Go for it, then. (Or turn it into a leather handbag? If you can make fancy leather out of hagfish, slug demons might do as well. My S&S party makes whatever they can out of cured Naga hide, mostly for the pun)
Also, fun tip today from one of my monthly IRL games: While many people know, love and take advantage of the fact that Explosive Runes have an unlimited duration, it turns out the same is true about the oft-forgotten Magic Mouth. Spending unused spell slots on it at the end of every day, you end up with pouches of pebbles that can be scattered or thrown to trigger a lengthy conversation when a creature comes near, as each magic mouth calls out a phrase in response to the previous one finishing. (My personal favorite, so far, is a pinch of sand that, when scattered on the floor, loudly counts down from two hundred to one if any creature comes near, simply ending when it reaches zero)
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in an IRL game i was in, a friend of mine had permanent Magic Mouth on some article of clothing or another that would shout SORCEROR SUPREME every time his name was spoken.
...but... what could that kind of thing actually be used for?
An ominous countdown clock? Throw it into a crowded room or fortress, watch everyone scatter.
Still working on my character. Downloaded herolab and it isnt playing well with psionic and/or gestalt stuff..
Dang. Well, my sister's no longer visiting, so I have time to move things forward, though I can certainly wait a few more days.
I just need to finish re-choosing Illia-'s maneuvers.
Done. And, I'm grabbing the Mantis Blade (maybe Crimson can make it into a greataxe for me later. :P), and I'm thinking about the +4 Heavy steel shield for when I absolutely must have as high AC as possible.
I'm done save for making my demon buddy.
Im putting focused effort into getting mine done tomorrow.
Alrighty, good news! there was an update and now i can make my character in herolab!
Question for the GM:
I have an ability that gives me a (scaling with level) shield bonus while wielding a two-handed weapon. I understand that using the weapon's enhancement bonus on attack rolls to add to this shield bonus would be exploitative, but could i spend from my wealth to enhance the weapon as a shield as well (separate from the to-hit enhancement cost)? I figure this would be similar in vein to a spiked shield, how you enhance the to-hit of the spikes but the AC of the shield part.
Hmm. That's not normally possible, however; technically, you could enchant the hilt (or just one side of the blade) of any weapon as a +X Defending Improvised Weapon. I'd say you could use your class ability to treat this as automatically Defending; so yeah, buy a +X shield enhancement bonus, but do it at weapon prices (2000 x bonus^2 instead of 1000 x bonus^2)
oh yeah, and the pommel/hilt counts as a light shield for shield bashes, i should add.
Here is Tenro's submission. Statistically complete, barring something small I may have missed.
The profile will undergo some minor tidying up as time passes.
Looking at the other party members, I hope this character can hold his own. He could be a good "proxy general" for the undead armies of the party since a lot of his abilities benefit those around him (AC boosts and negative channel energy).
Mostly worried about my mere +10 to hit, and me saves of F10/R9/W13
EDIT: now i see Herolab is telling me my attack modifier is +10/+5, but when i hover over it it says +14 (+7 BAB +5 STR + 2 weapon)
odd...
And, of course, there's your at-will paralyzing touch, which it looks like you might technically be able to use on a full attack even wielding something 2H.
The party's got a ton of cool defenses and survivability, but nobody's actually that melee-offensive.
Illia's not a slouch, her to hit has always been good, and now she has some punch with the mantis blade and maneuvers.
Illia's not a slouch, her to hit has always been good, and now she has some punch with the mantis blade and maneuvers.
If you don't mind my asking, how did you get your saves so high? do you have some "CHA to all saves" ability or something?
I get Cha to Will, I have +6 ability modifiers, and tons of hit dice.
Having double checked to confirm, I got a result of 18/17/15... which is confusing, but still in the same neighborhood.
ah, makes sense. I saw them and i was like daaaamn what am i doing wrong haha
As far as defenses though, DR 15 is a looooot nicer than DR 5. :P
Been crazy busy between work and the holiday weekend. I'll review Mer as soon as I can.
Annnd gameplay is live! Meredian—feel free to use whatever character you have now (and not bother to review until you level) or wait on it, whichever you prefer; the enemies rolled well, so the party's initiative is staggered anyway.
Now, time to see what happens when the party contains a hybrid Warlord, Stalker, AND Warder (and let's test out your new, shiny, improved DR—don't worry, I've been keeping track of it all...)
Ooh! Forgot about party info, let me update that with Illia-'s new stats.
Illia- no longer provides the +2 initiative buff, sadly, so people are on their own initiative.
