Priest

The average cleric is simply any person who has been ordained into his religion’s priesthood.  There are experts (theologians), warriors (monks and templars), adepts (faith-healers), aristocrats (high-ranking clergy), and even commoners (preachers) to be found ministering to the masses; holding mass for the faithful; and preaching to and praying for nonbelievers.  These clerics have no special desire or aptitude for adventuring.

       
Then there are the priests who have been trained by their church for the special purpose of seeking out evil and destroying it.  The Connaian Church is especially notorious for training agents who are well-equipped to deal with matters of the occult, though adventuring priests may be trained by any church of any faith.  In Lethandria, the most common sort of adventuring priest is an investigating agent, exorcist, or undead-hunter working for one of the churches of Connaia, Pensula, or Ruloskiva.

       
These priests take up arms (whether it’s the classic warhammer and crossbow, or a more up-to-date saber and shotgun); holy symbols and blessed water; and spellbooks filled with theurgical spells, and go out into the world to defeat the forces of darkness, wherever they may lurk (because darkness does seem to just lurk around an awful lot…).

Hit Die: d6

Starting Cash: 5d4 × 100ƒ

Alignment: Any, but a priest’s alignment must be within one step of his religion's (that is, it may be one step away on either the honor-freedom axis or the good-evil axis, but not both). A priest may not be neutral unless his religion's alignment is also neutral.

Class Skills
The priest’s class skills (and the key ability for each skill) are Concentration (Con), Craft (Int), Diplomacy (Cha), Decipher Script (Int), Heal (Wis), Knowledge (all skills) (Int), Profession (Wis), Speak Language (none), and Spellcraft (Int).
Domains and Class Skills: A priest who chooses the Animal domain adds Handle Animal (Cha) to the priest class skills listed above.  A priest who chooses the Travel domain adds Survival (Wis) to the list. A priest who chooses the Trickery domain adds Bluff (Cha), Disguise (Cha), and Hide (Dex) to the list. See Religion, Domains, and Domain Spells, below, for more information.
Skill Points at 1st Level: (4 + Int modifier) × 4.
Skill Points at Each Additional Level: 4 + Int modifier.

 

Class Features
All of the following are class features of the priest:
 

Starting Feats: Priests start with Simple Weapons Proficiency, Martial Weapon Proficiency (warhammer), Light Armor Proficiency, Medium Armor Proficiency, Shield Proficiency, and Scribe Scroll.

A priest who chooses the War domain receives the Weapon Focus feat related to his religion's favored weapon as a bonus feat. He also receives the appropriate Martial Weapon Proficiency feat as a bonus feat, if the weapon falls into that category.

Heavy armor and tower shields can interfere with priest spells that have somatic components, but even when wearing heavy armor or carrying a tower shield, priests may ignore up to 30% of the spell failure chance that these pieces of equipment would normally cause.

Aura: A priest of a free, evil, good, or honorable religion has a particularly powerful aura corresponding to the religion's alignment (see the detect evil spell for details). Priests who don’t follow a specific religion but choose the Freedom, Evil, Good, or Honor domain have a similarly powerful aura of the corresponding alignment.

Spells: A priest casts divine spells, which are drawn from the cleric spell list. However, his alignment may restrict him from casting certain spells opposed to his moral or ethical beliefs; see Free, Evil, Good, and Honorable Spells, below. A priest must choose and prepare his spells in advance (see below).

To prepare or cast a spell, a priest must have a Wisdom score equal to at least 10 + the spell level. The Difficulty Class for a saving throw against a priest’s spell is 10 + the spell level + the priest’s Wisdom modifier.
 

Like other spellcasters, a priest can prepare only a certain number of spells of each spell level per day. His base daily spell allotment is given on Table 3-11: Priest Spells. Note that the number of spell slots is fixed -- priests do not prepare additional spells for having high Wisdom. A priest does, however, get one domain spell of each spell level he can cast, starting at 1st level. When a priest prepares a spell in a domain spell slot, it must come from one of his two domains (see Religions, Domains, and Domain Spells, below).

Priests must study holy texts and pray for their spells. Each priest must choose a time at which he must spend 1 hour each day in quiet contemplation of a sacred book to regain his daily allotment of spells. Time spent resting has no effect on whether a priest can prepare spells. A priest may prepare and cast any spell on the priest spell list, provided that he can cast spells of that level, but he must choose which spells to prepare during his daily meditation.

