Gaiden said:
At 7th level I could get a character with an AC around 33 or so who could be hitting every other round with a +30 or so after power attacking for 5 doing probably upwards of 30 damage a hit.
How do you manage 30 points of damage/hit? Assuming 20 strength after a bull's strength or other item, 20 charisma, a +2 greatsword, power attack and divine might I'm only getting
7 greatsword +7 strength, +2 enhancement, +5 Divine Might, +5 power attack =26 points of damage on average.
(I play a Ftr2/Wiz 6 at the moment so I'm looking for ways to increase my damage)
Elder-Basalisk: I have a few questions.
1. I know people usually don't like blur, but is it really that bad? If I have a very high armor class, I imagine that most enemies when they hit, will hit hard (probably with a crit.) Having a 1in5 chance of negating the damage, seems pretty good. Moreover, it makes me immune to sneak attacks. Also, it only has a V component so I could cast it when I get 2nd level spells and make it persistant later on. Also, if I take it, it would stack with the miss chance from blink.
1. blur has a range of touch so you can' t make it persistent. (Not that you'd want to).
2. It's unclear whether or not it would stack with the Blink miss chance which seems to be 50% concealment and 50% etherealness based on the different conditions that change the miss chance.
3. Immunity to sneak attacks isn't much of a worry if you've got AC 33. Rogues have a lot of trouble hitting high ACs. And there are other ways of becoming immune to sneak attacks that are actually useful for other things: Obscuring Mist, Blink, Displacement, Improved Invisibility, etc.
4. When you consider that the things that will hit your AC will probably do so on a roll of 17 or so (8th level raging 18 str barbarian with weapon focus, improved critical and a masterwork greatsword is +16 to hit--all hits will be critical threats) there's only a 4% chance that you will be struck with a confirmed critical. Blur changes that to a 3.2% chance. Not nearly as big of a difference as you might have thought. Compare it to adding two points of armor class through protection from evil which reduces the 4% chance of a successful critical to a 1% chance of a confirmed critical. A 20% miss chance doesn't look nearly as impressive in that light. . . .
2. I think Displacement requires a S component - IDHMBWM. This brings up the core of the issue though. It seems that there are a collection of spells that are all very similar and that I should choose only one of (maybe 2). Those spells are as follows:
invisibility
blur
blink
displacement
improved invisibility
mirror image
Blur has the advantage of not having a S component and if I took it, then I certainly would not take displacement. I am not sure which spell or combination of spells is the best out of this pool. I tend to think mirror image or invisibility or improved invisibility, blur or displacement, blink or displacement (although I suppose both would be quite devastating effectively 75% miss chance). Let me know what you think.
The spells overlap somewhat. These are the combos I would avoid:
Blur and Displacement
Blink and Improved Invisibility
Displacement and Blink
Improved Invisibility and Invisibility
Any kind of Invisibility and Mirror Image
I wouldn't worry about blink and blur or displacement stacking. Even if it worked (which I'm not sure it would) it would be overkill. Against the barbarian discussed earlier, if either displaced or blinking, you have only a 10% chance of being damaged by her primary attack and a 2.5% chance of being damaged by her secondary attack. If you used a second action to up the miss chance to 75%, you only reduce that to a 5% chance of taking damage from the primary attack and a 1.25% chance of taking damage from the secondary. That sounds impressive until you realize that by using Haste or Prot Evil instead, you end up with a 5% chance of taking damage from the primary attack and a 2.5% chance of taking damage from the secondary (Prot Evil) or a 2.5% chance of taking damage from either (Haste).
Other things to consider:
Blink and Improved Invisibility both deny your opponents their dex bonusses (and thus combine well with expert tactician).
Of all of those spells, only blink reduces your damage from area effect spells.
Of all thoses spells, only blink enables you to walk through walls and doors.
Of all those spells, only blink enables you to hit (or see) ethereal creatures.
Of all those spells, only blink should render you immune to grappling (it's not listed in the spell description but it makes sense).
Of all those spells, only blink gives you a miss chance.
Of all of those spells, only Invisibility and Improved Invisibility enable you to sneak past opponents.
The images produced by mirror image have an AC of 10 plus a little bit. Since your armor class is very high, it's likely that attackers will take out all your images with attacks that would have missed you anyway. So it doesn't buy you much.
All told, I'd go for Blink and Improved Invisibility if you're taking Expert Tactician. Otherwise, I'd probably just pick up improved invisibility or Invisibility and Displacement.
3. IDHMBWM as I already stated and I actually have not looked over the S.E. spells. I probably should before I make any further decisions about the character's spell list. However, the modified character is thus:
Feats:
Still Spell
Arcane Preparation
Cooperative Spell
Power Attack
Extra Turningx2
Divine Might
Extend Spell
Persistant Spell
+3 (need to check on Material components for Eschew Materials)
Spells
1st (5) - True Strike*, Featerfall*, Shield, Grease, Magic Missile
2nd (5) - Blur*, Web, Glitterdust
3rd (4) - Haste, Vampiric Touch, Slow, Blink
4th (4) - Polymorph Self*, Fireshield, Stoneskin
5th (4) - Wall of Force, Feeblemind, Telekinesis,
6th (3) - Geas*, Tensor's Transformation, Greater Dispelling
7th (3) - Teleport without Error*, Limited Wish, Power Word Stun*
8th (2) - Mind Blank, SunBurst
9th (1) - Time Stop*
I like grease and think it is too useful to pass up. On any significant incline it will be useful, it can work on an area I can't get to in melee to disarm, and as you said, no Spell Resistance.
I was thinking I ought to choose either Otto's irresistable dance or power word stun.
Yes--especially if you're picking up Expert Tactician. The more ways to make people lose their dex bonus the better.
I think the power word is better since neither allow a save and I get more 7th level spells. I am not sure about Sun burst, if I take glitterdust and/or blindness deafness, it seems like they may overlap a bit much.
Sun burst is a tac nuke against undead and the DC would be far far higher than either glitterdust or Blindness/Deafness. (Also it's an area effect unlike Blindness/Deafness and it's not a will save like glitterdust). There's a little bit of overlap there but I don't think it's too much.