Post/Author/DateTime	Post
ehrin 07-04-05, 05:19 PM	Looking for hints and tips as I create a new, 10th level MT. I plan to do a 3/3 Wizard/Cleric, with the rest as MT. I took domains of Magic and War, specifically for the ability to use identify without that 100gp cost, and for the weapon ability (lets me use a spiked chain with no feat burning... DM will let the Spiked Chain be the weapon of a War Diety). I don't plan to combat much, but i want the ability to hit at 10 feet as well as 5 foot, if i need to. The war domain also lets me do a spiritual weapon, which would be nice with that spiked chain... I don't need uber high AC (party rule), so I plan on using Mage Armor, Ring of Protection, and maxing my dex. I also have a darkwood buckler... simple stuff, puts my AC at 21 or so. For magic, I upped my wisdom and intelligence with items, and my dex with gloves. I took a rod of extend spell, and a rod of silent spell (could be useful to cast a few things if/while silenced). Plan to use the extend to do mage armor all day, plus other ideas you might have? Took a rat as a familiar, for the Fortitude save bump (plus, a cleric of war could have rats as a common theme). Is it worth it to do weapon finesse, for the chain and for my ranged/touch attacks? Seems decent, but advice gladly accepted. other recommended magic (cheap). I don't have much money left (about 10K), after spending on healing items and other party needed items (immovable rods, etc). Any simple tricks I am overlooking that would maximize my bang?
Yohan McDuff 07-04-05, 06:23 PM	I am not a great min-maxer, even less since i don't have 3.5. But for ALL i know a wiz-cleric-MT who need to enter melee did something wrong along the way. I would suggest staying away from war domain and weapon feats. Concentrate on your spell, you should never run out of them as a MT anyway. Sorry if i don't give you more specific help but, as i said before, i don't have 3.5 so any help i give you might end up being wrong. Good luck
PhaedrusXY 07-04-05, 06:27 PM	Your ranged attacks already use Dex, so Weapon Finesse isn't going to matter for them. And once you get access to Polymorph, it is easier to get a super high Strength than to get a high Dex. So I wouldn't bother with Weapon Finesse.
Elgonn 07-04-05, 06:31 PM	Gameplay wise it sounds like you might be better off playing a Chameleon. MyTh can't enter combat virtually at all. Your a major support character.
20goingon1232 07-04-05, 06:58 PM	If you are going MT, take War domain with a Longbow. Great for when you run out of combat spells or don't want to waste spells on itty-bitty Goblins. I am not too sure about Magic domain. I prefer Luck. That re-roll once a day will save your rear if it is a failed save that ends up with you dead. In Core rules, I prefer Ehlonna because of Sun and Plant domains and because it allows me to be Chaotic Good as a cleric. A bit of Druid type spells on top of cleric and wizard spells.... Mmmm. Nice. :)
ehrin 07-04-05, 07:15 PM	thanks... will take more advice, and the idea of switching to longbow sounds smart, especiall with flame arrow as a spell...
20goingon1232 07-04-05, 07:42 PM	For items, get a Monk's Belt (13k, from the DMG). You have a high Wis (from being a Cleric) and you can't wear armour (from being a Wizard). Monk's Belt is pure gold for you. You get to add your Wis bonus+1 to your AC that applies even when you are flat-footed and also to touch attacks. You also get 1d8 damage when striking unarmed in melee if you are forced into it, which neatly circumvents your lack of good melee weapon profficiencies. The ranged weapon profficiency is taken care of by your War domain. Add Mage Armour, Shield, Shield of Faith....! I get the shivers just thinking about it. And remember, your familiar gets to hold a touch spell as a charge. So, cast a buff touch spell (Animal buffs and Shield of Faith, I think, are touch buff spells) as soon as you wake up (I think it goes away when you rest/sleep, so you can't do it the day before). When you get into a fight, on your first turn, have your familiar touch you and discharge the spell first. THEN, take your turn as per normal.
ehrin 07-05-05, 10:43 AM	Monks belt is great. I added that, and dropped some other protective magic. I am using a bow when I have to now, with a rapier on hand so I look less like a mage than a rogue, perhaps. With the monk's belt, i don't need a weapon anymore (do more with fist than rapier if combat gets close). FYI, we are core only... Any other ideas?
20goingon1232 07-05-05, 05:11 PM	Drop your ring of protection if you are going to use shield of faith. They don't stack. Hmmm... so, no Psychic Theurge (although it can be argued that there is MT and Cerebre, there is no reason not to have PT). Drop the rapier. You can't use it anyway, unless you are an elf, which will then beg the question: why War domain? Carry a couple of light weapons around in case you get swallowed. This is what I plan to get for my level 8 MT (about 27k gold): Metamagic Rod Extend (3k) Metamagic Rod Silence (3k?) Monk's Belt (13k) Headband of Intellect +2 (4k) Periapt of Wisdom +2 (4k) plus bits and pieces not exceeding 200gp
ehrin 07-05-05, 08:28 PM	I am an elf, and pretty much carry the rapier and dagger so I look less like a wizard. I will never use them, especially now that I can do more damage with my hand and the monk's belt. I did drop the ring of protection... noticed it didn't help a lot. I dropped the war domain, and picked up Sun (helps a bit with the lousy turning I do). Your magic list 20goingon is just about exactly what I chose too... My one big fear is throwing rays and ranged touch attacks into melee... suffering from that -8 is a bit hard. But, is it worth it to take the two feats to get point blank and precise shot?
