Post/Author/DateTime	Post
Wizu 08-16-03, 05:54 AM	Sooo. I have agreed on a tournament. It will be kept on an arena full of obstacles of all sorts, possibly with even one small town for hiding/necromantic purposes. The starting level is 12, pointbuy is 32 points and money allotment is 88k. Now, heres the trick. I have agreed to battle yet unknown party consisting of four players, and I am solo against them all. All books available are splatbooks, it will be 3.5 so all core 3.5 books too, and FR material. But no psionics for the reason of coup de grace weapons. And all level 9 spells, even when casted on scrolls, are prohibited. The DM is same as in the last campaing, and he allows some customisation of character before the match. Now, whitin these boundaries... Rogue 10/Shadowdancer 1/Fighter 1 Is what I am thinking. It should have the versality to seriously kick give a good whopping even when solo. I know I might not win this, but I intend on taking atleast 2-3 of em down. So basically, give me tips whatkind of character to make. And what items/stats/skills/feats and stuff should I take. Remember, I am solo against 4 opponents, who are playing well together with their abilities and all. One most probadly is a cleric, one wizard and two frontliners from what I have heard. So... The most uber solo character. One that can deal with taking spells/damage/avoiding spells/damage. I know its alot of asked... But I hope Snow is out there helping me once again! :angel:
Wizu 08-16-03, 05:57 AM	Or to put it bluntly... Make me level 12 BBEG character that seriously spanks the monkey!
MC_Hammer 08-16-03, 06:05 AM	Go a cleric. i cant min/max 1 for u cos i cant min/max clerics, but it looks like the best choice for this situation
J011yroger 08-16-03, 06:35 AM	man has a point, cleric is the most diesel solo char you are gonna find, and esp when dealing with a bunch of guys over a short time, your buffs will be rockin and you can summon up some meat shields to get their attention and soften them up before you start rippin off spells, then wade into melee and mop up whoever is left. If you have already agreed to this challange then i assume you dont need to hear this from me, but i just wanna go on record sayin kill the wizard first, then the cleric, then you can take your time with the other two frontliners. make sure you cast true seeing, a ring of counterspells or two might not be a bad investment if you can spare the ring slots. make sure your saves are through the roof....fighting four guys is way more about tactics than about your build...fire up the search button and take a look for domain ideas, its pretty tough to build a sucky solo cleric as they are the most powerful class, so that they can heal the party and still have something to do, so when you play one without a party using up all their spells for healing and such...they rock. Gimme some info about your opponents, what lvls they are, and what type of players they are...if they are not min/maxers or experienced PvP duelers then we can probably get cheesy on them and rock em pretty quick....also their level will limit your spell selection. i seriously think you are woofing up the wrong tree with a rogue based build, and if you dont know clerics...now is the time to learn. J
Naja 08-16-03, 06:49 AM	Wizu and MC are right about this. I would strongly recommend an clerical archer [oh, you´re playing 3.5? It´s still strong there...] with magical devices to fly/hover. Yeah, you could cast airwalk, but 4th lvl spells are rare enough. On the other hand, i´ve seen a well build rogue/shadowdancer taking out most of one party. But beware of true seeing and see invis., and since there´re two caster, you will be seen alot.
raistlin42 08-16-03, 06:50 AM	Rogue builds are okay, just get a ring of blinking and a ghost touch weapon. Oh, and don't forget a Dagger of Defiance (MoF). That'll probably eat up most of your money, though. Clerics, however, rock. Look at Fortunate Fate (7th level spell, MoF). Persistant Divine Favor isn't bad, especially when coupled with Divine Power, Spikes, and Righteous Might...a melee cleric can do a ridiculous amount of damage with his humble quarterstaff. Add Freedom of Movement and you have immunity to grapples. Add true sight, immune to illusions. Blindsight (4th, MoF) is a must. Pick up a scroll of Mind Blank. And finally, don't forget a scroll of Elemental Body (Manual of the Planes), for the immunity to crits/SA's. If you really want to try and be clever, take the Magic Domain, and scrolls of Solid Fog...they can't see well, and are limited to 5ft movement, whereas you and your freedom of movement+blindsight have no problem finding them and teaching them the error of their ways. Throw Death Ward in the mix for protection from annoying insta-deaths. As far as I can tell, the only way to ice this cleric is by doing enough combat damage to kill him twice, and that's not easy when you have a couple of heals prepared, are immune to one element (Elemental Body), and have Spell Resistance on. Another option is a Druid. Cast Fire Seeds (Holly Berry Bombs), and shift into a flying creature of some sort, and go to town. Most of the cleric tricks apply here, too. Druids can get nasty with clever use of wildshape and natural spell. Their awesome-ness is left as an exercise to the reader.
