Why would anyone ever make constructs?

[ahenobarbi]

They look so horribly overpriced to me (some 2000gp per HD) I wonder why anyone ever would make one. Mayhaps a mad wizard, because of the "mad" part. But is there any way to make the price more reasonable? Or reason to pay that much for a construct?

[kulosle]

Umm not to be so blunt, but... this (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=282178)

[Zero grim]

Constructs are very pricey, if we use effigy as a guide line then medium size costs 2k and 1 HD is another 2k, this is all expensive, so what do you get?

A mindless servant With unlimited lifespan
stronger and tougher then a zombie, as fast as a skeleton, keeping all type fo movement.
Immunity to basically every environmental hazard, even positive and negative energy does nothing.
Much less taboo then undead.

The construct is better then a skeleton or zombie of the same creature in a lot of ways, they are slightly easier to hurt since their damage reduction scales with level as opposed to being a flat 5.

the higher grade constructs like golems are even more useful due to their unbeatable spell resistance and unbelievable toughness and strength.

you pay for quality, sure a skeleton or zombies may be a little over 25g (if you count the cost of animate dead itself) but they require having corpses of whatever you want to make, a effigy could be of an extinct animal, like a gnome or dodo.

[ahenobarbi]

Umm not to be so blunt, but... this (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=282178)

Wow. They reduced cost more than 40 times... Constructs certainly are worth 50gp/HD.

[Asteron]

Umm not to be so blunt, but... this (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=282178)

That thread is pretty much based on third party rules, which are so borked that no sane DM would allow it.

[pbdr]

because they are tough to deal with. Would you rather have a "meat shield" or a "stone shield"?

[ahenobarbi]

because they are tough to deal with. Would you rather have a "meat shield" or a "stone shield"?

The problem is that I can get loyal powerful minion much cheaper:
- Buy lyre of building (13'000 gp)
- Find a big stone.
- Hire a someone for a day to play the lyre (just make DC 18 Perfrom check a few times... 1st level with maxed ranks, skill focus and Cha 12 can do it, <1000gp.
- Have your employee create a statue of Great Wyrm Gold Dragon.
- Shrink Item the statue (375gp from a scroll).
- Cast Stone to Flesh on the statue (1650gp from a scroll).
- Unshrink dragon corpse.
- Cast Desacrate (150gp from a scroll).
- Cast Animate Dead (1830gp from a scroll, because we want CL 11).
- Enjoy your 41HD Gold Dragon Skeleton.

Total: <= 18'025gp (and only <= 5'025 if you want to make a next one). And that's without even trying to save money. And not only the skeleton is much cheaper, it also is more powerful (it lacks magic immunity and has slighlty worse AC bt pretty much everywhere else it's much better):

Now let's compare the skeleton to cheapest (20'000gp) SRD golem:
{table]|Dragon Skeleton|Golem
Size/Type | Collosal Undead | Large Construct
Hit Dice | 41d12 (266) | 9d10+30 (79 hp)
Initiative | +0 |-1
Speed | 60ft | 30 ft.
Armor Class | 12(-8 size, +10 natural), touch 2, flat-footed 12 |18 (-1 size, -1 Dex, +10 natural), touch 8, flat-footed 18
Base Attack/Grapple| +41/+71 | +6/+15
Attack | 1 bite +54 (4d8+13)|Slam +10 melee (2d8+5)
Full Attack| like 8 natural attacks +54ish, each dealing 2d8-4d8 + 13 | 2 slams +10 melee (2d8+5)
Space/Reach | 30ft / 20 ft (30ft with bite) |10 ft./10 ft.
Special Attacks | - | Berserk
Special Qualities | DR 5 /bludgeoning, Cold immunity, undead traits, fire immunity, cold vulnerability, |Construct traits, damage reduction 5/adamantine, darkvision 60 ft., immunity to magic, low-light vision
Saves | Fort +22, Ref +22, Will +22 | Fort +3, Ref +2, Will +3
Abilities | Str 47, Dex, 10, Con -, Int -, Wis 10, Cha 32 | Str 21, Dex 9, Con Ø, Int Ø, Wis 11, Cha 1
Skills | - | —
Feats | - | —
[/table]

[zabbarot]

Nitpicky DM here.


The spell also can convert a mass of stone into a fleshy substance. Such flesh is inert and lacking a vital life force unless a life force or magical energy is available. (For example, this spell would turn a stone golem into a flesh golem, but an ordinary statue would become a corpse.) You can affect an object that fits within a cylinder from 1 foot to 3 feet in diameter and up to 10 feet long or a cylinder of up to those dimensions in a larger mass of stone.

There's nothing here that says your dragon statue would gain bones that could become a skeleton.

[killem2]

I think it is also important to point out, that while in the grand scheme of all powerful players, races, monsters among each plane, not every wizard ever born is going to have to deal with that the strongest and the most bad ass of enemies ever. Sometimes, they might just be a local sage that's been around for decades and doesn't want his precious library disturbed.

Sometimes, the most basic of constructs are decent enough deterrents to the common thief. :smalltongue:

[Fibinachi]

Well, once I've mastered the nebulous arcane powers available to any man who studies hard enough, you think I'm really going to cop out like some two bit necromancer and just summon a wight apocalypse?

Now now, I'm a figure of power, I can call myself the arbitrator of the cosmos and you wouldn't be able to disagree, and I'm not going to spend my time with some triple templates obscure skeletons.

Here's why: Money means nothing to me, now, because I've already used one of the endless, endless holes in logic to make enough of it that the DM has been forced to look up the word "Stagflation" and people are using solid gold coins instead of rocks when they go rock skipping (or, well, coin skipping these days).

So I make constructs. I make themed constructs. I'd like to see you have a greater fiend summoned in from some obscene corner of the multiverse accept wearing my clown gown. They don't. They argue.

