I'm testing the waters to see if there is interest in this thread at all.
I'm currently halfling bard 2 druid 2, eventually ending up as bard 4, druid 3, Divine Oracle(CD) 2, Arcane Hierophant (Rotw) 1, Fochlucan Lyrist (Cadv) 10
Yes I know about sublime chord and evasion rings, my main purpose with this character was to be optimized to help the party and hide my knowledge of things like that.... it hasn't worked well.
stats
DM uses the "roll till you rock method", which explains why he almost kills us every session.
Str 8
Dex18
Con12
Int14 (+1 stat increase)
Wis17
Cha17
Hp 18 + 1d6+1 for this last level.
DM uses the "roll till you rock method", which explains why he almost kills us every session.
Str 8
Dex18
Con12
Int14 (+1 stat increase)
Wis17
Cha17
Hp 18 + 1d6+1 for this last level.
Rp heavy session, the majority of the time was spent looking for NPC X then NPC Y. Not having bluff or UMD is annoying.
Bard 2/Druid 3/Divine Oracle 2/Arcane Hierophant 3/Fochlucan Lyrist 10
Also, your dog can't be your familiar, can it? You have to choose from the normal list available to Wizards.
Your list would make sense if it weren't for the steep skill requirements I need to fight off to take FL.
If you are using the Divine Oracle way into Fochlucan Lyrist, may I suggest the following?
Bard 2/Druid 3/Divine Oracle 2/Arcane Hierophant 3/Fochlucan Lyrist 10
Also, your dog can't be your familiar, can it? You have to choose from the normal list available to Wizards.
+1 for Andy's build, assuming you can make the skills work. He's right about the familiar unless you're just waiting till Arcane Hierophant which lets you treat your animal companion as a familiar. Actually after looking at it do you even need to take Obtain Familiar? A familiar isn't required to enter AH and it says nothing about needing an existing familiar to use the Companion Familiar class feature. Even if your DM doesn't let you add your Bard levels for familiar abilities you'll only miss out on a point of NAC, a point of Int, and the speak with master ability.
However, even with your dog being a familiar how are you planning on using it to heal (unless you mean the deliver touch spells ability, but that doesn't save you standard actions)?
http://forums.gleemax.com/showpost.php?p=5415303&postcount=7
By my reading I need obtain familiar, i don't see it working another way.
At this point, I'm just caught up on the 'healing lick' my dog could deliver, thats hilarious.
As far as 'honest FL' I don't like Dragon personally, the books are bad enough.
For andy jame's build to work, I would have sacrifice hide and movesilently, even then.... probably not.
For a normal familiar casting a 1st level spell in a 12th level party might be worthwhile but your dog would probably be better off just attacking. Still, I can't fault you for wanting the "flavor" of a healing lick.Really don't think you need to have a familiar already to get the benefits of AH (it even says you must dismiss any existing familiar) but I guess we'll have to agree to disagree. I realize Obtain Familiar lets you stack arcane classes for your "familiar level", I'm just not sure it's worth it . The extra Natural AC bonus and eventual SR would be very nice, but it sounds like you'll be feat strapped as it is. On the other hand Companion Spellbond does seem worth it since I'm guessing you probably won't want to be standing in melee range.
I can't use constructs, because I'm using riding dog for halfling druid.
I'd never have thought this character would need int, however at low levels I'm actually hurting for skills. My initial idea was to glide through low levels using ranged weapons, but in reality, if you are building a FL, I suggest all mental abilities. If I had dumped physical I might have taken the wildshape option. However since you never really improve wildshapng to anything good, I never viewed it as more than a better scouting form.
You know... it may be worth taking a look at construct familiars out of the CA, the bird there has a nasty ability and if you can stack the Animal companion with that well it would be really nice.
No. You apply the Familiar abilities to the Animal Companion, not the other way around. That means your Familiar is expendable (in fact, it is not even required that you have a Familiar). It is the Druid Animal Companion that you'd want to buff up.
So after skill focus knowledge religion (DO requirement) I'm free to pick whatever.
As far as 'honest FL' I don't like Dragon personally, the books are bad enough.
i can agree that some dragon material is dumb, but greensinger is competely mediocre and fits perfectly with FL flavor, I'm not sure how anyone could consider this build overpowered or questionable
I'm playing a honest FL in a current campaign and it's far from a powerhouse in combat, but quite enjoyable nonetheless.
Remember that I'm trying to avoid to much optimization.
My character is a "Honest Fochlucan" human Bard1/Druid4/Green Whisperer3/Spelldancer2/FL 3 (current level 13). We play forgotten realms, The current phase of the campaign features our party in a series of adventures that have taken us to the Upperdark below Cormyr and the Dalelands in order to stop a coalition of undead mind flayers (alhoons and vampiric), elder brains and drow that also have affiliations with the City of Shade. In a semi-alternate timeline of the year 1372 DR, these nefarious fellows are attempting to repair and subvert the Mythal or Myth Drannor for purposes that are pretty nasty, as well, there are some subplots I won't detail here yet.
My Lyrist, who goes by the name of Winter, has been a fun and interesting character to play thusfar, if not the powerhouse some of the other PC's are. He is a member of the Harpers and a worshiper of Mielikki. As far as CO goes, the Honest Fochlucan clearly is better advantages as a hybrid spellcaster rather than a melee, especially since I've only advanced the FL 3 levels thusfar and don't have the BAB to make more than 2 attacks per round (base) yet.