J011yroger 08-16-03, 06:54 AM	hopefully the battle will be short enough that you wont need to burn feats for persistant spell J
Wizu 08-16-03, 07:29 AM	Enemies will be all at level 12. And unfortunately the cleric is min/maxer-pvper. So I was thinking of being as unseen as possible. I do hope there is a way to kick cleric solo with some other class. If not... Well the cleric will have everything nice and nifty to use for the samekind of buffs I would do, and there is also the matter of three more characters I need to deal with. Heck, with rogue I get UMD so basically I could go scrolls route and use divine/arcane scrolls for the sake of it. How about sneak attakking with humble club cast spikes on it? And scrolls/wands/all things class restricted are in my book nicer when employed from long enough range than having to be in melee against pvp cleric... Preferably, Ill just snipe everything with scrolls of horrid wilting if I can. And do this while in air, middle of darkness hiding in plain sight. Improved invis on of course. heck, thatd be hard to hit... And think of it, does cleric have enough tactics when compared to rogue who has been loaded with everything cool? oh, and the wizard most probadly knows just how to dispell... Dispel is something I would be getting alot if I am cleric. And cleric without buffs is... Is... The most sucky cleric of all. For shame... :nonono: *Takes mental note of adding wand of dispel if makes rogue/shadowdancer.*
raistlin42 08-16-03, 12:00 PM	Well, any buffed up cleric worth his/her salt will have a ring of counterspells (Dispel Magic) or spellblade (dispel magic, greater dispelling)... Since it's possible to get the cleric immune to SA, that's probably what your cleric will do. For a rogue build...what about Teflammar Shadowlord? I don't have Unapproachable East, but Shadow Pounce is supposed to be uber, esp. with the Shadow Jump ability of the shadowdancer. For a rogue going up against a cleric, without MDJ, I'd say a min/maxed cleric can hose a min/maxed rogue, but maybe I just haven't played any good rogues....
catharz 08-16-03, 03:02 PM	Ran 1/Wiz 4/UP 2/MT 4/ND 1, if that makes any sense to you...
LordShade 08-16-03, 03:46 PM	You need to be able to hit hard and hit fast. You need to be killing at least one of them every round for you to even have a chance. If these guys are the same level as you, I'd say this is an impossible task. Can you at least give us some idea of what level these guys are going to be, so we can estimate how many HPs of damage you need to be able to inflict each round? I think, at level 12 with no 9th level magic in play (timestop), spellcasters are out. 6th level spells are scary, but you won't have enough high-level slots to metamagic spells effectively. Going against multiple opponents, if you were higher level, I'd suggest a cleric with a timestop, and then a bunch of reached, quickened cause wounds spells combined with reached harms. Since you are lower level, and need to inflict massive damage fast, I'd say look at one of the following: 1. Bladesinger/Telflammar Shadowlord combo - using the free action dimension door + full attack combo. Hit and run hardcore, teleporting in, killing a character, and teleporting out. 2. Iaijutsu Master - you will be just high enough to have Strike from the Void. With a high enough charisma score (star elf, magic blooded) you will be able to kill one character with the initial iaijutsu strike, and kill a second with your flick of the wrist wakizashi strike. That still leaves you in a 2v1 matchup, and you've used up your biggest guns. 3. Thrall of Juiblex - you can qualify for this PrC at level 4, getting its best ability by level 11 (polymorph). You will basically be a strong fighter, but polymorph gives you outstanding disguise capability. If you are going with spellcasting, I think some kind of summoner build is best. If you can minmax it enough, using classes like Demonologist or Nar Demonbinder, you can get some high-level summons out early. Bringing out multiple fiends per casting might just be enough for you to bring down the enemy. But we really need to know what level your opponents are going to be.
Wizu 08-16-03, 03:52 PM	Already said, theyre all level 12. Help me! :bigeyes: I just want to :fight!: them to death!
boer 08-16-03, 03:59 PM	If you want to go rogue, try to hide untill most buffs are gone. Ambush and run. Make their cleric and wizard waste spells to buff up again while you run away. A cleric can heal only so much, so if he is immune to SA, SA the meatshields and let the cleric waste his healing on them. For this tactic, I would think about targeting first their rogue, if noone can spot you, noone can target you. Also, wizards only have so much hp, a few SA's might kill the poor guy before he has the change to react to the ambush. And then, if there are only a few left, he has to sleep sometime, does he? P.S. this assumes no time-limitation. If it's going to be short and ugly, a caster might be a better option.
