Author Topic: SorO's Enlightenment Series  (Read 21641 times)

Offline SorO_Lost

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SorO's Enlightenment Series
« on: October 10, 2013, 11:08:14 AM »
Hello and welcome to my Enlightenment Series where I ramble on about stuff, good and bad, in relation to Classes under the pretenses I'm so damn awesome I'm enlightening you. For the most part I'm looking at Classes that prove contrary to their forum reputations or it's a well hidden and often overlooked Class that has a cool gimmick.

(click to show/hide)

Quote from: New FAQ entry on Tiers
Q: You make it sound like Tiers are useless.
That's because they are. My dad can beat up your dad debates have spawned countless heated debates producing hatred for your fellow community members, increased moderation work effort, and people made asses of them selves to a point where most people just wish their comments were buried and forgotten once they grew up a little. And the long lasting impact of this is forms of stigmata like mundanes can't use wands or buy spells and wizards are just too powerful to even see play. These stigmatas prevent us from exploring optimizing UMD or spell-buffed mundanes and convince DMs that classes break the game when in reality it's the Player which leads them to all sorts of terrible houserules.

Thread Index (if unlinked, means I'm working on it. Maybe)
1. Using The Omnislash (arcane dualist)
2. I know Kung Fu (monk)
3. Robots are cool, but costly and prone to breaking down (artificer)
4. The Superhero (divine crusader)
5. The ultimate insult (rules interpretation and faq)
6. Why the editors need to be fired (stuff that should never have been published)
7. Jedi Knights are playable too (arcane swordsage)
8. The most powerful Races in D&D.
9. What's next? I'll decide!

Be sure to check out my Discussion thread where people complain about me!
« Last Edit: February 18, 2018, 02:00:28 PM by SorO_Lost »

Offline SorO_Lost

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SorO's Enlightenment Series: Using The Omnislash
« Reply #1 on: October 10, 2013, 11:14:09 AM »
Hello and welcome to my little to no clue ramblings. Today's topic is the Arcane Duelist's Omnislash ability, or Flurry of Swords as it calls it's self. But before we go into that I'd like to run off on a tangent, off topic, out of focus, sidetracked, if you'll hear me out.

Preamble
Remember back in the 339 (that is WotC's forums pre-Gleemax) all the rave and attention the worthless Dervish from Complete Warrior got? If you are unfamiliar with the class allow me to enlighten you. The Dervish is primarily about an over glorified Spring Attack gone Bounding Assault PrC and that is about it. Srsly, it is. Dancing lets you attack while you move and the rest of the PrC gives Cleave, Spring Attack, Fast Movement, and you can use Scimitar's as a light weapon thus reduce your TWF penalty by 2. The class didn't get attention for those crummy abilities offered in feat form to the NPC warrior class but for it's 10th level capstone ability of the Dervish named Thousand Cuts. It is a 1/day ability to double the number of attacks you have but you must move around while doing so. This PrC had loads of threads dedicated to being able to deal 500~1,000 damage once per day in a full attack action. But! The little ole Arcane Duelist went unnoticed. Well if the dervish can get so much attention surly the Arcane Duelist can too.

(back on topic)

To provide highlights to the link offered above the Arcane Duelist, AD for short, offers stuff not granted in feat form. At first glance instead it offers stuff found in magic items, only worse. However it's capstone is quite possibly the coolest thing under the sun. Not just in looks but for optimization as well.

Here is the lowdown on it's abilities.
(click to show/hide)

Bard 8 / Crusader 1 / Arcane Duelist 10 / ...
For the first few levels you'll play as a dragonfire inspiring bard, later on you'll take a level in crusader and pick up Song Of The White Raven and as asap as you can you'll enter Arcane Duelist. Eight times per day you'll Word of Creation up some dragonfire inspiration and Omnislash a foe to death. Simple and sweet. Thanks to it's bardic abilities it remains useful even with the very close to dead six levels of AD. And don't forget, Greatness awards HD and per Maneuvers 1/2 Initiator level per HD which lets use Maneuver granting items to access a higher level of Maneuvers than normal.

Hexblade 4 / Paladin of Tranny 2 / Arcane Duelist 10 / Marshal 1 / Iajutsu Master 2
Cha to saves twice (sort of), Cha to AC, Cha to Initiative using marshal, and also +9d6 damage on every attack. Not the strongest option but I'm sure you grasp the concept of what it tries to do. the more you can stack Cha to stuff the more simple leveling becomes useful.

Sorcerer 6 / Arcane Duelist 10 / Abjurant Champion 5 / ...
Take Arcane Disciple(diabolic domain) just for Devil's Ego and it's +4 profane to charisma. It's not a super powerful caster by any means but you can create a stack of +1 Spellstoring Gnome Quick Razors to use in your downtime too. Just use Dexterous Attack to cover the lack of proficiency.

