Building a Utility Caster

[Nettlekid]

What might be a good build for higher levels, to take care of all the little things that a high level party would find useful without wanting to specialize in? The party in question is small, consisting likely of one BSF and one skillmonkey/scout. The BSF wants to do damage, and the scout wants to gather intel, so there's not much magical power. The campaign's high level, focused on dealing with dragons, so the BSF's going to be carrying the weight of damage dealing, even though a Mailman sorcerer would be pretty handy. Instead, because this group doesn't want to play casters (too much bookkeeping), they're likely to be without a lot of high level utility if I don't. So, a little battlefield control (probably just have some Wall of Stone/Force and call it a day), taxicab services (including interplanar, if need be), maybe a little HP/ability score/status healing if need be, that kind of thing. The thing that the BSF relies on a caster for. What sort of build might be good for that?

[Fouredged Sword]

Well, there is a lot that can be done by a...

Sha'ar (dragon compendium) 3 / Druid 1 / Arcane Herophant 10 / Mystic Thurge 6

You get a very interesting elemental companion, and access to lots of spells.


I think there is an elemental companion ACF that would be flavorful for the druid side.

[Maginomicon]

What might be a good build for higher levels, to take care of all the little things that a high level party would find useful without wanting to specialize in? The party in question is small, consisting likely of one BSF and one skillmonkey/scout. The BSF wants to do damage, and the scout wants to gather intel, so there's not much magical power. The campaign's high level, focused on dealing with dragons, so the BSF's going to be carrying the weight of damage dealing, even though a Mailman sorcerer would be pretty handy. Instead, because this group doesn't want to play casters (too much bookkeeping), they're likely to be without a lot of high level utility if I don't. So, a little battlefield control (probably just have some Wall of Stone/Force and call it a day), taxicab services (including interplanar, if need be), maybe a little HP/ability score/status healing if need be, that kind of thing. The thing that the BSF relies on a caster for. What sort of build might be good for that?
Since you're dealing with dragons, any caster build should include mass fly as a regular aspect as well as featherfall. If you can manage it, nerveskitter, sign, close wounds, antidragon aura.

See this video (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bFnTRfR46Gc).

Personally, I've found that the best thing a sorcerer can do to help be a utility caster (if you'd be playing a sorcerer) is the Draconic Breath feat. It lets you have a modicum of scaling damage ability at all times freeing up your spells known slots for all the utility you could want. The wings of cover spell in such a setup would allow you to stick to the party and protect them when the dragon circle-strafes you all (this particular tactic wouldn't be that great in battles involving multiple enemies, but one-dragon fights make it indispensable).

Anything that helps your BSF do a lot of ranged damage or overcome the strengths of dragons is good.

[Nettlekid]

Hmm, that's an interesting thought. Although I've never quite understood the Sha'ir's spell-gaining mechanism. He keeps repeatedly preparing spells throughout the day, and has a certain number of spells that he can prepare more quickly than others, but he can still prepare those others? That's rather useful, but a bit complicated. If I was to go for the spell versatility thing, I'd probably just take a few levels of Mage of the Arcane Order to pick up the slack.

Although that does give me an interesting idea. A lot of utility spells are Conjuration, aren't they? Wall of Stone/Iron, Orb of X for damage, Healing spells, Teleportation spells, etc. Perhaps a Shadowcraft Mage would be the best choice, since you just prepare a ton of Heightened Silent Images and choose what you want it to be at casting. Heck, even take the Signature Spell feat and don't even prepare Silent Image, just be able to spontaneously turn any spell into Silent Image, and thus into any Evocation or Conjuration spell you want. Normal Silent Images would take care of Conjuration (Creation) and Conjuration (Summoning), and then Shades can do Teleportation. If you took a little Wyrm Wizard you could get a spell like Heal on your list, and now Shades can do that too. (Or you just prepare Heal. Meh.) Would that work for a utility caster? Or is there a better option?

[Maginomicon]

Well, there is a lot that can be done by a...

Sha'ar (dragon compendium) 3 / Druid 1 / Arcane Herophant 10 / Mystic Thurge 6

You get a very interesting elemental companion, and access to lots of spells.

I think there is an elemental companion ACF that would be flavorful for the druid side.
To avoid confusion, the Sha'ir has 3 levels in there because with that it counts as both arcane and divine for the purposes of meeting the prerequisites of Arcane Heirophant and Mystic Theurge (you can't advance Sha'ir twice with a PrC).

As I recall though, Arcane Heirophant requires the Trackless Step ability, which you don't get from Druid until level 3, so I'm not sure why that's in there. You'd get the most of that kind of build by going
Sha'ir 3, Druid 5, Arcane Hierophant 10, Mystic Theurge 2 (although by that point you might be better off exchanging Mystic Theurge for some other class that fits your goals better)

[tiercel]

Although that does give me an interesting idea. A lot of utility spells are Conjuration, aren't they? Wall of Stone/Iron, Orb of X for damage, Healing spells, Teleportation spells, etc. Perhaps a Shadowcraft Mage would be the best choice, since you just prepare a ton of Heightened Silent Images and choose what you want it to be at casting. Heck, even take the Signature Spell feat and don't even prepare Silent Image, just be able to spontaneously turn any spell into Silent Image, and thus into any Evocation or Conjuration spell you want. Normal Silent Images would take care of Conjuration (Creation) and Conjuration (Summoning), and then Shades can do Teleportation. If you took a little Wyrm Wizard you could get a spell like Heal on your list, and now Shades can do that too. (Or you just prepare Heal. Meh.) Would that work for a utility caster? Or is there a better option?

