It is usually a bad idea to tell a player that he cannot play the character he wants to, but you should mention to him that this could be problem. He might have a solution himself.
Also, consider using his hatred for the undead to tie him in with the dhampir. Maybe they met while hunting the vampire the dhampir are descended from. Maybe the paladin saved their lives, or maybe he screwed up and the dhampir saved him from the vampire. There could be plenty of reasons for these characters to work well together. And if he does play the situation well (ie avoids lawful stupid) then you could set up some great roleplaying later, where he has to defend his dhampir companions from more judgemental paladins
As long as the dhampir are not actually evil, this party could work quite well, and if some PCs are evil, then he is looking for trouble in playing a paladin. The paladin is the only class who the rules basically require party permission to play, because its restrictions effect the whole party and not just the one character.
Talk to your players, mention that their could be a problem and point out that it is the paladin whose class restricts the party's behavior, so it is really his responsibility to see that his character does not spoil the game for the others.
Also, try dropping Improved Initiative and taking Toppling Spell instead. With Magical Lineage->Magic Missile you will still use level 1 spell slots and your magic missiles will trip your targets.
Jiggy gave you very good advice, lowering his Charisma to 16 preracial will give you 7 more points to spend on increasing survivability (ie Dex and Con) and you will still be very powerful with your spells.
Consider using the sage variant of the arcane bloodline. You will lose your arcane bond and the DC bonus on metamagic spells, and would gain a minor blast a few times per day, but mor importantly, you will use INT in place of CHA for all spellcasting purposes. This will give you plenty of skill points and really increase your out of combat options.
Actually Dudemeister is right, Indian mythology is very interesting and not something most players will know about, so a little research could give you something truly awesome.
A castle wide spell ward that disallows True Seeing with a custom illusion to make them think their true seeing spells are still working. Then reveal several illusions to get their confidence up and sucker them completely for the final battle. Also, run them through illusion traps and summons for a while, then when they get to what they think is the illusionist's room, he has already left and taken up a different identity as a beloved philanthropist in a nearby city. Remember, illusionists should be clever and tricky, even without magic.
Sudden inspiration, have the illusionist kidnap every friendly npc your players ever interacted with and have them as additional dominated and disguised doubles to pop out along with your mirror image spell. When they cut down a duplicate and see it turn into Biltus the slow-witted but affable stableboy from their favorite inn, they will hesitate to do any more randomn slashing about.
Adjusting the CR seems the best choice. You could also work with the players on what to build. Some classes are going to work better in a two PC group than others. The cleric for instance can provide healing and be a strong frontline tank if built properly, but you might want to avoid the sorcerer and wizard, since they will probably not be able to stay out of melee without a full party to work with. Also, any class that gives you helpers could be good, ie the druid for his animal companion and summons on the summoner. Actually with a summoner using the master summoner archetype, you could field a pretty full frontline and keep the PCs themselves in the back, using ranged weapons or spellcasting.
Personally, i love the selfish drow better than the angsty good ones. I played a one shot character that was a level 11 drow wizard that fled from his home city to escape punishment. He was ordered to kill a human wizard that had insulted a matron mother, but refused, not because he cared about the human, but because he was still learning about human magic from him. The only thing that mattered to the character was mastery more magic, no matter what the cost. He did some very good deeds and some very bad deeds, but that obsession was his only motive.
Malebranche's advice is excellent.
There is a trait that lets you use your whip like a rope with a grappling hook, letting you do all those Indiana Jones, swinging around type stunts. I think it is called Prehensile Whip, it could be fun for your build.
Go for human for the bonus feat, and make sure at some point to get Quick Draw, then acquire a scorpion's tail, which is a whip that can damage armored foes. That way you can switch between spellstrike buffing your barding-wearing animal companion and havng a more effective weapon for your enemies.
Remember to get Intensify Spell at later levels to really boost some of those low level spells (Shocking Grasp especially, 10d6 at level 10 as part of your full attack using a level 2 spell, or level 1 spell if you get the Magical Lineage trait for that spell).
