| prileska |
My friend is a GM and he wants me to play with him and the guys. We aren't doing the mythic route, apparently. I can use whatever I want (yay) as long as I can back up with a source online or in a book.
The concept I want, after looking around, is eventually ending with the Armor Bonded (http://tinyurl.com/bondedprc). I thought having a skin tight suit of full plate, the metal separating itself as my mouth opens etc, to be really cool. Then, of course, I saw the Kyton bloodline for Bloodragers (imagine the armor bonded covered in chains), and of course, the Dragon Disciple (with platinum [metal] wings). So, here's my idea; I'm sure you'll tear it apart as I'm pretty much a newb to this stuff, but here goes.
Start with Bloodrager to 5 (http://tinyurl.com/bloodragerhybrid). Archetype to Crossblooded and Steelblooded (Draconic/Kyton). Take a -2 hit to Will saves (boo), get some mythril fullplate @ 9AC, +4 Max Dex, -2 ACP, 25ft speed and no spell failure. At level 5, have claws, resist cold 5, +1 AC from draconic resistance.
Grab the 10 levels in DD and 1 more in Bloodrager, getting +3 nat AC, a bite, +4 Str, +2 Con, +2 Int, 3 bonus feats, breath attack, wings, and bloodline levels to give me (at 16) resist cold 10 and +4 AC from draconic resistance, resist cold 10 more and +8 ac from armor of chains, more breath attacks, and agony's embrace gives me +2 Str bonus when hit by crits. I end my bloodline leveling at 16, capstone for kyton is dr/10 good and silver, and cold immune (which isn't too great since I have a lot of resist anyway), or Dragon gives me immune to sleep and paralysis which I'll give up (the agony's embrace isn't too great either, but it's 2 more ac from draconic, and 4 more from Kyton, soooo).
Anyways, then move to the cool Armor Bonded which negates speed penalty from armor (so I'll move at 35ft), can sleep in it without penalty, don't need to ever take it off or anything as it's part of my skin, ACP is reduced again by 2 and max dex is increased by 1, plus my class level (5), so: Mythril Fullplate, +9AC, Max Dex +8, –0 ACP, 0% fail.
Add it all up: 10 +9 from armor, +3 from DD, +8 from Kyton chains, +4 from Draconic resistance for 34 AC. BAB is 18/13/8/3, with saves at 13/7/7. Some spells (3/2/1/1), with a caster level of 12 I think.
Is this good, or do you have suggestions on a better build with a similar concept? Or does the concept suck and is not viable at all?
Could I put a spiked chain somewhere in there for flavor or just stick with natural weapons?
Also, I have no real idea on feats. And I have 9 more levels to work with, but once I have a level 30 character I can show him for approval and we will all start at level 1.
Any help is appreciated!
nennafir
|
For a melee natural attacking build, look no further than the Goliath Druid.
You can 24/7 be a regenerating (so you NEVER die unless--if you choose the right troll--you are hit with fire and/or acid and/or sonic) troll with natural attacks. Since it is by giant form, you can keep all of your equipment. Giant form II also gives +8 bonus to strength, and you can be in it 24/7.
Also, you are full caster level as a druid.
For traits, take both magical lineage and wayang spellhunter for frostbite. That gets you empowered for free. You can add rime and quicken metamagic later, and any other metamagic you want.
I would start with this as a base and choose rage subdomain. Have 20 STR at level 1 and okayish (say 14) wisdom. Have good CON, like 18ish at the beginning. Don't worry about your other stats---tank them.
On this Druid 20 base, add whatever other prestige classes you want for flavor. Don't do bloodrager--you already have rage subdomain and are a full caster.
| Scott Wilhelm |
You can 24/7 be a regenerating (so you NEVER die unless--if you choose the right troll
That is friggin' awesome, but
For a melee natural attacking build, look no further than the Goliath Druid.
I must disagree.
Since it is by giant form, you can keep all of your equipment.
True, and awesome, but being able to keep all your gear and use it normally doesn't make you an awesome natural attacker. It doesn't diminish that Goliath Druids are awesome, but if Natural Attacking is the way the OP wants to go, I don't recommend turning into a Giant. I recommend turning into a Troll so you can supersize your regular weapons! And Regenerate 5 is awesome.
