D&D 3.5 Character help

[Joviwan]

Guys, guys. Obviously cheese isn't going to be allowed. No Loops of Doom.

While the werechicken idea is hilarious it'll pretty well fail miserably.

The DM was talking about being in love with dragonbloods, poisons, and traps (in that order) and, since we don't have anyone really capable of handing the last two I need to able to fill that role effectively enough to make up for it.

So far I'm kind of mixing and matching the ideas for the Artificer from the D20 website linked before, only throwing leadership in, as well, to make up for whatever I can't already do. But is leadership really worth it? Another (two level lower) party member plus helpers for item creation seem like a pretty big boon to me, but I could be wrong. Yeah, it's extra paper work, but I can live with it.

Leadership is pretty stupendous, assuming you have the charisma to back it up. We've got a demon adventuring party at almost epic level, and my own character (a 45 charisma succubus marshal) loves her some Leadership. her cohort is a master-specialist transmuter wizard. The pre-adventure "warm-up" usually consists of giving everyone +6 strength and con, 2 extra arms, and bonus fighter feats. The character also does item crafting. And if you're going to do item crafting? There's an item in... Complete Arcane? That "saves" your current experience total and lets you refresh it... whenever you want.

[Raxmei]

Bit of a long shot, but a kobold cleric might fit some of your needs. The kobold domain in some sourcebook or other gives a cleric the trapfinding class feature.

Leadership is nice, not for combat but for having some extra hands. The followers can keep an enterprise running in your absence and provide aid another checks on crafting rolls in your presence. The cohort is nice if you need someone to fill an essential role that none of the players are interested in playing. Healing or trapfinding, for instance. He isn't powerful enough to be a main combatant, but can be useful enough to justify his existence.

[Erik von Nein]

It only works when you get rezzed. It saves your current XP total so you don't have to worry about level loss from anything, really. Plus it's 500 XP to use every time and it costs 20,000 gp. It'd be pretty beasty otherwise.

[Samuel]

http://shadowsystems.laurencemartin.org/DND_35Ed/


Everything you ever needed in one convinient place.

[Joviwan]

It only works when you get rezzed. It saves your current XP total so you don't have to worry about level loss from anything, really. Plus it's 500 XP to use every time and it costs 20,000 gp. It'd be pretty beasty otherwise.

Are you absolutely sure about that? I remember pouring through the text once I read what it "does", trying to find the catch, and not once did I find anything that wasn't absolutely broken. I recall that it didn't even say it was usable only once.

[Erik von Nein]

It only works when you get rezzed. It saves your current XP total so you don't have to worry about level loss from anything, really. Plus it's 500 XP to use every time and it costs 20,000 gp. It'd be pretty beasty otherwise.

Are you absolutely sure about that? I remember pouring through the text once I read what it "does", trying to find the catch, and not once did I find anything that wasn't absolutely broken. I recall that it didn't even say it was usable only once.

It says: "A thought bottle can be used to offset level loss as a restoration spell can, but is effective against level loss that even restoration can't undo (including levels lost due to death, but not the negative levels bestowed by magic items such as a holy weapon). When a user's experience has been stored within the bottle, he can subsequently access the bottle to restore his XP total to exactly what it was when it was last stored, negating any levels lost in the interim. Storing experience in the bottle is diffifcult, and the use must pay 500 XP (deducted before storing) to do so. Only the creature that stored experience can retrieve it, but if the bottle is destroyed or lost, the user suffers no ill effects."

Considering the emphasis placed on level loss I think it was intended for that only, but it does say that you can just access it any any point for your last experience total (minus the 500 XP). In that case I guess you can just store your XP, dump it all into item creation, then restore it later. I suppose it's up to the DM in that case.

[Akhlut]

I found a way of making a level 15 character with an AC of around 50+.

First, you require the knight class from PHII. With that, you get 8 levels of that (so you have heavy armor mastery and can move around unhindered), plus any more that you would like.

Then, you use a bladeling as your PC race, as it is +1 level adjustment, but you get +5 natural armor out of it.

You then purchase Mechanus Gear heavy armor, which gives you +10 AC. You get the +5 AC enchantment on this. You also get the best shield you can with +5 AC enchantment.

You take the combat expertise and improved combat expertise feats in order to transfer all of your BAB into AC. To make up for your now shitty attack, you get a brilliant energy weapon which bypasses armor. Hell, if you want, get improved natural armor feats.

Your knight abilities will allow you to call out specific characters as well as hordes of peons so you can take the brunt of their punishment. Of course, with an AC in the 50s, you can only expect 1 out of 20 of the bastards to hit you, and your d12s of HP should be buffering you from harm quite nicely.

