How powerfull is the Leadership feat? (Cohort with leadership feat?)

[Count_Jaschk]

As the title says, how powerfull is the leadership feat really?

Could you as a player make a whole clan by taking this feat on each cohort?

As a level 20 with buffed cha and a cohort with equally buff cha you could by my counting wind up with 7 cohorts each with their small army of followers (each at a decreasing rate than oneself ofc)

My rp groups dm is setting us up against increassingly impossible odds so me and a couple of other players have agreed that cheese is now accepted (without the dm knowing beforehand)

we're level 20 gestalt

[Phelix-Mu]

Well, Leadership chains are a thing. But Leadership is in the DMG for a reason; it entirely relies on DM permission and adjudication for it to function. When a player takes Leadership, it has a concrete impact on the plot (if handled realistically), and thus can be a bit of a headache for a DM (especially if all pcs take it, or if there are chains involved). Such tactics can provoke the rapid ban of the chain tactic or Leadership in general.

I've allowed players to do it, but only with my blessing. I, for one, usually make the cohorts available as a variety of npc recruits (i.e., no Design-A-Cohort for the player to cheese out). I ask the player what kind of cohorts the pc would be interested in recruiting, then I design a handful of applicants. Again, the feat exists at the whim of the DM.

But if cheese is in, this is some decently aged stuff.

[ArcturusV]

Well, the reasons that Leadership tends to be powerful is due to a few things.

1) Circle Magic. If you're playing Forgotten Realms and are from Thay (Or handwaving that requirement), you can end up taking the Red Wizard PrC, and with Circle Magic end up having your level 1 Followers able to power up high level magic. Of course at level 20 this is less useful. But at level 6 being able to crank out 9th level spells (Particularly permanent/long duration ones) can be insane.

2) The various vagueness of "Aid Another" and the ilk. Insane DCs are not a problem when the Aiding DC is just a simple 10. Go ahead and make up Epic Magic that has some insane research DC due to insane power. You don't care, with your 100 followers all adding +2, it suddenly is trivial.

3) Economy breaking. Generally not an issue at level 20, but due to how some skills are written and some not even Cheese/Moderate level of thinking you can end up breaking WBL over it's knee with your army of level 1 followers.

4) Various Niche things. Like level 1 Archers teamed up with you could use arrow volleys to do things that level 1 Archers shouldn't be able to do typically. So in your situation if you're an Archer at level 20, and you have some 100 1st level followers with Longbows, you can volley ever round for 20d8 damage on a square, AC be damned it does nothing for your target, but they can Reflex save for half damage.

I mean 20d8 doesn't sound THAT impressive at level 20. It only targets a square so no AoE unless you're talking about a horde of pixies or something (Does damage to everything in the square)... but hey, it's free damage that can be dealt from a range where most things can't respond. Still, for the cost of a feat 20d8 a round, every round, ain't bad.

[HunterOfJello]

It depends on how it's used, but it's usually quite powerful.

How powerful? Well, how powerful is a wizard who is only 2 levels lower than you?

Think about how powerful that is, and then remember that used in certain ways, it can be even more powerful than that.

[eggynack]

It depends on how it's used, but it's usually quite powerful.

How powerful? Well, how powerful is a wizard who is only 2 levels lower than you?

Think about how powerful that is, and then remember that used in certain ways, it can be even more powerful than that.
You get a free serving of bonus points if the class that gets a free lower level wizard is a fighter, or even a commoner. The difference in power between a 20th level wizard and an 18th level wizard is pretty negligible, so that single feat is effectively raising your power by 4-5 tiers. For an extra delicious serving of points, make that wizard into a druid. Now, your helpful cohort is flying around being much more powerful than you, and can do melee combat better than you. By 18th level, the druid is running around as a huge creature, and he has a pet tyrannosaurus (or whatever other good animal companion you want at 18th level. I've really never looked into what you'd want at that point.) Druids are fancy because they can obsolete you directly, as opposed to wizards who generally obsolete you indirectly. At high levels, the wizard can out-melee the fighter too, but he probably won't.

[nobodez]

You get a free serving of bonus points if the class that gets a free lower level wizard is a fighter, or even a commoner. The difference in power between a 20th level wizard and an 18th level wizard is pretty negligible, so that single feat is effectively raising your power by 4-5 tiers. For an extra delicious serving of points, make that wizard into a druid. Now, your helpful cohort is flying around being much more powerful than you, and can do melee combat better than you. By 18th level, the druid is running around as a huge creature, and he has a pet tyrannosaurus (or whatever other good animal companion you want at 18th level. I've really never looked into what you'd want at that point.) Druids are fancy because they can obsolete you directly, as opposed to wizards who generally obsolete you indirectly. At high levels, the wizard can out-melee the fighter too, but he probably won't.