Khaim 08-16-03, 05:29 PM	I would seriously try to get your DM to allow psionics. Explain you won't be using CDG weapons, or Psychofeedback, but you just want to options. Then min/max a telepath and dominate them all. Or a constructor. Failing that... I think you're dead. I don't see how you can solo an equal-level group, no matter how much min/maxing you do. Finally, remember: Get Improved Initiative. You really want to go first.
Snow Savant 08-16-03, 06:12 PM	All valid points brought up by the prior posters. Although here is one solution .... Your standard Arcane Trickster. Rog1/Wiz5/GuildThief1/AT5 is good. You need: ======= 1. A bunch of spell slots allocated to Solid Fog (4th Level Spell). Use 2 Pearls of Power and a Conjuration specialty (opposite schools - Enchantment & Transmutation) to help supplement your #'s. Transmutation you say? Yes! You need Rays! 2. A Blindfold of Darkness (title may be incorrect) from the Arms & Equipment Guide. 9K GP ... very cheap. The Blindsight spell works fine as well (can't remember the book it is in - I don't have them with me). 3. A Wand of your fave no-save damage-causing cantrip "Ray"or 1st level spell. Very cheap. 4. Quicken Spell .... to attach to your fave no-save damage-causing "Ray" cantrips. Now you can cast 2 spells per round, including another Solid Fog if yours get countered or dispelled. 5. Ring of Freedom of Action ... about 30K GP. Now you can maneuver freely in your Solid Fog. All others move at 5' / round. 6. Improved Initiative ... critical you go first. ******* Now, cast the Solid Fog on top of you. All ranged weapons cannot pass through it. All spells cannot pass through it except for Rays. People outside the Fog cannot target you. They get no save or SR against the Fog's affects. You on the other hand, can cast Rays out of the Fog at no penalty and you will be catching them flatfooted as they cannot see the source of the Rays or predict when/where they are coming from. You can "see" them as long as they are within 60's of you. Feel free to walk close to the edge of your current Fog to cast another one and extend your Fog "area of operations". If the Fighter-types are foolish enough to walk into the Fog to track you down, they can only move at 5' per round. You can move at 30'. Do the math, they'll never catch you. Lastly, if you have Magic of Faerun, track down the "Simbuls" spells to see which one you can cast at your level) to stack up your Ray spell attacks. You should be able to fire off about 3 or 4 Rays per round at +5d6 SA per Ray. Kill those spellcasters at first to eliminate the threat of Dispel Magic. Leave the Tanks for last. Hope and pray for a confined playing space. Also remember too, cast Invisibility on your flying Owl Familiar and give him the Magic Jar needed for the spell's namesake. Have fun with Magic Jar and your invisible Jar courier. The spell was made for killing parties larger than you as long as you have your body/soul in safe keeping. Snow :)
PhaedrusXY 08-16-03, 07:47 PM	Meet the Shadow UrWizard Archer :devil: Human Wiz5/ShadowAdept1/UrPriest1/MysticTheurge5 Casts as 11th level wizard, and 9th level cleric Feats: Iron Will (human), Point Blank Shot (1), Scribe Scroll (Wiz1), Shadow Weave Magic (3), Rapid Shot (6), Malign Spell Focus (9), Extend Spell (Wiz5), Persistant Spell (12), Insidious Magic (SA1), Pernicious Magic (SA1), Tenactious Magic (SA1) Long duration spells to cast before anticipated combat, all last 13+ hours: 1) Use Karma bead, 2) Cast GMW on bow, gives +3 total enhancement bonus, 3) Cast magic vestment on robes and animated mithral buckler, using Pearl of Power so it only takes 1 spell slot. 4) Persistant Divine Favor, 5) Persistant Shield Spell slots used: 1 each of Cleric 2, 3, 4, 5 and 1-Wiz5 Spells to cast immediately before combat: 1) Protection from Good (Wiz 1), 2) Aid (Clr2), 3) Cat's Grace (Wiz2), 4) Bear's Endurance (Clr2), 5) Bull's Str (Clr2), 6) Protection from Energy (Clr 3), 7) True Seeing (Wiz 6) 8) Scroll of Death Ward, 9) Use scroll of Antilife Shell 10) Weapon of Energy (Clr 4) (Savage Species, for 1 rnd/lvl weapon is a burst weapon) 11) Blacklight and 12) Divine Power Spell slots used: 1-Clr1, 3-Clr 2, 1-Wiz2, 1-Clr3, 3-Clr4 Essential Magic items: Pearl of Power 3rd 9,000; Strand of Prayer Beads: Karma bead (+4 caster level for 10 minutes, 1X/day) 20,000; +1 animated mithral buckler 9,000; Bracers of Archery, Lesser 5,000; Ring of Counterspells with Dispel Magic in it 4,000; Scrolls of Antilife Shell and Deathward; bow of your choice Tactics: 1) Scry and find when to best launch an ambush, 2) Cast all the above preparative spells 3) Teleport or Dimension Door into the midst of your enemies, kill them with your bow. You still have most of your wizard spell slots unused for offense, defense, or other, and the Karma bead is still giving you a +4 to caster level. Your enemies will find it difficult to see into the Darkness or Dispel any of your spells because of your use of the Shadow Weave. You could also use Fly, but with Antilife Shell, you probably won't need it. Bring lots of scrolls of your own making to supplement your already massive spellcasting powers. You could also throw in Snow's Solid Fog/Ring of Freedom of Action combo for good measure with this. This build assumes that Mystic Theurge can be used to advance the UrPriest's strange casting abilities.
