The rest of the group is a paladin, wizard and rogue.
We most likely will not get past our low teens for leveling and are starting at level one and working our way up. If you can give me some advise on builds I would appreciate it. Alot of builds I read are for a level 20ish toon and we are starting at the bottom and going up. Any help is appreciated.
Thank you
Please include classes and feats.
Monk is a smooth move for the early entry (one wants early entry because shadows own the early levels), but obviously there are other options. Any class with a good Will save will do nicely. Monk is possibly the optimal entry. Wow, I feel really funny using 'monk' and 'optimal' in a sentence lacking negation.
Swordsages get 6 skill points, a stance, and some maneuvers that might be useful.
Wizards can be Conjurers and get Abrupt Jaunt.
I do not understand why he took a level of monk. I also do not see what gives a mutable spell list. There are specific added spells but what adds the ability to take any divine spell?
You could do the same build as a (cloistered) cleric 1/archivist 2/Master of Shrouds, and have the ability to cast any divine spell plus access to Divine Metamagic, etc.
Here is a handbook for the Master of Shrouds class that might explain more.
I doubt you're going to get along well with the palladin, though... so I'd go with something else. (Unless he's some evil palladin variant).
5 Cloistered Cleric (UA; for K.Nature)/ 5 Master of Radiance
30 uses a day of Sunbeam (13th CL spell) at 10th Character Level is very useful.
Druids can heal just fine. You're only supposed to heal after the battle is over anyways.
I read that all the time but really its just necessary to heal in battle.
Especially with my play group.
I read several portions of the MoS thread but there are tons of links to other threads in there. I still do not see what allows you to cast any divine spell.
The archivist entry. Read it.
I read that all the time but really its just necessary to heal in battle.
Especially with my play group.
Have you tried playing a well designed Cleric/Druid that doesn't heal in battle (say a DMM Persist Cleric or Greenbound summoning Druid)? First off, since you're going to end up killing the enemies substantially faster less players will need a heal afterward, second lesser vigor is a lot more effective at healing. Also, usually healing only affects a battle when someone drifts below 0 HP, which is why you should have one or two healing spells just in case someone does, but not bother using them otherwise.
Put more simply, if a player can still fight then healing them probably isn't going to materially affect the battle, ergo you're helping more if you're doing something else (this isn't even getting into the way preventing damage is more effective than healing it).
There's also a thread floating around somewhere that details the effective methods of healing in D&D, check the Surrealdex if you're interested. (It's more in depth than simple stuff like wands of lesser vigor, belts of healing, etc)
That said, it's possible you just have a group who gets themselves knocked below 0 constantly. In that case, you'd be well advised to help them optimize their characters and tactics beforehand.
Given the immense power of the druid/cleric, ONLY support healing is generally a really bad idea, USUALLY support healing is still generally a bad idea, SOMETIMES support healing can have its optimal moments.
Prefaced with IMO.
While healing is optimized by being done outside of combat, I think there should be a generally clarifier. There times in which the frenzied bersker just has bad luck and every bastard he pounces past rolls a crit; the most optimized move at that point is to drop a heal spell on that meatshield. A dead meatshield is no longer a meatshield. Wizard get it's int handed to it in a basket? Drop a restoration.
Given the immense power of the druid/cleric, ONLY support healing is generally a really bad idea, USUALLY support healing is still generally a bad idea, SOMETIMES support healing can have its optimal moments.
Prefaced with IMO.
I did note that one should keep some on hand in a just in case manner (albeit I admit I did not note the exceptions), but as for your example... I was going to say you should use an Inflict spell, however even though I would swear those bring the FB back to -10 health I can't find the rules anywhere. I feel very wrong footed.
Am I just confused from it being before dawn and hallucinating rules that don't exist? Or am I simply forgetting where the relevant information is located?
I did note that one should keep some on hand in a just in case manner (albeit I admit I did not note the exceptions), but as for your example... I was going to say you should use an Inflict spell, however even though I would swear those bring the FB back to -10 health I can't find the rules anywhere. I feel very wrong footed.
Am I just confused from it being before dawn and hallucinating rules that don't exist? Or am I simply forgetting where the relevant information is located?
I think 3.0 harm did something like that (set their HP to 1d4).
There's always drowning.
