After a long wait, I finally have some players to DM for (yay!) and I'm at long last able to get started running the Age of Worms.
Since many of you are probably quite far along (or even finished) with the adventure path, I'd like to pick your brains if I may. Would some of you be so kind as to suggest some prestige classes that have worked well in AoW? I want to suggest some possibilities to my players so that they can be thinking about entry requirements right from the beginning.
I'll be setting the adventure in Eberron. We haven't had our first session yet, so no characters have been rolled up. But I'm sure there will be a ranger and a cleric in the party (as suggested in the first installment, The Whispering Cairn). I may try to convince somebody to play a psionic character, but that's iffy at this point as none of the players have any experience with that. Also, feel free to suggest any other base classes besides cleric and ranger that work especially well for AoW.
Here are the books I have to work with (that I own):
Player's Handbook
Dungeon Master's Guide
Monster Manual
Complete Warrior
Complete Adventurer
Complete Arcane
Complete Divine
Complete Psionic
Libris Mortis
Lords of Madness
Fiend Folio
Fiendish Codex I: Hordes of the Abyss
Eberron Campaign Setting
Sharn: City of Towers
Five Nations
Explorer's Handbook
Magic of Eberron
Races of Eberron
Player's Guide to Eberron
Secrets of Xen'drik
Faiths of Eberron
Book of Vile Darkness
Book of Exalted Deeds
Expanded Psionics Handbook
Dungeon Master's Guide II
Player's Handbook II
Dragon Magic
My players have these supplements (to the best of my knowledge):
Draconomicon
Races of Stone
Thanks!
Thanks for the suggestion :)
To add to my original question, just how much emphasis should I put on this being an "undead campaign", for the purpose of recommending PrCs? I've only read as far as installment 4, "The Hall of Harsh Reflections". I know there are a lot of undead early in the adventure, and a big bad undead at the end (Dragotha), but what about in-between?
If you're playing in Eberron, I'd encourage checking out the prestige classes in the Eberron campaign setting, to give the gameplay a more "eberron" feel. I'm playing in an Eberron campaign right now, and am looking forward to the Extreme Explorer prestige class. I would recommend this one highly, as it puts more control over certain luck-related events, while keeping the dangerous and suspenseful feel I believe the AP has.
All of the characters in my own AoW campaign went the prestige class route. (But who doesn't these days!) One of the most influential prestige class combinations has been from our kobold diviner. Now at 19th level, he took six levels (I think) of Divine Oracle (Comp. Div.), four levels of Fatespinner (Comp. Arc.), and four levels of Master Specialist (Comp. Mage?). This combo of prestige classes has allowed him to define his character as a true master of knowledge.
Other prestige classes that have worked well for us include Spellsword (Comp. War.) and Eldritch Knight (DMG), and both were taken by our resident elven fighter/wizard, to give him a versatile mix of melee combat and spell use to augment his fighter skills. Our bard took Seeker of the Song, which has helped with extra offense, flexible supernatural abilities, and energy resistance. My own cleric has finished the five-level prestige class Sacred Purifier (Libris Mortis)--great for using turn attempts to empower strikes against undead.
The same cleric also took levels from one of the most interesting prestige classes for this campaign--and one of the most appropriate--Wormhunter, from Dragon #338. This prestige class seems to work best for melee-oriented characters, (with clerics, fighters, and rogues in particular) and can drive home the threat of Kyuss at a personal level. If you can, try to encourage at least veteran players to consider it. It's not too flashy, but very appropriate.
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After a long wait, I finally have some players to DM for (yay!) and I'm at long last able to get started running the Age of Worms.
Since many of you are probably quite far along (or even finished) with the adventure path, I'd like to pick your brains if I may. Would some of you be so kind as to suggest some prestige classes that have worked well in AoW? I want to suggest some possibilities to my players so that they can be thinking about entry requirements right from the beginning.
While it is not available as a PrC until after The Champion's Belt, but far and away the best PrC class for AoW is the Wormhunter. It appears in the Worm Food section of Dragon #338.
Their big schtick is, when properly constructed, the Wormhunter will be able to inflict criticals and sneak attack damage on the undead.
Given the unrelenting nature of the undead in the series from Spire of Long Shadows onward, many pure combat classes like the Fighter or Rogue may feel quite frustrated by an inability to deal a critical hit. The Wormhunter PrC potentially restores the combat balance somewhat for those players.
