The Son of Ash Ketchum

[kulosle]

So I have some really good ideas for a pokemon catcher, but i'm having troubles bringing it to fruition. So essentially it's going to be a bard build that uses the Soothe the Beast feat to make animals fanatic. Then use his bardic abilities to make them amazing. I have a build that works but i know it's no where near optimized. Basic build is

Bard 6/Warchanter 10/Heartfire Fanner 4

take the ancestral relic feat (ash's hat) at 3rd level, and item familiar (same hat) at level 6. Make the hat a wondrous item that ups perform, and maybe handle animal. Have perform high enough to easily make animals and what not fanatic about me.

Unfortunately my ideas end there. Something that might be closer to optimized would be

Bard 4/Crusader 1/Warchanter 10/Sublime chord 1/Heart Fire Fanner 4

But this build, and the first one too, is very feat intensive and means i probably won't be taking ancestral relic or item familiar, as those feats are just for fun more than power, but i'd like to still be able to include them. I'd also like to optimize IC but that's also pretty feat intensive. Maybe feat shuffling. I'd also like to be able to take wild cohort at level 1 to be my starter pokemon. Any ideas and input would be amazing. Oh and take cosmopolitan to get handle animal as a class skill permanently.

I don't know what race i'd be but it will probably end up being human because i need that extra feat. But Spellscale lets me get DFI.

[Rebel7284]

Don't think animals respond to perform RAW. Handle Animal is the skill you need.

Perhaps Glibliness + Examplar to use bluff for your handle animal check? Add the 2nd Level cleric spell Guidance of the Avatar for +20 more.

Silverbrow Human can allow you to get DFI too.

edit: Just read the feat. It works. You can still use exemplar. :)

[kulosle]

Soothe the Beast (http://dndtools.eu/feats/eberron-campaign-setting--12/soothe-the-beast--2677/) is the feat i'm talking about. It lets you use a badic music attempt to let you use a perform check to affect an animals attitude as if you had wild empathy, but with perform.

[Feralventas]

While going about and capturing creatures may work, have you considered the summoner rout?

PF's summoner class would be the 1st go-to for my view, but even on 3.5 only content, a Sorcerer with summon spells fluffed as being released from a container works quite well, and allows for a wider variety of pokemon to work with. You could even pick up a familiar to act as your Pikachu. You could even ask for access to alternative summon spells to be able to represent other creatures you come across along the way.

Artificer might also work.
>Craft Wondrous Item.
>Bag of Holding.
>Permament Charm Monster effect.
>Refluff bag as box or other small container.
>Shrink Item and or Reduce Person spell crafted into it.
>Add in Ring of Sustenance.

You now have a container that, when thrown, grants a will save as per the highest spell effect on the item. If it fails the save vs Charm Monster, it is taken into the Holding item for the time being, with the creature inside also kept alive and sustained.

[Psyren]

The big problem with animals is that... well, they're stupid. Even if you get them to fanatic, getting them to actually do what you want them to do is another matter entirely. Even with amazing Handle Animal checks, the range of directions you can give them is pretty limited.

I think summons are the better way to go about this concept.

[Fouredged Sword]

A magical beast is only a -4 to the check, so I would look for some good ones. Blink dogs and phase spiders at lower levels, all the way to taming yourself the Tarrasque.

[Psyren]

A magical beast is only a -4 to the check, so I would look for some good ones. Blink dogs and phase spiders at lower levels, all the way to taming yourself the Tarrasque.

That only works on Int 1 or Int 2 magical beasts. All the ones you've listed are too smart for Wild Empathy. (Yes, even the dim-bulb Tarrasque.)

[Daftendirekt]

While going about and capturing creatures may work, have you considered the summoner rout?

PF's summoner class would be the 1st go-to for my view

Even better is a Preservationist (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/classes/base-classes/alchemist/archetypes/paizo---alchemist-archetypes/preservationist) Alchemist with the Planar Preservationist (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/feats/general-feats/planar-preservationist) feat. You can now Summon Monster AND Summon Nature's Ally, giving you a HUGE list of summons (i.e. Pokemon).

[Psyren]

Even better is a Preservationist (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/classes/base-classes/alchemist/archetypes/paizo---alchemist-archetypes/preservationist) Alchemist with the Planar Preservationist (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/feats/general-feats/planar-preservationist) feat. You can now Summon Monster AND Summon Nature's Ally, giving you a HUGE list of summons (i.e. Pokemon).

Yep, and you summon them as a standard action by uncorking flasks. I choose you!

[kulosle]

Using bard to buff all my animals will make them stronger, so will the war beast template which is easy to add on. I'm thinking about going into diplomacy as well so that i can get smarter creatures, but if i have a nice enough DM i should run into plenty of powerful creatures. There are lots of templates that you can put on animals that keep their Int below 3. I just have to hope I run into them, again nice DM. If not i will include Diplomacy. Ash was actual quite a good diplomat. And he talked legendary (intelligent) pokemon into helping him on more than one occasion. Also I'd like to keep this a 3.5 bard build. Willing to use pathfinder feats and items as my group already uses some pathfinder things anyways. But I'd mostly like to know more/better ways of stacking bonuses on my pokemon.

[Psyren]

Well, again I say, the thing about pokemon is that they are smart. Most aren't big on conversation but they can certainly understand pretty complex commands. Anything wild empathy is going to work on... isn't, by definition.

As for Warbeast, doesn't it take months, if not an entire year of training? That's fine if you're working it into your backstory or coming across one that's already trained, but it sounds like you're trying to make them from scratch.

[kulosle]

It takes two months normally but with a high handle animal check you can lessen it. it only takes a 70 to make it a day. But what are some good ways of giving all my animals bonuses. I've been looking through spells and there doesn't seem to be any good aoe buff spells.

[RogueDM]

For AOE buffs I would think the old stand-by Mass [insert animal]'s [insert aspect] would work. ie: Mass Cat's Grace etc. I can guess without looking that those aren't available to a bard (without some work-arounds at least) but some generously applied UMD can remedy that.

Also, while I'm sure it's totally not what you're looking for I will mention that Bride of the Portable Hole has what it calls the Ball Master PrC which is a summoner heavily (and blatantly) based on Ash Ketchum.

[Valwyn]

I read somewhere that there's a summoning variant that doesn't summon a random animal/outsider/whatever, but a specific one, meaning it always has the same stats (and possibly remembers you).

There's also this (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/variant/magic/summonMonsterVariants.htm).

This (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=191752) could also be of interest.

You could just replace the material component for the spells (a candle, I think) with some container of your choice.

[kulosle]

I really don't want to do it via summoning. It doesn't feel like i want it to, plus i always prefer doing something via skills. I'm a skill monkey at heart.

[Mithril Leaf]

Well you could always be a diplomancer and pick up an item of smoky confinement and telepathy somehow.

[Tvtyrant]

Leadership + magic jar spell. Put your followers inside of monster bodies and have them follow you into combat. If you can get ghost followers they can do it yhemselves

[Invader]

It takes two months normally but with a high handle animal check you can lessen it. it only 70 to make it a day. But what are some good ways of giving all my animals bonuses. I've been looking through spells and there doesn't seem to be any good aoe buff spells.

It's 2 months for a domestic animal which are generally pretty unimpressive, it's a year for rearing plus 2 months training.

I didn't see where you could lessen training time. :smallconfused: