Breaking into Epic Mages

[sirpercival]

That's not the right version.  The one in PGtF is the right version.  It's possible that you might be able to find something somewhere which could help you...

[sealofnoob]

I'll dig around.  Just got off the phone with the DM.  He's banning Reserves of Strength entirely.  I'm awaiting his reply on what he intends to do for epic spellcasting.

[sealofnoob]

Looking like he doesn't want to use epic magic at all.  *sigh*  What is the point of having a level 35 epic character with no epic abilities?

[sealofnoob]

Let's try this again.  Assuming my DM will be a stickler for both RAW and RAI and use whichever is more advantageous to him.  What can I do using only printed WoTC material for items, feats, and spells?       (and possibly that broken feat that allows for +1 spell level  to change the range of a spell one range higher)

Maybe I should just roll an arcane archer.  Lawl.

[Endarire]

A Wizard20 could probably win this scenario.  Since you have more resources, I recommend this:

Dragonborn Gray Elf Generalist Wizard3 (Transmutation Domain/War Weaver5/Spellguard of Silverymoon5/Initiate of the Sevenfold Veil7/Incantatrix10/X5.

(Get into War Weaver via Complete Arcane's Sanctum Spell feat.)

This gives you plenty of spellcasting and spiffy party-boosting abilities.  For your 5 remaining levels, you could go Escalation Mage (Faiths of Eberron) and get Shadow Haste, so you can Quicken or Extend 5 spells per day.  You also get your CHA bonus to HP once, at Escalation Mage1.  (Auto Quicken, when taken 3 times, removes most the need for Escalation Mage.  If you go this route, more Incantatrix levels would help.)

Taking a level or few of Warblade (Tome of Battle 20) or/and Swordsage (Tome of Battle) would get you spiffy swift/immediate action maneuvers.  (Maneuver cards are here.)  White Raven Tactics is wonderful, even if you can't use it on yourself!  The Diamond Mind maneuvers Mind Over Body, Action Before Thought, and Moment of Perfect Mind let you use a Concentration check instead of a save, and you don't auto-fail on a natural 1.  (Save 'em for when you want to guarantee a successful save.)  The Iron Heart maneuver Wall of Blades lets you use an accuracy roll instead of your AC against one attack, which may be higher at this level.  The Shadow Hand maneuvers Shadow Jaunt, Shadow Stride, and Shadow Blink are extraordinary (non-magical) means of teleportation!

Legacy Champion (Weapons of Legacy) would let you apply up to level 9 spells in your tapestry.  Shapechange your party into Chronotyryns (Fiend Folio) for flight and two turns per round!  Alternate between that and Choker form for an extra standard action per round!

As for "Epic" abilities, Exceptional Deflection and Infinite Deflection mean you're just plain immune to ranged effects that target you and require an accuracy roll.  All of them.  Add in Reflect Arrows to humiliate enemy attackers.  If you go this route, a Monk2 or/and a Fighter2 dip is probably worth it for the feats.

If you're playing at this level and your GM isn't coddling you, then you need immunities!  Specifically, become immune to these:
-[Mind-Affecting] abilities.  Mind blank is a common spell for this, but if you become a creature of the Undead or Plant type, you're set!
-[Death] effects, and if you can, also negative energy.  Death ward, Soulfire [+5 armor/shield enchant] (Book of Exalted Deeds), and Undeath help here.
-Movement-impairing effects.  A ring of freedom of movement is probably best.
-True seeing.  Because being fooled by Illusions sucks and you can afford a mask of this.  (It's 75K and from Unapproachable East.)  Additionally, having blindsight (such as from the Diamond Mind stance Hearing the Air) also helps.  Go ahead and get both!
-You probably don't need a ring of universal elemental immunity, but when you're this epic (and therefore, this rich), why not?

You'll also need flight, such as from Chronotyryn form, the fly spell, a Winged Mask (Magic of Faerun), whatever.

