Post/Author/DateTime	Post
copperwyrmling 10-30-07, 01:34 AM	I'm looking at taking Leadership for my sorcerer's L15 feat and making a bard / sublime chord cohort for her (Snowsong, Harmonic Chorus, Inspire Spellpower, and plenty of buffs for the rest of the party too). For builds, I'm tossing up between various mixes of bard, marshal, sublime chord and warweaver (assuming PCs' access applies to cohorts: if it doesn't, the list of options will shrink dramatically and I'll have an easier choice ;) ) Lyric thaumaturge is also a possibility (replacing some of the early bard levels) if I decide not to work at Inspire Courage: this is a distinct possibility as Snowsong already gives a +4 morale bonus to attacks, which won't stack. If my sorcerer takes advantage of expiring item access right now, she could grab a horn of resilience and badge of valor. However, this is only really worthwhile if the cohort is going to be doing inspire greatness and / or inspire courage. With the badge of valor + inspirational boost and at least eight bard levels, his inspire courage would be +4/+4 - but the +4 attack doesn't stack with Snowsong, and it takes up an amulet slot, a L1 spell known, and a swift + immediate action in the first two rounds of combat. The action cost is quite significant, as my sorcerer has Core access to belts of battle (so her cohort shares that access, and my sorc is likely to buy several), and they convert swift actions into move/standard/full-rounds. I think the best options so far look something like: 1: Bard 9 / Marshal 1 / Sublime Chord 3 - Inspire Greatness with Horn of Resilience - Inspire Courage +2 base - Song of Arcane Power - Marshal aura: Motivate Dexterity or Determined Caster (not sure yet) - Lots of skills Requires my sorc to buy gear for the cohort now. 2: Bard 1-7 / Warweaver 1-3 / Sublime Chord 1 / Warweaver 4-5 - All the cool Warweaver powers, including the ability to throw a Quiescent Weave at Close range as a move action that contains Greater Invis, Freedom of Movement, Harmonic Chorus, and Good Hope / Heroism / Greater Dimension Door. (Comments on how Greater D-Door would work at your tables, when it's modified to Close range rather than Touch, would interest me.) Also allows casting Harmonic Chorus on the entire party as a standard action without blowing lots of feats into chain spell + MMSF + rapid metamagic. - Inspire Courage +1 base - probably not used much (would be +3/+3 with the badge and inspirational boost, but I'd rather save the actions and money and pop a Good Hope through the quiescent weaving along with other spells, if I'm desperate for a morale bonus to damage) 3: Bard 1-7 / Warweaver 1-2 / Marshal 1 / Sublime Chord 1-2 / Warweaver 3 (option to swap marshal level for another level of warweaver) - Warweaver L3 powers - you can put L3 spells in the weave and have two spells in a quiescent weaving, but touch spells remain touch. Not nearly as good as warweaver 5 (no freedom of movement + greater invis at range), but it still allows multitarget Harmonic Chorus, buffing the entire party with Heroism with one spell, etc. - Marshal aura (Motivate Dex or Determined Caster) - Song of Arcane Power - Inspire Courage +1 base - probably not used much Other info that may be relevant: - My sorc has Core access to the runestaff containing Otto's Irresistible Dance: it will probably be a high priority once the cohort has played a few APL 14-16 games. This is the other reason that getting L6 spells is non-negotiable... - She also has access to the spell Sonorous Hum, which maintains concentration on a spell for you (so could use it to maintain Harmonic Chorus). Comments and/or advice would be appreciated :)
Timlagor 10-30-07, 09:41 AM	MIC errata mentiones a whole load of Runestaffs so you'd better check that. Are you really sure you want to have another spontaneous arcane caster as your cohort?
MwaO 10-30-07, 05:45 PM	Have you considered a build that involves Beguiler or Wizard with a level of Bard as the entry to Sublime Chord? Beguiler is a lot easier with the skill points, Wizard is more flexible, faster, and has better choices for the tapestry.
Maesto 10-30-07, 07:23 PM	I think that taking the beguiler/wizard route loses the ability to cast harmonic chorus, doesn't it?
Lomiat 10-30-07, 07:36 PM	Here's the bard/marshal/sublime chord build I was working on for my potential cohort: Dahlia Lonasong grey elf bard 1/marshal 2/bard 3-10/sublime chord 11-13 STR 10 (8) DEX 12 (14) CON 14 (12) INT 13 (15) WIS 8 CHA 15 [à18 by 12th] (22) HP 12d6 + 1d8 + 13 = 68 Fort 6 base (+7) Ref 8 base (+10) Will 12 base (+11) Feats: 1 – Extra Music 3 – Extend Spell 6 – Chain Spell 9 – Metamagic Song 12 – Arcane Strike OR Improved Initiative, Elven Spell Lore, Skill Focus (perform) Spells: 0 (3/day) – Detect Magic, Message, Light, Read Magic, Summon Instrument, Mending 1 (5/day) – Cure Light Wounds, Inspirational Boost, Grease, Feather Fall 2 (5/day) – Harmonic Chorus, Harmonize, Silence, (Whirling Blade OR Calm Emotions) 3 (3/day) – Haste, See Invisibility, Sculpt Sound 4 (4/day) – Dimension Door, Evard’s Black Tentacles, Orb of Force, Freedom of Movement 5 (3/day) – Greater Dispel Magic, Wall of Force 6 (2/day) – Otto’s Irresistible Dance OR Heroes’ Feast Gear: 35k Regalia of the Hero (3 pieces: 1/day grant allies +5 on atk, save, skill; 1/day grant nearby ally move action) Badge of Valor (throat) 1,200gp (3/day increase inspire courage by 1) Helm of Tactics (head) 2,000gp (increase effect of minor aura by 1) Horn of Resilience (held) 5,000gp (grant DR5/- or grant 50 temp hps) Tunic of Steady Spellcasting 2,500gp Cloak of Charisma (+4) 16,000gp **Subtotal: 24,700gp (10,300gp remaining) ?? +1 mithral chain mail 5,450 ?? ?? +1 light steel shield 1,1XX ?? ?? Ring of Protection (+1) 2,000gp ?? AC 21 MW Cold Iron dagger
MwaO 10-30-07, 08:25 PM	I think that taking the beguiler/wizard route loses the ability to cast harmonic chorus, doesn't it? Yes. But on the other hand, you get 2 sets of 4th level spells instead of 1 set. There are a bunch of nice 4th level spells in both spell lists which are a shame to take in the Sublime Chord list.
