Post/Author/DateTime	Post
Mosyali 05-16-07, 08:06 PM	Okay guys, I am in need of assistance. I have come to you, the people of the development boreds, for help with my new person not because I want optimizing on combat, but because I want a character with... well... character. If I wanted her to be optimized, then I would have either asked the people at the Char. Ops. boreds to turn her into an X-level mutant by level five or have done it with myself (and believe me, with the things I did with my level eleven Beguiler and my books, I can do it on my own.) Basically I want an un-optimized build, one that is almost devoid of any power to take on something by herself. I don't want a D.I.D., but I do want her to not kill everything by herself either. Now that I have that laid out, here goes. What I want from this from a mechanics standpoint: 1) Concentration on Weather effects and spells, namely [air] and [water] subtypes. 2)Full caster progression. 3)No prestieging. Sorry, but my DM told me no more of that for me only. He did not like my Shadowdancer either. 4)A weird ranged weapon. Got the go ahead to make one up at the expense of an Exotic Weapon Proficency feat, but I want it to be reasonable. 5)Support Spells, if possible. Things I do not want: 1) One man party. 2) Save-or-dies. 3) Uberness. 4) Anything that would make my DM cry. He has done that already with my last three characters and I think he might be out of tears. Well. Seems like I have a task for you all, but I do have some ideas for my girl. She, as the title implies, is supposed to be geared towards wind spells. I have no idea how to do that. I also have a rough idea of how I want her backstory to go, but some of the things in it seem farfetched for her to have done. Well, this is what I have so far in a very stat block format that would make any storyteller wince. 1) Apprenticed on a large shipping vessel under another person who claims the title of Wind-mistress. 2) Grew up in a culture highly dedicated to shipping and fishing. Large attachments to boats and water. 3) She is from the western continent in the world my dm is devising (He gave me my own island nation that he was not going to touch with a ten foot pole for me to tinker with). As such, she needs an event that places her on the Eastern continent, where our game is to take place. 4) She needs to have met and interacted with the party Druid a few months before the party officially meets. The person playing the Druid and I have decided that our characters know each other. Unfortunately, he is not going to even start working on his guy untill July. 5) Openings to attach my girl to the rest of the party, so I would like to devise some open holes in my character life for them. Most will be from the eastern continent, so it is going to probably be after meeting Druid. Fortuntaely for me, I have till late August to finish this girl and get attached to her. If any of you guys made it to this point, I would certainly appreciate any help with devising her. I do plan on updating this post occasionally with developements of the girl, both RP and mechanic-wise. Thank you for your time and effort. I hope to hear some nice responses. :D Apparently I cannot have met the silly Knight. I think he might end up as a Knight or Pally, but that is okay, I think. He likes tanking... a lot. After his Rogue got its face smashed in he has not had less than 22 AC starting. He is being a meanie-butt however. His background is "secretive", so seeing him once in the six months is out of the question. As to girly, I have motivation for her now! She was kicked off the the shipping vessel for crossing the Wind-mistress on bored (all she really did was question her orders, but that counts as crossing in the culture she is in). So Teiwaz was stripped of her name and rank in the society she was brought up in and cast overboard, left to fend for herself. She is intent on makeing it back to the Western Continent to extract revenge on the Wind-mistress (unfortunately, the boat went under after she was tossed, no survivors), and to find the one man that actually helped her. Horray! She has a goal. Some things that have been decided for her. Name: Teiwaz Race: Half-Elf (with the DMGs variant of Half-Human per DMs approval) Class: Shugenja (again, DM approval) Age: 44 years old Alignment: True Neutral (might be chaotic though) Hair: Blonde Eyes: Brown Height: 5' 02" Weight: 97 lbs. Rest of it: /shrug
trickydevl666 05-17-07, 12:05 AM	Well...the only real class I could think of would be a Shugenja from Complete Divine... but that's an eastern flavored class.... but with the Air element you get rid of earth, and so Air gives you manipulation of well air, water...water... and fire you get firey things but it also gives you the lightning spells like call lightning and what not... They do eventually get control weather, and I believe at a spell level earlier than Clerics druids and the sorceror/wizards... And as I've heard claimed on the CO boards many a time, Shugenja is a far from optimized class. But as I said before... it is eastern... But Now that's got me thinking that maybe that could have been what brought her to the east. In a trading city, and since it is an island nation, probably the city was located in some strategic location that allowed it to get access to a lot of the trade routes, otherwise it wouldn't be that prosperous. One day, some strange looking vessel comes in and she meets an Air Shugenja and is fascinated by her blah blah blah... Travels with Air Shugenja, learns about elements learns to love the air blah blah starts adventuring blah blah meets with druid. Blah Blah meets with party... At least that's it short... So shugenja 20... Too bad your DM won't allow you to prestige, then you could Stormlord in which case you could do a Shugenja 10/Stormlord 10 still not that optimal but fits the flavor more. Of course, you could add that into the backstory. The Stormlord build is what belonged to the Air Shugenja, and your character failed to meet up to the standards her mentor had. As for a weapon... I have no idea...