Factotum 8 / Arcane Duelist 10 / Swordsage 2
Yes, even a factotum works. This one picked up Knowledge Devotion and Burning Blade for an extra boost to attack & damage. This my be the one case Cunning Strike's +1d6 per inspiration point becomes useful as each point spent gives a total of +5d6~+8d6 damage in total.
« Last Edit: August 08, 2017, 12:15:17 PM by SorO_Lost »

Offline SorO_Lost

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SorO's Enlightenment Series: I know Kung Fu
« Reply #2 on: October 10, 2013, 12:58:34 PM »
Hello and welcome to the second thread in this series where like every other franchise I attempt to use bigger explosions and butcher the first's concept so much the fans hate me. Today's topic is how to kick Agent Smith's ass.

Preamble
The Monk Class takes a lot of crap at times. Insults like Furry of Misses, MAD, and Unarmed Swordsage get tossed around a lot. But here is the thing, the Monk Class is loaded with Supernatural Abilities which means at a casual glance the Monk should out preform mundane Classes, and the interesting part is that it really does. Furry of "Misses" on paper makes a Monk more accurate than pars set forth by the Fighter or Barbarian, MAD allows for higher optimization plateau, and yeah the ToB kicks the crap out of everything else so that's a moot point. We know that, and love it for that. But when you look into the Monk's ACFs and not the default Class Feature list (sort of like how "lion totem whirling frenzy" has become synonymous with "barbarian") the Monk certainly pulls his own weight, and when you look even farther in some of his abilities are worded in ways you wouldn't expect. That just goes to show what a little research into a topic can do for you. So here is a Monk modified by several such options and I dub it the "Matrix Monk" to give it a bit of extra flavor.

(back on topic)

Here a quick lowdown on the Matrix Monk
(click to show/hide)

***

Abusing the Matrix Monk

1. There is no Medium.
Weapon Sizes are based on their intended wielder with no inherent cap on increase or imagination, so if you wanted a two-handed kama for a colossal+ force dragon you can. In the same vein effects increase a monk's damage without altering it's actual Size so there is no upper limitation to how far you can go. Greater Mighty Wallop is one such example instantly progressing your unarmed damage up to 12d8 (54 avg) damage per punch per the Rules Compendium. If your DM lets you stack Improved Natural Weapon or a Fanged Ring on top of that you'll hit 16d8 (72 avg) and you're starting to see how ridiculous this can get aren't you?

2. Shadow Blend & Blink
It's gamebreakingly insane. As previously mentioned Total-Concealment is an amazing condition to benefit from.
* Offensively you net a +2 Bonus to Attack Rolls and your opponent's are not just denied their Dex-to-AC, per the Hide Skill Update they are Flat-Footed against your attack. This means they cannot use Immediate Actions to counter you and you can easily apply even Sudden Strike damage.
* Defensively you cannot be directly targeted by anything such as Hold Monster, Fleshshiver, Grim Revenge, and so on. Anything with an Attack Roll has to accurately target which Square you are in and is still subject to a 50% Miss Chance.
* Area Spells can still hit you and you traded away Evasion. I'd pick up the Ring to reobtain it when you could but this is also where Blink comes in. You have a 20% chance to ignore any none-force effect, this includes Black Tentacles, Holy Word, Iceberg, & Gygax's Sphere of Destruction in a Snake's Mouth (cough spoiler alert).
* Blink also allows you to run through walls, doors, and... the air you're not breathing. Now just think your character is stepping on when he walks through a wall.
Like a ghost your limitations of movement are far and few and no one can see you anyway.

3. Mantis Leap
Quote from: Mantis Leap
Prerequisite: Jump 5 ranks, Monk level 7
Benefit: Designate an opponent who is within the maximum distance you can reach with a successful Jump check. Make a normal Jump check; if your check is successful, you can make a normal charge attack against the opponent you designated as part of the same action. If your charge attack is successful, you inflict normal damage, plus your Strength modifier multiplied by 2.
Quote from: SRD, Jump
Action: None. A Jump check is included in your movement, so it is part of a move action. If you run out of movement mid-jump, your next action (either on this turn or, if necessary, on your next turn) must be a move action to complete the jump.
So you've got no-action charging done part of a Move-Action. If you can't think how a Jump Check equals Charge can break the game then you're not trying.

4. Enhancements.
Monk is mostly unique in that any Spell or effect that improves a Manufactured or Natural Weapon improves his Unarmed Strike. You can synonymously benefit from Magic Fang or Magic Weapon. And some times oddities come out of this like Ghost Touch makes your Unarmed Strike but not you, your gear, or anything else count as being Incorporeal.

