Craziest yet practical class

[Graytemplar]

Ok Playground goers, my friends have challenged me to play whatever the craziest, but still practical, class that you guys can come up with. Add races/templates/ prestige classes as you see fit, and give me the best u got!


P.S. I intend to play him good, so if its evil, my dm and i will probably adapt it accordingly

[HunterOfJello]

the average Kender Bard is pretty freaking crazy

[hivedragon]

exemplar focused on basket weaving

[Graytemplar]

exemplar focused on basket weaving

Sorry dude, need something useful in a fight somehow

[QUOTE=the average Kender Bard is pretty freaking crazy[/QUOTE]

where would i find this?

[flumphy]

Kender are a race in the Dragonlance campaign setting. And I'm almost positive they are not the type of crazy you're looking for.

[OracleofSilence]

the mecha-wizard. have a cohort that you polmorph into a iron golem with a custom saddle. you ride it into battle acting as its cannons. (later you can polymorph any object twice, once into an iron golem and then again into a 1/8th of an inch taller iron golem).

[Big Fau]

Sorry dude, need something useful in a fight somehow

Craft: Basketweaving is one of the most dangerously overpowered skills in all of 3.5, second only to underwater basketweaving. Do not underestimate the sheer power of thrown baskets.

[Divide by Zero]

Play an Expert with Diplomacy, Handle Animal, and UMD. Break the game in half with a NPC class.

[Sception]

Race: Illumian (heroes of destiny) - a humanoid race born of magic words.

why it's crazy: you're made of words, glowing letters (of which there are several to choose from) float about your head granting a variety of odd benefits. and a cool aesthetic touch.

Why it's practical: the benefits are pretty good, and while intended for multiclass characters they can be pretty impressive out of the box for certain obscure mixed-archetype classes. In this case you'll be using the combination that nets you a sort of mini divine metamagic a few times per day, spending turn (or rather rebuke) checks to fuel metamagic feats on arcane spells.

Templates - if you start above level 3, you'll be using two one (if you don't start above level 3 you can buy it later):

Necropolitan (libris Mortis): You're undead, with all the advantages and disadvantages thereof, but none of the distracting riders that come with other brands of undeath. No level adjustments, but you do lose a level for taking it, and you need to pay money to buy your way in, causing the 3rd level minimum.

Swarm Shifter (libris Mortis): what's better then an undead pc? How about an undead pc that explodes into a mini tornado of black sand?

Why they're crazy: you're a sentient, person-shaped undead pile of black sand. Remember that scene in the Mummy where the mummy got spooked by that cat and disolved into a cloud of sand, flying out the window? Yeah, that's you. Crazy enough?

You're an undead PC. You don't sleep, you don't breathe, you don't get sick, you're creepy as all get-out, but your class will give you the bluff and disguise skills (and as soon as you can afford it hat-of-disguise), to function in society, and to hold off your party's suspicians until they've already befriended and come to rely on you.

Why it's practical: all the normal immunities and characteristics of the undead type, including allowing you to tank con at no penalty whatsoever. Also, there are illumian communities in the cannon fluff that study necromancy both purely for the sake of knowledge and in order to extend their lives, making it a fitting fluff choice as well. Necropolitan doesn't come with an alignment restriction (well, you don't have to be evil) or a level adjustment - though you lose a level for being necropolitan you actually end up at a lower character level and as such will eventually catch back up.

Class: Dread Necromancer (Heroes of Horrror) - one of the 'focused arcane casting' classes a la warmage and beguiler, this one focused on necromancy, with a number of thematic class features including rebuking undead.

Why it's crazy: touch attacks, damage reduction, an imp or quasit familiar, and a spell list that grants summoning, animation, energy drains, magic jar (my favorite spell, crazy and practical enough for an entire character all on its own!), haunt shift (from heroes of horror, more craziness then you can shake a haunted stick at) and so on. The eigth level ability lets you control more undead via the animate dead spell then anyone would feel comfortable with.