So, I make constructs and I give them tiny stone moustaches and granite monocles and adorable limestone tophats and believe you me, it's a much better deterrent than some "economically sound, reasonable approach". Pfah.

[ahenobarbi]

I think it is also important to point out, that while in the grand scheme of all powerful players, races, monsters among each plane, not every wizard ever born is going to have to deal with that the strongest and the most bad ass of enemies ever. Sometimes, they might just be a local sage that's been around for decades and doesn't want his precious library disturbed.

Sometimes, the most basic of constructs are decent enough deterrents to the common thief. :smalltongue:

Fair enough. Not efficient but a wizard dislinking undead could employ a small construct to handle small threats.


Well, once I've mastered the nebulous arcane powers available to any man who studies hard enough, you think I'm really going to cop out like some two bit necromancer and just summon a wight apocalypse?

Now now, I'm a figure of power, I can call myself the arbitrator of the cosmos and you wouldn't be able to disagree, and I'm not going to spend my time with some triple templates obscure skeletons.

Here's why: Money means nothing to me, now, because I've already used one of the endless, endless holes in logic to make enough of it that the DM has been forced to look up the word "Stagflation" and people are using solid gold coins instead of rocks when they go rock skipping (or, well, coin skipping these days).

So I make constructs. I make themed constructs. I'd like to see you have a greater fiend summoned in from some obscene corner of the multiverse accept wearing my clown gown. They don't. They argue.

So, I make constructs and I give them tiny stone moustaches and granite monocles and adorable limestone tophats and believe you me, it's a much better deterrent than some "economically sound, reasonable approach". Pfah.

:smallbiggrin:
Yeah, mad wizard id it. Neat.

[Vizzerdrix]

One of the big selling points for constructs instead of undead is turning. I've only ever seen two ways to turn a construct. Every cleric can take or break your undead.

It is also very, very hard to cherry pick your undead. If you can't find it, you can't have it. Constructs lack this drawback.

You can make homunculi relatively early, and with proper feat investment do it faster and cheaper than other constructs, or upgrade them as you go. You can't upgrade your undead, only replace them.

Siege Crab tank. It should still be floating around these forums someplace. Go take a look.

[Jack_Simth]

They look so horribly overpriced to me (some 2000gp per HD) I wonder why anyone ever would make one. Mayhaps a mad wizard, because of the "mad" part. But is there any way to make the price more reasonable? Or reason to pay that much for a construct?
They are expensive, yes. However, a Greater Stone Golem is a CR 16 servant that is totally loyal that can be made by a single cleric with the right domains (for Slow and a lower-level antimagic field), or a single Wizard - both at 14th level.

Yes, they're expensive without obscure mitigation... but they're tough (DR, reasonable HP), they're easily fixed (for the Greater Stone Golem, a single Transmute Mud to Rock fully heals it), highly resistant to most forms of control (not undead, immune to mind affecting effects, and in the specific case of a Greater Stone Golem, immune to most magic), and if you need a minion to manage them for a little while, you can just tell them to obey someone else... and take it back later regardless of whether or not the person you told it to obey agrees to the return.

Meanwhile that Great Wyrm Gold Dragon skeleton you connived is some 3rd level Wizard's plaything (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/commandUndead.htm) for the next three days (longer, if they choose to recast).

[ahenobarbi]

They are expensive, yes. However, a Greater Stone Golem is a CR 16 servant that is totally loyal that can be made by a single cleric with the right domains (for Slow and a lower-level antimagic field), or a single Wizard - both at 14th level.

Yes, they're expensive without obscure mitigation... but they're tough (DR, reasonable HP), they're easily fixed (for the Greater Stone Golem, a single Transmute Mud to Rock fully heals it), highly resistant to most forms of control (not undead, immune to mind affecting effects, and in the specific case of a Greater Stone Golem, immune to most magic), and if you need a minion to manage them for a little while, you can just tell them to obey someone else... and take it back later regardless of whether or not the person you told it to obey agrees to the return.

Meanwhile that Great Wyrm Gold Dragon skeleton you connived is some 3rd level Wizard's plaything (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/commandUndead.htm) for the next three days (longer, if they choose to recast).

Whoa. I was so convinced lots of HD protect undead from rebuking/ turning that I forgot aobut the fact that 2nd level spell can take away the minion from me (and no saving thow since it's mindless). Yup, that's a big point in favor of constucts there.

[Urpriest]

Basically, constructs are high-end and specialized. A Dedicated Wright will make items for you, while a Shadesteel Golem will fight for your right to Tippyverse.

[Vknight]

Speaking of which, I got a question.

Where are all the things to reduce the cost for making Golems and other Constructs?
I may have sort of forgot

[Waker]

Speaking of which, I got a question.

Where are all the things to reduce the cost for making Golems and other Constructs?
I may have sort of forgot

There may be some feats designed specifically for it, but the Artisan feats from the Eberron Campaign Setting book can reduce the cost/xp/time required by 25% if I'm remembering them correctly.

[Invader]

The problem is that I can get loyal powerful minion much cheaper:
- Buy lyre of building (13'000 gp)
- Find a big stone.
- Hire a someone for a day to play the lyre (just make DC 18 Perfrom check a few times... 1st level with maxed ranks, skill focus and Cha 12 can do it, <1000gp.
- Have your employee create a statue of Great Wyrm Gold Dragon.
- Shrink Item the statue (375gp from a scroll).
- Cast Stone to Flesh on the statue (1650gp from a scroll).
- Unshrink dragon corpse.
- Cast Desacrate (150gp from a scroll).
- Cast Animate Dead (1830gp from a scroll, because we want CL 11).
- Enjoy your 41HD Gold Dragon Skeleton.