The Affiliations and Magical Locations Handbook will help a bit in getting the best locations.  (Complete Scoundrel's Otyugh Hole is probably the best.  Complete Mage's Metamagic Storm, Rainbow Falls, and Shieldstone Cavern are also spiffy.)

At epic levels, buffs work.  Most other things don't.  Focus on buffing your teammates (and yourself) and winning the fight in the first round (or the surprise round, if you can).  (The technical term is 'rocket tag' due to the squishy nature of the creatures and the very dangerous nature of the attacks.)  See The Seven (7)  Facets of Character Optimization for general ideas.

[RobbyPants]

Knowing him, he will jew it to #1.   Now, I'm still having trouble finding the incatatrix that people are talking about.  Was this PrC printed anywhere?

I'm sure you didn't mean anything by it, but don't use racial slurs.

[awaken_D_M_golem]

Knowing him, he will jew it to #1.   Now, I'm still having trouble finding the incatatrix that people are talking about.  Was this PrC printed anywhere?

... and besides, you really don't want your DM to Hextor you.

[Captnq]

Your problem isn't going to be spells. You'll have plenty. No, the problem is, you'll never get to use them all. Focus on buffs. The ones that last all day. Extend them. Buff the hell out of everyone. Get a ton of metamagic rods

Level 35? I'm thinking Ultimate Magus/Incantrix/War Wizard maybe Ur-priest/Mystic Theurge if he doesn't mind evil. And hey, you only have to be evil to take the class. You could have been evil for ONE level, then you got over it and used mystic theurge for the next 9.

Yeah... Sorcerer 1/Wiz: 3/Ultimate Magus: 10/Ur-priest: 1/Mystic Theurge: 9/Incantrix: 10/Something Else 1

Or hey, Why Screw Around? Wiz: 3/Sorcerer: 1/Ultimate Magus 10/Dweomerkeeper 10/Incantrix: 10/Something else 1

Not an Op Build, but I don't think the goal is to twink too much, now is it? Take Easy Metamagic on Quicken. Tack on Epic Quicken Feat Now you can quicken everything as a +1 level adjustment and cast 3 spells a round. I'm sure you can get it down to +0 if you try.

Stack those 1 hour/level spells on top of one another until the other players melt.
Work out anti-anti-magic so the buffs stay up.

Take Still, Silent, Epic Eschew materials. Float around cross legged blasting everything that moves without even looking up because You are the ultimate Bad Ass master of reality. Take Innate Spell on Arcane Fusion, cast it three times a day for one spell slot. Now you're casting 4 spells a round.

Get REALLY funky and wish you had a second Personality. With all your spells Still Silent, Epic Eschew Material you could have your second mind cast spells as well as the first. Be a two headed Wizards tossing around six spells a round while you float about, cross legged on a greater floating disk, dispassionately dispencing arcane magic like you were sewing seeds in the earth. Occationally bother to open your eyes when someone bothers you and stare at them with both heads.

One head speaks, "I bring you a gift."
The offending individual explodes as the earth opens up and black tentacles drag the pieces to the Abyss.
The second head speaks, "My gift is pain."

[Rejakor]

Endarire's build is great, but if you really want to check out some cheese, go and look at some of the Iron Siege builds.  You'll have to tone them down a touch, but wandering around the place INSIDE a sphere of annihilation (Disciple of the Sphere 10 capstone ability) is hilarious.  For extra fun times, LAYER spheres so you're in a matrioska of them.  Hope they brought a lot of those rod-things that kill spheres!

