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Let me start by saying that I have no free time and with that no free time I read the rules.
I haven't had a chance to read the source book or the APG although I have them both. I have been making due with my once vast knowledge of 3.5, much of which does still apply. But right now I am in a crunch and only have a few days to get a character together and I'm tired of the relatively cookie cutter ones I've been throwing up just to get by.
I'm looking to assemble a control arcane spell caster, 10th level. I've no good ideas of yet, especially in the domain of magic items. Again, the character would be a control caster, not a boom stick. Although we all love to drop a dozen dice, and okay, I do really want to, I'm looking to be a support spell caster for the party...
I've been out of the game (literally) for over a year and want to show that I can, even if I can't and wasn't, be a team player ;).
Tips on Magic Items and perhaps some suggestions on prestige will be the most useful, although spells are also always welcome because we all see something in a spell others do not. Thanks for any help. Don't worry about something being too complicated.
First thing is first. The wizard is still the end all be all of the arcane control master. Pathfinder did a great job of taking him out of the "nuker" throne and put him squarely where (I personally think) he belongs, as a battlefield control specialist and skill jockey. If that is what you want to do, be a wizard. I am going to give my advice assuming you follow it. Specialization is really up to your tastes and what kind of spells will be your bread and butter. My personal new favorite is the Phantasm sub-school of illusion, which allows you to cause any creature you touch to go bat-sh!t crazy and provoke attack of opportunity with no save involved. That in addition to your AOE slow effect that flanks all targets inside of it (your rogue will LOVE you).
You should have something like 62k in wealth to spend. Assuming 2k is spend on mundane gear like weapons, armor, healing potions, and the like that leaves you with 60 grand to spend. With that much money there is no excuse not to have every single level 0-2 spell in your spellbook, most level 3 spells, half of level 4, and a good dent into level 5 spells.
The prices for each spell are as follows.
0-5g
1-10g
2-40g
3-90g
4-160g
5-250g
There is a community member who put together an amazing website to help build spell lists easily. Perram's Spellbook helps by making easy to print spell cards with all applicable rules, allows you to hand pick the spells you want, and all done in an easy intuitive way that a 5 year old could pull off.
Don't forget, it is often smart to make an emergency spellbook with your most used spells in it as a backup, just in case.
I wont pretend like I want to do the math, so I wont but you should still have PLENTY of moolah left. First thing you should get is a Handy Haversack, at least 1-2 bags of holding. Probably a ring with +4 int. A pearl of power for first and second levels, and a nice FAT stack of scrolls with various useful spells scribed on them. You know the type, things that you wont want to prepare but would be nice in a pinch. Things like animate rope, or spiderclimb (If the rogue doesnt have boots of it already), suggestion, various wall spells, a few different sleep spells... you get the idea.
The neat thing is as long as you take the appropriate item creation feats you can halve the price of all of those magic items you want to make, so your buck goes a lot farther.
As for race that is very much up to you, I like the new dwarf options especially the Magic Resistance at level 1 but keep in mind it does make concentration a bit harder. Human is actually not a bad choice.
As for feats, you should already know the story if you are experienced with 3.5 but if you take an elder race and take Breadth of Experience that gives a PC (effectively) +25-30 to his various skills. One that (still) sticks out is craft construct if you have the funds to pay for the thing it will be a great boon to you.
You can also tweak your mental stats a little bit if you choose to play an older character as well, with the -1/+1 across the board for each level of starting at middle age. Just something to think about.
I would also highly recommend going with the familiar, the bonded item just isn't very good. Plus it opens you up to take Imp familiar, which has a LOT of synergy with craft construct if you take the homunculus as your familiar.
I hope this helps :D
This is a must-read for you Treantmonk's Guide to Wizard Optimization.
It has everything you're looking for. Feats, spells, items, all geared toward being a control-type wizard of all levels up through level 20.
Everything you need to know in one handy place.
Probably not much in there about the APG yet, but once you grasp what the master is teaching you, it won't be difficult to apply APG concepts to base idea.
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Probably not much in there about the APG yet, but once you grasp what the master is teaching you, it won't be difficult to apply APG concepts to base idea.
Oh man, I don't envy Treat one bit now that the APG dropped. With the expectation mounting for him to revise all of those guides... I know I would personally melt under that heatlamp.
I like most of what Metric wrote, but a couple counterpoints:
1. I like the bonded item, but not one you have to hold. A bonded sword means you don't have a free hand for holding a wand or rod while still being able to cast spells with Somatic components. So stick with a ring or an amulet. It's not a bad option. Sure, familiar might be more useful, but it's also more of a liability a lot of the time. And it's hard to scoff at one free spell each day - especially since it can be your highest level of spell and you don't even have to prepare it.
My wizard has a bonded ring and I love it. I never have to prepare spells like Feather Fall, Tongues, etc. Sure, those spells are rarely used, so if you prepare them, you could go to bed every night with those spells still sitting in your brain, uncast, day after day. Instead, I prepare the good stuff that I know I will almost certainly need, and if I do happen to fall off a cliff, then I'll cast Feather Fall from my ring.