My personal favorite feat for a wizard, assuming you have an openminded DM, is Craft Wondrous Item. As long as you can design your creations yourself, you can make some awesome stuff with really cool flavor.
Other than that, Heighten Spell and Preferred Spell can be very nice, Improved Initiative is a must have from a charop point of view. You could also look at Eldritch Heritage and Improved Eldritch Heritage, which give you powers from one of the sorcerer bloodlines. They can be very effective and very useful at refining the character's persona.
A gnome can be a great front line fighter. With a twenty point buy you should go:
Strength 16 (18 preracial) 17 points
Dexterity 12 2 points
Constitution 15 (13 preracial) 3 points
Intelligence 10
Wisdom 10
Charisma 10 (8 preracial) -2 points
I would say go with cavalier for the mobility boost and sick charging damage or barbarian for the boost from raging and fast movement. Use your favored class bonuses for hit points, because your lower weapon damage will probably add a round or two to each combat, and you need to make up the difference in the amount of damage you take. Go two-handed weapon and you will do 2 less damage per hit, but you will hit just as often and have slightly better AC. Also, as has been posted above, your gear will weigh less proportionally, so encumbrance should not be an issue. You should look carefully at racial traits and feats, because there are several that give very nice bonuses against enemies larger than you, which is most of them.
These are all good suggestions for the characters to do.
What the players should do is talk to the DM. Find out why he hates prepared casters, and point out that deliberately targetting the character's spellbooks on a regular basis is unfairly punishing the players. In general, a wizard should be deprived of their spellbook as often as a fighter should wake up deprived of all his weapons and armor, i.e. only when it is an important part of the adventure's story. If your DM will not see this, ask him to change what he hates about these classes, because right now, he is unfairly gimping some of his players, which is a good way for a DM to find himself lacking anyone to play with.
To be honest, i am one of those players that seem to always roll high ability scores. Despite that, I am not always one of the most powerful characters. Especially in Pathfinder, other bonuses stack up so quickly that an additional +2 or even +3 does not mean much after the first few levels, and even at those levels the range of rolls allowed by the d20 will tend to balance things out. Also, you need to realize that for combat purposes, which is the only way of comparing character power without knowing a great deal about how you run your games, most classes only need one or two good ability scores to shine. If a fighter has an Intelligence over 13, it really has no effect on his combat prowess. If a wizard has a 14 Strength, it does not improve his spellcasting at all. Higher scores are never useless, but the increase in character effectiveness is much less after the class's primary stats are assigned. Your player's high rolls make him an interesting character for roleplaying, and allow some of the more MAD classes to be viable, but do not break the game.
I already own the Iron Kingdoms books. From the sounds of it, you may be referring to Iron Heroes. I remember a couple years back, a friend of my brother bought it. I recall being interested in it, but never thought to seek it out. Thank you for the advice. Since I have almost all the PRPG rulebooks, is there anything you could recommend I do with that?
Speaking with a friend, he brings up that it's mostly a "setting issue". I tend to agree. Maybe, there really isn't as much to it as I thought initially.
My bad. I did mean Iron Heroes. Your friend is right. It is a setting issue. Never be afraid to homebrew.
I would suggest looking for Treantmonk's awesome monk guide. His main point was to go high strength and realize that no matter how fast you can run, the monk is not an effective mobile fighter. You need to get in melee range and flurry, flurry, flurry.
saw it. sadly, the class as is still relies on a party that's somewhat geared towards helping the Monk more than other classes.
I guess I just don't believe that a single PC should skew the party tactics so much more than other classes.
A single PC skewing party tactics? I thought this was about monks, not wizards.
Actually, you are right, the monk is a frontline fighter without the HD and very MAD when it comes to AC. They do need the party's help more than say fighters do, but they are also more versatile outside of combat. Monks are cool, but still a class you play because you love the flavor.
In reference to the OP, the rogue multiclass can be effective if your party is good at getting into positionfor flanking and support.
