Shadowheart: "My life is devoted to Lady Shar, may her darkness spread across the land." PC: "Cool, cool. Go talk to Withers, you are Light Domain now." Shadowheart: "Ok."
@@nerdorama009 did that on my first play trough, because spirit guardians is very useful in act two, and it was fine as her main source of contribution to damage/control (her other contribution being healing). That said: on my second play trough I've respecced her immediately.
Throughout the game, I came to see Shar and her followers as being dumb, petty and overall incompetent. Seeing how Shadowheart's starting build is a mess, with her Shar-aligned subclass being worthless, it kinda reinforces the point. I've always seen her first visit to Withers as something along the lines of "Yeah, whatever you say, you edgelord lady. Praise the shadows or whatever... Let uncle Jergal set you straight for now, we'll get that moron goddess outside of your head later." For real, everyone serving Shar sucks. You can legit talk all of the Shar adoring bosses in Act 2 to kill themselves, except for Ketheric who ditched her. Then there's Vicona, who butchered her own followers in preparation to raise Shadowheart, only to send her to go MIA on a mission Shar didn't even ask her to do. That said, at least Shadowheart got to meet Withers to fix all the garbage the Sharians had turned her into. Geez.
Light domain? Oh no two levels of life domain, the rest into bard. You want to be a good supporter with some damage spells instead of a bad fighter/ support that barely hot something, even if respeced like mentioned in the video.
Lmao, and that's unfortunately not exclusive to Shadowheart. Wyll seems to be my problem child. I prefer building him as a spell caster, but he has a thing for missing 90% accurate Eldritch Blasts, but can easily land one while he's threatened and ensnared on an enemy stood on high ground 💀
At that point I gotta wonder if the percents really matter in this game? Is it offset by the AC value? Is the game just built to be inconsistent? I don’t get it
@@incognitoinhell8742For me it is Karlach. She would roll at least 2 critical misses every single combat encounter. On the other hand, every time I rolled a critical failure trying to open a lock, my next roll would always be a nat 20. There is something deeply bugged about the RNG in BG3.
@@MrWhygodwhyit could be your “Karmic Die” setting. I am unsure exactly how it works, but it says that it “prevents repeated failed rolls while still keeping RNG mostly random.” It affects your die, that’s all I know and all I’m saying.
@@don8659 well, her guiding bolt attack and inflict wound is still pretty useful for dps, but she sucks as a cleric when she is trickery domain…ugh why don’t they just make her war domain? It makes more sense.
@@nathanieljefferies5491 I put all her stats on wisdom and strength. And put the headband of warped intellect on and it boosts her intelligence to 17 so it actually makes her pretty good. Just gotta find something else to stack intellect. I make her life domain and she can cast fire bolts and buffs like this and just dump healing when needed
You dont have to read this, i just need to vent cause it vexes me to no end, also some minor spoilers She's the most romanced because the game is constantly putting her story in your face even when you're actively trying to avoid it Then also she's a Perfect Goth Tsundere Waifu, she even looks more anime than fantasty, landing right into the tastes of most players, while Lae'zel is a mean odd looking alien with weird skin, Karlach is for the lesbians and her good ending is more vague than good, and every man aside from astarion is extremely underdeveloped (especially Wyll, i demand justice for my man) I personally dislike her, Lae'zel at least has a reason in upbringing to be bitchy, and if you're bitchy back she likes it Shadowheart is just whiny and demanding respect while showing none, you can't even excuse it by her childhood cause according to her she doesn't remember it And even tho you helping in her quest is you being nice (while also very needed cause she can't do shit by herself) shes still acting like she's doing YOU a favor by ALLOWING you to even be in her company And then shes trying to kill Lae'zel in her sleep but acts like its Lae'zels fault and you can't call her out on her bullshit The only reason i allow her in my party is cause i like my run to be completed in 100%
This is another reason why going down the Selune path in her quest is the best choice, you now have a narrative excuse to change her to the Life domain.
@@tjdragon7993I mean she created the sun by basically pulling the flames from the elemental plane of fire and other than that she didn't take responsibility over the sun so she has no power over it and since clerics get their power from the diety they worship it makes sense selune doesn't give light cleric powers to people if the sun isn't part of her portfolio
Exactly that was my excuse for when I changed mine to a life domain cleric. Plus I gave her a statue of Selune to hold on to (Something she didn't like at the time when I took it. She said "do you REALLY want that trash" )
@@KitsuneFyoraHes so overpowered if you use magic missile as one of his main spells. Just stack whatever magic items you can get that increase spell damage in some way, or give an effect when you hit with a spell ( there are so fucking many things that do that in the game ) and you can easily deal like 60 damage with just a level 1 magic missile
@@honey-hunterslimefanno.3257 yeah I just recently found a ring that increases the amount of magic missiles used by one. Already on his way to being the ultimate no misser
If you want to optimise her in light domain: I'd dump INT and STR as you mentioned, but only raise CON to 15. This is so at level 4 you can take resilient con taking her con to 16 and adding her proficiency bonus to concentration checks. The added hitpoints are retroactive.
Yea, or you take war caster, I am not a numbers guy but the optimization dudes say it's better at low levels. Only at the higher ones does resilient become better afaik.
@@hulmhochberg8129 War caster gives you advantage on con saves. While that is pretty cool, there are a couple ways to get advantage on Con checks, such as giving her Minratha's armor. Starting with a +2 resilient con means immediate +3 to con saves (2 proficiency 1 con score increase) Keep in mind that Concentration checks are a DC of 10 or half damage taken, enemies aren't doing 20+ damage per hit early game (or midgame for that matter unless they get lucky.) so the DC will be 10. With a plus 5 to your con saves means you have an 80% chance to succeed a Con check. Advantage with a +2 gives you 87.8% TL:DR, at level 4 you can either have an 80% or an 87.8% to make your save. While an extra 7.8% is nice, the benefit is minimal. besides at level 5 your proficiency goes to 3 so it becomes 85% to 87.8% Take Resilience Con and give her Minratha's armor for that sweet, sweet 96% success.
What i like todo with her is high ac high con and and and stuff where she does not trigger opp attacks when dashing with sprit gard and then use other characters to grease and fire wall to finish the job. Sometimes she gets hit but she heals it off
I had a similar experience with Warlock. It was my first pick as a custom character because I liked the vibe of the class but I was struggling with it right until I found out about Pact of Blades and it immediately got WAY more fun to play
Warlock doesn't need much to be strong. Agonizing blast + hex does a lot in fights. Need to burst something fast? scorching ray + hex for that sweet 6d6 + 3d6. Pact of the chain for another body + attack.
@@Broomer52can you please explain your rotation when fighting? I have pact of blades but I was going to get rid of it because I don’t use it much - do you use your warlock as a melee character? Which weapon do you usually pick to create?
I must be the unluckiest bastard ever cause both of them missed so much for me. Shadowheart was just my tanky healer and Wyll became my cloud of daggers guy for a bit
One of my playthroughs I might actually use Wyll and Gale... I've restarted the game like 5 times now. I usually play a cleric-lock for a heavy armored warlock so I don't need Wyll. It's handy having a spellcaster whose AC is 23 and can push mobs.
@@Soul_Resinance Wyll was actually the one who ended up rofl-stomping the Act 3 Female Antagonist in that one temple. My wizard would hit her with high-level magic missiles to reduce her defensive ability, and then Wyll's Hex+Eldritch Blast would just blast her across the map.
for reference you can respec all controllable characters at my man withers. just make sure they're selected when you talk to him! Also fireBOLT is bad. fireBALL is good. I'm not super clear when I speak my b
Firebolt is a fine cantrip. Problem is that since it's a High Elf cantrip it uses your INT, and Shadowheart is going to have low INT if she's a Cleric. Since it's an attack roll, it can get advantage so most of the time it's still going to be better than Sacred Flame anyway.
Starter Shadowheart has firebolt so she can light the purple puddles on fire and explode the barrels. A lot of players don’t seem to realise that and keep spamming it but that’s really the reason she comes with it. She isn’t built to use it for damage. She’s built to be an early game healer/support with a crossbow, then you respec asap.
That's not the reason. There is no reason. High Elf characters just default to Firebolt as their cantrip unless you change it. Shadowheart and Astarion both came with different cantrips appropriate to their character in early access, so I don't know why that got changed for the worse.
But you can just dip a bow/cross bow in the easily accessible fire in those situations. Or throw an explosive. It even tells you about dipping your weapon the first time you go near a bunch of fire.
Made her Light Domain and sneaked a Heavy Armor Proficiency in with a feat. She's one *hell* of a sturdy fighter now. It's like she's on overwatch and she's like the anchor of my group. Really changed my whole playstyle. And I waited until after Act 2 to make the change. I just hadn't really considered doing it earlier? Cause Trickery was just...her thing. It fit her character, she was still a mighty useful and core member of the group. Then, boom, Light Domain and it's like she's ascended to a new level of power. Kinda epic, not gonna lie.
I respec her as Light was well, but I'd rather have her take 2 dips into fighter for the heavy armor and action surge than waste a feat for just heavry armor. 2 Fighter 10 Light Domain Cleric is a great fit for Shadowheart.
I’m only just realizing when built right the ladies of the group are absolute bruisers. Karlach in my group charges in and just tears rooms apart and flips the entire place (enemies being chucked at each other like I was bowling, smashing chairs over peoples heads, throwing my ax at a retreating enemy) Lae’zel is a two handed swashbuckler out maneuvering enemies and disarming them before cutting them to pieces and Shadowheart unleashes unrelenting Holiness upon our enemies before crush their heads with a mace
@@Broomer52 Yeah I had a lot of fun with my Girl Power playthrough. Half Drow Female Bardlock with all the other ladies just powered through the content. :)
I just respec her to 8 Int, then give her Lumps circlet of Int. She can at least hit with firebolt at low level, then when she doesn't really need it anymore, I drop the circlet for whatever is better. By Act 3 she isn't using cantrips often. So many better options.
That's actually a pretty great idea. Plus she has a pretty high medicine so if you need a party member to make your potions she's actually the one the game supplies I think.
It's probably better to give her higher dex and a bow and only use firebolt for igniting. There's a great healer hat early game I wouldn't sub it for the lump item.
Why does she need to hit firebolt? Just don't use it as a standard attack but rather a situational firesource. There is plenty of better uses for actions other than using a suboptimal spell you got for free.
I think Light Domain makes sense for Shadowheart even as a Sharran in Act 1 - because any truly dedication to Shar on her part is contradictory to her nature. She dislikes massacring the grove, she does like being clever rather than starting a fight etc etc.
What people forget is that the Domain and who you worship in D&D are forcibly linked. "Light Domain" doesn't mean you're a good person no matter who you worship, it means you worship a god of Light, not Trickery. Shar is a goddess of the Trickery Domain, so even though the game (BG3) doesn't care and allows you to swap things round willynilly, if you have any understanding of how Domains work in that world, it will feel like a major clash from that person's perspective.
I usually let either karlach or Lae'zel carry grease bottles to throw to allow SH's firebolt to at least hit something in the early act. SH's low initiative rolls in combat prompt me to really just turn her into a dedicated healer/ light domain. This way She has functions outside of combat via Guidance, Friends, speak with dead, But also important in setting up big damages with Create water and tactical maneuvering with Dimension door.
this is great advice for anyone new to the 5e ruleset. i will add to your point about finesse weapons here 4:10, clerics only get simple weapons so the only finesse weapons they can really use effectively are daggers (very low damage). If you want to use finesse weapons like shortswords and rapiers, you need to be a war or tempest domain. It's unconventional to do a DEX build with those subclasses because you can't use the heavy armor, but it's still an option. clerics tend to be very stat-hungry because they are "frontline" casters- you need con for health and for concentration spells, and since they don't get very good damage cantrips you need str/dex for your armor and for your basic attacks (at least in the early levels). and of course you need wis for your spells above all. so balancing your stats properly is really important. it kinda sucks that the designers gave her such a weak build. I can forgive the 10 INT because it's a RP thing, shadowheart isn't a stupid person so she should have at least 10 INT. but putting str AND dex at 13? just useless points wasted there, her whole build becomes so much better just by moving one point into one or the other. and firebolt as her cantrip is such a bad choice, something like mage hand, minor illusion, or friends would give her more utility and suits her character (secrets/trickery) better.
