Arcana Domain Cleric 5e

Review by Sam West, Twitter: @CrierKobold

Wizards really like magic. It’s kind of their job. They’re dedicated to studying and practicing, learning the ways of magic for practicality. Arcana Domain Clerics don’t just like magic; they worship it.

Arcana Domain is a hybrid option for clerics who want access to some wizard toys, primarily in the abjuration department. They’re all about breaking enemy magical effects, and while I don’t love most of their domain spells, there are a few big hits alongside a solid Channel Divinity option, expanded spell-breaking enhancements, and eventually access to the best spells in the game. If you’re in a spell-heavy game, this can be a blast to play. If you’re facing regularly against less spell-focused foes, this domain is going to feel pretty awful.

1st Level: Domain Spells, Arcane Initiate

Domain Spells start this option off with two heaters: Magic Missile and Detect Magic. Thanks to ritual casting, Detect Magic always prepared ends up being a bit more like a feature than a spell, as you always can cast it should you have ten minutes. Magic Missile lines this option up to function somewhere near the middle to back of a fight, wanting to sling damaging spells out with some levels of certainty. As a domain spell, Magic Missile shines brightly, acting as a flexible damage option early that can ensure specific enemies go down when needed in most tiers of play.
Arcane Initiate opens up the mediocre cleric spell list and adds any two wizard cantrips you’d like to it. My recommendations are Mage Hand and Silent Image for the full wizard feeling, but you can also go with Fire Bolt or other reasonable options and not feel too bad about it. Acid Splash is a notable option as well, as this feature notes cantrips obtained this way are considered cleric cantrips for you, and Potent Spellcasting is a feature you’re eventually getting that will empower the damage you deal with your cantrips. Hitting two creatures instead of one doubles the effectiveness of Potent Spellcasting; not amazing early, but pretty solid in the mid tiers.
As far as 1st level domain features go, this isn’t anything wild or game-warping. It is a solid chunk of expanded utility and damaging options, though, making this feel pretty fair.

2nd Level: Arcane Abjuration

Arcane Abjuration is a single target turn on a celestial, elemental, fey, or fiend out the gate, and honestly, that’s a pretty reasonable effect. While something like Turn Undead hits masses, Arcane Abjuration hits four creature types. Turning one creature can shift the momentum of a fight entirely, and with its upper level payoffs giving you a banish option for lower CR monsters, this is an entirely reasonable channel divinity you can expect to get a decent amount of use out of at most tables.

3rd Level: 2nd Level Domain Spells

2nd Level Domain spells here are horrendous: Magic Weapon and Nystul’s Magic Aura. The prior is a concentration effect that only adds a +1 modifier to a weapon and makes it magical- you have better things to concentrate on than this. It being a domain spell at least makes it a bit more useful in the lower tiers when you need to make your fighter function against an enemy with non-magic resistance, but that’s not happening enough where I’m happy to have it. Nystul’s Magic Aura has no meaningful text; sure, if you’ve got spare 2nd level slots laying around you can make Detect Magic or Divine Sense get the wrong read on your buddies or their stuff, but seeing as those are primarily player tools that monsters have next to no incentives to ever use, you’re left with a spell that is purely flavorful, and not even that exciting to use as it doesn’t produce any perceptible changes.
Of all the reasons to consider avoiding this domain, these lackluster domain spells are my biggest reason.

5th Level: 3rd Level Domain Spells

3rd Level Domain Spells are a major step up from the 2nd level offerings. You get Dispel Magic and Magic Circle.

Honestly, Dispel Magic carries enough power on this character concept I’d be happy enough to get here and get this to basically remove the need to automatically prepare it. Not only is it one of the best effects for this archetype, but it’s also just a powerful effect that a lot of tables want access to confront enemies that are using higher-tier magic.
Magic Circle mainly acts as a ribbon, as spending a minute to create the circle in the first place is a pretty tall order. It can lead to some fun moments spent capturing magical enemies, but that’s usually a once-in-a-campaign kind of event.

6th Level: Spell Breaker

Spell Breaker marries the abjurer wizard archetype ideas with cleric’s bulk support options in perfect harmony. It acts as an automatic Dispell Magic on every healing spell you cast so long as the effect you’re ending is equal to or lower level than your healing spell. Mass Healing Word pairs beautifully with this, often being a means of ending a fear or charm on potentially multiple allies while getting creatures up from zero. Bonus action Dispel Magic is powerful, and Spell Breaker is a defensive version of that idea with neat limitations. Its only issue is most tables aren’t running a ton of spellcasters casting debilitating persistent effects, making its usability encounter to encounter a bit suspect. If you know you’re going into a spell-heavy world, though, Spell Breaker is nuts.

7th Level: 4th Level Domain Spells

Like the 2nd-level options, Arcana’s 4th-level options blow chunks.

Arcane Eye is a niche scouting tool that is outclassed in every way by Find Familiar and other similar scouting effects, leaving it as a niche tool you’ll probably never need.
Secret Chest doesn’t improve things as a spell version of a Bag of Holding just isn’t practical, nor worth the gold investment and potential risks.

8th Level: Potent Spellcasting

Potent Spellcasting has the core design identity of further scaling up damaging cantrips in the mid to upper tiers. In practice, full-casters aren’t burning through all their slots at most tables anyway, making it fairly likely you’ll get next to no use from this boon as you’d much rather still cast upper-level spells on your turn than a cantrip.
Still, Acid Splash doubles up the boon offered, and with Fire Bolt as a reasonable ranged damaging option, you can get a bit of a boost at grindy tables with this.

9th Level: 5th Level Domain Spells

Planar Binding and Teleportation Circle serve mainly to open up your utility to look more like a wizard. It's cute that you get Planar Binding alongside Magic Circle, basically ensuring you’re setup to do that encounter at least once. Beyond that specific use case, Planar Binding can be munchkin-ed into extending the duration of your summon spells while removing concentration (namely with Summon Celestial) or turning captive planar enemies into weapons. Teleportation Circle is kind of like D&D’s fast travel system, but usually, that’s not a major important factor. It can still be nice to pick up, as it opens up a means of getting to and from your base quickly, but it isn’t going to be a huge power spike by any means.

17th Level: Arcane Mastery

Arcane Mastery acts like a “choose your own domain spells” for the upper tiers with one 6th, 7th, 8th, and 9th auto-prepared wizard spell. Normally I’m not a huge fan of expanded options as a capstone feature, but when the expanded options are as busted as Wish, Crown of Stars, Reverse Gravity, Dominate Monster, and True Polymorph, I can’t possibly complain. In order to justify its level you’re heavily encouraged to prepare only the most busted options wizards have access to, and if you’re journeying with a wizard, this feels like total garbage compared to them just getting it for free alongside Signature Spell, but hey, at least you can do most of what makes them busted.

All Together

Arcana Domain is a mid-to-backline caster option for clerics that establishes you as an anti-magic abjuration wizard look-alike. None of its features are going to be particularly noteworthy at most tables, but at some, Spell Breaker will be a massive force in the game the entire party will play around and all enemies will consider. Their Channel Divinity and combination of Magic Circle/Planar Binding does also make them adequate monster hunters when looking for fey, fiends, or elementals.

Their Domain offerings are about as good as they get at 1st level with Dispell Magic being the only other massive addition offered at 3rd level, which is disappointing for a class whose literally supposed to be the wizard/cleric hybrid.

You can put together a character with Arcana Domain and feel fine with it. It offers you opportunities to shine when facing off against spellcasters. If you’re going into a world where that’ll happen often, you can get a lot of mileage out of this domain.

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