Character Codex: Exorcist (Part 2)

Greetings and welcome back to the Character Codex! Let’s head back into this Exorcist build from Dungeon Fighter Online and see what else they can do all the way up to level 20.

© Dungeon Fighter Online

Level 11 (Cleric 8/Monk 3) – Another ASI/Feat! Gonna even off that Constitution modifier with Resilient CON. That will also help with concentration checks going forward as they will go from a +1 to +6. We’ll pick up Guardian of Faith now as another tool in area obstruction. For us, it’ll be a spectral white tiger capable of striking for radiant damage at a 10 foot range. Turn Undead now becomes Destroy Undead. If the undead fail against the Turn Undead feature, and are of a CR 1 or lower, they are instantly destroyed. Arcane Abjuration also gets upgraded to the same CR 1. With Tasha’s rules in play, there is a choice to be made here. Normally, Arcana Clerics get Potent Spellcasting which allows us to add our Wisdom modifier to the damage of cantrips, or with Blessed Strikes lets our weapon attacks or cantrip damage to add an additional 1d8 of radiant damage once per turn. A flat bonus to all attacking cantrips, versus an extra d8 of damage on weapon and cantrip damage. Even though the extra radiant damage would be nice on a crit, Potent Spellcasting buffs our AoE cantrips a lot. Each hit of Sword Burst, Green-Flame Blade, and Word of Radiance would receive that +4 (at the moment) damage. Whereas Blessed Strikes is only against one foe.

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If you were able to pick up an Amulet of Health before this level, definitely grab War Caster instead of Resilient CON. It will be 2 less on the concentration check, but now have advantage on it. And if enemies trigger an opportunity attack that will lead to more Sacred Flame or Toll the Dead chances and Potent Spellcasting activations!

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Level 12 (Cleric 9/Monk 3) – 5th level spells! Planar Binding and Teleportation Circle. Planar Binding isn’t something that we’ll typically use, but it does bind a celestial, an elemental, a fey, or a fiend to our service if it fails a CHA saving throw for 24 hours. Teleportation Circle is pretty much what it says, draw a 10-foot-diameter circle on the ground inscribed with sigils and teleport to a permanent teleportation circle of our choice that we know the sigils of. Since it is an hour to cast, it will need some coordination with your group. For the spell to pick up, let’s improve our fiery shikigami and select Flame Strike. We can style the spell as the shikigami emerging from the ground, transforming into a Phoenix and attacking a 10 foot radius, 40 foot high vertical column of fire and radiant damage. 4d6 damage for each type. Not as great as Fireball, but very thematic for a rising phoenix.

Level 13 (Cleric 10/Monk 3) – At this level we get Divine Intervention. It allows us to ask our deity to help us out after describing the assistance that’s needed. Then we must roll a percentile die (d100), and if it lands on our Cleric level or lower, the Divine Intervention is successful! Subsequently, we can’t use it again until 7 days have passed. If we fail the roll, we can use this feature again after a long rest. We can pick another cantrip, and I guess whichever one that was picked between Sacred Flame and Words of Radiance, take the other one. Or Spare the Dying to stabilize a party member if you tend to run out of spell slots. Now we’ll grab Divination. After putting forth an offering, we make contact with a higher power or their emissary. We can then ask a single question about a certain goal, event, or activity to occur within seven days. While we are offered a truthful reply, it can be a short phrase, a cryptic rhyme, or an omen that needs to be deciphered.

Level 14 (Cleric 11/Monk 3) – 6th level spells, but only one 6th level spell slot! Let’s learn Forbiddance. It allows us to protect 40,000 square feet of floor space to a height of 30 feet above the floor against magical travel. If a celestial, an elemental, fey, fiends, or undead enter that area or stay in it, they take 5d10 radiant or necrotic damage. However, you could give one of those creature types the password so they take no damage. It also takes 10 minutes to cast so a heads up might help. Also, Destroy Undead and Arcane Abjuration both increase to CR 2 or lower.

Level 15 (Cleric 12/Monk 3) – With this ASI, we’ll max our Wisdom bringing it to 20. AC is now 18, and we can prepare two more spells. Take Death Ward, as it allows someone you touch to remain at 1hp if the attack were to drop them to 0. Let’s also grab Remove Curse from the 3rd level. Does exactly what it says on the tin, unless it’s a cursed magic item. In that instance the curse remains, but it breaks the user’s attunement to it.

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If curses seem to be prevalent in your campaign, maybe pick this spell up earlier.

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Level 16 (Cleric 13/Monk 3) – 7th level spells! And again, only one 7th level spell slot. There are a few spells here that can work well for us; Conjure Celestial, Divine Word, and Fire Storm. Treat the conjured celestial as another friendly shikigami. Divine Word can be styled as hitting our foes with paper talismans causing them compounding debuffs of being deafened, blinded, and stunned, or just outright killed depending on their hit points if they fail a CHA saving throw. If the creature that fails is celestial, elemental, fey, or fiend, they get ejected back to their home plane and cannot return for 24 hours, unless a Wish spell is used. Fire Storm evokes the might of a gold dragon as ten 10 foot cubes of fire cut a swath of destruction. Any of these are a great option to grab.

Level 17 (Cleric 14/Monk 3) – Choose between one of the other 7th level spells mentioned previously that wasn’t picked, or dive back to one of the earlier levels with more slots to spare! Both Destroy Undead and Arcane Abjuration level up to affect creatures of CR 3 or lower.