copperwyrmling 11-01-07, 01:18 AM	MIC errata mentiones a whole load of Runestaffs so you'd better check that. Checked it. There was an insignificant price change (it changed by 200gp or something). It is an expensive item, but I was considering it buying for my sorc anyway, just for the tables where she can do tricks with it with UMD. The cohort would make it useful all the time (when he's playing). Are you really sure you want to have another spontaneous arcane caster as your cohort? Pretty sure, yes. As far as I remember my planned spell list, there's one point of overlap in their spell selections and it's Friendly Face. I did consider other options, but I subscribe to the theory that since a cohort always knows one of the PCs they'll be sharing a table with, they should be designed to be very helpful to that PC. I'm pretty sure that sublime chord is the best synergistic build for the main PC: a buffs-focused divine caster wouldn't be horrible (heroes' feast is nice), but there are precious few divine buffs that actually help Azrien (my sorcerer) significantly. It was the Snowsong spell that really made me enthusiastic about the sublime chord, as it's a very unusual but effective Az-buff that also seems very nice for most other classes (and the idea of multi-target harmonic chorus is also very nice). Also... it's extremely rare for Az to feel scared due to the lack of a party role. She and the others in the party can usually compensate pretty well. For a cohort I mostly want something that will be fun for me to play with. Another part of it is just having fun with the silliness available at L15, since after LG ends it'll probably be a long time before I have other PCs of this level, and the system will be different anyway. (Examples: "Make a DC 32 save against my favorite save-or-be-screwed spell of L6 or lower, reroll it if you fail", "My caster level for this spell is 22, I have a +18 bonus to defeat SR on top of that, do I need to roll?" or for the cohort himself, "My take-10 bluff check is 76... now what do I want you to believe?") Wizard requires quite a bit of effort at the table to function at full potential, which is a major downside for a cohort. Wizard also introduces nasty multiple attribute dependency on the elite array, hurts skills a lot, and I'm not really sure how you create and value a cohort's spellbook (and since item-access favors don't apply to them, I'm going to bet Azrien's spell-scribing favors also don't carry over to the cohort). I'm also not sure wizard has better spell choices for the tapestry: what would you use? If there are some really tempting wizard spells I might be able to grab some of them from Lyric Thaumaturge: in the heavily warweaver build I wouldn't be using inspire courage much anyway. Azrien has access to a whisper gnome cohort who would make an extremely cool beguiler. However, it doesn't work well with sublime chord (how would you allocate ability scores on the elite array for a caster using both Int and Cha?), and I really want sublime chord for the Snowsong spell. When I wrote up a trial spell selection for the cohort, I don't remember L4 being one of the real pressure levels - Freedom of Movement and Greater Invis are lovely, but I don't remember that much else I really wanted. I quite like the low-level bard list - there are some very nice L1-3 spells there that Az has never had a chance to play with (joyful noise, swift invis, improvisation, harmonic chorus, silence, hymn of praise, glibness, etc) I guess one of the questions I'm looking for comments on is how you would value inspire courage bonuses + inspire greatness (with regalia of the hero) vs the warweaver abilities? How about the marshal aura vs warweaver 5? Here's what my sketched spell selection looked like for the bard 9 / marshal 1 / sublime chord 3: L6: Snowsong L5: Greater Dispel Magic, Greater D-Door / Telekinesis / Moonbow L4: Freedom of Movement, Greater Invis, open, open L3: Hymn of Praise, Glibness, Good Hope / Haste / something else L2: Harmonic Chorus, Harmonize, Silence, Heroism / something else L1: Improvisation, Friendly Face, Joyful Noise, Inspirational Boost That would be modified somewhat if I took one of the warweaver builds, of course.
magebeast 11-01-07, 01:50 AM	I think the warweaver build is cool as hell, but I don't think that cohorts share PrCs. The equipment thing is listed explicitly, and unfortunately the PrC access is not. Without crunching any numbers I'd vote for the warweaver build if I'm wrong, but I think you should probably plan on the Sublime Chord build.
copperwyrmling 11-01-07, 02:09 AM	I think the warweaver build is cool as hell, but I don't think that cohorts share PrCs. The equipment thing is listed explicitly, and unfortunately the PrC access is not. I asked on the LG Questions thread a little while back: no response yet, still waiting on it (and hoping for one before I have to decide whether or not to buy the regalia of the hero). I would've assumed the same thing as you, but I've seen a LOT of people building cohorts with classes and PrCs based on the main PC's access (I remember one person saying their cohort is a L12 single-class duskblade), so I'm not certain, and it seemed worth asking. Like I said, for purposes of the thread, assume they share access: if they don't it just makes the choices easier ;)
MwaO 11-01-07, 11:45 AM	I'm also not sure wizard has better spell choices for the tapestry: what would you use? If there are some really tempting wizard spells I might be able to grab some of them from Lyric Thaumaturge: in the heavily warweaver build I wouldn't be using inspire courage much anyway. Lyric Thaum doesn't work too well - you can't enter until 7th and more than 1 level means you can't get all the War Weaver levels. The advantage is where you have a Bard 1/Wizard 5/War Weaver 5/Marshal 1/Sublime Chord 1. There's really no pain for specializing, you end up with 2 4th level spells to cast per day, and the MAD isn't all that much - you're just getting a 14 Int, nothing more. But really useful tapestry spells are: 1: Enlarge Person, Low-Light Vision, Benign Transposition(depending on DM ruling and access - with the right ruling, it can be better than DDoor in certain circumstances), Remove Fear, Endure Elements 2: Darkvision(cheap mass darkvision for entire party), Resist Energy, Spider Climb, Owl's Wisdom, Cat's Grace 3: Fly, Displacement, Heroism, Greater Mage Armor, Telepathic Bond(Lesser), Nondetection, Protection from Energy, Magic Circle Against Evil, Tongues, Water Breathing 4: Greater Invisibility, Stoneskin, Remove Curse, Dimension Door, Freedom of Movement(SC), Cure Critical Wounds(SC) 5: Greater Heroism(SC), Greater DDoor(SC) - with Greater Heroism, you can essentially create Heroes Feast on demand and give a better + to hit/saves. That's where the extra spells become valuable - 4th level spells can be real killers through the tapestry - Greater Invisibility is a cool spell to cast 3/day through the tapestry. With a +4 Int Item, it isn't that hard to do with the Wizard levels. Also, it isn't that hard to start off with a 12 Wisdom and pick up Arcane Disciple(Healing) and/or (Plant) for Barkskin, Cure Critical on the Wizard list - you have a +2 Wisdom item to memorize spells, feed Owl's Wisdom through the tapestry, then cast Cure Critical if necessary. It might not be the most powerful 8th level spell out there, but it is actually the equivalent of Mass Cure Critical for the most part. The real problem for a Bard/Sublime Chord War Weaver build is casting those spells for the initial tapestry action - that will eat up spells like there's no tomorrow - having a 2nd set of 4th level spells really relieves that pressure, whether it is from Beguiler or Wizard. When I wrote up a trial spell selection for the cohort, I don't remember L4 being one of the real pressure levels - Freedom of Movement and Greater Invis are lovely, but I don't remember that much else I really wanted. I quite like the low-level bard list - there are some very nice L1-3 spells there that Az has never had a chance to play with (joyful noise, swift invis, improvisation, harmonic chorus, silence, hymn of praise, glibness, etc) It depends on your feats, but Break Enchantment, Freedom of Movement, Greater Invisibility, Modify Memory, Otiluke's Resilient Sphere, Shadow Conjuration, Solid Fog, Orb of Force, and Zone of Silence all have their charms.
magebeast 11-01-07, 03:57 PM	The biggest issue with all of these builds are the interactions between the PrCs and the way that Sublime Chord's caster level thing is worded.
