Post/Author/DateTime	Post
#1 hyooz Feb 15, 2009 3:43:16	Allright, some background first: Started this campaign as a Beguiler, took it into Mindbender (with a lovely houserule that gave the Mindbender 8/10 spellcasting, losing a caster level at 2nd and 8th levels) until about level 9 when something... well, something quite frankly bizarre hit. I won't go too deep into the story details, but the end result is that my beguiler came out of our last boss encounter having gained the half-dragon and mineral warrior templates with no LA to worry about, and no changes to mental stats (positive or negative.) So, at this point, I'm looking for a change, I guess. It feels like this sudden breach of race should effect his class path somewhat, to maybe take advantage of his suddenly almost admirable physical stats. I know Beguiler doesn't exactly lend itself to Gish-ing, but I'm mostly here hoping for suggestions and ideas. We have access to pretty much every book, and even some Dragon Magazine stuff has been allowed (though we need to run that by the DM first, as is standard.) My build (minus most of the gory details) is as follows: Beguiler 1: Improved Initiative, Mastery of Faerie Enchantment, Mastery of Dreams, Spell Focus (Enchantment) Beguiler 2 Beguiler 3: Greater Spell Focus (Enchantment) Beguiler 4 Beguiler 5 Mindbender 1: Unsettling Enchantment Mindbender 2: Mindbender 3: Mindbender 4: (Haven't chosen this feat yet) Any ideas and suggestions are appreciated.
#2 jenos Feb 15, 2009 3:55:47	Would it be possible to do some retraining, if thats the case? Mindbender, even with additional spellcasting, isn't all that great. The Mindbender abilities can't get modified through things like Spell Focus, so any usual way of inreasing enchantment DC's doesn't work for Mindbender abilities, usually making them pointless. If possible, I'd retrain some Mindbender levels. If not, oh well. You definitely NEED to retrain some feats. If you can't do that, then you pretty much are forced to take combat casting as your 9th level feat. Take 1 level of barbarian, 5 levels of abjurant champion, 1 level of spellsword, 1 level of dragonslayer, and 3 levels of beguiler. You only end up with 14 BAB and 8 th level spells, so its kinda sucky. Its going to be very hard to do gishing without retraining of feats or levels. If you can retrain feats, and not class levels, take 1 level of beguiler, 1 level of dragonslayer, 1 level of spellsword, 5 levels of abjurant champion, 3 levels of eldritch knight. You'll end up with 15 BAB, and 9th level spells at level 20.
#3 ninjarabbit Feb 15, 2009 5:43:31	You will want to take 5 levels of abjurant champion, so your next 2 feats are combat casting, arcane strike, and maybe multiattack and fly-by attack if you have wings. The final build should look something like beguiler8/mindbender8/abjurantchampion4. You could also look for a weapon will the skillful enhancement, that way you'll have medium BAB instead of poor BAB.
#4 brainpiercing Feb 15, 2009 6:37:34	I would: Retrain as much of Mindbinder as you can. Hit and Run Fighter 1 (DotU) or anything that trades in Heavy Armour Prof. for something useful. Unseen Seer 3 Divine Oracle 1 or 2, don't remember exactly Abjurant Champion 5 That gets you sneak attack in addition to combat capabilities and fits the thematic very nicely.
#5 pithica Feb 15, 2009 10:19:33	Assuming you can't do any retraining... Take the 9th level feat as combat casting, your 12th should be Arcane Disciple-Competition, and your 15th Arcane Strike. You should 'buy' an Otyugh's Hole at some point to get Iron Will ASAP. From where your at, go (not necessarily in this order, see below)... Abjurant Champion 5/Incantatrix 4/Whatever that gives full caster progression +2 (probably two more levels of Mindbender, since they're both full with your house-rules). I'd start with AbC for the BAB/hitpoints but as soon as I got the free Iron Will from Otyugh's Hole I'd run into Incantatrix (drop Necromancy, I don't think you have any spells from that school anyway). Take Extend and Persist with the two free feats then persist the ever loving hell out of Divine Power (this is the reason I don't say drop Evocation as your lost school from Evocation, unless your DM rules that the spells Arcane Disciple grant overwrite lost school selections) when you get Arcane Disciple. Going with Competition may involve changing your Deity. I don't know where that domain originally came from and I've never seen an official deity entry containing it. If you can't get away with Competition (which has a very superior spell selection for a self-buffing gish), Pride, War, Orc, and Celestia all have it. Some of those may be easier to get, but still require a deity change (of course, you did just get race-changed, so you may have an entirely new outlook on a lot of things, so this makes sense). If you still haven't chosen your 18th feat, Mindsight (LoM) is a solid choice, it's basically Blindsight but only affects thinking creatures.
#6 jenos Feb 15, 2009 11:23:51	The problem is - he doesn't meet the requirements of Abj at level 10. Only 4 BAB. A single level in beguiler at 10 will bump it up to 5, so a beguiler 6/mindbender 4/abj 1 works. I'd go with a Beguiler 6/Mindbender 4/Abj5/Incanatrix 4/Beguiler +1, which will net you a 9th level advanced learning. Thats only if you want to follow Pithica's strategy of ignoring BAB and finding a way to get divine power on your spell list.
#7 hyooz Feb 15, 2009 14:14:02	Thanks for all the input. I'm retraining toward Abjurant Champion and beyond, and think I've got something that will work for me. Thanks a lot, everybody.