With all of this, you should have a character who is essentially unhittable and great at keeping your buddies from being hit..

[Darwin]

With all of this, you should have a character who is essentially unhittable and great at keeping your buddies from being hit..

You need a cloak of greater displacement and ring of evasion around this level. Spells will have no trouble hitting your lousy touch AC or reflex save, and large critters can grapple and sit on you, taking you out of the fight.

Also affording +5 armor and shield with a brilliant energy weapon (a property worth +4 alone) at this point is a bit of a stretch.

[Joviwan]

Words

Congratulations on an entirely useless build. The number of things at level 15 that can laugh at AC 50 is monstrously large, let alone in the face of something that is incapable of doing anything other than drawing Aggro from the party. Also, anyone who buys a brilliant energy weapon is dumb, retarded, or so fabulously wealthy that he doesn't mind throwing money away on a minimum +5 weapon. And that's not going into the fact that you spent all of your money on armor class and a brilliant energy weapon, so you can no longer afford essential things like a cloak of resistance or stat-boosting items to help your piss poor saving throws. Which, by the way, don't care about your fabulous, mystical 50+ armor class.

You'd be much better served by cheesing... anything else. This build is completely destroyed by "Disarm", by the way, as it will take absolutely no effort to strip you of your shield and your magical sword, dropping your AC by 10+ points and destroying you with grapple.

[Rogue 9]

It only works when you get rezzed. It saves your current XP total so you don't have to worry about level loss from anything, really. Plus it's 500 XP to use every time and it costs 20,000 gp. It'd be pretty beasty otherwise.

Are you absolutely sure about that? I remember pouring through the text once I read what it "does", trying to find the catch, and not once did I find anything that wasn't absolutely broken. I recall that it didn't even say it was usable only once.

It says: "A thought bottle can be used to offset level loss as a restoration spell can, but is effective against level loss that even restoration can't undo (including levels lost due to death, but not the negative levels bestowed by magic items such as a holy weapon). When a user's experience has been stored within the bottle, he can subsequently access the bottle to restore his XP total to exactly what it was when it was last stored, negating any levels lost in the interim. Storing experience in the bottle is diffifcult, and the use must pay 500 XP (deducted before storing) to do so. Only the creature that stored experience can retrieve it, but if the bottle is destroyed or lost, the user suffers no ill effects."

Considering the emphasis placed on level loss I think it was intended for that only, but it does say that you can just access it any any point for your last experience total (minus the 500 XP). In that case I guess you can just store your XP, dump it all into item creation, then restore it later. I suppose it's up to the DM in that case.

Errata is your friend. Thought bottles do not work for item creation. I should know; a player of mine tried to pull that shit.

[Erik von Nein]

Okay, cool. Good to know. I kind of figured it wouldn't, or the DM would rule that it wouldn't.

Okay, so I had my character with his construct and seventh level cohort and three other buddies (including the DM's Gary Stu... player character) and the first thing he pits us against? Epic level acid rain, a 16th level character (mind you we started at 9th) with a high-save paralysis weapon and a hoard of wraiths (literally, there were hundreds in the cave, though "only" 10 in the place we were in). He handed us a jar with an elder lightning elemental in it earlier and expected us to use it during this battle we weren't really supposed to win. Forgetting that it would then trap us with an elder elemental, a hoard of wraiths and ACID RAIN.

Oie.

Funny enough I did manage to single-handedly kill his 16th level character, though that ended up turning them into a vampire (some racial feature of whatever it was), though I lost my cohort in the process.

Oh, does the monk and ninja AC bonuses stack if you take the Caramandine Monk feat that applies your intelligence bonus to AC?

[Rogue 9]

The monk and ninja AC bonuses stack anyway; you just don't add your Wisdom bonus twice. It's awkwardly worded. As for Carmendine Monk, it removes the problem of doubling up on one ability score. On the one hand, it allows higher AC, but on the other, a monk's AC is going to be low anyway and taking Carmendine Monk but going into ninja (which is still Wisdom-based) introduces an insane level of multiple ability dependency, and both monk and ninja are weak anyway. I'd let it go.

[Joviwan]

Errata is your friend. Thought bottles do not work for item creation. I should know; a player of mine tried to pull that shit.

Thought Bottles also do not appear in any of the errata's I can find. Is it instead in an Ask Wizards? I can't find it in the FAQ either.

EDIT: Found it, it's in the FAQ. Cool, that's good to know.

[Raxmei]

That session doesn't sound terribly encouraging. Good luck.