copperwyrmling 11-01-07, 07:48 PM	Lyric Thaum doesn't work too well - you can't enter until 7th and more than 1 level means you can't get all the War Weaver levels. For some reason I remembered it as having entry at 5. Okay, probably no lyric thaumaturge then (except possibly in a build without warweaver). The advantage is where you have a Bard 1/Wizard 5/War Weaver 5/Marshal 1/Sublime Chord 1. There's really no pain for specializing, you end up with 2 4th level spells to cast per day, and the MAD isn't all that much - you're just getting a 14 Int, nothing more. In elite array, that means Con 12 instead of 14 (which everyone tells me is a Really Big Deal, although it wasn't a major issue for Az). Also, can you even get the skills to work with no retraining and Int 14 in that build? That's a lot of 2+Int skillpoint levels. I did look at this exact build, but I think the MAD makes it a bad idea. 1: Enlarge Person, Low-Light Vision, Benign Transposition(depending on DM ruling and access - with the right ruling, it can be better than DDoor in certain circumstances), Remove Fear, Endure Elements I have two wands of endure elements on the main PC, but haven't used a charge in ages, since almost always a prep-caster just says "I use five of my 20 L1 pearls and cover the party". Heroes' Feast is probably present at 90% of the tables this PC plays on, making Remove Fear irrelevant. I don't have access to BT. 2: Darkvision(cheap mass darkvision for entire party) If I really need Mass Darkvision the main PC will Limited Wish for it. It's a nice idea though. Resist Energy This one is cool, although its usefulness depends on whether you need to nominate the energy type beforehand when you put it in a quiescent weaving. Being able to affect everyone as a standard action would be great though. Spider Climb The main PC has Mass Fly and keeps it up for all of most dungeon-crawls - she also casts it preemptively at the slighest hint of danger. Owl's Wisdom, Cat's Grace By APL 14, everyone who really uses these stats tends to have +4 stat-boosters already. Why Owl's Wisdom? Fly, Displacement, Heroism, Greater Mage Armor, Telepathic Bond(Lesser), Nondetection, Protection from Energy, Magic Circle Against Evil, Tongues, Water Breathing Displacement seems redundant with Greater Invis. Heroism is cool, but on the bard list. Greater Mage Armor is almost always redundant with people's armor (or if people don't have a +6 armor bonus at APL 14, they generally don't care about AC for other reasons). My wild mage has had a permanent nondetection for two levels and I don't think it's ever come up, so I'm dubious as to its utility. Prot Energy - same comment as Resist Energy. Magic Circle is great, but doesn't benefit that much from being woven. Same for Tongues, unless you're using it to set up a battle language for the whole party (the main PC also probably has Tongues, unless I change my L14 spell-retrain plans - which I might do given the new FAQ on Magic Circle). Water Breathing is good, but it's already multi-target, and is useful rarely enough that I can cover it with Limited Wish (and wouldn't put it in a quiescent weaving). I just don't see much on this list that justifies the MAD, the effort of playing a wizard as a secondary PC, the cost of putting the spellbook together, and the lack of Harmonic Chorus and enough bardic music to fuel Inspire Spellpower, given that this is a sorcerer's cohort. 4: Greater Invisibility, Stoneskin, Remove Curse, Dimension Door, Freedom of Movement(SC), Cure Critical Wounds(SC) 5: Greater Heroism(SC), Greater DDoor(SC) - with Greater Heroism, you can essentially create Heroes Feast on demand and give a better + to hit/saves. Stoneskin is horribly expensive through the weave, and since this cohort's level will never reset, I'd rather save their money for buying fun toys. The others are very good, although Remove Curse is useful rarely enough that I can probably compensate with Limited Wish. Greater Heroism is in the PHB, did you mean something else? The +4 to saves and temp HP are very nice, although the +4 to attacks wouldn't stack with Snowsong. (For people without Frostburn, Snowsong is a 10 minutes/level spell that affects a 30ft radius centred on the caster and gives allies within the radius +4 morale bonus to attacks, +4 morale bonus to Charisma, +4 insight bonus to AC, +1d6 cold damage on all melee attacks, and cold resistance 15. It also gives enemies in the radius a 25% spell failure chance.) How do you think Greater D-Door works? It seems like a very unclear spell to me... especially when you can cast it with Close range. I do want to take it, but ideas of the possible table variation would be useful :) Telekinesis also seems like it might be a good L5 candidate, especially with Song of Arcane Power. That's where the extra spells become valuable - 4th level spells can be real killers through the tapestry - Greater Invisibility is a cool spell to cast 3/day through the tapestry. With a +4 Int Item, it isn't that hard to do with the Wizard levels. Sure, but a +4 Int item and a +4 Cha item are already over the cohort's wealth limit, and I need to get ONE stat to 22 so I can hook up the entire party through the tapestry (also, I need that L6 bonus spell for sublime chord). Also, it isn't that hard to start off with a 12 Wisdom and pick up Arcane Disciple(Healing) and/or (Plant) for Barkskin, Cure Critical on the Wizard list - you have a +2 Wisdom item to memorize spells, feed Owl's Wisdom through the tapestry, then cast Cure Critical if necessary. It might not be the most powerful 8th level spell out there, but it is actually the equivalent of Mass Cure Critical for the most part. Cure Crit is on the bard list already, so a sublime chord can take it. Arcane Disciple is only once / day remember. I assume you're looking at something like Str 8 Dex 10 Con 13 Int 14 Wis 12 Cha 15. I personally agree that a lowered ability score should only make the slot temporarily unavailable (it should switch back on when your Wis goes back up), but I have seen people rule that it makes the spell unavailable for prep-casters until you get a chance to rest and re-prepare. The real problem for a Bard/Sublime Chord War Weaver build is casting those spells for the initial tapestry action - that will eat up spells like there's no tomorrow - having a 2nd set of 4th level spells really relieves that pressure, whether it is from Beguiler or Wizard. If I put Greater Invis + Freedom of Movement in the quiescent weave each three times / day, that costs me six L4+ spell slots / day, if we fight three combats. That's a lot of slots, even with Lyric Spell to shore it up, so I see your point. Still, it's not like the cohort needs to fling their supercharger quiescent weave every fight to be effective, and if we're fighting that many combats in one day then a single freedom of movement may last for more than one of them. It depends on your feats, but Break Enchantment, Freedom of Movement, Greater Invisibility, Modify Memory, Otiluke's Resilient Sphere, Shadow Conjuration, Solid Fog, Orb of Force, and Zone of Silence all have their charms. I wouldn't take Otiluke's, Solid Fog or Orb of Force on this cohort, since the main PC has Orb of Force and Freezing Fog and I can't see Otiluke's as more than a somewhat inferior save-or-split-the-combat. The cases when you really want it seem to be to protect a critical NPC, and those are rare enough that Limited Wish probably comes to the rescue again. Zone of Silence might be of interest. I'll check it out. Some way to stop Blasphemy would be most excellent. The main PC's spell list is as follows: some tweaking is permissible as I marked TUs off for a spell retrain at L14 and haven't played her since levelling (the current spell list includes my planned retrains). Please don't divert this thread into a discussion of the merits of the main PC (I've watched people try to give me advice on her spell selection before, and if they haven't played with her, they tend to misunderstand how it works). L7: Limited Wish L6: Disintegrate, Freezing Fog L5: Teleport, Mass Fly, Spiritwall L4: Enervation, Assay SR, Orb of Force, Evard's Black Tentacles L3: Tongues, Anticipate Teleport, Phantom Steed, Greater Magic Weapon L2: Glitterdust, See Invisibility, False Life, Scorching Ray, Rainbow Beam L1: Magic Missile, Ray of Enfeeblement, Feather Fall, Guided Shot, Friendly Face Metamagics: Empower, Sculpt, Split Ray, Quicken (with Rapid Metamagic) Another possible build, if I can't or don't use warweaver, would be bard 7 / marshal 3 / sublime chord 3, for the extra marshal aura. Having Cha to both initiative and SR checks would be nice, maybe more so than inspire greatness. Re the sublime chord caster level issue... I don't think it's a very big deal, since I'd almost certainly be taking Practised Spellcaster, and there are no more than three non-bard levels before entering sublime chord in any of these builds. The later PrC levels advance sublime chord casting and thus explicitly improve its CL.