Conjurer is a solid generic battlefield-control caster (even just Core, using standard spells like grease, glitterdust, web, stinking cloud, black tentacles, solid fog etc) — much less if you use the hideously evil Abrupt Jaunt ACF (PHB II) or tack on some Master Specialist PrC (CM, early entry too).

Shadowcraft Mage has the infamous Killer Gnome build (about which more here (http://community.wizards.com/go/thread/view/75882/19872354/Shadowcraft_Mage_Handbook))—you can abuse the heck out of shadow spells until they are more real than the real thing, not to mention spontaneously casting any Conjuration or Evocation you like.

If you're worried about healing, there's always A Player's Guide to Healing (And, why you will be Just Fine without a Cleric to heal) (http://community.wizards.com/go/thread/view/75882/19871786/A_Players_Guide_to_Healing_%28And,_why_you_will_be _Just_Fine_without_a_Cleric_to_heal%29).

[Maginomicon]

Hmm, that's an interesting thought. Although I've never quite understood the Sha'ir's spell-gaining mechanism. He keeps repeatedly preparing spells throughout the day, and has a certain number of spells that he can prepare more quickly than others, but he can still prepare those others? That's rather useful, but a bit complicated. If I was to go for the spell versatility thing, I'd probably just take a few levels of Mage of the Arcane Order to pick up the slack.It's simpler than that. He has spells he sets as knowing intimately (his spells known list). For any spell outside of that, all he has to do is know the name of a spell (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showpost.php?p=15202614&postcount=34) on his spell list to cast it. The preparation mechanism is kind-of a "short term preparation" of how a wizard prepares spells, but he can prepare as many copies of a spell as he likes provided that he can cast them before their time limit runs out.

[Nettlekid]

Huh, Sha'ir's pretty interesting after all. I do like that it's capable of divine and arcane at the same time, and I could imagine some pretty strong double/triple (maybe 2.5?) theurge builds using classes like Cerebremancer and Psychic Theurge to get 9s in Sha'ir and a Psionic class. Or maybe Binder, comboing Anima Mage and Tenebrous Apostate. Or Jade Phoenix Mage+Ruby Knight Vindicator. The fact that, with a really good Diplomacy check, a Sha'ir can get Miracle is pretty good indeed. But if you plan to theurge-PrC you'd only take three levels of Sha'ir, and so you only retain spells for 3 hours. That's not great for a dungeon expedition.

[Fouredged Sword]

There is nothing wrong with pure Sha'ir also. I think you can shoe horn it into contemplative for access to domains as well.

As for the recovery method, you just send your jen out for more spells. Three hours is enough that you send your gen out every 2 hours to refresh your list. You don't even have to stop, your jen just pops in and out for a bit. Divine spells take a while though.

Also, geomancer may let you retrieve divine spells as arcane spells, and cast in armor. It could make an interesting gish now that I think about it.

[Waker]

A decent utility caster would be Conjurer with the Spont Divination acf, then ducking into the Mage of the Arcane Order.
Cloistered Cleric with Divine Magician.
Artificers can craft a wand/scroll/staff for any occasion, so they are quite good for utility.
Incarnates can be multiclassed with any of the above to buff skills and save on defensive spells.

[Maginomicon]

But if you plan to theurge-PrC you'd only take three levels of Sha'ir, and so you only retain spells for 3 hours. That's not great for a dungeon expedition.
Advancing Sha'ir through a prestige class advances "spellcasting", which very easily could be said to include how long it takes for a spell to expire.

[Nettlekid]

Although you could argue that, I'm not sure. It does say Sha'ir level, which makes me think it would work the same was a Sorcerer/Wizard level for familiar abilities.

[Maginomicon]

Although you could argue that, I'm not sure. It does say Sha'ir level, which makes me think it would work the same was a Sorcerer/Wizard level for familiar abilities.
In the sections of a class that *air-quotes* "obviously" are affected by spellcasting advancement, they all refer to its own spellcasting abilities by its own class name. This is why I said the above.

[Nettlekid]

I think this is what I want to do. I'm going to go Bard 1/Factotum 8/Swiftblade 1/Sublime Chord 2/Swiftblade +9/something 1, maybe Swordsage. Factotum qualifies me for Swiftblade, and gets me a way to get extra Standard actions (which, with the Swiftblade, means I get lots of actions). With Sublime Chord I get spells from 4-9th, with plenty of room for blasty spells like Orb of Force, debuffs like Enervtion, personal utility like Draconic Polymorph, and party utility like Greater Teleport. SO, what's a good list of other utility spells that I should pick?