Total: <= 18'025gp (and only <= 5'025 if you want to make a next one). And that's without even trying to save money. And not only the skeleton is much cheaper, it also is more powerful (it lacks magic immunity and has slighlty worse AC bt pretty much everywhere else it's much better):



Your only problem is there no reason this would work. A statue of a creature doesn't determine how old/many HD it has. Its a completely arbitrary number. That's besides the fact that its not actually a dragon of any age before you shrink it down. At best when you used stone to flesh you'd have yourself a pseudodragon that looked like a gold dragon as you shrunk a stone statue not an actual dragon corpse you cant unshrink it.

[ericgrau]

It is either remarkably stingy or a sign of power creep on your own build to not want to spend level 7 WBL - not 7 levels of class features and abilities but only the WBL - on a CR 10 creature. Not to mention you retain all your own class features in spite of your lighter equipment.

I suppose the drawback is that they can't be resurrected so you have to be a little careful. But that should be easy to do on a highly damage & special effect resistant beatstick.

The only reason I can think of why every wizard isn't doing it is because they don't know much about it, or if they're so system savvy with such a lenient DM they have something else that's crazy over-optimized and better. Or lack of downtime to craft. Or they're heavy victims of DM fiat & railroading where things often get destroyed and there's nothing you can do about it. Hmm, ya, I think it's a combination of stinginess, warranted fear and complication that keeps the PC golem population down.

Thx for the inspiration for a crafting concept I have btw. Added golems to the list :smallwink:.

[Suddo]

Speaking of which, I got a question.

Where are all the things to reduce the cost for making Golems and other Constructs?
I may have sort of forgot

For the Artificer in all of us. (http://brilliantgameologists.com/boards/index.php?topic=7274.0)

[Vknight]

For the Artificer in all of us. (http://brilliantgameologists.com/boards/index.php?topic=7274.0)

Thank you so much for that.
Now to work on that army of Iron Golems under the castle

[Emperor Tippy]

To the OP, because Shadesteel Golems (MM3) are great. Especially when you pay the extra 8,000 GP to give it an Int score equal to half your CL (while still keeping the full loyalty/obedience).

It's a medium sized flying creature with an AoE attack, an exceptional ability to hide, and a single scroll of Greater Shadow Evocation can be used to give it Fast Healing 8 and haste (use it to replicate Continual Flame and so long as the Golem is in range of the flame it gains those benefits).

The Int score also gives it skill points and feats, which are based on HD and not CR. It can be a great scout and assassin, especially when you pay for a permanent telepathic bond, most of the rest of the permanency choices, a ring of invisibility, and a medallion of thoughts. Oh yeah, and add in some Craft Contingent spells.

It's even better when you convince your DM to let you give your golem Factotum, Monk, and Swordsage levels. It does have an Int score after all and thus can gain XP.

----
Oh yeah, your players will tend to hate you if you through a CR 20 Shadesteel Golem with Factotum levels (non associated class levels are great), epic feats, and full NPC WBL (much less PC WBL) at them.

Although that was still hated less than my CR 20 wyrmling Mercury Dragon Monk/Factotum. Nothing quite pisses players off like an enemy who drops a Weirdstone a mile away and then proceeds to use Improved Flyby Attack and Great Flyby Attack along with it's 600 foot movement speed and its Permanent Emanation: Antimagic Field, to make massive sneak attacks and disappear well outside of the range of the party only to come back and do it again. Stupid players saying that I couldn't make a CR appropriate monk that was actually a challenge for a decently optimized level 20 party.

[Sapreaver]

Constructs are very pricey, if we use effigy as a guide line then medium size costs 2k and 1 HD is another 2k, this is all expensive, so what do you get?

A mindless servant With unlimited lifespan
stronger and tougher then a zombie, as fast as a skeleton, keeping all type fo movement.
Immunity to basically every environmental hazard, even positive and negative energy does nothing.
Much less taboo then undead.

The construct is better then a skeleton or zombie of the same creature in a lot of ways, they are slightly easier to hurt since their damage reduction scales with level as opposed to being a flat 5.

the higher grade constructs like golems are even more useful due to their unbeatable spell resistance and unbelievable toughness and strength.

you pay for quality, sure a skeleton or zombies may be a little over 25g (if you count the cost of animate dead itself) but they require having corpses of whatever you want to make, a effigy could be of an extinct animal, like a gnome or dodo.

Best of both words in a flesh colossus

[TuggyNE]

Best of both words in a flesh colossus

Since basically the only advantage undead have is being stupidly cheap compared to constructs, I'd say colossi do not in fact capture the best of both worlds; 760kgp is certainly not cheap by any stretch of the imagination.

[Akal Saris]

I think he'd end up with a disgusting pile of flesh shaped like a dragon.

...WHICH HE THEN CAN TURN INTO A FLESH GOLEM! :smalltongue:

[Threadnaught]

because Shadesteel Golems *snip*

Tippy, nobody cares about your super awesome Tippyverse, nobody even reads your posts about it. :smalltongue:

Now if you'll excuse me, I've got to work out the cost of securing the inside of a mountain against teleportation while using teleportation as the primary means of transportation. :xykon:


Aren't there constructs that can be used as transportation? Or storage space?
There's also Homonculi for Artificers. Well, any construct for Artificers, but for some reason Homonculi are supposed to be the best for some reason. I think somebody mentioned something about a Dedicated Wright or something.

[Lord Vukodlak]

Nitpicky DM here. There's nothing here that says your dragon statue would gain bones that could become a skeleton.

More importantly animated dead is limited to 20HD. So even if the 40HD dragon fell from the sky already dead he couldn't animate it. The fact that "2 cu. ft./level" is not very much and its doubtful a 20th level caster could shrink a huge sized dragon statue let alone colossal. You'd somehow have to find someone whose seen a great wyrm gold dragon to make the statue and as others have said turning a statue into flesh does not necessarily give it bones, HD or any other statistics.

[ahenobarbi]

Your only problem is there no reason this would work. A statue of a creature doesn't determine how old/many HD it has. Its a completely arbitrary number. That's besides the fact that its not actually a dragon of any age before you shrink it down. At best when you used stone to flesh you'd have yourself a pseudodragon that looked like a gold dragon as you shrunk a stone statue not an actual dragon corpse you cant unshrink it.