In order to cast a spell, the priest must expend the appropriate amount of magic points. A priest's total magic points are equal to his base MP per Day (see Table 3-11: Priest Spells) plus bonus magic points earned for high Wisdom. Bonus MP are equal to the priest's Wisdom modifier × priest level × one-half.
 

Base MP Cost by Spell Level

Spell Level   0  1  2  3  4  5  6  7  8  9

Magic Points  *  1  3  5  7  9  11 13 15 17

Most spells use the MP cost given on the chart, but for spells that deal so many dice of damage per caster level, you have to add 2 MP for each additional die of damage, up to the maximum allowed by your level.
 

Religion, Domains, and Domain Spells: A priest’s religion influences his alignment, what magic he can perform, his values, and how others see him. A priest chooses two domains from among those belonging to his religion. A priest can select an alignment domain (Evil, Freedom, Good, or Honor) only if his alignment matches that domain.
 

If a priest is not devoted to a particular religion, he still selects two domains to represent his spiritual inclinations and abilities. The restriction on alignment domains still applies.
 

Each domain gives the priest access to a domain spell at each spell level he can cast, from 1st on up, as well as a granted power. The priest gets the granted powers of both the domains selected.
 

With access to two domain spells at a given spell level, a priest prepares one or the other each day in his domain spell slot. If a domain spell is not on the priest spell list, a priest can prepare it only in his domain spell slot.
 

Ready Cure: A good priest (or a neutral priest of a good religion) can channel stored spell energy into healing spells that the priest did not prepare ahead of time. As a free action, the priest can “lose” any prepared spell that is not a domain spell in order to instantly prepare any cure spell of the same spell level or lower (a cure spell is any spell with “cure” in its name). Once the swap has been made, it cannot be changed back until the priest is again able to prepare spells normally.
An evil priest (or a neutral priest of an evil religion), can’t convert prepared spells to cure spells but can convert them to inflict spells (an inflict spell is one with “inflict” in its name).
 

A priest who is neither good nor evil and whose religion is neither good nor evil can convert spells to either cure spells or inflict spells (player’s choice). Once the player makes this choice, it cannot be reversed. This choice also determines whether the priest turns or commands undead (see below).
 

Evil, Free, Good, and Honorable Spells: A priest can’t cast spells of an alignment opposed to his own or his religion's (if he has one). Spells associated with particular alignments are indicated by the evil, freedom, good, and honor descriptors in their spell descriptions.
 

Turn or Rebuke Undead: Any priest, regardless of alignment, has the power to affect undead creatures by channeling the power of his faith through his holy (or unholy) symbol (see Turn or Rebuke Undead).

A good priest (or a neutral priest who follows a good religion) can turn or destroy undead creatures. An evil priest (or a neutral priest who follows an evil religion) instead rebukes or commands such creatures. A neutral priest of a neutral religion must choose whether his turning ability functions as that of a good priest or an evil priest. Once this choice is made, it cannot be reversed. This decision also determines whether the priest can spontaneously ready cure or inflict spells (see above).
A priest may attempt to turn undead a number of times per day equal to 3 + his Charisma modifier. A priest with 5 or more ranks in Knowledge (theology & philosophy) gets a +2 bonus on turning checks against undead.
 

Bonus Languages: A priest’s bonus language options include Celestial and Fiendish (the languages of good and evil outsiders, respectively). These choices are in addition to the bonus languages available to the character because of his race.
 

Bonus Feats: At every 4th level, the priest receives a bonus feat. This feat may be a metamagic feat, an item creation feat, or a divine feat.
 

Banish Fiends or Celestials: A priest of 11th level can affect outsiders just like undead, in place of a daily turn undead attempt. Priests who can ready cure spells and turn udead are able to banish fiends, while priests who can ready inflict spells and rebuke undead can do the same to celestials. An affected outsider is banished to its home plane, rather than merely turned away – and even if the outsider can travel between planes, it may not return to the prime material plane for 10 rounds. If the priest’s level is twice that of the outsider's, the affected outsider is immediately and utterly destroyed.

Ex-Priests
A priest who grossly violates the code of conduct required by his religion loses all spells and class features, except for starting feats and bonus feats. He cannot thereafter gain levels as a priest of that religion until he atones (see the atonement spell description).

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