Why it's practical: you're a spellcaster, powerful but without the game-busting versatility of a wizard, cleric, or druid. You get damage reduction to make you more survivable early on, and an at will touch attack that heals you (because you're undead), so you won't drain party resources for healing (you also have the inflict spells and harm on your spell list so if emergency in-battle healing is required you can provide that yourself as well. You can't be good, but you don't have to be evil, so you can easily fit into the rather common 'neutral party member willing to use the occasional evil method in order to advance a good cause' spot in the party.

Summoned or animated undead minions, while they majorly slow down the game if spammed, should instead be used for a number of useful utility purposes (such as providing you with a range of powerful bodies - just order them to fail their magic jar saves). Try making a single undead companion for each party member that doesn't already have a companion of some type instead of trying to bring an army with you when you go adventuring. Order these custom made companions to follow your allies' commands, and you'll find that you can earn some (probably much needed) good will and let your undead contribute without monopolizing too much time to your own turn. (some ideas - skeletal nightmare mount for your warrior friend? skeletal gorrilon flanking buddy for your rogue? skeletal troll bodyguard for a caster?) Rebuking and arcane casting on the same class lets you really get some mileadge out of metamagic feats via your racial abilities.


While dread necro 20 is practical and crazy enough, there are diminishing returns after 8th level. If you want to take a prestige class, there's always Incantrix from Magic of Faerun - both crazy and practical from its ridiculous metamagic shenanigans, already something you do well. Bust out some reached, twinned shivering touches (picked up from frostfell via advanced learning) and watch the dragons fall from the sky (protip: skeletal dragon and skeletal zombie template from Draconomicon are way better then the regular skeleton and zombie templates, and can explicitely be created via the same animate dead spell you're already using).

[TroubleBrewing]

As much as I'd love to suggest the above build whole-heartedly, there's one minor problem with it.

The swarm-shifter template isn't available for PCs, because it only lists an increase in CR, not LA.

[Sception]

Bah, poot. Drop the swarm-sifter then. The rest is still plenty crazy/practical.

Just don't spam as many undead as you can possibly control at one time - while certainly crazy that's never practical (as you can easily get up to the hundreds of hit dice, thousands with leadership, to say nothing of an unlimited supply of chain-controlled wights and shadows).

With light armor, rebuking, arcane spells, a martial weapon proficiency (comp longbow is the best, but rapier or longsword is the most confusing), a mithril buckler (non-proficient, no penalty), an 'animal companion' (imp or quasit familiar in animal form), and class skills in bluff and disguise, have fun fooling your party as to what you're really playing, at least until you hit level 8 or so.

[FMArthur]

The Mind Fist

The Buildup: Play a soulknife and take Monastic Training (Soulknife) and Tashalatora. Now your soulknife levels act as monk levels for unarmed damage and AC bonus. You'll want to buy a Fanged Ring to get Improved Unarmed Strike for 10000gp since you're down some feats, and it also gives you Improved Natural Attack and 1 Con damage on a crit at the same time. You can also use the Bonus Feats soulknife variant that replaces Psychic Strike to make up for the feat loss or just add more feats.

The Key: Then take Reshape Mind Blade (unarmed strike) for your Mind Blade to take the form of your unarmed strike. Yeah, you read that right. So now you have a magically-enhanced unarmed strike which functions as both a Mind Blade and a monk's unarmed strike.

The Ensuing Madness: Your Throw Mind Blade class feature works as normal, and by normal I mean crazily. If you take Scorpion's Grasp, it functions as a tele-grapple with your thrown unarmed strike because of its wording. If you take Atavist levels you can progress UAS and Mind Blade, and double-up on Mind Blade progression for four levels with Practiced Mind Blade, as well as gain +5ft reach at its 5th level (you can't double up on UAS progression with Monastic Training (Atavist) due to wording). Increasing your size via Hidden Talent: Expansion (which you trade Wild Talent for) improves your damage with greater returns than with normal weaponry.

