Level 12 Dragonborn Druid with Vow of poverty

[deathwolf669]

Hey guys, I am looking at some help to build a Dragonborn Druid with VoP.

My starting characteristics are 18/16/14/12/10/10 with 3 points to add where I wish. I am guessing due to being able to wildshape I do not need to worry about Strength and Dex. I will probably spend most of my time as a Brown Bear to tag team with my Brown Bear again, an Ape for using tools and climbing or a fleshraker for all out carnage, or a Dragon if I can take dragon wild shape, if I am allowed.

Also if I took the Draconic Aspect Mind (Ex) would these abilities roll over into my wildshape form or would they be wasted if I was mostly in this form?

What I would like to know is what is a good race as I will be building him from level 1 up, I want to get VoP as soon as I can, for the RP aspects of the character.

I am looking for a way to communicate with my team while I am in wildshape, any suggestions for this?

[eggynack]

My starting characteristics are 18/16/14/12/10/10 with 3 points to add where I wish. I am guessing due to being able to wildshape I do not need to worry about Strength and Dex. I will probably spend most of my time as a Brown Bear to tag team with my Brown Bear again, an Ape for using tools and climbing or a fleshraker for all out carnage, or a Dragon if I can take dragon wild shape, if I am allowed.
Sounds about right. 18 wisdom and 16 constitution is obvious, and then 14 intelligence and 12 charisma is probably the way to go with the other two stats. I'd toss desmodu hunting bat onto the list of forms, though it's almost certainly redundant if you do end up taking dragon wild shape.


Also if I took the Draconic Aspect Mind (Ex) would these abilities roll over into my wildshape form or would they be wasted if I was mostly in this form?
They'd carry over to all appearances.

What I would like to know is what is a good race as I will be building him from level 1 up, I want to get VoP as soon as I can, for the RP aspects of the character.
Anthropomorphic bat (SS, 215) is a classic option, and it goes well with dragonborn. Desert half-orc (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/variant/races/environmentalRacialVariants.htm#desertHalfOrcs) is also good if you pick up half-orc substitution levels (RoD, 159).

I am looking for a way to communicate with my team while I am in wildshape, any suggestions for this?
A pearl of speech (MIC, 118) is likely the best option.

Edit: I'ma turn that maybe on the dragonborn mind thing into a yes. To quote alternate form, "The creature retains the special qualities of its original form." Mind is probably the best choice, because the other two abilities do not transfer over in a wild shape.

Double-edit: Crap. Forgot that you're itemless. Maybe toss a helm of telepathy to a teammate?

[Biffoniacus_Furiou]

Consider dipping a single level of Master of Many Forms to be able to talk when wild shaped. Another option would be to learn Drow Sign Language by spending two skill points.

[deathwolf669]

Consider dipping a single level of Master of Many Forms to be able to talk when wild shaped. Another option would be to learn Drow Sign Language by spending two skill points.

I want the level 20 druid thingy for elementals so I wont dip into another class, which book is drow sign language in and I will see if I can get a team mate to take it too, if not it will be a waste of points using sign language someone cant read.



Maybe toss a helm of telepathy to a teammate? I will see if I can get someone to take this but I don't think they will.

[Gavinfoxx]

Check Frozen Wild Shape or Exalted Wild Shape or Dragon Wild Shape for methods to talk in Wild shape -- even with a Vow of Poverty.

[eggynack]

Dragon wild shape is pretty sweet. Everything from true seeing to phenomenal flight to burrow+crazy tremorsense to gaseous form+spells to earthquakes once/wild shape, all in one neat package, and more stuff besides. Ya need lots of sources to make it great though. Exalted wild shape is comparatively all kindsa simple, basically just granting one amazing form (blink dog), one pretty decent form (unicorn), and heavily improved versions of all your other animal forms. It's all rather nifty.

[deathwolf669]

Ok so if I take a human to start with sacred vow as my bonus feat and then vow of poverty as my level 1 feat, when I become dragonborn I wont loose the sacred vow will I?




• If your original race granted you a nonspecific bonus feat (such
as the one gained by a human at 1st level), any feat can be lost, so long as it is not a prerequisite for another feat you have.

And as I am building him at level one I might as well ignore the +4 skills a human gets to start and the extra skill point each level?