Yeah, it's a bit sketchy (Stone to Flesh says it will tranform statue to a corpse but as the corpse never lived...)... But there are other methods:
- Scroll of wish?. It's significantly more expensive (28 825 gp) but it can explicitly create corpse of a specific creature. But then undead becomes significantly more expensive.
- Dragon ally+ clone. Cheaper but takes a lot more time and yelds weaker dragon (up to 22HD).


It is either remarkably stingy or a sign of power creep on your own build to not want to spend level 7 WBL - not 7 levels of class features and abilities but only the WBL - on a CR 10 creature. Not to mention you retain all your own class features in spite of your lighter equipment.

I suppose the drawback is that they can't be resurrected so you have to be a little careful. But that should be easy to do on a highly damage & special effect resistant beatstick.

The only reason I can think of why every wizard isn't doing it is because they don't know much about it, or if they're so system savvy with such a lenient DM they have something else that's crazy over-optimized and better. Or lack of downtime to craft. Or they're heavy victims of DM fiat & railroading where things often get destroyed and there's nothing you can do about it. Hmm, ya, I think it's a combination of stinginess, warranted fear and complication that keeps the PC golem population down.

Thx for the inspiration for a crafting concept I have btw. Added golems to the list :smallwink:.

Well. I do lack time to craft it. And I'm worried that it will be destroyed. And that it will become irrelevant in a few levels.


More importantly animated dead is limited to 20HD. So even if the 40HD dragon fell from the sky he couldn't animate it.

That's why I'm using a dragon. Dragon skeletons don't have HD cap (see Draconomicon).

[Lord Vukodlak]

That's why I'm using a dragon. Dragon skeletons don't have HD cap (see Draconomicon).

Template doesn't say it bypasses normal animate dead limits. You can have a 40HD zombie from the MM1 template you simply can't create it via animate dead.
Wizards is infamous for getting important little details. And given the skeleton and zombie templates are more powerful then the base they should have even lower HD limits then the regular templates.

[jindra34]

Template doesn't say it bypasses normal animate dead limits. You can have a 40HD zombie from the MM1 template you simply can't create it via animate dead.
Wizards is infamous for getting important little details. And given the skeleton and zombie templates are more powerful then the base they should have even lower HD limits then the regular templates.

Um... Animate Dead limits you to creating up to TWICE your caster level in HD, so yes 40 HD undead are creatable. And as its uncapped you can boost your caster level for even more, and of course Desecrate doubles the limit again.

[Lord Vukodlak]

Um... Animate Dead limits you to creating up to TWICE your caster level in HD, so yes 40 HD undead are creatable. And as its uncapped you can boost your caster level for even more, and of course Desecrate doubles the limit again.

Look at the original templates for skeletons and zombies form which the dragon versions are based. If you can't animate a purple worm zombie(it be 32HD) why the hell would you be allowed to make a 40HD dragon skeleton?

[big teej]

personally, I've made it known to my players that any caster seeking to build up a construct army is going to get major discounts based on the construct at hand.

I think the largest reduction I've ever done was lopping off the last two zero's in the price tag. (I think it was a dread guardian, or something like that... it's a critter out of MMII that has 2 hit die and costs 40,000 to make)

[Coidzor]

One of the big selling points for constructs instead of undead is turning. I've only ever seen two ways to turn a construct. Every cleric can take or break your undead.

It is also very, very hard to cherry pick your undead. If you can't find it, you can't have it. Constructs lack this drawback.

You can make homunculi relatively early, and with proper feat investment do it faster and cheaper than other constructs, or upgrade them as you go. You can't upgrade your undead, only replace them.

Siege Crab tank. It should still be floating around these forums someplace. Go take a look.

Harder to steal with a 2nd level spell too. (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/commandUndead.htm)

[thethird]

Now if you'll excuse me, I've got to work out the cost of securing the inside of a mountain against teleportation while using teleportation as the primary means of transportation. :xykon:

Expedition to undermontain pg. 219?

I mean Halaster teleport cage makes people unable to teleport to it (or away from it) but it works if you teleport from one place to another of the cage.

Alternatively you could create an anchor plane to create a manifest zone, having a trait of teleportation magic not working, if need be create your own plane, to impede the spells/powers that you want.

[Gavinfoxx]

Making constructs is great!

...

Provided you have access to the rules that get you the ones that are good bangs for the buck!

Read this:

http://community.wizards.com/go/thread/view/75882/19870786/Mechonomicon

And this:

http://brilliantgameologists.com/boards/index.php?topic=7274.0

You can get some VERY NICE constructs, very cheap, if you pay attention to the two of those threads...

[Threadnaught]

Expedition to undermontain pg. 219?

I mean Halaster teleport cage makes people unable to teleport to it (or away from it) but it works if you teleport from one place to another of the cage.

Alternatively you could create an anchor plane to create a manifest zone, having a trait of teleportation magic not working, if need be create your own plane, to impede the spells/powers that you want.

Nah, I mean using Teleportation Circle for trade and moving around my armies... No, it's totally different to the Tippyverse. It's in a mountain and I'm trying to block all outside teleportation that isn't Wish based, unless it's to the designated TC docks, which will be under heavy guard.

Basically, I'm trying to work out the most cost effective way to creating the most powerful fortress city in a Tippyverse setting... Okay, I like the Tippyverse and I still read it. Tippy try not to look so smug while you're being awesome. :smalltongue:


I think constructs would work better in the anti-Tippyverse fortress. They don't need to eat or sleep and aren't reliant on available corpses.
Besides, the next best thing is a Wight/Wraith-ocalypse, which you'd have to clean up yourself eventually.

[Gavinfoxx]

There's a few things you can do...