The Honest FL is a very skill and feat hungry build. I've had to pick up many less than optimal choices on those fronts such as Combat Casting, Dodge, Mobility, and Endurance, as well as ranks in 2 different perform skills, etc. I'm attempting to use my remaining points to fill out a party role as tracker, info gatherer, and Diplomancer. I've had some success with this-- I took Track as my 12th level feat (9th was practiced spellcaster-- bard) and using the primal instinct/senses spells I've been able to pull off the tracking and listening checks with some success.
As far as combat spellcasting, MAD is a pain for the FL. We have freedom to use almost any WoTC material (eberron is banned i think), and the druid gets access to some nice save-or-die's at level 5 and 6 like Baleful Polymorph and Drown. Sadly, I had to spread out my item budget pretty widely to cover MAD and decent AC, etc, It wasn't until last session I managed to afford to upgrade on my periapt of wisdom from +4 to +6 which sets me at 25 wisdom. This puts my save or die's in the 22-23 DC range which I haven't had much success with as you can guess. Thus, as far as offensive spellcasting goes, I've mostly switched to Battlefield Control with Wall of Thorns/fire, Kelpstrand, and Antiflife shell, as well as summoning the quite nasty Huge elementals. Currently I'm only 1,000 xp from 14th level and being able to spontaneously pop off 1d3 of those puppies is going to be nice. Our group also includes a cleric/Eye of Horus-Re who has a slight edge on me for healing, but I've pulled a few rears out of the fire with Rejuvanation Cocoon. Finally, High saving throws are maybe the strongest feature of this build, with Superior Resistance running full time, my saves are sitting at Fort +16 Ref +19 Will +28, with evasion from spelldancer and a few buffs running, this character is well defended in that regard.
I mentioned the cleric/eye of horus-re, the rest of the party consists of a (vanilla) wizard13, a heavily multiclassed rogue/fighter/ranger/cleric/wizard/swordsage/assassin who is pumping out 200+ damage a round against eligible foes using an optimized sneak attack and a repeating light crossbow and a (brass) Dragon Shaman. The players have various levels of CO experience, and the DM, while relatively new to the game, is a avid reader and has nearly scored multiple party deaths in the encounters thusfar by using somewhat optimized opponents.
Last session, we advanced north from Shadowdale (well, greater teleported) towards the southern border of the fallen city of Myth Drannor. On its' outskirts, we faced a advanced Ice Devil and his summoned bone devil minions, who we trounced handily, although they got in a few decent hits and managed to grapple the cleric for most of the fight-- I'm not sure why he didn't do the same, but since we had the Assassin guy scout out the area beforehand and spot our opponent, I entered the encounter with Alter Self (troglodyte), Heroism, Freedom of Movement, and Displacement running, and the opponents had little luck in harming me, especially after I threw up Antilife Shell in addition and used it to shield the cleric from further harm while the assassin and Wizard destroyed our opponents at range.
Well, this seems like a good first post about my FL experience thusfar. Any comments or critique are welcome!
A heated battle ensued. My character, Winter, was relatively ineffective in this fight for a couple reasons. I found out much to my dismay in the first few rounds of battle that the allies conjured by means of Summon Nature's Ally were uncontrolled and hostile within the Corrupted Mythal, luckily, I was still able to dismiss them. My Antilife Shell was likewise ineffective against the mount and his rider, who seemed to be a martial cleric/blackguard type of some power, as they were both outsiders and thus unaffected. Luckily, my companions had more luck, our Wizard was able to use Banishment to get rid of the nightmare and then, while the assassin did major damage to the rider with his crossbow, dropped Reverse Gravity beneath the villain. Unfortunately, he used Plane Shift to escape before we could slay him.
Other encounters last session included a Barbed Devil and his summoned Bearded Devil allies, which I was able to use Call Lightning Storm against to some effect, and a swarm of advanced gargoyles, who fell fairly quickly to assault of fire and lightning AoE launched by myself and the Wizard.
The two unfortunates slain by the Blackguard before he fled turned out to be followers of Illmater, we are hiking our way out of the Mythal so we can Teleport back to their temple in Waterdeep for raising from the dead and. As well, Winter needs to rest because he is now level 14! I can now cast 14th level spells, currently I've memorized Heal and Fire Storm. Also, I've swapped out Call Lightning Storm for Flaywind Burst from sandstorm and Antilife Shell for Fire Seeds in an attempt to get some more nuking power since my elementals aren't useful within the mythal. Fortunately, the Mythal also doubles the effect of healing spells and effects, so I can play that role very effectively while tossing about some nukes. For my new 3rd level bard spell I picked up Haste.
[snip]I can now cast 14th level spells[/snip]
Really? ;)
That sounds like a very fun game you're playing in. And it's nice to hear that even the "honest" Fochlucan lyrist manages in play. Though 13th level is probably where it starts catching up again.
I've been a big FL fan since Complete adventurer came out, but haven't had a chance to play one yet. Mostly because the games I play in tend to focus on the lower levels, so I'd never even get to a point where I qualify for the PrC. And now I've started DMing City of the Spider Queen (which is a very long module, and I'm making some very hefty changes to it, making it a lot longer) for my party, which will likely be the last 3.X game we play (assuming 4th edition actually works), so I'll likely never get to try the Fochlucan lyrist out.
next session is tuesday, I'll test out those 7th levels and post next week how it goes!
anyone have any thoughts on the effectiveness o creeping doom?