• If your original race granted bonus skill points, you should deduct an appropriate amount of skill points from your current skill ranks. The specific skills affected are up to you, but the DM’s input might be required to adjudicate tricky situations (such as multiclass characters who might have purchased ranks of various skills as both class skills and cross-class skills).

[eggynack]

I think you would just lose a different feat, like, say, vow of poverty. It specifically says that you can lose any feat. Dragonborn human isn't the best idea.

[deathwolf669]

Ah, so it will remove a single feat rather than the one I took at that time?


But it implies that feat from the human race, not any you have chosen, unless it is a prerequisite, if any was lost then they would not have needed to state about the prerequisite

[eggynack]

Ah, so it will remove a single feat rather than the one I took at that time?
Seems like it, yeah. It'd be pretty weird otherwise, honestly.


Well guess I will RP to level 4 in my back story.
Well, you can get VoP at level three without bonus feats. You don't lose out on all that much, really, as all you miss is a pair of bonus exalted feats that wouldn't have gone to much use anyway. You pick up nymph's kiss or exalted companion at level 4, the one of those you missed at 6th, exalted wild shape at level 8, intuitive attack or touch of golden ice at 10th, the other one at 12th, and then something like nimbus of light and stigmata or something. Even on a druid, for whom the strong exalted feats run stronger than on any other, they're going to run dry pretty fast.

Edit:
But it implies that feat from the human race, not any you have chosen, unless it is a prerequisite, if any was lost then they would not have needed to state about the prerequisite
It doesn't really imply that though. It explicitly says that if your race gave you a feat, then you can lose any feat. They needed to say the thing about the prerequisite because otherwise the set of "Any feat you've taken" could include prerequisite feats. This isn't a bonus, in other words. It's a restriction.

[Phelix-Mu]

Hmm. Does the elven dragonborn lose all of those free weapon proficiencies? I'm suddenly wondering why I don't know this, as I've made a dragonborn elf cohort for one of my group's pcs before.

[eggynack]

Hmm. Does the elven dragonborn lose all of those free weapon proficiencies? I'm suddenly wondering why I don't know this, as I've made a dragonborn elf cohort for one of my group's pcs before.
I don't see why they wouldn't. They are bonus feats, after all, and they're also not listed as something that sticks around, which would be necessary for you to keep them. You're mostly stuck with races that are mostly good for the stat boosts, and maybe some races with negative traits like the buoman which could theoretically ditch the speechlessness with their other racial traits. It's a lot of cheese for minor gains though.

[bekeleven]

Edit: I'ma turn that maybe on the dragonborn mind thing into a yes. To quote alternate form, "The creature retains the special qualities of its original form." Mind is probably the best choice, because the other two abilities do not transfer over in a wild shape.

As a note, I'd call this a bit more RAW-ambiguous than you do, especially with the wings. The wings are an extraordinary special quality that grant a physical quality with a move speed attached. My interpretation of alternate form was that when it says, "The creature loses the natural weapons, natural armor, and movement modes of its original form", it's talking about natural abilities, so you could get away with a layer of abstraction.

[eggynack]

As a note, I'd call this a bit more RAW-ambiguous than you do, especially with the wings. The wings are an extraordinary special quality that grant a physical quality with a move speed attached. My interpretation of alternate form was that when it says, "The creature loses the natural weapons, natural armor, and movement modes of its original form", it's talking about natural abilities, so you could get away with a layer of abstraction.
I don't see what the wings are outside of a movement mode of your original form. It's really not RAW-ambiguous at all, because the text says what it says, though going the other way on it probably wouldn't cause the world to dissolve in hellfire.

[Zaq]

Shape Soulmeld for the Shedu Crown is probably the best way to get telepathy on an itemless character without dips. I forget if you need to take Open Least Chakra (Crown) to get the telepathy function, or if the telepathy is the basic shape (AFB at the moment), but even if it takes two feats, it's unambiguous, doesn't rely on DM adjudication or teammate cooperation, and can be used for more than just talking to teammates. Plus, you're a Druid . . . How many feats do you really need to kick ass, amirite?

[bekeleven]

I don't see what the wings are outside of a movement mode of your original form. It's really not RAW-ambiguous at all, because the text says what it says, though going the other way on it probably wouldn't cause the world to dissolve in hellfire.

