Where to go with this weird character?

[Horsehead]

Hey all,

I read about a really interesting idea on another website that I am tempted to try out when my friends and I start playing again...

"Be a wizard. Raise CON and DEX. Take Skill Focus: Handle Animal and Collegiate Wizard.

Sell your spellbook. This is worth a lot of money because of the spells in it.
Use the hundreds? Thousand+? GP to buy riding dogs. Lots and lots of riding dogs, already trained.

Be a Forest Gnome.

You now have a hoard of 2-HD, highly-effective-at-level-1 melee "characters" as pets. You're Tiny, they're Medium, you can hide among them and get full cover... and they tear anything you meet apart."

I was wondering though where I should go with this character as I level. What spells would benefit this strategy? Feats? Equipment? It's been a long time since I have played Dungeons and Dragons and any help would be appreciated! Thanks. :)

[nedz]

It would be great at very low level — unless the challenge you are facing makes this trick irrelevant — but after only a couple of levels you will want your spellbook back.

I suspect that the suggestion you found was a joke, do you have a link ?

[Nettlekid]

Hey all,

I read about a really interesting idea on another website that I am tempted to try out when my friends and I start playing again...

"Be a wizard. Raise CON and DEX. Take Skill Focus: Handle Animal and Collegiate Wizard.

Sell your spellbook. This is worth a lot of money because of the spells in it.
Use the hundreds? Thousand+? GP to buy riding dogs. Lots and lots of riding dogs, already trained.

Be a Forest Gnome.

You now have a hoard of 2-HD, highly-effective-at-level-1 melee "characters" as pets. You're Tiny, they're Medium, you can hide among them and get full cover... and they tear anything you meet apart."

I was wondering though where I should go with this character as I level. What spells would benefit this strategy? Feats? Equipment? It's been a long time since I have played Dungeons and Dragons and any help would be appreciated! Thanks. :)

I do like the idea, because it's rather silly and interesting, but I would like to point out that in order to make your spellbook worth anything special, you're going to have to put some significant investment into your Wizard levels. Even with Collegiate Wizard, you'll probably only have six or seven 1st level spells. A Wizard without the feat but with say, 16 Int (reasonable) has close to that. And they're only level 1 spells, so they're not in super high demand. You want more money than a 1st level Wizard would have, let alone pay, for measly 1st level spells.

Secondly, you're going to have a really hard time controlling your minions if you have to make Handle Animal checks to get them to act, and you will since you have no special Druid-y powers to make them do so. And they're going to be very difficult to train. It'll take months. Months that you could have spent playing a Druid and selling your daily spells for a lower price, but you'll never run out, and forming an animal army that you will eventually be able to directly speak to.

[Horsehead]

http://forum.rpg.net/archive/index.php/t-347201.html

The post is roughly a third of the way down the page. There isn't really any other discussion on it.

While you may be right about it being a joke post, I would still like to pursue this character. It just sounds too amusing to pass up. I mean, there is always the option of not selling your book or buying it back later?

[Horsehead]

I do like the idea, because it's rather silly and interesting, but I would like to point out that in order to make your spellbook worth anything special, you're going to have to put some significant investment into your Wizard levels. Even with Collegiate Wizard, you'll probably only have six or seven 1st level spells. A Wizard without the feat but with say, 16 Int (reasonable) has close to that. And they're only level 1 spells, so they're not in super high demand. You want more money than a 1st level Wizard would have, let alone pay, for measly 1st level spells.

Secondly, you're going to have a really hard time controlling your minions if you have to make Handle Animal checks to get them to act, and you will since you have no special Druid-y powers to make them do so. And they're going to be very difficult to train. It'll take months. Months that you could have spent playing a Druid and selling your daily spells for a lower price, but you'll never run out, and forming an animal army that you will eventually be able to directly speak to.

So you're saying druid would allow me to do the same thing only WAY easier? Sounds good to me! Can I get some help setting up a Forest Gnome Druid that is all about his pack of animals? I should of thought of going druid in the first place. Hehe!

[Urpriest]

How are you hiding among them? Soft Cover doesn't let you hide normally.

[Horsehead]

How are you hiding among them? Soft Cover doesn't let you hide normally.

Honestly, I have no idea. I'm just getting back into Dungeons and Dragons and don't remember much about specific rules.

[Captnq]

Dogs cost a minimum of 150 gp each.

Your spellbook has 3 1st level spells and 35 cantrips (assuming you are playing with every possible official book.) Each 1st level is 100 gp. A cantrip is 50 gp. that makes your spellbook 2050 gp. However, it is far more likely you only have 18 cantrips and 3 1st level spells (Most DMs would not allow EVERY cantrip. Only the ones out of the PHB.) so your book is more likely 1,200 gp.