Human Monk1/Cleric2/Master of Shrouds 7
1 Monk1 Stunning Fist (monk1), Spell Focus: Conj. (1), Augumented Summoning (human)
2 Clr1 Domains (Planning, Undeath), Rebuke Undead, Extend Spell (bonus), Extra Turning (bonus)
3 Clr2 Persistent Spell
4 MoS1 Extra Rebuking
5 MoS2 Summon Undead (Shadow)
6 MoS3 Divine Metamagic: Persistent Spell
7 MoS4 Summon Undead (Wraith)
8 MoS5 Improved Summoning
9 MoS6 Summon Undead (Spectre) Practiced Spellcaster
10 MoS7
There are no levels of archivist in that list.
perhaps I misunderstood what he meant by mutable spell list.
I do like your other option of cleric / archivist / MoS
Thanks for the help, sorry for the confusion if any.
That said, it's possible you just have a group who gets themselves knocked below 0 constantly. In that case, you'd be well advised to help them optimize their characters and tactics beforehand.
Seeing as I play in at least 3 groups and run 1 group a week (4 total a week) that this happens every battle, what can one do about it?
Two examples, my Druid in Sat took 83 damage from an unfortunate Breath weapon when he was fully healed with 91 hit points (10th level.) The next week my Cleric (highest AC in party at 32) takes a full attack from a fire giant (three hits) for a total of 92 damage with only 93 hit points max (12 th level.)
My question is: How do I prevent the Hydra from breathing on anyone? How do I prevent the charging Giants from charging?
Human Monk1/Cleric2/Master of Shrouds 7
perhaps I misunderstood what he meant by mutable spell list.
Yea, I also didn't understand what was meant by mutable. I just assumed he meant "clerics get good spell lists and has domains for filler."
Seeing as I play in at least 3 groups and run 1 group a week (4 total a week) that this happens every battle, what can one do about it?
First off, my condolences sir, that at least partially has to be pure bad luck. Even when I DM people don't get incapacitated very often and I tend to use challenges substantially (read, much) higher than recommended. To put this in perspective however, no one was incapacitated in the entire last campaign I finished PCing in (lasted around three months). The DM wasn't anything like soft on us (the average fight was a few CR above us at least), but a well built party generally isn't going to be seriously threatened even by something several CR above it.
Two examples, my Druid in Sat took 83 damage from an unfortunate Breath weapon when he was fully healed with 91 hit points (10th level.) The next week my Cleric (highest AC in party at 32) takes a full attack from a fire giant (three hits) for a total of 92 damage with only 93 hit points max (12 th level.)
My question is: How do I prevent the Hydra from breathing on anyone? How do I prevent the charging Giants from charging?
Work with the players during character creation (even if you aren't DMing), offer your assistance with CO work and point out obvious flaws in their builds, if they have an idea they want to use offer optimized ways to get there. If you're playing, you should also try to work out effective tactics IC and make sure the entire party prepares beforehand for anything you're likely to encounter. An ounce of prevention and a pound of cure, etc.
Even then however, remember my qualifier. Sometimes you are going to get incapacitated, or otherwise screwed... It shouldn't be often, but it does happen. So long as your party isn't consistently getting incapacitated, it's just another part of the game.
Yea, I also didn't understand what was meant by mutable. I just assumed he meant "clerics get good spell lists and has domains for filler."
This.
Work with the players during character creation (even if you aren't DMing), offer your assistance with CO work
Playstyle differences?
Maybe it is just all the people I know really play in significantly more difficult encounters? FYI I design encounters that fall into the encounter calculators as Overpowering as a minimum threshold. I suspect the other DM's do as well.
All the groups are full of highly optimized characters.
My last encounter had two CR 12 Bone Devils (for wall of ice), one CR12 Siege Golem (6d6+20 ranged attacks), one CR18 BBEG that negated teleporting (dimensional anchor) and flying in any form for 120 ft radius. All against a 4 person party of CR12's.
Playstyle differences?
Maybe it is just all the people I know really play in significantly more difficult encounters? FYI I design encounters that fall into the encounter calculators as Overpowering as a minimum threshold. I suspect the other DM's do as well.
All the groups are full of highly optimized characters.
My last encounter had two CR 12 Bone Devils (for wall of ice), one CR12 Siege Golem (6d6+20 ranged attacks), one CR18 BBEG that negated teleporting (dimensional anchor) and flying in any form for 120 ft radius. All against a 4 person party of CR12's.
Hm, might be. As a general rule in games I'm PCing I try to hold the parties level of optimization a bit above whatever is being thrown at us, but based off that encounter your DM seems to bear a higher resemblance to my own DMing style. Admittedly however in my case people I'm DMing for don't need to worry about incapacitation much either, simply because if they get that low whatever hit them probably killed them.
Damn though, I have to admit I kinda envy you. I wouldn't mind having my DMs scale the difficulty up a bit more. Most of the time my DMs run in the Very Difficult range. I'm the main (and often only) optimizer in the party.