking for healing and Blasting. Bless is neither healing or blasting, and Cure Wounds is a reeeaaallllyyy bad spell as written. For that reason I'd go light, since Burning Hands is blasting and feaeaearieeaeie Fire is a a situationally usefull spell, useful enough to forgo one of the rituals the wizard usually likes to add into his spellbook as one of his "extra" spells.

[rmnimoc]

Hey y'all,

I'm sure this has been asked many times, but here we go again. If I want a basically-wizard character with access to "real" healing spells (and maybe good against the undead), what is the best way to go about it? I'd like either a wizard who can heal or a cleric who can fireball. A light cleric might be good, but not as much healing; a life cleric has the healing but not the blasting. I don't think a bard would have either.

I'm thinking a theurgy wizard, an arcana cleric, or a divine soul sorcerer.

Any thoughts?

Theurgy Wizard and Divine Soul Sorcerer are both pretty solid ways to get what you're looking for. Personally I'd go with a Divine Soul Sorcerer over a Theurgy Wizard, but I think the Theurgy Wizard matches what you're looking for a little bit better, especially if you fondly remember the white mages of FF1 and having to run around buying spells.

If you go Theurgy I'd suggest Life domain. The domain powers are pretty solidly in the white mage's wheelhouse. Heal better, heal even better, heal yourself while healing others, boop for radiant damage, and heal even better. They don't have your target healing spell, but their entire selection is pretty solid for what you're aiming for, though they're lacking any heavy radiant damage.

[HappyDaze]

It's extremely edgy, but the Boros Legionnaire background from Ravnica applied to a Cleric adds a lot of what you're looking for to your spell list.

[Ogre Mage]

One possibility which has not been mentioned yet is the Celestial Warlock. I would go variant human with the moderately armored feat and take the Pact of the Tome for the wizard-flavor you are looking for. Healing light is like a bunch of healing words every day and cure wounds, lesser restoration and revivify are all on your spell list. Granted your "blasting" is mostly eldritch blast, but that is nothing to dismiss (be sure to take agonizing blast and hex).

[paladinn]

One possibility which has not been mentioned yet is the Celestial Warlock. I would go variant human with the moderately armored feat and take the Pact of the Tome for the wizard-flavor you are looking for. Healing light is like a bunch of healing words every day and cure wounds, lesser restoration and revivify are all on your spell list. Granted your "blasting" is mostly eldritch blast, but that is nothing to dismiss (be sure to take agonizing blast and hex).

I'm familiar with sorlocks; I've actually built a sorlocadin before. And yes, I trypically love EBlast with ABlast. Force is an amazing damage type. I've heard that Hexblade is truly the only way to go for a Warlock anymore, and I wanted to do something different.

I've wanted to avoid MC'ing with this build, but I'm curious: while the Brightlock and Divine Soul are certainly complementary RP-wise, do they overlap too much in abilities?

[JackPhoenix]

I'm familiar with sorlocks; I've actually built a sorlocadin before. And yes, I trypically love EBlast with ABlast. Force is an amazing damage type. I've heard that Hexblade is truly the only way to go for a Warlock anymore, and I wanted to do something different.

I've wanted to avoid MC'ing with this build, but I'm curious: while the Brightlock and Divine Soul are certainly complementary RP-wise, do they overlap too much in abilities?

Not really. Class (and subclass) abilities don't really compete or interact with each other, Celestial lock has access to warlock list and few picks from cleric's (and two spells that are NOT on cleric's list), sorcerer has full access to both sorcerer and cleric list.

[Ogre Mage]

I'm familiar with sorlocks; I've actually built a sorlocadin before. And yes, I trypically love EBlast with ABlast. Force is an amazing damage type. I've heard that Hexblade is truly the only way to go for a Warlock anymore, and I wanted to do something different.

I've wanted to avoid MC'ing with this build, but I'm curious: while the Brightlock and Divine Soul are certainly complementary RP-wise, do they overlap too much in abilities?

I think it could work but the Divine Soul/Hexblade multiclass is more optimized.

[paladinn]

I think it could work but the Divine Soul/Hexblade multiclass is more optimized.