It's not amazingly strong or anything, since it is effectively a gestalt of two of the weakest classes out there, but it sure as hell is cool.


Sources:
Soulknife: Expanded Psionics Handbook
Monastic Training: Eberron Campaign Setting
Tashalatora: Secrets of Sarlona
Fanged Ring: Dragon Magic
Bonus Feat variant: Here (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/psm/20070214a)
Reshape Mind Blade: Dragon Magazine #341 (or was it 314?)
Scorpion's Grasp: Sandstorm
Atavist: Races of Eberron (Kalashtar only)
Practiced Mind Blade: Dragon #341
Hidden Talent variant: Here (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/psm/20070214a)

[GoodbyeSoberDay]

If you're talking about the fraying edge of practical optimization, some sort of Initiate of Mystra "persisted AMF that doesn't affect me" shenanigans probably fits the bill.

[Anderlith]

Alchemist (Mutagen focused) /Barbarian. One minute you are a just Professor Badass. A halforc with spectacles tossing grenades. Then you mutate & rage & charge in with a greataxe.

[Arbane]

Warforged Artificer. "Why? Because I want children, that's why."

[Groverfield]

Race: Illumian (heroes of destiny) - a humanoid race born of magic words.
Even better: Illumian Barbarian, so those magic words, you can't read 'em.

Dungeon Delvers are pretty neat of a class for rogues that don't want to specialize in maxing their sneak attack, and note that the law of conservation of ninjitsu applies to sneak attack. The less you have of it, the more opportunities you'll have to use it.

[Wyntonian]

What's a talashtora and what does it offer to the Mindfist build?

[Piggy Knowles]

I've always wanted to play a Necropolitan Cloistered Cleric or Druid, with Plant Control (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/divine/divineAbilitiesFeats.htm#plantControl). Rebuke a tendriculous (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/monsters/tendriculos.htm),cast Resist Energy (Acid), and let it swallow you whole. You're immune to the paralysis and acid damage, and you can just ride around in your huge regenerating tentacle plant. Buff it up to turn it into a nice melee beast, and cast spells from inside its belly.

[Fox Box Socks]

Craft: Basketweaving is one of the most dangerously overpowered skills in all of 3.5, second only to underwater basketweaving. Do not underestimate the sheer power of thrown baskets.
This is actually not a joke. Pump Wis for Craft: Basketweaving, take Skill Focus, and make a whole bunch of baskets. Then sell them. Then you take the money that you make form selling them and invest in magic items that make you better and weaving baskets, so you can sell more baskets, so you can make more money.

Then, once you've sufficiently torn the WBL apart, buy whatever you want for you and your party from your friendly neighborhood magic emporium.

[Hiro Protagonest]

What's a talashtora and what does it offer to the Mindfist build?

It's in one of the most obscure first-party sourcebooks, being both Eberron specific and not necessary. Secrets of Sarlona.

It's also the easiest way to build an accurate firebender in 3.5.

[FMArthur]

What's a talashtora and what does it offer to the Mindfist build?

Tashalatora is a feat that grants full monk progression of unarmed damage, flurry of blows and AC bonus to the psionic class you selected with its prerequisite feat, Monastic Training. Monastic Training is a feat that allows a monk to multiclass normally to a selected class. Neither actually requires monk levels, so if you can get Improved Unarmed Strike, psionic characters have little reason to ever multiclass to monk.

The funny thing is, despite these features being the heart of the monk class and basically its main selling point... most psionic melee classes are just as well off not bothering with it. It's not an overpowered feat. That's an incredible testament to the monk's design right there. Its main features are worth about the same as basic weapon and armor proficiencies to be quite honest.

[Ravens_cry]

Warforged Artificer. "Why? Because I want children, that's why."
That is both so funny and yet so beautiful at the same time. I approve.:smallbiggrin:

[Soranar]

The Genius Ditz

Play a dumb (and really ugly) Factotum that kills people with the power of his mind (seriously).

