Lads, I'm going to be having my first D&D game in a few days, and I'm going to be playing as a cleric

Your "picks" are fucking fedora cringe material, and your background is generic.

>I'm a le intelligent priest who READS ALL THE BOOKS WOAHHH

What an absolutely abhorrent post

What's wrong with clerics being educated and scholarly?

Historically speaking, some of the greatest centers of leaning were in monasteries. Hell, if it wasn't for priests, alot of the classical works would have been lost after the fall of Rome. Not to mention literacy tended to be the highest in the clergy.

Okay, I'm going to assume that since you're new and you're playing cleric, you got pressured into doing it because "we need a healer".
So.

>Combat healing is a bad meme. You will not be able to outheal the damage monsters are dealing, and even if you could, you're wasting your valuable spellslots. The best way to mitigate damage is to kill the monster before he does it.
>Thus the only healing spells you should use at combat are Healing Word and Mass Healing Word - and only to raise those, who are bleeding out, because your party members are equally good at fighting when they have 50hp and 1hp.
>Out of combat, pop a prayer of healing to recover from the battle.
>Bless is the spell you're supposed to be concentrating on most of the time.
>Bestow Curse and Contagion are also powerful against a single enemy, like a hydra.
>Spiritual weapon is a nice bonus action source of damage, and doesn't take concentration.

Nono, I actually wanted to be a Cleric, though I was considering being a warlock. I thought it would be interesting, plus if I was pressured into being a healslut I'd probably pick the life domain.

Thanks for the tips though! From what I understand, it's more important to buff than to heal.

By the way, which of the cattrips would you say are particularly good?

Knowledge Clerics. Intrigue

Go about learnimg secrets, have people confess secrets to you to be faithful. Build a network of faithful ears to tell you everyones business. Don't be a dick about it unless thats the kind of character you want to play. Just tell the DM that your religion has tenents of confession, that faithful members don't lie, because it obsures Truth & such. Become the ultimate secretkeeper/spymaster. Use this to do good work. Unburden the nubile daughter of the king of her secret feelings toward her father's knight champion. Task a layman to instruct the knight in his faith while reporting back to you. See if the dude is a dick or not. Influence the king that pairing them would be good/bad based on evidence. Upturn plots & schemes. That sort of thing. Be a good natured not just "Good"

My advice is not to worry about if you're a "good" player or not. I've seen so many people spend their entire first session freaking out about how well or poorly they're playing. Just relax and do what makes sense in the context of the game and it should go well.

Remember to kill them with implosion

Man. I wish I got to use this bait image more. I'm whipping out one of my favorites just for you user.

Character generation revolves around who the character is, not what they are. There are ways to make any character archetype interesting regardless of how frequently it's done. It's the entire tropes vs. cliches argument all over again. Without wishing to project, this kind of shit makes me think you're a spectacle obsessed fuck that dismisses any character that isn't running two different Unearthed Arcanas, or some really weird background that you make a writing exercise out of trying to justify.

As for you OP, my advice to you is as follows. Give your character a few hobbies and interests outside of adventuring, they give the character a little more depth and give the DM something to run with. Have a backstory with maybe a couple of loose ends the DM can use as plothooks. Avoid trying to optimize your build, and just look for fun spells/abilities you like and you think fit the character. Otherwise, stay frosty, read up on the rules, use a coaster, and have fun.

Sounds like a good start to the campaign. Going along with what another user said about having outside interest, I'd try to find a particular area of interest your character has within the broad spectrum of religuous knowledge. Most scholars have at least one area of expertise and you would be surpirsed how much nailing down something like that helps with your roleplaying decisions. Maybe you study the history of nobility in this area or are compiling a treatise on the great successful coups of history. Or you're really in to tile work. Specificity is always appreciated.

Guidance is good all the time. Use it whenever you possibly can.
Mending is good in a city campaign, or when your DM is making you count arrows.
Sacred Flame is their only attack cantrip. Gotta have one unless you have good str/dex

source?

Seconding this. Go Life Cleric so you'll spend less time on healing spells, grab Healing Word because it's both ranged and bonus action so you won't have to use your main actions on healing. *Don't* worry about trying to keep people topped off, just use your Healing Word to keep people from getting fully unconscious-ed and ending death saves.

Most health is actually going to be coming from Hit Dice, so lean on that (as in don't spend heals between combats if you can avoid it.)

Oh, and bonus tip: don't feel obligated to go Str build just because you *can* use Heavy armor. Dex is going to give you a better Initiative roll and it's as good if not better for your AC (and cheaper to boot.) If you're going to be "healing" from the back (and you should be) your damage will probably be coming from a ranged weapon or a damage cantrip anyway.

What the other guy said. Guidance is really good and Sacred Flame is very useful. Your mileage may vary on Mending depending on your DM.