You should be a) necropolitan, or b) under the Veil of Undeath spell.  Freedom of movement is a must, magical is okay but Ex is better.  Immunity to TRANSFORMATION (from various items, a savage species ritual, or the HAAGENTI Vestige (Tome of Magic) (available as a pair of feats I believe, either that or 1 level of binder (Anima Mage is good even without this) + 1 feat)) immunity to all energy types, immunity to death (Contingent Delay Death/Contingent Planeshift to your personal Genesis plane if you're about to die landing on a revivify/break enchantment/break curse/Epic Rejuvenate platform), immunity to any form of diplomacy, have some clones ready, be an astral projection to begin with, remember to have your full complement of Epic Monsters turned into Undead, Mindcontrolled, or Gated/Bound to serve you at all times.  Fill a enveloping pit with spell turrets of magic missile and shoot things for 2359238957239841241251d4 force damage every time you open it.  Fill a different enveloping pit with spell turrets of <AoE non-elemental damage spell of your choice (Hail of Stone?)> and kill anything without evasion.

GET improved evasion.  GET Mettle.  Get the Conc-replacing save maneuvers.  Use Timestop + Adaptive Style to Refresh them.  Better yet, use Ruby Knight Vindicator to Timestop and refresh them in the Timestop.

Learn Epic Dispel.  It's really worth it.

Have a pocket communion!  Shrink a whole bunch of mages down real small and keep them in a forcecage in your pocket.  When you want to cast an epic spell, make it always a ritual!  Rituals are neat.  Oh, and make them red wizards/be a red wizard and let them boost your CL a lot while you're at it.

There is no reason you shouldn't have every single buff in the game active at all times.  There are ways for clerics to put personal only buffs on people.  You have clerics.  They do that.

There's no reason, with 35 levels, why you can't be a cleric of mystra AND a mage.  Fuck that antimagic null magic dead magic noise.  If there is still noise, use one of the many ways to get infinite spells, and spam Invoke Magic until the pain goes away.

You have minions.  There is no reason anyone should have line of sight on you ever.  Travel in an obdurium ball!  Have people open shutters for you to cast and then close them again when you're done.  Oh and have a shaped antimagic field as well so only YOU know where the safe-passage for spells is.

There are ways to have lots of small, dangerous minions!  (like say, explosive undead cockroaches).  Do it.  Use them and your other minions(like say.. solars) as disposable meat to get the enemy to give away their strategy!

[Captnq]

There is no reason you shouldn't have every single buff in the game active at all times.  There are ways for clerics to put personal only buffs on people.  You have clerics.  They do that.

Yeah, what he said.

There's no reason, with 35 levels, why you can't be a cleric of mystra AND a mage.  Fuck that antimagic null magic dead magic noise.  If there is still noise, use one of the many ways to get infinite spells, and spam Invoke Magic until the pain goes away.

Oh yeah! Cleric of Mystra! You need that.

There are ways to have lots of small, dangerous minions!  (like say, explosive undead cockroaches).  Do it.  Use them and your other minions(like say.. solars) as disposable meat to get the enemy to give away their strategy!

Not a big fan of the minion. I've seen the druid do the wall of meat thing. He stopped doing it. It became tedious and boring. Remember, the DM is leaving for War. He wants this to be fun. Remember your Paranoia: Be interesting, and fate will smile upon you. Be boring, and you're dead.

Try and make something with STYLE. He'll chuckle over a wizard flying around blasting things from a sphere of layered defenses, but will he think about it in a fox hole and laugh or just roll his eyes?

It's a new PC. Get a HOOK. Pyrus Incendium the Fire mage. As in, a mage of living FIRE. Mordok the Metamage, every spell is metamagiced every time. You spend all your time staring at everything and remarking about how limiting it must be to only live in five dimensions. My all time favorate characte I've ever seen was a guy who looked just like Conan. Wore a loin cloth. Had a big sword on his back. He was a wizard. Int off the charts but he just waved an ordinary stick and said, "Magic Stick, DO SOMETHING." Then cast meteor swarm.

Remember: STYLE

New Idea:
Ooo... Cloud of Knives and Persistent Spell. Cast it a dozen times. Have a cloud of Knives that constantly floats around your head all the time. The knives all swivel to point at anything you look at. Be Mack the Knife Mage.