MwaO 11-01-07, 09:13 PM	In elite array, that means Con 12 instead of 14 (which everyone tells me is a Really Big Deal, although it wasn't a major issue for Az). Also, can you even get the skills to work with no retraining and Int 14 in that build? That's a lot of 2+Int skillpoint levels. I did look at this exact build, but I think the MAD makes it a bad idea. Yes, skill points work out fine(tested it out in Heroforge). Also, not entirely sure what the big difference is between a Wizard build with a 12 Con and False Life and a Bard build with a 14 Con and not... If I really need Mass Darkvision the main PC will Limited Wish for it. It's a nice idea though. The advantage of Mass Darkvision is that with a Wizard War Weaver, it is assumed by definition. You do it every day, all day. That is one of the major powers of a War Weaver - to take 10 minute or hour per level spells and spawn them all day across the party. The main PC has Mass Fly and keeps it up for all of most dungeon-crawls - she also casts it preemptively at the slighest hint of danger. War Weaver Tapestry Fly is better than Mass Fly. There's no limitation to stay near each other. And it takes a 3rd level slot instead of a 5th. Rather than have to rely on you burning spells all day, you'll know it will go up in the 1st round of combat. By APL 14, everyone who really uses these stats tends to have +4 stat-boosters already. Why Owl's Wisdom? In a sense, it represents an almost unnamed bonus to Will Saves to everyone but Clerics/Druids in the party. And that's a great thing about Wizards - if it doesn't seem useful, you just ignore it. Magic Circle is great, but doesn't benefit that much from being woven. Each member of the party has their very own Magic Circle. It lasts 10 minutes a level. With a lesser extend rod, that's 4 hours. i.e. with a few Pearl 3s, it isn't difficult to make it last all day every day. No need for the BDFs to stay in Fireball formation to get the effects. Greater Heroism is in the PHB, did you mean something else? Nope. If you don't have a party cleric, the benefits of Greater Heroism through a Weave are remarkably similar to Heroes Feast in LG. How do you think Greater D-Door works? It seems like a very unclear spell to me... especially when you can cast it with Close range. I do want to take it, but ideas of the possible table variation would be useful :) It isn't just a touch spell; it requires all people being DDoor'd to be in contact with each other. That's an additional limitation that I think greatly restricts just how useful Greater DDoor could be through it. Telekinesis also seems like it might be a good L5 candidate, especially with Song of Arcane Power. If you use it as Brad does, definitely. Though that means you want a bunch of Unseen Servants, too and some large Greatswords. Sure, but a +4 Int item and a +4 Cha item are already over the cohort's wealth limit, and I need to get ONE stat to 22 so I can hook up the entire party through the tapestry (also, I need that L6 bonus spell for sublime chord). Over the cohort's wealth limit - an easy way around a cohort's wealth limit is just to buy stuff you think they'll need. Just a note, it isn't completely necessary, it just adds an additional 4th level spell - think of it as being a Pearl 4 that gives an additional +4 to Int. And if they're not there, you put it on your own head. Still, it's not like the cohort needs to fling their supercharger quiescent weave every fight to be effective, and if we're fighting that many combats in one day then a single freedom of movement may last for more than one of them. If you have two War Weaver builds and one can fling the supercharger quiescent weave in every fight and the other one can't, the 1st is probably vastly superior. A lot easier to run, too, as you can simply tell everyone what they're going to get every combat beforehand.
Maesto 11-02-07, 01:16 AM	Quick question - what UMD fun is available with runestaves? I'm unsure that anybody who can hit DC 35 on a UMD can produce an Otto's Irresistable Dance effect, although UMD is one of the stranger skills...
copperwyrmling 11-02-07, 01:52 AM	Short version: I like the sorc/wiz spell list a lot, but I have several PCs who use it, and from everything I can see, the bard list is superior for buffing casters' abilities. I'm not especially interested in a build that can't do Harmonic Chorus + Inspire Spellpower, or something equivalently nice for pure casters. This is Az's cohort: it should be built to support her first and foremost, with supporting other party members as a secondary role. Also, wizard involves more paperwork than I wish to take the time for on a cohort. Long version: The advantage of Mass Darkvision is that with a Wizard War Weaver, it is assumed by definition. You do it every day, all day. That is one of the major powers of a War Weaver - to take 10 minute or hour per level spells and spawn them all day across the party. I understand that. I play a sorcerer, it works in pretty much exactly the same way. I've been on tables with (high-level) sorcerers with Darkvision as a known spell, who can and will cast it on the entire party every evening - and there are times when it's a lifesaver, but it doesn't seem to be that frequently useful at APL 14. I guess it's great if the scenario is such that you can do the entire mod at night in unlit areas, but that doesn't seem common. War Weaver Tapestry Fly is better than Mass Fly. There's no limitation to stay near each other. And it takes a 3rd level slot instead of a 5th. Rather than have to rely on you burning spells all day, you'll know it will go up in the 1st round of combat. I'm not worried about burning spells all day. That's what all the slots are FOR. Azrien isn't going to lose Mass Fly, because being able to cast it repeatedly as she does means that she can keep it up consistently throughout dungeon-crawls, which is really useful. It's amazing how many traps are pressure-triggered and how useful 3D mobility can be, even in a dungeon setting. Because she tends to have it up preemptively, it usually doesn't take any combat actions to get up. It's not worth having the cohort spend an action in combat to give everyone their own individual fly spell when they already have mass fly. I also strongly suspect that the cohort has fewer L3+ slots than Az has L5+ slots, and he's better than she is at packing multiple spell slots into one combat action: thus, saving her L5 slots by burning his L3 slots is a false economy. Also, if we're out in the open (which is where the limitation on mass fly tends to bite), everyone is probably riding their own flying phantom steed. Each member of the party has their very own Magic Circle. It lasts 10 minutes a level. With a lesser extend rod, that's 4 hours. i.e. with a few Pearl 3s, it isn't difficult to make it last all day every day. No need for the BDFs to stay in Fireball formation to get the effects. Azrien has actually never seen access to a lesser extend rod, as far as I can remember, only the greater version. But they're not uncommon among people she plays with. I like Magic Circle, especially with the new FAQ ruling, but I like Harmonic Chorus much more. If you don't have a party cleric, the benefits of Greater Heroism through a Weave are remarkably similar to Heroes Feast in LG. It gives immunity to fear and a chunk of temp HP (better temp HP than Heroes' Feast). It doesn't give immunity to poison, and it requires a combat action to put up. The save bonuses are very nice however. It isn't just a touch spell; it requires all people being DDoor'd to be in contact with each other. That's an additional limitation that I think greatly restricts just how useful Greater DDoor could be through it. Ah, indeed. I hadn't noticed that limitation inherited from D-Door. I'll think about that: Brad recommends D-Door for shuttling fighters in for a full-attack, but if Az takes Anticipate Teleport this level (as I was planning), that could put a hole in that plan (if Greater D-Door worked from range, I could've bypassed the AT by including Az in the spell). Maybe I should take Magic Circle instead ;) If you use it as Brad does, definitely. Though that means you want a bunch of Unseen Servants, too and some large Greatswords. It probably means I want a bunch of Large arrows that I GMW every morning: the Large greatswords require rather more investment to work (unseen servants are really slow, and GMW'ing all the Large greatswords requires Chain Spell to be efficient). Telekinesis has other uses though, like opening magic doors from a distance (although of late I've been using disintegrate for that), and transporting people around the battlefield. It's a nice versatile spell. The cohort doesn't really need to deal damage, although I don't mind him having that option. Encounters already tend to explode fast enough. The cohort's purpose is to buff up all the PCs, let them show off, and let me pull off some tricks that amuse me. Over the cohort's wealth limit - an easy way around a cohort's wealth limit is just to buy stuff you think they'll need. Just a note, it isn't completely necessary, it just adds an additional 4th level spell - think of it as being a Pearl 4 that gives an additional +4 to Int. And if they're not there, you put it on your own head. Az likes the item currently occupying her head slot, and paying 16k for +2 