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Thanks for the suggestion :)
To add to my original question, just how much emphasis should I put on this being an "undead campaign", for the purpose of recommending PrCs? I've only read as far as installment 4, "The Hall of Harsh Reflections". I know there are a lot of undead early in the adventure, and a big bad undead at the end (Dragotha), but what about in-between?
I don't remember any undead in HoHR. The Champion's Belt has an undead as the final battle, but it's a combat-heavy adventure, and that's the ony one. A Gathering of Winds has at least one, but it can be negotiated with, I think. My memory is somewhat hazy. The Spire of Long Shadows has lots of undead. A Prince of Redhand has about half of it where if you get into a fight, you have failed, and no undead that must be fought. The Library of Last Resort has almost no undead, at least until the end, as it was built to keep them out. Kings of the Rift also has almost no undead (but more than a score of live dragons, all hostile).Into the Wormcrawl Fissure has Dragotha. Dawn of a New Age has plenty of undead, all of them hostile.
After a long wait, I finally have some players to DM for (yay!) and I'm at long last able to get started running the Age of Worms.
Since many of you are probably quite far along (or even finished) with the adventure path, I'd like to pick your brains if I may. Would some of you be so kind as to suggest some prestige classes that have worked well in AoW? I want to suggest some possibilities to my players so that they can be thinking about entry requirements right from the beginning.
The number one and number two foes that appear in this adventure path are undead and aberrations.
A ranger would do well to take aberrations as his first favored enemy; it fits in with the Bronzewood Lodge, making it easy to work up the character's background, and is useful throughout the path. Undead as the second favored enemy and dragons as the third are probably the best choices. There is also a nice longsword/shortsword set that appears later, so ranger/tempest can work well.
A cleric with the Sun domain is a very good thing to have. The best prestige class choices would be radiant servant and sacred exorcist.
The rest of the party can be filled in as the players wish, for the most part. However, making sure all the bases are covered (arcane spells, combat, divine spells, trapfinding) is extremely important. Also, try to stress teamwork on your players. There are numerous difficult encounters that can spell doom for a poorly prepared party or one that doesn't use sound group tactics.
Well so far our group of 8 characters is trending towards the following prestige classes:
Dwarf Barbarian/Fighter - Pious Templar
Dwarf Cleric - War Priest or none
Human Wizard - Arch mage
Elf Cleric - Heirophant
Elf Rogue/Wizard - Arcane Archer
Human Fighter/Dragon Shaman - none
Human Cleric - Elemental Archon (slightly modified from the Forgotten Realms to summon elementals of various sizes rather than mephits)
Human Paladin/Rogue - Worm Hunter (from Dragon Magazine Worm food supplement)
I hope that helps, I'm rather partial to the Tempest Prestige class from Complete Adventurer, it makes a good match with a ranger, or ranger/rogue, or fighter/rogue.
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To add to my original question, just how much emphasis should I put on this being an "undead campaign", for the purpose of recommending PrCs? I've only read as far as installment 4, "The Hall of Harsh Reflections". I know there are a lot of undead early in the adventure, and a big bad undead at the end (Dragotha), but what about in-between?
About 25% of encounters in Age of Worms are against undead. I took the time to list down and score every non-random encounter, keeping in mind that some encounters were harder or more important. I came up with the following:
Undead: 25% (every adventure)
Aberrations: 8% (9 adventures)
Monstrous Humanoids: 8% (most in 2nd and 4th adventures)
Reptilian Humanoids: 8% (all in 3rd adventure)
Dragons: 7% (most in 10th adventure)
Magical Beasts: 6% (9 adventures)
Evil Outsiders: 5% (9 adventures)
Humans: 5% (5 adventures)
Other: 28%
Whispering Cairn: Undead & Elementals
Three Faces of Evil: Monstrous Humanoids & Humans
Encounter at Blackwall Keep: Reptilian Humanoids
Hall of Harsh Reflections: Monstrous Humanoids, Aberrations, & Elves
Champion's Belt: Undead & Humans
Gathering of Winds: Elementals
Spire of Long Shadows: Undead & Aberrations
Prince of Redhand: N/A
Library of Last Resort: Magical Beasts & Undead
Kings of the Rift: Dragons & Giants
Into the Wormcrawl Fissure: Undead & Aberrations
Dawn of a New Age: Undead & Evil Outsiders
Undead make major appearances in the 1st, 5th, 7th, 9th, 11th, and 12th adventures. A ranger/wormhunter with an undead bane weapon can definately deal out lots of damage throughout most of the adventure path.