[Rejakor]

Did I say wall of meat?  No.  I said 'explosive undead cockroaches'.

That's about as far away from wall of meat as you can get.

Ride around on undead epic monsters, don't bother using their actual melee attacks or whatever except against mooks, just use their death glares or whatever to add another free save or die.  And have them tank stuff for you by being intelligent undead with that Bodyguard feat from drow of the underdark.

Prepare all your attacks, like stopping time and delaying dozens of save or die spells, like write down what all the DCs are and have 10-12 of them and give them anime-esque names.

'Tide of Fire' and 'Eternal Shadow Prison'.  Shit like that.  Make it epic.

[imoenofcandlekeep]

1) Get Body Outside Body as a spell like through Archmage.

2) Cover the entire continent in Shadow Clone No Jutsu.

3) ???

4) Profit.

[Rejakor]

I'm pretty sure body outside body keeps your buffs on the bodies.  So you can buff yourself to hell, pick up a nonmagical sword, and then 50,000 clones of you go running in every direction stabbing things.  Even more shenanigans when you persist it.

There was that AAR with the 4 solar group taking on a dungeon.  That had a lot of circle magic shared-buff tricks, and mini-mes (shrunk body outside body clones) with prepared actions hanging out on the adventurers and being used as scouts.  That's the best 'laundry list' i've seen for a level 20+ character to use, although obv an epic character should have more things thanks to epic magic.

[Captnq]

Ooo! Dress up like a wimp, get a giant undead Lich dinosaur named Wally. Have wally die repeatedly. keep his phylasatry (sp?) in you pocket so you can keep spawning him over and over. Every time wally dies, scream, "NNOOOOOOOOOOOOOOoooooo..." then cast tenser's transformation and hulk out. Take a level of barbarian so you can rage when you want to.

Walk around asking questions like, "All my soap says it's anti-bacterial. Where can I buy the bacteria-friendly soap?"

[SorO_Lost]

Are you going for broke? I mean, I can't even finish my lv20 Sorcerer but I have some good stuff like you can't even be harmful to him until you make a DC 52 Will Save and I'm not really using any T.O stuff. >.>

[Daniel]

I suggest Incantatrix 10 + Cosmic Descryer 12 That leaves you with 8 levels to play with, of which 3 of them need to progress casting.

Another build would be Beguiler 1/Rainbow Servant 10/Sacred Exorcist 1/ Luckstealer 1/Pious Templar 1/Marshal 1/Swiftblade 10/Cosmic Descryer 12

Luckstealer1 : Nobody can detect your spells with divinations. This ability is vital if you want to be completely undetected and is not available anywhere else. If you take this then make sure to mask both yourself and your equipment from divination using spells.
Hexblade 3/Pious Templar 1: Mettle.
Swiftblade 10: An extra action per turn and the ability to cast a time stop that cannot be stolen.
Cosmic Descryer 7/12: Provided that you are immune to health damage (delay death) this turns you into a god for 7/24 minutes per day.
Rainbow Servant 10: If you decide to play a non-wizard arcane caster I suggest that you take this.
Marshall 1: If you have a good charisma you should take this for spell penetration. (If you take Cosmic Descryer don't take this unless you have a charisma based build)
Archmage 1-5: This offers some nice features if you have extra feats and a few extra levels.

The only epic feats worth taking are Improved Metamagic, Improved Spell Capacity, and Multispell. All of them are worth taking multiple times. The Incantatrix epic feats are also worth taking.

[Endarire]

Spell Stowaway is also spiffy as an epic feat.  I prefer mine with time stop.

[imoenofcandlekeep]

I'm pretty sure body outside body keeps your buffs on the bodies.

Wait, what?  where does it say that?  O.o

  So you can buff yourself to hell, pick up a nonmagical sword, and then 50,000 clones of you go running in every direction stabbing things.  Even more shenanigans when you persist it.

... it's personal range.  I forgot that.  Cue Sun Wu Kong shenanigans.