Bombsonengland 08-16-03, 11:03 PM	Here's what I am thinking... Wiz5/Shadow Adept 1/ Red Wizard 6 Necromancy will be your speciality. I know what you are thinking, but the build is going to be a bit.. different. The focus is on dominating a monster with a low will save, then casting magic jar and making it carry the gem into battle while your body is hidden elsewhere. Basically, try to find a tough monster with a low will save and take it's body. Send it into Melee and have it try to take out at least the party's Wizard so you won't have to worry about a Dispel. When it goes down (as it invariably will) you end up back in your gem. Hop into the body of the party's fighter and try to take down the cleric or the rogue. Try to use summon monster spells to lead a small army against the party, as well as provide yourself with plenty of fresh bodies to hide in. With any luck, the party won't be able to survive your summon / jar combo. Human Red Wizard 1 Spellcasting Prodigy 1 Shadow Weave Magic 3 Tatoo Focus (Necro) 5 Extend Spell 6 Spell Focus (Necromancy) 9 Greater Spell Focus (Necromancy) 12 Open (Use it for whatever you can) Stats: Str 8 Dex 8 Con 8 (Magic Jar says you use the HP of your new form...) Wis 18 Int 21 (3 ability increases) Cha 8 Patron: Shar As far as magic items go, all you need is enough cash for the focus for Magic Jar. With the rest of it, buy the best Tome of Clear Thought you can possibly afford, as a headband of intellect will be useless while you aren't using your own body. If you have enough left over, buy an orange Ioun stone, but your first priority is your int score. Your DC should be: 10 + 1 (Shadow Weave) + 2 (Spell Foci) + 1 (Tatoo Focus) + 5 (Int Mod.. possibly higher) for a of at least 24, maybe higher. Ooops... logged in on my old board name! This is opticassault, hi.
AmbiguityX 08-17-03, 01:32 AM	well i think a huge asset would be a race that has some spell resistance. Even if you do go rogue that could but a sever hamper on their spell effects towards you. and you'd be able to concentrate on killin than defending. I think as a rogue you have a very good change of hiding and isolating them, hide in plain sight will be extremely helpful. Sort of a hit and run. Drow could do well not sure if there are any other races with with SR that have lower ECL's, but at least its something. 1Rogue Dodge -1d6 2Rogue 3Rogue Mobility -2d6 4Rogue 5Rogue -3d6 6Assasin Combat Reflexes -4d6 7guild Thief -5d6 8 Shadow Dancer 9 Shadow Dancer Expert Tactician Disgues Make your way up to them, death attack with your expert tactician enacts, (you maybe able to use the death attack as you expert tactician attack, depending on the wording) if not attack again; then you have a move equiv to hide in plain sight. Repeat-they will prolly get paranoid and not let anyone near them in the city but oh well that their problem. You just have to ambush some other way Against spells you have SR and evasion.
Little_Buddha 08-17-03, 10:24 AM	Quaal's Feather Token: Whip is extremely open to abuse as well, on a more simple note. It has an unreasonably high bonus to Grapple which could come in handy.
Ranthanas 08-17-03, 11:23 AM	You're going to have to fight very dirty here. My suggestion would be an Asimar Rogue 10/Wiz 1 PAOd permenantly into a Kyton (thanks, Iku). Use a Baleful Polymorph/ maximised Awaken spell on him to bump his INT up to 18 (make it a dump stat to start with) Give him a ring of invisibility (to hide) and a stack of powerful wands (which is what the Wizard is for). If they are remotely close together, strike from ambush with a couple of level 10 fireballs then go invis and run away *fast*. Hide. Repeat.