Now you sell it, you get 50% of the value. That leaves you with 600 gp or 4 dogs. Hardly the end all be all of power gaming, but not bad for the first level.

However, you still have to count those dogs against your WBL. Which means that even if you manage to scrape up another 10,000 gp, you still cannot have more the 900 gp in equipment, and the dogs count as equipment. That means at most 6 dogs.

And you are naked. So an effective limit of five dogs, if you want to own pants.

[nedz]

http://forum.rpg.net/archive/index.php/t-347201.html

The post is roughly a third of the way down the page. There isn't really any other discussion on it.

While you may be right about it being a joke post, I would still like to pursue this character. It just sounds too amusing to pass up. I mean, there is always the option of not selling your book or buying it back later?

OK — it seems to be a thread about how to make a powerful 1st level character. This is fine except that the game is about character development and the suggestions in the thread offer only early gratification.

I'm pretty sure there are better ways to build a dog handler. IIRC Handle Animal allows you to have three highly trained animals so you just need to find a class which has this as a class skill. Now there are many such classes, but Wizard isn't one of them. You can also spend you money on buying more dogs but it takes a while to train these. Also you could choose a class with an animal companion, this would give you one dog with several boosts.

[Platymus Pus]

Sounds like the murder hobo/hermit class:smallbiggrin:
This probably would be more effective in mountain areas.

[eggynack]

So you're saying druid would allow me to do the same thing only WAY easier? Sounds good to me! Can I get some help setting up a Forest Gnome Druid that is all about his pack of animals? I should of thought of going druid in the first place. Hehe!
Eh, druids are mostly about just the one animal, being his animal companion. You could go Beastmaster from Complete Adventurer page 26, but that class is surprisingly terrible. I'd generally just rely on the animal companion, and fill out my ranks with summons on an encounter by encounter basis. You could always pick up wild cohort from hereabouts (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/re/20031118a), and increase your animal ranks to two, and maybe throw natural bond (CAdv, 111) and pump your AC (just one though. The errata stops it from hitting multiple AC's) to additional competence. Companion Spellbond (PHBII, 77) is also nice for AC boosting purposes.

[Nettlekid]

Except that they also get Wild Empathy. Although it's harder to boost, remember that it's basically Diplomacy for animals. Now think about the mischief a Diplomacer can get up to.

[Horsehead]

Alright so I am going to be a Druid with Handle Animal! Thank you for the suggestion! Just a couple more questions...

What stats should I aim for as a druid planning to rely on his animals a lot?

What monsters are in the game that resemble dogs but have better stats? I imagine the basic dogs I plan to start with won't cut it once I level up a bit.

Also, would it make sense to take some levels in bard at some point for the buffs it can provide to the party?

Thank you. :)

[eggynack]

Alright so I am going to be a Druid with Handle Animal! Thank you for the suggestion! Just a couple more questions...

What stats should I aim for as a druid planning to rely on his animals a lot?

What monsters are in the game that resemble dogs but have better stats? I imagine the basic dogs I plan to start with won't cut it once I level up a bit.

Also, would it make sense to take some levels in bard at some point for the buffs it can provide to the party?

Thank you. :)
Well, I'd just use standard stat assignment, and where I'd ordinarily bump intelligence, I'd push charisma instead. That means wisdom as primary, constitution as secondary, and charisma as tertiary. Put some skill points in diplomacy for the wild empathy, and handle animal for both wild empathy, and for handling animals. Also, you can exchange survival for sense motive for the diplomacy synergy bonus by using skilled city-dweller from the cityscape web enhancement. You should generally use war trained riding dogs, because those guys are reasonably powerful. Finally, do not take bard levels, because bard levels are not druid levels, and outside of like three prestige classes, the only thing a druid wants is more druid.

[Nettlekid]

Alright so I am going to be a Druid with Handle Animal! Thank you for the suggestion! Just a couple more questions...

What stats should I aim for as a druid planning to rely on his animals a lot?

What monsters are in the game that resemble dogs but have better stats? I imagine the basic dogs I plan to start with won't cut it once I level up a bit.

Also, would it make sense to take some levels in bard at some point for the buffs it can provide to the party?