1.) Anticipate Teleportation, and Greater Anticipate Teleportation
2.) Custom Lair Wards, a la Draconomicon, but with custom effects
3.) Building fortresses concurrently in the Ethereal Plane, so they can't use that to get in, and have to go through a fortress
4.) Making sure that things that burrow through stone can't get through either, and there is no place that is safely outside line of effect (ie, an underground that someone with earthglide could get to, outside the line of effect of all of your teleportation blockers)
5.) Use Weirdstones, from a faerun book
6.) Use the options in Stronghold Builder's Guide to make things impervious or solid to teleportation

And even then... this just makes it more difficult to teleport in, not impossible. People could still Wish-teleport in... hence the need to put absolutely everything under guard, a la Tippyverse. So your walls of spell-enhanced iron, your walls of lead, your walls of worked, reinforced stone, your walls of force... it's mostly just deterrence.

[Threadnaught]

There's a few things you can do...

1.) Anticipate Teleportation, and Greater Anticipate Teleportation
2.) Custom Lair Wards, a la Draconomicon, but with custom effects
3.) Building fortresses concurrently in the Ethereal Plane, so they can't use that to get in, and have to go through a fortress
4.) Making sure that things that burrow through stone can't get through either, and there is no place that is safely outside line of effect (ie, an underground that someone with earthglide could get to, outside the line of effect of all of your teleportation blockers)
5.) Use Weirdstones, from a faerun book
6.) Use the options in Stronghold Builder's Guide to make things impervious or solid to teleportation

And even then... this just makes it more difficult to teleport in, not impossible. People could still Wish-teleport in... hence the need to put absolutely everything under guard, a la Tippyverse.

It's a fortress in a Tippyverse setting, can't I just create resetting Dimensional Lock traps and spread them everywhere, other than the specific TC Docks?
It does say "Once dimensional lock is in place, extradimensional travel into or out of the area is not possible". Meaning the only way into or out of the fortress is to either cast Wish, go to one of the specially designated TC Docks, or the old fashioned way, which requires getting past several interlocked gates completely separate to the main complex... But still Dimensional Locked and patrolled by constructs.

Sure it'll be a pain to somehow get all those Solars into a fort which is constantly running out of room to summon them in, but in the end, you'd have the single most powerful location in a Tippyverse setting.
Walls would have to be made from the strongest possible/available material and lined with a Wall of Force effect to prevent any possible loopholes in the city's defences. Obviously this fort isn't limited to being in a mountain, but since the next best place is still underground... :smallamused:

Several years after the Tippyverse became known, I may have just near conquered a large part of it. Wish is my fortress' only weakness, but assuming adequate patrols and considering the design is a series of tunnels (for the "streets") with rooms leading off them as what passes for buildings, it should be relatively easy to mobilize a force to crush whatever meagre forces Wish can transport into my great fortress... Which needs a name.

I wonder if I could turn the mountain my fortress is in, into a construct. Have my armies attacking the Tippyverse way and the old fashioned way at the same time. :smallcool:

That's so awesome, I have to... Just, I'll be one minute.


There that's better, I had to edit the thread title at the top of my post.

[Gavinfoxx]

Yea, Dimensional Lock. Forgot that one, duh.

And Wish overrides all of that.

"Transport travelers. A wish can lift one creature per caster level from anywhere on any plane and place those creatures anywhere else on any plane regardless of local conditions."

Also, every one of those barriers I mentioned?

Is blocked by things which block line of effect.

They can just teleport underground, and burrow/earthglide upwards...

So you Wish a few high level adventurers / other absurdly powerful things, or use LoE shenanigans, to take out one of the anti teleportation projectors, and teleport everyone in the other way...

Also, most of these effects? Are absurdly short ranged, and can't really protect an entire city; they're better for throne rooms and mage's domiciles and vaults and royal courts and such.

[thethird]

Did you actually check the spell I pointed out? :smallconfused:

[Gavinfoxx]

Yes, I checked dimensional Lock. Wish overrides it's capability of teleport block. So you Wish adventurers in, or do it by tunneling underneath the teleport blockers, and they stop the thing which is preventing the army coming through, and then you teleport circle the army in.

It's basically the same as not having the teleport blockers at all. What is REALLY preventing people from coming in... is really the monsters and densely packed, absurdly powerful defenders as it always was the case in the Tippyverse.

Edit: oh, thethird, holdon... And Wish should still override it. It might be Epic magic though, cause Halastar...

*Checks* Noope! Doesn't say anything about Wish. Wish defeats it, both going in and out!

[thethird]

there is no way of defeating wish teleport.

You could technically make it a dead magic area, but they will still be able to teleport to it via wish.

[Zero grim]

Little point about raising dragon skeletons and zombies, nowhere in either template does it cay "as the skeleton/zombie template except where different" point 2 is that the sample skeleton dragon is 22HD, since there is no solid ruling against it and the only evidence suggests that there is no such limit id rule your only limit is your casting of plague of undeath (cause who's casting animate dead at this point really?)

[Threadnaught]

Did you actually check the spell I pointed out? :smallconfused:

I don't actually have that source.


Yea, Dimensional Lock. Forgot that one, duh.

And Wish overrides all of that.


there is no way of defeating wish teleport.

I do remember pointing out Wish as being one of the ways of entering the city. Earthglide and Incorporealness wouldn't help if the walls and gates are all augmented with a Wall of Force effect. Well when I say "gates" portcullises are harder to get through without the proper clearance.

I have no plans for attempting some futile battle against Wish based teleport. Greater Teleport and the TCs of all other Tippyverse cities allow more controlled access to the city and of course, there is the standard way inside the mountain. Through at least four portcullises, while potentially being fired on the whole time.


I'm far more interested in what a mountain large enough to contain southern Manhattan, would look like as a Construct. The city itself would indeed cost a few million and would have to include one of those marvellous Ring of Three Wishes Traps right in the middle. Yeah, surrounded by the entire military and possibly alarmed if any creature other than the Supreme Commander of the... Walking Mountain Fort needs a catchy name... And the Vault Guard (a bunch of Constructs who protect the RoTWT and set off the DLT) enters the room.