to Spellcraft, Knowledge (The Planes) and Knowledge (Arcana) is not a good deal for her. I don't want the cohort to become a giant money-sink for her: she finally found some good access recently, and has a lot of stuff she wants to buy, and she doesn't craft unless I spend my L15 retrain on changing Sculpt Spell into CWI. If you have two War Weaver builds and one can fling the supercharger quiescent weave in every fight and the other one can't, the 1st is probably vastly superior. A lot easier to run, too, as you can simply tell everyone what they're going to get every combat beforehand. Well, except your build can't do Harmonic Chorus and can't do Inspire Spellpower without the investment of several additional Extra Music feats. It's not like the builds are equivalent except for the number of L4 spell slots. And the bard probably CAN fling the quiescent weave in every combat, it just requires them to burn off bardic music uses (they'll have eight as a baseline, before Extra Music feats), on the rare occasions where you have three fights / day and the bard gets to act before the combat is over in the first two. (When I played Cloud of Darkness with Azrien, there was one player whose PC never got to act in any combat. She wasn't hit by status conditions or anything - she just kept rolling low on initiative, and by the time it got down to her the combat was over.) A bard/sublime chord cohort can give Az +3 caster level and +4 to save DCs, +3 caster level and +2 save DCs to other (non-charisma-based) arcanists in the party, +5 caster level and +2 save DCs to good-aligned divine casters. That means, for example, that all the tanks in the party have +5 GMW, the phantom steeds are flying and last 20ish hours before extend spell, and the party's own spells are extremely difficult to dispel. It lets Az show off with CL 20 Empowered Moonbows, and DC 32 Limited Wishes for save-or-be-screwed spells, and it lets other casters show off too. The build isn't exactly bad for the fighters, either. I agree the wizard build is better for general utility buffs, but that's not what I'm really trying to do here.
copperwyrmling 11-02-07, 02:02 AM	Quick question - what UMD fun is available with runestaves? I'm unsure that anybody who can hit DC 35 on a UMD can produce an Otto's Irresistable Dance effect, although UMD is one of the stranger skills... Expect massive table variation, as usual with UMD. The runestaff description basically says "burn an arcane spell slot, the spell needs to be on your spell list". What I'd like to do is emulate having a spell on my spell list in order to cast it out of a runestaff (still burning a slot of the appropriate level). That Otto's runestaff has some other cute bard spells in it. I think it's ambiguous in the RAW whether you could emulate sacrificing an arcane spell slot to activate the runestaff - it seems similar to the infamous "Lidda pretending to channel positive energy" example in the PHB - but I don't think I'd feel comfortable asking for this one, as I'm pretty sure it wasn't the intent. The general problem is that runestaffs aren't either spell trigger or spell completion, as far as I can see, and I don't think the MIC spells out how UMD interacts with its new categories of items.
Mattastrophic 11-02-07, 11:17 AM	This is Az's cohort: it should be built to support her first and foremost, with supporting other party members as a secondary role. In my experience with cohorts, this type of cohort is the worst type someone could choose. Instead of the cohort filling an empty party slot with a valued role, all they do is boost the role of the existing PC. That PC becomes stronger, but it suddenly takes two table slots to fill one role; in this case, arcane. The last time I saw this happen, it involved a 2-handed Power-Attack Dervish taking a Bard/Marshal/Warchanter cohort for Inspire Recklessness. He wiped everything on the board in Round 1 by attacking at something like +28/+28/+23/+18/+13 for 2d4+50, 15-20/x2. Sure, it was mighty, but... that's about fourteen hours (2-rounder... online... *sigh*) of my life I'm never getting back. Point being, even if the cohort works and your sorcerer becomes super-solo-mods-awesome, it's still not fun for the other 3-4 people at the table. On top of that, I know I've never seen a muster hinge on whether there's an additional bard in the party. That's why my own Virtuoso took a healing-focused cleric cohort. Best decision he ever made. But it seems like you're set in stone, anyways. If it were me, I'd find ways to use things like LimWish->Imbue With Spell Ability, Scrolls (or Eternal Wands *grin*) of Harmonic Chorus, Rings of Spell Storing, your familiar, etc, to accomplish this self-buffing on your own. -Matt
solbergb 11-02-07, 11:54 AM	In elite array, that means Con 12 instead of 14 (which everyone tells me is a Really Big Deal, although it wasn't a major issue for Az). Also, can you even get the skills to work with no retraining and Int 14 in that build? That's a lot of 2+Int skillpoint levels. I did look at this exact build, but I think the MAD makes it a bad idea. It might not matter as much on a L13 cohort that will mostly be playing APL14, although the lack of cash for a con item > +2 means you'll be fragile. You can't really compare it directly to a primary character - you've got the cash of a much lower level character so your attributes have to carry a larger load. When my L8 cohort was playing up to level 12, it mattered (was the diff between being one swat = dead to one swat = badly hurt). Every encounter was something like EL+7 for the cohort....
solbergb 11-02-07, 11:59 AM	If you use it as Brad does, definitely. Though that means you want a bunch of Unseen Servants, too and some large Greatswords. I've only really used it that way once, and only with warmaces during a battle interactive. It is one of those things that is both awkward to set up and so powerful that you don't want to do it as a routine tactic. Somebody foolishly gave me access to a "adamantine chest of holding" which is a bag of holding that can hold sharp things. So I do now have some size large greatswords that I can carry around on my phantom steeds, but I mostly don't bust them out (I have to really prep them between combat. I need to empty out the box, cast chain greater magic weapon and have my servants carry them around, which tends to have negative modifiers to social skills and/or greatly reduce the party's land speed). It's there though, for those situations where the enemy lacks DR and doing 12 attacks/round for 3d6+3 damage each is what the party needs. TK works pretty well just with size large bolts, GMW cast on the bolts and maybe a few bags of splash weapons in the haversack (and also as a way to do combat maneuvers at long range). Large bolts are better than Large arrows (large arrows are like 8' long, large bolts only the length of normal arrows. They also weigh slightly less. OTOH, there are no blunt bolts, no serpentongue bolts etc)
solbergb 11-02-07, 12:09 PM	In my experience with cohorts, this type of cohort is the worst type someone could choose. Instead of the cohort filling an empty party slot with a valued role, all they do is boost the role of the existing PC. That PC becomes stronger, but it suddenly takes two table slots to fill one role; in this case, arcane. -Matt My experience is different. Your experience is with a cohort that buffs ONE party member. This cohort buffs ALL party members, and can choose which individual to buff more if the party needs more. EVERY caster benefits EVERY melee benefits. This kind of cohort can make a melee party fantastic (Az provides GMW5 and phantom steeds, cohort provides bardsongs and dim doors). This kind of cohort can make a caster party fantastic (everyone gets caster level boosts and save boosts, both for long duration buffs and short duration). This kind of caster also can take care of the "weak but useful and necessary" spells such as silence and glitterdust so the "Real" casters can drop the boom. In addition to the party buffs, it can focus on one individual in the party (whomever is most critical to the fight) and boost either melee or spellpower further. (or both if you use harmonize) This type of cohort supercharges the party, while not requiring very much player attention to run at full efficiency. It can lead to situations where the 2-3 party members who roll high init get most of the fun in a given fight, because everybody is so strong, but it's not the same as having one character+cohort dominate every fight (unless the same folks roll high init every time). A pure support bard is less like having a 6th character in the party than adding a couple levels to everybody in the party. I've watched such characters turn crappy fighters into pretty good fighters, iconic fighters into slaying machines, and if carefully built, they can do much the same for spellcasters. Some effects are subtle....but really.... if the party melee is getting +5 weapons instead of +3, and he's getting a +3/+3 inspire courage bardsong he's getting +5 to hit and damage on every swing (or +15 damage if he can already hit pretty well). If he's also getting dimension doored next to the bad guys, he's getting his full attack too. Note that anticipate teleport only blocks teleport into an area. You can still dim door the fighters to enemies not yet in the area.