But if I wanted to really max out the damage I do with Natural Attacks, I'd turn into a Giant Octopus! 8 Tentacles, 1 Bite. I'd take a level in Warpriest, so the Base Damage is 1d6 (Sacred Weapon Damage) at Size Medium, 1d8 at Size Large until I buff myself with a Strong Jaw Spell or Wand, raising the Damage/Atack to 3d6. All the Tentacles get Grab and Constrict, so that means you don't get 9 Attacks: you get 17. I'd have Octopus-shaped Barding Armor made for myself, which I'd put on upon transforming, with Armor Spikes: 1d8 (+bonuses) per successful Grapple. I'd take Hamatula Strike so the Bite Attack gets a Grapple, too. I'd dip a level in White Haired Witch and Add a Hair Attack. I'd get a Helm of the Mammoth Lord and get a Gore Attack. I'd dip a level or 2 in Monk or Brawler and take 2 Weapon and take Snake Style so my Unarmed Strikes count as Piercing and benefit from Hamatula Strike, too. So Gore, Hair, Bite, 8 Tentacles, + 2 Unarmed Strikes = 13 Attacks X Grab and Constrict = 26 Attacks/round! all doing a base 3d6 damage. To make this work, you need take only 4-5 levels in Druid, the 5 if you want to be able to cast Strong Jaw yourself and not rely upon the Wand. If you take Shaping Focus, up to 4 of your Nondruid levels count as Druid levels, so you can turn into an Octopus by level 6 and an Allosaurus by level 8. Or a 2 Headed Troll by level 12 with at least 8 levels in Druid. If you keep adding more levels in Warpriest, your base damage keeps going up, and your Wildshape and Strong Jaw will keep raising your Size by 3-4 places.
Tentacles are Secondary Natural Weapons, you have to take Multiattack to reduce the -5 Attack penalty to a tolerable -2.
Still other quite respectable options for piling on the Natural Attack Damage are Megaraptor: Bite, 2Claws + 2 Talons, and Allosaurus 1 Bite & 2 Claws, but Size Huge. But Goliath Druids can do Dinosaurs, too. Similar options would include Dire Tiger and Warcat.
Like I said, I have new respect for Goliath Druid, but for heaping on the Natural Attacks, go Giant Octopus!
| Scott Wilhelm |
I can use whatever I want (yay) as long as I can back up with a source online or in a book.
Ohhhhh, dear.
Does that mean you can any d20 source, or do you have to stick to Pathfinder?
Because if you can go with any d20, Ohhhh, dear! .
Your DPR just might go into the thousands. And I do think I just might go Goliath Druid for this. Or play a Thri-Kreen...
| Scott Wilhelm |
I like working in an inexpensive and devastating build feature in my melee characters, a Grappling feature.
There is a Cavalier, Order of the Pentitent ability called Expert Captor. With Expert Captor, you can Tie Up a Grappled--not Pinned!--opponent, and you don't take the normal -10 when you do it. So, if you also take Greater Grapple, you might Initiate a Grapple as a Standard Action, then Tie Up your opponent as a Move Action. With Greater Grapple, your Grapple Mod is up to +4. If you take 4 levels in Alchemist, you can take Tentacle with Grap, +4, and grow a Crab Tumor Familiar for another +2. Take Infusion (Perhaps we are up to 6 levels in Alchemist, or we are taking Extra Discovery Feats.), and Use Share Spells and Touch Injection to give your Familiar an Infusion of True Strike. Put True Strike on yourself, and run up to your opponent (I mean run, not Run.). Then the next round, you Grapple as a Standard Action with an extra +20; your Familiar inject you with True Strike as a Readied Action, and you can Tie Up your opponent with an additional +20 again as a Move Action. You can quite plausibly bring your full-time GMB up to +30 even by level 10. So you will have a 90% chance of neutralizing any single target with a Grapple mod of under 50, or a 100% chance of neutralizing any opponent with a Grapple mod of 61, if someone in your party has Touch of Law. The Tarrasque has a GMD of 64.
Of course, this is completely undone by an opponent with Freedom of Movment, and it also means your character is under an oath to never kill. But I think the Feat-level cost is pretty low and makes a delicious part of this nutritious breakfast.
| prileska |
I'll take some of your suggestions, Alzhan, thanks for that. Nennafir and Scott, while those builds are impressive, they lose all of the flavor I was going for. I really enjoy the armor bonded concept, I don't have an interest in becoming a troll or octopus, really.