In my play through she actually became the most powerful member in my crew. She heals and shields everyone,has long range devastating spells and carries the blood of Lathander. Astarion always rolls highest to start with sneak attacks,Shadowhart blasts the battlefield with spells,La’zael and my paladin teleports into the middle of the chaos to hack’n slash. I mow down everything like that usually
I kept her as trickery. By the end of the game I didn't even need to hit with her anymore, I'd just use her to dimension door deliver my heaviest hitter or MC(paladin) directly into the fight, then hit herself with sanctuary, and healbot, while my hitter would misty step deeper in, and just wail on whatever target was the major threat. I'd usually have a fight handled within the first two rounds. Dimension door is just too powerful to give up.
This isn't world of warcraft. Clerics aren't healbots, they're the right hand of their patron deities. They speak for the gods. This means that if you are healbotting with a cleric you're not using them to their potential and just gimping your options. Also if your fight is over in 1 to 2 rounds why even use Sanctuary? Why even waste time healing?
@@blizztedo7577 Fight handled isn't over, it just meant my hardest hitter downed their most dangerous target. As for clerics being heal-bots, that's been a thing since aDnD. Right hand of god, indeed. Especially if their patron deity is a healer type. Warcraft had to get it from somewhere. As for Sanctuary, it just messes with enemy aggro, and causes weaker enemies to waste rounds reaching squishies. By the end of the game I wasn't losing anyone, and my 28-29 AC MC wasn't even taking damage. I probably should have switched to tactician at act 2, but I'll just do that on second play.
I switched her to Life domain as well. She wears heavy suits of armor, is decked out in gear that enhance her healing abilities, and if you find the Blood of Lathandar in the sanctuary in act 1, I'd argue there's barely a better weapon for her in the rest of the game. I'll copy in what gear I used for her from another video comment I made on why I mainly used Healing Word with Shadowheart or tossed potions. TL;DR: There's a LOT of gear for healers. Relevant equipment: - Head gear: Wapira's Crown. Get it as a reward from Zevlor for getting the caravan ready and the road cleared of goblins. It might be more noble to waive the reward, but doing so nets you no alternative reward. When you heal others, you gain 1d6 healing yourself. - Gloves: Hellrider's Pride - get them from Zevlor for enabling the Tieflings to stay, or loot it off his unconscious body. They grant Blade Ward to anyone you heal for 2 turns, and also give +1 Strength Saving Throws. Later: The Reviving Hands - Basically upgraded version of the previous gloves, they also grant the revivify spell once per long rest, AND add Death Ward on anyone you bring back. Buy them in Act III from Vicar Humbletoes in the Stormshore Tabernacle. - Rings: --The Whispering Promise, adds Bless to anyone you heal. You can buy this from various vendors, for instance from Volo in the druid grove before he goes off to the goblin camp. --Ring of Salving: Restore an additional 2 hp per heal. Act I, Myconid colony in the Underdark, bought from Omeluum. Boots: Boots of Aid and Comfort: When you heal another, they gain 3 temporary hp. Buy it from Grat the Trader in the goblin camp in Act I. Amulet: Amulet of Restoration, an additional Healing Word and Mass Healing Word per long rest. Get it in Act I in the Myconid Colony. So, to sum up: Healing Word - bonus action 1d4 + spellcasting modifier, which will be high for druids and clerics + Blade Ward + Bless + 3 temp hp + 2 hp + 2 hp per spell level, and I think you can upcast it. +1d6 for yourself Best part? This also applies to healing potions you throw on the ground at others. Just don't throw them directly at them, it might miss, aim for the ground around them, you'll see a splash area. In total, it just beefs up the spell to be very much more useful, and works for any healing spell, but Healing Word is cheap.
Thank you, love my life cleric shadowheart, so much utility and she gets all the heally goodies for free and has that nice free party heal multiple times per short rest. I feel like shes a much better support than damage dealer. Upcasted hold person on multiple targets to help my frontline melee fighters, or go in prayers blazing as a heavily armored beast that can't lose concentration whos holding a chokepoint with spirit guardians. She's an amazing life cleric.
How to make Shadowheart hit smth. Alternative guide. 1) Best early game option is to respec her to nature domain, give her a staff. Good choice is Staff of Arcane Blessing, which you can find in Act I in Arcane tower, Underdark that gives her bless spell an additional 1d4 to Saving Throws and Weapon Attack Rolls, and an additional 2d4 to Spell Attack Rolls, so under the bless spell she and her companions will have 2d4 buff to her Attack rolls with both spells and regular attacks. Nature domain suggest that she will start her first turn casting Shillelagh cantrip and Bless. Now all her attacks rolls require WIS instead of STR. You can now lower her STR to 10 or 8, set DEX to 14, max out WIS and CON. Get Polearm Master feat, which allow her to attack twice by using a bonus action. 2) Second option (less cool) is to get her the Club of Hill Giant Strength. Act 1, Arcane tower, Underdark. It sets STR to 19. Respec to War priest. remove points on DEX, get Heavy armor, so you don't need STR or DEX now. 3) In act 2 Wyll can get Infernal Rapier. Give it Shadowheart instead. Get Warpriest domain and 5 ranger levels (thus you will continue to get priest spell slots). Here you go, melee Shadowheart with 2 attacks, extra Warpriest attack and possible free attack at 1st turn if you are Gloom stalker. 4) Once you get her quest spear, you can get 1lvl of Monk, now your spear depends on DEX modifier instead of STR. remove STR, max out DEX and wisdom. Get Polearm Master feat. Done. 5) Superlate game - give her Gauntlets of Hill Giant Strength, but it's too late.
here's another choice, get her to level 4, grab spell sniper eldritch blast, grab 3-4 levels of fighter for action surge and champion +1 crit(that combos with spell sniper cantrip +1 crit). and you can get her to either +18 or 19 wis with your 4th level of fighter. after that you can either put 4 more into cleric for another 2 feats(like lucky and resilient wisdom to cap her wis at 20). no respect needed.
You can also go to aunty eithel, buy a giants strength potion, and then give the potion to Lae'zel because she is the one that needs to do damage and not Shadowheart.
This video is a fantastic illustration of why it's important to have a fundamental grasp of game mechanics at the outset of the game. Experienced players will take one look at the default build and just start making adjustments, based on key stats for each class. We really need to do this for all of the party members as we come across them.
80+ hours in and I never once thought to take control of a party member and have THEM speak to Withers. I just assumed that the player character was the only one capable of respec. I thought that Shadowheart was just a bad party member and there was nothing that could be done. Of course, it all makes perfect sense.
@@kode-man23 It doesn't help that Larian is basically the only studio that makes CPRGs in which you can respec companions to such an extent without mods.
Jut like any other game, you get into it and start learning the ropes, i know i didn't knew i could use the crafting menu in cyberpunk to upgrade Problem Solver into a goddamn AC-130, that was in the recent 2.0 patch and I've been playing since 1.0 😅
Its just that she is a backline support caster on the default build. Not amazing at combat in any regard but as a support can be invaluable for the team. I ignored all damage anything on her, pretty much just Sanctuary on her and have her only act as the support for the team. Trying to make every character amazing at every aspect of a fight can ultimately hinder you from what they can excell at. For instance, Bless out the gate on the party, Sanctuary on herself. Now the party has a +1d4 to everything but a skill check (Guidance is for that) or Bane if its only a couple of enemies (-1d4) and nothing can directly target her as long as she doesnt attack anything. As you said yourself. Even +1 is huge. Bless can be at worst a +1 to everyone, at best it hits a +4 (and vice versa for Bane) She is built as default to be the source of buffs, negative effects, and control on a battlefield instead of the one hitting things with sticks until it dies.
you ould also give her eldritch blast with either magic initiate warlock or spell sniper. that would make for her primary source of damage. also, champion's crit bonus combo with spell sniper cantrip crit bonus for eldritch blast. so you could get a few levels of fighter, for that(and action surge of course).
I got to the selenite option for her narrative, immediately went "We respecting to light domain now" and made her a polearm master sentinel, never gone back, always instantly respec her like that now, glad someone else agrees that light domain is the way 😊
I fix her before I can respec her by taking a level of Druid at her second level, then give her a quarterstaff and she uses her Wisdom as her attack stat instead of Strength. Then, I make her a Spore Druid to boost her damage with the staff, and when I get to respec her I usually take either Light or Tempest Cleric with a little extra Dexterity, but I still go back to Spore Druid too because even a little bit of it is an awesome damage boost and solves her hitting problem quite well.
I dont like changing the subclass because i want to have the companions stay true to their intended build. That being said, I learned a lot from watching the video, thank you.
It doesn't matter how I rebuild her, Shart has about a 50% chance to hit anything with anything no matter the % displayed. I once had Shart use divine intervention in the Raphael fight and SHE MISSED!
My early game shadowheart recommendation: shadow the hedgehog, meaning going nature cleric! You can talk to animals and get shillelagh. That means you can take an early game quarterstaff with a cool effect like Natures Snare and turn it into a potent melee weapon (1d8+3), while not worrying about strength or dexterity!
@@legendofJupp you could think of it like that or you could think of it like a hp and con buff at the cost of just a bonus action that clerics rarely use the first few turns of combat, but I'm just going without respecting her. Honestly I love using clerics with a dip in Warlock better. It's wildly convenient to spam healing prayers on the whole party using the warlock spell slots then primary use Eldritch blast while concentrating on cleric spells. You get heavy armor proficiency for your warlock and free damage using wrath of the storm as a reaction using storm cleric. Mid game you get devil's sight and advantage on everything in darkness while healing your party in a pinch. (Multi drop potions then Eldritch blast to attack and heal or double heal)
I had her in my party because I had her as my healer, she is absolutely drop dead gorgeous, I am romancing her, and I generally like MOST of her input during gameplay. But CHRIST, was she absolutely fucking USELESS in a fight. So I simply took maybe 20-30 minutes to respec her and she's been an absolute demon in combat ever since. I respec'd her to Light Domain, high Dexterity (for archery, since she's half elf and elves are always great archers. Plus, I wanted a Plan B tacticin case she is Silenced, and she hits EVERYTHING with her arrows now with high Dexterity), high Wisdom (for her spells, which get powerful as hell pretty early on), and now she hits everything. Now, if she doesn't shit on someone with her incredibly powerful spells, she has elemental arrows for days and just pelts them with those bad boys until she can get in a position to cast an even better spell. I also like hitting them with a heavy spell and then casting Sanctuary on herself, so that she cannot get attacked afterwards. Works great.
Having a great time using her with tempest. Arc lightning does a good amount of damage and being able to throw it every turn of an engagement for one spell slot is nice. Heavy armor makes best girl happy. Light domain is also really good, I just really like high strength of my characters for jumping. Makes getting around the map easier XD
I kept her has a trickery domain cleric until the nightsong decision. But even then, she can't miss after level 5 because of spirit guardians, one of the best spells in the game and in dnd. That plus war caster feat for the concentration.
Or you could either take the magic initiate feat/nature domain for Shillelagh (turn club/quarterstaff into 1d8+wis weapon with wis to attack as well). Nature domain also gives you heavy armor prof. Magic initiate is good for life domain as well since it can give access to things like Goodberry or Thunderwave (single cast but its 4d4 of free healing every long rest or a get away from me type spell in case of emergency). Even Entangle once per long rest is an option.
Honestly I just multiclass her into moon druid so I can get a major concentration boost on spirit guardians then tank through everyone late game and shillelagh early game. Otherwise I just grab spell sniper and just pick up Eldritch blast using the wisdom mod.
