Swarm control

[Kazy]

I have a game coming up in a few weeks and I'd like to play a character that revolves around controlling or summoning swarms. Is this possible?/How would you go about it?

For creating the char, assume a lvl 20 character and any possible race; the DM likes optimizers.

[ZamielVanWeber]

Bland and a little meh: Be a summoner, give up your familiar and bonus feats for the rapid summoning and variety of boosts (like free Augment summoning to start). Use Arcane Thesis on Summon Swarm so you can use Twin and Extend at the same time. Spend the rest of your time dropping some buffs spells so they don't get dropped by AoE. Human works best for this (with the bonus feat) along with Strongheart halfling.

[Rebel7284]

Don't warlocks get it as an at-will invocation pretty early? They don't actually have any control of the swarm though.

[kulosle]

Vermin lord is clearly the best option here. It's from Book of vile darkness, give it a read. Don't know what you'd do for a base class though, cleric or druid obviously, prolly doesn't matter which. Their capstone is amazing. But i'd understand a GM not allowing it, it is technically 3.0.

[Deophaun]

Well, let's see what's available.

Cleric: insect plague (L5), summon clockwork mender swarm (L4), summon pest swarm (L4)

Druid: creeping doom (L7), elemental swarm (L9, not really a swarm), insect plague (L5), summon elementite swarm (L4), summon pest swarm (L4), summon swarm (L2)

Wizard/Sorcerer: doom scarabs (L4, not a swarm, but swarm-themed), fire spiders (L6), summon clockwork mender swarm (L4), summon pest swarm (L4), summon swarm (L2)

If you can get access to the pestilence domain, you can get plague of rats (L5) and otyugh swarm (L9, not really a swarm).

Edit:

Vermin lord is clearly the best option here. It's from Book of vile darkness, give it a read.
Best for flavor, but the class is pretty terrible.

[ZamielVanWeber]

Actually their capstone gets ridiculous under BoVD rules. Suddenly in a swarm, that you control, that has sorcerous powers, means that players can create situations where they are casting at way higher than their character level.

[Deophaun]

Actually their capstone gets ridiculous under BoVD rules. Suddenly in a swarm, that you control, that has sorcerous powers, means that players can create situations where they are casting at way higher than their character level.
But you're going through 9 levels of suck to get it. So, it's fine as long as you're starting the game at high levels and don't have to actually play it.

It's really a class that is more suited to an NPC than a PC.

[Kazy]

There was a Swarm template somewhere, which I can't find. I could house rule some invocations with that, but I can't find it.