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How would you build a cleric? Feats? Ability scores? Spells/tactics?

What kind of Cleric would you want?

Do you have the (virtually mandatory because it's so awesome) PrC installed, which offers tons of new options?

Gawain, I do not have the PrC. They had that in NWN 1?

I'm thinking a melee cleric.

5 or 6 levels of Dwarven Defender to get Battle Awareness (unflankable) which is different from uncanny dodge. It will also allow another attack per round with four or more high BAB classes.

I would never sacrifice so many caster levels to take a PrC with such mediocre prereqs just to be unflankable. Four levels of Fighter for a 4th attack and Weapon Spec, at the most.
Search for the PrC on the vault, it's made specifically for NWN1.

Are the caster levels related to difficulty checks like in NWN2 edition of DnD? Or is it like Icewind Dale 2 where more than 15-20 cleric levels was a waste. Fifteen in that game because 9th cleric levels spells aren't too powerful.

It's like NWN2 in that regard. Addiotionally, many folks like to take 26 (or more) levels in the cleric class, since that means, their buffs can't be dispelled by other casters. Though in HotU this is probably not that important.

I think you can't do much wrong with just taking cleric levels. It's certianly powerful enoguh on it's own, strong. Maybe throw in a fighter level fot the weapon proficiencies and bonus feat.

My personal favorite would be a (human) cleric with two levels of fighter and barbarian each. This gives you martial weapon profiency, bonus feats that you can spend on e.g. exotic weapons, the barbarians running speed (yes, works in heavy armor) as well as the ability to rage, which can be useful early in your career. Four levels in high BAB classes give you an additional atack, as GawainBS pointed out (though some cleric players prefer to rely on the awesome "divine power" spell instead to boost their attack. I prefer to use both - normal attacks for easy foes and divine power for tougher fights).
Domain choices are strength and knowledge. Strength gives you earlier access to Divine Power; knowledge gives you Identify (personal preference - useful for some quests as well as a money-saver) and knock, which together with the cleric's find traps means that you can replace a rogue quite well.
That's actually the point of this build; there are more powerful ones out there, but I really like it for the campaigns because if offers a lot of versatility: You can use any weapon and armor, disarm traps, open locks, and cast offensive as well as defensive spells.

If you want to take a look at some optimized builds (power-wise), you should check out the builds at the old Epic Character Builders Guild. Lots of good stuff there. And you can always "tweak" one of those builds to suit your own preferences better.

Some examples are "The Fighting Ariel of Ehlonna: Rogue 5 / Cleric 29 / Fighter 6" for another versatile build or "The War Machine of Gruumsh: Cleric 26 / Barbarian 4 / Champion of Torm 10" for a melee-heavy, Divine Power-centered build.

Endugu, I am obsessed with role playing a cleric (earth and healing) dwarven defender. I can see that fighter will get me more (epic feats) whereas 6 levels of DD are good for: hp, damage reduction 3, defensive stance, and battle awareness.

I could become a full casting cleric with a little bit of DD and either F2 or Rogue 2?

He, I can totally see where you're coming from.

A mix Dwarven Defender and Cleric seems to be quite popular.
Rogue levels are not even a necessity (and would net your dwarf an experience penalty). Personally, I just like them for the evasion, sneak attack, skill points & skills, but they're not necessary at all.

DD6/Ftr2/ClrX would actually be a nice melee build.
Basically you should decide between taking all your non-cleric levels before hitting the epic levels (character level 20) or taking more cleric levels earlier. In the former case, your Base Attack Bonus would not suffer, but you would receive the higher level spells later in the game. Not that that would make your character unplayable; far from it. And they would be able to reach their full casting power in any case.
So it simply depends on whether you prefer to cast spells or to smack things in the earlier parts of the game.

Just a note:
When looking at "powerbuilds" you have to keep in mind that they're mostly meant to be able to compete aganist other players, not monsters, indepedently of the equipment used. That means that even the worst of them would probably be able to play through the campaigns with ease (more or less).
Just use them as an inspiration.

For the DD6F2Clx build should I specialize in Wisdom or strength?

I'd take enough WIS to cast lvl 9 spells, but focus on STR for the rest: you will be smacking things to death and using spells to buff yourself. Your low caster level will render your spells less effective in an offensive capacity.

BTW, I really, really, really suggest the PrC.

Do you like the PrC because you become more powerful? I like the Dwarven Defender for roleplaying but I wouldn't mind using the PrC for a third class to add to the mix.

Claudius wrote:For the DD6F2Clx build should I specialize in Wisdom or strength?

Depends what you want to be good at.
As GawainBS wrote, focusing on strength would turn you into a melee machine with divine backup via buffing spells (as well as the odd no-save-allowed-spells, like Harm).
Focusing on wisdom would make you a stronger offensive caster (and you could still boost your melee presence with spells like Divine Power and Bull's Strength), though your non-cleric levels would mean that the effectiveness of your spells would be reduced. But it should still work fine for the HotU campaign.

Also, count me among those who're curious as to why the PRC is so great.
I've taken a look at it some time ago, but it wasn't really to my liking.
For example, I got the impression that there's not ECL adjustment for the new races. That would make some of them absurdly powerful, wouldn't it?