Also, gosh, all those lovely lovely targets.... Makes me wish I was first so I could hit them without hitting us...
Oh well, I'm sure our team has good Reflex saves and SR. :P
I have nether good reflex or SR
Well... At least you're immune to Sickened? :P
Of course, your enemies here know almost nothing about your party's strengths, weaknesses, or even race...
I have been silent in gameplay, as my turn has not come up. in case you were wondering GM.
Everyone should keep in mind that right now John is kinda in a weak state, being made of a "theurge" type class. I don't even have third level cleric spells yet, and while i have managed to keep an initiator level equal to my HD, i have less maneuvers known/readied than a character of my level normally would.
That's ok, we still love you. Illia- does at least, given your awesome intro. :P
sorry for a late change, i just realized (while typing up a descriptive paragraph) that i wanted a greatsword, not a bastard sword.
A few rules points to work out for John-
Normally Improvised weapons cannot be Enchanted or even made Masterwork. Even when wielding a masterwork or enchanted weapon or object as an improvised weapon, you don't get the benifits. Also, a Defending weapon must be Wielded for the user to gain its bonus. Normally a two handed weapon doesn't allow you to Wield anything else at the same time.
The exception to this is the Buckler, which can be enchanted as a defending weapon, and as a shield, and can be Wielded with a two handed weapon.
So, it seems like the best thing to do would be to get a buckler, or to use the buckler mechanics for the hilt of the weapon. (A pretty neat idea if you ask me. Conjures the image of one of those big, ornate crosspieces you see on German great swords)
Next, the Conducting enchantment would let you use Paralyzing Touch with your sword. Might want to check it out.
A few rules points to work out for John-
Normally Improvised weapons cannot be Enchanted or even made Masterwork. Even when wielding a masterwork or enchanted weapon or object as an improvised weapon, you don't get the benifits. Also, a Defending weapon must be Wielded for the user to gain its bonus. Normally a two handed weapon doesn't allow you to Wield anything else at the same time.
The exception to this is the Buckler, which can be enchanted as a defending weapon, and as a shield, and can be Wielded with a two handed weapon.
So, it seems like the best thing to do would be to get a buckler, or to use the buckler mechanics for the hilt of the weapon. (A pretty neat idea if you ask me. Conjures the image of one of those big, ornate crosspieces you see on German great swords)
Next, the Conducting enchantment would let you use Paralyzing Touch with your sword. Might want to check it out.
1. I am not sure what improvised weapon you are talking about.
2. I do not have a weapon with the Defending property.3. The Zweihander Training ability counts the two-handed weapon as a light shield for purposes of shield bashing, and while using the weapon I gain a shield bonus to AC that scales with the class ability it modifies.
4. I did sorta use a buckler, but only to track the gold piece expenditure of enchanting the shield portion of the weapon (as allowed by the GM), but that buckler isn't actually wielded. In Herolab, when using a two-handed weapon you click a box for each hand, and doing so when you have the Zweihander Training ability brings up the "Armament Shield Bash" you see on my sheet, which you then click the off-hand button for to apply. The idea behind it is indeed the large ornate crosspieces, and i substitute a "pommel smash" in place of a "shield bash" in what constitutes a "half-swording" style like the Germans.
5. I put the Conductive property on there, though Herolab doesn't automatically apply it to my standard weapon damage. I'll do that manually when rolling.
Hmm, buckler mechanics could work—although using a buckler normally applies an attack penalty.
Also, getting a +5 on top of the Zweihander bonus would give you a +10 shield, far better than anything actually possible otherwise, so this could be problematic for balance reasons.
Hmm. An item giving +1 to Natural Armor and +1 Luck bonus to AC costs about the same amount as a +2 shield...
I don't know, do any players have opinions on how to handle this? DoomedHero's buckler suggestion could be balanced, but it would also mean you'd take a -2 bonus to hit every time you use it as a shield booster.
...
Maybe just handle it as Defending Armor Spikes instead of a buckler?
Also, Sir John isn't the most offensive character in the party (think that's Dris with the rebuild), but he is a massive defensive tank. And with Iron Tortoise Stance + Combat Reflexes, he can play the tank role very well—if he uses his touch attack on the AoO (which he can, because conductive), he's got a good chance to freeze everyone who tries to move past him, turning him into a wall of save-or-die.
1. I am not sure what improvised weapon you are talking about.
I was talking about this -
Hmm. That's not normally possible, however; technically, you could enchant the hilt (or just one side of the blade) of any weapon as a +X Defending Improvised Weapon.
