Gaining SLAs

[Amador]

Is there any way other than Heirophant, Archmage, and spell-stitched to gain SLAs?

[GhoulPolitician]

I think runesmith from races of stone gets what amounts to a 2/day sla.

[Thrice Dead Cat]

Warlock, some Binder abilities, some feats in Complete Arcane, and some soulmelds can also get you SLAs.

[Vistella]

be a kobold and do the draconic rite of passage

[rakkoon]

Service Level Agreements? Probably not...

[Thurbane]

The Fey Legacy, Fey Presence, Fiendish Legacy and Fiendish Presence feats all give three 1/day SLAs.

[Darkfire]

Dragonpacts (see Dragon Magic p87-91) can give Sorcerers multiple SLAs in exchange for gold and a spell slot. The higher the level given up, the more SLAs and uses per day you get. You can have multiple pacts and they can be upgraded relatively easily or broken if you find you'd rather have the spell slot back (although your gold won't be refunded).

[Thurbane]

Is there any way other than Heirophant, Archmage, and spell-stitched to gain SLAs?
There's actually a lot of ways to get SLAs in 3.5. No ones even mentioned Factotum or Dragonfire Adept yet - they're up there with Warlock.

Did you have any specific purpose in mind? Might help us with your question.

[The Rose Dragon]

Shadowcasters have SLAs between spells and supernatural abilities.

[Amador]

My purpose is animate dead, but I think that others in my group will be interested in this once I bring it up. So, more general methods are better suggestions.

Thanks.

[Chuckthedwarf]

There are also many feats that grant SLAs - there's the gnome racial ability, then there's a feat from Races of Stone that augments it and gives a gnome a 1st level illusion spell as a spell-like ability - Silent Image or Ventriloquism, I think.

But that's too specific.

There's also a whole bunch of feats that are easy to qualify for in Complete Arcane, that grant a few 0-level spells and 1 1st level spell as a spell-like ability, once a day each, if I'm not mistaken.

Then there's the whole Warlock class - who do in fact get Animate Undead, sort of, as a spell-like ability. All of their invocations are spell-like abilities, I'm pretty sure. It would require some investment though, The Dead Walk invocation is either Lesser or Greater, so it's at least 5 or 6 levels in warlock, if not 11.


Fey/Fiendlish feats from Complete Mage also grant various spell-like abilities. The Complete Scoundrel PrC with masks (Master of Masks? I think?) has a number of spell-casting masks he can wear that grant various spell-like abilities. I'm AFB, so I can't tell if they're spell-like abilities and not spells for sure, but spell-like abilities make more sense in that instance.

There's also the Innate Spell feat from Complete Arcane, but it requires too much investment.

Really, warlock might be the easiest way to do it. And since most warlock invocations are at-will (I'm aware of only one that can be used once a day, everything else is at-will) you'd get the most bang with it.

[Chuckthedwarf]

Oh ya, and Libris Mortis has a lot of nice things too.

First of all, the Pale Master PrC gets Animate Dead at 2nd level, once per day with no material component. You have to be nongood, spend one feat on Skill Focus: Religion and sacrifice one casting level progression because Palemaster 1 has literally NOTHING.

And the class itself isn't necessarily great for most purposes, although there are much, MUCH worse things out there.

Dirgesinger bard PrC from the same book can use bardic music to raise a recently slain creature with all it's feats and abilities intact at 5th level, but I'd imagine that counts as a supernatural ability. (what does bardic music count as? I don't even know)

[Gullintanni]

Dirgesinger bard PrC from the same book can use bardic music to raise a recently slain creature with all it's feats and abilities intact at 5th level, but I'd imagine that counts as a supernatural ability. (what does bardic music count as? I don't even know)

Bardic Music is not specified. It is, in and of itself, not Ex., Su. or SLA, and therefore can only be a Natural ability. Same as a Sorcerer/Wizard/Cleric/Druids etc. ability to cast spells. That being said, each song is specified as either Spell-like or Su. so...there's that to consider. You'd have to check the entry for the song itself.

[Re'ozul]

If it doesn't need to be an SLA directly:

Polymorph into a Rotreaver (MMIII p142).
Take the "Assume Supernatural Ability" Feat twice. (Because you need wound rot and animate dead on it)
Get a free 10HD animated Zombies. (or more if you count your HD and nor the base Reaver's.)

Necrothane is the same but has 20HD (limited usefulness)

[Person_Man]

My purpose is animate dead, but I think that others in my group will be interested in this once I bring it up. So, more general methods are better suggestions.

Thanks.

Necrocarnum Circlet soulmeld bound to your Crown chakra lets you Animate Dead at will with no material components. You create a single Necrocarnum Zombie (which is far superior to a normal Zombie in a variety of ways, but still loses most of the creature's base abilities. However, it notably keeps the base creatures size, attributes, movement forms, natural weapons, etc, so many big magical beasts are actually dramatically improved by being made into a Necrocarnum Zombie). You can only have 1 Necrocarnum Zombie at a time, any particular corpse can only be Animated with this ability once, and it's total hit dice are limited to your Meldshaper level (which is equal to your Incarnate level + relevant PrC levels, or 1/2 your character level). The best way to take advantage of it is to play an Incarnate or Incarnate/PrC. But anyone with 12 Constitution can gain full access to it with just 2 feats (Shape Soulmeld and Open Least Chakra) as early as level 6. Having a constantly renewable minion is very handy for a variety of tasks in and out of combat, even if it's HD is fairly limited for non-Incarnates.

[Thurbane]

Yeah, Animate Dead seems to be a fairly common request as an SLA...to get around the material component, right?

[dextercorvia]

If you just want around the costly component thing, try Dweomerkeeper.

[randomhero00]

Be a summoner. Their eidolon can get SLAs.

[Amador]

I want around the material component, but that is a nifty side effect of my necromancer looking for a way to get around prepared spells.

[Zaq]

Truenamer Utterances are considered to be SLAs.

Hilariously, all psionic powers are PLAs (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/psionic/psionicPowersOverview.htm#psiLikeAbilities).


Psi-Like Abilities (Ps)

The manifestation of powers by a psionic character is considered a psi-like ability, as is the manifestation of powers by creatures without a psionic class (creatures with the psionic subtype, also simply called psionic creatures).

I'm pretty sure that everyone ignores this rule because it makes no sense (it goes on to say that PLAs have no power point cost, but if the manifestation of powers by a psionic creature is considered a psi-like ability, then powers have no PP cost, which is madness). But it's there.