Respec her to war domain cleric if you want her in combat. She can use heavy armor and pop spirit guardians and dodge all day ehile dealing damage. Then use your charges to attack as bonus action if there is no reason to cast other spells
I gave her the Spear that automatically applies true strike when you miss and made her into a life cleric. She doesn't need to hit things, her job is to not die and keep me on my feet
@@im7254 The best part about that is you can just take life cleric with 2 levels of paladin for ridiculous heals and 5th level divine smites. The duelist's prerogative allows you to make an extra attack as a bonus action as much as you want which means you're a life cleric with infinite war priest charges and paladin smites. and even better? if you use a divine smite above 3rd level, the game allows you to use a second divine smite 3rd level or below as a reaction for... whatever reason.
@@IzalithLostyou what!?! Uff! I somehow still think its better to stay as a full cleric. You will have to dumb a bit of wisdom and dex to get enpugh strengh to hit anithing with your weapon and will have weaker spells lots
You dont have to dump wisdom or strength. you can already safely dump dexterity thanks to Paladin's heavy armor proficiency. and if you're concerned about dex saving throws, the gloves of dexterity (or gloves of ogre strength) exist to mitigate the dump of dex. My Minthara was running with 20 strength and 18 wisdom, which was more than good enough to drop a 200 damage bomb on a target using a 6th level smite (You still get 6th level spell slots, just not the spells themselves) and then healing word the entire party back up to full health thanks to life cleric. If you forego life cleric for war cleric, guiding strike also just guarantees hits, so you can build around not actually having strength, and just using guiding strike to drop a 6th level smite with a 3rd level smite attached, and then a 5th level smite with another 3rd level smite attached thanks to the duelist's prerogative's extra attack feature. 6th level spells are strong, but 200 damage bursts are pretty worth it.
You could also drop the 17 wis down to 16 (if you plan on not using the hair) so you can even out dex to 10 because having a -1 to init sucks when init is rolled with a d4. +Dex saves are one of the most common in the game.
I prefer using Magic Initiate: Druid to give her Shillelagh so she can attack with Wisdom using a staff. At level 8 you can pick up Polearm Master or Great Weapon master to make her even better.
The strongest Shart spec I used so far is having her be 6 levels fighter, 6 levels cleric. And if you happen to have her go down the dark justiciar route, she's practically unhittable, casting darkness and getting advantage against opponents with melee.
Life cleric gets heavy armor and can aoe heal the entire party to max hp very easily at the click of a button. Paladin's lay on hands is designed as an emergency response, not a consistent source (as you only get 2-3 uses of it for the majority of the game) and that's fine, because paladin also has raw dps coming from smites. but if you want the best of both worlds? Make a life cleric with 2 levels of paladin as a multiclass while using the duelist's prerogative. Duelist's gives an extra attack as a bonus action Life cleric can pump out crazy heals in a giant radius and you can use your 5th level slots for divine smite, which is VERY powerful. I ran this on one of my evil playthroughs with Minthara and she could very easily tunnel an enemy out of the game in a single turn and then heal any damage the party took the next turn.
I know I'm a few months late, but gosh, thank you for this! I really like Shadowheart as a character, but she hits so rarely that I just had my sorcerer Tav grab a pair of healing-spell gloves to take over the role instead. I've never played DnD or a game like this before, and I've really been enjoying learning the game statistics. Thanks for educating people like me, (now I'm off to fix 'er)! :) Update: I've done it, and she's excellent now! Thank you again - you rock!!
Im shocked not one of these comments is mentioning storm domain, its genuinely nuts on her, with heavy armor and a shield you are guaranteed at least 20-21 ac, and her access to storm spells + the usual cleric stuff like the guardians ensures she does high dps while being super tanky. Not to mention their channel divinity, which ensures you deal ridiculous damage with your lightning/thunder spells
Incandescent staff is a great weapon for her. That particular staffs version of firebolt is tied to the characters casting start giving her a great filler when she doesn't have a more important action to take
Since the patches Trickery Domain has at least gotten better since the Invoke Duplicity can now move around, having it stuck in place was terrible, but Trickery is still one of the weaker domains. Personally I'm using a mod and have her as Death Domain.
@@c.krueger9530in tabletop trickery is also a tier down to just their 2nd lvl spell alone. Pass without trace is an absolute s tier spell(some going as far as to say it's best 2nd lvl or even best spell in the game) +10to stealth is huge in 5e. Less useful when you can see where enemies are looking and just not walk into those zones with 8 dex no stealth prof etc.
Trickery is fine on the second evil playthrough since you want to steal and ambush much as you want, but initial playthrough where you are going head first into trouble, and not annoying the locals, she not good for that.
Tempest domain with a 2 level dip into evocation wizard for sculpt spells is super nice. The cleric lightning spells are sick and not having to worry about damaging teammates is even better
Holy shit I thought I was crazy I was wondering why she always seemed to miss (especially noticed it more when I was in a near death battle and needed her to come through) definitely gonna respec her asap thank you for this!
you could also grab shillelagh through magic initiate. but i still defend that the better choice would be to grab spell sniper eldritch blast. and then, get 4 levels of fighter to get action surge, make her champion(for another +1 crit on eldritch blast) and a feat that you could take wisdom attribute to get her to 18 or 19. you would keep her leveling as cleric and either use her as a healbot that can eldritch blast, or an eldritch blast that can go invis in case of danger.
My favorite party comp in case anyone is interested: Tav is oath vengeance paladin Shadowheart lightning tempest cleric Karlach is swords bard with a lot of utility spells Gale is 2 warlock with the rest in sorcerer. Act one just hunt for class beneficial equipment for each character, by level 5 or 6, with all your spell buffs applied and with the right gear you basically become unstoppable. You’ll be wiping the floor in most fights within turn one.
I kept the characters mostly the same except for Shadowheart that I respecced into light domain because it fits so well in my team comp. MC blade master fighter as an archer. Shadowheart as light domain. Karlach as throwbarian / thief rogue 3. Gale as Gale. Basically I kill everything from a range. Shadowheart and Gale bring in the AoE options with Wall of Fire/Ice, Fireball and Ice Storm. And if someone does come in melee range, I can yeet them with Karlach or use Thunderwave. Unless they start the fight there, they never manage to. It's kinda nuts how seldomly I use short rests with that party due to hardly ever taking damage.
I loving her on war domaine. And honestly, narratively i couldn't respec her before act the end of act 2 for lore reasons. She is also the one who got the strength boosts to make the war cleric even better. I know that class is already giga strong with just the spells it just feels more thematic to have the war clreric also be able to bonk really REALLY hard with a big bonk hammer.
Changing her domain to anything other than Trickery or eventually Knowledge goes totally against the background of the character. She serves Shar. A cleric doesn't choose his domain, he takes the domain of the deity he serves! And since you can't change the deity she serves, then you have to follow the only 2 possible options for Shar, being Trickery or Knowledge (in 4e).
I was unaware of the meme that she can't hit anything, However last night, she managed a grand total of 1 damage in the entire fight against the Goblins outside the temple, which is probably around 12-15 enemies, so I googled it so see if it was just my awful luck or if she really was as blind as a doorknob in general. Good to see its not just me.
Light domain is so good even late game... popping a potion of speed and bloodlust on her, destructing wave > destructing wave > radiance of the dawn. You can delete and entire army in 1 turn, I've had her turn "hard" fights into trivial ones by just aoe'ing everything out of existence It served me well because my Tav was fighter and I had Astarion/Karlach (rogue/barb) so without a wizard/sorc in my party, Shadowheart filled the aoe damage role perfectly, while providing healing support if I ever needed it.
If you're respeccing, there is no benefit to keep her Wisdom at 17 if everything else is evens. Put Wisdom at 16 and use those extra 4 points somewhere else, then use Ability Score Increase at level 4 to bump Wis from 16 to 18.
Yeah, was about to comment that. Actually every character has a spread with three odd numbers and can benefit a ton from spending 100 gold early, with a 17 in their primary stat that may rarely matter. Doubles as a way to cycle the store for weapons from the level ups too. Shadowheart has it the worst from a lack of a good filler attack and how poor trickery is, but Gale doesn't really have a good reason to have 17 int while 13 dex affects his initiative a ton and AC a little (though his 15 con can be useful for resilient to make concentration saves). Karlach could go tavern brawler from 17 strength but she's got the same dex and con as Gale, could have such a nice initiative boost and a respectable +2AC for 100 gold.
@@tirell2075 Yeah, default stats on most characters are actually pretty bad though Shadowheart's are probably the worst. Like, the official character sheets they have for the characters if you buy the digitial deluxe version makes a hell of a lot more sense, on the sheet she has the following stats: 12 STR 14 Dex, 14 con, 10 int, 16 Wis, and 10 CHA. It's not a huge difference but is a lot more optimized than the weird 13/13 split she has now. The stats we got at launch seem to be a last minute change.
Something I like to do before unlocking Withers is immediately multiclass her into Druid for Shillelagh. Then skip fighting the brains by jumping up the cliffside to get Gale, and put his Quarterstaff on Shart for her to use Shillelagh. This, Thornwhip, Ice Knife, and Ritual Spells all make her more useful until you unlock the reroll. And if you get a Torch at any point, equip it in her main hand in place of the Quarterstaff.
I think you should use a crossbow or shortbow with her in act 1 for your ranged option, goblins have very good dexterity, in act 2, sacred flame is MUCH better. Youll have items and stats to support a much higher save DC and things like Shadows just get deleted by radiant damage
Eh, by act 2 you should be high enough level to have enough spell slots to use non-cantrips every combat. And a fairly easy supply of the potions that restore spell slots.
I change her to a Tempest domain. Cast Sanctuary on herself, run into battle and draws all enemies to her, cast Create Water, then Nuke with lightning or thunder spells.
To have her hit everything, have her only do things that have 100% hit chance. Only one type of things has 100% hit chance and that's beneficial spells for the allies. And that's what I mainly use Shadowheart for: blessing, healing, restoring, and teleporting allies. I only give her one offensive spell: the firebolt cantrip to mop up dying enemies. I give her 19 AC so enemies are not likely to go after her. She usually just stands on the sideline buffing allies and finishing off enemies with low health. All my other characters can deal big damage but not she. I always thought that was how Shadowheart should be used.
Trickery Domain is underrated as a dip class. Casting Sanctuary on a Mirror Image basically turns it into an invulnerable mobile advantage/disadvantage beacon, and can elevate the effectiveness of any frontline character with any rogue levels at the cost of only a few level dip into cleric.
I got her the waterqueen robe, nylruna, resether for thunder, and those boots that electrify water. As soon as fighting starts she creates lvl IV water all around her and fucks up everyone with lightning
Nature Domain is amazing just for Spike Growth. The Heavy Armor is just the cherry on top when you have a spell that trivialises every grounded encounter. Also dumping Dex is a really bad idea, moreso in BG3 than in 5e. BG3 does not use a D20 for initiative but a D4, meaning your Dex has a huge impact on initiative. Have a -1 to Dex and you will be going last most of the time.
God this explains so much. I have a war cleric with neutral dex and I was almost always dead last. It seems weird they chose d4 instead of d20. I guess maybe to make the initiative lineup more predictable?
I made her a Nature domain with Monk as an additional class and she kicked ass with Shillelagh and a quarterstaff… until she eventually got outclassed by my Tavern Brawler Laezel. Points for the effort though!
if you're gonna use shart as a support (rec light, life) don't dump your DEX. high DEX means you always roll first on initiative. dump INT and use the INT headband and have her MC wizard. now shart can damage and support at the same time
Yes, few people mention how important dex is because of initiative. A lot of times it's great to start a fight with silence forcing the enemy to move if you haven't CCed them. Then my melee can get into range and go to work.
@@kroanosm617 on my mc, i usually go paladin/warlock with 10 dex, but because i go 8/4 i also pick alert, which i find is better than wasting stats on dex on the character.