Hmm, buckler mechanics could work—although using a buckler normally applies an attack penalty.
A -1 penalty, yeah.
The big issue is that normally you can't gain the benefits of a buckler on any round you attack with the weapon.
When using a shield to attack, Improved Shield Bash lets you attack and still get the shield bonuses. Since shields can be used two handed, this is pretty much exactly the mechanic we're looking for in this case.
My suggestion would be to treat the pommel as a buckler, complete with -1 penalty, and allow Sir John to take Improved Shield Bash to count as wielding the cross guard on rounds he attacks with the sword.
Pretty cool concept, John. I love the way your mechanics portray a germanic zwihander fighting style.
Yeah... but anything you could enchant into the hilt would probably be more kosher on an enchanted armor spike, as I recently realized.
Yeah... but anything you could enchant into the hilt would probably be more kosher on an enchanted armor spike, as I recently realized.
You can't "wield" armor spikes and a two handed weapon at the same time. (That comes out of the annoying "metaphorical hands" action economy FAQ).
It could work if John devoted one of his attacks to actually using the armor spikes to attack with. On rounds he has to move it would screw him over though.
The buckler would work because he would count as wielding it even if he wasn't actively attacking with it.
Or, we could ignore the "metaphorical hands" thing.
It just occurred to me that bucklers don't count as weapons (unless you are a Thunderstriker or Rondolero Duelist).
That sort of blows my idea out of the water. Defending can't be put on things that aren't weapons.
Yeah, I'm... I dunno. We could Houserule it, but I worry that that would be a little unbalanced... since at level 20, his Zweihander shield bonus is as good as a +4 light shield.
So I think I'm going to have to say "no, enchanting it like a buckler is too easy/broken" and reverse my previous ruling (sorry!). But custom magic items to increase your Armament Shield bonus by a fixed amount (instead of a cheap scaling enchantment) would probably be fine, and could be, for instance, a modified Gloves of Dueling in terms of cost, power, and secondary effect.
Meanwhile, if you want to AC all the AC through terrible decisions, get Leadership, an Imperious Sorcerer cohort, and bounce your Aegis bonus back onto yourself.
Alrighty im just a bit too tired to really grasp all the back and forth on the mechanics you all are talking about, so i'll check it out tomorrow after work.
As it currently stands, i'm essentially wielding a double weapon without the penalties (or extra attacks) and one side is defending (except it gives a shield bonus so i cant stack a spell with it like i could with defending). That, coupled with the fact Warder is supposed to tank, and the fact that AC doesnt solve all that many problems at this level of play, i dont think i have gone too far afield of concept even at the logical extension of my possible level 20 AC.
The fact the Zweihander Bonus is as good as a +4 shield at level 20 is also easily doable as a Soulknife for the same cost.
A custom item might be a passable bandaid, might be tough in herolab but i could probably figure it out.
And I'm not trying to go absolutely bananas on AC, being a one trick pony is not doing anyone any favors. So no cohort just for the purpose of more AC, haha
Honestly, I'm not too concerned—I'll allow most things as long as all the players think it's reasonable, etc. Your AC is equal to Illia-'s, and you're both pretty defensive-focused, so it probably works out okay however you're doing it now. Or get a Gloves of Whatever (I'm done with bookkeeping for tonight, and I really don't mind either way, sorry if I've sounded petty).
It's equal to mine before I Osyluth Crane Style to bump it up by another 3 to everyone and an extra 6 towards the most threatening target.
Also... Drisquar... Kill some baddies, its your initiative.
FYI: I'll need to know what's available to throw around in a telekinetic rage when my turn comes.
Also, if hero lab has updated I may revisit her build as a telekineticist as opposed to mystic theurge.
FYI: I'll need to know what's available to throw around in a telekinetic rage when my turn comes.
There's like... 12 dudes.
FYI: I'll need to know what's available to throw around in a telekinetic rage when my turn comes.There's like... 12 dudes.
There's no save if I throw things instead of people. Though both are an option.
There's a throne. There's something funny about using it to beat the queens guard to death.
When we have some down time I'm going to make an enchanted anvil. I'll make my minions carry it. Out of fights it's mine. In combat you can have it.
Anaxian, that's why you're my favorite. Beating someone to death with their own throne is exactly the kind of thing Meredian would do.
Awesome.
Er... the throne is made significantly of gold, which means it probably weighs in the realm of 500-1,000 lbs.
There's some standing candelabras, if you want to throw them instead, but that's probably your best bet.