And Scott, as much as I'd like to pull from other sources, I meant in terms of Pathfinder.
I'm not looking for an overpowered optimized build. I'm looking for a viable build, with some of the flavor I listed. I'm not overly keen on turning into an oversized monster of a character. Enlarge self, yeah, that's neat, but turning into a giant or a troll or whatnot isn't appealing at all.
I was looking around a little and thought building on the Kyton theme would be neat too; losing the DD in favor of a more focused role utilizing a spiked chain (or dual wielding a spiked whip); so they'd be essentially an armor bonded covered in chains and making constant AoOs to trip and disarm using those chains (thematically, anyway). I'm sure it wouldn't be hard to use a spiked chain like a whip; maybe I'm wrong in that.
Thanks for the suggestions though.
| Scott Wilhelm |
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I'll take some of your suggestions, Alzhan, thanks for that. Nennafir and Scott, while those builds are impressive, they lose all of the flavor I was going for. I really enjoy the armor bonded concept, I don't have an interest in becoming a troll or octopus, really.
Well, I hope you found our ideas useful in some way, or at least entertaining. I didn't really get a sense of flavor that our suggestions deviated from: Bloodrager, and I have to admit, I don't really know what Armor Bonded is.
But,
I'm not looking for an overpowered optimized build.
Yes, you are. It's a level 30 adventure.
| Scott Wilhelm |
So, I have to admit, I didn't know about Armor Bonded until you showed it to me. Looking it over, I have to say I'm not super fond of the combination of Armor Bonded and Bloodrager.
I thought having a skin tight suit of full plate, the metal separating itself as my mouth opens etc, to be really cool.
I don't this will work very well with Bloodragerr. Bloodragers are limited to Light and Medium Armor. The Armor Bonded Ability to reduce Arcane Spell Failure is nice, but your character is supposed to have been wearing that armor for 2 levels. The reduction is 15%, but Full plate's Failure rate is 35%. I guess you can make it Mithral Full Plate and reduce it to 10%, and take the Arcane Armor Training Feat to knock it down to 0, or maybe 5%. That would work, especially if your party is starting at level 30, but I wouldn't like what that would do to my character's backstory, going without magic armor until I had 12,000gp for Mithral Full Plate, sweltering in that Full Plate for 2 levels with a high Arcane Spell Failure Chance until I could take levels in Armor Bonded, it feels very artificial to me.
I think playing a Dwarf turning into a Troll for your Natural Attacks and taking a 1 level dip in Paladin with the Gray Paladin Archetype so you can use a Wand of Swift Girding to dress quickly makes a lot more sense than what you have going on. But you don't want to do that.
So, how would you feel about playing a Tengu who have 2 claws and a bite full time? Take some levels in Warpriest and apply your Sacred Weapon Damage to your Natural Attacks, then go Armor Bonded to pump yourself up that way. Warpriests can wear Heay Armor, so you don't have to do any trickery to be an armored spellcaster.
Meanwhile, I also gave you a lot of other advice about how to make the most out of your Natural Attacks: a Helm of the Mammoth Lord and a level in White Haired Witch to give yourself more attacks. Hamatula Strike so every one of your Attacks turns into a Grapple Attack, etc. And that build relies heavily on Armor Spikes, which is in keeping with your theme of Armor Bonded, Natural Attacking, Spellcasting monster.
If you really like Arcane Spells, how would you feel about Magus? Magi can wear Heavy Armor by level 13.
| Alzhan |
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The steelblood bloodrager archetypes lets you wear heavy armor without arcane failure. No problem with spell failure
| prileska |
The helm and strike additions are neat, and I'll definitely look into those for sure. And yes, as Alzhan said, Steelblood allows heavy armor with no penalty and lower ACP.
It's also not for a level 30 adventure, he just asked us to show him what we would like our characters to eventually end up becoming so he can make sure the party is fairly balanced. We will be starting at level 1, but he wants to know what we hope to have our characters grow into (also so he can plan adventures that will counter our strengths and make it challenging too).
He's had some bad experiences in the past where a group member overpowered everything and caused the rest of the group to lose interest. He wants to ensure that everyone has a fun concept they want to play, but also to make sure that we are all fairly balanced.