Unarmed Strike it's self can be Enhanced by a number of means and combined for abuse. For instance a +5 Necklace of Natural Weapons, and a +1 Holy Bracers of Striking, means your Unarmed Strike has both a +5 Enhancement Bonus & Holy, a +7 equivalent value which costs anyone else 98,000 gold, but because you've split it up between two items it only costs the Monk 68,000 gold, you saved thirty thousand gold pieces just by moving Holy off to your Bracers. And You can enhance your Gauntlet, Ward Cestus, Scorpion's Kama and if you're Warforged even a Battlefist to do much of the same. Even Epic Rules don't allow you to have an effective +40 Enhanced weapon, but the Monk does this off a 15th level or lower budget.

Using The Matrix Monk
You have the highest none-charge damage in the game that doesn't use a blasting Spell or a hurled Plutonium Ball, amazing defenses, and nearly unbeatable stealth but the problem is you're Keanu Reeves. In short, you are better than anyone incapable of hacking reality, like Fighters & Barbarians, and a great guy behind the scenes but the Internet hates you. So you need to keep things short and brief so people focus on your better moves.

Passive Way Monk 7 / Lion Totem Whirling Frenzy Barbarian 1 / Factotum 3 / ...
God of Trippers, free Improved Trip, Dex-to-Trip Checks, unique Monk-Only +4 Bonus, you can even Rage for Strength increases. Thanks to Monk you also qualify for Lightning Fists and Dragon's Broken Fist Mastery I & II for even more Trip attempts and bonuses.

Monk 9 / Swordsage 2 / ...
A basic unfocused Monk. Combines the three most powerful traits of a Monk and picks up up to 8th level Swordsage Maneuvers. Not to shabby for trading in 9th level Maneuvers.

Monk 2 / Psion 18 (or any manifester PrC)
You can take Monastic Training as a Monk Bonus Feat then use Tashalatora to advance your Unarmed Strike as a Psion. This really isn't a Monk so to speak but the next time someone throws Unarmed Swordsage at you remember to mention that that having 9th level Powers and being a Spell-to-Power Erudite is superior to their stupid suggestion but you are uninterested in both.

Monk 9 / Warlock 1 / Hellfire Warlock 3 / Uncanny Trickster(hellfire warlock) 3 / Legacy Champion(uncanny trickster) 4
Dragon #358:87 has a Feat called Eldritch Claws which gives you two Claws that deal your Eldritch Blase & Unarmed Strike Damage. And then Dragon #355:76 adds your Claw damage to every Unarmed Attack. Essentially you deal your Unarmed damage twice, Blast once, and +8d6 Hellfire per hit. Use the officially suggested variant of the Trickster (see adaption after the class features) to obtain lots of bonus Feats as well.

Passive Way Monk 7 / Shiba Protecter 1 / Fist of the Forest 3 / Paladin 2 / Swordsage 2 / ... Using Dragon Magazine
You'll hear the word "MAD" be tossed around a lot. Foolish people are quick to use it as a rebuttal but thanks to Point Buy, Item Prices, and such PrCs as the above well rounded attributed characters are significantly more powerful than their "SAD" counterparts, which is why they are so sad right? Anyway, Wisdom to AC, to Attack, to Damage, & to Saves via Dragon's Serenity Feat. Also Con to AC so really help make you attack immune. Plus you can get ticked off and grow long fingernails. Just like Meg! Wait... That's not cool man.
« Last Edit: August 13, 2017, 12:52:34 PM by SorO_Lost »

Offline SorO_Lost

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Hello again and welcome to the trilogy. Sticking to the trope it's time to go back to before the beginning to add backstory and pretend character depth. Today's topic goes back to an optimized classic the Artificer.

Preamble
I know what you're thinking. The Artificer is Tier 0, best of the best, omfg powerful, it's like a Wizard but stronger! How did this end up joining the ranks of the Arcane Duelist or the Monk? Well the Artificer is a heavily penalize PC that just doesn't compare to other Classes. while the Monk embodies the rewards of research, the Artificer is the exact opposite. In truth, I think the Class was initally designed for NPCs. Eberron it's self needed a Crafting oriented Class as part of it's Steampunk flavor and it must have half way through campaign design this background information of a Class was bumped to being PC material and given Infusions to expand on Player Options.