Anyone have any idea what kind of stats a Mountain Construct would have? What about the GP cost?
Threadnaught wants his mountain to crap out Shadesteel Golems and Warforged while being a credible threat on it's own... As well as a name for it, gotta be something people would fear when they hear it whispered in hushed voices.

[Shovah]

I do remember pointing out Wish as being one of the ways of entering the city. Earthglide and Incorporealness wouldn't help if the walls and gates are all augmented with a Wall of Force effect. Well when I say "gates" portcullises are harder to get through without the proper clearance.

Couldn't they just Disintegrate (or if you want to get fancy, Sphere of Annihilation) a small section of the walls after gliding/burrowing their way to the edge of it?

[Gavinfoxx]

Couldn't they just Disintegrate (or if you want to get fancy, Sphere of Annihilation) a small section of the walls after gliding/burrowing their way to the edge of it?

This... there's really no way to prevent a properly-equipped team of adventurers from getting in... even if they don't have access to Wish teleportation...

[Emperor Tippy]

Couldn't they just Disintegrate (or if you want to get fancy, Sphere of Annihilation) a small section of the walls after gliding/burrowing their way to the edge of it?

In D&D you can always get in. The level of difficulty and how involved the process is might vary but you can always get in (Wish if nothing else, even though you can usually get around the need for Wish).

[Gavinfoxx]

In D&D you can always get in. The level of difficulty and how involved the process is might vary but you can always get in (Wish if nothing else, even though you can usually get around the need for Wish).

Care to give us more details of some other processes we might not have mentioned, without escalating up to Wish-entry?

[Emperor Tippy]

Care to give us more details of some other processes we might not have mentioned, without escalating up to Wish-entry?

Well first is to convince (bribe, magic, diplomacy, etc.) someone that is authorized to come in to take you with them.

For example, take a cloak or shirt and sew a portable hole with the party inside of it inside of the cloak or shirt and then hit the thing with magic aura to make it show as non magical. That will get you past most security. Also building people into shipping crates or even money. Or using Smokey Confinement to put them in stasis inside crystal vials and then stuffing the vial up your ass (or dropping it into a container filled with liquid of various kinds, when is the last time the guards popped open your parties beer bottles to see what was inside of them).

Sneak in a Ring Gate, a Weirdstone might block it (I can't remember) but nothing else does.

Come in from under ground/ethereal/the plane of shadow (although good security will block all of those). One trick is to use Xorn Movement or some other way to move through the ground on the Ethereal Plane, the common way to block ethereal movement is to put some object physically on the ethereal plane in the location in question.

If they use force effects to block entrance then go ethereal and just teleport past the wall of force on the ethereal plane. Most people forget that they also need to drop a weirdstone on the ethereal plane if they want to stop teleportation there. This can let you spy but if a weird stone is up then it won't let you back into the material plane inside the fortress though.

Another way to bypass force effects is to shapechange into a wyrmling force dragon, and then you can just pass right through all force effects without any issue.

Use a Ring of Invisibility, have Mind Blank up, and then use Gaseous Form. You might also want to be shapechanged into a wyrmling force dragon and have cast Xorn Movement so that you can pass right through force effects and float through the ground as well.

Polymorph Any Object twice into, say, a shirt which triggers a Magic Aura Craft Contingent Spell that makes you look nonmagical with a Craft Contingent Break Enchantment set to trigger say twenty minutes after the shirt passes through a Teleportation Circle and then just have some random peasant or merchant that enters the city where the shirt.

Use Teleport Through Time to jump back to before the location was built/shielded and get in the location you want to arrive in before using Wish or Reality Revision (one that is XP free) to Wish up a Drilbu of Time Hop, Mass with a ML equal to the number of days that you want to move forward in time times 24. You pop back into existence bypassing all defense. Honestly just Wishing yourself in tends to be easier and cheaper but this can have advantages on occasion (especially for bypassing Contact Other Planes divination and the like where questions like "Will any entity use Wish to transport something into the city without authorization?").

You can also Teleport Through Time and then create a Craft Contingent Prismatic Sphere set to trigger at the chosen time before putting yourself in stasis until you are back in the correct time period and then just using Teleport or Greater Teleport to pop yourself into your Prismatic Sphere.

There is also traveling far into the future, to after the defenses are non existent, and then using Teleport Through Time to jump back to when you want to arrive (although this can be quite imprecise).

This isn't an inclusive list, its just some of the potential methods. Mostly focusing on the ways to bypass the defenses and not use force to create weaknesses.

[VeisuItaTyhjyys]

I really wish the Dragon skeleton full attack block actually said "Like eight attacks."

[Gavinfoxx]

*snip of a bunch of awesome tactics*

Wow... Tippy, you equal win.

[thethird]

I don't actually have that source.

It is also printed in city of splendors waterdeep (which has some of my favorite spells by the way)


*snip*

Anchor plane (dead magic area) would defeat all the magic entry methods :smallsmile:

Intensify manifest zone or make overlaping anchor planes with limited magic to disallow the ways of bypassing a dead magic area and that would greatly reduce the ways of bypassing it.

[Threadnaught]

Anchor plane (dead magic area) would defeat all the magic entry methods :smallsmile:

Except Wish. :smalltongue:


Wow... Tippy, you equal win.

Yep, he most certainly does.

Charlie Sheen saw the Tippyverse just before his breakdown, during his breakdown he thought he was Emperor Tippy.


Come in from under ground/ethereal/the plane of shadow (although good security will block all of those). One trick is to use Xorn Movement or some other way to move through the ground on the Ethereal Plane, the common way to block ethereal movement is to put some object physically on the ethereal plane in the location in question.

A nice bunch of ways in, including two I'd already alluded to, but this one is one I find more interesting as I may have already countered much of it.

