Post/Author/DateTime	Post
magebeast 03-16-07, 02:49 AM	Race: Human CG Worships Kord STR 15 DEX 10 CON 14 INT 14 WIS 14 CHA 8 Lv1(Beguiler) Battle Caster, Retributive Spell Lv2(Ranger) Lv3(Beguiler) Power Attack Lv4(Beguiler) STR 16 Bladeweave Lv5(Beguiler) Lv6(Unseen Seer) Arcane Disciple (Competition) Lv7(Unseen Seer) Critical Strike Lv8(Eldritch Knight) WIS 15 Close Quarters Fighting (suggestions?) Lv9(Eldritch Knight) Arcane Strike Lv10(Eldritch Knight) Lv11(Eldritch Knight) Lv12(Eldritch Knight) WIS 16 Weapon Focus (Greatsword – suggestions?) Lv13(Eldritch Knight) Lv14(Eldritch Knight) Lv15(Eldritch Knight) +1 whatever (inherent bump of some sort?) (Feat Suggestions?) Okay, so you’ll probably note a few wonky things about this build – I end up with a higher wisdom than intelligence for an int casting gish. However, there is a method to this madness. The competition domain gives this character Divine Power, Righteous Might, and Zealot Pact which I think is pretty neat. I’ll pick up a headband of intellect +2 before I hit level 12 and get 5th level spells. I’ll be able to wear Mithril Full Plate without any spell failure, although I’ll need gloves of dex to take advantage of it fully. An of important questions – if I take the four ranks of knowledge (religion) at level 6 with unseen seer, do I qualify for the Arcane Disciple feat? I’m also looking for suggestions for my 8th level feat from EK as well as my 12th and 15th level feats. In addition, thoughts on how bad this build may end up sucking? Does adding those three spells to my spell list make it worth it? Lastly, if I end up with an inherent bump to one of my stats, I can delay the 16 bump to wisdom till level 15 when I want to cast zealot pact. General thoughts?
cycloptic_squirrel 03-16-07, 03:35 AM	1) I like it. I'm not too sure it will work out well, but flavor wise, I like it. Then again, I'm a sucker for spellcasting. 2) I'm assuming you're referring to battle caster at first level? So you can wear mithril full plate without arcane magic penalty, but you're still not proficient. Switch out ranger for fighter if you can make the skills work. Barring that... swashbuckler? Fighter would be better, as you could dip into spellsword for a hint of straight up spell chance failure negation, allow a nice animated shield. 3) If you take the skill points at 6, you should be able to get arcane disciple at the same time. I'd be very wary here. Since you spontaneously cast, you can only cast each domain spell once per day. If you're set on a spontaneous caster, I'd pick up scribe scroll and make sure you have a dozen copies of everything you want. 4) The gish's greatest asset is the ability to craft. Pick up CWI and perhaps CA&A. Pick up some heavy ranks in UMD (provided there's room) to power these feats. 5) What about improved toughness? It'd help the low hit points. Overall, I'd worry about your spell selection. There's a lot in the beguiler spell list that work for the build, but some is still missing. False life, blink, GMW, all the stat bumpers, and dimension door come to mind. Nothing you can't work around, but it will be work. I'd also have concern over the fact that you can only cast the domain spells once per day as a spontaneous caster. Casters who prep can eek their way around it with pearls; you need scrolls. Also ask yourself: what will I be doing to survive combat? My impression is: very few (if any) gishes have the hit points to just soak anything (like a barbarian), some have very high AC (full plate+shield+many buffs), some up the miss chances (mirror image, blink, etc.), I've even seen a few builds where they aren't in the area (dervish and spirited charge/ride-by). But you gotta have a plan. I'm no expert in the area (my own gish is still recovering from the alter self fiasco), so take all this with a grain of salt. Like I said at the beginning, I like it, just take your concept and tweak it a little. Poke at it with CR critters. See where the weaknesses are and ask if you're comfortable with them ('cause all builds have weaknesses, the best characters just know how to minimize or compensate well)