Note: by the time you get your familiar, he is smarter than you.

Race: Mongrelfolk
Alignment: Any good but I recommend neutral good for the guardinal musteval familiar (see reason below as to why)
Template: Dragonborn of Bahamut (breath weapon)

STATS (32 pts)

STR 16
DEX 14
CON 24 (main stat, gets every increase)
INT 6
WIS 8
CHA 4

1 Factotum Entangling breath
2 Factotum
3 Factotum Quicken Breath
4 Factotum
5 Factotum
6 Factotum Obtain Familiar
7 Factotum
8 Factotum
9 Warblade Celestial Familiar (guardinal musteval), gain insightful strike (maneuver), moment of perfect mind maneuver, Mind over body maneuver, medium armor proficiency, shield proficiency
10 Factotum
11 Factotum
12 Factotum Font of Inspiration
13 Factotum
14 Factotum
15 Factotum Font of Inspiration
16 Factotum
17 Factotum
18 Factotum Font of Inspiration
19 Factotum
20 Warblade gain greater insightful strike maneuver

skills: You get 4 skillpoints per level. Forget social skills and UMD since your CHA is abysmal, Concentration is a must (explained below). You might want to spend 1 point in each knowledge skill (since you can add half your Factotum level to any skill, it's pretty handy if you don't have a walking library.

You can also search for traps (should you not have a smart trapfinder in your group) so feel free to use the remaining 2 for search and disable device (again, not so bad if you add half your class level to do it).

Last option is hide and move silently (you can spend inspiration points to sneak attack people).

Fighting:

Level 1-8

Get a reach weapon (I recommend a guisarme) and armor spikes ASAP. You have a reasonable STR so hitting people isn't that hard and you don't need pounce as long as you only have 1 attack per round. By the time you get your second one you can get extra standard actions to charge.

Your breath weapon is essentially a free action by level 3 (quicken breath makes it longer before you can use it again but it becomes a free action so it's really worth the wait). The entangling effect is especially useful against high dex creatures or arcane casters. Since you can pick which elemental effect you want each time (fire, ice, acid or lighting) you can always use the right vulnerability and your breath save is really high (CON based.

You can spend inspiration points to murder people with sneak attack dice by level 3 (usually you should unload them all at once).

You also get access to a few low level spells, I recommend a long lasting buff, maybe mage armor until you can afford something better.

Level 9 and +

1rst, your familiar can lay on hand (like a paladin) the total number of his hitpoints, which is the same as yours. Since your hitpoints are phenomenal, that's a lot of healing. It can also cast magic missile at will (2 missiles for 1d4+1 damage twice) + a few other useful abilities.

You get the insanely funny Insightful strike maneuver. You're a warblade so you can recover a maneuver every time you spend a turn hitting people normally (so charge with the strike, next round full iterative which reloads your spent maneuver, repeat).

Your damage is a Concentration check (with +7 from CON and half your Factotum level for an inspiration point). You don't get your STR to damage bonus though, your weapon's enchantment bonus or any other class ability to damage (so don't waste inspiration points on sneak attack dice).

This is a standard action, you can get more standard actions by spending inspiration points.

Your spellcasting gets a lot better and your breath attack gains a decent range and damage.

[Hiro Protagonest]

You can only take Font of Inspiration if you have an intelligence of 15 or higher.

[erikun]

Bubs (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showpost.php?p=7097263&postcount=38) says hi.

[Soranar]

You can only take Font of Inspiration if you have an intelligence of 15 or higher.

Right, it's also limited by the intel bonus. Guess I need 3 dump feat for those levels (althought they rarely see play unless you start really high).

[Curious]

This is a gestalt build, so your friends may not allow it. I am also using homebrew, but it's essential for the build.

