PDA

View Full Version : Banning conjuration on a Gish



mykelyk
2011-01-30, 06:26 AM
In a Focused Transmuter gish build (wizard 6/swiftblade 9/abjurant champion5) is banning conjuration, enchantment and evocation a good idea?

Or is better banning necromancy instead of conjuration?

As I see:

Conjuration
Pro: good battlefield control
Con: No good buff/debuff

Necromancy
Pro: Awesome debuff, good buff (vampiric touch)
Con: No battlefield control

I'm using a real armor and shield so [greater] mage armor aren't useful.

umbrapolaris
2011-01-30, 06:36 AM
Or is better banning necromancy instead of conjuration?.

yes! keep conjuration, it is the greatest school. summoning creatures, devastating forces , etc...

ex cathedra
2011-01-30, 06:55 AM
As far as Conjuration buff spells go, there's Mailed Might of the Magelords, which is worse than Greater Luminous Armor, and Necromancy has no worthwhile buffs. Evocation gets Divine Power, which I prefer to use on my gish builds, but that's not relevant in that build. Enchantment, however, gets Greater Heroism, which is simply fantastic.

Even as a gish, all of your spells shouldn't be buffs. It's good to have variety, and Conjuration's variety is simply unmatched. Battlefield control is still quite helpful on a gish. Additionally, unless you have to be evil for some reason, it's generally always better to use Greater Luminous Armor than actual armor, and Temporal Shield than an actual shield.

In this build, I would ban Necromancy and Evocation, at the very least. If you're willing to not use Greater Heroism, which is one of the best buff spells that you'll find, ban enchantment as well. If you're willing to give up a lot of versatility, ban Conjuration, but only do so if you don't want to do anything but swing hammers and buff yourself. Personally, I wouldn't go Focused Transmuter; Gishes get less out of Focused Specialist than normal wizards.

faceroll
2011-01-30, 06:58 AM
Get rid of conjuration. You can find control spells in other schools, just takes a little looking. Slow should do you just fine.

Kaww
2011-01-30, 07:00 AM
... and Temporal Shield than an actual shield...


Book name please?

Toliudar
2011-01-30, 07:01 AM
For me, losing conjuration means losing the ability to move yourself and others where you most need to be. That's a big deal. I'd drop necromancy.

ex cathedra
2011-01-30, 07:06 AM
Book name please?

Legends of the Twins.

Kaww
2011-01-30, 07:09 AM
Legends of the Twins.

Sorry, never heard of it. Is it a WotC book, which setting?

EDIT: Never mind google search did the trick...

faceroll
2011-01-30, 07:14 AM
For me, losing conjuration means losing the ability to move yourself and others where you most need to be. That's a big deal. I'd drop necromancy.

Only if you're the only arcane caster in the party and the divine caster isn't a cleric with the travel domain or an archivist.

mykelyk
2011-01-30, 07:14 AM
As far as Conjuration buff spells go, there's Mailed Might of the Magelords, which is worse than Greater Luminous Armor, and Necromancy has no worthwhile buffs. Evocation gets Divine Power, which I prefer to use on my gish builds, but that's not relevant in that build. Enchantment, however, gets Greater Heroism, which is simply fantastic.

Mailed Might of the Magelords seems interesting, however chain shirt+magic vestment has a higher ac (4+5 = 9) and dispel is less dangerous, however dr 5/magic sound interesting.
Greater Heroism doesn't work well with Mind Blank.



Even as a gish, all of your spells shouldn't be buffs. It's good to have variety, and Conjuration's variety is simply unmatched. Battlefield control is still quite helpful on a gish. Additionally, unless you have to be evil for some reason, it's generally always better to use Greater Luminous Armor than actual armor, and Temporal Shield than an actual shield.

Actually I'm LE so no exalted spell for me.
I agree with variety, however I can get it with UMD + money, I'm searching for spell to cast often. Temporal Shield?


