I was looking at the pathfinder cleric today compared to the 3.5e cleric. Few players volunteer to play the cleric. In most games I ran, the cleric ended up being the cohort in the party. When someone actually chose the cleric class, I noticed they would choose their two domains from either War, Travel, Sun, Healing or Good and most other domains were ignored. Every player hated turning, because undead seemed to always be immune turning. I remember turning being broken to the point that when you did actually turn the undead monster, you felt bad beating up the helpless cornered beast while the cleric kept his distance.
Pathfinder dropped turning in favor of channel energy (su) ability, in a way, this fixes at least one common problem the cleric would run into at low level, where a group of players would drop in a round and the cleric has only one action to help only one character but not the others. Now in Pathfinder, if the party of wounded players are within 30 feet of the cleric then she can channel energy to mass heal all of them. You can also damage undead with this ability which can be handy from time to time. What I like the most are the new domain descriptions, again, just like in 3.5e there are more to choose from than what most players will actually ever select. Pathfinder domains for clerics are really well thought out and make the cleric even more attractive to play than ever.
Lets look at the description for Sun and Good domain over at the d20srd website for 3.5 cleric
Sun Domain
Granted Power
Once per day, you can perform a greater turning against undead in place of a regular turning. The greater turning is like a normal turning except that the undead creatures that would be turned are destroyed instead.Good Domain
Granted Power
You cast good spells at +1 caster level.–The domain spell lists for both are back on their website.
Compared to the d20pfsrd website description for the pathfinder cleric:
Sun Domain
Granted Powers: You see truth in the pure and burning light of the sun, and can call upon its blessing or wrath to work great deeds.
Sun’s Blessing (Su): Whenever you channel positive energy to harm undead creatures, add your cleric level to the damage dealt. Undead do not add their channel resistance to their saves when you channel positive energy.
Nimbus of Light (Su): At 8th level, you can emit a 30-foot nimbus of light for a number of rounds per day equal to your cleric level. This acts as a daylight spell. In addition, undead within this radius take an amount of damage equal to your cleric level each round that they remain inside the nimbus. Spells and spell-like abilities with the darkness descriptor are automatically dispelled if brought inside this nimbus. These rounds do not need to be consecutive.Good Domain
Granted Powers: You have pledged your life and soul to goodness and purity.
Touch of Good (Sp): You can touch a creature as a standard action, granting a sacred bonus on attack rolls, skill checks, ability checks, and saving throws equal to half your cleric level (minimum 1) for 1 round. You can use this ability a number of times per day equal to 3 + your Wisdom modifier.
Holy Lance (Su): At 8th level, you can give a weapon you touch the holy special weapon quality for a number of rounds equal to 1/2 your cleric level. You can use this ability once per day at 8th level, and an additional time per day for every four levels beyond 8th.–The domain spell lists for both are back on their website.
What I like most is the domain bump at 8th level which is stagnant for a cleric, most classes have something new and cool to do at 8th level, but the cleric doesn’t get anything special except one new spell at 3rd and 4th level. Some other domains give bumps at 4th or at 6th level, so building a cleric with domains like Fire (6th level bump) and Sun (8th level bump) may make a fun PC.
I just get a chuckle looking at what a 3.5e cleric got with the Good domain compared to the Pathfinder cleric’s Good domain. Yeah +1 level to my “good” spells compared having the option to touch the thief so that she can try that trap again say at +8, something that would be handy in the Tomb of Horrors game I am running. Though the cleric in my 3.5e game is 16th level and like normal, a cohort and rarely does anything to help anyone except the player with the leadership feat. Or, she could give the fighter’s weapon the holy quality to help him fight some big bad. In my Keoland 3.5e game, an infernal beast was giving us the beat down and we really needed a holy weapon, because the primary weapon of our party’s fighter was sundered. One tap to the fighter’s standby weapon by a Pathfinder cleric with access to the good domain, and that beast would have been put down faster.
Paizo brought back new life into a character class often overlooked in 3.5e games as anything but a cohort, by retooling the cleric to create a holy man on steroids.
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What I like the most are the new domain descriptions, again, just like in 3.5e there are more to choose from than what most players will actually ever select. Pathfinder domains for clerics are really well thought out and make the cleric even more attractive to play than ever…..