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Mystic Muse
2010-07-26, 05:34 AM
My brother has stated that for his class he wants to be really good at building golems. Are there any classes besides artificer that would be good at this? He has stated that he doesn't want to be a wizard or Sorceror.

JeminiZero
2010-07-26, 05:37 AM
Archivist would be the obvious one. Golem construction requires certain spells, that tend to be more readily available to Arcane Casters, but which Archivist should have access to *some*.

Other would be Warlock, since they can fake spells via Imbue Items, but they don't get this till level 12.

Eldariel
2010-07-26, 05:39 AM
Honestly, Warforged Artificer is heads and shoulders above everything else in this; you get Craft Reserve, bonus Artisan feats, free Craft Construct and can trade for Tools of War (Craft Homunculus, which is just a part of Craft Construct anyways) to halve the XP cost for crafting Constructs.

Bushidough
2010-07-26, 05:40 AM
If he doesn't want to be a spellcaster you're aout of luck as the prereqs for the craft construst feat require spellcrafter levels.

Psionics available? If so go shaper and then this (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/psm/20040625b) I guess.

Maybe someone will have a workaround

FyreByrd
2010-07-26, 05:51 AM
I know it's not exactly Golems, but how about Effigy Master (PrC - Complete Arcane) can't remember pre-reqs, but may be able to get in as something other than wiz/sorc?

Mystic Muse
2010-07-26, 05:52 AM
Well, don't Artificers get every infusion of every level of infusion they can cast? Maybe I'm reading it wrong but that's the reason I'm avoiding it as it would be a lot of bookkeeping I'd imagine. I don't have access to the book right now so I can't check but I know for a fact that my brother wouldn't want a lot of bookkeeping involved.

Biffoniacus_Furiou
2010-07-26, 07:34 AM
+1 to Effigy Master, though to qualify you need to have Simulacrum on your class spell list. You could use (Cloistered) Cleric with the Envy domain, but otherwise you'd need at least one level in either Sorcerer or Wizard to qualify. It loses three points of BAB in five levels, probably too much of a drawback to take it on any nonspellcaster, though you could get away with only taking four levels of it. Artificer, Wizard, or Sorcerer would definitely be your best choices just because they get the Repair Damage line of spells.

If using Cloistered Cleric with Envy I'd get either Dwarf, Greed, or Trade as the other domain to get Fabricate so you can make construct bodies in minutes rather than weeks. Consider taking Divine Metamagic: Fell Drain, which would cause any spell that deals damage to benefit from the Envy domain bonus. The only problem with this is the lack of access to the Repair Damage line of spells, so you wouldn't be able to fix your pets except through costly Craft checks. Maybe go with a Warforged and see if the DM will let you swap out Cure/Inflict spells for the Repair Damage spells, and spontaneously convert prepared spells into those, though you'd probably need to homebrew some Mass-versions as well.

aivanther
2010-07-26, 08:04 AM
Well, don't Artificers get every infusion of every level of infusion they can cast? Maybe I'm reading it wrong but that's the reason I'm avoiding it as it would be a lot of bookkeeping I'd imagine. I don't have access to the book right now so I can't check but I know for a fact that my brother wouldn't want a lot of bookkeeping involved.

It's only really book keeping if you use them all, all the time. The easiest thing to do is create cheat sheet of infusions you'll probably want to use regularly. Then just keep in the back of your mind that htere's other things you might want.

However, I'll echo what others have said, to make golems you need caster. Warlock's imbue item is probably the only thing I can think of that might get you where you want to go.

Telonius
2010-07-26, 08:27 AM
Well, don't Artificers get every infusion of every level of infusion they can cast? Maybe I'm reading it wrong but that's the reason I'm avoiding it as it would be a lot of bookkeeping I'd imagine. I don't have access to the book right now so I can't check but I know for a fact that my brother wouldn't want a lot of bookkeeping involved.

On that account, there's no more bookkeeping involved than there would be for a Cleric. Less, in fact, since he doesn't have to keep track of which Infusions he prepares for that day. Think of it like a Sorcerer with a bit longer list of Spells Known.

FyreByrd
2010-07-26, 09:29 AM
+1 to Effigy Master, though to qualify you need to have Simulacrum on your class spell list.

I knew there was one requirement that'd be more difficult.

Escheton
2010-07-26, 10:31 AM
+1 to Artificer. They can make any item they want by faking the spellcasting prereqs with umd.
And when rumaging through the DMG and MiC you will notice that your fave items have cleric, druid, wizard and even paladin and ranger only spells as prereq to create. Otherwise off limits then.
But artificers mainly because they can make humunculi that are above the normal hitdie limits. And there is a feat that adds natural armor and special abilitys such as flight and free weaponenhancements to their natural attacks. Which for the arbalester(self-shooting crossbow) adds to the bow.
The artificer also has repair infusions so to keep bookkeeping down you can just be a selfhealing warforged. That should use up must of your infusions unless you cower behind walls a lot.
Some infusions take a minute to set up and last 10min/lvl. Something for later lvls anyways.

Draz74
2010-07-26, 02:08 PM
Artificer is definitely the most obvious fit.

However, with some minor homebrew and/or major refluffing, you could make a pretty awesome golem-master out of a Shaper (Psion) / Constructor (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/psm/20040625b). Your "golems" tend to disappear a few minutes after you summon them (which is where you might need that heavy refluffing), but you do, at least, fight mostly by ordering Constructs into the front line of battle for you. And IMHO, Psions are a lot less of a headache to play than Artificers.

Optimystik
2010-07-26, 02:14 PM
With Hyperconscious, you can make Astral Constructs permanent. It's prohibitively expensive as written, though.

HunterOfJello
2010-07-26, 02:28 PM
There's always the Techsmith prestige class. It only builds one construct that fights alongside you, but I've always liked the flavor of the class. I think the construct is pretty strong and it does scale in power as you level.


You can enter that prestige class as a Cleric if you have the Artifice, Craft, Creation or Gnome domains. Otherwise you enter it as a Wizard/Sorcerer.

Devils_Advocate
2010-07-26, 06:30 PM
Well, don't Artificers get every infusion of every level of infusion they can cast? Maybe I'm reading it wrong but that's the reason I'm avoiding it as it would be a lot of bookkeeping I'd imagine. I don't have access to the book right now so I can't check but I know for a fact that my brother wouldn't want a lot of bookkeeping involved.
Huh?

To build a spellcaster who knows some of the spells on his spell list, like a Sorcerer or Bard, you have to pick the character's spells known. When playing a spellcaster who can prepare any spell on her spell list, like a Cleric or Druid, you have to choose which spells to prepare. When playing a character who can cast any spell on his spell list (provided that he has a spell slot of sufficiently high level), like a Beguiler or Dread Necromancer, you have to choose which spells to cast.

In each case, you have to pick spells from a spell list. For casters of the last type, the list is at least relatively short, so there's less to look through. And that's the case for Artificers, except that they have "infusions" instead of "spells".

Not that the Artificer involves a low amount of bookkeeping. But I'd be surprised if there's any way for a character to produce magic items with a low amount of bookkeeping.

Tangentially: I was just looking at the Artificer infusion list to confirm that it was fairly short. (It is.) I noticed that some of the high-level infusions are not targeted spells. How does that work? I know that spells targeting creatures are infused into worn items, but how is an Artificer supposed to infuse blade barrier? :smallconfused:

true_shinken
2010-07-26, 07:38 PM
Tangentially: I was just looking at the Artificer infusion list to confirm that it was fairly short. (It is.)

Don't let this deceive you. The best infusions need you to select stuff you find scattered across all D&D books ever, like weapon augmentation.