Personally I loved shadowheart's design. She has character flaws while still being a cleric which is broken in general. You don't NEED light, lighting or life domain to do well with her. I even went warlock feat with her with some cha to make her more unique and it was still fine.
For me the best method for a good shadowheart, is to start her off with one level of sorcerer, and then the rest into light cleric. You only miss out on the level 12 feat but get con save proficiency from sorcerer instead of resilient. Also, one extra level till you can cast 6th level spells, but that's also no biggy as you still get the slots, and get the spells before end game. But she has access to minor illusion which pairs well with that fireball, and she also can now have the shield spell, which is just great to make up for that lack of heavy armor. I also like to do false life and give her the Staff of Cherished Necromancy later on for free casts of it, and other necro spells. She still lacks on cantrips, but it's rare that i resort to her for single target damage anyway, as she is too busy dishing big damage spells, or controlling the battlefield.
IDk why everyone hates on trickery domain I personally found the class spells it gives her to be incredibly helpful during my playthrough. The extra mobility and CC provided by the domain spells literally carried some encounters that would have been a pain without them.
Yep, I don't really like respecing Origins either. If you choose to play as an origin you do get the option to choose how to distribute their stats and which cantrip you want, though you can't change her domain this way, though trickery is fine and the only one that fits Shar anyway.
Literally just level her up... Clerics are a god tier (pun intended) class in DnD5e. Stop trying to make her smack things with a mace, shes not a war cleric nor a paladin. Honestly the main issue is that in the first act you're dealing with a lot of humanoids and goblins which Sacred Flame targets for its save, and that Trickery Domain is rather nerfed compared to its Tabletop counterpart with Invoke Duplicity not being an actual summon for her to cast through. However her spell list is still fantastic in this subclass if you keep it. (Which later on I'd say its warranted that you change it.) Anyways once she hits 5th level spirit guardians will carry you in a lot of fights ESPECIALLY in Act 2. Had her on my team for my entire first playthrough and she cleaning house with massive AOE damage from spells like Flamestrike, Destructive Wave, and good ol Spirit Guardians. Not to forget that she was still an incredible support with control, summoning, and healing spells. I do support swapping her stats around though as Larian seemed to like giving every single damn origin character odd stats.
I think the dump dex problem is a lack of initiative(this can be fixed with "alert"), plus saves from strong damage spells like the aforementioned fireball, at the same time dump str causes it to be thrown by push very easily and lose concentration which is not interesting for a cleric, both for support and for damage... dump int and car and leave the secondary sex/str damage status slightly higher than the tertiary is the best choice, I don't know if I made myself clear enough... but that's it
This playthrough, I switched shadowheart to war domain cleric and added two levels of fighter. She's my heavy armor tank now. I'm not finished with Act two yet and she's already got 27 AC. Nothing can even scratch her most of the time, and if it does, she just heals. I think it's one of my favorite builds.
I love Tempest cleric with war caster for shocking grasp as your opportunity attack, as well as advantage to maintain concentration, gives great crowd control from shatter, thunderwave, and call lightning
If you go nature domain, you not only get heavy armor, you also get access to the Shillelagh cantrip, which lets you turn a club or quarterstaff into a magic weapon that uses your WIS modifier instead of streangth or dex. Then you can drop both.
Thematically you should go life or twilight (twilight isn't in the game, but would be the most thematic) if she goes one path or trickster if she goes the other. In previous versions of DnD divine domains were tied to deity selection, and while they changed it so they don't, it's like playing an oath of something paladin that is constantly breaking their oath with no consequences.
Generally speaking, I would not dump dex. It's just as important as constitution because it impacts your initiative and rolling top of initiative is incredibly important. The 2 ways I'd consider building a cleric are: 16 Wisdom, 16 Con, 14 Dex and 12 strength. The reason for these stats is that only even ability points have function. So 17 or 15 in an attribute doesn't serve you, though there is still and argument for taking it which I'll get to. This arrangement lets you put points into strength which affects your carry weight, jump distance, melee attacks, and athletics checks when you shove. It's a quality of life pick. The second stat spread I would consider is 17 wisdom, 16 con, and 15 dex. The reason this can pan out is that you can take an ability improvement as one of your feats. It gives you 2 points to use and so you can use that to split between your 2 odd stats and get 2 stat increases for the price of one. It will allow you to have 16 dex and con, while still maxing your wisdom later if you wanted. You can also do something I'm between and take 1 odd stat if you wanted to take a feat that grants one ability point and then you could take 10 strength for the quality of life that offers. A key thing is that i would not focus on strength as a cleric. Making weapon attacks is typically just less valuable than a lot of other options clerics have and so it's just not worth the opportunity cost of dumping your dex. Dumping dex for strength gives you a few mid options in combat at the cost of falling near the bottom of the turn order at the beginning of the game where you're most likely to lose and need the most advantages.
I gave her the headband that gives you 17 int for free. Her firebolt now hits things. Respeced her as a War Cleric and she has this build where she can use a cantrip or spell to buff her weapons to deal that damage type and then when she deals elemental damage she hits extra damage. So she's this tanky melee build that has elemental potential and some range spells. Basically fight starts, she hits them at range and buffs, moves into melee and next turn goes to town. I think I had her something like 16,14,14,8,16,8 for ability points. She doesn't need int or cha and the dex I think was just for initiative and to spend the final few points.
Tempest makes much more sense than Light. For roleplay reasons it makes more sense. You can always respec into Light at the end of chapter 2. Once again, for roleplay reasons.
On my third play through i wanted to play around with multi classing and on first level up i gave Shadowheart 1 level in Ranger (my thought was character-wise we discover she has a fondness for animals, and find familiar at level 1 ranger so she could summon the Raven to blind her enemies and give her advantage) gotta say it worked really well. I ended up just having the 1 level ranger and everything else Cleric all through the game and it was awesome especially when Hero's Feast and Aid give Scratch and the familiar extra HP
First playthrough I don't respec the characters as it feels lore breaking. I do multiclass readily though. She makes a pretty damned effective cleric thief once you purchase bracers of dexterity. That wound up being my route for her and it feels sensible. You could easily make her a cleric dex fighter or shadow monk (might actually be optimal) if you prefer. Or a cleric wizard if you replace her helmet with that on the ogres ate. Her stats aren't great, but they aren't outright terrible. She just happens to have caster stats in a not very caster domain.
I also would like to add that it's probably best to set all of the stats (for any character, not only Shadowheart) to an even value. The odd value does not give you any particular advantage in saving throws, it just make you closer to the next level. Because of that, you can even drop your best stat from 17 to 16 and just wait till you get to the level where game gives you a feat option. Then take an ability improvement (its probably on of the "must have" upgrades), and upgrade your best stat to a next even number, getting higher saving throws for it.
I had respecced Shadow in my current playthrough for higher DEX for a completely different reason. I just didn't want to take Astarion along often because he had been such a continuous presence in my first run, and wanted to emphasize some other companions more...so I was trying to shoehorn Shadow into a minimally-acceptable locks-and-traps handler (mixed success at best, have to admit). But was then pleasantly surprised at how reliably she started popping folks with a crossbow, in between using her thus-conserved spell slots for buffs/heals. That difference between 13 and 14 DEX for the extra +1 is indeed pretty huge (at least in low-level Act 1 context). I think I'm going to load her up with all the magic arrows which pile up in inventory over time. I'm also now musing about getting her a level or two in Fighter for Archery fighting style, access to Heavy Crossbow, and perhaps the Action Surge. It's also another way besides subclass choice to unlock Heavy Armor. I'm not really trying to make her some sort of "holy Ranger" or anything...it's just that there's so many turns where she's got Bless or some other concentration spell up, no one is currently in dire need of a heal, and I just don't see any worthwhile options to use scarce spell slots. It's nice for her to have that reliable, non-spellcast-dependent damage option for those "in-between" turns. At least in the early going...as her spell book and slots open up, I think this will become less important (which is my main hesitation in pursuing the Fighter multi-class idea).
Crossbow support is the trickery domain's bread and butter, so it makes sense you came to that conclusion. If only their duplicity actually worked as it was supposed to, aka a relay for touch spells, then I'd be content with just the dex respec.
Man I wish I found your video a couple weeks ago haha, I ended up changing my Shadowheart to a tempest cleric, and took a dip in 2 levels of evocation wizard and I haven’t looked back since haha
Shadowheart: "My life is devoted to Lady Shar, may her darkness spread across the land."
PC: "Cool, cool. Go talk to Withers, you are Light Domain now."
Shadowheart: "Ok."
This is why I save respeccing her into something good for late Act 2 when plot happens.
@@nerdorama009 Same, really worked it well into the story. Actually kinda loving how it's turning out.
@@nerdorama009 did that on my first play trough, because spirit guardians is very useful in act two, and it was fine as her main source of contribution to damage/control (her other contribution being healing). That said: on my second play trough I've respecced her immediately.
Throughout the game, I came to see Shar and her followers as being dumb, petty and overall incompetent. Seeing how Shadowheart's starting build is a mess, with her Shar-aligned subclass being worthless, it kinda reinforces the point. I've always seen her first visit to Withers as something along the lines of "Yeah, whatever you say, you edgelord lady. Praise the shadows or whatever... Let uncle Jergal set you straight for now, we'll get that moron goddess outside of your head later."
For real, everyone serving Shar sucks. You can legit talk all of the Shar adoring bosses in Act 2 to kill themselves, except for Ketheric who ditched her. Then there's Vicona, who butchered her own followers in preparation to raise Shadowheart, only to send her to go MIA on a mission Shar didn't even ask her to do. That said, at least Shadowheart got to meet Withers to fix all the garbage the Sharians had turned her into. Geez.
Light domain? Oh no two levels of life domain, the rest into bard. You want to be a good supporter with some damage spells instead of a bad fighter/ support that barely hot something, even if respeced like mentioned in the video.
Imagine Shadowheart's face when you showed up with an ice pick saying "let's move some points off from intelligence"
The Volo method
It will make you move quicker so you can dodge hits from enemies better. Promise!
@@scottski02 - have you ever done this before?
- No. But I dreamed about it!
@@RubenKelevra and a thousand times, no less!
She dodged more efficiently than the heavy hitters in my party.
"95% to hit? Great. Attack." (Miss). "... Sigh..."
*Critical miss
Lmao, and that's unfortunately not exclusive to Shadowheart. Wyll seems to be my problem child. I prefer building him as a spell caster, but he has a thing for missing 90% accurate Eldritch Blasts, but can easily land one while he's threatened and ensnared on an enemy stood on high ground 💀
At that point I gotta wonder if the percents really matter in this game? Is it offset by the AC value? Is the game just built to be inconsistent? I don’t get it
@@incognitoinhell8742For me it is Karlach. She would roll at least 2 critical misses every single combat encounter.
On the other hand, every time I rolled a critical failure trying to open a lock, my next roll would always be a nat 20.
There is something deeply bugged about the RNG in BG3.
@@MrWhygodwhyit could be your “Karmic Die” setting. I am unsure exactly how it works, but it says that it “prevents repeated failed rolls while still keeping RNG mostly random.”
It affects your die, that’s all I know and all I’m saying.
She was the #1 romanced NPC according to Larian's Stats, so she has DEFINITELY been hitting things! 😆
Cause she is the one you can build approval the earliest and the easiest compared to other companions
Lol she's got a awesome character arc but she stays at camp until I can respec her lol
@@don8659 well, her guiding bolt attack and inflict wound is still pretty useful for dps, but she sucks as a cleric when she is trickery domain…ugh why don’t they just make her war domain? It makes more sense.
