monkey3
2010-05-17, 10:34 AM
The name may have been used before, but this character concept is original.
The goal of this character is to never spend any of his own experience points on anything. He leeches them! This is not your typical optimal character. With 9th level spells at 16th level, (and fewer spells) he is probably a worse caster than a straight Cleric 20. But he makes up for it in leeching...
Human Cloistered Cleric 1 / Artificer 5 / Ur-Priest 10 / Artificer 4
Stats: Wis > Int > Chr > Con > Dex > Str.
Why Artificer? In making magic items, he uses "retain essence" to suck dry magic items, and use their experience to make just about any magic item he wants - go go Artificer.
Why Ur Priest? He uses the capstone Ur-Priest ability to never pay for experience on wishes, spend money on Animate Dead, etc.
Why Cleric? This one is the craziest! To qualify for Ur-Priest, we need
Fort +3, Will +3 and Skills: Bluff 6 , Knowledge (arcana) 5 , Knowledge (the planes) 5 , Knowledge (religion) 8 , Spellcraft 8.
Artificer 5 will give us everything except Fort +2, Bluff 6, and Knowledge (religion) 8. What single class dip will give us all 3? The only one I know of is a Cleric with the Trickery domain. [I am happy to hear other options here, since I'd rather not have Cleric.] For the other cleric domain I'd go for Magic, and temporary god Boccob (right before our Ur-Priest disavowed all religion).
Go ahead and make the Cleric Cloistered for extra skills at first level (we only loose Heavy armor and 2 hp).
The last 4 levels could be altered to personal preference, but 3 of them should be in something with a caster level. Thanks to Ur-Priest getting 1/2 caster level for all non-cleric caster levels, The Leech can have 20 caster levels at the end if he takes Practiced Caster Ur-Priest, and Artificer. [Math: 10 Ur-Priest + 4 Practice Ur-Priest + 1/2 (9 Artificer + 4 Practiced Artificer) = 20]
Feat recommendations,Not any options here. In order:
Able Learner, Iron Will, Spell Focus-evil (both pre-reqs.), Practiced Artificer, Circle Mage (after switching god to Galaedros), Practiced caster Ur-Priest, Craft Construct (why not, you have plenty exp from Artificer)
Cheese option- Necropolitan: Basically the character advanced to third level Cloistered Cleric. At that point he was captured/volunteered and turned into a 1st level undead. This traumatized him enough to quit all religion, and loose access to all the spells he knew. (Nice back-story for Ur-Priest.)
Cheese option- Circle Magic: This is the only Circle Magic option available to divine casters (Ghostwalk p.29). It can only be taken by a "Divine spellcaster with Galaedros as a patron deity." Ur-Priest stipulates that you can’t pray to a god. If you can resolve the two, Circle Magic is a great addition to the theme, as you leech caster levels and power from your followers (that you keep in a portable hole).
Awesome trick - Simulacrum: You need to have met a Mirror Mephit (a monster from Expedition to the Demonweb Pits with SLA Simulacrum p. 208) at some point (after achieving Ur-Priest 10). You then steal its Simulacrum ability (via your capstone) and male a Simulacrum of it (need some of its hair/whatever). New you have a Simulacrum of a Mirror Mephit in your portable hole that you can steal from and make 1 free Simulacrum per day. You this to make an army of your own self to use as clones/meat-shield/Circle Magic allies.
Awesome trick - Teleport: Make a Simulacrum of any of the many demon/devil/angels that have Great Teleport and other juicy SLAs. Put simulacrum in portable hole, and use when needed.
Broken trick - Wish: Use above trick on Efreet Simulacrum to get free wishes. Be prepared for DM blowback.
Downside - Evil: You have to be evil to be an Ur-Priest. Lots of DMs don't allow evil because they are babies who can't separate real from fantasy. (Oops, sorry about ranting.)
The goal of this character is to never spend any of his own experience points on anything. He leeches them! This is not your typical optimal character. With 9th level spells at 16th level, (and fewer spells) he is probably a worse caster than a straight Cleric 20. But he makes up for it in leeching...
Human Cloistered Cleric 1 / Artificer 5 / Ur-Priest 10 / Artificer 4
Stats: Wis > Int > Chr > Con > Dex > Str.
Why Artificer? In making magic items, he uses "retain essence" to suck dry magic items, and use their experience to make just about any magic item he wants - go go Artificer.
Why Ur Priest? He uses the capstone Ur-Priest ability to never pay for experience on wishes, spend money on Animate Dead, etc.
Why Cleric? This one is the craziest! To qualify for Ur-Priest, we need
Fort +3, Will +3 and Skills: Bluff 6 , Knowledge (arcana) 5 , Knowledge (the planes) 5 , Knowledge (religion) 8 , Spellcraft 8.
Artificer 5 will give us everything except Fort +2, Bluff 6, and Knowledge (religion) 8. What single class dip will give us all 3? The only one I know of is a Cleric with the Trickery domain. [I am happy to hear other options here, since I'd rather not have Cleric.] For the other cleric domain I'd go for Magic, and temporary god Boccob (right before our Ur-Priest disavowed all religion).
Go ahead and make the Cleric Cloistered for extra skills at first level (we only loose Heavy armor and 2 hp).
The last 4 levels could be altered to personal preference, but 3 of them should be in something with a caster level. Thanks to Ur-Priest getting 1/2 caster level for all non-cleric caster levels, The Leech can have 20 caster levels at the end if he takes Practiced Caster Ur-Priest, and Artificer. [Math: 10 Ur-Priest + 4 Practice Ur-Priest + 1/2 (9 Artificer + 4 Practiced Artificer) = 20]
Feat recommendations,Not any options here. In order:
Able Learner, Iron Will, Spell Focus-evil (both pre-reqs.), Practiced Artificer, Circle Mage (after switching god to Galaedros), Practiced caster Ur-Priest, Craft Construct (why not, you have plenty exp from Artificer)
Cheese option- Necropolitan: Basically the character advanced to third level Cloistered Cleric. At that point he was captured/volunteered and turned into a 1st level undead. This traumatized him enough to quit all religion, and loose access to all the spells he knew. (Nice back-story for Ur-Priest.)
Cheese option- Circle Magic: This is the only Circle Magic option available to divine casters (Ghostwalk p.29). It can only be taken by a "Divine spellcaster with Galaedros as a patron deity." Ur-Priest stipulates that you can’t pray to a god. If you can resolve the two, Circle Magic is a great addition to the theme, as you leech caster levels and power from your followers (that you keep in a portable hole).
Awesome trick - Simulacrum: You need to have met a Mirror Mephit (a monster from Expedition to the Demonweb Pits with SLA Simulacrum p. 208) at some point (after achieving Ur-Priest 10). You then steal its Simulacrum ability (via your capstone) and male a Simulacrum of it (need some of its hair/whatever). New you have a Simulacrum of a Mirror Mephit in your portable hole that you can steal from and make 1 free Simulacrum per day. You this to make an army of your own self to use as clones/meat-shield/Circle Magic allies.
Awesome trick - Teleport: Make a Simulacrum of any of the many demon/devil/angels that have Great Teleport and other juicy SLAs. Put simulacrum in portable hole, and use when needed.
Broken trick - Wish: Use above trick on Efreet Simulacrum to get free wishes. Be prepared for DM blowback.
Downside - Evil: You have to be evil to be an Ur-Priest. Lots of DMs don't allow evil because they are babies who can't separate real from fantasy. (Oops, sorry about ranting.)