Not quite.

Fly and Flight have different entries in the glossary. This is because one refers to a movement mode and one refers to a special ability. For further reading, try the rules compendium:


NATURAL ABILITIES
This category includes abilities a creature has because of its physical nature, such as a bird’s ability to fly. Natural abilities are those not otherwise designated as extraordinary, supernatural, or spell-like. They’re rarely identified as natural...

"Natural Abilities" seems to line up perfect with the abilities removed by alternate form, if you ask me.

Edit: This made more sense when I was responding to your un-edited post.

[eggynack]

Indeed. Didn't notice the second definition of flight before. Anyways, this is still a movement mode, natural or not. Keeping some of the gliding is plausible, if unlikely, but when you start getting actual flight speeds, that's a definitely listed thing that you lose. It wouldn't be all that good, in other words.

[deathwolf669]

Ah well, will hope the DM will let me off with the extra feats, if not I guess I will start as a ghostwise halfling. How will size affect my changing or doesn't it?

EDIT: Forgot to ask, how can I get my knowledge nature up to 15 at level 12, as I thought skills cap at your level?

[Chronos]

If you wanted to maximize your exalted feats, it'd go something like this:
Level 1: Be a human. Take Sacred Vow and Vow of Poverty as your first two feats. This immediately gives you an exalted feat: It might as well be Nymph's Kiss, since that gives you more benefit the earlier you take it.
Level 2: Get another bonus exalted feat. It doesn't matter which one this is. Then, go through the Rite of Rebirth and become a dragonborn. Your original race gave you a bonus feat, so you need to give up one feat (it doesn't matter which one). Give up that level 2 exalted feat-- You'll have more than enough of those anyway.
Past that, just proceed as normal, taking whatever feats you want. Effectively, starting as a human doesn't give you an extra feat itself, but it lets you take Vow of Poverty earlier, which nets you a couple of feats.

That said, though, it's probably not worth it. Better to start with some other race that gives you something useful that you'll keep when you're reborn, and just settle for getting VoP at level 3. You'll still run out of worthwhile exalted feats pretty quickly anyway: You'd eventually want Nymph's Kiss, Exalted Wildshape, Intuitive Attack, and Touch of Golden Ice... and probably not much else. You'll have all of that by level 10, just from your bonus feats.

EDIT:
EDIT: Forgot to ask, how can I get my knowledge nature up to 15 at level 12, as I thought skills cap at your level?
In D&D 3.5, the skill cap is level+3. Perhaps you're thinking of Pathfinder? I think the cap is equal to your level there.

[eggynack]

Ah well, will hope the DM will let me off with the extra feats, if not I guess I will start as a ghostwise halfling. How will size affect my changing or doesn't it?
Size stays the same after dragonborn. You'd lose speak without sound though, which is presumably the reason you want to be a ghostwise halfling. Seriously, dragonborn is great, but there's only a narrow swath of races that it actually works on in an effective manner. Have you considered just going human or strongheart halfing and just leaving dragonborn behind? Might be a good choice.

EDIT: Forgot to ask, how can I get my knowledge nature up to 15 at level 12, as I thought skills cap at your level?
They cap at your level+3. So, just do that.

Edit: @Chronos: Huh, that's pretty cool. Hadn't considered using exalted feats to fuel dragonborn. Your list of exalted feats is missing companion though, cause that lets you put VoP on your animal companion, which is reasonably strong.

[deathwolf669]

I can get VoP on my AC as well, sweet how do I do such a thing and do they get all the bonuses I would?

Thank you chronos I will do it like that :)

[Chronos]

Ah, right, I was listing feats from memory. Silly of me to forget that druids get more good stuff than everyone else. So level 12 to get all the feats you want from a non-human race, then. By contrast, doing it as a human gives you all your exalted feats by 10, plus leaves your level 3 general feat open. Not a huge difference, IMO.

Incidentally, this whole problem does a very good job of accentuating the problem with Vow of Poverty: There are a whole bunch of little miscellaneous abilities that you can get from items, that aren't replicated by the effects of the Vow. Even with a druid, widely considered the class least hurt by poverty, misses out on the Pearl of Speech, which doesn't overpower anything but makes the game a lot more fun, without any easy way to replace it.

