Stocking up on Wands, Scrolls and Staves

[Nettlekid]

As some people may have been following, I've been trying to finalize a good spell list for a Sublime Chord I intend to play in an upcoming low-Epic campaign. Thanks to some rearranging of weapon and armor special abilities, getting a buckler, etc, I find myself now with 80,000 gold left to spend. I have quite a lot of gear already, and I don't need some standards (I can Shapechange to take care of things like Freedom of Movement and True Seeing, for example,) so I thought I might as well spend the rest on useful, expendable items like Wands, Eternal Wands, Scrolls, Schemas, and Staves. I have a UMD of +26, easily increased if need be, so I can activate just about anything I need to. Now, what I'm bad at is knowing what's crucially important and what's trivial, so I'm relying on people's experiences to suggest what's worth buying.

My spell list, since that's rather important I imagine, is:
0:Prestidigitation, Summon Instrument, Detect Magic, Open/Close, Light, Message
1:Improvisation, Understand Object, Animate Rope, Master's Touch
2:Alter Self, Invisibility, Bladesong, Reveille
3:Glibness, Ray of Dizziness, Sculpt Sound
4:Orb of Force, Ruin Delver's Fortune, Celerity, Assay Spell Resistance
5:Greater Blink, Wall of Stone, Wall of Force, Hide From Dragons
6:Geas, Otto's Irresistible Dance, Contingency, Freezing Fog
7:Avasculate, Reverse Gravity, Arcane Spellsurge, Limited Wish
8:Polymorph Any Object, Moment of Prescience, Greater Prying Eyes
9:Shapechange, Mordenkainen's Disjunction

If anyone has suggestions on how to alter these, do suggest. (Though maybe you should do it on the other thread, to keep this one just about Wands, Scrolls and Staves.)

[Humble Master]

ICE ASSASIN!

Maybe get Gate for summoning and movement?

[BowStreetRunner]

I would seriously consider investing in a Runestaff. Without UMD, you can use it to carry a few spells around that appear on your class spell list but you don't have on your known list. With UMD, you can use it to carry spells that don't even appear on your class spell list.

[Nettlekid]

I don't think I'll need Gate, because I can Shapechange into an Ether Scarab and make little Gates whenever I want. There are also forms that can do Plane Shift and/or Greater Teleport, which basically adds up to Gate.

Runestaffs are pretty cool, but I wouldn't know how to go about putting together a custom one, and none of the pre-made ones are spells that I'm dying to have. There might be one or two good ones on a list, but overall it feels wasteful.

[Tvtyrant]

A wand of Resilient Sphere, because it will remain useful forever. Even if you only got 1 minute out of it, it still blocks everything.

[Nettlekid]

Ah, that's a good idea. That's a spell I would have put among my spells known, except that there are tons of excellent 4th level spells that I felt obligated to take above it.

I've also got a sword (that won't be in my hand all the time), as well as armor and a buckler (that would be on me at just about all times), so if I was to get a few wands, I should grab a few Wand Chambers too. In which case, I should put some really important wands in those.

On a completely unrelated note, can anyone give me a list of damages that don't heal normally? Stuff like Vile damage and Desiccation damage. The character this is all for is a sailor/pirate, who I've given a couple of Construct Grafts (because pirates need peg-legs), and I need to give a reason that he hasn't just had his limbs Regenerated. Some kind of cursed wound or something. Any ideas?

[BowStreetRunner]

Runestaffs are pretty cool, but I wouldn't know how to go about putting together a custom one...

The rules are pretty simple, from page 225 of the MIC. There should be 2-5 arcane spells, all of 3rd level or higher. The creator uses Craft Staff plus the spells to be included - of course if you are buying the staff you can ignore this part. The cost is 400 gp times the level of highest-level spell, plus 200 gp times the square of the level of each additional spell. You can reduce the cost a bit by decreasing the number of times a day a spell can be used if you want (the default is 3/day for each spell).

It's a great way to expand your spell list, and for many spells can be far more cost-effective than wands in the long run.

[Nettlekid]

Oh wow, that's actually really cheap. You can effectively gets tons of spells known that way. I should have looked into these long ago.

Now..........the agony of choice. So many spells to choose from. Does anyone know of some good must-have lists?

[BowStreetRunner]

Oh wow, that's actually really cheap.

They are cheap because the user has to provide the material components, foci, or XP costs at the time of casting, instead of the crafter incorporating it into the staff.

