Reconstructing a Quori Nightmare (3.5) Eberron

[panaikhan]

Hi.
I have the task of re-making a lost character (the original player left the group)
I know the basics of the build, but I'd like the playground's input in how to get the most of this unusual PrC.
The character is 10th level: Psion Telepath (substitution) 1 / Cleric 6 / Quori Nightmare 3
The race is Kalashtar (obviously), and is geared primarily around touch attacks - making the most use of the 'nightmare touch' ability and psychic powers that make touch attacks.
Str:12 Int:16 Wis:18 Dex:16 Con:14 Cha:11 (after level increases)
Looking at TWF (unarmed), Finesse (unarmed) and Psychic Talent as feats - two slots open
I'm assuming usual WBL until I speak with the DM again, and trying to decide between Monk's Belt and Mithril Full Plate for the defence.
I'm not sure Nightmare Touch stacks with Monk damage. If it does, that's the way to go. If not, Improved Unarmed Strike (or an embedded shard) to eliminate AoO.

Constructive criticism welcomed.

{edit} This is the party healer, so that's the reason for the cleric-heavy build

[hivedragon]

Its weird that you have levels in both cleric (wis) & psion (int). I'd replace psion with psywarrior. There is a feat in secrets of sarlona that lets you advance monk abilities while taking levels in a psionic class.

[panaikhan]

Yeah.
The 'psionic' class is psion for one reason only - XP penalty.
I'd lose too many levels of cleric evening up with a different one.
I don't plan on taking Monk levels - I only mention it because the item 'Monk's Belt' gives you monk abilities - one of which is your Wis to AC

[panaikhan]

I keep wondering about the Monk damage from a Monk's Belt.

If you have a 'touch attack' (i.e. your slightest contact does something) does that stack with actually hitting someone?
If so, the 1D6+class level from quori nighmare makes the monk belt far more appealing.

[The-Mage-King]

May I suggest asking your DM to let you use a third party class? Specifically, Dreamscarred Press's Worldthought Medic (http://dsp-d20-srd.wikidot.com/worldthought-medic)? It's psionic, and a healer, so you can cut out the cleric and psion levels if you take this.

[DueceEsMachine]

If your Dm allows it, I had a character with the Monks belt and the Monks Robe (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/magic-items/wondrous-items/wondrous-items/r-z/robe-monk-s).
It accomplishes the same thing, and lets you make an unarmed character without all those pesky monk levels (playing).

Still, it could be worth a shot.

[panaikhan]

It's strictly 3.5, no 'crossovers' - though I still need evidence to suggest the nightmare touch stacks with monk damage or ther monk's belt is out the window.
No point having to choose between 1D8+1 (unarmed strike, standard attack) and 1D6+3 (nightmare touch, touch attack)

[T.G. Oskar]

Seconding the change regarding the Psion class, but I'd go with Ardent instead. Life is a good primary mantle for healing, and Corruption & Madness goes well with the theme. It'd be interesting to know which powers does the character has, in order to suggest better mantles. Another dip in Ardent is necessary for accessing a third mantle, or else you need Tap Mantle to gain new powers.

Quori Nightmare, on the other hand, works best if you reinforce your fear effects. Nightmare Shroud grants extra points in Intimidate, which might not be that pumped up, which could open the Imperious Command feat (from Drow of the Underdark) + Never Outnumbered skill trick, which is an excellent opening trick. Then, you can set up for disturbing touch, which you can use to lock down most enemies with the penalty to saving throws that results from shaken. A way to extend your touch range would be phenomenal.

Heal-wise, a few wands of CLW or Lesser Vigor do well outside of combat. An extra level in Cleric allows you to get the Pool of Healing ACF (you have to sacrifice a 4th level spell, though), which you can use as lay on hands and depends mostly on your divine caster level (so Practiced Spellcaster helps here). Touch of Healing (from Complete Champion) also helps, what with having a good and cheap source of healing (up to half maximum hit points per person, tho, so you need to complement). The Amulet of Retributive Healing helps on your own hit points, Armbands of Maximized Healing boosts your healing from most spells, and Ring of Mystic Healing not only boosts your caster level with healing spells, but also increases your total healing. A Metamagic Rod of Reach Spell, though, should be part of your arsenal because most healing spells are touch-ranged. Still, don't depend on healing spells (or powers) inside of combat except for an emergency, and not without providing some sort of protection (based on your domains, Imbued Healing from Complete Champion can do that and more).

