Beguiler Build and group despair.

[James the Newbie]

I've been less active as of late since I have had less spare time, missed you guys I see on the boards.

My friend who has never played D&D except for a faux campaign where they played all the players and I built in a day to teach them the rules wants to join our party. We found our scout is unfortunately unable to attend, and they want a build with spell casting, but who can also fill a role in the group we don't have, this role is trap finding.

The perfect role here seems to be a beguiler, which I am unfortunately inexperienced with. we have 5332 gold to spend and a custom point buy that left this character with 80 points.

They want to be a changeling, but if you have any other race suggestions I am sure they would be interested, they are more interested in being 'cool' than being powerful, however I would like to make sure they are optimised enough to enjoy their game play with us. They do have the complaint that beguilers cant throw about fireballs and such willynilly, but they really want to fit in so insist on having trap finding. Also the best person at social encounters is our sorceror, so anything to make social encounters easier (other than the obvious glibness) would be a nice shout out.

All source books including dragon magazines are available, but our DM will just say 'no' if the mechanic makes gameplay unfair. I dont want them to outshine the whole group, as I don't want anyone to dislike their character, or get angry at them. The person who owns the cleric simply dislikes the beguiler class as he thinks reading it is too much effort and doesn't understand the class, while the sorcerer is jealous as he will no longer be the group face, we need a better face since social encounters are becoming more prominent, so ways to talk to these people without hurting their feelings/making them angry will almost certainly result in my gratitude and exp if I haven't exp'd you too recently, and if they are not copying a post above.

The build is level five and I mapped it out is as follows

Stats
Cha 14
Int 18
Wis 10
Con 16
Dex 12
Str 10

Weapons, armour and magic items
Gloves of the stary sky (for some magic missile offence)
Goggles of the golden sun (For fireball offence level 6)
Rapier
Short-bow
Chain Shirt

skill ranks
Bluff 8
Diplomacy 8
Sense Motive 8
Gather Information 8
Concentration 8
Tumble 4
Spot 6
Listen 6
Search 8
Disable Device 8
Forgery 4
Use rope 4+1 (see below)
Heal '1' (see below)

Feats
level 1: Spell focus enchantment
Level 3: Greater Spell focus enchantment
Feat from Flaw 1: Flexible mind* (Use rope) (Heal) This feat allows you to make 2 skills class skills and grants +1 in all skill checks related to each
Feat from Flaw 2: obtain familiar**

*Flexible mind is dragon 326 page 80
**They enjoyed having a raven familiar that could talk, but anything else they may find fun as a basic familiar would be appreciated

This character is fitting into the following group
Fighter4/Paladin1
Wizard5
Sorcerer5
Cleric5
Monk5

As a result if you see any gaps this beguiler can fill that the current characters can't I would appreciate it

To summarise, I am looking to help this person make a beguiler fit into the group, and be useful in area's we cant cover properly with the classes we have, optimise them reasonably in combat without overdoing it, avoid over-shining the others in all area's of the game and help talk to the cleric and sorcerer owners without making them feel bad.

 

[anest1s]

I love beguiler, but maybe you should check out factotum? Beguiler will make the sorceror very jelly. Factotum has awesome skills, and some spells, and he can basically do everything.

If he wants to throw fireballs and be a rogue at the same time, then why not rogue-wiz? He won't have to be the party face. Changeling rogue substitution levels also rock your skills out. And you can take 10 on social skills. Able learner for keeping most skills as class skills, then 4 wizard then unseen seer? Or some other prestige.

Also check out chameleon.

 

[Jackinthegreen]

Keep in mind Obtain Familiar requires being a third level arcane caster, so you might have problems lining up feats and such.

Changelings are a great race to play and if the player is creative there will be lots of fun opportunities.

You might find the insight in The Beguiler's Handbook to be useful.

 

[Empath Negative]

The best way to not make the Sorc jelly is by having the Beguiler come with contacts, or means of acquiring contacts in most civilized areas. When the Beguiler gets to city A have him roll knowledge local and the higher his roll the more impressive his contact, or network in the area is.

Essentially use the Sorc for faceman in most circumstances... but allow the beguiler to exert social influence, or use his social influence to obtain items, get information, hire guards... basically when interacting with the "city" is when the beguilers skills come to play.

 

[James the Newbie]

The best way to not make the Sorc jelly is by having the Beguiler come with contacts, or means of acquiring contacts in most civilized areas. When the Beguiler gets to city A have him roll knowledge local and the higher his roll the more impressive his contact, or network in the area is.

Essentially use the Sorc for faceman in most circumstances... but allow the beguiler to exert social influence, or use his social influence to obtain items, get information, hire guards... basically when interacting with the "city" is when the beguilers skills come to play.

Defiantly worth experience, and a very good all round idea, unfortunately we purchased a castle which we enjoy building and improving, leaving to gather information, artefacts, or deal with foreign threats, meaning we need someone good at social encounters mainly for interrogating prisoners, dealing with diplomats and mainly the local area anyway, where diplomacy and sense motive are rather vital.

 

[Greenfield]

Well, there's the obvious split class - Beguiler/Wizard/Ultimate Magus.

You don't need to spend a Feat on Obtain Familiar, and you get Scribe Scroll as well.

This build focuses more on the spell casting side than on the Scout side, merging the spontaneous caster abilities of the Beguiler with the expanded spell repertoire of the Wizard. The build can also burn spell slots from one class to power metamagic feats applied to spells from the other class. Additionally, the build can add a small number of spells from the Wizard side to the Beguiler list, over time.

It may be a bit much for the relatively inexperienced player, but it has interesting potential.