Some stuff to remember is that you're supposed to have and buy any Magic Item you want. Crafting has no inherent rewards nor is access to it in some way unique any Spellcasting Class can craft Magical Items and it's possible to do so for free (hello sacrifice).  Also there is this thing called Wealth-By-Level and it has a dual edge to it, on one hand it disallows something like a 5th level Character having 500,000gp in gear because they would be too powerful. And on the other WBL is a PC empowerment, 3rd Edition (Like 4th and every MMO ever) expects you to have the gear you want. Not just gear, the gear you want. What I'm trying to get across here is, "crafting" is not something to base a Class on and don't be fooled into thinking the Artificer does it better than full spellcasters.

(back on topic)

The low, low, low, way lowdown.
(click to show/hide)

***

Abusing this NPC Class

1. Item Alteration
The one and only claim an Artificer has is his Item Alteration Infusion. This allows him to swap the typeof bonus to another. For instance you could purchase the additions of three +6 Enhancement Bonuses to Intelligence into any magic item via the Magic Item Compendium then use Item Alteration to change their bonuses around thereby giving you +18 Int. And this works for so much more than just Ability Score bonuses. Change your Bracers of Armor to an Enhancement Bonus rather than Armor Bonus for a direct Enhancement Bonus to AC that stacks with your enchanted armor, change your Vest of Resistance +5 to an Insight Bonus and don a Cloak of Resistance, you name it. It's awesome. And best of all, it's only 1 Round for casting time. You can kick this thing out within a single turn.

2. Enhance Item
Let's face it, if you're doomed to be an NPC tossing gold at encounters you might as well be good at it. Enhance Item is buried deep in the Epic Level Handbook in a sidebar, it's a none-epic Feat that allows your Ability Bonus at the time of creation to be used instead of the typical minimum. This is a "for free" upgrade because as you would expect it makes no notation of cost increases to the item. Literally meaning if you claimed (for beginning of games) or sought out (for continued games) a crafter with this Feat you'd empower your gear without WBL rearing it's ugly head.

Notably examples would include stuff like Weapon Properties, like Stunning Surge can single handedly win Encounters for you, but what if you tanked your Charisma? Stunning is a DC 17 which stems from a 5th level Spell and the +2 Ability Bonus for the 15 minimum required. If you purchased this from a 20th level 34 Int Artificer the Save DC would be 27. +10 to the Save DC, for free. And DC 27 is holycrappowerful when you can only afford +2 Weapons. You can use this to improve the Save DC of any published Magical Item ever, awesome.

3. Wand Bonding and also Unfettering Heroism and Wand Surge
Wand optimization for an Artificer. Wand Surge burns an Action Point to reduce a charge spent off a Spell-Trigger Item (a wand for instance). Unfettering Heroism gives you a free Action Point each round. Awesome! Wand Bonding is an amazing gem buried in a sidebar in City of Stormreach, it improves a Wand's CL by +1 per five caster levels while it's in your hand and gives you the option of expending Spells or Infusions so by intent of the Feat it's self an Artificer can pick it up no matter which side of the CL argument you're on. Downsides? Must be Warforged (means no halfing) and it's kind of a Sorcerer thing since they can trade their Familiar for it.

4. Metamagic Item
This ultimately wins out over Spell Storing Item since the latter demands XP and it's lack of PrC support. This Infusion again takes a Full-Round to cast but in turn it applies any one Metamagic Feat to an Spell Trigger Item for free. This puts the possibility of Persisting Spells within the Artificer's Hands even through he is utterly dependent on buy/crafting Wands for the desired Spell. But because we're talking a Wand here, you can pass this Persist-powered buff around to the entire party. It means rather than just you, the entire party can chip in on say a Wand of Divine Power and in turn everyone benefits from it for the next several days.

...And then you use Item Alteration to retype their +6 Belts of Strength to Luck so it stacks with the Spell.
Item Alteration pwns.

Using this NPC Class
As previously noted, this Class has a lot of limitations. Pursuit in this career path takes dedication and the willingness to give up promises of shiny new toys now for problem solving with old toys today. Power plays will be your three most powerful Infusions and finding ways to keep that Artificer progression up or finding alternatives.

Artificer 5 / Uncanny Trickster(artificer) 3 / Legacy Champion 2(uncanny trickster) / Any none-caster 10
Uncanny Trickster and Legacy Champion are intended to provide additional virtual levels to your selected Class, it stands to reason Spells and such that check for levels in a set Class would also factor in those progressions. This allows you to advance the Spell Storing Infusion up to it's 4th level cap and then deliberately hedge your Artificer caster level increases to minimize it's cost. The Spell Storing Infusion is extremely valuable because it allows you to effectively prepare a Spell on the fly like a Wizard but it has a lot of downsides. Kind of like the Artificer's Class Features when you think about it. But as you get closer to the higher levels you'll all but ignore them and you'll effectively have dozens of 4th level Spells at your command. Oh, and you'll pick up three freebie Skill Tricks too.