When you think about, that little bonded item might save you a half dozen spell slots. You might have one each of several of those rarely used spells stowed in slots and never getting used.
It's one Get-Out-Of-Jail-Free card and I love it.
2. The other point of contention is the notion that you can take Magic Item crafting feats to "halve the price of all of those magic items you want to make, so your buck goes a lot farther".
Many GMs won't allow you to do that (I wouldn't). The reason (aside from game balance) is that you weren't born 10th level with 62,000 GP in your pocket. You adventured for it. Along the way, you probably found some magic items. If you liked them, you kept them. If you didn't need them, you sold them for about half of their value.
It breaks down somewhat like this:
Let's say half of your 62,000 GP was items you actually wanted. Ring of Protection, Cloak of Resistance, Haversack, Blessed Book (make sure you get one!), etc. That leaves you 31,000 GP to spend on making your own stuff.
But you really didn't find 31,000 gp lying around in dungeons. You probably found a couple other rings you don't need, maybe a magic crossbow you sold, etc. Let's say 20,000 gp of your remaining "unspent" wealth came from unwanted magic items, or magic items you used at lower level but replaced when you found better stuff. That leaves you with 11,000 gp in actual free coin.
So you sell that magic stuff for 10,000 gold because you only get half value for it. Add that to your 11,000 gold and you have 21,000 gold to spend on making magical equipment for yourself.
That means you can actually make stuff worth a total of 42,000 gold Add that to your 31,000 gold worth of stuff you already have, and you end up with 73,000 gold value of total gear - after making as much of your own stuff as you can.
Remember, you began with 62,000 gp and end up with 73,000 gp. That's a nice little profit, without a doubt. But it is not even close to halving the price of all your items so your starting gold will go twice as far.
Yes, I know, I made assumptions about how much you kept and how much you sold. But those seem like reasonable assumptions for someone who had a typical adventuring career up to 10th level.
Ultimately, it's up to your DM. Me, I usually say crafting your own items cannot give you more than a 20% increase to your starting wealth. Your DM may have a different view on this (I know this has been kicked around on these forums a lot, and a lot of DMs do something similar to what I do, a lot of them just don't let you craft your starting items, and some of them allow you do actually double your starting coin - the community is all over the place on this one).
My point on crafting your magic items really boils down to this: ask your DM; don't assume you can just double your gold.
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My point on crafting your magic items really boils down to this: ask your DM; don't assume you can just double your gold.
This is a very good point. Especially do so if you are considering any magic item creation feats.
Personally I wouldn't have any issue with a player trying to use this as an advantage esp since they would be required to actually take said feats and as you said they adventured and all that but in that same time it could just as easily be said that they always took time off to craft things.
This goes doubly for Craft Construct, if you are disallowed crafting pre-game then there is no reason to take this feat as I doubt you will be given the appropriate amount of time in game to make your menacing bodyguard.
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What do you think of the idea of a permanancy reduce person spell? It's 2500 for +2 dex, +1 ac, -2 strength. Right now I'm looking at a 10th level straight wizard with base stats of 7, 20, 12, 22, 8, 11. No significant hinderances, but huge on the int/dex without factoring in magic items.
Speaking of which, using magic item creation- not the feats just the setup- is there anything preventing stacking intelligence bonuses? For example could I do an amulet and a circlet of +2 intelligence giving up the slot but saving on the cost of a +4? There weren't rules about a lot of things in the past, and these techniques are great for protection bonuses. So a quick peek at the rules haven't shown me a "No" but it's not like it'd be a large section.
I... don't see the reason for investing in dex to that degree. A 14-16 alone would suffice for AC purposes and for your ray spells (Not that you will/should be using those types of spells). Putting any more into the stat is a waste IMO. Also, putting a negative mod into wisdom is just ASKING for your character to get disabled with a single spell. The only stats you should be worried about stacking up on is INT and CON to lesser extent, other than that you can give yourself a nice even distribution of +1 and +2's.
If you really want a size reduction and you have a nice DM you could see about possibly taking the Simple Young Template allowing you; Size decrease by one category; AC reduce natural armor by –2 (minimum +0); Attacks decrease damage dice by 1 step; Ability Scores –4 Strength, –4 Con, +4 size bonus to Dex.
Alike bonuses do not stack. You can only have 1 enhancement bonus which is what those items and spells give, so you will only benefit from the strongest occurrence. That said you can have an item that gives +4 Int, another that gives +2 Con, and a belt that gives +6 Str.
Be careful stacking Dex and dropping Str.
At 5 Str your medium load is only 17 lbs, and heavy is 34. Under a medium load you only get a max of +3 Dex to AC, so your Dex of 22 is mostly wasted.
That is assuming your GM cares about encumbrance.
Personally, I don't watch encumbrance too closely for most characters, but if you intentionally dumped Str, I'm gonna make sure you deal with the consequences of that.