Wizu 08-17-03, 11:44 AM	Thanks folks, this gave me insight what to do. So, Im gonna go rogue/shadowdancer/assasin/guildtief route, or then rogue/wizard/guildthief/arcane trickster way. Quaals feather token is a must, Ill get as much of them to provide me some nifty combat bonuses and sneak attack opportunities, solid fog trick is also in my bag now, magic jar can not be forgotten. And telfammar shadowlord is not out quite yet. So, I have told you guys what I want, now lets dwelve to the closer points of the build. 10 20 12 14 8 10 sounding good? Heck, Im quite out on the stat part. Dont know how to exactly min/max them. And what race? Elf? Halfling? Kobold? :smirk: Neverthless, items are clear what I want. Now, what I want you guys to tell me is the exact levels. I seek as much of UMD, SA and Mobility/Capability to do alot of damage at the first round of jumping in. I guess it would need guildtief, telfammar shadowlord, assasin, rogue and shadowdancer at thiskind of build. Is it possible? Heck, I just want it sooo broken... *Sniffle* Oh, and craft trapmaking is a must, I am going to waylaid them, make them suffer soo much at stepping into my traps, and... and... TRAPS! Its only so much cleric can do if he falls 60 feets underground. Into spikes. Into ADAMANTINE deadly spikes... Or something like that. With invisible hentaimonster on bottom. Allright, now I am sleepy... And the battle will most probadly last a veevy veevy long time. If it lasts over one weekend irl, we decided it would be a draw.
AmbiguityX 08-17-03, 04:06 PM	so you don't think spell resistance is going to come in handy or you just don't want to have to pay the ECL cost for it?
Wizu 08-18-03, 12:47 AM	Scroll of spell resistance :smirk:
AmbiguityX 08-18-03, 05:09 AM	ah ha
AmbiguityX 08-18-03, 06:24 AM	oh and robe of blending does wonders for hiding and disguising... if you can make your own items I suggest creating one with persistant blade. I think its in Magic of Faeurn, it a 2nd lvl spell that flanks. If your ever caught you can activate it to keep you sneak attack active, since you are alone. The name of the spell starts with Shiloniosernsdfjh;alerj something or other, but i'm sure you can figure it out. A wand with minimal charges or scroll should help out. (nah nm this if all else use your shadow familiar to flank for you.) how do those tokens help out? I'm not sure on how to use them. As for race strongheart halfling... you get the dex bonus and an extra feat, as well as bonus to hit and AC, this race can't miss. But I suppose if you want to be a telfmar shadowlord your going to need become the required race, I'm not sure if its a race or template, but anyhow I can't see you being able to become shadowlord through dimensional door. If you go arcane trickster, you could still use the halfling, but you 'll need to use one of stat boosts for your intell, to cast 5th lvl spells. use the extra feat for finese or even stick to skiprocks and other ranged weapons. Or whatever. I think even a wand of ray of frost would do wonders. So let me just flesh out my previous post: Strong heart halfling Lvl Class SA Feats 1 R 1d6 Combat reflexes, dodge 2 R 3 R 2d6 Mobility 4 R 5 R 3d6 6 Assasin 4d6 Improved Init 7 GuildTheif 5d6 8 Bayushi Deciever 6d6 9 Shadow Dancer Expert Tactician 10 SD 11 SD 12 SD Improved Fient(or whatever can't think of anything else that might be useful) Abilities: 1 trapfinding 2 Evasion 3 TS+1 4 uncanny dodge +DEX 5 6 death attack 7 8 +DEX 9 hide in plain sight 10 darkvision 11 shadow illusion, summon shadow 12 shadow jump 20 ft. +to whatever works for you Tactics: Hide or Disguise to get close Death attack then hide in plain sight. Can use your shadow jump to get out of there and sneak away or inivisbility or fog. Surprise round Most likly a Wizard with max hit points get 48. Damage on average will be 18+weapon. Another attack from Expert tactician will make it 2x(18+weapon). 36+2d6. In one round you can take the wizard out. Using a skip rock would work or even a short bow (any dex based weapon will do) will be your best bet because your BAB will suck +6/+1, but that's about what it would have been with the cleric archer too, with the potential for more damage. 1st round Improved init should help you win init so you can sneak attack someone else and use expert tactician to do it again, then use your move equivalent to hide. 2nd round They won't be able to find you. So you sneak attack someone else activating another attack through ET and shadow jump away if your hiding spot is ruined. I think the penalty for sniping is like -20, which something that even with item boosts will be pretty tough to beat, unless you can find a sweet place to hide to get circumstance bonuses.