Alchemical Savant + Master Alchemist
In the words of Arz you can craft 9th level Infusion Potions. Which is pretty impressive seeing how there isn't such a thing as 7th level or higher Infusions. And even as I repost this thing I still want to keep this in for what I'm going to claim is a fairly obvious reason seeing how this entire post is about facts being lower than expectations.

Artificer 5 / Chameleon 10 / Any 4
Chameleon can access any Arcane & Divine Spell for limitless Scroll Access and by the 14th level your CL is 18! So it's just a matter of casting the exact Spell, which per DMG you can use other Spellcasters or Magic Items. Hello Planar Ally/Binding! Oh, and Artificer 5 let's you make a Wight or something and suck XPs out of still useful items.
« Last Edit: August 08, 2017, 12:15:54 PM by SorO_Lost »

Offline SorO_Lost

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SorO's Enlightenment Series: The Superhero!
« Reply #4 on: October 23, 2013, 05:18:52 PM »
Hello and welcome to number four where I talk twice as much number two as normal. Today's subject is Completely Divine, or comes out of Complete Divine. One of the two. It's an accelerated Spellcasting PrC people often forget about.

Preamble
Divine Crusader is a nice PrC honestly. Very well balanced and if you read the very first post this is one such stigmata I was talking about, the auto-assumption that mundanes don't get nice things even through they do. By arbitrarily limiting mundanes to no-spells to perpetuate a worthless debate and fearmongerling high levels of play things like this PrC simply pass unnoticed.

One of the things I like about this is the limitation to one Domain. Heroes and such in comics, novels, shows and films don't "do it all" and instead of a limited repertoire of super powers. Hulk has strength and protection, Wolverine has claws and regeneration, Naruto has Shadow Clones and Rasengas, Jace the Planeswalker is limited to mind control and illusions. Chuck has downloaded government secrets for skill boosts. What can break the game is being able to rewrite reality and acquire information with no effort and this is a pain to narrate around and is the chief reasons people avoid high levels. A Divine Crusader on the other hand gains exactly 9 different Spells by ECL17 and these 9 "talents" or "powers" all share a set theme. Like Iceman a DC can create snow, cool people off, create ice, and even in full swing he can cause nearby blizzards. But without expanding his list, "Iceman" isn't summoning the angels from the book of Revelation one round and reversing gravity the next.

(back on topic)

Here is the lineup of your superhero resistances.
(click to show/hide)

***

Abusing the Superhero

1. Additional Domains
Contemplative (CD) grants an additional Domain, Ordained Champion (CC) grants the War Domain if you lacked it and is a prime perfect pick, Sovereign Speaker (EB:FoE) loses caster levels (not a big deal mr accelerated caster) but grants an additional Domain out of the Sovereign Host for each level taken. However, you cannot choose two Domains offered by the same Deity. Example concludes you cannot choose Strength, War, and Good all because Dol Dorn offers all three. So as you get up there in levels in this PrC you'll become intimately familiar with the Sovereign Host. Lastly, Domain Staffs (MiC) can substitute Divine Spell Slots for any Spell within the Staff.

2. Prestigious Classes
Your Class Features suck, so what? The Cleric gains nothing too. You have no reason not to PrC out for better Class Features. AS noted, you can obtain 9th level Spells by ECL 16 using this Class so you've even got some ley way if you want to choose PrCs that are not quite full-progression, of course until ECL 15 you're behind everyone else, but you don't play a DC to be a pure caster, you play an DC to be a seven level long competent combatant that picks up spellcasting.

3. Ordained Champion
I gotta be honest this bears a second and specific mention. Full-BAB 7 / ED 1 / Ordained Champion 5 / Anything +7. You pick up Turn-Undead & Spells (and more spells!) to Smite Creature, freebie access and Quickened War Domain. It's not "versatile game breaking spellcaster" expanding, rather I'm a meleer with special abilities and I can use magic to augment punching you in the face.

Using Superhero
Obliviously this is a more of a late game PrC so you'll need to define your background and be able to rely on it during low levels of play. Think of it as Lelouch vi Britannia was a brilliant leader and tactician prior to being able to dominate minds, Spawn was a highly skilled marksmen before getting his necrosuit, Captain America is just a reoided up jock with a moral compass and military training. These guys were heros before they were superheros (or anti- like the punisher/spawn). You'll be a Superhero that isn't defined entirely based on his super-powers.

Crusader 5 / Solder of Light 2 / Divine Crusader 1 / Ruby Knight Vindicator 10 / Contemplative 1 / Warblade 1
Cha to Saves, Crusader healing while attacking, full on RKV progression for stealth and Devoted Maneuvers, an additional Domain and Warblade polishes things off with 5th level Iron Heart & Tiger's Claw boosts.

