First Time Warmage, looking for ideas

Ok, a longtime buddy of mine is starting up a new campaign, and surprised me by probably allowing the use of non-PHB base classes. I have chosen to play Blitz Magnussen, a human Warmage, with an eye towards multiclassing with 2 Ftr levels and some Eldritch Knight. I haven't played a Warmage before, but here is my vision:

I'm thinking he'll have a lot of James Tiberius Kirk in him...possibly a little Flash Gordon and Zap Brannigan thrown in for good measure. He'll be charismatic, a lady-killer, impetuous & brash...some might also call him foolhardy and insolent.

Books allowed are Core 3 + Completes (no Psionics) + other on case-by-case approval. I don't know at this point if its pure homebrew or a published setting. If it is the latter, it may be Dark Company, but is more likely to be Greyhawk or Forgotten Realms.

I like to plot my PCs growth over 20 levels to make sure I don't screw up qualifiying for a PrCl or to make sure the PC develops to fit my overall conception. Assuming War8/Ftr2/EK10, Blitz Magnussen should have 11 Feats.

Probable Feats:

Reach Spell
Split Ray
Weapon Focus: Ranged Touch Spells
Point Blank Shot
Precise Shot
Empower Spell
Practiced Spellcaster
Ranged Spell Specialization
Arcane Strike
Combat Reflexes
Energy Substitution

Under Consideration/pending approval:

Weapon Finesse
Combat Casting
Battlecaster
Guided Spell (DCv1)
Exotic Weapon Proficiency
Improved Unarmed Combat

We haven't been told how stat generation will be handled, but with this concept, Charisma and Dexterity will be the high stats, with Wisdom being the probable dump stat. Depending upon books allowed- and which kewl mini I use- Blitz may be using a polearm or Maul.

The question is this: would you change any of the choices on that Feat list?

Consider Spellsword for a level or 3? better saves, a bonus feat, and you can offset ASF 10 or 15%.

at 10th level he would be
-casting as a 7th Warmage
-spellsword would offer? ASF offset

2 Fighter / 5 Warmage / 1 Spellsword / 2 Eldricht Knight ?
or
2 Fighter / 5 Warmage / 3 Spellsword

This may not be the kind of advice you're looking for but here goes:

If you're looking for a fighter/mage/eldritch knight type - warmage does not go well with that.

War mages make great heavy artillery -they blast things to a pulp, usually from a distance (rays, area affect spells, etc.)- they don't have the self buff and other defense spells necessary to survive a prolonged hand to hand encounter. Mixing them with fighter just means you're slightly less sub par in melee, but the hit you take to casting far outweighs this benefit. If you want to focus on rays - go straight warmage and take weapon focus ray and precise shot - you should still do fine with touch attacks and you don't take the level hit a fighter/mage takes (minimum 3 levels and while practiced spellcaster helps offset the caster level it does nothing for the lost spells and the delay in getting higher level spells).

Another way to say it is: there is little synergy between the warmage and the fighter. The reason a fighter/mage can stay competitive is with spells like shield, enlarge, mirror image, wraithstrike, false life, blink, haste etc. - the warmage gets none of these spells.

In short if you want a good fighter/mage take wizard levels, if you want a blaster just stick with straight warmage.

In my current game (as a player for the 1st time in 6 years, yay) I'm having a blast with my Ftr1/wizard5/Knight Phantom 2 and can readily say a gish can work - but I rely heavily on spells not available to a warmage.

Mort said:

In short if you want a good fighter/mage take wizard levels, if you want a blaster just stick with straight warmage.

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Agreed, fighter/warmage (while i've never seen one played) seems a bad combination.

Vorp

Vorput said:

Agreed, fighter/warmage (while i've never seen one played) seems a bad combination.

Vorp

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Quite right...if you want to melee. If you want to be a bowman/warmage they work awesomely together.

Here is my current character, Jek Peppin

Human Ftr2/Warmage4

Feats:
Point Blank Shot
Rapid Shot
Precise Shot
Weapon Proficiency (Greatbow)
Weapon Focus (Greatbow)
Practiced Spellcaster (Warmage)

+1 Mighty Greatbow (+2 STR)

Combine your ability to cast Accuracy and True Strike and you are one decent archer. Mix in the occasional Burning Hands (5d4) or Chill Touch (5d6) if people get too close.

When he doesn't need to spell things up he can trot up close to the melee (he wears armor and has decent hit points so he isn't worried about being blindsided) and fire two arrows each round at +7/+7 D10+4 damage.

Im going to mix in Arcane Archer (if I can convince the GM to let my non-elf get it) and start to snipe from a distance with my spells attached to the arrows.

I am not great at H2H, but as soon as I gain the ability to wear heavy armor I can tank up and not worry about being CLOSE to the action.

Mort said:

In short if you want a good fighter/mage take wizard levels, if you want a blaster just stick with straight warmage.

Click to expand...

I think you skimmed over the part where the warmage can (by spending a feat) wear medium armor at level 1 and heavy at mid levels with NO spell failure.

You can't do that with a regular mage.

DS

The main problem with fighter/warmage is, that the warmage spells basically do the same thing the fighter does with weapons. Their main focus overlaps and does not complement each other well.

As for feats, Arcane Disciple is a great feat for a warmage, if it fits the background.

Bye
Thanee

Sabathius42 said:

I think you skimmed over the part where the warmage can (by spending a feat) wear medium armor at level 1 and heavy at mid levels with NO spell failure.

You can't do that with a regular mage.

DS

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you can easily make up for that:

1 level of spellsword = ignore 10% arcane spell failure good enough for mithrill shirt.
3 levels = ignore 15% good enough for a buckler add on, which with the protections a high level mage can cast is good enough for a very good AC.

If the DM allows knight phantom - they can wear light armor and still cast with no spell failure - and if they want to waste the feats can go to heavy.

A high level fighter/wizard in melee will have some nice protections up - even with no prep time. A contigent blink, 1 mirror image, dragon skin, blur (and lots of others) - any of these will make up for lack of armor - if he can get more than 1 up he can truly dominate. A warmage doesn't even have access to these spells.

The fact that warmage can wear medium to heavy armor is irrelevant - if they get into melee they are screwed (plus they've wasted a feat or 2 that could be better spent elsewhere).

The main reason for fighter Warmage, IMHO, would be to get armor proficiency and bonus feats for ray spells, and even that is pretty weak. Warmage spells generally lack the buffing ability that's needed to properly combine the melee ability of a fighter with spellcasting. The combination is rather redundant - warmages blast, fighters chop, and nothing lets them do both at once.

Warmages don't have armored casting and bigger HD so they can go into melee. They have those conventional defensive abilities because they have no defensive spells.

Get a Skillful Weapon and add Sudden Stun to it. Helps get opponents out of your face since you already have a high Cha.

My experience was playing a Halfling Warmage/Arcane Trickster, much fun. The bonus sneak dice helped make up for lower casting abilities. (PS used Extra Spell to meet entry requirements)

Consider a Warmage/Exalted Arcanist instead, that would be the combo I'd play if I played another.

Oh, play a small race, Halfings are great Warmages.