Timlagor 07-06-05, 12:11 AM	1) Not optimal Domains at all. You have so many spells you don't need War. Just use the bow if it's not worth spending spells -you certainly shouldnt' dedicate a Feat to situations where you don't really need to contribute to the combat. You have Wizard levels so you don't need Magic Domain (100gp isn't much especially at 10th) Luck (reroll) and Travel (freedom of movement) would be much better choices -but then so would most imo -haven't really looked at them all. 2) I assume the blucker has 0 arcane spell failure? 3) If you have the belt, why not pretend to be a monk? Since you're not going to use it anyway why not get an Axe or something to make yourself really look non-squichy (as much as you can with a weapon). 4) I absolutely wouldn't take PBS and PShot with this character -even a lot of Arcane tricksters don't take them. If you want to use rays try to position yourself to avoid cover. Touch AC doesn't go up very fast so you shoudln't have much trouble hitting anyway. 5) Make sure you take Practised Spellcaster in both classes. By the way -why are you taking MT?
ehrin 07-06-05, 12:24 AM	taking MT because I am the only spellcaster in a party... basically, the only cleric and the only mage. Without MT, I fall behind sooooo far. I will stick with magic domain... the pearls are really hard to come by in our world (we are rarely back at a town, and we too often find magic items we need to use to complete the adventure, and need to identify). Oddly enough, money is pretty tight once we get into the adventure as well... we rarely end up with more than 1500 each when we are done. Spending 400 gp to ID my three or four magic items leaves me without much left. Either that, or we sell our magic "blindly", and lose our shirts. I will drop the buckler, and drop the PBS/Precise shot... I think i have enough to do with spells, i hope the fighters will just protect me. I will probably be healing anyway. Practised Spellcaster? Where do I find that? What is it?
PhaedrusXY 07-06-05, 12:36 AM	Practised Spellcaster? Where do I find that? What is it?Hmm... wow, I thought that was Core. It is in Complete Divine and Complete Arcane. It adds up to +4 to your caster level for a particular class, but the bonus can't go over your character level. It doesn't add anymore spell slots or spells known or anything. Just caster level for determining damage, beating spell resistance, etc.
Timlagor 07-06-05, 12:38 AM	Practiced SC: Feat in Complete Divine I think (might be Arcane). It increases your caster level by 4 (max your class level or HD -I forget which) -though ti doesn't grant any exrta spells or anything like that. If you have "3 or 4" magic items, then how are you only getting 1500gp? The other party members should be contributing to the costs of all consumables (including pearls assuming you are identifying all the party's magic loot). Try a mithral buckler (you can cast magic vestment on it I believe) for 0% ASF.
20goingon1232 07-06-05, 02:07 AM	He said Core only, unfortunately, or a PsyTheurge would have been a better combo than MT. I'd rather take the Shield spell instead of a buckler. The buckler would render his Monk's Belt totally useless. Ehrin - If you are an Elf, take Luck and something else. The reroll is golden for when you fail a save (a nat 1 is a surefire way of telling). I don't think Travel is optimal for you as you will only ever have 3 levels of Cleric. Magic domain is pretty useless, I'm afraid. Try Sun or Plant. My personal favourite is Plant AND Sun as a Cleric of Ehlonna (because I like the Good aligned deities and not so much the Neutral ones for flavour reasons). Good low level defensive spells in the Plant domain, switching over to the Sun domain for powerful attack spells at higher levels. The domain bonuses are pretty crap though. It don't seem like the rest of the party is sacrificing themselves for the benefit of the party (no cleric and wizard???). Why are you diving on the landmine?
Funny Slaughter 07-06-05, 06:53 AM	ehrin i think you should be well aware of the role a MT playes in a party. if your group does not have any primary casters it is a bad idea to play a MT because it is a second tier caster and won't mature until very late in the game. I don't deny the usefulness of this kind of character, it is just not the right choice for the only caster. if your party needs casting as well as combat prowess as your feat selection implies i would go with a druid. you have a wide array of offensive spells, can wildshape and have your animal companion to melee effectively and can heal the party. a straight cleric would benefit from heavy armor and could enter melee as well, even if its spells would be better used to buff and heal the party. anyhow, i think druid would be your best option. a party without primary caster lacks important ways to defeat challenges of appropriate CRs! gs Funny
ehrin 07-06-05, 09:30 AM	Thanks for all the advice... I am constantly rebuilding my ideas from it. To help answer some questions: In our world(s), we have been gold poor. Just never have found much (lots of bad choices and bad luck). We do find some magic, let's say, 6 pieces, along with 1000 gp for the treasure. When we get back to town, we can either spend 600 of our 1000 gp, to find out we have a +1 dagger, +1 shield, potion of speed, etc. etc., or we can sell the magic at a horribly reduced cost, blindly (thus, we sell a +3 blade for half the price of a +1, because we didn't know what it was). Subtract Taxes and Tithes, and we don't have much gold to play with in a typical adventure, so stocking up on pearls is tough (and, even if we do, those darn shatter spells make such planning worthless). Doing Identify without the component cost would have allowed us to ID each magic item as we find it (the day after, at least), and we could use the magic in the adventure. But, you raise great points... I may need to force the party to fend more for themselves, and forget that domain. As to the party dynamics... some new players, and no one feels comfortable stepping into the lead, i guess.