In any case, more information could be useful. For example, if the character follows a deity and what domains does it chose. Oh, and by the way, Weapon Finesse is no longer limited by weapon (I noticed you were referring to the 3.0 version of Finesse, because of the insistence in mentioning unarmed, whereas the 3.5 version works with all light weapons, plus a few extra more (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/feats.htm#weaponFinesse). Also, monk's unarmed damage doesn't stack with disturbing/nightmare touch; both are treated separately.

[panaikhan]

I don't have access to every book - Ardent is not a class I am familiar with.
Plus I have already stated my reason for Psion - XP penalty. It's only one level (before quori nightmare).
Being Kalastar, the deity is "The Path Of Light" - the domains I chose were Law and Meditation.
Powers. I have pencilled in Hammer, Mind Thrust, Knock, Recall Agony(?). There are others but i can't remember (not at home atm)

I have chosen an embedded shard that empowers psionics (+2PP, 3/day I think)
For healing I was thinking a few eternal wands of CMW.

When you say unarmed / disturbing touch don't stack - is it an either/or, or are they considered damage from seperate sources in the same attack?

[T.G. Oskar]

I don't have access to every book - Ardent is not a class I am familiar with.

It's a class that appeared in Complete Psionics, which deals with psionics as a divine concept. You choose powers from a series of mantles (much like domains), of which you get around 7 total. It's a bit complex, but it allows you to get powers from Wisdom (instead of Intelligence or Charisma) and it has an odd progression method.


Plus I have already stated my reason for Psion - XP penalty. It's only one level (before quori nightmare).

I see. I presume you can't convince your DM to ditch that rule, because it's really detrimental considering that you're locked into certain classes whenever you multiclass. Maybe allow some alternatives?


Being Kalastar, the deity is "The Path Of Light" - the domains I chose were Law and Meditation.

Ugh. I figured as much, but it makes stuff like the Domain feats and Imbued Healing less useful options. The Law rider effect for Imbued Healing isn't so good (+4 sacred bonus vs. mind-affecting spells/SLAs), and Meditation doesn't have an equivalent. I asked because you could attempt some nice stuff through other domains: Healing domain could net your healing with temporary hit points (so you effectively heal more than you'd usually would, plus prevent losing a few of the hit points you've healed), Strength domain grants a nifty bonus to damage rolls, Chaos domain grants a +2 sacred (or profane, if evil) bonus to a random ability score...it makes using healing spells in combat far more useful, since you're providing valuable buffs while at it. It also limits your choice of Domain feats, which can be pretty awesome (Animal, Trickery). Law Devotion isn't so bad (you gain a scaling bonus to attack rolls or AC that lasts for 1 minute), though, and you can spend daily uses of Turn Undead to gain further uses of this ability.


Powers. I have pencilled in Hammer, Mind Thrust, Knock, Recall Agony(?). There are others but i can't remember (not at home atm)

Hmm...so three attack spells and one general utility spell (Knock is pretty nice, actually). Hammer combines pretty well with Disturbing/Nightmare Touch, adding an extra dice of bludgeoning damage. Mind Thrust and Recall Agony are a bit detrimental against enemies immune to mind-affecting powers, but they do decent damage otherwise. You're open to three more powers, which should hopefully be decent enough.


I have chosen an embedded shard that empowers psionics (+2PP, 3/day I think)
For healing I was thinking a few eternal wands of CMW.

I presume it's Power Link embedded shard, so you at least have access to Magic of Eberron.

As for Eternal Wands of CMW, they're not very cost-effective. A wand of CLW doesn't heal as much, but they're much, much cheaper; for the price of one eternal wand, you can buy up to 5 normal wands, and have just about enough for a 6th one; you'd heal much less (about 5-6 less hp) but you wouldn't have to worry enough about healing for a long time. For the same price, you could have about three wands of CLW and an Amulet of Retributive Healing, which allows you to save on expenditures whenever you need to heal yourself. One wand and a Ring of Mystic Healing helps even more, since you can add up to 6d6 points of healing with up to three spells per day, which can somewhat compensate for the loss of healing through the eternal wands, and you could patch up afterwards with the wands. If you're lucky to get one, keep it (of course), but don't save up money to buy or craft one until you get some of the lesser items I mentioned.