Race: Human

Build: Warblade 2/ Wizard 3/ Eldritch Knight 10 (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=57794)/ Wizard 5// Factotum 2/ Warblade 3/ Factotum 15

Take the Experimental Spellcaster (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/magic/words-of-power) feat (near the bottom of the page), the Persistent Spell (http://dnd.savannahsoft.eu/feat-2142-persistent-spell.html) feat, and choose Accelerate (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/magic/words-of-power/effect-words/accelerate) as your chosen effect word. Persist that baby for an all-day extra move action.

At level 19, your Initiator level reaches 17. Take the Martial Study (http://dnd.savannahsoft.eu/feat-1879-martial-study.html) feat, and choose Time Stands Still as your bonus maneuver.

Make sure you choose White Raven Tactics as a maneuver in your earlier levels.

Make sure you chose Time Stop (http://www.dandwiki.com/wiki/SRD:Time_Stop) as one of your ninth level spells.

Using Spell Points (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/variant/magic/spellPoints.htm) is recommended so you can get more high level spells, which this build demands.

Your basic battle plan is this:
At the start of the day, you Persistent metamagic Accelerate on yourself, giving yourself an extra move action.
When you enter battle, your first action (which doesn't actually take an action) is to use the Factotum's Cunning Surge ability to grant yourself an extra standard action.
Then, you use your extra move action to close in with the enemy, and initiate Time Stands Still.
You full attack twice, and then activate Time Stop. You then use whatever spells you think will help make your enemies dead.
After Time Stop wears off, you spend a swift action to use White Raven Tactics on yourself, allowing you to take a whole turn again.
Repeat until everyone on the map is dead.

Action economy is your b***h.

[Zaq]

Even better: Illumian Barbarian, so those magic words, you can't read 'em.

Illumians don't work that way.

"Superior Literacy: Illumians are always literate, regardless of their character class. Speak Language is always a class skill for illumians, regardless of class." Races of Destiny, p. 55.

[Divide by Zero]

Illumians don't work that way.

"Superior Literacy: Illumians are always literate, regardless of their character class. Speak Language is always a class skill for illumians, regardless of class." Races of Destiny, p. 55.

Meh. Rule of Funny > RAW.

[gorfnab]

Kender Blue Mage (see sig).

[Zaq]

Meh. Rule of Funny > RAW.

While I agree in principle, in this case I think it's too easy.

Now, if you wanted to tell me that your illumian Barbarian could read perfectly, but not in any language he could speak out loud . . . then we'd be talking. I'm imagining him picking up a book written in Dwarven (say he doesn't speak Dwarven) and totally understanding it. If you asked him to read it out loud, he couldn't do it. If you read it out loud TO him, he'd have no idea what you were saying. But just reading it himself? Totally cool. Hilarity ensues.

Or I guess you could just go with pure illiteracy, but really, if we're going to be futzing around with the rules, we may as well do it with style.

[Flame of Anor]

(later you can polymorph any object twice, once into an iron golem and then again into a 1/8th of an inch taller iron golem).

Doesn't work that way. The later effect makes the first irrelevant (see PHB). I'm not sure how much PAO cheese that negates, but at the very least it means you have to go step by step with each change small enough to be permanent.

[Xavrias]

Play a goliath or Feral Gargun from races of stone, as a fighter. Grab extotic weapom prof (warmace), 2 weapon fighting, oversized 2 weapon fighting and monkey grip from ph2. And voila a Fighter dual-wielding 4d6 or 5d6 weaapons in each hand with lots of str. You pretty much murder anything you can hit.

[Zaq]

Play a goliath or Feral Gargun from races of stone, as a fighter. Grab extotic weapom prof (warmace), 2 weapon fighting, oversized 2 weapon fighting and monkey grip from ph2. And voila a Fighter dual-wielding 4d6 or 5d6 weaapons in each hand with lots of str. You pretty much murder anything you can hit.

Needs more sugliin.

[Xavrias]

I was thinking of a big 2 handed weapon, but I decided the warmace dual-wielding was crazier. But that would be epic.