I would like to second the Radiant Servant of Pelor - it has insane healing abilities and great turning undead abilities.
You would have to adapt it to the Sovereign Host or Silver Flame.
Contributor, RPG Superstar 2008 Top 6
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I would like to second the Radiant Servant of Pelor - it has insane healing abilities and great turning undead abilities.
You would have to adapt it to the Sovereign Host or Silver Flame.
Note that a lot of people do radiant servant healing wrong: they only empower/maximize Healing domain spells, NOT clerical spells that happen to also be in the Healing domain. So if you prepare a cure moderate wounds spell in a domain slot, it benefits, cast spontaneously or prepared it does not, because those are not domain spells. There is one way to get extra uses out of it - domain spontaneity - but this method uses up a turn attempt each time.
"When a radiant servant of Pelor of at least 2nd level casts _a domain spell_ from the Healing domain..."
(see also the definition of "domain spell" in the PH appendix - read the whole entry, the last sentence confirms that spells that are not in domain slots are not domain spells)
Russ
At later levels, and especially at the endgame, Entropomancer (Complete Divine) becomes abysmally powerful, due to the extra precision gained with the deadly Sphere.
A canny entropomancer could hide a sphere inside of herself, use death ward and freedom of movement to get safely close to Kyuss, and then begin ripping him to shreds.
Overall, while there are many ways to negate the sphere, a smart character can prevent most of them, and an etropomancer can generally do one better and negate them all.
I'd suggest you to gently nudge a player into 2 weapon fighting because they will love the weapons of Icosiol.
Tempest is the best PrC for that.
Master Specialist (Comp. Mage), Archmage (DMG) are always good for an arcane caster.
Wormhunter is very good for this AP.
I'd suggest you to gently nudge a player into 2 weapon fighting because they will love the weapons of Icosiol.
Tempest is the best PrC for that.
Our party's bard doesn't have any training with two-weapon fighting, and is still using Icosiol's weapons, because of how awesome they are. Mithril aside, they have fantastic abilities, and wonderful campaign flavor. I could only fathom what a tempest would do with them.
Hello, everyone.
I would like to second the Radiant Servant of Pelor - it has insane healing abilities and great turning undead abilities.
You would have to adapt it to the Sovereign Host or Silver Flame.
I'm currently DMing AoW for a group of 5 players, using Eric Boyd's conversion notes for Fortgotten Realms. One of the PCs is now a Radiant Server of Lathander (our version of Radiant Server of Pelor). I've made the following changes:
1) In this campaign (AoW), I'm using the "Variant Turning Rules: Destruction of the Undead" option (CDiv, pg 87): 1d6 damage/cleric level, 30 ft radius, Will save (DC 10 + cleric level + CHA modifier) for half damage.
2) Since turning undead now causes damage, I had to change the Extra Greater Turnig ability. Now, whenever the Radiant Server of Lathander performs a greater turning, the granted power of the Sun domain (undead creatures that would be turned are destroyed instead), the damage is multiplied by 1.5.
3) Lathander doesn't have the Healing domain, so I changed the Empower, Maximize and Supreme Healing class features using the example presented here (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/ebmoh/20050311). Essentially, it amounts to this:
For the empower healing, maximize healing, and supreme healing abilities, instead of affecting domain spells from the healing domain, it allows the radiant servant to prepare (thus they cannot choose these spells spontaneously) as many as half its class level divine conjuration (healing) spells each day with the effects. For example, a 10th-level Radiant Servant of Lathander can prepare 5 divine conjuration (healing) spells of any level that are affected as though by both the Empower Spell and Maximize Spell feats. Those spells do not use up a higher-level slot.
4) The Positive Energy Burst class feature now causes maximized damage (6 points/class level), Will save (DC 10 + class level + CHA modifier) for half damage. It still uses up two turning attempts.
This character was _very_ effective against the undead monsters in the Spire of Long Shadows. :)
Our party's bard doesn't have any training with two-weapon fighting, and is still using Icosiol's weapons, because of how awesome they are.I'd suggest you to gently nudge a player into 2 weapon fighting because they will love the weapons of Icosiol.
Tempest is the best PrC for that.
I hope that bard isn't chaotic...that negative level can be a tough burden to carry.
In my game it looks has if the bard will take them too...happy coincidence!
Hunter of the Dead (Complete Divine) might be a good choice as well. And any arcane or divine PrC that makes it possible to control undead--if you can do this without succumbing to the temptations that drove Kyuss to become what he is. Mwahahaha!