The city is in a mountain purely to make it more difficult to fly into the middle, it is mostly a series of tunnels as I've stated from the beginning, with the entrance from the outside in the form of those specialized gatehouses.
Every single wall and portcullis would have to be made from Adamantine or Obdurium if available, augmented with Wall of Force to prevent Incorporeal abuse. Now, the Ethereal Plane is a very interesting way to get around my defences, you mention the possibility of putting some anti-teleportation measure there, but if my fortress city were in a mountain construct, would the Weirdstone move on the Ethereal plane relative to my city on the Material plane?
And if I use a Weirdstone on the Ethereal plane, how can I be sure it won't interfere with my TC Docks on the Material plane?

[Emperor Tippy]

A nice bunch of ways in, including two I'd already alluded to, but this one is one I find more interesting as I may have already countered much of it.

The city is in a mountain purely to make it more difficult to fly into the middle, it is mostly a series of tunnels as I've stated from the beginning, with the entrance from the outside in the form of those specialized gatehouses.
Every single wall and portcullis would have to be made from Adamantine or Obdurium if available, augmented with Wall of Force to prevent Incorporeal abuse.
Shapechange into a Wyrmling Force Dragon and cast Ghost Form, you can walk right through all of the defenses.


Now, the Ethereal Plane is a very interesting way to get around my defences, you mention the possibility of putting some anti-teleportation measure there, but if my fortress city were in a mountain construct, would the Weirdstone move on the Ethereal plane relative to my city on the Material plane?
And if I use a Weirdstone on the Ethereal plane, how can I be sure it won't interfere with my TC Docks on the Material plane?

No, you need a Weirdstone on both the Etheral and Material planes if you want to shut down teleportation in the area on both.


Anchor plane (dead magic area) would defeat all the magic entry methods :smallsmile:
Not really. Besides the fact that it only has a radius of 150 feet, you can also use Planar Bubble or Planar Pocket to ignore the Anchor Plane effects. And there is always Wish.


Intensify manifest zone or make overlaping anchor planes with limited magic to disallow the ways of bypassing a dead magic area and that would greatly reduce the ways of bypassing it.
Not really, there are a number of ways to overcome both and Anchor Plane in general.

[Eldan]

At this point, I'm wondering why anyone is building anywhere that's coterminous with the ethereal plane. If you have that kind of resources, just go to the outer planes, or the astral. The deep ethereal should be another option, if your DM includes it.

[Threadnaught]

Shapechange into a Wyrmling Force Dragon and cast Ghost Form, you can walk right through all of the defenses.

Exactly, part of a combo, otherwise Incorporeal only gets you so far.


No, you need a Weirdstone on both the Etheral and Material planes if you want to shut down teleportation in the area on both.

Yay, I'll have to build two of these damn things, one with Weird Stones on the Etherial Plane, the other in the Material Plane without them... Effectively doubling the cost making any potential construct required to have a double and somehow mind linked so they're both in exactly the same place at once.


Right, so apparently the city of New York has 24800 feet of land between Battery Park and Central Park. A creature of that size would apparently be Macro Huge, falling between 16384 and 32768 feet. Let's make the Construct my city is in Macro Gargantuan 32768-65536 feet, by doubling the size so it doesn't have to shuffle the city around when it moves. No randomly contracting streets or twisting hallways for me thank you.
So my city is in a creature roughly 50000 feet in size, I'm probably better off having it as an artificial island.
Or a Space Station, if I can manage to make it airtight. :smallamused:

Why would it have to be a Construct if it's a Space Station? What if someone else tries building a Space Station? What if I got it to throw Macro-Huge Spears of Uranium at the planet, like some sort of orbital nuclear weapons platform?
Tippy, is this thing possible?

[Emperor Tippy]

Yay, I'll have to build two of these damn things, one with Weird Stones on the Etherial Plane, the other in the Material Plane without them... Effectively doubling the cost making any potential construct required to have a double and somehow mind linked so they're both in exactly the same place at once.
You don't need to make two. You just need to get a Mage's Lubrication trap and then cast tons of Walls of Stone to basically make it a giant stone block on the ethereal plane where your city would be and just dump a Weirdstone in the middle of that. Then use Wish to create a really high CL scroll of Animate Objects followed by Shapechanging into a Lilitu and using it to animate the giant stone block and then make that permanent (ideally cast by someone with Tenacious Magic: Permanency).


Why would it have to be a Construct if it's a Space Station? What if someone else tries building a Space Station? What if I got it to throw Macro-Huge Spears of Uranium at the planet, like some sort of orbital nuclear weapons platform?
Tippy, is this thing possible?

Yes.
http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=86964&page=5
http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=97476
http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=86843

[Gavinfoxx]

I'm kinda upset that you didn't put me in your sig yet, tippy!

[Emperor Tippy]

I'm kinda upset that you didn't put me in your sig yet, tippy!

There you go, I had stopped adding people a while ago because the list was getting too large.

[Shining Wrath]

To OP:
1) Aesthetics. The Undead tend to be ugly and smelly.
2) Undead have been around (in the D&D Universe) longer than constructs, there are more ways to beat them, starting with a class feature of a core class (clerical turn / rebuke)
3) Ethics. A LG Wizard does not have the option of Undead, or for that matter Flesh Golems.
4) Availability of raw materials / craftsmen. If you have skilled artificers in your employ because you are Uber Wizard Wizardopolus, you can have them spend some of their time making constructs. If on the other hand you have necromancer employees you can have them make undead for you.
5) Sometimes, you just have to go with what's cool. And different wizards will have different opinions

[Threadnaught]

You don't need to make two. You just need to get a Mage's Lubrication trap and then cast tons of Walls of Stone to basically make it a giant stone block on the ethereal plane where your city would be and just dump a Weirdstone in the middle of that. Then use Wish to create a really high CL scroll of Animate Objects followed by Shapechanging into a Lilitu and using it to animate the giant stone block and then make that permanent (ideally cast by someone with Tenacious Magic: Permanency).