He knows most of the other characters already, but we won't know who is playing what until we start (our characters wake up in a room with each other, with no recollection how we got there, amidst a war with two opposing factions who see us as enemies).
I know we have healing and ranged covered, that's about it. I am wanting a sort of tanky/damage hybrid. I thought the concept of a melee fighter with the heavy armor always appealing.
The Tengu warpriest does seem neat though; spikey armored birdman with divine power, hm.
| Scott Wilhelm |
There is a problem with Heavy Armor that needs to be addressed. You can't sleep in Heavy Armor without magical assistance or waking up Fatigued. You can't put on Heavy Armor at all without assistance, and it usually takes several minutes. Few things make my skin crawl more than the GM looking across the table, smile at me and ask, "Are you sleeping in your Armor?" If the answer is "yes," I wake up Fatigued. If the answer is "no," then there will definitely be a Wandering Monster that night.
If you take the Endurance Feat, you can spend the night asleep in Medium Armor. And Mithral Full Plate does count as Medium Armor, but I consider the 10,000gp cost of Mithral Heavy Armor to be prohibitive. To me, the sight of Mithral Full Plate is a sure sign that this was a character created by the GM, and that armor was never acquired through gaming.
My current favorite solution is the Swift Girding Spell. Dip a level in Paladin, Sorcerer, Wizard, or Magus, and you can cast or use a Wand of Swift Girding. With Swift Girding, you can put on your armor in 1 Standard Action.
That will tide you over until you can be Armor Bonded.
| prileska |
Changing it up:
Human w/Armor Expert trait.
1st Ftr1; *Endurance, *Iron Will, *Power Attack
2nd Ftr2; *FtrFeat, Bravery I
3rd Ftr3; *Feat, Armor Training I (-1 ACP, +1 max Dex)
4th Ftr4; *Ftrfeat
5th Ftr5; *Feat, Weapon Training I
6th Ftr6; *Ftrfeat, Bravery II
7th AB1; *Feat, Within the Shell (-2 ACP, sleep in any armor)
8th AB2; One with the armor (Normal speed in heavy armor)
9th LM1; *Feat, 3/day Enlarge, *Toughness
10th LM2; Auto stabilize < 0, immune bleed/blood drain, +2 some saves.
Some feats unaccounted for. Start with medium armor until I can afford a heavy option (I originally saw my character as a magical crafter of armor from a barbarian tribe hence the barb/sorc hybrid class, so aspiring to create the best armor is still their goal; need to edit that a bit though)- probably doable by 7th. With the Living Monolith PrC, I was thinking of using Stoneplate, a stoneplate armor bonded would essentially end up with stone skin (so less mechanical, more statuesque). Stoneplate is heavier (which is negated from AB2), instead of mithril, I guess a magical lightweight stone (I'm sure my DM will allow it if it's cost and mechanics are the same) leaving an unenchanted Stoneplate at +9, more max dex than I'll ever need, no ACP, with no speed reduction.
Not sure now if I want natural attacks, or a big 2her since with Enlarge it makes everything bigger (big statue guy with a keen falchion or something). Maybe go with your brawler and Hamatula idea up top, with the mammoth lord helm if I go the nat attack way. Since I'll essentially be a big statue, I can just hit things with stone fists (pretty much). LM goes on to add some neat stone based stuff, becoming immortal at 10, and healing when using enlarge. It's a pretty neat concept when mixed with Armor Bonded so the character is essentially a living statue at all times, who can enlarge and is immortal.
*Sigh, it seems Armor Bonded really doesn't offer much outside of flavor that a fighter can't really emulate though - the armor mastery pretty much gets the same results just not becoming bonded to it; aside from the Stat increases - I can graft on +2 to any ability, which can stack to +4. So 7 levels in AB can grant +4 Str, +7 to max dex on armor, -2 ACP, no speed reduction and a 4000g ability and the flavor of armor becoming the skin and not able to be removed.
| Scott Wilhelm |
Hamatula idea up top,
To go with Hamatula Strike with a Human Fighter is fine. Use Piercing Weapons. The simplest way to go would be say Morning Star and Armor Spikes. But you might have guessed, I don't really go for simple.
