The better Loremaster

[ReluctantDragon]

Greetings Playground,

I am looking at creating a new character. The idea behind this character is one that will be emulating the fictional character Verin Mathwin from the Wheel of Time series. A fairly similar crunch build for the character would be Wizard7/Loremaster X. The problem that I am encountering is that I have never played/built a Loremaster before and would enjoy any recommendations that you guys have including feats, spell selection, etc.

Thanks in advance,
RD

[gorfnab]

Wizard 5/ Paragnostic Apostle 5/ Loremaster 10 might work.

[Keld Denar]

Loremaster requires Skill Focus: Knowledge(Any). Divine Oracle (CDivine) requires Skill Focus: Knowledge(Religion). Since Religion is a subset of Any, you can actually use that one feat to qualify for BOTH PrCs. Due to skill prereqs, DO is easily enterable after 5 levels of wizard. Stick around for your level 5 bonus feat, grab 2 levels of Divine Oracle for Precience Sence (Evasion, basically), and then hop into Loremaster.

The BEST way to do that, actually, would be to BUY the Skill Focus feat you need from visiting the Frog God's Fane, a magical location in CScoundrel. Totally worth it.

[Xetheral]

I’d recommend an Archivist entry into the Divine Oracle/Loremaster PrCs. (Yes, Wheel of Time channeling ties in more closely with what is arcane magic in D&D, but as the series don’t have a divided magic system and Archivist is mechanically Wizard-like, I don’t think you’re straying too far from concept.) This way you get more skill points, intelligence is still a primary stat, and the thematic elements of the class (particularly the Dark Knowledge class feature) seem a dead ringer for Verin.

If you’re willing to stray farther from the books, and you have access to the Academic Priest feat (I'm only familiar with it secondhand--I think it's from the Dragonlance setting), then taking an INT-based Cloistered Cleric is a stronger option mechanically. You get even more skillpoints and with the Lore feature you’ll effectively have full bardic knowledge. If this option is available, consider the Obscure Lore feat at whatever point you can manage to afford it in what is likely to be a feat-starved build.

As an aside, the effectiveness of bardic knowledge and the knowledge skills are entirely dependent on the DM. Accordingly, you need your DM to understand just how serious you are about the Loremaster shtick; that way he’ll spend the time to devise suitably impressive answers for your (potentially) outrageous check results. Otherwise you’re likely to get the same information whether you roll a 25, 35, or even 45. A character background is all well and good, but to really hammer it home, I suggest maxing out Bardic Knowledge AND pumping the knowledge skills, particularly the obscure ones. Nothing screams Loremaster like a character sheet with maximum ranks in Knowledge: Architecture/Engineering, Knowledge: Geography, and Knowledge: Nobility/Royalty. You could even max out Profession (Librarian), but that’s probably excessive. :smallsmile:

Miscellaneous Build Ideas:
-Nymph’s Kiss (BoED) gives an extra skillpoint per level.
-Loremaster includes Perform as a class skill. This can be important if you end up taking Bard or non-caster levels and want to rebuild spellcasting with Sublime Chord (play up the math and astronomy angle).
-Divine Oracle/Loremaster is already one of the potential entries for the meddlesome Fochlucan Lyrist Aes Sedai.
-Royal Explorer (3.0 Song and Silence) is very appropriate for an itinerant scholar and gives more entry options for Fochlucan Lyrist (probably need flaws for the feat requirements).
-Mage of the Arcane Order White Tower might work.
-A darker take on a scholar might include Ur-Priest (Academic) or Disciple of Asmodeous.

Hmm, this is interesting… if Disciple of Asmodeous’s Learn Secret is sufficiently powerful to suborn a Druid, then with two flaws I think you could pull off a Neutral Evil human scholar with:

Archivist 4/Wizard 1/Divine Oracle 2/Disciple of Asmodeous 1/Loremaster 2/Fochlucan Lyrist 1/Sublime Chord 1/Fochlucan Lyrist 8

Note that this requires a lenient interpretation of FL's entry requirements. Final spells per day would be as Archivist 15/Wizard 5/Chord 9, so just shy of dual 9’s. Unfortunately this requires decent charisma in addition to intelligence, and may not have skillpoints to spare on extra knowledges until level 12 or so. On the plus side, you should be able to cast just about every spell in the game except 9th level divine spells and you don’t need to resort to Archivist shenanigans. That being said, your DM might still smack you.

[Analytica]

Verin might actually just be straight Archivist. The only real gain from Loremaster over Archivist is Lore, and you can get that via Paragnostic Apostle instead if you really need it.

EDIT: Given all druid and domain spells an Archivist can learn, most Aes Sedai (possibly as opposed to Ashaman) elementalism can be handled without wizard casting.

[Taelas]

I doubt the specific type of spellcasting is really important, given that the character will emulate Mistress Mathwin, not be her.

Cloistered Cleric could work just as well, really.