WyvernSlayer 08-18-03, 08:08 AM	I'd definitely go Druid here. It's you on 4(?!) other guys, so it's gonna be tough. The Druid comes jam-packed with an animal buddy to start (powerful too), summons even more animal buddies into the fray, and has awesome battlefield control spells (ranging from simple entangle to spiked ground, fog cloud, ). You can set up call greater lightning for rounds when you can't think of something else to do (or hide, etc etc), and have dirty spells like stone shape at your disposal (no save!). I run a lot of PVP tourneys in my area, and I've seen them in action, very powerful. I had trouble taking on one with a cleric ;) . Try a nice animal buddy that flies or something like a Dire Wolf which has Improved trip with mad bonuses (remember getting up from prone provokes AoO now!). Other options to consider though: Arcane Trickster who focuses on Enchantment could be awesome. Take over your enemies and make them help you!:smirk: While maintaining hide! There's so many options to consider here...I'd still go with the Druid though..who knows, you might get stacked up against a party of all clerics or something..:eek:
True Balance 08-18-03, 03:15 PM	if you want to be unseen just be sure to have a good hide check, not even true seeing can spot hidden. blindsight however can but that would be difficult for them to have.
PhaedrusXY 08-18-03, 04:39 PM	There are spells in Savage Species that grant Blindsight.
Wizu 08-19-03, 11:03 AM	My strongheart halfling prevailed. I'll explain how it all goed. First I used a scroll of stone shape on a remote valley to make myself a well created battlefield, then I proceeded on with some wands of "digging" and created the whole valley to be a literate deathtrap, I rolled really good on my craft trapmakings, and from first glance the whole setup looked like just an ordinary valley. I stored few extra wands on save havens should I get myself greater dispelled by unknown reasons, and started the preparations with protection of good and all the ilk like that, making me enchanted through the roof. I had scouted the estimate when they would be arriving to my deathtrap, story going like "Were just four happy adventurers going to next town where we can enter the next dungeon to get l00t, become l33t and kick ass." So I patiently waited in my secure hiding place (gotta love hide in shadows) up in near mountain, and watched the party walking to the valley through my magnified scope. I never succeeded to see more than three of them, ranger most probadly hiding in some bushes. Well, I had my tricks for him and his tracking skill on my sleeve. Party of unhappy adventurers got soon seriously damaged when they walked on my acid burst trap wich exploded the ground and poured acid from a small hill. After fleeing it and getting severely hurt, they left one very unhappy and very dead wizard behind them (gotta love bad reflex rolls and no acid immunity.) I had planned this from the start because I knew that fire is most favoured elements. Now, after taking out the wizard by my überleet tactics, I casted darkness on myself and used celestial armor, took off to air and in few rounds I was in good spot to start raining death and decay from my wands. Ofcourse I had took countermeasures and sought through my own darkness. Lukily the party far too below didnt realised my presence high up and tried to get to wizard, most probadly trying to resurrect him. Cleric had started casting all spells nifty and epic. Now it turned akward, I fired my wand of acid ball amongst the fighter and cleric, ranger staying a bit further from the pool of acid. The cleric got VERY unhappy cause he rolled 1 in his reflex save (And me 20 on my spell resistance check) and the acid ball affected his items. And when his amulet and fullplate corroded to nothingness he was pretty badly injured. Well, nothing that good old heal spell couldnt repair. Fighter had hps enough to be only barely injured, and he drew bow, took 30 feet out from cleric to save himself from further things that hurt. And so the feeble attemp of making shot in the run to 300ft above into darkness and trying to hit me obiously missed. The next 10 feet adjustment he took to hide behind a rock was the ouch part of his life. The pittrap was kinda lethal, thanks to my good craft trap roll, and poor fighter soon found himself injured 60 feet underground in cold iron spikes. There were still three unused traps, all being at near vicinity of the hill. I tried to took advantage of my supreme manouverability and lure em to the next magical wall of iron trap, dropping height and using wand of melfs acid arrow on cleric. Hit, nice rolls, and cleric was even more unhappy. Now, this is where it turned eerie. They had one advantage that was almost equal to all of mine, the ranger was shade. And when everything near you sdtarts to become dark as something dark approaches and your vision gets reduced, even you would feel unhappy. He was