How many Weirdstones would I need to cover an area of 3 cubic miles? The minimum I think I'd need to get my entire city under cover in the Ethereal plane.
How many for 5 cubic miles/the whole thing?


Yes.
http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=86964&page=5
http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=97476
http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=86843

I'll get to work on a Tiny Construct immediately... SPAAAACE!!!

[Pickford]

Umm not to be so blunt, but... this (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=282178)

So...where does one get the ability to make a construct that has any type other than construct? Because that's not anywhere in the MM that I can find.

[Emperor Tippy]

How many Weirdstones would I need to cover an area of 3 cubic miles? The minimum I think I'd need to get my entire city under cover in the Ethereal plane.
How many for 5 cubic miles/the whole thing?
One per 6 mile radius. Weird stones do have a six mile range.

[TuggyNE]

Incidentally, for the curious, a mage's lubrication trap would just be grease. Mage's lucubration, on the other hand…. :smallwink:

[Threadnaught]

One per 6 mile radius. Weird stones do have a six mile range.

Excellent, I'll take 27.

Drop them all 3x3x3 so the central one covers the whole city outline in the Ethereal plane and the others are there just in case someone manages to destroy one. How much is the GP cost for these and ten Golems to protect each one? With some way to move through the Stone... And maybe the Walls of Force.

Hey, if I just have the one, some bunch of Wizards'll just 'port in and blast it away. At least with a few spares, I can slow them down and possibly find a way to prepare for their arrival. Maybe even kill a few with the Ethereal defenders.


I'd like to somehow have a Locate City Bomb Trap on one of my nukes, but it appears that the only one I could use to any effect is the Wight-ocalypse version, which is horribly ineffective against the more dangerous members of a Tippyverse city's military (Constructs and Wizards). Though it could provide a distraction in an invasion. There aren't any treaties banning the use of chemical and nuclear weapons in the TV, are there?

[Clistenes]

About how making better constructs...does exist any magic item able to grant Fast Healing or Regeneration to a construct? Rings of Regeneration explicitly don't work on them, and the White Ioun Stone works like a Ring of Regeneration.

[Emperor Tippy]

About how making better constructs...does there exist any magic item able to grant Fast Healing or Regeneration to a construct? Rings of Regeneration explicitly don't work on them, and the White Ioun Stone works like a Ring of Regeneration.

Shadow Evocation Continual Flame on an item and give it to a Shadesteel Golem, effective fast healing 8.

Use Rudimentary Intelligence and create one on a positive dominant plane before giving it permanent emanation: Sculped Planar Bubble that only effects it's square(s). Use a Major Positive Dominate plane and arguably the construct can just stack up limitless temporary HP without any worry as the Fort save doesn't apply to objects and thus the golem never needs to make it.

[Clistenes]

Shadow Evocation Continual Flame on an item and give it to a Shadesteel Golem, effective fast healing 8.

Use Rudimentary Intelligence and create one on a positive dominant plane before giving it permanent emanation: Sculped Planar Bubble that only effects it's square(s). Use a Major Positive Dominate plane and arguably the construct can just stack up limitless temporary HP without any worry as the Fort save doesn't apply to objects and thus the golem never needs to make it.

But if I were to build a golem from the scratch, I would probably just give it Fast Healing and pay for it (Woundmender template, or the Pathfinder rules for Shield Guardians).

I was thinking about a guy who has an Iron Golem or Nimblewright and decides that the critter needs upgrading and equips it with some bling. Is there some item that would work in any golem or automaton?

[Emperor Tippy]

But if I were to build a golem from the scratch, I would probably just give it Fast Healing and pay for it (Woundmender template, or the Pathfinder rules for Shield Guardians).

I was thinking about a guy who has an Iron Golem or Nimblewright and decides that the critter needs upgrading and equips it with some bling. Is there some item that would work in any golem or automaton?

Step 1: Travel to a minor (or major) positive dominate plane.
Step 2: Take a small object and cast Animate Object + Permanency on it.
Step 3: Awaken the Animated Object.
Step 4: Have the Animated Object use a power stone of Augmented Persistent Compression (you want 2 size reductions).
Step 5: Create a Craft Contingent Mastery of Shaping Planar Bubble (might need to go Extended to get it to last at least 8 hours or use a Wish if you aren't an Archmage, you want the Planar Bubble to only cover the AO's square) on the Animated Object and then activate it.
Step 6: Create an Ice Assassin of the Animated Object.

Congrats, you now have a Fine Animated Object that can never disobey you and provides fast healing 2 to anything in the same square that it is in without any problems, ever.

Give it to your Golem.

If you get a Scroll of Shapechange then you can do the rest without any other monetary outlay.

[Clistenes]

Step 1: Travel to a minor (or major) positive dominate plane.
Step 2: Take a small object and cast Animate Object + Permanency on it.
Step 3: Awaken the Animated Object.
Step 4: Have the Animated Object use a power stone of Augmented Persistent Compression (you want 2 size reductions).
Step 5: Create a Craft Contingent Mastery of Shaping Planar Bubble (might need to go Extended to get it to last at least 8 hours or use a Wish if you aren't an Archmage, you want the Planar Bubble to only cover the AO's square) on the Animated Object and then activate it.
Step 6: Create an Ice Assassin of the Animated Object.

Congrats, you now have a Fine Animated Object that can never disobey you and provides fast healing 2 to anything in the same square that it is in without any problems, ever.

Give it to your Golem.

If you get a Scroll of Shapechange then you can do the rest without any other monetary outlay.

Woa...that's complex. I would have to check if crafting an item that grants unlimited Repair Minor Damage is cheaper (constructs can't fall unconscious and don't sleep, so it could heal itself all the time it isn't fighting). Quickened Repair Minor Damage would be even better (to heal itself during combat too), but that would cost 56000 gp.