Does anyone know of some good must-have lists?

List of Save-or-be-Screwed Spells (http://brilliantgameologists.com/boards/index.php?topic=391)
The beginnings of a complete list of good/Great/AWESOME spells from all sources. (http://brilliantgameologists.com/boards/index.php?topic=13402)
No Save, No SR, No Hit effects (http://www.minmaxboards.com/index.php?PHPSESSID=skifnivd54dv5g3ll4j1n3rqb4&topic=8913)
Long Duration Spells (http://www.minmaxboards.com/index.php?PHPSESSID=skifnivd54dv5g3ll4j1n3rqb4&topic=8771)

[Nettlekid]

Excellent lists. I've written up five custom Runestaves designed more for flavor than pure effectiveness, but I kind of like them. As always, I welcome suggestions and critiques. I've also taken some of my spells known and put them on a Runestaff, which means that those slots are now open.

The way I've written them here is: Name of Runestaff: Spell name (level of spell, times usable per day).

Annihilation: Enervation (4th,3), Disintegrate (6th,3), Avasculate (7th,1)

Captain: Detect Ship (3rd, 1), Servant Horde (3rd, 1), Repair Critical Damage (4th, 3), Phantasmal Thief (5th, 1), Control Weather (7th, 1)

Dragondoom: Scale Weakening (2nd, 3), Shivering Touch (3rd, 3), Assay Spell Resistance (4th, 3), Hide From Dragons (5th, 3)

Fantasia: Dominate Person (5th, 1), Geas (6th, 1), Programmed Amnesia (9th, 1)

Protection: Explosive Runes (3rd, 1), Otiluke's Resilient Sphere (4th, 3), Superior Resistance (6th, 1), Greater Anticipate Teleportation (7th, 1)

[BowStreetRunner]

Captain: Detect Ship (3rd, 1), Servant Horde (3rd, 1), Repair Critical Damage (4th, 3), Phantasmal Thief (5th, 1), Control Weather (7th, 1)I don't believe that Repair Damage spells work on anything but constructs. Now, if you have a ship that is also a construct, that would be totally awesome. RAW though, it probably won't work on a normal ship. Using Animate Objects on parts of the ship would allow you to use Repair Damage spells on them, but it would depend on where the damage occurred and what sort of things your DM allowed you to animate as to how useful this would be.

[Nettlekid]

Maybe not. Would Make Whole do the job? I don't want to Animate the ship.

[BowStreetRunner]

Maybe not. Would Make Whole do the job? I don't want to Animate the ship.

It would, but I do not know of an arcane version of Make Whole.

[Nettlekid]

I have a Cleric cohort who's tasked with the ship's upkeep anyway, so she can take care of that.

Once again, my spell list is as follows. Those marked with a * are Persisted, and those marked with a ^ are cast at the beginning of the day. In the case of Glibness, Snowsong, and Inner Beauty, they're also Extended so they last the majority of the day.

0:Prestidigitation, Summon Instrument, Detect Magic, Open/Close, Light, Message
1:Improvisation, Understand Object, Animate Rope, Master's Touch
2:Alter Self, Invisibility, Bladesong, Reveille
3:Glibness^, Ray of Dizziness, Sculpt Sound
4:Orb of Force, Celerity, Assay Spell Resistance, Ruin Delver's Fortune
5:Greater Blink*, Wall of Stone, Wall of Force, Streamers
6:Otto's Irresistible Dance, Glass Strike, Freezing Fog, Overwhelm
7:Greater Shadow Conjuration, Reverse Gravity, Arcane Spellsurge*, Limited Wish
8:Polymorph Any Object, Moment of Prescience, Greater Prying Eyes
9:Shapechange*, Mordenkainen's Disjunction

Via Runestaves:
1:True Casting
2:Scale Weakening
3:Detect Ship^, Servant Horde^, Shivering Touch, Explosive Runes
4:Enervation, Dominate Person, Otiluke's Resilient Sphere, Inner Beauty^
5:Phantasmal Thief, Hide From Dragons, Magic Jar
6:Disintegrate, Geas, Snowsong^, Superior Resistance^
7:Avasculate, Control Weather, Energy Immunity^, Greater Anticipate Teleportation^
9:Programmed Amnesia

EDIT: My DM has just let me know that he's planning on building Level 30 Metamagic-based casters for us to fight. I feel significantly less conflicted about using cheesy tactics. What are some good means that a caster can use to shut down another caster?