I was thinking a build with the Phalanx Soldier Archetype would be cool. At 3rd level, you can use a shield in 1 hand any pole arm in the other. So you could do something like take Great Cleave and Improved Shield Bash, Bashing everyone adjacent to you and also hitting everyone 10' from you with your Lucerne Hammer.
Or, you could 2 weapon fight with Halberd and Shield. If it's a Spiked Shield, you are using 2 Piercing Weapons now, and you can Hamatula Strike with both of them.
You could also take Shield Slam which turns every Shield Bash into a Bull Rush. If you take Greater Bull Rush, every Bull Rush gives all your allies Attacks of Opportunity. If you take Paired Opportunist, and a dip in some class with some kind of Teamwork-Tactics Class Ability, you get an Attack of Opportunity, too. If you get a Flanking Buddy, you could make your AoO another Shield Bash, triggering more AoOs, looping for as long as everybody's Combat Reflexes lasts. Your Full Attack would look something like this Halberd + Grapple/Shield + Grapple + Bull Rush + Attacks of Opportunity all around. Brutal.
And, since you are now considering Living Monolith, it sounds like you are thinking of playing with Reach. Incorporating Shield Slam in your build makes even more sense, then.
Some feats unaccounted for.
This is a departure from Hamatula Strike, but classic weapon and shield combination to look at is the Thunder and Fang Feat. That lets you fight with a Klar in 1 hand and and Earthbreaker--normally a 2 handed weapon--in the other.
If you are going sword-and-board, you should take a look at the Throwing Shield. The rules say you can "unclasp and throw" a Throwing Shield as a Free Action. You can get Quickdraw, Throwing Shields: if you have the Quickdraw Feat, you can draw and put away your Shield as a Free Action. Here's the funny part. There is a magic item called the Blinkback Belt. Whenever you throw a weapon, it returns teleports instantly back to your belt: these are all Free Actions. While it's fun to shout "Infinity damage! I win at D&D!" Your GM is specifically encouraged by the Core Rulebook to limit how many Free Actions you can "reasonably" take. But this combination should be good for 1 free attack/round at least, allowing you to do things like throw your shield after making a full attack, taking Snapshot feats, using your 'Shield as a Tripping Weapon (It does have the Tripping Quality.), then using it again for your AoO off of Greater Trip. Using your regular attack to throw your shield, using Rapid Shot to throw it again, then take another Free throw, stuff like that.
Sigh, it seems Armor Bonded really doesn't offer much outside of flavor that a fighter can't really emulate though - the armor mastery pretty much gets the same results just not becoming bonded to it; aside from the Stat increases
Oh, I don't know: how else would you get DR10?
Also I apologize for confusing things further, but since you are allowed to use 3rd party stuff, what about Psionics? Have you looked at the Aegis Class?
| prileska |
I did consider Psionics mainly as I have always liked Goliath; I was trying to find a way to have the half-giant template (that's on the srd site) and modifying it slightly. The Aegis' power ranger suit doesn't really interest me, though the Aberrant archetype is neat - the concept seems fairly alien though (like, sci-fi alien).
After thinking on it more and more, I am very much interested in the PrC for living monolith, and the Thunder and Fang style seems really neat. Not sold on the Klar, but it's basically a shield with a punching/slicing dagger in essence, yeah? Earth Breaker though, definitely cool; one handing a big spiked maul as an enlarged statue, I can see the potential in that.
So, let's build on that then:
1st Ftr1; *Endurance, *Iron Will, *Power Attack
2nd Ftr2; *TWF, Bravery I
3rd Ftr3; *Weapon Focus (EB), Armor Training (-1 ACP, +1 max Dex)
4th Ftr4; *Weapon Focus (Klar)
5th Ftr5; *Thunder and Fang, Weapon Training [Hammers]
6th Ftr6; *TWDefence, Bravery II
7th AB1; *Feat, Within the Shell (-2 ACP, sleep in any armor)
8th AB2; One with the armor (Normal speed in heavy armor)
9th LM1; *Feat, 3/day Enlarge, *Toughness
10th LM2; Auto stabilize < 0, immune bleed/blood drain, +2 some saves.