See if you can find the Iron Kingdoms books. they were an alternate player's handbook for 3.5 and the setting was human only with powerful but rarer and more chaotic magic. the classes were focused around combat styles mostly and were very well done.
I love the unlimited cantrips. i actually played in a game where the party wizard only had an Int of 11. The character was obvious comic relief until he used his cantrips to steal away the mcguffin and save a kingdom. The character was amusing to no end.
Also, I rarely play wizards, but one of the high level wizards I ever played in 3.5, I actually considered a prestige class just to get unlimited cantrips. It really makes you feel more magical to have these little effects to play with.
I would suggest looking for Treantmonk's awesome monk guide. His main point was to go high strength and realize that no matter how fast you can run, the monk is not an effective mobile fighter. You need to get in melee range and flurry, flurry, flurry.
Definitely go with Breakfast's idea. Focus his spells and feats on the undead, but play it as an unwanted talent. Have the charcter be jealous of other sorcerers and wizards for the amzing spells they use, while all his are dark and morbid. Remember, the player gets to pick the spells, the character does not.
Also, you should make sure the father is played as completely evil, but not a bad father. He is disappointed in his son for not following in his footsteps, but still loves the boy. He might kill the rest of the party, but he will animate them so his son will not miss his friends.
You could also play with the idea of whether or not undead are inherently evil. The character grew up with a skeleton nanny and loved her greatly. He uses undead, just not for evil purposes.
I might be wrong (I might be rembering a house rule), but I think this would make your grappler flat-footed, in which case, the best defense is for your party to gank him while he is hugging you.
I think this should be okay, as long as you provide at least an opportunity to acquire silver weapons, or at least some silver ammo. Without those weapons, this creature's DR and fast healing might keep it around long enough to kill a few PCs.
You do not have to hand them these weapons openly, but maybe foreshadow the creature and let them search for what they need, or include the silver weapons as something they could grab, but not blatantly treasure. For instance, they could encounter a traveling tinker, and you could happen to mention in his description that he has what looks like some silver arrows on his cart. As long as the PCs had a shot to get properly equipped you should be fine.
Or you could try gestalt with just one character per player. That works pretty well.
Oh yah, the 3.5 "Unearth Arcana" gestalt rules, sweet idea
gestalt rules? What is that? I don't own UE.
Gestalt is a rule option where you advance in two classes simultaneously for each level you go up, gaining all class features, using the better of the two BAB, saves, hit dice, skills, etc. The full rules are in the d20srd.
Just remember, with gestalt, the characters are more powerful than normal, but not as powerful as two separate characters would be, due to the action economy.
Get the Arcane Armor Training and Mastery feats then go for a mithral breastplate. You need to focus on buffs from your cleric spells, and battlefield control for wizard spells. There are some low level wizard spells that stay useful a long time, such as Grease or Glitterdust.
The first time was in a very powerful evil campaign and we just figured the great wyrm dragon had it coming and moved on.
The second time, in a fairly light hearted game, my DM pulled the playground classic on us. "My brother will beat you up!" The original BBEG was a cleric, and his actual brother appeared behind us in a cloud of smoke.
As it turns out, his brother could not beat us up, since our wizard, played by an optimizer that is a wonder to behold, managed to one round kill him as well. The DM just gave up after that.
When I saw this thread I immediately pictured a bunch of gnomes in robes mounted on a wild assortment of creatures lining up like the indy 500, HA!
I would go either half-elf for a synthesist, or human for master summoner. If I was going straight summoner, I would use a gnome and go for the pouncing mount set-up.
Maybe the good dragons, run a profitable business of selling their shedded scales to merchants for a large cut of the profit. How else are the good dragons going to get their horde of loot?
From the legions of greedy neutral, evil and misguided good adventurers they kill who try to stupidly attack them in their lairs?
I mean everyone knows that adventurers have the very best loot table in the game...
And now I want to run a campaign focused on hunting down adventuring parties for their loot.
