As the cohort turns...

[Skrayper]

So as you saw, I've worked on both a healer cohort and a buffing cohort (which was, previously, a crafting cohort). One of players came back, covering both healing and buffing between his main and his cohort. So I was debating between retraining my Leadership feat, or trying something new with the cohort.

I decided to try out a Counterspelling build.

The guide I found basically covered two potential builds:
Arcanist (School Savant)
Exploiter Wizard

Right now, I have the character as an Exploiter Wizard. I took that because of the fact that, as a cohort (as opposed to being a full player character), they're two levels behind. This means in an 11th level party, I could either make a 9th level Wizard or 9th level Arcanist.

I prefer the Arcanist under normal circumstances, but in this regard I felt it better to go Wizard and only be behind 1 spell level instead of 1.5 (presently would be 2) from the party.

Secondary role is arcane buffs, as we don't have someone doing that (though the number of buffs that are arcane ONLY is pretty limited - mostly just looking at Haste and a tiny selection of others).

To ensure this character could use Dispel Magic (figuring that was way more likely to work than, say, prepping enough spells of various schools and having the Improved Counterspell feat), I went this route:

(Traits obtained through the Additional Traits feat)
CL Checks for Dispel Magic:
+1 from Forest Blessing
+1 from Varisian Tattoo
+1 from Outlander: Loreseeker
+2 from Spell Duel Prodigy
+2 from Spell Specialization
+2 from Numerology Cylinder
+2 from Potent Magic (if spending Arcane Point)

Exploits:
Familiar
Counterspell
Potent Magic

Other feats:
Scribe Scroll
Spell Focus (Abjuration)
Improved Familiar (Faerie Dragon)
Dispel Synergy

Loreseeker includes the spells Dispel Magic, Greater Dispel Magic, and Baleful Polymorph

There's a part of me still very tempted to go Arcanist anyway (though possibly not school savant) and just try to focus more on the Dispel Magic method and not use the Counterspell exploit.

Also have an Echoing Rod (Lesser) to get more mileage with my Dispel Magic slots, as a Ring of Wizardry for 3rd level is pretty pricey.

Thoughts? Has anyone ever pulled off a true counterspell build?

[Ryze Kuja]

The 2nd to last campaign that I ran was an Evil Gestalt game that went lvls 20+, and one of the PC's wanted to start his own cult-like religion so he took Leadership at level 7 and turned his Cohort into an Emissary who focused on working behind the scenes to make his religion grow-- he didn't take a single combat feat, it was all social feats. He had his Emissary going absolutely everywhere and starting up new temples, and the Emissary would travel to townships with some low level followers who would hand out food, textiles, medicine, and they even had a cleric who would heal people from afflictions while spreading his religion.

The Emissary pretty much handled everything for him, and the PC only had to show up to do the social events that required the "heavy-lifting". Whenever the PC came into a major city, he would stand up on his soapbox and start proselytizing "Now is our time brothers, when the Four Suns Shine as One, our Great Mother blah blah...", and then he'd have his Emissary do all the work after that. He ended up creating 2 "walkie-talkies" for him and his Cohort with Permanent Whispering Wind spells so they could be in constant contact at all times while he was out adventuring. By the end, he also ended up creating his own demiplane and put a network of portal gates going to all his different Temples so that him and his followers could move around quickly, and he turned 10ish of his level 3-6 followers into a "Delta Force / Seal Team 6" of Assassins; these Assassins would basically blend into crowds with Adjustable Disguise and Stealth, and would follow the PC and the Emissary wherever they went as "Navy Seal" bodyguards. He also created two towns from scratch at a place with a continental cliff/shelf, and he installed a Gondola system between them; normally it would take a couple of days to go up this cliff, and with the Gondola, it only took a couple of hours, so he would charge people a fee to use it and of course, his followers would profess his religion the whole time. This ended up making a ton of free gp for him.

Anyway, it was seriously the most clever way that I've ever seen a Cohort and the Leadership feat used, hands-down.

[VoodistMonk]

I don't know much about Counterspelling... every time I think about putting something together, I constantly find the advice to prepare or learn a cantrip of every school and pick up the Heighten metamagic feat... seems, lame. The whole concept... wait to react to someone else's magic... just seems anticlimatic. And it's hard for me to explore it or dedicate any time to it.

When I was looking at putting a couterspelling build together, School Savant Arcanist focused on Dispel is what I had in mind, though. So I would probably run with that as your Cohort.

[Ryze Kuja]

But if you're dead-set on making a counterspeller cohort, get Dispel Focus and Greater Dispel Focus feats. Also, as an Arcanist, take the Exploit "School Understanding", and choose Divination (Foresight)

Quote:

Foresight

At the beginning of your turn, you may, as a free action, roll a single d20. At any point before your next turn, you may use the result of this roll as the result of any d20 roll you are required to make. If you do not use the d20 result before your next turn, it is lost. You can use this ability a number of times per day equal to 3 + your Intelligence modifier.

This is hands down one of the best abilities to have for counterspelling, because you can use this d20 roll in lieu of a CL check if you want to. It's also nice for survivability to make Conc checks or Saves.