archer type, and took some shots in to me. At this point I got my hp reduced to almost half of total. Cursing, I casted solid fog and it all became blurry. Thanks to my trappings I didnt had gem of true seeing, but when nothing happened I casted it from scroll as soon as possible in the next round. I was lucky enough to see the fighter who had crawled out of my trap, healed partially, walking into my wall of iron trap. Total crushage was his demise, and bad save. I unplugged a healing potion and took care of the hp loss problem by that. Cleric was making his way to fighter to heal him again, and looked to be in his best divine powers. I truly hate clerics. Archer was not far from me, staying alert in middle of the fog trying to move with his pathetic 5ft steps. Well, seeing my possibilities to make short work of the fighter before the cleric would reach him, I took myself bit further into air and used wand of acidballs again. It took him down to like 20-30hp. Cleric casted something once agains and now started to move fast enough in the fog. Prolly true seeing. Well, I had few options at my sleeve. And the best I came up was scroll of Evards Black Tentacles. I almost failed the UMD even, would hate to have a mishap at my face. Tentacles kept the cleric from 15ft at fighter, and they both got allmighty grappled. Poor things. Ranger on the other hand was slooowly trying to advance at me. Poor bugger. Poor bugger because next 5ft adjustment and my wall of blades would go pop from the moss. I made short work of fighter/cleric threat with scroll of transmute rock to mud. They were so out of the battle. Cleric started to cast something and fighter shot few arrows at direction X screaming painfully. Archer on the other hand took that 5ft step and got popped by blades straight through his body. Roll of 10d6 when he failed his reflex save really hurted the bugger and I decided to make the shade a little more dead and soulless.Advance 30ft from him, cast melfs acid arrow. Rince and repeat when he gets out from the trap and tries to flee. One dead shade. Meanwhile I had to save 2 searing lights and one flamestrike from the cleric, and cause of my overpowered ref save the job was a tad too bit easy. To my luck the cleric was melee-er, and I proceeded to see what the tentacles had done to rest of the paartayh. One grappled to death fighter and one cleric so stuck in a mud than can be. Well, to make it all more painful, I casted mud to rock from a scroll. My char laughed maniacilly and tossed EVERYTHING he had on his person that was lethal to the cleric. Saving all those scary will saves and one fort (hates destruction) were a pure luck from my perspective, and the cleric getting crap thrown to him was in trouble when all of his spells were ran out and all he had was his buffs. Know what killed him eventually? Alchemist fire! Gotta love those gnomes. It gets eerie when you dont have very effective means to extinguish the flames. And guess was his armor resistant to fire, the one that got melted by acid? In the end my character really didnt get much loot cause items of partaayh got destroyed in battle. The traps costed a craplot. But it was awarding experience and taught me just how well does UMD and SA rock. Oh, and there was only one scroll that got mishap. My scroll of endurance. It activated on me 8 hours after the battle. Kudos to all of you that helped me. Altough I did have ONE original idea of my own... TRAPS! ALOT OF TRAPS! I feel evil :smirk:
AmbiguityX 08-19-03, 02:47 PM	that seemed really disgusting. Did you even use a sneak attack. The whole thing seemed like brilliant use of magic items.
Wizu 08-19-03, 02:56 PM	Yeah, I used 3 sneak attacks to the cleric and 2 to the ranger throughout the whole thing. But hey, its the tricks not the skill. I bet level one commoner with good boost in craft (trapmaking) could have done same. :angel:
Moherajikuyx 08-20-03, 06:31 AM	Well done, I love rogues! Only thing, didn't the cleric ever use any will or fort save spell? That sounds foolish.
Wizu 08-20-03, 07:55 AM	Yeah he did, reread my post. Me lucky!
Prakhog 08-20-03, 10:16 AM	i must congradulate you.
Prakhog 08-23-03, 10:46 PM	This is great. I'm saving this on my favorites, just to remind me that quantity ain't anything.
LordShade 08-23-03, 11:28 PM	Wow, wizu, I am impressed. You have some serious skill ;) Although it sounds like you did have a fair amount of luck. Your enemies failed critical saves and you made some key ones. Still, I'm thrilled you won. Props :)
Wizu 08-24-03, 02:22 PM	Thanks guys, appreciated. Now, maybe I can get the same bunch to have another duel against me... To be seen, but I will update this if it is to happen. Though I think I need to change tactics in the next one. :smirk:
AmbiguityX 08-24-03, 04:55 PM	watch they do dual rogues. I could totally see that happening. Then you should try something totally off the wall to mess with them. Like an anthropmorphic feral squidy.