@@nathanieljefferies5491 I put all her stats on wisdom and strength. And put the headband of warped intellect on and it boosts her intelligence to 17 so it actually makes her pretty good. Just gotta find something else to stack intellect. I make her life domain and she can cast fire bolts and buffs like this and just dump healing when needed
You dont have to read this, i just need to vent cause it vexes me to no end, also some minor spoilers
She's the most romanced because the game is constantly putting her story in your face even when you're actively trying to avoid it
Then also she's a Perfect Goth Tsundere Waifu, she even looks more anime than fantasty, landing right into the tastes of most players, while Lae'zel is a mean odd looking alien with weird skin, Karlach is for the lesbians and her good ending is more vague than good, and every man aside from astarion is extremely underdeveloped (especially Wyll, i demand justice for my man)
I personally dislike her, Lae'zel at least has a reason in upbringing to be bitchy, and if you're bitchy back she likes it
Shadowheart is just whiny and demanding respect while showing none, you can't even excuse it by her childhood cause according to her she doesn't remember it
And even tho you helping in her quest is you being nice (while also very needed cause she can't do shit by herself) shes still acting like she's doing YOU a favor by ALLOWING you to even be in her company
And then shes trying to kill Lae'zel in her sleep but acts like its Lae'zels fault and you can't call her out on her bullshit
The only reason i allow her in my party is cause i like my run to be completed in 100%
This is another reason why going down the Selune path in her quest is the best choice, you now have a narrative excuse to change her to the Life domain.
@@ojodeoro1106selune don't have the light domain in her options. She has access to knowledge, life and twilight domain
@@ojodeoro1106 Twilight, not light
@@lorenzomazzoleniferracini5816while that's true with the 5e RAW mechanics it is incredibly dumb lorewise given Selune literally CREATED THE SUN lol.
@@tjdragon7993I mean she created the sun by basically pulling the flames from the elemental plane of fire and other than that she didn't take responsibility over the sun so she has no power over it and since clerics get their power from the diety they worship it makes sense selune doesn't give light cleric powers to people if the sun isn't part of her portfolio
Exactly that was my excuse for when I changed mine to a life domain cleric. Plus I gave her a statue of Selune to hold on to
(Something she didn't like at the time when I took it. She said "do you REALLY want that trash" )
i had exactly ZERO idea that the elf firebolt automatically scaled off INT. Sweet christ I wish I knew that 147 hours ago thank you
Withers is truly the best companion.
Shadowheart: *misses literally everything*
Me: "remind me, why do i keep you around?"
Shadowheart: *does literally anything*
Me: "oh yeah. Thats why."
Me for gale
@@Apprecihateu I literally use Gales Magic Missile 99% of the time. He isnt great, but at least his missiles never miss
@@KitsuneFyoraHes so overpowered if you use magic missile as one of his main spells. Just stack whatever magic items you can get that increase spell damage in some way, or give an effect when you hit with a spell ( there are so fucking many things that do that in the game ) and you can easily deal like 60 damage with just a level 1 magic missile
@@honey-hunterslimefanno.3257 yeah I just recently found a ring that increases the amount of magic missiles used by one. Already on his way to being the ultimate no misser
@@KitsuneFyora It is a necklace
If you want to optimise her in light domain: I'd dump INT and STR as you mentioned, but only raise CON to 15. This is so at level 4 you can take resilient con taking her con to 16 and adding her proficiency bonus to concentration checks. The added hitpoints are retroactive.
Yea, or you take war caster, I am not a numbers guy but the optimization dudes say it's better at low levels. Only at the higher ones does resilient become better afaik.
@@hulmhochberg8129 war caster is not as good in bg3 as it is in tabletop
@@hulmhochberg8129 War caster gives you advantage on con saves. While that is pretty cool, there are a couple ways to get advantage on Con checks, such as giving her Minratha's armor. Starting with a +2 resilient con means immediate +3 to con saves (2 proficiency 1 con score increase) Keep in mind that Concentration checks are a DC of 10 or half damage taken, enemies aren't doing 20+ damage per hit early game (or midgame for that matter unless they get lucky.) so the DC will be 10. With a plus 5 to your con saves means you have an 80% chance to succeed a Con check. Advantage with a +2 gives you 87.8%
TL:DR, at level 4 you can either have an 80% or an 87.8% to make your save. While an extra 7.8% is nice, the benefit is minimal.
besides at level 5 your proficiency goes to 3 so it becomes 85% to 87.8%
Take Resilience Con and give her Minratha's armor for that sweet, sweet 96% success.
You aren't using two or three hirelings with Transmuter Wizard that can give the stone with Con save proficiency?
17 con with resilient to 18 so she can take the pain she claims shar likes
She's a great support and when she gains holy weapon and spirit guardians she does a lot of damage indirectly
Shart with Blood of Lathander carried my Act 2
@@thomasbutalid9695 Shart with Blood send me to the hospital
What i like todo with her is high ac high con and and and stuff where she does not trigger opp attacks when dashing with sprit gard and then use other characters to grease and fire wall to finish the job. Sometimes she gets hit but she heals it off
Spiritual weapon you mean
@@seeker296 the thing where birds fly around her
She felt lagging behind on my first play through. I respec her under Tempest domain and now she wreaks havoc as if she is Thor.
Storm ftw. Gives you Heavy armor and call lightning.
I had a similar experience with Warlock. It was my first pick as a custom character because I liked the vibe of the class but I was struggling with it right until I found out about Pact of Blades and it immediately got WAY more fun to play
Warlock doesn't need much to be strong. Agonizing blast + hex does a lot in fights. Need to burst something fast? scorching ray + hex for that sweet 6d6 + 3d6. Pact of the chain for another body + attack.
That's what I do as well.
@@Broomer52can you please explain your rotation when fighting? I have pact of blades but I was going to get rid of it because I don’t use it much - do you use your warlock as a melee character? Which weapon do you usually pick to create?
The way you get shadowheart to actually hit is you carry all spirit guardians, and walk around.
Funnily enough, Ive never had issues with Shadowheart hitting things. Wyll has been the lord of missing every attack during my playthrough
I'm romancing Wyll right now and wow it truly must be love because till level four he couldn't hit a thing
I must be the unluckiest bastard ever cause both of them missed so much for me. Shadowheart was just my tanky healer and Wyll became my cloud of daggers guy for a bit
One of my playthroughs I might actually use Wyll and Gale... I've restarted the game like 5 times now. I usually play a cleric-lock for a heavy armored warlock so I don't need Wyll. It's handy having a spellcaster whose AC is 23 and can push mobs.
See, wyll for me and a friend hit absolutely nothing but crits. Twas stupid
@@Soul_Resinance
Wyll was actually the one who ended up rofl-stomping the Act 3 Female Antagonist in that one temple. My wizard would hit her with high-level magic missiles to reduce her defensive ability, and then Wyll's Hex+Eldritch Blast would just blast her across the map.
for reference you can respec all controllable characters at my man withers. just make sure they're selected when you talk to him! Also fireBOLT is bad. fireBALL is good. I'm not super clear when I speak my b
Firebolt is a fine cantrip. Problem is that since it's a High Elf cantrip it uses your INT, and Shadowheart is going to have low INT if she's a Cleric. Since it's an attack roll, it can get advantage so most of the time it's still going to be better than Sacred Flame anyway.
Firebolt is a nice fire starter and barrel exploder. When shooting with advantage it can also work for some weak foes.
I always respec Astarion into a bard, That class just seems like a better fit for him IMO
Sacred flame is the only Radiant cantrip, which can proc all the 'when you deal Radiant damage' armors.
^ This
Though you only really start getting access to these around Act 2 :p
Doesn't deal any radiant when it misses. It can't hit things that you can't miss either.
Starter Shadowheart has firebolt so she can light the purple puddles on fire and explode the barrels. A lot of players don’t seem to realise that and keep spamming it but that’s really the reason she comes with it. She isn’t built to use it for damage. She’s built to be an early game healer/support with a crossbow, then you respec asap.
This^
That's not the reason. There is no reason. High Elf characters just default to Firebolt as their cantrip unless you change it.
Shadowheart and Astarion both came with different cantrips appropriate to their character in early access, so I don't know why that got changed for the worse.
@@jameshill2450I fucking knew it, one of them had minor illusion...
But you can just dip a bow/cross bow in the easily accessible fire in those situations. Or throw an explosive. It even tells you about dipping your weapon the first time you go near a bunch of fire.
Her stats were better too. @@jameshill2450
Made her Light Domain and sneaked a Heavy Armor Proficiency in with a feat. She's one *hell* of a sturdy fighter now. It's like she's on overwatch and she's like the anchor of my group. Really changed my whole playstyle. And I waited until after Act 2 to make the change. I just hadn't really considered doing it earlier? Cause Trickery was just...her thing. It fit her character, she was still a mighty useful and core member of the group. Then, boom, Light Domain and it's like she's ascended to a new level of power. Kinda epic, not gonna lie.
I respec her as Light was well, but I'd rather have her take 2 dips into fighter for the heavy armor and action surge than waste a feat for just heavry armor. 2 Fighter 10 Light Domain Cleric is a great fit for Shadowheart.
I’m only just realizing when built right the ladies of the group are absolute bruisers. Karlach in my group charges in and just tears rooms apart and flips the entire place (enemies being chucked at each other like I was bowling, smashing chairs over peoples heads, throwing my ax at a retreating enemy) Lae’zel is a two handed swashbuckler out maneuvering enemies and disarming them before cutting them to pieces and Shadowheart unleashes unrelenting Holiness upon our enemies before crush their heads with a mace
@@Broomer52 Yeah I had a lot of fun with my Girl Power playthrough. Half Drow Female Bardlock with all the other ladies just powered through the content. :)
I just don’t see how trickery is useful for her. But I’m probably not playing that class very optimized. I took her light domain for the spells.
But you lose out on 6th level spells, which are huge... go tempest and forget action surge. 🤷
I just respec her to 8 Int, then give her Lumps circlet of Int. She can at least hit with firebolt at low level, then when she doesn't really need it anymore, I drop the circlet for whatever is better. By Act 3 she isn't using cantrips often. So many better options.
That's actually a pretty great idea. Plus she has a pretty high medicine so if you need a party member to make your potions she's actually the one the game supplies I think.
It's probably better to give her higher dex and a bow and only use firebolt for igniting. There's a great healer hat early game I wouldn't sub it for the lump item.
Why does she need to hit firebolt? Just don't use it as a standard attack but rather a situational firesource. There is plenty of better uses for actions other than using a suboptimal spell you got for free.
I think Light Domain makes sense for Shadowheart even as a Sharran in Act 1 - because any truly dedication to Shar on her part is contradictory to her nature. She dislikes massacring the grove, she does like being clever rather than starting a fight etc etc.
What people forget is that the Domain and who you worship in D&D are forcibly linked. "Light Domain" doesn't mean you're a good person no matter who you worship, it means you worship a god of Light, not Trickery.
Shar is a goddess of the Trickery Domain, so even though the game (BG3) doesn't care and allows you to swap things round willynilly, if you have any understanding of how Domains work in that world, it will feel like a major clash from that person's perspective.
Light is generally considered good. Tyr, lathandar, selune etc are relatively good dities.@@moosecannibal8224
I usually let either karlach or Lae'zel carry grease bottles to throw to allow SH's firebolt to at least hit something in the early act.
SH's low initiative rolls in combat prompt me to really just turn her into a dedicated healer/ light domain.
This way She has functions outside of combat via Guidance, Friends, speak with dead,
But also important in setting up big damages with Create water and tactical maneuvering with Dimension door.
this is great advice for anyone new to the 5e ruleset. i will add to your point about finesse weapons here 4:10, clerics only get simple weapons so the only finesse weapons they can really use effectively are daggers (very low damage). If you want to use finesse weapons like shortswords and rapiers, you need to be a war or tempest domain. It's unconventional to do a DEX build with those subclasses because you can't use the heavy armor, but it's still an option.
clerics tend to be very stat-hungry because they are "frontline" casters- you need con for health and for concentration spells, and since they don't get very good damage cantrips you need str/dex for your armor and for your basic attacks (at least in the early levels). and of course you need wis for your spells above all. so balancing your stats properly is really important. it kinda sucks that the designers gave her such a weak build. I can forgive the 10 INT because it's a RP thing, shadowheart isn't a stupid person so she should have at least 10 INT. but putting str AND dex at 13? just useless points wasted there, her whole build becomes so much better just by moving one point into one or the other. and firebolt as her cantrip is such a bad choice, something like mage hand, minor illusion, or friends would give her more utility and suits her character (secrets/trickery) better.