I agree that you should be able to use scales from multiple dragons, but if your Dm will not allow that, use alligator hide and lie to anyone who asks. For that matter, I could see a greedy wizard developing a spell to transform lizard hide into effective but fake dragon scales, temporary for a scam or permanent for a lasting business model. Remember that if you need to kill a collosal dragon to make it, dragonhide armor would be rare to the point of extreme value.
Might I suggest Craft Wondrous Item. You get to make your items for half the purchase price, and get whatever you need. This is very useful if you can only get what is in the books and is insanely good if your dm allows you to design your own items.
If you do not like item crafting, Extend Spell is great for summoning and Spell Mastery has alot of flavor and when you need it, nothing else will do.
First, remember that in-combat healing is usually a waste. Most encounters you would be better off attacking and ending the fight that much sooner.
That said, I would suggest that the summoner go for UMD and a wand of CLW. If you had to heal in combat, the summoner could use an action to do so, while the eidolon could still attack. Alternately, if noone will go with UMD, give them plenty of potions and let them use them outside of combat to heal.
An out of game option is to check your local game or comic shop for anyone looking for a game. You might get a healer and might even get a new friend.
First, you should talk to your player. Both of you need to remember that not every encounter has to be about killing something. I played in a campaign with a 2 character party, both rogues, and we had alot of fun with stealth and traps without actually fighting. The best encounter of the whole campaign was in the second session, when while searching the sewers for a rival gang's hideout, we stumbled over and accidently freed a mummy. We were only level 3 (started at that level) and could not hope to fight it. So we ended up leading it on a chase through the sewers, into traps and creatures we had avoided on the way in and finally trapped it between a sewer grate and a caved-in tunnel. The encounter was way beyond us as a combat, but was not unbeatable when we realized we did not have to kill everything.
That reminds me, consider starting your characters above level one. I alway felt that characters were not ready to leave their teacher's apron-strings until at least level 3.
First, you have to go with Leadership for the roadie-cohort and the groupies. You need to focus on Intimidate for that metal attitude, and Improved Sunder is a must for smashing amps with your guitar and trashing your hotel rooms. You need to abuse potions for buffing, so definitely look at the Accelerated Drinker trait. Also do not forget Endurance for those four day party binges.
I would suggest either a wizard or the sorcerer-sage as your other class, except that on the levels where magus would not advance your BAB you multiclass the wizard/sorcerer side with a full BAB class such as fighter or ranger. This would give your gestalt a full BAB as well as either some bonus feats or some nice ranger abilities. For example:
At level 20 you will be Magus20/Wizard15-Fighter5 with full magus abilities, level 8 wizard spells, full BAB and 3 bonus fighter feats.
I would strongly recommend not doing this, because it does not work at all. Please read over the gestalt rules more carefully. You do not compare the benefits level-by-level; you compare both sides of the gestalt as a whole. A Magus 6 // Fighter 2 / Wizard 4 would have a BAB of +4, because Magus 6 has a BAB of +4 and Fighter 2 / Wizard 4 has a BAB of +4.
You could be right, I have not read the gestalt rules in a while, and may have misremembered. If so, then I would suggest bard for some nice skills and class abilities plus some versatility in spells.
Actually, after reviewing the gestalt rules, I think I had the rules right in my first post. Each time you level you choose two classes and get the better of the BAB progressions. The levels where you multiclass fighter gives the fighter BAB progression for that level regardless of what progression you were using before.
Rogue4/ Fighter2 for +5 BAB, good weapons and armor, 2d6 sneak attack, 2 rogue talents, and 2 fighter feats among other stuff.
Arcane Duelist Bard6 for good skills, nice spells, and decent combat.
Paladin6 for combat and very good saves.
I actually played in a game for 3 years that only advanced 1 level per real world year of playing (though we started at level 5). I found that you can have plenty of fun with a character without worrying about leveling, and the 5-6-7 range is great for being capable, but still having to think things through.
Love the guide, treantmonk, but it does need some updating. I noticed that Ultimate Magic had some very noteworthy feats for a Mystic Druid. The wild speech feat would essentially let you use wands in certain forms. The other summoning feats were interesting as well specifically superior summoning.