Bard 4 / Crusader 4 / Divine Crusader 1 / Sublime Chord 1 / Mystic Theurge 9
Requires Mother Cyst so Sublime Chord has a 2nd level Spell to cast for Mystic Theurge. Overall, Dragonfire Crewsader with a late bloom of full Arcane/Divine access. Primarily meant to play catch up if everyone else is playing full casters.

Monk 9 / Divine Crusader 1 / Ordained Champion 5 / Contemplative 1 / Anything 4
An interesting downplay of things full of potential abuse. Perpetual Full-Concealment & Blink and enormous Unarmed Damage with +1d6 vs Evil (see matrix monk). Coupled with the ability to burn Spells for bonuses to Bonuses to damage, channel Spells/Turns for empowered attacks, you even apply Quickened to Divine Power for Free.
« Last Edit: August 08, 2017, 12:16:41 PM by SorO_Lost »

Offline SorO_Lost

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SorO's Enlightenment Series: My own FAQ!
« Reply #5 on: November 05, 2013, 10:16:08 AM »
Welcome to the 5th post in this series. Here if I have not provoked you to troll my discussion thread I burn your bridges. That's right, I'm using this post as my own FAQ!

Preamble
First thing you need to understand is English 101. Language is an act of encoding expressions and decoding messages. I have a thought, idea, or experience I want to share and in turn I must pick and choose which words I feel can explain and express this. You in turn must take those words you have heard and/or read and change them back into thoughts, ideas and experiences. In typical communication this runs near flawless, occasionally someone may ask for clarification or their eyes will widen and they will say oh as the concept dawns on them.

Like the joke about about two drunks walk into a bar and the third one ducks. The joke's set up is "two drunks walk into a bar" is a lead into a joke about two drunks in a bar or tavern and they are about to do something stupid. The third one ducks tells the speaker has told you they have ran into a physical piece of metal impeding their way. It's unexpected and the human brain responds, possibly, thinking it's funny.

When arguing rules you often run into the problem of what does the passage mean vs what do you pretend it says. The writer encoded things the best they could but they are not around for further clarification, instead you have to work with what you have, can find, and how do similar cases work. This is where the false pretense "RAW" (rules are written) comes in, where you deliberately ignore the message and how English works to insert your syphilis coated penis into things rather than admit you misinterpreted things.

Anyway, I just feel I can never say that enough.

(back on topic)


Here are some common things I've seen and a quick rebuttal to them for you to use.
(click to show/hide)

Other ways to tell people to drop it and move on

1. The FAQ
Ahh the good ole FAQ. 90% of the articles in here stem from people arguing on the forums leading to people sending a crap ton of messages to Ask Wizards. In an effort to reduce the number of complaints filling their inbox with stupid questions they printed and continued to update the FAQ so paid staff can get around to doing something productive.

As such, most of the topics in here are kill joys to certain cretins and because they have nothing better to do, they will refute anything that proves them wrong. Be it you, the source book, the FAQ, WotC, and Jesus descending form the sky. No matter their comments through, the FAQ is part of the Game Rules.

2. Supplements
D&D primarily updates it's rules using additional supplements. Such as the Miniature Handbook adding Swift & Immediate Actions and reconning Quicken Spell to be Swift Action based ir the fact virtually every single supplement after that also printed such. Tome of Battle and Libris Mortis both contain updates on the Incorporeal Subtype. Complete Warrior updated PrC rules, Complete ARcane further defined Spellcaster-related Feat/PrC Requirements, Heroes of Horror updated Oriental Adventure's Tainted rules. Complete Mage and such updated Polymorph. Dungeon Master's Guide II updated Monster Entries. The Magic Item Compendium updated all kinds of Magic Item related rules and specific items. The granddaddy of them all is the Rules Compendium which consolidated 99.1% of the rule updates into one manual and further added it's own. Always check for rules updates out of the RC at the bare minimum prior to initiating anything.

3. Inherited Rules
Often one such rule, area, or thing, is based on another set of governing rules. Like the Bard's Spellcasting entry states all Bard Spells have Verbal Components, this means even through Mislead it's self lacks a Verbal Component, the Bard will still need to sing as that is part of his means to cast the Spell. Other examples can include things like Strike of Righteous Vitality not working in an Antimagic Field as it is treated as if it were cast by a Cleric which means anything that prohibits Spells applies or not Feat can be taken twice or stack with it's self unless noted otherwise per PHB 87. Spells have a minimum caster level and Energy Drain can prevent Spell access PHB 171.