In my play through she actually became the most powerful member in my crew. She heals and shields everyone,has long range devastating spells and carries the blood of Lathander. Astarion always rolls highest to start with sneak attacks,Shadowhart blasts the battlefield with spells,La’zael and my paladin teleports into the middle of the chaos to hack’n slash. I mow down everything like that usually
I kept her as trickery. By the end of the game I didn't even need to hit with her anymore, I'd just use her to dimension door deliver my heaviest hitter or MC(paladin) directly into the fight, then hit herself with sanctuary, and healbot, while my hitter would misty step deeper in, and just wail on whatever target was the major threat. I'd usually have a fight handled within the first two rounds. Dimension door is just too powerful to give up.
just use shadestep on a barb or something lol
This isn't world of warcraft. Clerics aren't healbots, they're the right hand of their patron deities. They speak for the gods. This means that if you are healbotting with a cleric you're not using them to their potential and just gimping your options. Also if your fight is over in 1 to 2 rounds why even use Sanctuary? Why even waste time healing?
@@blizztedo7577 Fight handled isn't over, it just meant my hardest hitter downed their most dangerous target. As for clerics being heal-bots, that's been a thing since aDnD. Right hand of god, indeed. Especially if their patron deity is a healer type. Warcraft had to get it from somewhere. As for Sanctuary, it just messes with enemy aggro, and causes weaker enemies to waste rounds reaching squishies. By the end of the game I wasn't losing anyone, and my 28-29 AC MC wasn't even taking damage. I probably should have switched to tactician at act 2, but I'll just do that on second play.
Healbot? With limited spellslots? Especially with 28 Ac I can’t imagine you take much damage anyways
i used her as trickery rogue to dual heal (2 bonus actions) and sneak attack until level 5 i changed her to a spirit guardian tank from then onwards.
I switched her to Life domain as well. She wears heavy suits of armor, is decked out in gear that enhance her healing abilities, and if you find the Blood of Lathandar in the sanctuary in act 1, I'd argue there's barely a better weapon for her in the rest of the game.
I'll copy in what gear I used for her from another video comment I made on why I mainly used Healing Word with Shadowheart or tossed potions. TL;DR: There's a LOT of gear for healers.
Relevant equipment:
- Head gear: Wapira's Crown. Get it as a reward from Zevlor for getting the caravan ready and the road cleared of goblins. It might be more noble to waive the reward, but doing so nets you no alternative reward. When you heal others, you gain 1d6 healing yourself.
- Gloves: Hellrider's Pride - get them from Zevlor for enabling the Tieflings to stay, or loot it off his unconscious body. They grant Blade Ward to anyone you heal for 2 turns, and also give +1 Strength Saving Throws.
Later: The Reviving Hands - Basically upgraded version of the previous gloves, they also grant the revivify spell once per long rest, AND add Death Ward on anyone you bring back. Buy them in Act III from Vicar Humbletoes in the Stormshore Tabernacle.
- Rings:
--The Whispering Promise, adds Bless to anyone you heal. You can buy this from various vendors, for instance from Volo in the druid grove before he goes off to the goblin camp.
--Ring of Salving: Restore an additional 2 hp per heal. Act I, Myconid colony in the Underdark, bought from Omeluum.
Boots: Boots of Aid and Comfort: When you heal another, they gain 3 temporary hp. Buy it from Grat the Trader in the goblin camp in Act I.
Amulet: Amulet of Restoration, an additional Healing Word and Mass Healing Word per long rest. Get it in Act I in the Myconid Colony.
So, to sum up:
Healing Word - bonus action
1d4 + spellcasting modifier, which will be high for druids and clerics
+ Blade Ward
+ Bless
+ 3 temp hp
+ 2 hp
+ 2 hp per spell level, and I think you can upcast it.
+1d6 for yourself
Best part? This also applies to healing potions you throw on the ground at others. Just don't throw them directly at them, it might miss, aim for the ground around them, you'll see a splash area.
In total, it just beefs up the spell to be very much more useful, and works for any healing spell, but Healing Word is cheap.
What heavy armor did you use?
I changed mine to a life cleric and i love it.
Shes both my Frontline heavily armored tank, summoning divine weapons and a dava, and a very op healer.
Thank you, love my life cleric shadowheart, so much utility and she gets all the heally goodies for free and has that nice free party heal multiple times per short rest. I feel like shes a much better support than damage dealer. Upcasted hold person on multiple targets to help my frontline melee fighters, or go in prayers blazing as a heavily armored beast that can't lose concentration whos holding a chokepoint with spirit guardians. She's an amazing life cleric.
How to make Shadowheart hit smth. Alternative guide.
1) Best early game option is to respec her to nature domain, give her a staff. Good choice is Staff of Arcane Blessing, which you can find in Act I in Arcane tower, Underdark that gives her bless spell an additional 1d4 to Saving Throws and Weapon Attack Rolls, and an additional 2d4 to Spell Attack Rolls, so under the bless spell she and her companions will have 2d4 buff to her Attack rolls with both spells and regular attacks. Nature domain suggest that she will start her first turn casting Shillelagh cantrip and Bless. Now all her attacks rolls require WIS instead of STR. You can now lower her STR to 10 or 8, set DEX to 14, max out WIS and CON. Get Polearm Master feat, which allow her to attack twice by using a bonus action.
2) Second option (less cool) is to get her the Club of Hill Giant Strength. Act 1, Arcane tower, Underdark. It sets STR to 19. Respec to War priest. remove points on DEX, get Heavy armor, so you don't need STR or DEX now.
3) In act 2 Wyll can get Infernal Rapier. Give it Shadowheart instead. Get Warpriest domain and 5 ranger levels (thus you will continue to get priest spell slots). Here you go, melee Shadowheart with 2 attacks, extra Warpriest attack and possible free attack at 1st turn if you are Gloom stalker.
4) Once you get her quest spear, you can get 1lvl of Monk, now your spear depends on DEX modifier instead of STR. remove STR, max out DEX and wisdom. Get Polearm Master feat. Done.
5) Superlate game - give her Gauntlets of Hill Giant Strength, but it's too late.
here's another choice, get her to level 4, grab spell sniper eldritch blast, grab 3-4 levels of fighter for action surge and champion +1 crit(that combos with spell sniper cantrip +1 crit). and you can get her to either +18 or 19 wis with your 4th level of fighter. after that you can either put 4 more into cleric for another 2 feats(like lucky and resilient wisdom to cap her wis at 20).
no respect needed.
You can also go to aunty eithel, buy a giants strength potion, and then give the potion to Lae'zel because she is the one that needs to do damage and not Shadowheart.
This video is a fantastic illustration of why it's important to have a fundamental grasp of game mechanics at the outset of the game. Experienced players will take one look at the default build and just start making adjustments, based on key stats for each class. We really need to do this for all of the party members as we come across them.
Yeah, Karlach’s about the only one who’s built half decently, at the cost of shit AC
80+ hours in and I never once thought to take control of a party member and have THEM speak to Withers. I just assumed that the player character was the only one capable of respec. I thought that Shadowheart was just a bad party member and there was nothing that could be done.
Of course, it all makes perfect sense.
@@kode-man23 It doesn't help that Larian is basically the only studio that makes CPRGs in which you can respec companions to such an extent without mods.
Jut like any other game, you get into it and start learning the ropes, i know i didn't knew i could use the crafting menu in cyberpunk to upgrade Problem Solver into a goddamn AC-130, that was in the recent 2.0 patch and I've been playing since 1.0 😅
Its just that she is a backline support caster on the default build. Not amazing at combat in any regard but as a support can be invaluable for the team. I ignored all damage anything on her, pretty much just Sanctuary on her and have her only act as the support for the team. Trying to make every character amazing at every aspect of a fight can ultimately hinder you from what they can excell at. For instance, Bless out the gate on the party, Sanctuary on herself. Now the party has a +1d4 to everything but a skill check (Guidance is for that) or Bane if its only a couple of enemies (-1d4) and nothing can directly target her as long as she doesnt attack anything.
As you said yourself. Even +1 is huge. Bless can be at worst a +1 to everyone, at best it hits a +4 (and vice versa for Bane)
She is built as default to be the source of buffs, negative effects, and control on a battlefield instead of the one hitting things with sticks until it dies.
In my solo game i made Shadowheart a bard and Lae'zel a cleric. :P
I make Karlack a wild magic sorcerer or bard.
The heresy!
I personally gave her the Lucky Feat. Being able to re-roll misses helps you hit more often.
Lucky is a very underrated feat.
you ould also give her eldritch blast with either magic initiate warlock or spell sniper. that would make for her primary source of damage. also, champion's crit bonus combo with spell sniper cantrip crit bonus for eldritch blast. so you could get a few levels of fighter, for that(and action surge of course).
I got to the selenite option for her narrative, immediately went "We respecting to light domain now" and made her a polearm master sentinel, never gone back, always instantly respec her like that now, glad someone else agrees that light domain is the way 😊
She's Light in mine too. It felt absolutely fitting for Selunite. Haven't regretted it for a second.
I fix her before I can respec her by taking a level of Druid at her second level, then give her a quarterstaff and she uses her Wisdom as her attack stat instead of Strength. Then, I make her a Spore Druid to boost her damage with the staff, and when I get to respec her I usually take either Light or Tempest Cleric with a little extra Dexterity, but I still go back to Spore Druid too because even a little bit of it is an awesome damage boost and solves her hitting problem quite well.
Spoiler:
That could work with her storyline too since her father was a druid.
@@kroanosm617 her father is not a druid, he's a werewolf. lycanthropy is treated as a curse/disease in the world of faerun and general dnd
I dont like changing the subclass because i want to have the companions stay true to their intended build. That being said, I learned a lot from watching the video, thank you.
It doesn't matter how I rebuild her, Shart has about a 50% chance to hit anything with anything no matter the % displayed. I once had Shart use divine intervention in the Raphael fight and SHE MISSED!
My early game shadowheart recommendation: shadow the hedgehog, meaning going nature cleric! You can talk to animals and get shillelagh. That means you can take an early game quarterstaff with a cool effect like Natures Snare and turn it into a potent melee weapon (1d8+3), while not worrying about strength or dexterity!
I just multiclass her into moon druid. Nothing like a tackling deep Roth hitting everyone with spirit guardians as she crashes by.
@@thomasgormly6941 i wish that druid stuff would scale with character level, not druid level. Otherwise it feels icky to multiclass with druid
@@legendofJupp you could think of it like that or you could think of it like a hp and con buff at the cost of just a bonus action that clerics rarely use the first few turns of combat, but I'm just going without respecting her. Honestly I love using clerics with a dip in Warlock better. It's wildly convenient to spam healing prayers on the whole party using the warlock spell slots then primary use Eldritch blast while concentrating on cleric spells. You get heavy armor proficiency for your warlock and free damage using wrath of the storm as a reaction using storm cleric. Mid game you get devil's sight and advantage on everything in darkness while healing your party in a pinch. (Multi drop potions then Eldritch blast to attack and heal or double heal)
@@thomasgormly6941 thanks for the idea!
I had her in my party because I had her as my healer, she is absolutely drop dead gorgeous, I am romancing her, and I generally like MOST of her input during gameplay. But CHRIST, was she absolutely fucking USELESS in a fight.
So I simply took maybe 20-30 minutes to respec her and she's been an absolute demon in combat ever since. I respec'd her to Light Domain, high Dexterity (for archery, since she's half elf and elves are always great archers. Plus, I wanted a Plan B tacticin case she is Silenced, and she hits EVERYTHING with her arrows now with high Dexterity), high Wisdom (for her spells, which get powerful as hell pretty early on), and now she hits everything.
