I need some help

[ThatGuyOvaThere]

So, my players have decided to go under water in my campaign. However i suggested they get some aquatic equipment. Are there any really useful gear suggestions? Preferably water breathing and see under water.

[nedz]

All they need is a fifth level cleric.

[tiercel]

If they are going to be underwater for extended periods of time, then they have a number of challenges.

The most obvious is being able to breathe. The water breathing spell lasts for 2hr/CL, divided by the number of recipients... so your party may or may not have the capability to spam it enough.


Party/caster level # characters # WB spells/day
6 4 8
6 6 12
9 4 6
9 6 8
12 4 4
12 6 6

Barring this, the obvious answer is probably necklace of adaptation (Core, 9000gp, always-on fresh air, also protects from gas/inhaled poison attacks). Assuming that falls in their budget. The cheaper solution is the bottle of air (Core, 7250gp, can be shared amongst several users, but party is screwed if they get separated/lose the bottle; plus spellcasting when you can't breathe freely might be a problem).

If the water is "very cold" (because of environment or because of being fairly deep), then they will need endure elements to avoid taking environmental cold damage (or some form of all-day energy resistance to cold). If the water is "very deep" (100 ft+) then characters make Fort saves every minute to avoid water pressure damage, and I don't know if there's an easy way out of that one -- necklace of adaptation might. (It's also dark, but magical light sources aren't that hard, and your PCs probably already have some continual flames or such.) http://www.d20srd.org/srd/environment.htm#waterDangers

If your PCs actually want to fight underwater, they would be much happier having freedom of movement -- otherwise they'll be restricted to piercing weapons if they want to do full damage, making Swim checks if they want to move full speed, and being off-balance and losing Dex to AC if they fail Swim checks/don't have solid footing on the bottom. http://www.d20srd.org/srd/wilderness.htm#underwaterCombat

The problem with freedom of movement is that it isn't nearly so easy to spam with spell slots all day -- it only lasts 10min/CL for a single creature. Fine for 1-2hrs of combat time at a go, but that's it.

You could get freedom of movement in always-on, ring form; it's very nice for far more things than moving around underwater. At 40k gp a pop, though, it's unlikely for any PC that's not pretty high level.

Probably the best all-around inexpensive catchall item, as long as we are talking salt water, is the cloak of the manta ray (Core, 7200gp, transformation gives you water breathing and swim speed, as well as an extra natural attack and some natural armor; useless outside of salt water though).