4. Errata
I bet you expected this to somehow have a lower number didn't you? Nope, the Errata's primary function is correcting printing errors, not updating or clarifying rules. Checking the Errata is still a good thing to do, sometimes a Spell slips past with a forgotten "; See text" or the example text baffles the crap out of everyone reading it. And sometimes, things are based on the misprint rather than what is supposed to be stamped on the page.

Using this FAQ
You know, I'm sure some ass out there will remind you I'm just a forum poster and the official rules trump everything I say.
And that guy is me.
Learn to read the manual, because if I gave you all the fish, you'd never learn how to chug beer (or something like that).
« Last Edit: January 26, 2015, 08:20:55 PM by SorO_Lost »

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SorO's Enlightenment Series: Why the editors need to be fired
« Reply #6 on: November 05, 2013, 10:31:23 AM »
Hello and welcome to the 6th post in this series. Here were invoke the devil's name for wonderful prizes, now spin the wheel!

Preamble
Unless the other posts which focus on Classes we're focusing on character options available to everyone. Simply being powerful is not enough, it needs to invoke a knee jerk reaction upon being seen, a groan around the table when you mention it's name, and even Min/Max's Optimizers avoid it because seriously it's just that damn cheap.

This post also uses a different color scheme for it's text. Since everything is amazingly good there just is no point in using blue & red to rate things. Instead I've put the Evil related stuff in dark red and may use other colors a well later on.

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Abusing these things
Just buy/choose them and use them as intended, enough said.

Using these things
It's in the rules, use it! Ha, just kidding. DMs & Players alike will hate you and you won't be invited back if you're a dick to them. Plus you risk rioting, for that reason I suggest the following.

1. Baseball Catcher's padding, glove and mask
These provide a modest level of protection from rioting. However the helmet is not fully cover your head and an unseen book slap to the back of the head will provoke Fort Saves vs Daze.

2. Full-Plate (or police riot gear)
A must for any home really. It provides serious protection against harm, including small arms fire. However some Players may attempt to drown you in thrown Cheetos and this does not prevent aspiration nor clear vomited materials from your airway.

3. Industrial Craft's Quantum Armor with GraviSuite's upgrade (or alternatively, ultimate cheat armor)
The ultimate munchkin protection. Convert sunlight into force field protection, enhanced speed and flight allow you to remain out of range of thrown salsa and you have your own self contained breathing apparatus "just in case". Ahh Minecraft references.
« Last Edit: August 08, 2017, 12:24:07 PM by SorO_Lost »

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SorO's Enlightenment Series: The King of Gishdom is playable
« Reply #7 on: April 26, 2014, 03:15:55 PM »
Gooooooooooood afteeeeeeeeernooooon dear readers. Welcome back to discussing classes. This time around we're talking about the Arcane variant of the Swordsage and how it's not as bad as you think. This kind of falls in line with the Divine Crusader post so you'll hear some repeats but honestly CD is about the hero that goes superhero while the Arcane Swordsage (ASS for short) starts out as the perfect gish from the start allowing us to indulge our sword & sorcery fantasies.

Preamble
The ASS is a suggested variant of the Swordsage found near the end of the class entry. It gets a lot of flak due to some bad assumptions and the knee jerk reaction of infinite casting is a bad thing. Likewise people think the ASS's CL is equal to his IL and somehow that means ASS 1 / Fighter 2 / Barbarian 2 has 2nd level Spells. This is just plain wrong on several levels. For one thing, while Maneuvers grant access based on IL, a 5th level Wizard with a CL of 50 still won't have 4th level Spells because Spellcasting does not.

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Here is what this sword & sorcery character has, including Jedi Knights and such.
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Abusing the Gishking

1. Alter Self, Polymorph, and Shapechange
As Personal/Touch Transmutation Spells to can learn and abuse these endlessly. You can turn into which ever creature you need when ever you want, in this aspect you're like a Druid that traded Spell versatility for Wild Shape versatility. Unless you break your list :p

2. Blindsight, Fly, Heroics and Shadow Phase
Truly the breaking point of the ASS isn't Persisting Alter Self. Hell, a Cleric with the proper Domain can do that with Divine Metamagic. An ASS is capable of providing party buffs over and over again. Give the party stuff like Blindsight and Incorporeal Miss Chances. Heck Fly's several minute long duration even bypasses that running along and tagging everyone once a minute deal that your DM may prohibit during social encounters & exploration.

3. Creation
You don't get Fabricate but there are limited version of it such as Ice/Stone/Wood Shape and Shape Metal which does allow you to reshape entire terrains to fit your needs. Stone Metamorphosis for Sickstone, Water-To-Poison for a crappy ingested poison. ... Actually I could use some suggestions here. I mean Hidden Talent lets you conjure Black Lotus Poison by the bucket and Fabricate does everything those Shape Spells do, except its one Spell and allows fine details. We can't let normal casters show us up here.

