Peter Stauffenberg
Keeper of the Watch
I tried that too in NWN and did rather well if I remember correctly. I stayed behind and let you do all the fighting while I used spells. Unfortunately you were used to me healing you and when you realized I was a sorcerer and not a cleric then you were already dead. So my sorcerer died when you were overwhelmed.
The group is vulnerable if the cleric doesn't instinctively heal others who are going to get into trouble. You need to put your eyes on the situation and protect the others instead of rushing in an join the fight. Too often the cleric understands the problem when it's too late. You try to heal, but the PC died before the spell got off. Or you try to heal only to realize the character in trouble is in another corridor. So being a good cleric is dependent upon your instinctive playing style. If you lack those instincts you will not be effective. The same with rogue. You have to instinctively feel where the traps and secret rooms can be so you can warn the group to stay behind and do your job. It's not fun to see the rogue running into a trap that incinerates the group while the rogue tumbles out of danger. Then the cleric has a lot of extra work that could have been avoided. Sometimes the rogue can't disable a trap and that's fine, but then we can cast protections and get across anyway.
The group is vulnerable if the cleric doesn't instinctively heal others who are going to get into trouble. You need to put your eyes on the situation and protect the others instead of rushing in an join the fight. Too often the cleric understands the problem when it's too late. You try to heal, but the PC died before the spell got off. Or you try to heal only to realize the character in trouble is in another corridor. So being a good cleric is dependent upon your instinctive playing style. If you lack those instincts you will not be effective. The same with rogue. You have to instinctively feel where the traps and secret rooms can be so you can warn the group to stay behind and do your job. It's not fun to see the rogue running into a trap that incinerates the group while the rogue tumbles out of danger. Then the cleric has a lot of extra work that could have been avoided. Sometimes the rogue can't disable a trap and that's fine, but then we can cast protections and get across anyway.