For me, losing conjuration means losing the ability to move yourself and others where you most need to be. That's a big deal. I'd drop necromancy.
What spells do this well?



Only if you're the only arcane caster in the party and the divine caster isn't a cleric with the travel domain or an archivist.

We have psion with Dimension Door and freedom of movement.

ex cathedra
2011-01-30, 07:28 AM
He's probably referring to the Dimension Hop line.

Temporal Shield is a second level abjuration that gives 50% more AC than Shield.

In my experience, Greater Heroism is always useful, whereas Mind Blank is only useful in very specific situations. It's nice to know both.

UMD on a wizard seems redundant, to be honest, unless you're using it on stuff like Beads of Karma.

faceroll
2011-01-30, 07:38 AM
UMD on a wizard seems redundant, to be honest, unless you're using it on stuff like Beads of Karma.

UMD gives you access to crazy good cleric & druid buffs, as well as all those "well that one obscure spell from that school I banned could be REALLY useful right now" spells. I mean, what else are you going to be spending skill points on? Spellcraft, concentration, maybe a handful of knowledge skills for knowledge devotion?

mykelyk
2011-01-30, 07:50 AM
UMD gives you access to crazy good cleric & druid buffs, as well as all those "well that one obscure spell from that school I banned could be REALLY useful right now" spells. I mean, what else are you going to be spending skill points on? Spellcraft, concentration, maybe a handful of knowledge skills for knowledge devotion?

I have able learner and knowledge devotion so:
Maximized Concentration, Knowledge (arcana, dungeon, local, nature, religion, planes), Spellcraft.
Maximized cross class UMD, remaining skill points in tumble.

UMD is useful to use on a wand of resurgence for example (gotta do something with all those extra std actions).


He's probably referring to the Dimension Hop line.

Teleporting everybody sounds very interesting.


Temporal Shield is a second level abjuration that gives 50% more AC than Shield.

It's third party, so it's out for me.


In my experience, Greater Heroism is always useful, whereas Mind Blank is only useful in very specific situations. It's nice to know both.

Mind blank, if used to stop scrying or similar, is a spell that must be always on to be useful.

ex cathedra
2011-01-30, 08:32 AM
It's not third party. Legends of the Twins is official WotC material.

Mind Blank is not used to prevent scrying, generally. It does that, but Scrying isn't really useful to a DM, since they're, you know, the DM. Mindblank is useful when directly facing other spellcasters and some outsiders, but for most enemies it won't be nearly as useful as Greater Heroism.

Psyren
2011-01-30, 10:02 AM
It's not third party. Legends of the Twins is official WotC material.

It is officially licensed, yes, but that's not what third-party means. "Third-party" simply means it was published by someone other than WotC, which Legend of the Twins was. (Sovereign Press (http://www.amazon.com/Legends-Dungeons-Dragons-Roleplaying-Dragonlance/dp/193156731X) to be exact.) Dragonlance Campaign Setting (http://www.amazon.com/Dragonlance-Campaign-Setting-Dungeon-Roleplaying/dp/0786930861) is the only first-party Dragonlance book.

Personally I think the license is just as important, but you need both to be first-party

ex cathedra
2011-01-30, 06:33 PM
It is officially licensed, yes, but that's not what third-party means. "Third-party" simply means it was published by someone other than WotC, which Legend of the Twins was. (Sovereign Press (http://www.amazon.com/Legends-Dungeons-Dragons-Roleplaying-Dragonlance/dp/193156731X) to be exact.) Dragonlance Campaign Setting (http://www.amazon.com/Dragonlance-Campaign-Setting-Dungeon-Roleplaying/dp/0786930861) is the only first-party Dragonlance book.

Personally I think the license is just as important, but you need both to be first-party

Oh, fair enough. Apparently I just glossed over that, I had done my best to make sure that nothing in my collection was third-party. Oh well. Thanks for correcting me.