Well, I was going to say that cohorts were limited to 17th level outside of using 3.0 ELH rules, but then I realized that the table just lists the limit on the level you can attract, the only limit on the actual level is XP and 2 below the character's level.

Also, if you read the second paragraph under "Cohorts" on page 104, you'll noticed the clause, "… nor limits to the number of cohorts who can be employed by a character." I just realized that you don't have a limit on how many cohort you can attract.

That's just fraking awesome and makes Leadership just that much more powerful. So, instead of a single feat giving you the power of a cleric, druid, wizard, archivist, STP erudite, or artificer two levels lower than you, it gives you the power of a cleric, druid, wizard, archivist, STP erudite, and artificer two levels lower than you.

[Vertharrad]

nobodez you're right there is no mention of a number limit on how many cohorts you can have at any one time, however the usual conjecture is that the limit is one.

Also in paragraph 5 it says that cohorts are not leaders clearly prohibiting cohorts taking leadership themselves. As has been said before this feat will be at the DM's mercy. I would heavily suggest you consider real hard before trying the shenanigans you want to pull Count_Jaschk. If your group is having a problem or going to have a problem with the game take your DM aside and have a serious talk with the DM. If that doesn't work you all might want to start considering other options.

[Count_Jaschk]

Thx for your fast replies guys, much appreciated :)

Hmm... Well, the DM specifically said "all 3.5 content is open." Which is more content than I could possibly memorize in a lifetime xD

The thing is, last time we played he assaulted ud with 4 CR 25 colossal sized giants (can't remember their name) and on top of that, a collection of eldritch, fire, frost, cloud and storm giants with a total CR of 400. We were 3 players, all level 20 gestalt. I played a 20th level Astral Deva from savage species on one side and had a mix of various classes and prestige classes on my other side which specializes in fighting evil outsiders. One play was a 20th level Trumpet Archon also from savage species and also had different flavorfull classes on his other side, specialized against evil outsiders. and then we had a psion. Because of our allignment, vows, codes of conduct, etc, etc, etc we were all bound by honor to help defend this castle and protect the powerfull artifact that these giants were sent by their master to collect. To aid us, we had a level 30 wizard played by the dm himself, yet it was clear that the dm favoured the giants so that hardly mattered.

I mean, the ecl of the party was as per gestalt guidelines 20+1 which by my interpretation of the rules shouldn't be pitted against an army of giants. Me and the archon used every SLA we had, up to and including several holy words and earthquakes, and we still got our backsides handed to us in shreds.

The session before that, we had to get through a dungeon to close an open portal to hell (the lawfull one i think) which had several shadowy clouds and gave you 1d10*10 dmg with no save, no sr, no dr, no negative energy protection, no nothing, each round you stayed in it. and it filled enough squares to make us take that dmg twice. Appart from that there were several adamantine golems (20 i think, all lined up as nice statues) who all had enough reach to get AoO on us everytime we moved.

At that time, we didn't even have a spellcaster because he was out cold and most of us was fairly new to the concept of gestalting. (and non of us are power-players). It just seems to me that he wants us to lay down in a corner and die slowly.

So what I basically need is a way to supprise the dm with. something he won't foresee, be that a chimpansee dancing with a cane or a bottle tossing drunkard. (not guessing my examples would do anything good though xD )

The only restriction we have is that we have to be within one step of the good allignment.

We've already tried to talk with the dm but judging my his horde of giants, he wasn't very receptive

[Phelix-Mu]

...snip....

Oh, your problems seem much larger than just optimizing. In a race of player v DM, DM is designed to win every time. And as this DM sounds like a bit of a sadist in terms of the challenges he's proffering, I don't rate the likelihood of your success very highly.

Leadership chains (or just a party of people with Leadership) will dramatically slow down the pace of combat, as well. Might be worth reflecting on.

If you are looking for some brand of gestalt cheese, I can guarantee you that there are about a hundred million other options for powering up in anticipation of slaughterfest 3.5.

In the end, though, you might want to talk to the DM about his target lethality. Or play a non-gestalt game?

[Lazers etcetera]

But if cheese is in, this is some decently aged stuff.




we're level 20 gestalt

:smalltongue:


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On a more serious note - how long is each round going to take with you running around with multiple 17+ cohorts and a private army of people with class levels?

[eggynack]

Have you ever considered the psionic PrC thrallherd? It doesn't stack with leadership, but if you make one of the cohorts a thrallherd, then it can stack down that way. Basically, it's like leadership except as a capstone you get two cohorts, at one and two levels below you. If that thrallherd has two thrallherds, and those thrallherds have thrallherds, then the number of characters you control grows exponentially with your level down to a certain point, after which that exponential growth produces some linear growth. I haven't run the numbers, but if you want cohort cheese, that's the way to do it.