I wonder if bringing AB to 7 after a first level in LM would be best - I figure stat wise I'll want my high Str and Con to be my focal points, 15 for Dex for some AC and TWF pre-reqs. The others not really "dump" stats, but not entirely important.
e* Maybe I could be a Goliath after all and just move one of the feats from first level and shift them down a bit. They allow the use of weapons one size category larger, so I could technically have a really big hammer and klar combo. Also my enlarge would make me huge instead of large, since I'd be "large" already in terms of spells.
| Scott Wilhelm |
I don't know if you are interested, but here is a build I put together that uses Thunder and Fang. Feel free to use any part of the build you find useful.
Father Maxwell MacKenzie
Human
1Ranger1: Archetype, Freebooter, Weapon Focus Klar, 2 Weapon, Freebooter's Bane, Tracking, Wild Empathy, BAB+1
I picked Freebooter because I think Freebooter's Band is better than the normal Favored Enemy.
2R2: Shield Slam, BAB+2
Rangers get to take this without meeting the prerequisites as a bonus Feat.
3R2Fighter1: Weapon Focus Earthbreaker, Thunder and Fang, BAB+3
Thunder and Fang has a lot of prerequisites, and some of them end up being rather taxing. What do you do with Weapon Focus Earthbreaker and 2 Weapon Fighting before you get Thunder and Fang, for example. With Thunder and Fang, you can attack with the Klar as if you had Improved Shield Bash.
To help bypass Damage Reduction, the Earthbreaker will be Alchemal Silver. This is partly where the character gets his name: from the Beatles song, "Bang, Bang, Maxwell's Silver Hammer came down on her head! Bang, bang Maxwell's Silver Hammer came down, now she's dead." I guess the Klar would be made of Adamantine or Cold Iron. I like to keep my bases covered.
4R2F2: Power Attack, BAB+4
5R2F2Inquisitor1: Improved Bull Rush, Domain, Spells, Judgement 1/day, Monster Lore, Stern Gaze
With a level in Inquisitor, Maxwell becomes Father Maxwell MacKenzie, another Beatles song.
6R2F2I2: Detect Alignment, Cunning Initiative, BAB+5
7R2F2I3: Solo Tactics, Paired Opportunist, Greater Bull Rush, BAB+6
Greater Bull Rush means that with every bash from the Klar, you give out Attacks of Opportunity, and Paired Opportunist means that you get one, too. But Paired Opportunist is a Teamwork Feat, and you only get the benefit of it if allies have it, too. Unless that is you have some special Class Ability, such as the Inquisitor Class Ability Solo Tactics which lets you use your Teamwork Feats as if your allies had your Teamwork Feats. There are other ways of doing this. a level in Cavalier or 3 in a Warpriest Archetype come to mind, but Solo Tactics is superior in that it works with all your Teamwork Feats and not just the one Bonus Feat. Another Teamwork Feat this character will want is Harder they Fall, which will bypass the Size Restriction on Bull Rushing and Tripping. Anyway, taking levels in some kind of Divine Casting Class keeps up the Beatles theme.
Where I was thinking of taking this character next was that Throwing Shield thing. Since the Klar counts as a Light Shield, you can have a Quickdraw, Throwing Klar. I was also thinking of developing Tripping.
You want to go Armor Bonded, and this character I outlined can start taking levels in Armor Bonded immediately. It does not address the problem I outlined earlier: fatigued while asleep in Heavy Armor, and taking a long time to don the Heavy Armor. And again, I would fix that with a level in Paladin and a Wand of Swift Girding.
With a 3rd level in Ranger, you get Endurance as a Bonus Feat, which will need for Living Monolith. So what would I do to go int LM and AB next?
8R3F2I3: Endurance, Favored Terrain
9R3F2I3Paladin1: Aura of Good, Detect Evil, Smite Evil, Iron Will
10R3F2I3P1Living Monolith1: Soul Stone
11R3F2I3P1LM2: Stone Blood, Feat
12R3F2I3P1LM2Armor Bonded1: Within the Shell
I hope you find this interesting and helpful.
| Scott Wilhelm |
The DR3 and DR10/adamantite don't stack I assume
Nope. Unless otherwise specified, DR from Different sources don't stack. If you are attacked by anything other than Adamantine, you get your DR 10. If you are attacked by Wolverine, you get DR 3, unless you can rules-lawyer your GM.
But Wolverine's Claws are adamantium, not adamantine!