Post/Author/DateTime	Post
Darhelion 10-29-06, 09:18 PM	I know a lot of thought and optimization effort was put into the minigod spell Trancend Mortality. I looked around to make sure no new work was done on this, but I appologize in advance if my humble contribution to the thought process should not be started in its own thread. Anyway, until now, the best solution I'd seen was Wu Jen going into Jade Phoenix Mage, so you could get your mini-godhood 1/week without costing massive numbers of EXP, GP, or level losses (or some combination of all three). Some friends of mine and I were also contemplating various abuses of the ever-popular Divine Metamagic: Persist; 1 level splash of cleric to get turning and then Persisting Trancend Mortality for 1 day in every 7 of total godhood is also pretty nice. But still somewhat unsatisfying from an optimization standpoint. Then I hit upon it. First, we need to pick a creature that does not need sleep. Easiest way is Necropolitan from Libris Mortis. Gravetouched Ghoul has some nice statmods, if you want to go that route, though I don't recommend it unless you can use level adjustment buy-off. Finally, if you can dip into the potentially non-core Dragon Compendium Volume I, the Diopsid is a +1 LA race that is alive and never needs to sleep. The being alive bit is good; it means you're not picking up further weaknesses by becoming undead. Now, play a Psion(Nomad) going into Metamind. Yes, this is an old trick from this very board - we're going to pick up Temporal Reitteration and use it in conjunction with Font of Power. But wait, that's a psion build (and you'll want to use Nomad specialty to get the Temporal Reitteration, since it's a 5th level power and a level 10 metamind is at best a 10th level manifester). How do we get Trancend Mortality in here at all? The answer is relatively simple, if roundabout: Use Magic Device. Specifically, make sure you can make a DC 37 to activate a 9th level scroll. You could perhaps try for a staff, but it's easier to convince a DM to let you get a scroll of a 9th level spell than to convince him to give you a 1-off staff of the same, I think. Take Cosmopolitan(UMD), and max the ranks. By level 15, that alone gives you a +20 to the skill check. If you have Craft Universal Item (or just want to spend full price for it; it's only 1000 gp market value), pick up a +10 shard of UMD for another +10 to your single important roll. Now you just need a +6 from other miscellaneous sources (like your cha mod) to be guarenteed a 37 on a roll of a 1. If you can get away with taking 10, you don't even need quite THAT much, since you just need a +27 bonus, then. Now that we've got that, buy yourself your scroll of Transcend Mortality from your Wu Jen friend. Activate it - you've made sure you cannot fail the UMD check, and we're not even abusing UMD beyond what it's obviously designed for. You now have 17 rounds of godhood before you die. Throw up Font of Power in the next round; you now have 16 rounds of minigod status and 10 rounds of infinite power points. Finally, spend your swifty to activate Temporal Reitteration. Repeat this activation every round, forever. Now you see why getting rid of any need at all to sleep - having Font of Power eternally restored by the Temporal Reitteration keeps you from needing the 8 hour downtime manifesters and casters are forever lamenting, but doesn't prevent you from suffering the other ill effects of not sleeping. And if you ever fall asleep, you'll stop manifesting Temporal Reitteration, which will eventually lead to your death at the conclusion of Trancend Mortality. But, if you are a creature who never needs sleep, you have a warlock's scorn for the caster/manifester's need to rest now that you've infinite power points, and at the cost of your swift action for all time, you have Trancend Mortality in place forever. You can even partially regain your swiftie by picking up Schism through Expanded Knowledge; it at least gets you an extra standard action to act with each round, even if it's only mental, and at a manifester level of a measely 2 by the first level this combo hits its schtick. Anyway, that's my contribution to the attempt to maximize the power of the new Wu Jen Godspell. Any holes in my build the more experianced members of this august body can find? Any improvements to it? I look forward to hearing whether this is as potent as I think it is, or not. Thanks!
Lokiyn 10-29-06, 09:25 PM	It should work until you run into an antimagic field. It seems like you should slip this into a Cascade Bomb (http://boards1.wizards.com/showthread.php?t=637859) for a sort of juggernaut build with swarms of summons, which helps locating antimagic fields when they wink out.