Thank you. :)

Druids like high Wis, of course, because it's their casting stat. Usually they tend to dump Cha, but you're going to be using Handle Animal and Wild Empathy which both use Cha, so you'd want that non-negative at least. Druids also usually don't use Int for much, but you want to max your ranks in Handle Animal and other skills like Knowledge: Nature and Spellcraft, so having a decent Int will be good for your skill points. Con is also important because it determines your HP, of course, but apart from that Druids usually get by with low physical stats because their Wild Shape forms have high physical stats. I might suggest bumping up to Middle-Aged or Old, if +1/-1 or +2/-3 to your mental/physical is worth it to you. Venerable, +3/-6, is usually not worth it unless you're REALLY not worried about low HP.

I'm not sure what animals would be good for you. Usually stronger animals are actually Magical Beasts, which Handle Animal works poorly on if they have Int 1 or 2, and not at all if they have higher Int than that. They aren't dog-like, but any Dire animal like Dire Bears, Dire Wolves, or Dire Jackals/Pumas (Sandstorm) are pretty good meatshields. Dinosaurs are also animals, such as the well-renowned Fleshraker. Don't forget that you also have an animal companion, which is easier to control and can be potentially very strong.

Something else you might like is the Elven Ranger (Races of the Wild), which gets Wild Empathy like a Druid and an Animal Companion as though he was a Druid of 3 fewer levels, but that animal companion can be an Elven Hound (again, Races of the Wild) which, while not very strong, is a Magical Beast that you treat as an Animal and is very very houndlike.

If you do prefer Druid, and maybe the whole Gnome thing loses its appeal, you might then like to look at the Shifter Druid levels from Races of Eberron. They get +2 Dex, -2 Int, and -2 Cha, which doesn't seem great, except that they also get +2 on one physical stat based on their choice of shifting form while shifting (or +2 Wis if you're a Dreamsight Shifter, which you probably will want to be.) They give up their Animal Companion, but gain a Beast Spirit that as you level up, can be used to grant yourself a physical stat bonus (hint: Con), boost your Wild Empathy and Handle Animal a little (offsetting that -2 Cha and then some), you can pass your spirit to another animal like one of your pets or something that you summon to grant that pet the spirit's benefits, speed up your Summon Nature's Ally, and more. Pretty nifty. The later Shifter Druid levels give your +2 Reflex and -2 Will (*shrug*) and then make you lose Wild Shape in order to boost your racial Shifting, which isn't worth it, so don't take that level. But the Beast Spirit is pretty cool.

It's generally a bad idea to multiclass into anything, let alone Bard, because you'll be losing out on level-based bonuses from Druid (like Wild Empathy and your Animal Companion/Beast Spirit) and not getting enough in return.

However, looking around, I see that there's a Bard variant in Unearthed Arcana that gives up Bardic Knowledge, Inspire Courage, Inspire Competence, Inspire Greatness, and Inspire Heroics in favor of a Druid's Animal Companion, Nature Sense, Resist Nature's Lure, and Wild Empathy. Which is interesting. You lose a lot of the Bard's music buffing ability, but if you like the Bard spells more, you could go with that. However, it doesn't seem to make Handle Animal a class skill, so that's probably bad for you in the long run.

Anyway, I hope that answered a few questions, and gave you some ideas.

[nedz]

Some (http://www.minmaxboards.com/index.php?topic=940) Druid (http://brilliantgameologists.com/boards/index.php?topic=10942) handbooks (http://brilliantgameologists.com/boards/index.php?topic=6531): these should handle most of your questions.

And one (http://www.minmaxboards.com/index.php?topic=1300) about Handle Animal.

Ed: Pesky broken links — fixed now

[Zomg Zombies]

Animal Lord looks like a good direction to me http://dndtools.eu/classes/animal-lord/

Also a dip in warlock for Call of the beast would go miles for organizing and training your dog's of war

[Gavinfoxx]

If you sell your spellbook, you will want to retrain to eidetic wizard.

[Andezzar]

However, you still have to count those dogs against your WBL. Which means that even if you manage to scrape up another 10,000 gp, you still cannot have more the 900 gp in equipment, and the dogs count as equipment. That means at most 6 dogs.WBL only applies during character creation. Once in play a character can amass whatever wealth he is able to get his fingers on. Since any selling of items must occur during paly and not during character creation he has no limits.

[Killer Angel]

While you may be right about it being a joke post, I would still like to pursue this character. It just sounds too amusing to pass up.

To be fair, it would be amusing for a single session of play...


That leaves you with 600 gp or 4 dogs. Hardly the end all be all of power gaming, but not bad for the first level.

Sadly, once a dog is dead, it remains dead. And you lose a quarter of your power!

[Grayson01]

For the Wizard I would say take Spell Mastery at first.