Binders

[ZombieGirl]

So a friend of mine will be taking part in a campaign with a level range of 10-15 (unsure what level the gm will be going with). Be that as it may, any official material is available except for Psionics, since one of the players apparently had a bad experience with psionics and is vehemently against it being present in the game (i bet it was a thrallherd... ;p). Anyway, I figured the player can have something else to complain about, so i suggested JaronK's Binder/Archivist/Tainted Sorc/Anima Mage/Tene Apostate build.

With this said, assuming Tainted Sorcerer is off the table due to the taint mechanic not being used in the campaign, is it still worth it to stick to the build even without Tainted Sorcerer? Or would the character be better off going with something else if Tainted Sorcerer is a no-go? And if it is still a viable build, what would that 1 level be replaced with?

The main goal behind the character is to have as much flexibility as possible and maintain being powerful -without- being something like a wizard,druid,cleric or any other pure caster. And i figured binder + all divine spells in the game was pretty darn flexible and just different enough to be set apart from the aformentioned classes.

The campaign itself wont be combat heavy and instead focus more on RP, hence why we went with binder since binder has quite a lot of goodies from their vestiges that can aid in the role-playing aspects.

[Unbeliever]

Anima Mage is among the strongest PrCs in the game.  Archivist is also quite good, and Binder is probably decent.  So, yeah ... you'll be fine. 

To be fair, you're not all that different from being a pure caster.  Anima Mage puts you about a level behind casting, and for that you get free metamagic and a lot of Binder goodies. 

[ZombieGirl]

So after doing some research on this build, ive realized the Tainted Sorcerer just isnt viable, even if it is allowed. There's a clause in its class feature 'Tainted Metamagic' that specifically states "A tainted sorcerer cannot enhance a spell to a level higher than she can cast by this means. For example, a tainted sorcerer must be at least a 9th-level caster to cast an empowered vampiric touch spell (or at least 10th level, if the character is casting as a sorcerer), since the empowered spell requires a 5th-level spell slot."

So going with the Tainted Sorc you'd only be able to persist 3rd level spells and lower, which is worse than DMM Persisting. With that said, decided to drop the level of Tainted Sorcerer and trade it in for a level in Death Delver for turn/rebuke for the sake of DMMing. Though doing so makes this an inefficient (as far as min-maxing goes) build since the character loses a caster level. This change also makes the binder half of everything redundant and the characters probably better off (min-maxing-wise) just going archivist+PrCs heh, but i think it should be fine either way. The Archivist is powerful enough to not feel weak even with 9th level spells at 20, especially with binder/anima mage supplementing it.

[Unbeliever]

Tainted Sorc is broken.  Or very easily breakable.  But, why all the talk about DMM Persist?  The build you described includes Anima Mage.  That's Persistent Spell right there if you want it.  That kind of firepower, plus some Binder goodies on top of it, is worth 1 caster level and a feat.

Although then you'd have to ask what you want to do with it.  Are you aiming to gish?  The class combo is great at it, but it's great at a lot of things.

[phaedrusxy]

Tainted Sorc is broken.  Or very easily breakable.  But, why all the talk about DMM Persist?  The build you described includes Anima Mage.  That's Persistent Spell right there if you want it.  That kind of firepower, plus some Binder goodies on top of it, is worth 1 caster level and a feat.

Although then you'd have to ask what you want to do with it.  Are you aiming to gish?  The class combo is great at it, but it's great at a lot of things.

You only get 1-2 uses of the AM metamagic ability per day, though. Maybe s/he wants more persistent spells than that?

[linklord231]

You could try and argue that binding Tenebrous gives you unlimited Rebuke Undead attempts per day.

[phaedrusxy]

You could try and argue that binding Tenebrous gives you unlimited Rebuke Undead attempts per day.

I'd suggest instead picking up one of the Devotion feats that only uses one Rebuke/Turn attempt to power it. I remember one of them being pretty decent that only needed 1, but I don't remember which one...

[linklord231]

You could try and argue that binding Tenebrous gives you unlimited Rebuke Undead attempts per day.

I'd suggest instead picking up one of the Devotion feats that only uses one Rebuke/Turn attempt to power it. I remember one of them being pretty decent that only needed 1, but I don't remember which one...

Looks like Destruction, Earth, Evil, Good, Healing, Strength, Sun, and Water are the options.  Of them, only Sun and Earth are terrible, and I wouldn't recommend Destruction for this build.  Water and Healing are probably the best.