solbergb 11-02-07, 12:18 PM	But it seems like you're set in stone, anyways. If it were me, I'd find ways to use things like LimWish->Imbue With Spell Ability, Scrolls (or Eternal Wands *grin*) of Harmonic Chorus, Rings of Spell Storing, your familiar, etc, to accomplish this self-buffing on your own. -Matt That's impractical in LG. You have an xp limit per round and you want to spend your 1-2 shots of limited wish per adventure on stuff that is vital to the entire success of the adventure. You don't have access to scrolls, wands or eternal wands of harmonic chorus and are highly unlikely to get such access. Harmonic chorus also requires somebody to concentrate, and your familiar likely lacks a ring slot assuming you have access and 20k to buy a ring of spell storing. You can't get inspire spellpower that way either. A cohort can do it all without needing any access and without tying up any actions, xp or requiring nonstandard ring slots. Finally the cohort can buff some other party member with harmonic chorus, or buff all casters with inspire spellpower (or both with harmonize) if what they do is more important than what Az does.
Mattastrophic 11-02-07, 01:41 PM	You don't have access to scrolls, wands or eternal wands of harmonic chorus and are highly unlikely to get such access. Well, I have, but anyways, building a Sublime Chord team-oriented cohort... I would say focus on being a Dex Marshal, getting really high Charisma, then maybe adding Chain Nerveskitter from the main PC (or the cohort, if you use a Lesser Chain Rod and Lyric Thaumaturge, or if the cohort is a Bard/Marshal/Wizard/SublimeChord), and Heroics->ImprovedInit if you've found it. If the entire party goes first, you won't need Inspire Spellpower (inferior, btw. Why add +1d6 to the main PC's spell damage when the cohort can cast a damage spell on his own?) or Harmonic Chorus (same reason, not a good in-combat idea unless you're just showing off) or Snowsong (same reason. Notice that Snowsong's area is not an emanation, and thus is stationary, meaning you can't really prebuff with it). The incombat song remaining is Inspire Courage, though best you can do in-combat is +4/+2 with MW Whicheverinstrument, since it takes two swift actions to activate Inspirational Boost and the Badge. If you're Chaining Nerveskitters with the cohort, only +3/+1. Remember, we're already winning initiative, and it's APL 14, so you're lucky to even get to the second turn, much less the third, and even then you're in mopup mode and are just wasting resources with more buffs. I can see some prebuffing going on with Chained CL20 GMW, though. Remember, though, that the cohort has Song of Arcane Power, and can crank out some high CLs, too. -Matt chose Freezing Glance instead of Snowsong on That AR.
Maesto 11-02-07, 06:52 PM	I don't know that the area of snowsong not being an emanation has anything to do with it moving around, but you do have a point. There is nothing in the spell which says that it moves with the caster, just that it is originally centred on the caster. Thoughts?
bitznarf 11-02-07, 07:35 PM	Does the wording match that of Magic Circle vs Evil?
Maesto 11-03-07, 12:49 AM	Wording on p175 under emanation is "An emanation spell functions like a burst spell, except that the effect continues to radiate from the point of origin for the duration of the spell." Precise wording for snowsong is "Area: 30-ft. radius centred on you". Wording for MC vs Evil is "Area: 10-ft.-radius emanation from touched creature". Wording for Prayer is "Area: All allies and foes within a 40 ft. radius burst centred on you". So Prayer explicitly doesn't move. MC vs Evil explicitly does. Snowsong doesn't explicitly state, although the wording seems to indicate that the "Area" isn't moving.
copperwyrmling 11-03-07, 05:25 PM	Wording on p175 under emanation is "An emanation spell functions like a burst spell, except that the effect continues to radiate from the point of origin for the duration of the spell." Precise wording for snowsong is "Area: 30-ft. radius centred on you". Wording for MC vs Evil is "Area: 10-ft.-radius emanation from touched creature". Wording for Prayer is "Area: All allies and foes within a 40 ft. radius burst centred on you". So Prayer explicitly doesn't move. MC vs Evil explicitly does. Snowsong doesn't explicitly state, although the wording seems to indicate that the "Area" isn't moving. *shrugs* I thought of this. I read it as it moves with you (prayer affects "creatures within an area", which is closer to targeted spells in many ways: the area is relevant only for determining targets and then the effect of the spell sticks with the affected creatures for the duration, no matter where they move, so it's not really the same situation), but the lack of the word "emanation" in the area description makes it ambiguous. If it doesn't, that too has its advantages: it means the squishy cohort can throw it up where the frontliners are and then get away from the frontlines on a phantom steed, rather than having to remain close in (and still toss their quiescent weave, or do whatever they want to do with their move action, as they run for it). I think the benefits are easily enough to make it worthwhile in either case. In that case it won't give Az extra spell slots, but that's not really the point (that was going to be hard to maintain anyway, given how much she moves around during combat): it WILL still give everyone boosts on save DCs when they cast within the area, it'll give the people who are actually in the frontlines +4 AC / +4 attack / +1d6 damage / cold resistance, and after combat, it still heals everyone up for free. It just makes it less fun for out-of-combat skill uses and the like. I don't really want to get into an argument on the rules of snowsong, since regardless of what people here think I'm still going to have to talk to GMs about it ;) Anecdotally, I did a quick search for Snowsong on the boards after I first noticed it, and every time it was used it had a note next to it like (+4 morale bonus to attack, 10 minutes / level duration), so I'm not the only one reading it like that. Checking the PHB on the duration of area spells, all it says is, "If the spell affects an area, as silence does, then the spell stays with that area for its duration" - which isn't really helpful as Silence makes it clear that "area" may be defined in terms of a person or object rather than a point in space, and as far as I can see, Snowsong does define it that way.