When you say unarmed / disturbing touch don't stack - is it an either/or, or are they considered damage from seperate sources in the same attack?

Either/or. Either you make a melee touch attack and use Disturbing Touch (and probably mix it up with Hammer), or you attack with your unarmed strike (and no bonuses). Thus, they wouldn't stack, unless you had an ability that allowed you to manifest touch powers or class abilities that relied on touch via unarmed strikes.

That said, if you still want the unarmed strikes, the Ectoplasmic Fist embedded shard grants something pretty similar (make unarmed strikes without provoking AoO, effective Imp. Natural Attack with unarmed strike). Still doesn't stack with melee touches, tho.

[Thrice Dead Cat]

If you're allowed to rearrange the ability scores - swap out Cleric and Telepath for Wilder? Mantled Wilder (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/psm/20070214a) allows for divine flavor, is CHA-centric, and can be used to get some psionic healing online. Educated Wilder from the same link can help you get some extra (and desperately needed) powers known.

If not, could you list your rolls/PB/other method of stat generation before level up boosts? Multiclassing like this makes for both a poor cleric and a poor Psion. You could instead go with Telepath 5/Quori Nightmare 1/Sangehirn (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/psm/20040625c) 3/More of either prestige class, at your leisure. It doesn't help with the CHA-issue on Disturbing Touch, but it does add a bunch of healing-based powers to the would-be Nightmare's power list, although he' still have to learn them as normal. Sangehirn is a more proactive version of healing than a cleric would be, but it is much more heavily focused on being psionic and readily available, book wise, to boot!

If you're wanting to use Disturbing Touch, boosting the Will save DC is easily done with more CHA. A quick Google searched reveals that touch spells can be channeled through unarmed strikes (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=179265). By transparency, this would also include psionic powers that require melee touch attacks, but I can't find a quick ruling supernatural abilities.

EDIT: Fixed a couple word issues.
Also, remember PrCs don't count for multilclass penalties.

EDIT 2: Ditch Psionic/Wild Talent in favor of Hidden Talent. It's only available as a first level feat, but it comes along with a first level power known in addition to the other two feats' "2 extra power points" clause.

[Psyren]

Mantled Wilder is reeeeeally bad. Elude Touch is a valuable ability, and you're forced to learn from your Mantle before any other source; having the mantle doesn't give you any extra powers known, it just adds to the list you can draw from. If you're allowed to pick up the Ardent's Mantle Substitution ability beforehand then go for it, but otherwise I would avoid it like the plague.

[The_Snark]

If you have a 'touch attack' (i.e. your slightest contact does something) does that stack with actually hitting someone?
If so, the 1D6+class level from quori nighmare makes the monk belt far more appealing.

You can deliver a touch spell with an unarmed strike. I'm not 100% sure that this rule extends to supernatural abilities and such that give you touch attacks, but it's not unreasonable to say that it does. (Check with the DM first, maybe.)

Note that you have to make a regular attack roll to hit instead of a touch attack if you do this, so it's not always a good idea. And you cannot make a full attack; essentially, you're taking a standard action to use the touch attack and swinging a little harder than usual.

[2xMachina]

No one noticed that The Path of Light hates Quori? Their's main ideology is to destroy Quori. Kinda odd for a Quori to worship Path of Light, or a Path of Light becoming a Quori.

EDIT: Hmm, I might be wrong. Now that I think about it, Path of Light hates Inspired, who are people hosting a Quori.

[The_Snark]

I believe that in this case, Quori Nightmare refers to a prestige class, rather than an outsider. The character is in fact a kalashtar, not a true quori, so worshipping the Path of Light is perfectly normal.

(And it is both true and untrue that adherents of the Path of Light want to destroy all quori; they seek to unmake the Dreaming Dark and bring about the turning of the Age, which will destroy the quori as we know them and reincarnate them as new—and hopefully better—beings. They hate the quori as they are but not what they could be. It's unusual but not totally unheard of for quori themselves to follow the Path; the religion was invented by rebel quori philosophers, after all.)