I would also like to know what you thought about the storm druid archetype as well. Does having 3 domains but no summoning powers sound like a fair tradeoff?
The thing about treantmonk's guides... is that it's not about armchair theorycrafting. He writes about what he's actually played, which is why he never wrote a guide for every class. There's just too much now to cover. Each class is not just one classm it's bunch of classes with archetypes.
But that's not really a problem. If you go beyond just reading the text and get the logic behind it, you can use it to apply his thought process to just about any of the archetypes of each class.
TM's guides are not a bible to come to for wisdom. What they are are stepping stones to get you to think for yourselves. And you may very well find out that your answers will vary on occasion.
How dare you ask us to think for ourselves? What, do you think we are the kind of people that spend hours upon hours, and large sums of money, on a hobby that encourages both logical and creative thinking? The very nerve, sir.
That said, the druid is not my favorite class, but I would play the core druid over any of the UM archetypes, with the possible exception of the saurian shaman. The core is nicely versatile, but I have a child-like joy at the idea of a dinosaur companion and the mechanics seem strong enough not to be a disadvantage.
I think you could be mechanically solid, but more importantly, I love the flavor of this character. I usually try to make my characters good at either Diplomacy or Intimidate just for roleplay reasons. So you have this hardcore bounty hunter so scary that the enemy basically defeats itself out of pure fear. That's awesome!
I love anything multiclassed with rogue. Lots of skill points and class skills, sneak attack (even at 1d6) is a nice situational boost, and trapfinding is always useful. The only exceptions are full casters that focus on spells, such as wizards or sorcerers. Note that some full casters, notably cleric and druid, are not always casting focused and can use the rogue levels.
I would suggest either a wizard or the sorcerer-sage as your other class, except that on the levels where magus would not advance your BAB you multiclass the wizard/sorcerer side with a full BAB class such as fighter or ranger. This would give your gestalt a full BAB as well as either some bonus feats or some nice ranger abilities. For example:
At level 20 you will be Magus20/Wizard15-Fighter5 with full magus abilities, level 8 wizard spells, full BAB and 3 bonus fighter feats.
I would strongly recommend not doing this, because it does not work at all. Please read over the gestalt rules more carefully. You do not compare the benefits level-by-level; you compare both sides of the gestalt as a whole. A Magus 6 // Fighter 2 / Wizard 4 would have a BAB of +4, because Magus 6 has a BAB of +4 and Fighter 2 / Wizard 4 has a BAB of +4.
You could be right, I have not read the gestalt rules in a while, and may have misremembered. If so, then I would suggest bard for some nice skills and class abilities plus some versatility in spells.
Give each of them the Eldritch Heritage (Arcane) Feat tree, then just watch as they always have the tools for every situation, all the time. Always rocking a +X to hit/damage (which stacks with Word Striker), -X to enemy hit/damage, Sneak Attacking, trap disabling, counterspelling, the Duelist can be an adequate group defender if built the right way, everybody can heal and Use Magic Device...
Okay, I admit, this might not be as powerful as my idea, but I would love to play in this group, especially if you flavor it less as an adventuring party and more as a performing troupe that accidently finds adventures.
and make them a dwarven heavy metal band?
Only if your DM will let you supply the game's soundtrack. I'm thinking Disturbed and ManO'War.
Gives you 19 level spell casting in wizard,bonus Met magic and combat feats .Great BaB and the EK's Spell critical .
You can't gestalt prestige classes.
Actually, if your are using the 3.5 Unearthed Arcana gestalt, you can gestalt prestige classes except for the ones that are essentially just a combo of two base classes, such as mystic theurge or Arcane Trickster. (if you aren't using those rules, please tell me what rules you are using)
Give each of them the Eldritch Heritage (Arcane) Feat tree, then just watch as they always have the tools for every situation, all the time. Always rocking a +X to hit/damage (which stacks with Word Striker), -X to enemy hit/damage, Sneak Attacking, trap disabling, counterspelling, the Duelist can be an adequate group defender if built the right way, everybody can heal and Use Magic Device...