copperwyrmling 11-03-07, 06:47 PM	The last time I saw this happen, it involved a 2-handed Power-Attack Dervish taking a Bard/Marshal/Warchanter cohort for Inspire Recklessness. He wiped everything on the board in Round 1 by attacking at something like +28/+28/+23/+18/+13 for 2d4+50, 15-20/x2. Sure, it was mighty, but... that's about fourteen hours (2-rounder... online... *sigh*) of my life I'm never getting back. Heh. I think I've played with that guy online - was the cohort called Buffy? ;) As Brad said, pretty much all the abilities I'm trying to set up for the cohort are multi-target. Inspire Spellpower is multi-target. Harmonic Chorus through an eldritch tapestry is multi-target, and if the warweaver access is disallowed, I'll probably imitate Lomiat with chain spell + metamagic song (and take as many extra music feats as I can cram in... sigh). Snowsong boosts to attack/damage/AC, and freedom of movement + greater invis through a tapestry, are all multi-target. I'm making an effort to have something for every sort of PC. Weapon-users get boosts to attack/damage/AC, and high-CL prebuffs, and may get greater d-doored into position. Arcane casters get bonuses to caster level and save DCs, and also attack rolls and AC. Divine casters get all of the above, plus even bigger CL bonuses and bonuses on turning checks, and if I can somehow find access to the healing song class feature and build the cohort with it, I'll take it to boost healing as well. Sneak attackers get the same buffs as other weapon-users, and greater invis to help them land their sneak attacks. Am I missing anybody? (Druids get the CL/save-DC boosts, and the melee bonuses for their animal companions or themselves in wildshape, so that's okay. Paladins are weapon-users, and probably also like the Snowsong charisma boost. Other bards hopefully have some non-overlapping abilities, but if they don't, there are probably enough good standard/move actions for both of them.) Point being, even if the cohort works and your sorcerer becomes super-solo-mods-awesome, it's still not fun for the other 3-4 people at the table. My sorcerer is already super-solo-mods-awesome (or at least she thinks so) :P However, so are most of the rest of the PCs she plays with ;) Both in-character and out-of-character, the point is to let EVERYONE show off - but because I can't predict the table composition apart from Az, part of that has to involve boosting Az herself. On top of that, I know I've never seen a muster hinge on whether there's an additional bard in the party. If I'm playing Az, I will play with any table that's legal for the APL. I've been on tables consisting of a fighter and four sorcerers before, in a mod generally considered to be quite tough, and it was a blast. With my cleric, the only sort of high-APL tables I'm especially worried about are the ones with zero arcane. That's why my own Virtuoso took a healing-focused cleric cohort. Best decision he ever made. Glad you're happy with it :) But with 3.5 ending, and having already played a cleric with Augment Healing through to L15, I want to do something different. The sublime chord - supercharging everyone's offensive abilities - is also much more Azi's style than a mostly-defensive cleric cohort. (This is a girl who believes the Magic won't let her die, and who has AC less than the typical APL she plays. The best defence is to kill them first ;) ) But it seems like you're set in stone, anyways. If it were me, I'd find ways to use things like LimWish->Imbue With Spell Ability I don't think that works, for several reasons. Imbue only works on cleric spells and only works on currently prepared spells. Az doesn't prepare spells and Harmonic Chorus isn't a cleric spell. Scrolls (or Eternal Wands *grin*) of Harmonic Chorus, Rings of Spell Storing, your familiar, etc, to accomplish this self-buffing on your own. Much as Az loves her rat, I don't think he can boost her caster level - I'd love to know how, if you have a way ;) I don't have access to scrolls or wands of harmonic chorus, and I don't think she has access to rings of spell storing (minor or major), but would need to check that one (since it's DMG, I might have an ancient favor or something). I would say focus on being a Dex Marshal, getting really high Charisma, then maybe adding Chain Nerveskitter from the main PC (or the cohort, if you use a Lesser Chain Rod and Lyric Thaumaturge, or if the cohort is a Bard/Marshal/Wizard/SublimeChord) Don't have access to a lesser rod of chain spell. If warweaver is disallowed, I could go bard 6 / lyric thaumaturge 3 / marshal 1 / sublime chord 3, and pick up Nerveskitter. Of course, it also requires Rapid Metamagic to chain. My sorcerer has rapid metamagic, and could retrain sculpt spell to chain spell, but I do like sculpt and I'm not at all sure chained nerveskitter is a good idea for her (since she uses her swift actions a great deal). and Heroics->ImprovedInit if you've found it. Nope. A pretty good guideline for Az's access is that if it hasn't appeared in a Core at an appropriate APL, she doesn't have it. (She was playing APL 2-4 in 2004, APL 4-8 in 2005, APL 8-12 in 2006, APL 12-14 for most of this year.) There are a couple of exceptions, but she just hasn't played many (meta)regionals, and when she did she seemed to have a gift for picking the ones with great access for melee types and nothing for casters who weren't bards ;) (she does have regional access to a greater choker of eloquence, a songblade, and some other cute bard stuff - of course it's Perrenland regional access, which makes taking advantage of it a bit difficult these days) If the entire party goes first, you won't need Inspire Spellpower (inferior, btw. Why add +1d6 to the main PC's spell damage when the cohort can cast a damage spell on his own?) It adds to everyone's caster level. So it boosts that dismissal or holy word the cleric was going to cast, it gives everyone +1 to punch past SR, and it gives everyone an extra couple of dice if they feel like throwing damage spells. Out-of-combat, it can be what kicks GMW and Magic Vestments up to +5 (combined with other abilities), and gives a bit of extra duration and durability (vs dispel) to the entire party's buffs. I think it's worth it. or Harmonic Chorus (same reason, not a good in-combat idea unless you're just showing off) Even when you're getting the whole party, and doing it as a move action with quiescent weaving? I play with enough caster-heavy tables that boosting the save DCs of everyone's spells (and giving them the CL-based bonuses I mentioned for inspire spellpower) seems like a pretty good idea for me. (We did the last combat in White Plume - I kid you not - by spamming the BBEG with save-or-dies until he rolled a 2, which was enough to fail. It took two rounds from memory.) or Snowsong (same reason. Notice that Snowsong's area is not an emanation, and thus is stationary, meaning you can't really prebuff with it). I take it you don't think clerics should cast Recitation or Righteous Wrath or bards should ever use Inspire Courage / Inspire Greatness, because they'd do more by throwing an offensive spell? +4 AC (insight bonus) / +4 attack (morale bonus) / +1d6 damage (cold) and fast healing 1 for everyone near the monsters seems like a pretty good use of a standard action to me, and the fact that it gives +2 on save DCs for Cha-based casters is gravy. The incombat song remaining is Inspire Courage, though best you can do in-combat is +4/+2 with MW Whicheverinstrument, since it takes two swift actions to activate Inspirational Boost and the Badge. Actually, the badge is an immediate action. It says you activate it to add 1 to the bonus of your inspire courage for the duration of its effect. I think you can activate it in a subsequent turn to boost an ongoing inspire courage (so you inspirational boost, start bardsong, as soon as your turn is over activate the badge). Remember, we're already winning initiative, and it's APL 14, so you're lucky to even get to the second turn, much less the third, and even then you're in mopup mode and are just wasting resources with more buffs. I played my cleric with that attitude for a while back around L10-12. Whenever I contemplated casting a spell, someone else in the party would say, "Don't bother, conserve your resources", so I'd sit back and delay until someone needed help - and the overall effect would be that I'd go through entire modules without ever actually doing anything in combat. It was boring. Really, really boring. Anyone who's played with me (especially online) can attest to my liking for IC chatter and roleplay, but I do also enjoy combat. Effectively removing myself from the table for the combat sections, because the party could win without me, was not leading to a fun 4-5 hours for me. So I don't really believe in resource conservation any more: if you've got it, use it. Sure, you'd win anyway, but this way you win more spectacularly and everyone gets to call out bigger numbers, which for most people is fun ;) I can see some prebuffing going on with Chained CL20 GMW, though. Remember, though, that the cohort has Song of Arcane Power, and can crank out some high CLs, too. If I take a more sublime-chord based build, yes. Not so much with warweavery. The cohort can get up to CL 18 borrowing Az's orange ioun stone and with song of arcane power, whereas Az can hit 22 on a high wild magic roll. But CL 18 is enough that if I get song of arcane power, I'll probably grab greater dispel as a L5 pick: Az doesn't do that one, for flavor reasons. Btw, MwaO, I hope you weren't offended that I wasn't enthusiastic about your wizard build. I think it's a nice build - I may do something like it for my dervish's cohort when he gets to L15, as he also has warweaver access, couldn't care less about CL boosts, and is so simple to play that I can afford to spend a little more table time on a cohort - and you made some good points, in particular the MAD isn't as severe as I thought it was in elite array. In this particular case, though, I think I'm sticking with bard.