[aquaticrna]

Play a goliath or Feral Gargun from races of stone, as a fighter. Grab extotic weapom prof (warmace), 2 weapon fighting, oversized 2 weapon fighting and monkey grip from ph2. And voila a Fighter dual-wielding 4d6 or 5d6 weaapons in each hand with lots of str. You pretty much murder anything you can hit.

i have a friend in our campaign doing something like this... except he's a dwarf cleric who uses various buffs to up his damage/size instead of the extra feats, works out pretty nicely, oh and exotic weapon master so that the 1 handed weapons he's wielding count as being wielded two handed

[Xavrias]

i have a friend in our campaign doing something like this... except he's a dwarf cleric who uses various buffs to up his damage/size instead of the extra feats, works out pretty nicely, oh and exotic weapon master so that the 1 handed weapons he's wielding count as being wielded two handed
That sounds pretty sweet too. Where does exotic weapon master come from?

[aquaticrna]

complete warrior

[Xavrias]

Thanks, I'll lookat that.

[Graytemplar]

Wow.... U guys rock, keep the ideas coming right now I particularly like the timedude, the monk/mindblade, and that awesome dread necro

[Draz74]

Am I the only one who keeps seeing this thread title and thinking, "Binder. Duh."?

If Binder's default flavor isn't crazy enough for you, fail all your Pacts (either on purpose or by having low Charisma), so the class's own features literally push you towards roleplaying insane quirks all the time.

[Graytemplar]

Am I the only one who keeps seeing this thread title and thinking, "Binder. Duh."?

If Binder's default flavor isn't crazy enough for you, fail all your Pacts (either on purpose or by having low Charisma), so the class's own features literally push you towards roleplaying insane quirks all the time.

While a binder is an excellent wierd choice, I'm not sure its practical by itself, does any1 have good races/ templates classes that would go well with it? It's always been my understanding that the binder has a limited amount of possible powers

[Psyren]

Meh. Rule of Funny > RAW.

I found Zaq's RAW of Opportunity crit against you pretty funny myself :smalltongue:


While a binder is an excellent wierd choice, I'm not sure its practical by itself, does any1 have good races/ templates classes that would go well with it? It's always been my understanding that the binder has a limited amount of possible powers

T3 is practical by definition, and the Binder is the poster child of T3.

[Divide by Zero]

While a binder is an excellent wierd choice, I'm not sure its practical by itself, does any1 have good races/ templates classes that would go well with it? It's always been my understanding that the binder has a limited amount of possible powers

I disagree, the Binder is one of the most practical classes. It can do basically everything well, but can't break much.

[Aergoth]

Human Archivist, from Heroes of Horror.

Congratulations, you're now playing someone who studies the horrible knowledge for fun, ??? and Profit!

You get the following fun stuff!

Divine spells from the cleric spell list, prepared like a wizard, that are *intelligence based*. You can also add spells from divine scrolls to your prayerbook like a wizard. But they don't have to be cleric spells. Congratulations, you have all the spells of every divine class in the world accessible!
You also get to make knowledge checks to grant your allies bonuses in combat by virtue of knowing everything.
Then take levels in Wu Jen (Complete Arcane)!
Spell secrets are metamagics that you could apply to "any spell known", and are permanently altered without altering their level.
You get taboos (little tics) that you have to avoid violating to cast your spells. On the other hand, you could throw a scarf at someone and have it try to cut their head off.
If you're still bored after that? Mystic theurge the two together.

[Zejety]

How about homebrews?

You could play as your own haunted mansion (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=172358) :)

[Sception]

Necropolitan + Haunt Shift (both libris mortis): you don't need to homebrew to play a haunted mansion ^_^

That said, the practicality of haunt-shifting yourself to a location is questionable, at least from a default dungeon delving perspective. ;)

[Telonius]

Warforged Druid16, City Shape ACF and City Soul feat (both from Cityscape). Transform and Roll Out!