An Incorporeal Undead's... Gear and Feats...?

Jimlock · Oct 16, 2011

How would you boost an Incorporeal Undead?

What Feats would you choose?

What items would you give it?

(citations fron any 3.5 book/source are welcome...)

Jackinthegreen · Oct 16, 2011

The type of undead will change these tactics greatly.

A standard Ghost still has a body and the equipment on the body is given to its ghost. The only other incorporeal undead I've looked at really is the Phantom from MM5, and it walks a fine line between corporeal and incorporeal. Basically it can become corporeal, equip such gear, and when it shifts back into being incorporeal its equipment does the same.

I'd really need to brush up on that though, but Types & Subtypes :: d20srd.org is a good place to start.

frankthedm · Oct 16, 2011

Jimlock said:
How would you boost an Incorporeal Undead?

What Feats would you choose?

What items would you give it?

(citations fron any 3.5 book/source are welcome...)

As a monster, you really don't need to give it items or feats, just give it a few interesting abilities and adjust it's CR up accordingly. Indeed cherry picking items or feats for a monster may create synergies that make the monster too strong for it's CR.

Adding Special Abilities

You can add any sort of spell-like, supernatural, or extraordinary ability to a creature. As with a class level, you should determine how much, or how little, this ability adds to the creature’s existing repertoire. A suite of abilities that work together should be treated as a single modifier for this purpose. If the ability (or combination of abilities) significantly increases the monster’s combat effectiveness, increase its CR by 2. Minor abilities increase the creature’s CR by 1, and truly trivial abilities may not increase CR at all. If the special abilities a monster gains are not tied to a class or Hit Die increase, this CR increase stacks.

A significant special attack is one that stands a good chance of incapacitating or crippling a character in one round. A significant special quality is one that seriously diminishes the monster’s vulnerability to common attacks. Do not add this factor twice if a monster has both special attacks and special qualities.

Make sure to "scale" your evaluation of these abilities by the monster’s current CR.

Jimlock · Oct 16, 2011

[MENTION=1164]frankthedm[/MENTION], [MENTION=6678119]Jackinthegreen[/MENTION] sorry for not specifying the creature...

We are talking about a Shadowdancer's undead companion.

RUMBLETiGER · Oct 16, 2011

I houseruled that crafting any equipment on the Ethereal Plane out of materials brought from the Material Plane, and using elements from the Ethereal Plane (misc. Plane stuff, dirt from the ground would suffice), would result in incorporial items that could be held by incorporial creatures, or corporial creatures with gloves appropriately crafted to affect incorporial creatures.

This was for an Artificer who had the incorporial shadow construct* from Eberron, I forget what it's called. Part of her workshop could shift to the Ethereal Plane.

Edit: *Umbral Spy

Jackinthegreen · Oct 16, 2011

Ghost Touch items work in this case, and if worn by an incorporeal creature they can pass through solid objects as well. Magic Armor :: d20srd.org

As for feats, Libris Mortis would have a lot to offer I imagine, assuming you're not using the feats presented in its MM entry.

frankthedm · Oct 17, 2011

Jimlock said:
[MENTION=1164]frankthedm[/MENTION], [MENTION=6678119]Jackinthegreen[/MENTION] sorry for not specifying the creature...

We are talking about a Shadowdancer's undead companion.

Is there anything supporting a summoner can change out a summoned creature's feats? Also the HD increases from leveling up the shadowdancer only specify increasing "(and the requisite base attack and base save bonus increases)" and even if the shadow does get more feats, it only seems logical those feats would follow the chain the greater shadow is on; Mobility then spring attack.

Item wise, you have armor and weapons that have ghost touch. Weapons might not be worth it with the shadow's Whack-A-Stat normal attack and lack of martial weapon proficiencies, And unless you can't get mage armor, getting good AC armor will be more pricey than it is worth since the shadows won't have armor prof and Ghost Touch is a +3 modifier on armor.

airwalkrr · Oct 17, 2011

An invaluable resource for any undead played by PCs is Libris Mortis. That's the go-to book for any situation in which you are talking about an undead under the control of a PC. However, the shadow summoned by a shadowdancer is a normal shadow as per the MM until the shadowdancer reaches 6th level and above. If your DM allows you to customize it otherwise, your DM is being very nice. As for advancing it from 6th level onward with the bonus HD, I can see frankthedm's logic on the matter, but this is something to work out with your DM. If your DM is going to let you customize the shadow, Libris Mortis is the place to go. For items, you are mostly out of luck. And for that matter, I wouldn't worry about it, unless you are a munchkin and you just need to worry about it or your DM is running a particularly difficult campaign and expects you to be a munchkin.

Jimlock · Oct 18, 2011

Thanks for the answers guys.
.....right the shadow is a normal MM Shadow. Non customizable up until.... it gets new HD.
I understand the logic of following the Greater Shadow path but that is not necessary. Nothing under RAW suggests that one should.
Of course, in the beginning you have to take the standard MM shadow, without tweaking it, but once you get new HD, there's nothing stopping you from allocating the new ability point and feat as you like. Don't forget that the highest the shadow can get, (with a 20th character level shadowdancer) is 7HD. So no worries about that 9HD greater shadow....

Unfortunately (for me), I already knew about Libris Mortis and its nice collection of feats, as well as about ghost touch weapons and armor.

Stupid of me, AGAIN, to not tell you guys what I I've found on my own already...
...But that's about it. Libris Mortis and ghost touch weapons and armor....

and the monster feats in MM...which are not interesting for this creature.

I was hoping that someone had tried something unique, or had found some useful feat, some interesting item from MIC.... I don't know... some interesting combination... whatever....

suggestions?

Ok.... Even with what we've got, what is the best feat/item in your opinion?