MwaO 11-03-07, 08:06 PM	Btw, MwaO, I hope you weren't offended that I wasn't enthusiastic about your wizard build. I think it's a nice build - I may do something like it for my dervish's cohort when he gets to L15, as he also has warweaver access, couldn't care less about CL boosts, and is so simple to play that I can afford to spend a little more table time on a cohort - and you made some good points, in particular the MAD isn't as severe as I thought it was in elite array. In this particular case, though, I think I'm sticking with bard. If I was offended, I'd never sell my Bracers of Quickstrike ;) My primary, until they killed LG, was a Bard/Sublime Chord build almost identical to yours. I think the War Weaver Wizard is better if you magically start at 13th and don't really plan to go above 13th. But it is kind of silly and some work to keep track of.
copperwyrmling 11-03-07, 08:14 PM	If I was offended, I'd never sell my Bracers of Quickstrike ;) Noooooooo! What an evil threat! ;) ... so, when are you planning to sell them? :P My primary, until they killed LG, was a Bard/Sublime Chord build almost identical to yours. I think the War Weaver Wizard is better if you magically start at 13th and don't really plan to go above 13th. But it is kind of silly and some work to keep track of. Next thread... optimize a cohort for my dervish ;) Although he's only L10, and won't take Leadership until 15th, so it's a bit further off... although I guess planning ahead might not be a bad idea, so I can watch out for access that might be useful.
MwaO 11-03-07, 08:43 PM	Noooooooo! What an evil threat! ;) ... so, when are you planning to sell them? :P Well, it depends on how the next few mods go. I decided to go with your Bull's Strength idea. That means I'm spending 6K and then following it quickly with 10K. Instead of smaller chunks. So, there isn't as much immediate need for selling it, not until I get the +6 Belt of Str. Perhaps sometime in November of 2008 ;)
magebeast 11-11-07, 01:22 PM	TimRat answered some questions in the Q/A thread and although his answers aren't as clear as Britt's always were, it looks like Cohorts get the player's PrC access.
copperwyrmling 12-22-07, 11:45 PM	Resurrecting this thread... the major decision I need to make now is whether to take all five levels of warweaver (bard 1-7 / warweaver 1-3 / sublime chord 1 / warweaver 4-5) or to sacrifice 1-3 of them for some mix of Sublime Chord 2 and/or Marshal 1-3. What the various options get me: - Warweaver 3-5: more spells for the quiescent weaving, higher-level spells can be cast through the tapestry, and at L5, touch-range spells can be used at close range instead. - Marshal 1: either the Dex aura or the SR aura. - Marshal 1-3: both the Dex aura and the SR aura. - Sublime chord 2: Song of Arcane Power (+4 CL, likely coupled with Greater Dispel Magic as a known spell if I go this route) Thoughts?
magebeast 12-23-07, 12:46 AM	Resurrecting this thread... the major decision I need to make now is whether to take all five levels of warweaver (bard 1-7 / warweaver 1-3 / sublime chord 1 / warweaver 4-5) or to sacrifice 1-3 of them for some mix of Sublime Chord 2 and/or Marshal 1-3. What the various options get me: - Warweaver 3-5: more spells for the quiescent weaving, higher-level spells can be cast through the tapestry, and at L5, touch-range spells can be used at close range instead. - Marshal 1: either the Dex aura or the SR aura. - Marshal 1-3: both the Dex aura and the SR aura. - Sublime chord 2: Song of Arcane Power (+4 CL, likely coupled with Greater Dispel Magic as a known spell if I go this route) Thoughts? Warweaver 5. That's just my opinion. Having everyone in touch-range for the quiescent weave is kind of a pain in the ass since it means your whole party is clustered. Close means they all just need to be within 50 feet or so. I like Song of Arcane power, if you think the cohort is going to be effective with the GDMs, but that close thing is killer.
solbergb 12-23-07, 12:53 AM	No idea on which choice, but whatever you choose, Olivia when she hits 15 wants to travel with level 15 Azzie and her cohort and get all those yummy caster levels for her daily buffs... Not likely though. We've been having a steady diet of 6 person tables when we get to play together. That's part of why Olivia retired her cohort at level 12. I looked at how she'd be spending level 12-14 and saw very few tables with less than 6 (and level 15 it is too tempting to have all of silent, still and eschew materials...."components are optional, they just make it easy"). She's also far enough along her power curve that she CAN carry the proverbial "weak 4 person late-convention table with weird levels" without a cohort. That was a lot less true at level 9.
copperwyrmling 12-23-07, 01:04 AM	No idea on which choice, but whatever you choose, Olivia when she hits 15 wants to travel with level 15 Azzie and her cohort and get all those yummy caster levels for her daily buffs... And not just daily buffs: the in-combat buffs should also help quite a lot with the Swords of Death :) Not likely though. We've been having a steady diet of 6 person tables when we get to play together. That's part of why Olivia retired her cohort at level 12. I looked at how she'd be spending level 12-14 and saw very few tables with less than 6 (and level 15 it is too tempting to have all of silent, still and eschew materials...."components are optional, they just make it easy"). She's also far enough along her power curve that she CAN carry the proverbial "weak 4 person late-convention table with weird levels" without a cohort. That was a lot less true at level 9. Whereas I've been finding it very hard to make APL 14-16 tables in f2f play, both at home and at conventions. The online games are the only tables that end up being full, and even then I see cohorts used on a fairly regular basis. Olivia + Az games are a very small sample size, there have been two of them ever ;) I'd avoided Leadership with Az because of full tables, but at the high end I've found it very difficult to get more than four-person tables with Yol, and while I don't think the cohort will be needed to make tables survivable, what the cohort does for Az (and her friends) is far more spectacular than anything another feat would provide ;)
solbergb 12-23-07, 10:46 AM	Yeah. In Olivia's case she knew that most of level 12 would be in demonweb pits with a 6 character party, and the two conventions she's playing between 12 and 15 are mostly 6 person APL10-14 tables (at level 12) and 12-14 tables (at 13-14). I also got two (full) level 16 tables, although I did one with Burke. Plus rise of spider queen online, which was also 6 people. A lot of people in conventions now are primarily playing their higher level charactes. I found it difficult to get a couple games in for my lower level characters that needed to catch up with my wife's companion characters. Mostly though, she's doing well enough that she doesn't feel she needs a cohort at the 4 person tables to avoid risk of failure. At level 9-11 her toolkit was a lot smaller and powerful spell slots more limited and she needed other party members to execute when she set up the bad guys for destruction, so a bard cohort was really helpful. It's true about a cohort (when present) being a lot better than a feat. Maybe not though at level 12, since that's when I put together rapid+quicken. At 15 it's probably better than still spell, but I can't retire the character without weaning her of the need to do away components entirely. It just wouldn't feel right.