[eggynack]

I can get VoP on my AC as well, sweet how do I do such a thing and do they get all the bonuses I would?

You just pick up exalted companion, and then you have a perfectly intelligent and aligned animal friend to dump feats on. As for bonus quantity, I'm pretty sure it's HD based, and while animal companions don't usually keep up perfectly with you HD-wise, they don't fall that far behind either. You are an extra level behind in advancement terms, because that's the minimum deduction for one of the exalted companions, but that's not the worst thing. Realistically the animal won't get the same bonuses as you will, but it will get a lot of them. Natural bond (CAdv, 111) helps with that, and might even get your animal companion to a greater quantity of VoP bonuses than you get at some levels. For example, you can get a celestial fleshraker at level five, and that means 4 HD, but with natural bond that would increase to 6 HD.


Incidentally, this whole problem does a very good job of accentuating the problem with Vow of Poverty: There are a whole bunch of little miscellaneous abilities that you can get from items, that aren't replicated by the effects of the Vow. Even with a druid, widely considered the class least hurt by poverty, misses out on the Pearl of Speech, which doesn't overpower anything but makes the game a lot more fun, without any easy way to replace it.
They lose out on a lot more than that, though the pearl of speech is nice. Offhand, you're missing stuff like a ring of the beast, mantle of the beast, lesser rod of extend spell, belt of battle, monk's belt, golden desert honey, bone ring (neat for ability draining sanctified spells, ironically enough), and a bunch of other stuff besides. Druid itemization is more about making the things you do more awesome than covering for deficiencies.

[deathwolf669]

YEPY, thanks for the help guys, will get him written up tonight then have to do one without VoP with a purse of 88k :D

[Chronos]

They lose out on a lot more than that, though the pearl of speech is nice. Offhand, you're missing stuff like...
Those are all quantitative things, though: They make you better at what you do, but they don't really let you do anything you couldn't without them. And honestly, Vow of Poverty does a decent job on the numbers (not great, but decent). Doing without them is a nerf, but honestly, on a druid, a bit of nerfing is fine. A druid with a pearl of speech, however, is qualitatively different from one without, and in ways that are good for the fun of the game. It doesn't particularly make you much more powerful; it just enables you to role-play more.

[eggynack]

Those are all quantitative things, though: They make you better at what you do, but they don't really let you do anything you couldn't without them. And honestly, Vow of Poverty does a decent job on the numbers (not great, but decent). Doing without them is a nerf, but honestly, on a druid, a bit of nerfing is fine. A druid with a pearl of speech, however, is qualitatively different from one without, and in ways that are good for the fun of the game. It doesn't particularly make you much more powerful; it just enables you to role-play more.
I wouldn't call most of these things quantitative. Using up lower level spell slots, and reducing the action cost of various things, is a thing of great qualitative benefit. Either that or quantitative means a much wider variety of stuff than I'm aware of, because by this definition incantatrix provides mostly quantitative bonuses. You can absolutely survive without these things, because a druid can survive without anything, but these are the items that make druids without VoP better than druids with VoP.

[deathwolf669]

Just though which AC is best to put the celestial template on or is it better to take an exalted companion from the list?

[Biffoniacus_Furiou]

I want the level 20 druid thingy for elementals so I wont dip into another class, which book is drow sign language in and I will see if I can get a team mate to take it too, if not it will be a waste of points using sign language someone cant read.

It's listed as a possible bonus language for Drow (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/monsters/elf.htm#drow) PCs in the Monster Manual/SRD.

[deathwolf669]

It goes into better description in the underdome book

[eggynack]

Just though which AC is best to put the celestial template on or is it better to take an exalted companion from the list?
I don't think there's anything particularly noteworthy on the exalted companion list, so you'd probably do best with a standard companion with the template. The best companion of that kind is probably the same as it always is, which is a fleshraker dinosaur, but there might be a little more attention paid to the highest HD you can pack on, because of the VoP thing. I don't know the statistics around maximizing the HD of animal companions, unfortunately, but you'd probably do fine with the fleshraker. Can't go too far off course at least.