Sieylianna 03-16-07, 10:16 AM	I don't really like it. I can't quite put my finger on it, but it looks awkward. One thing I do notice is that you're going to require time to get the competition domain buffs working. It's almost like a melee oriented cleric with less hit points and less effective buffs. Ed
Mommy was an Orc 03-16-07, 10:38 AM	If you're going to be casting Divine Power in combat and your basic role is Beguiler, why are you taking Eldritch Knight...if you're taking Unseen Seer, why not take a level of Rogue+4 levels of Unseen Seer for the +3d6 Sneak damage at the cost of 1 more BAB? I'd use Unseen Seer's divination spell to get you Master's Touch - that way, you can wield whatever weapon you want. Something like: Beguiler 7/Rogue 1(5th)/Unseen Seer 7 - yes, your BAB isn't that great... I'd also worship Joramy - that way, you can take Arcane Disciple(War) at 6th(more useful from 6th-10th) and Arcane Disciple(Competition) at 12th. That gives you two helpings of Divine Power a day and the ability to cast Magic Vestment as a 3rd level spell. Feats would be something like this: 1: Power Attack, Practiced Spellcaster 3: Craft Wondrous Item 6: Arcane Disciple(War) 9: Arcane Strike 12: Arcane Disciple(Competition) 15: Retributive Spell Another important thing to note is that you really only need the 14 Wisdom - just get the party cleric to cast Owl's Wisdom on you, UMD a scroll of it or eventually get an Ioun Stone. I think UMD/CWI are very important to this build - you can craft more stat boost items cheaply with this. I'd make my stats: Str 14, Dex 12, Con 14, Int 14, Wis 14, Cha 8 then level Int
magebeast 03-16-07, 10:40 AM	I don't really like it. I can't quite put my finger on it, but it looks awkward. One thing I do notice is that you're going to require time to get the competition domain buffs working. It's almost like a melee oriented cleric with less hit points and less effective buffs. Ed Well, presumably I wouldn't use them all at once at the same time, unless I won the surprise round.
magebeast 03-16-07, 11:09 AM	If you're going to be casting Divine Power in combat and your basic role is Beguiler, why are you taking Eldritch Knight...if you're taking Unseen Seer, why not take a level of Rogue+4 levels of Unseen Seer for the +3d6 Sneak damage at the cost of 1 more BAB? I'd use Unseen Seer's divination spell to get you Master's Touch - that way, you can wield whatever weapon you want. Something like: Beguiler 7/Rogue 1(5th)/Unseen Seer 7 - yes, your BAB isn't that great... I'd also worship Joramy - that way, you can take Arcane Disciple(War) at 6th(more useful from 6th-10th) and Arcane Disciple(Competition) at 12th. That gives you two helpings of Divine Power a day and the ability to cast Magic Vestment as a 3rd level spell. Feats would be something like this: 1: Power Attack, Practiced Spellcaster 3: Craft Wondrous Item 6: Arcane Disciple(War) 9: Arcane Strike 12: Arcane Disciple(Competition) 15: Retributive Spell Another important thing to note is that you really only need the 14 Wisdom - just get the party cleric to cast Owl's Wisdom on you, UMD a scroll of it or eventually get an Ioun Stone. I think UMD/CWI are very important to this build - you can craft more stat boost items cheaply with this. I'd make my stats: Str 14, Dex 12, Con 14, Int 14, Wis 14, Cha 8 then level Int Beguiler was something suggested to me when I was building this last night. What do folks think about swapping Beguiler for Wizard, dropping the Unseen Seer and going the typical 1st level fighter class, 5 levels of Wizard, Spellsword 1/ Ek 8 with Arcane Disciple in there?