4. Celerity, Contingency & Time Stop
All the action breakers. They are Personal Transmutation/Evocation Spells, a bit more limited than White Raven Tactics but we do have a nice break point. Time Stop's 1d4+1 Rounds give you the Full-Round Action to recover the Spell and recast. High rolls in turn yield multiple actions in instantaneous time. So this is something you'll have over everyone else, infinite Time Stop as desired.

Using the Gishking
You know even less Spells than the Sorcerer and are severally limited on type. Most of the game breaking Spells are simply out of your reach. But that doesn't mean you can't be powerful in your own right. Focus on a single good Transmutation buff and convincing the DM to let it slide, learn a couple long duration defensive buffs that you can Un-Ready yet still benefit from like Superior Resistance or Mage Armor while your at it. And don't be afraid to PrC out as soon as you can.

Arcane Swordsage 5 / Rainbow Servant 10 / Silver Pyromancer 1 / Anything 4
While you cannot increase the Spells Known of an ASS using Spellcaster PrCs, you can expand on their Class List to choose from. This little get up gets to choose from any Arcane, Cleric, or Paladin Spell. Think of endlessly spammed Miracles. Well, I mean there is the XP cost for certain uses but still a must know.

Arcane Swordsage 5 / Swiftblade 10 / Abjuration Champion 5
Did people complained Tome of Battle was too animaish? Pick up Swiftblade to Bankai their ass with Tensa Zangetsu. You lose a couple caster levels but let's be honest with each other. You didn't pick this Class to be Batman with ten thousand out of combat choices and the ability to spam the single best spell round after round after round. You choose this class to stack on buffs to make killing people easy and there is very little better than uber-Haste.

Arcane Swordsage 6 / Warblade 1 / Abjuration Champion 5 / Jade Phoenix Mage 5 / Anything 4
Spells, Maneuvers, Spells & Maneuvers. What's not to love? Consider more JPM or splitting it up for a higher IL depending on your target level of play.
« Last Edit: April 02, 2016, 01:23:15 PM by SorO_Lost »

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SorO's Enlightenment Series: The Master Race
« Reply #8 on: July 17, 2015, 06:04:43 PM »
Hhhheeeelllllllloooo readers in the far flung future! Welcome to the eighth article in my series where I talk circles around my self and pretend someone reads it. Today's subject is all about that master race. And no I'm not talking about your PC. D&D is about as racist as you can get while still legally having fun with your clothes on and today we're going to touch on a few of my favorites and the most game breaking ones to request in place of your gestated level choice. So let's get started shall we?

Preamble
When you start looking at monsters as Races you really get this feeling them some have unfair advantageous. Like your typical Illithid is a 9th level Psion except it also has a ton of At-Will Psi-Like Abilities and enhanced combat abilities piled on top of better HP/Skills and someone was like that's totally CR 8. 8? Am I kidding you? Nope, it's CR 8. Of course, for Players it's total Effective Character Level (ECL) is 14 and you won't be buying that Level Adjustment (LA) off. But it makes a great minion to add to your stock.

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P.S. We're doing this top 8 style!

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Abusing them

1. Dominate Monster
A dominated minion will follow all kinds of none self destroying commands and it can be used to instantly obtain them in combat. There isn't really much to be said here other than focus on increasing your Save DC and make sure you order them to never cast Protection From youralignment.

2. Programmed Amnesia
Find a monster, beat it nonlethally until it passes out, make it your pet, then use it to fight others. It's like being a Pokemon trainer! Programmed Amnesia (aka the 3.5 version of mind rape++) is a much more permanent solution for captivity since you can rebuild the creature's memories to being your best friend and owes you for saving it's life ten thousand times, oh and it's a Lawful Good kind of guy. It has some limits of course since it is a Mind-Affecting attack (kind of useless on undead) and severe changes can be undone with the lower level Break Enchantment Spell. For this reason I'd suggest picking monsters who are close to your own goals, like if you are killing bad guys try to snag a good-aligned Dragon with a strong sense of justice.

3. Ice Assassin
Oh this spell is so powerful. You can create a clone of any target you have a DNA sample of and it obeys your every command. But if left to it's own choices it'll try to murder the original it's copied from so use at your own risk for self-duplication. Obliviously the is an extremely powerful method of building the ranks of your all-powerful legion but if you need a lower level alternative check out Core's Simulacrum. The copy is 1/2 HD but several creatures have abilities far beyond the normal scope of their CR.
« Last Edit: February 18, 2018, 01:58:38 PM by SorO_Lost »