Mosyali 05-17-07, 08:53 AM	I am having a hard time finding the Shugenja, but the flavor presented from a basic search and finding a history of that type of spiritualist is just amazing. I would love to give that class a spin if I could only get my hands on that book. It is far from optimal to go straight Shugenja? That is absolutly perfect. I think the concept of me playing something non-core would have my DMs ancestors turn over in their grave ( /sigh, I miss you Psychic Warrior and Dragon Shaman). Is it fairly apparent that the Shugenja is not great? If that is the case, then I should have no problem convincing the DM that I can play it safely. The heavy focus on elements and spontaneous makes it just so... pretty. But that might also make Mr. DM cry.
TalinXT 05-17-07, 09:59 PM	So you want to play a full spellcaster adn not be broken in anyway shape or form? Yet you dotn watn to totally suck? Sorceror.
trickydevl666 05-17-07, 11:49 PM	Yeah... He is in Complete Divine Page 10. He has Poor BAB, Poor Fort and Reflex, good Will. He is a spontaneous caster, d6 hit dice. Divine caster. Simple weapon and Short sword proficiency, no armor or shield proficiency. CHA based casting, Strict focus on elements, fire water earth and air and you have to choose one and then you can't cast it's opposite. It also gets a "sense Elements" ability that as a fullround action sense an element in 10 ft, then + time gain more information... So a divine Sorceror with no familiar and a more limited spell list... i've heard bad things about it before... but Now that I'm reading it I can see that it can be good as a support, and I believe that of course he is going to turn up short when compared with a Cleric or a Druid. In my personal opinion, I believe that a Shugenja is definitely made for a supporting role. Unless you choose fire spells, you get no major attack spells. Sadly some pretty good buffs are in the Earth element. But I'll break up what the elemental magic revolves around. Air- travel influence divination, and illusion. Earth-resilience growth and strength of body Fire -destruction intelligence creativity Water- transformation healing cleansing And as one more thing they get domain-ish type things called orders related to the favored element. However, instead of getting a special ability, they get a 0 level spell.
Mosyali 05-18-07, 09:32 AM	Sorry TalinXT, I never really did like the Sorcerror. My friend played one in the last campaign and it turned into a major blastfest. I know everyone says that evokers are not great, but after he tore through most things in one spell (those that did not survive either got a SAVE-OR-DIE in the face afterwards), I guess the Sorcerror lost its luster. After some searcing around, I found some information on the Shugenja myself. I am defineatly Air or Water, the two of those would easily fit into what I am aiming for. Not sure if I mentioned it, but the gal is level one, so she has a long time to grow as well. Would missing out on the damage spells of the Fire grouping really mess me up if I want to be a support caster? The list I have gives Water some of my favorite low level spells, Bless and Obscuring Mists. Coupled with Expiditious Retreat and Mage Armor, I should do okay at low levels, especially if I do get my silly little ranged weapon I want. Ewww... Just optimized again... I must stop that or my DM will say no. Mind you, if the DM says no to Shugenja, he gets the cleric thrown in his face again, and he knows I can break that easily without access to the Completes. I should probably work on her backstory some more. At least my DM can't strike that down, ever. :D
trickydevl666 05-18-07, 10:06 AM	Yeah, I believe Shugenja is a good character that can be powerful, but not too powerful. It is really hard to break because of their limited spell selection but missing out on fire won't really be that horrible, only thing is that you don't get the lightning spells which is the only reason I would take that.. but earth gains barkskin andeven the simple things like magic weapon and stones and stuff like that. And since it is an eastern flavored class you could somehow work that into your backstory.
Stormbrand 05-18-07, 12:43 PM	A simple alternative is to go straight Cleric with the Air & Water domains, perhaps with lighter armour and a spear instead of a mace. Fits in with your concept, including support spells. All you need to do is introduce yourself as a Windmistress and avoid the standard equipment choices and no one will think of you as a cleric. Aim for Empower Spell and Divine Metamagic and make your primary combat trick one enhanced Call Lightning (4d6+1d3/round, effective and reliable but not uber). Or, see if your DM will allow reserve feats for a cleric (in Complete Mage), and take Storm Bolt or whatever it is called and constantly make small blasts with that. Both methods give you a moderate electrical blast that you can use almost constantly through the combat (Call Lightning gives several rounds of constant small blasts, Storm Bolt gives almost limitless small blasts). Either way, your method in combat is fully seperate from the buff-and-bash clerical combat style. Gives full spells, weather control and support magic, but no one will look at you and think 'cleric'. Spears are also suitable weapons for storm-casters.
Mosyali 05-18-07, 01:17 PM	I guess untill I get ahold of Complete Divine and the DM approval for Shugenja, I will prepare Teiwaz as if she were in fact a cleric. It just means I will have some ret-conning to do if I get approval. I could give reverence to the elements as opposed to a deity to gloss over her preference of those to a deity. I just did not want a cleric so much because of CoDzilla. We already have the "D" part of it that plans on optimizing on the shifting, so I was trying to reign myself in with a character I could not reactionally make terrific. I had that problem with my last cleric, DM made the game harder, I prepared some spells from my Library, he made it harder again, I dug deeper. It was horrible and I know I won't have self control. I think that is why he is limiting my cleric this time to PHB only for feats this time.