Okay, I admit, this might not be as powerful as my idea, but I would love to play in this group, especially if you flavor it less as an adventuring party and more as a performing troupe that accidently finds adventures.
If the party must all be full casters, I would go with:
1 Druid (wildshape for melee)
1 wizard (Conjuration for battlefield control and summoning for melee)
2 Clerics (for massive buffing as well as decent melee)
1 Witch (for additional debuffing goodness)
If partial casters are allowed:
1 Druid (again use wildshape for melee)
1 Wizard (nothing better for battlefield control)
1 Summoner (either synethesist or master summoner for melee goodness)
1 Alchemist (bombing expert for some nice blasting with good buff and melee sub-options, also has some good skills)
1 Cleric (for buffing and debuffing purposes)
Both options have a most or all of the roles filled, with extra healing and buffing to make up the difference.
so what would you take as a magus as your second half of a gestalt if you wanted to maximize the whole spell blade that the magus is?
things to keep in mind is the broad study arcana, and his lower bab
i was thinking either a fighter to maximize his physical side and pick up wands for extra spellstrikes. or a sorcerer which i know has some major mad there but we have the stats to be alright with that, like i have two 18's and a 16 so it could be pretty easy to pull off a mad character also there is the sage bloodline that makes that issue disapear. either way your suggestions would be welcome.
I would suggest either a wizard or the sorcerer-sage as your other class, except that on the levels where magus would not advance your BAB you multiclass the wizard/sorcerer side with a full BAB class such as fighter or ranger. This would give your gestalt a full BAB as well as either some bonus feats or some nice ranger abilities. For example:
The idea of the apothecary (this particular one) is the classic idea of an herbalist/natural cure/etc. maker, but one that understands the use of less noble methods of protection.
I have yet to playtest it, so I can't speak to its relative power, but I'd like to get some input on it first. I've talked with a couple friends about some balance issues, and they've helped get it more in line, so I'm checking with a more open forum now. The fluff is pretty flexible, so I'm mainly looking for crunch feedback.
Apothecary:
Apothecary (Alchemist)
More in touch with power found in nature, apothecaries excel at creating natural remedies for bolstering allies and subtle poisons for those who cross them.
Class Skills: Apothecaries add Knowledge (nature) and Knowledge (local) and remove Appraise and Disable Device from their list of class skills.
Natural Remedies (Su): Each time an apothecary adds new formulae to his formula book for gaining a level, he selects a single spell from the druid spell list with a target of personal or touch with a spell level less than or equal to the highest level of formula the apothecary is capable of using. He adds this spell as a formula, using his Intelligence modifier in place of his Wisdom modifier, and his apothecary level as his caster level. Because of this training, however, his offensive potential is lower. His bombs are reduced to 1d4 damage, plus 1d4 damage for every odd-numbered level instead of 1d6.
This otherwise functions as and replaces the standard alchemist alchemy and bomb class features.
Toxic Bombs (Su): As a move action, an apothecary may add a dose of a contact or injury poison to a bomb. If a target takes damage from the bomb, the bomb and poison affect the target normally. Those that take damage from the splash are also required to make a save against the poison, but at a +4 bonus, and are only affected by the primary effect.
This replaces the mutagen class ability (an apothecary cannot create a mutagen unless he selects the mutagen discovery).
Nature Affinity (Ex): An apothecary gains a bonus equal to 1/2 his apothecary level on Knowledge (nature) checks.
This replaces the 2nd-level discovery class feature.
Tailored Toxins (Ex): An apothecary can tailor his poisons to his allies, lowering their chance of being affected. Allies exposed to an apothecary's poisons gain a +1 bonus on saves against them for every five levels the apothecary has, for a total of +4 at level 20.
This replaces the 6th-level discovery class feature.
Discoveries: The following discoveries complement the apothecary: combine extracts, dilution, infusion, malignant poison, poison conversion, precise bombs.