I understand optimization.. I did the sorlocadin thing. For this build, I want to focus on blasting (especially undead) and healing. Not sure which is priority.

So if I go with light cleric, I know I can get both. If I go vhuman, I get that intro feat. Should I go magic initiate to grab a few wizard cantrips and 1 spell Or should I grab elemental adept and never have to think about fire resistance?

Firebolt should totally be a light cleric cantrip :)

[RickAllison]

Another option is the Arcana Cleric. Full Cleric spellcasting plus focus on the magic side of things. You rely more on Spirit Guardians and Foamestrike than Fireball, but you can make do and it does a good job of doing the Mage with access to healing

[Ogre Mage]

I understand optimization.. I did the sorlocadin thing. For this build, I want to focus on blasting (especially undead) and healing. Not sure which is priority.

So if I go with light cleric, I know I can get both. If I go vhuman, I get that intro feat. Should I go magic initiate to grab a few wizard cantrips and 1 spell Or should I grab elemental adept and never have to think about fire resistance?

Firebolt should totally be a light cleric cantrip :)

I've played a light domain cleric three times. It is my favorite subclass in the PHB. I actually would not worry about elemental adept too much as the light domain cleric can put out a lot of radiant damage -- guiding bolt, spirit guardians, sacred flame, radiance of the dawn, etc. Toll the Dead from Xanathar's is a great attack cantrip which does necrotic damage. Spiritual weapon does force damage. I never had any problems when we encountered fire-immune creatures. Still, if you want to focus on blasting, elemental adept would be something to consider at higher levels.

It's not the most fun choice, but the feats which I found helped me the most as a light cleric were the ones which helped maintain concentration: resilient (constitution), warcaster and lucky. There were several times when maintaining spirit guardians or banishment swung the tide of the battle. The light cleric also has warding flare, which makes it harder for enemies to hit you and potentially disrupt concentration. Bless is of course an all around great party buff spell and also helps maintain concentration if you target yourself.

If you take magic initiate (wizard), I would highly recommend find familiar. Your familiar can deliver touch spells. Clerics tend to have a lot of touch spells, so this can be big.

Having fireball, spirit guardians and radiance of the dawn makes a light cleric dangerous both at range and close-up. You have a solid AC. You only need to max wisdom, although I would recommend getting dexterity and constitution to 14. It's a great subclass.

[Segev]

For completeness's sake, I'll point out the Celestial Patron Warlock also does the "divine healing + arcane magic" thing, but I think the Divine Soul Sorcerer is probably closer to what you're going for. I don't know the Theurge Wizard well enough to comment.

*reads it*

Yeesh, that's quite the theurge! It's basically a wizard/cleric in a subclass. I'm not sure if I think it's overpowered or just really well done.

[RickAllison]

For completeness's sake, I'll point out the Celestial Patron Warlock also does the "divine healing + arcane magic" thing, but I think the Divine Soul Sorcerer is probably closer to what you're going for. I don't know the Theurge Wizard well enough to comment.

*reads it*

Yeesh, that's quite the theurge! It's basically a wizard/cleric in a subclass. I'm not sure if I think it's overpowered or just really well done.

Overpowered is probably the right word While you are limited in your spell picks until 10 or 11, you really only need to poach the best spells. Heck, if you pick Life domain, Spirit Guardians is the biggest spell I can think of that you might want to dip down for. They get the big healing spells as well as Spiritual Weapon.

[paladinn]

Overpowered is probably the right word While you are limited in your spell picks until 10 or 11, you really only need to poach the best spells. Heck, if you pick Life domain, Spirit Guardians is the biggest spell I can think of that you might want to dip down for. They get the big healing spells as well as Spiritual Weapon.

The main reason for going theurge (and getting cleric spells) is, well, healing. Unfortunately it doesn't look like theurge would get me Healing Word (the best in-combat healing) until and unless I've grabbed all the available life (or whatever) domain spells.

I've been seriously considering going light cleric. It has plenty of blasting, especially againt undead. But it's really not the Mage feel I was wanting. Still pondering.

It just seems so weird that life domain doesn't have HW as a domain spell. But then, Firebolt isn't a cantrip for light clerics. Go figure.