JosephKell 08-24-03, 06:28 PM	Consider Half-Ogre Cleric of some deity with the Strength Domain! Take a big ass sword. Or take a Spiked chain. If you use Enlarge Person (Domain spell for Strength) you become Huge (Large Half-Ogre) with either 4d6 damage for Greatsword, or 3d6 Damage with Spiked Chain! Either way you will have either 15 foot reach for the Greatsword or 25 for the Spiked Chain! Also, if you can (within alignment restrictions) maybe take Hospitaler, to continue increasing your Cleric Caster Level (to increase the duration of Enlarge Person and other buff spells) while also getting a better BAB Other good spells are Shield of Faith, Greater Magic Weapon... Bless, Bane, Divine Favor... Basicly anything that can add to either Offense or Defense...
toomre 09-02-03, 08:35 PM	Well done. Good use of traps. I doubt anyone expects to run into traps in mock battles, I know I wouldn't have. Still, your opponents totally over-estimated their numerical advantage and played extremely poorly. A wizard that walks into town, visible, when he expects a fight deserves a hasty nasty death. He should have been flying, invisible, and apart from the rest of his group. And the cleric and the fighter should not have been walking in hand in hand, it's a basic rule of battle to stay out of area attack radius of your comrades. You sure gave them a schooling in planning.
mcbigski 09-02-03, 11:03 PM	Great tactics for the most part, and a great story. But True seeing doesn't allow you to see into solid fog. (The fog is truly there!!) From the RSRD on True Seeing: "True seeing, however, does not penetrate solid objects. It in no way confers X-ray vision or its equivalent. It does not negate concealment, including that caused by fog and the like. "
toomre 09-02-03, 11:48 PM	I had scouted the estimate when they would be arriving to my deathtrap, story going like "Were just four happy adventurers going to next town where we can enter the next dungeon to get l00t, become l33t and kick ass." Oh I didn't realize they were not supposed to know about the upcoming battle, I guess my criticism about their unpreparedness was not fair. Regarding the traps though, doesn't it take a good bit of time to set them up? I thought crafting anything often took days or at best hours depending on the CR of the trap and how well you roll on the craft check. How much time were you given before the 4 suckers entered the scene?
Wizu 09-03-03, 09:03 AM	Two days. That was the headstart I got, and I spend every waking hour to craft the things. Theres 24 hours in a day, and needless to say when you dont need to sleep you can make alot of thing in 24h. And most of them were magical traps, DM ruled that it doesnt take so long to make them when all I need to do is cast 4 scrolls. Or was it 5 I used to traps? Cant remember right. Really didnt know that about the true seeing. Neither did my DM. So I guess I lucked it out. Would have had some serious disadvantages and most probadly death. Maybe Ill just stay silent and dont speak to the group how true seeing really works... :smirk:
Jindl 09-03-03, 10:46 AM	Here's an idea I've been working on... One of the main problems with arena combat is having to spend rounds buffing. The opponents have 2 spellcasters and can therefore buff faster than you. But unless they're using feats like persistent spell, they're buffs will mostly have durations in the 10's of minutes. So I suggest: 1. Hide for 2 or 3 rounds and let them cast their buffs. 2. Use a scroll of rope trick (3rd level caster). 3. Hide in the rope trick, pulling the rope up after you. This puts you in an extradimensional space which is invisible on the material plane. Also spell effects cannot cross the invisible gate. This means that if they want to come in after you, they're going to have to do it one at a time, allowing you to sneak attack. 4. After 3 hours come out of the rope trick and sneak/hide into your standard tactics. This gives you the advantage of surprise, since they won't know when you are going to attack. After three hours their best buffs have probably expired (and they probably didn't memorize multiple buffs...) so you also get another tactical advantage. I'm calling this the Rope a Dope Trick because it gets your enemy to waste all their buffs before combat really starts... What do you guys think?
Ellone 09-03-03, 12:20 PM	Looks to me you know rules better than your master and know which one to forget. You don't get save against seering light. True Seeing don't help against fog. Congratulation too for making a ranger loose 3 rounds in a 20feet radius spread solid fog when he can walk 10 feet a round into it, impressive!
Wizu 09-03-03, 12:44 PM	Nothing better than that to prove how sucky me and my group is in D&D. :D I think there isnt a day going by when one of us notes something we have done wrong and we all shake our heads and blame the rabbit. Ofcourse, the rabbit being an inside joke among us. Coming from good old ages when party was hunting rabbit for food so they could get something to eat after being few days without nutritions. Rabbit put its head between two rocks and hided. We never found it because it rolled too darn good in hide. And the next day we realised when reading the books that it couldnt have hided in there in the first place. :smirk:
Ellone 09-03-03, 01:00 PM	Well everybody makes mistake and when you see the number of spell involved in this story, you can't go without a few miss. Still all errors were at your benefits :) a few correction coud have changed the result.
Prakhog 10-29-03, 06:53 PM	:bump: This thread deserves to stay alive