Now, if she doesn't shit on someone with her incredibly powerful spells, she has elemental arrows for days and just pelts them with those bad boys until she can get in a position to cast an even better spell. I also like hitting them with a heavy spell and then casting Sanctuary on herself, so that she cannot get attacked afterwards. Works great.
Having a great time using her with tempest. Arc lightning does a good amount of damage and being able to throw it every turn of an engagement for one spell slot is nice. Heavy armor makes best girl happy. Light domain is also really good, I just really like high strength of my characters for jumping. Makes getting around the map easier XD
I kept her has a trickery domain cleric until the nightsong decision. But even then, she can't miss after level 5 because of spirit guardians, one of the best spells in the game and in dnd. That plus war caster feat for the concentration.
Amazing. I took the life/strength/heavy armor path and it has been great ever since!
Or you could either take the magic initiate feat/nature domain for Shillelagh (turn club/quarterstaff into 1d8+wis weapon with wis to attack as well). Nature domain also gives you heavy armor prof. Magic initiate is good for life domain as well since it can give access to things like Goodberry or Thunderwave (single cast but its 4d4 of free healing every long rest or a get away from me type spell in case of emergency). Even Entangle once per long rest is an option.
Honestly I just multiclass her into moon druid so I can get a major concentration boost on spirit guardians then tank through everyone late game and shillelagh early game. Otherwise I just grab spell sniper and just pick up Eldritch blast using the wisdom mod.
Respec her to war domain cleric if you want her in combat. She can use heavy armor and pop spirit guardians and dodge all day ehile dealing damage. Then use your charges to attack as bonus action if there is no reason to cast other spells
I gave her the Spear that automatically applies true strike when you miss and made her into a life cleric. She doesn't need to hit things, her job is to not die and keep me on my feet
cleric is one of the highest damage professions lol
@@im7254 The best part about that is you can just take life cleric with 2 levels of paladin for ridiculous heals and 5th level divine smites. The duelist's prerogative allows you to make an extra attack as a bonus action as much as you want which means you're a life cleric with infinite war priest charges and paladin smites.
and even better? if you use a divine smite above 3rd level, the game allows you to use a second divine smite 3rd level or below as a reaction for... whatever reason.
@@IzalithLostyou what!?! Uff!
I somehow still think its better to stay as a full cleric. You will have to dumb a bit of wisdom and dex to get enpugh strengh to hit anithing with your weapon and will have weaker spells lots
You dont have to dump wisdom or strength.
you can already safely dump dexterity thanks to Paladin's heavy armor proficiency. and if you're concerned about dex saving throws, the gloves of dexterity (or gloves of ogre strength) exist to mitigate the dump of dex.
My Minthara was running with 20 strength and 18 wisdom, which was more than good enough to drop a 200 damage bomb on a target using a 6th level smite (You still get 6th level spell slots, just not the spells themselves) and then healing word the entire party back up to full health thanks to life cleric.
If you forego life cleric for war cleric, guiding strike also just guarantees hits, so you can build around not actually having strength, and just using guiding strike to drop a 6th level smite with a 3rd level smite attached, and then a 5th level smite with another 3rd level smite attached thanks to the duelist's prerogative's extra attack feature.
6th level spells are strong, but 200 damage bursts are pretty worth it.
You could also drop the 17 wis down to 16 (if you plan on not using the hair) so you can even out dex to 10 because having a -1 to init sucks when init is rolled with a d4. +Dex saves are one of the most common in the game.
that's not good advice. if you're gonna use the hair, then set WIS to 17. Hair boosts it to 18, then all you need is an ASI to get to 20.
@@Hirotoro4692 if you plan on NOT using the hair.
I prefer using Magic Initiate: Druid to give her Shillelagh so she can attack with Wisdom using a staff. At level 8 you can pick up Polearm Master or Great Weapon master to make her even better.
The strongest Shart spec I used so far is having her be 6 levels fighter, 6 levels cleric. And if you happen to have her go down the dark justiciar route, she's practically unhittable, casting darkness and getting advantage against opponents with melee.
War priest is a really good fit for her, giving her a 14/14 on str and dex allows versatility to go with two handed or crossbow as needed.
I always respec her into paladin because the heavy armor profiency is too good to pass up and Lay On Hands is guaranteed good healing
There are like 3 cleric subclasses that also get heavy Armor
Life cleric gets heavy armor and can aoe heal the entire party to max hp very easily at the click of a button. Paladin's lay on hands is designed as an emergency response, not a consistent source (as you only get 2-3 uses of it for the majority of the game)
and that's fine, because paladin also has raw dps coming from smites. but if you want the best of both worlds?
Make a life cleric with 2 levels of paladin as a multiclass while using the duelist's prerogative.
Duelist's gives an extra attack as a bonus action
Life cleric can pump out crazy heals in a giant radius
and you can use your 5th level slots for divine smite, which is VERY powerful.
I ran this on one of my evil playthroughs with Minthara and she could very easily tunnel an enemy out of the game in a single turn and then heal any damage the party took the next turn.
I know I'm a few months late, but gosh, thank you for this! I really like Shadowheart as a character, but she hits so rarely that I just had my sorcerer Tav grab a pair of healing-spell gloves to take over the role instead. I've never played DnD or a game like this before, and I've really been enjoying learning the game statistics. Thanks for educating people like me, (now I'm off to fix 'er)! :)
Update: I've done it, and she's excellent now! Thank you again - you rock!!
Im shocked not one of these comments is mentioning storm domain, its genuinely nuts on her, with heavy armor and a shield you are guaranteed at least 20-21 ac, and her access to storm spells + the usual cleric stuff like the guardians ensures she does high dps while being super tanky. Not to mention their channel divinity, which ensures you deal ridiculous damage with your lightning/thunder spells
Incandescent staff is a great weapon for her. That particular staffs version of firebolt is tied to the characters casting start giving her a great filler when she doesn't have a more important action to take
Since the patches Trickery Domain has at least gotten better since the Invoke Duplicity can now move around, having it stuck in place was terrible, but Trickery is still one of the weaker domains. Personally I'm using a mod and have her as Death Domain.
@@c.krueger9530in tabletop trickery is also a tier down to just their 2nd lvl spell alone. Pass without trace is an absolute s tier spell(some going as far as to say it's best 2nd lvl or even best spell in the game) +10to stealth is huge in 5e. Less useful when you can see where enemies are looking and just not walk into those zones with 8 dex no stealth prof etc.
Trickery is fine on the second evil playthrough since you want to steal and ambush much as you want, but initial playthrough where you are going head first into trouble, and not annoying the locals, she not good for that.
Tempest domain with a 2 level dip into evocation wizard for sculpt spells is super nice. The cleric lightning spells are sick and not having to worry about damaging teammates is even better
War domain gives you buffs to hit not only for her but for allies after you roll it’s really a life saver in tactician sometimes
Holy shit I thought I was crazy I was wondering why she always seemed to miss (especially noticed it more when I was in a near death battle and needed her to come through) definitely gonna respec her asap thank you for this!
Nature domain probably would fix all her problems because it gives you Shillelagh. With her WIS and Shillelagh, you'll be unstoppable.
you could also grab shillelagh through magic initiate. but i still defend that the better choice would be to grab spell sniper eldritch blast. and then, get 4 levels of fighter to get action surge, make her champion(for another +1 crit on eldritch blast) and a feat that you could take wisdom attribute to get her to 18 or 19.
you would keep her leveling as cleric and either use her as a healbot that can eldritch blast, or an eldritch blast that can go invis in case of danger.
My favorite party comp in case anyone is interested:
Tav is oath vengeance paladin
Shadowheart lightning tempest cleric
Karlach is swords bard with a lot of utility spells
Gale is 2 warlock with the rest in sorcerer.
Act one just hunt for class beneficial equipment for each character, by level 5 or 6, with all your spell buffs applied and with the right gear you basically become unstoppable. You’ll be wiping the floor in most fights within turn one.
I kept the characters mostly the same except for Shadowheart that I respecced into light domain because it fits so well in my team comp.
MC blade master fighter as an archer.
Shadowheart as light domain.
Karlach as throwbarian / thief rogue 3.
Gale as Gale.
Basically I kill everything from a range. Shadowheart and Gale bring in the AoE options with Wall of Fire/Ice, Fireball and Ice Storm. And if someone does come in melee range, I can yeet them with Karlach or use Thunderwave. Unless they start the fight there, they never manage to.
It's kinda nuts how seldomly I use short rests with that party due to hardly ever taking damage.
If you go nature domain make sure to take shillelagh so it uses wisdom for melee attacks
I loving her on war domaine.
And honestly, narratively i couldn't respec her before act the end of act 2 for lore reasons.
She is also the one who got the strength boosts to make the war cleric even better.
I know that class is already giga strong with just the spells it just feels more thematic to have the war clreric also be able to bonk really REALLY hard with a big bonk hammer.
Changing her domain to anything other than Trickery or eventually Knowledge goes totally against the background of the character. She serves Shar. A cleric doesn't choose his domain, he takes the domain of the deity he serves! And since you can't change the deity she serves, then you have to follow the only 2 possible options for Shar, being Trickery or Knowledge (in 4e).
Who need that attack anyway, we can give her a bow and more dexterity.
I love how this is a meme, and not just something friends and I have noticed.
I was unaware of the meme that she can't hit anything, However last night, she managed a grand total of 1 damage in the entire fight against the Goblins outside the temple, which is probably around 12-15 enemies, so I googled it so see if it was just my awful luck or if she really was as blind as a doorknob in general. Good to see its not just me.
Light domain is so good even late game... popping a potion of speed and bloodlust on her, destructing wave > destructing wave > radiance of the dawn. You can delete and entire army in 1 turn, I've had her turn "hard" fights into trivial ones by just aoe'ing everything out of existence
It served me well because my Tav was fighter and I had Astarion/Karlach (rogue/barb) so without a wizard/sorc in my party, Shadowheart filled the aoe damage role perfectly, while providing healing support if I ever needed it.
If you're respeccing, there is no benefit to keep her Wisdom at 17 if everything else is evens. Put Wisdom at 16 and use those extra 4 points somewhere else, then use Ability Score Increase at level 4 to bump Wis from 16 to 18.
You could get a half feat, but idk which ones are even good and let you boost wisdom.
@@asturias0267 I don't think there's anything except Resilient, but Clerics already have proficiency in Wisdom saving throws.
Yeah, was about to comment that. Actually every character has a spread with three odd numbers and can benefit a ton from spending 100 gold early, with a 17 in their primary stat that may rarely matter. Doubles as a way to cycle the store for weapons from the level ups too.
Shadowheart has it the worst from a lack of a good filler attack and how poor trickery is, but Gale doesn't really have a good reason to have 17 int while 13 dex affects his initiative a ton and AC a little (though his 15 con can be useful for resilient to make concentration saves). Karlach could go tavern brawler from 17 strength but she's got the same dex and con as Gale, could have such a nice initiative boost and a respectable +2AC for 100 gold.
@@tirell2075 Yeah, default stats on most characters are actually pretty bad though Shadowheart's are probably the worst. Like, the official character sheets they have for the characters if you buy the digitial deluxe version makes a hell of a lot more sense, on the sheet she has the following stats: 12 STR 14 Dex, 14 con, 10 int, 16 Wis, and 10 CHA. It's not a huge difference but is a lot more optimized than the weird 13/13 split she has now. The stats we got at launch seem to be a last minute change.
Something I like to do before unlocking Withers is immediately multiclass her into Druid for Shillelagh. Then skip fighting the brains by jumping up the cliffside to get Gale, and put his Quarterstaff on Shart for her to use Shillelagh. This, Thornwhip, Ice Knife, and Ritual Spells all make her more useful until you unlock the reroll. And if you get a Torch at any point, equip it in her main hand in place of the Quarterstaff.
