Starscream
2010-05-27, 02:57 PM
Hey all. I'm going to be playing in a 5 person campaign soon that starts at level 20 and will swiftly become Epic. One of the rules for this game is that no core races are allowed. Everyone has to be something exotic and weird. LA Buyoff is allowed. We already have a wizard and either a cleric or druid (player hasn't decided yet), as well as a factotum. So me and the final player are basically going to be the party beatsticks. We don't do too much optimizing, but since the campaign is soon to become epic, we can expect to face a fair amount of broken cheese (CR isn't even a decent ballpark estimate of challenge at such levels).
I was looking for something cool and different to be, and stumbled across the Keeper from Fiend Folio. This is an interesting creature. It's a 4HD outsider with an LA of +3 (which will already be bought off as I begin play) and some weird features, the most neat of which is the ability to turn its arms into any melee weapon it has seen, and use it with proficiency.
I instantly thought that this would have some interesting synergy with the Kensai PrC, which lets you apply magical bonuses and abilities to your natural weapons. The DM has OK'd the use of this with the Keeper's arms, no matter what form they are in, because honestly what difference does it make if I turn my sword into a club to whack some skeletons?.
This seems like a pretty sweet deal. Not super powerful, but fun. Basically instead of being Fighter 5 before entering the PrC I'm going to be a Keeper/Fighter 1. Essentially I'm trading two bonus feats for the following:
*Being an outsider, which means smaller HD but also 3 good saves, better skills, and the ability of the party wizard to polymorph me into some pretty potent forms (which he is more than happy to do).
* +8 str, +6 dex, +4 con, +4 int, -2 wis, -4 cha. Pretty good stats for a martial character.
* 40 foot speed, 20 foot climb speed.
* +4 natural armor
* DR 10/magic (though freaking everything is magic at this level, so it hardly matters)
* Blindsight out to 200 feet (and blindness, Keepers have no eyes)
* The ability to spit nauseating poison every 1d4 rounds.
* Most of the immunities of a construct, though I can still be polymorphed which is nice
* Resistance to acid, fire, cold, electricity and sonic 10
* The aforementioned weapon transformation thing, which even works with reach and exotic weapons.
Downsides:
* Outsiders are hard to raise. We're high enough level to do it, it's just expensive.
* A couple of racial abilities that are useless because they only work when other Keepers are around. So basically worthless to me.
* A rather bizarre weakness: if I'm captured, pinned or helpless I have 10 rounds to get free or I dissolve into a puddle of poison and die. Not sure how much of an issue this will be. Could be a minor nuisance, could be absolutely crippling.
Okay, so here's basically what I'm planning:
Keeper 4 / Fighter 1 / Kensai 10(?). That gives me 5 levels that I'm not sure what to do with. My 1st and 3rd level feats will need to be Combat Expertise and Weapon focus, so I can be a Kensai. After that, I don't know. There are also some skill requirements, but my Outsider HD will give me skills to spare.
I'm currently leaning toward taking Kensai all the way to level 10, to really pimp my shapeshifting weapons, but I'm open to other ideas. I know Kensai isn't too powerful a PrC, but we're not particularly optimized, and I'm doing it as much for the fluff as the crunch. I like the idea of constantly switching weapons during a fight, to make my tactics unpredictable, but at high levels non-magical weapons are nearly useless, and Kensai is the only way I know of to enhance natural attacks like magical weapons.
Pretty much all WoTC sourcebooks are allowed. I'm basically going for an "all around" decent warrior type, without too much focus on a single trick like charging or grappling. Especially not grappling, as the more I grapple the more I risk getting pinned and activating my bizarre racial self-destruct button.
So, any advice? I'm looking for suggestions for feats, equipment, tactics, and classes/prcs to fill my extra levels. I don't need to be super powerful; warrior types rarely are, and we have another martial type in the party.
I was looking for something cool and different to be, and stumbled across the Keeper from Fiend Folio. This is an interesting creature. It's a 4HD outsider with an LA of +3 (which will already be bought off as I begin play) and some weird features, the most neat of which is the ability to turn its arms into any melee weapon it has seen, and use it with proficiency.
I instantly thought that this would have some interesting synergy with the Kensai PrC, which lets you apply magical bonuses and abilities to your natural weapons. The DM has OK'd the use of this with the Keeper's arms, no matter what form they are in, because honestly what difference does it make if I turn my sword into a club to whack some skeletons?.
This seems like a pretty sweet deal. Not super powerful, but fun. Basically instead of being Fighter 5 before entering the PrC I'm going to be a Keeper/Fighter 1. Essentially I'm trading two bonus feats for the following:
*Being an outsider, which means smaller HD but also 3 good saves, better skills, and the ability of the party wizard to polymorph me into some pretty potent forms (which he is more than happy to do).
* +8 str, +6 dex, +4 con, +4 int, -2 wis, -4 cha. Pretty good stats for a martial character.
* 40 foot speed, 20 foot climb speed.
* +4 natural armor
* DR 10/magic (though freaking everything is magic at this level, so it hardly matters)
* Blindsight out to 200 feet (and blindness, Keepers have no eyes)
* The ability to spit nauseating poison every 1d4 rounds.
* Most of the immunities of a construct, though I can still be polymorphed which is nice
* Resistance to acid, fire, cold, electricity and sonic 10
* The aforementioned weapon transformation thing, which even works with reach and exotic weapons.
Downsides:
* Outsiders are hard to raise. We're high enough level to do it, it's just expensive.
* A couple of racial abilities that are useless because they only work when other Keepers are around. So basically worthless to me.
* A rather bizarre weakness: if I'm captured, pinned or helpless I have 10 rounds to get free or I dissolve into a puddle of poison and die. Not sure how much of an issue this will be. Could be a minor nuisance, could be absolutely crippling.
Okay, so here's basically what I'm planning:
Keeper 4 / Fighter 1 / Kensai 10(?). That gives me 5 levels that I'm not sure what to do with. My 1st and 3rd level feats will need to be Combat Expertise and Weapon focus, so I can be a Kensai. After that, I don't know. There are also some skill requirements, but my Outsider HD will give me skills to spare.
I'm currently leaning toward taking Kensai all the way to level 10, to really pimp my shapeshifting weapons, but I'm open to other ideas. I know Kensai isn't too powerful a PrC, but we're not particularly optimized, and I'm doing it as much for the fluff as the crunch. I like the idea of constantly switching weapons during a fight, to make my tactics unpredictable, but at high levels non-magical weapons are nearly useless, and Kensai is the only way I know of to enhance natural attacks like magical weapons.
Pretty much all WoTC sourcebooks are allowed. I'm basically going for an "all around" decent warrior type, without too much focus on a single trick like charging or grappling. Especially not grappling, as the more I grapple the more I risk getting pinned and activating my bizarre racial self-destruct button.
So, any advice? I'm looking for suggestions for feats, equipment, tactics, and classes/prcs to fill my extra levels. I don't need to be super powerful; warrior types rarely are, and we have another martial type in the party.