[WhamBamSam]

I don't think there's anything particularly noteworthy on the exalted companion list, so you'd probably do best with a standard companion with the template. The best companion of that kind is probably the same as it always is, which is a fleshraker dinosaur, but there might be a little more attention paid to the highest HD you can pack on, because of the VoP thing. I don't know the statistics around maximizing the HD of animal companions, unfortunately, but you'd probably do fine with the fleshraker. Can't go too far off course at least.HD optimization is also good for other things when the AC is intelligent enough to take real person feats. And at high levels, when he's just sharing your Shapechange spell anyway, more HD and more feats are the only things that really matter for him, insofar as an AC matters at all at those levels.

Still, Fleshrakers are pretty great, and the 12 HD one would have at Druid 12 assuming Natural Bond is enough for say...

1 - Sacred Vow
3 - Vow of Poverty
4 - Touch of the Golden Ice
6 - Martial Study (Battle Leader's Charge), Exalted Feat
8 - Sanctify Natural Attack
9 - Martial Stance (Leading the Charge)
10 - Exalted Feat
12 - Martial Study (White Raven Tactics), Exalted Feat

Plus Multiattack, for being an Animal Companion.

An Animal Companion that can WRT you 1/encounter as a swift action. He can also charge pretty well, and make all your other pet fighters (summoned or otherwise) charge better.

EDIT: 5gp says that this gets ToB banned instead of Druids or Exalted Companion.

[eggynack]

The real problem is that you have a lot of those listed as just "exalted feat", and I have no idea how to effectively fill those slots in a meaningful way. Druids have it easy, but animal companions are much worse off on this account. Crazy ToB animal companion, justified in the insanity by your companion's intelligence, is crazy nifty though. It's just more proof of the ultimate truth: druid optimization is everything optimization.

[WhamBamSam]

The real problem is that you have a lot of those listed as just "exalted feat", and I have no idea how to effectively fill those slots in a meaningful way. Druids have it easy, but animal companions are much worse off on this account. Crazy ToB animal companion, justified in the insanity by your companion's intelligence, is crazy nifty though. It's just more proof of the ultimate truth: druid optimization is everything optimization.Yeah, exalted feats kinda suck, and they suck worse for Animal Companions. Nymph's Kiss might or might not bring the skill points up to 2/level depending on the reading, but I'm not sure how much that actually helps. There are a few minor save bonuses you could get him (Vow of Obedience is fitting, and stacks with his regular old Devotion), but again, not that exciting. If you do something other than the crazy ToB companion, you might be able to qualify for some slightly better feats, but there's really nothing he could be doing that trumps WRTing you, at least not that I can think of.

An Animal Companion that makes the Fighter cry is child's play. Making the Warblade cry, now that's accomplishing something. Of course the Warblade is actually unambiguously better than Mr. WRT Fleshraker by a significant margin, but still.

[deathwolf669]

I have been told take one from the area so frostburn book, if I can't take a fleshraker which animal do I take?

I was going to take a brown bear but if there is better I can buff tht would be great.

What's a ToB companion?

[RegalKain]

Uhhh, I didn't see anyone say it was banned, so, why not use Unearthed Arcana and pick up a flaw(Or two) to get yourself into VOP at level 1? I think it's page 91 of Unearthed Arcana. As for the rest of this, sorry I'm not much help here, I don't do Druids, though I do enjoy the Animal Companion and Wild Empathy, just not casters in general.

[deathwolf669]

Its a house rule the DM has set. I might try and push the matter as my character is from a more temperate climate.

[WhamBamSam]

I have been told take one from the area so frostburn book, if I can't take a fleshraker which animal do I take?

I was going to take a brown bear but if there is better I can buff tht would be great.

What's a ToB companion?See my post above. Since Celestial Animals have Int 3, they are intelligent enough to take real person feats, like Martial Study/Martial Stance. A 12 HD Animal Companion (so 4 HD+the 8 bonus HD at level 12, possibly using Natural Bond to keep the progression up for a Druid level 4 companion like a Fleshraker) can get White Raven Tactics, and hence give you, the Druid, extra or earlier actions.

You could also be doing some sort of Shape Soulmeld/Open Chakra shenanigans or go for other maneuvers/stances, but I don't really know of anything the companion could be doing that trumps WRT.

I don't know offhand of a good arctic themed animal companion, but a look through Frostburn might yield something.