I think you should use a crossbow or shortbow with her in act 1 for your ranged option, goblins have very good dexterity, in act 2, sacred flame is MUCH better. Youll have items and stats to support a much higher save DC and things like Shadows just get deleted by radiant damage
Eh, by act 2 you should be high enough level to have enough spell slots to use non-cantrips every combat. And a fairly easy supply of the potions that restore spell slots.
I change her to a Tempest domain. Cast Sanctuary on herself, run into battle and draws all enemies to her, cast Create Water, then Nuke with lightning or thunder spells.
To have her hit everything, have her only do things that have 100% hit chance. Only one type of things has 100% hit chance and that's beneficial spells for the allies. And that's what I mainly use Shadowheart for: blessing, healing, restoring, and teleporting allies. I only give her one offensive spell: the firebolt cantrip to mop up dying enemies. I give her 19 AC so enemies are not likely to go after her. She usually just stands on the sideline buffing allies and finishing off enemies with low health. All my other characters can deal big damage but not she. I always thought that was how Shadowheart should be used.
Our Shart is a powerhouse that, for some reason, ALWAYS goes last in initiative.
Ignis!
Trickery Domain is underrated as a dip class. Casting Sanctuary on a Mirror Image basically turns it into an invulnerable mobile advantage/disadvantage beacon, and can elevate the effectiveness of any frontline character with any rogue levels at the cost of only a few level dip into cleric.
I always re spec her into a paladin or light cleric so it's a support/mage
I got her the waterqueen robe, nylruna, resether for thunder, and those boots that electrify water. As soon as fighting starts she creates lvl IV water all around her and fucks up everyone with lightning
Nature Domain is amazing just for Spike Growth. The Heavy Armor is just the cherry on top when you have a spell that trivialises every grounded encounter.
Also dumping Dex is a really bad idea, moreso in BG3 than in 5e. BG3 does not use a D20 for initiative but a D4, meaning your Dex has a huge impact on initiative. Have a -1 to Dex and you will be going last most of the time.
God this explains so much. I have a war cleric with neutral dex and I was almost always dead last. It seems weird they chose d4 instead of d20. I guess maybe to make the initiative lineup more predictable?
I made her a Nature domain with Monk as an additional class and she kicked ass with Shillelagh and a quarterstaff… until she eventually got outclassed by my Tavern Brawler Laezel. Points for the effort though!
if you're gonna use shart as a support (rec light, life) don't dump your DEX. high DEX means you always roll first on initiative. dump INT and use the INT headband and have her MC wizard. now shart can damage and support at the same time
Yes, few people mention how important dex is because of initiative.
A lot of times it's great to start a fight with silence forcing the enemy to move if you haven't CCed them.
Then my melee can get into range and go to work.
So we're just calling the best girl shart now? 😂😂😂
@@kroanosm617 on my mc, i usually go paladin/warlock with 10 dex, but because i go 8/4 i also pick alert, which i find is better than wasting stats on dex on the character.
Alternatively, dump her Int stat then have her equip the Warped Headband of Intelligence for a fixed 17 Int.
Personally I loved shadowheart's design. She has character flaws while still being a cleric which is broken in general. You don't NEED light, lighting or life domain to do well with her. I even went warlock feat with her with some cha to make her more unique and it was still fine.
For me the best method for a good shadowheart, is to start her off with one level of sorcerer, and then the rest into light cleric. You only miss out on the level 12 feat but get con save proficiency from sorcerer instead of resilient. Also, one extra level till you can cast 6th level spells, but that's also no biggy as you still get the slots, and get the spells before end game. But she has access to minor illusion which pairs well with that fireball, and she also can now have the shield spell, which is just great to make up for that lack of heavy armor. I also like to do false life and give her the Staff of Cherished Necromancy later on for free casts of it, and other necro spells. She still lacks on cantrips, but it's rare that i resort to her for single target damage anyway, as she is too busy dishing big damage spells, or controlling the battlefield.
I just put Blood of Lathandar on her, I think it suits her best, with a Shield.
IDk why everyone hates on trickery domain I personally found the class spells it gives her to be incredibly helpful during my playthrough. The extra mobility and CC provided by the domain spells literally carried some encounters that would have been a pain without them.
Two kinds of players
Players who optimise without staying true to character
Players who play the classes for RP
Yep, I don't really like respecing Origins either. If you choose to play as an origin you do get the option to choose how to distribute their stats and which cantrip you want, though you can't change her domain this way, though trickery is fine and the only one that fits Shar anyway.
It is a noticeable drawback to our wifu 😑
Literally just level her up... Clerics are a god tier (pun intended) class in DnD5e. Stop trying to make her smack things with a mace, shes not a war cleric nor a paladin. Honestly the main issue is that in the first act you're dealing with a lot of humanoids and goblins which Sacred Flame targets for its save, and that Trickery Domain is rather nerfed compared to its Tabletop counterpart with Invoke Duplicity not being an actual summon for her to cast through. However her spell list is still fantastic in this subclass if you keep it. (Which later on I'd say its warranted that you change it.)
Anyways once she hits 5th level spirit guardians will carry you in a lot of fights ESPECIALLY in Act 2. Had her on my team for my entire first playthrough and she cleaning house with massive AOE damage from spells like Flamestrike, Destructive Wave, and good ol Spirit Guardians. Not to forget that she was still an incredible support with control, summoning, and healing spells.
I do support swapping her stats around though as Larian seemed to like giving every single damn origin character odd stats.
I think the dump dex problem is a lack of initiative(this can be fixed with "alert"), plus saves from strong damage spells like the aforementioned fireball, at the same time dump str causes it to be thrown by push very easily and lose concentration which is not interesting for a cleric, both for support and for damage... dump int and car and leave the secondary sex/str damage status slightly higher than the tertiary is the best choice, I don't know if I made myself clear enough... but that's it
Yep, really hard to dump dex, even on heavy armor users you will want at least 12 if possible.
This playthrough, I switched shadowheart to war domain cleric and added two levels of fighter. She's my heavy armor tank now. I'm not finished with Act two yet and she's already got 27 AC. Nothing can even scratch her most of the time, and if it does, she just heals. I think it's one of my favorite builds.
I love Tempest cleric with war caster for shocking grasp as your opportunity attack, as well as advantage to maintain concentration, gives great crowd control from shatter, thunderwave, and call lightning
If you go nature domain, you not only get heavy armor, you also get access to the Shillelagh cantrip, which lets you turn a club or quarterstaff into a magic weapon that uses your WIS modifier instead of streangth or dex. Then you can drop both.
Thematically you should go life or twilight (twilight isn't in the game, but would be the most thematic) if she goes one path or trickster if she goes the other. In previous versions of DnD divine domains were tied to deity selection, and while they changed it so they don't, it's like playing an oath of something paladin that is constantly breaking their oath with no consequences.
Step 1: Respeck her into a paladin
Step 2: Watch the carnage
Generally speaking, I would not dump dex. It's just as important as constitution because it impacts your initiative and rolling top of initiative is incredibly important. The 2 ways I'd consider building a cleric are:
16 Wisdom, 16 Con, 14 Dex and 12 strength. The reason for these stats is that only even ability points have function. So 17 or 15 in an attribute doesn't serve you, though there is still and argument for taking it which I'll get to. This arrangement lets you put points into strength which affects your carry weight, jump distance, melee attacks, and athletics checks when you shove. It's a quality of life pick.
The second stat spread I would consider is 17 wisdom, 16 con, and 15 dex. The reason this can pan out is that you can take an ability improvement as one of your feats. It gives you 2 points to use and so you can use that to split between your 2 odd stats and get 2 stat increases for the price of one. It will allow you to have 16 dex and con, while still maxing your wisdom later if you wanted.
You can also do something I'm between and take 1 odd stat if you wanted to take a feat that grants one ability point and then you could take 10 strength for the quality of life that offers.
A key thing is that i would not focus on strength as a cleric. Making weapon attacks is typically just less valuable than a lot of other options clerics have and so it's just not worth the opportunity cost of dumping your dex. Dumping dex for strength gives you a few mid options in combat at the cost of falling near the bottom of the turn order at the beginning of the game where you're most likely to lose and need the most advantages.
I gave her the headband that gives you 17 int for free. Her firebolt now hits things. Respeced her as a War Cleric and she has this build where she can use a cantrip or spell to buff her weapons to deal that damage type and then when she deals elemental damage she hits extra damage. So she's this tanky melee build that has elemental potential and some range spells. Basically fight starts, she hits them at range and buffs, moves into melee and next turn goes to town.
I think I had her something like 16,14,14,8,16,8 for ability points. She doesn't need int or cha and the dex I think was just for initiative and to spend the final few points.
Tempest makes much more sense than Light. For roleplay reasons it makes more sense. You can always respec into Light at the end of chapter 2. Once again, for roleplay reasons.
I turned her into a Life Domain cleric, she’s AMAZING support and with the right “illuminating orb” setup she’s perfect.
On my third play through i wanted to play around with multi classing and on first level up i gave Shadowheart 1 level in Ranger (my thought was character-wise we discover she has a fondness for animals, and find familiar at level 1 ranger so she could summon the Raven to blind her enemies and give her advantage) gotta say it worked really well. I ended up just having the 1 level ranger and everything else Cleric all through the game and it was awesome especially when Hero's Feast and Aid give Scratch and the familiar extra HP
First playthrough I don't respec the characters as it feels lore breaking. I do multiclass readily though. She makes a pretty damned effective cleric thief once you purchase bracers of dexterity. That wound up being my route for her and it feels sensible. You could easily make her a cleric dex fighter or shadow monk (might actually be optimal) if you prefer. Or a cleric wizard if you replace her helmet with that on the ogres ate. Her stats aren't great, but they aren't outright terrible. She just happens to have caster stats in a not very caster domain.
I also would like to add that it's probably best to set all of the stats (for any character, not only Shadowheart) to an even value. The odd value does not give you any particular advantage in saving throws, it just make you closer to the next level. Because of that, you can even drop your best stat from 17 to 16 and just wait till you get to the level where game gives you a feat option. Then take an ability improvement (its probably on of the "must have" upgrades), and upgrade your best stat to a next even number, getting higher saving throws for it.
“So, Tav…how was your night with Shadowheart?”
“Awful. We went in for a kiss and she somehow got my eye despite a 98% chance of hitting.”
I had respecced Shadow in my current playthrough for higher DEX for a completely different reason. I just didn't want to take Astarion along often because he had been such a continuous presence in my first run, and wanted to emphasize some other companions more...so I was trying to shoehorn Shadow into a minimally-acceptable locks-and-traps handler (mixed success at best, have to admit). But was then pleasantly surprised at how reliably she started popping folks with a crossbow, in between using her thus-conserved spell slots for buffs/heals. That difference between 13 and 14 DEX for the extra +1 is indeed pretty huge (at least in low-level Act 1 context). I think I'm going to load her up with all the magic arrows which pile up in inventory over time. I'm also now musing about getting her a level or two in Fighter for Archery fighting style, access to Heavy Crossbow, and perhaps the Action Surge. It's also another way besides subclass choice to unlock Heavy Armor.
I'm not really trying to make her some sort of "holy Ranger" or anything...it's just that there's so many turns where she's got Bless or some other concentration spell up, no one is currently in dire need of a heal, and I just don't see any worthwhile options to use scarce spell slots. It's nice for her to have that reliable, non-spellcast-dependent damage option for those "in-between" turns. At least in the early going...as her spell book and slots open up, I think this will become less important (which is my main hesitation in pursuing the Fighter multi-class idea).
Crossbow support is the trickery domain's bread and butter, so it makes sense you came to that conclusion.
If only their duplicity actually worked as it was supposed to, aka a relay for touch spells, then I'd be content with just the dex respec.
Trickery domain gets some nice illusion spells and fear.
If you're not using the domain's fear spells, you're wasting it.
Man I wish I found your video a couple weeks ago haha, I ended up changing my Shadowheart to a tempest cleric, and took a dip in 2 levels of evocation wizard and I haven’t looked back since haha