Paul H 03-16-07, 11:10 AM	Hi Not having PHB2, I'm not sure what this build's all about. Is it: a) Fighter type with some arcane abilities, b) Arcane type with some combat abilities, c) Just exploring choices with new Beguiler class? The spells you mention are on the Cleric's list, so why not play a militant Cleric? Pearls of Power reasonably easy access now. Boccob's Force Domain has few nice 'arcane' spells and allows you to reroll damage 1/day. Magic Domain allows you to use items as Wizard. (Even has Identify, Dispel Magic & Spell Immunity as Domain spells)! Fharlanghn has Celerity & Travel Domains. Blur, Haste, plus 10' extra move in Light Armour. Fly, Teleport, Dim Door plus Domain power are also very good... If you're True Neutral you don't have to sweat those Protect vs.... spells! With Domain Spontaneity you can cast those spells more than 1/day :D If you want to use Arcane Disciple, try Grey Elf Wiz/Warmage, you meet prereqs as warmage early, taking feat at 3rd. Likewise a Gnome Bard/Warmage. Can even use WoCL. Besides, travelling to combat on Tenser's Floating Disc (Warmage Advanced Learning) is cool.:heehee (Even prevented setting off certain traps, problems with swamps etc in recent mod. Also grants 'height advantage' in close combat). Then again, I'm biased towards spellcasters. (Main Char: Dwarf Clr 3 [Boccob Magic & Trickery] Warmage 4 Mystic Theurge 1) Cheers Paul H
magebeast 03-16-07, 11:26 AM	Race: Human CG Worships Kord STR 14 DEX 12 CON 14 INT 14 WIS 14 CHA 8 Lv1(Wizard) Power Attack, Arcane Disciple(Competition) - Getting this out of the way earlier to free up later slots. Lv2(Fighter) Weapon Focus (Greatsword) Lv3(Wizard) Practiced Spellcaster(?) Lv4(Wizard) STR 15 Lv5(Wizard) Lv6(Wizard) Craft Wonderous Item, Craft Arms and Armor Lv7(Spellsword) Lv8(Eldritch Knight) STR 16 Close Quarters Fighting (suggestions?) Lv9(Eldritch Knight) Arcane Strike Lv10(Eldritch Knight) Lv11(Eldritch Knight) Lv12(Eldritch Knight) +1 to something... (Feat Suggestion?) Lv13(Eldritch Knight) Lv14(Eldritch Knight) Lv15(Eldritch Knight) (Feat suggestions?) Not sure why I was thinking I got a bump at 15... I guess, given that I don't have anything in my final feat slot, I could make my last feat the competition domain, and take war domain at first so I have magic vestments and can therefore craft my own magic armor - assuming I have the necessary spells for whatever enhancements I'm going to add. Thoughts? EDIT: Another issue I just thought of is I'm assuming I get access to a wisdom ioun stone at some point. How likely is that?
Alpha_Nerd 03-16-07, 11:43 AM	Well, with CWI you just need to see it once in your entire career. Also, you can always just owl's wisdom yourself like MwaO said.
Sieylianna 03-16-07, 08:17 PM	Race: Human CG Worships Kord STR 14 DEX 12 CON 14 INT 14 WIS 14 CHA 8 Lv1(Wizard) Power Attack, Arcane Disciple(Competition) - Getting this out of the way earlier to free up later slots. Lv2(Fighter) Weapon Focus (Greatsword) Lv3(Wizard) Practiced Spellcaster(?) EDIT: Another issue I just thought of is I'm assuming I get access to a wisdom ioun stone at some point. How likely is that? For six extra hit points, I'd start out with your fighter level. Also remember that you need to defeat a suitable foe in melee combat to qualify for spellsword. That's easy for a fighter at level 1. Ed
copper_wyrmling 03-17-07, 01:28 AM	For six extra hit points, I'd start out with your fighter level. Also remember that you need to defeat a suitable foe in melee combat to qualify for spellsword. That's easy for a fighter at level 1. Ed Well, it's 6 HP at first level. Overall, it's only 3 HP (fighter 1 / wizard 1 = 13 HP, wizard 1 / fighter 1 = 10 HP). Also, the spellsword requirement is "defeat a foe by force of arms alone, without recourse to spellcasting". My sorcerer met it in the first round of the first combat of the first scenario she ever played ;) (she rolled max damage on a point blank crossbow shot and knocked the human thug unconscious in one hit)
clik_ml 03-17-07, 01:36 AM	I love beguilers as primary casters. I am not fond of them as gishes. Your beguiler spells are largely save or suck spells, and a heaping stack of stealth. Your main combat-buffing spells are actually 1/day divine spells gained slowly via Arcane Disciple, and that's painful. If you didn't have Arcane Disciple, then I wouldn't call this a gish at all. I'd call it a beguiler who sometimes holds a sword when he's not being awesome (and at the expense of being 2 levels less awesome). I'd be tempted to ditch the ranger and eldritch knight entirely. You can keep Arcane Disciple and be almost exactly as effective in melee, on the rare occasion that you need to mix it up. If you want slightly higher BAB, then become an Unseen Seer at almost no cost. Whether you pepper in a rogue level for the extra sneak attack is entirely optional. You're going to be seriously low on HP and as such I'd be very worried about the MAD between Str, Con, Int and Wis. It's harsher than a melee cleric's stat demands. I'd be tempted to go at it as a dwarf: 14/8/18/14/14/6 (bumps to wis, wear a headband for casting). That would at least make you feel more like a class with d10 HD instead of d6. Main downside of this multiple ability dependency (caused by needing wisdom for Arcane Disciple) is that it kills your save DCs, which are the staple of beguilers.