Level 18 (Cleric 15/Monk 3) – 8th level spells, one 8th level slot! The spell choice here will be Earthquake. It’s a multifaceted concentration spell in that the range is 500 feet with a 100 foot radius circle where the earthquake occurs. Then this area becomes difficult terrain, forces concentration checks and forces DEX saves to prevent being knocked prone if creatures are on the ground. And that’s before damage. Even though this is up to the DM, 1d6 fissures open up in the area and each one is 1d10 times 10 feet deep, 10 feet wide chasms that stretch from one edge of the spell’s area to the opposite side. Creatures on top of the fissure have to make another DEX save, this time to avoid falling in. Also, this spell can deal 50 bludgeoning structural damage upon casting and at the start of our turn as long as we keep concentrating on it.

Level 19 (Cleric 16/Monk 3) – For the last ASI we’re going to raise DEX to 18 making our battleaxe attacks better and increasing our AC to 19. The spell choice here is another toss up, offensive or supportive. If you didn’t get Conjure Celestial, get it now or Summon Celestial from 5th level. Didn’t choose Fire Storm, take it now or Dawn. Didn’t pick Divine Word, prepare it now. For support, pick up Greater Restoration. It’s like Remove Curse Plus! Erases one level of exhaustion, charmed, petrified, reduction to one’s ability scores, or an effect reducing a target’s hit point maximum, as well as removing a curse. Although we have Spell Breaker, this magic takes care of some conditions that aren’t spell based.

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Alternatively, you can choose Greater Restoration instead of Forbiddance back at level 14, then prepare Forbiddance now or one of the other spell choices laid out here.

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Level 20 (Cleric 17/Monk 3) – 9th level spells! For this, we’ll prepare True Resurrection. It’s an extremely costly spell, with the material components of the diamonds equaling 25,000 gold pieces (which the spell consumes). As long as a creature has died less than 200 years ago and not of old age, they can be brought back. And now for the capstone of this build, Arcane Mastery. This will allow us to pick four Wizards spells to become domain spells. One of each from 6th, 7th, 8th, and 9th level. For the 6th level spell, we’ll take Tenser’s Transformation. This is how we’ll get that form displayed at the beginning of this build. It’ll give us a suite of buffs we didn’t have; 50 temporary hit points, advantage on attack rolls using simple or martial weapons, hitting a target with a weapon deals an additional 2d12 force damage, proficiency with STR and CON saving throws, and can attack twice when taking the Attack action on our turn. The downside is after the spell ends, we must succeed on a DC 15 Constitution saving throw or take one level of exhaustion.

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If you aren’t under the effects of exhaustion, one level of it leads to disadvantage on ability checks. Exhaustion gets increasingly worse, take care of it asap!

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7th level pick is between Crown of Stars or Symbol. Crown of Stars allows us to fire off a radiant mote for 4d12 damage on a hit as a bonus action, while Symbol lets us craft a nearly invisible glyph that does one of so, so many things. Only one of the eight does 10d10 necrotic damage, but the others all give effects from disadvantage on attack rolls and ability checks, to frightened, to stunned. 8th level spell choice will be Sunburst. With the ability to do 12d6 of radiant damage and blinding in a 60 foot radius, it can wipe out or deplete the health of a great many in an opposing force. And for the 9th level pick, we’ll end it off with Imprisonment. This spell can magically restrain a creature in one of five different ways, if it fails a Wisdom save. One, buried in a magical sphere far below the ground unable to teleport or travel through it. Two, chains root them to the ground and they are unable to be moved. Three, imprison them in a demiplane that can be a labyrinth, a tower, or a confined area of your choosing. Four, the creature shrinks to one inch and is contained within a gem that becomes impenetrable. And five, they fall asleep and cannot be awoken. Be sure not to use this option on an Elf or Half-Elf.

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We did it! Level 20! Now let’s look over the Exorcist and see what it’s capable of.

The Exorcist has improved on what they were already able to do in the previous tiers of play:

• Divine Word and Imprisonment add to our ability to expel otherworldly creatures.
• Guardian of Faith, Conjure/Summon Celestial, Forbiddance as area blockers.
• Remove Curse and Greater Restoration ousting effects Spell Breaker can’t.

The stats are now STR 8 (-1), DEX 18 (+4), CON 14 (+2), INT 12 (+1), WIS 20 (+5), CHA 10 (+0). A maxed out Spell Save DC of 19, thanks to that 20 in Wisdom. Best skills are +13 Arcana, +11 Insight, & Perception, and +7 Investigation, & Religion. Eight skills have a +4 to +6 modifier. While the rest are still at a +0 to +1. Base AC of 19, 21 if concentrating on Shield of Faith.

Techniques

After binding a humanoid with the Hold Person spell, be sure to follow up next round with a Sacred Flame, Flame Strike, or some other Strength or Dexterity saving throw spell since they’ll automatically fail the save. However if you can get into melee range, swing that battleaxe with advantage using Green-Flame Blade. If you hit, it’s a crit! And I guess this goes for your allies too.

While it may take a bit of set up, you can have the Guardian of Faith, Summon or Conjure Celestial, and Spiritual Weapon all up at the same time. This can be useful as you’ll have one large stationary attacker with reach, a celestial that attacks off of verbal commands, and a floating weapon allowing you to control the space around you or help funnel enemies into a trap set up by the group.

I really like how this ended up. A lot of the abilities from Dungeon Fighter Online have translated pretty well; shikigami that the Exorcist can summon are represented, many of the abilities have one-for-one translations. However as with most casters, there are so many concentration spells you’d want to use, but can only concentrate on one. Still you excel at removing status effects and ridding your realm of actual threats from beyond.

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That wraps up the Exorcist. I hope you all enjoyed it. Let me know what you think.

Next time, I’ll be bringing forth a build that’s hot and cold and dragon backed.

Well until then, stay safe and have fun!

Peace!