[panaikhan]

Hmm...so three attack spells and one general utility spell (Knock is pretty nice, actually). Hammer combines pretty well with Disturbing/Nightmare Touch, adding an extra dice of bludgeoning damage. Mind Thrust and Recall Agony are a bit detrimental against enemies immune to mind-affecting powers, but they do decent damage otherwise. You're open to three more powers, which should hopefully be decent enough.

I'm open to suggestions for the other powers.
Checking my list, I'd got Ectoplasmic Entangle, and two open slots.
If I can get the Monk's Belt damage to my 'touch', I'll probably look at Ectoplasmic Armour(?) to pump my AC a bit.

{edit} I realised after I had posted it, that I couldn't do what I suggested, so have deleted it.

[panaikhan]

Note that you have to make a regular attack roll to hit instead of a touch attack if you do this, so it's not always a good idea. And you cannot make a full attack; essentially, you're taking a standard action to use the touch attack and swinging a little harder than usual.

The wording in the 'Races of Eberron' says "make a melee touch attack". I don't think that locks it into a standard action.

[eggs]

The wording in the 'Races of Eberron' says "make a melee touch attack". I don't think that locks it into a standard action.
That doesn't. This does:

Races of Eberron:

Disturbing Touch (Su):
SRD: (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/specialAbilities.htm#supernaturalAbilities)

Using a supernatural ability is a standard action unless noted otherwise.

And there's no way to hold the charge on non-spells, no matter how neat it might be to hold the charge on a trip attempt or grapple. So whatever this unarmed combat thing you're building up is, it's not going to have any synergy with QN.

If healing is your goal here:
Using Ardent and a bit of optimization, you could have access to Mend Wounds, which is a decent little healing power at this level (75 HP single-target or 55 HP burst for 15 PP before cost reductions).

Alternatively, you could use Psion and with Craft Universal Item to craft healing items like Healing Belts, as outlined in the Magic Item Compendium, and possibly custom healing items, and just skip the healer role altogether.

Basically, taking the parallel roles of crummy-caster/crummy-psion/crummy-melee is probably not going to treat you well. You'll do best if you can either specialize in manifesting or manifesting-augmented melee.

And actually, there are a couple other weird elements here.
-Disturbing Touch doesn't provoke AoOs (it's a supernatural ability, not a spell or spell-like)
-If you're using Quori Nightmare, you're using 3.5, so Weapon Finesse doesn't require a selected weapon.

[panaikhan]

Managed to get a look at Complete Psionics today.
Ardent seems to make a very good case.

Now looking at Ardent 5 / Quori Nightmare 5, with the possibility of following Sangehirn for the next 10 levels.

[Psyren]

Managed to get a look at Complete Psionics today.
Ardent seems to make a very good case.

Now looking at Ardent 5 / Quori Nightmare 5, with the possibility of following Sangehirn for the next 10 levels.

Ew. Sangehirn? Even if you want touch-range healing powers that badly, you get that ability at 3, you don't need to be there for all 10 levels. Even better, you can get that same ability by taking the Life Mantle in its place.

I'd look into Crystal Master (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/psm/20040625d) instead. At least then you'd get some truly useful abilities, like always-on touchsight - and the required feats are ones you'd be getting anyway.

[panaikhan]

I'd look into Crystal Master (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/psm/20040625d) instead. At least then you'd get some truly useful abilities, like always-on touchsight - and the required feats are ones you'd be getting anyway.

I've already picked Life Mantle.
If I'm honest, I was looking at Sangehirn for the DR/--,and to give me a few powers I hadn't already got.

[eggs]

I've already picked Life Mantle.
If I'm honest, I was looking at Sangehirn for the DR/--,and to give me a few powers I hadn't already got.
Be sure you notice the limitations on the Sangehirn's powers learned.
Overlooking that can be a nasty surprise.

[2xMachina]

Slightly cheesy, but you can use the Make-your-own-Mantle feature to swap out some powers. If it's thematically consistent/appropriate, your DM might allow it.

[panaikhan]

Be sure you notice the limitations on the Sangehirn's powers learned.
Overlooking that can be a nasty surprise.

I think I know the drawback (only ones from the list), if not please enlighten me.
I think I can manage to pick 9 powers I don't have.