Village Idiot...with a twist! (3.5)

[Uhtred]

The concept is the Village Idiot by the wishing well in Peeptown from the miniseries "The 10th Kingdom." For those unfamiliar with the scene in question, he has fond memories of when the town's well was a real magic well that people came from miles around to bless things in. He makes it his life's work to stand by the well until it fills up again and so fulfill his destiny of becoming a Complete Idiot. But because my PC's are 16th-lvl, the majority of them are casters, and they haven't met a villain yet that hasn't been curb-stomped, it can't possibly be that simple.
I was browsing Cityscape and happened upon the Invisible Spell and Deceptive Spell metamagic feats and LOVED them. Invisible spells that, if viewed through Arcane Sight originated from somewhere else? Combined with Silent Spell and Still Spell? Throw Extend Spell on there, combined with the wishing well being on a hill overlooking the entire town, and he's got a line of sight to virtually everywhere in town, and even the extra observant won't have any idea what's happening or where it's coming from. And given how stingy the PC's are with their gold, they certainly won't be making any donations to the Idiot's well, provoking his wrath.
So he's a human sorcerer 16, with Still Spell, Silent Spell, Invisible Spell, Deceptive Spell, and Extend Spell. He's got two more feats, but I'm not sure what other feats, Metamagic or otherwise, would fit with the build of a powerful caster that nobody would suspect is a powerful caster, and is so built for misdirection that nobody will ever suspect it's him. Naturally he's got a very very high Charisma, for the inevitable Bluff checks he'll have to make, with Perform (Idiocy) being maxed out, too. Figure the rest of his stats (Except Con) will be dumped, essentially. Suggestions for feats? He's a straight Sorcerer right now, but are there any PrC's out there that fit?

[Erik Vale]

Reach spell for extra range [I think]. Make that perform acting.

[supermonkeyjoe]

Have look at the conceal spellcasting skill trick from complete scoundrel. It lets you make a sleight of hand check to hide the fact you're casting a spell, and is certainly cheaper that still/silenting all the spells

[Azoth]

You can remove Still + Silent spell if you are willing to max out Sleight of Hand. It allows you to disguise the verbal and somatic components of spells as something else. So Sleight of Hand vs Spot to notice he is the caster. Great way for him to ramble nonsense and things happen.

Arcane preparation lets your sorc prepare some of his spells so using metamagiced versions won't take a full round action to cast them. Great for those get out of jail free spells.

An approach that could still be fun is to have had the well made by any divine caster that had gone into rune caster. Since it is a long standing and somewhat forgotten about well, it could very well have its bricks covered in runes with the conditions set as "when well is x amount full and something is put in cast X on item/person". This basically allows the well to cast buffs/blessings on people for no resource expenditure at all, not even an activation action as dropping something is a free action. Let your idiot has studied the well, and lerned of these runes and what they can do. This way he can use the well to pre buff himself for the party when the showdown happens. If the fight goes badly, he can drop in larger "donations" for a free action casting of Heal or some other high end restorative ability.

[Segev]

If you're not wedded to Sorcerer, Psion can manifest his powers without all those feats with just a concentration check to suppress the display.

That said, I do think Sorcerer has more style, here.

[Uhtred]

Have look at the conceal spellcasting skill trick from complete scoundrel. It lets you make a sleight of hand check to hide the fact you're casting a spell, and is certainly cheaper that still/silenting all the spells

That well may be, but given he's mostly going to be spamming still silent deceptive invisible fireballs, is level 16, and totally willing to use up a few 6th-lvl spell slots to hide it. Plus the skill check's once per encounter, and the metamagic feats can apply every time. :)


Arcane preparation lets your sorc prepare some of his spells so using metamagiced versions won't take a full round action to cast them. Great for those get out of jail free spells.

An approach that could still be fun is to have had the well made by any divine caster that had gone into rune caster. Since it is a long standing and somewhat forgotten about well, it could very well have its bricks covered in runes with the conditions set as "when well is x amount full and something is put in cast X on item/person". This basically allows the well to cast buffs/blessings on people for no resource expenditure at all, not even an activation action as dropping something is a free action. Let your idiot has studied the well, and lerned of these runes and what they can do. This way he can use the well to pre buff himself for the party when the showdown happens. If the fight goes badly, he can drop in larger "donations" for a free action casting of Heal or some other high end restorative ability.

I love this. I love it a lot. I love everything here. The rune well is definitely happening. Thank you for that! :D


If you're not wedded to Sorcerer, Psion can manifest his powers without all those feats with just a concentration check to suppress the display.

That said, I do think Sorcerer has more style, here.

I am a bit wedded to Sorcerer, but that could just be because I'm terrified of the Psionics system. That's excellent to know, though. :)

So, taking a new tack, what invisible, untraceable spells could provide the most entertainment? Fireball, obviously, likewise Defenestrating Sphere. Maybe Telekinesis? Mage hand? Ghost sound? His whole schtick is that he asks people to donate to the well, because it's "bad luck not to," so when they walk away they suddenly have awful luck until they do.

[Arc_knight25]

For all the metamagic your using, maybe going into Incantrix to drop the spell slot of those metamagics by 1 each. All the metamagics except for Invisible have a +1 spell slot.

Incantrix will drop them all to 0 spell slots so your fireball will still be using a lvl 3 spell slot. You could then take heighten Spell to up your DC's.

[Uhtred]

For all the metamagic your using, maybe going into Incantrix to drop the spell slot of those metamagics by 1 each. All the metamagics except for Invisible have a +1 spell slot.

Incantrix will drop them all to 0 spell slots so your fireball will still be using a lvl 3 spell slot. You could then take heighten Spell to up your DC's.

That sounds delightful! I was under the impression that you couldn't ever drop a metamagic feat's level addition to below one?

[Segev]

Invisible Grease to make them just randomly slip and fall.

Still and Silent Open/Close can be used to open backpacks and the like to cause items to fall out.

Alternatively, Arcane Lock can seal shut their property.

Invisible Continuous Flame would be a mixed curse. Not noticeable in broad daylight, it would cause whatever it's cast upon to provide light in the dark...but also would make hiding hard. And telling what item is actually the source of the radiance would be very hard without lucky or extensive testing (so long as it wasn't something regularly put away and only drawn for use).

An Invisible Hypnotic Pattern still works despite not being visible, since it doesn't say a thing about the creatures within it needing to see it to be effected. Use it on their guards at night in camp. Empower it if you have the feat; 2d4x1.5 is an impressive 3-12 HD of influence, and you're still adding your CL (max. 10) to that, for up to 13-22 HD.

An invisible Magic Mouth set to go off with an insulting or counter-productive remark ("They're over here!" next time the party tries to hide, or "Watch where you're going, you worthless scum," next time something bigger than the character it's on bumps him without starting or continuing combat, for instance) would leave the character hard-pressed to explain where the voice came from, since the mouth never shows up.

Misdirection has some potential, too, both to hide magic and to cause, say, the cleric of Pelor to register as "evil" on the Paladin's evil-dar.

Invisible Spectral Hand enables touch spells at range without the target getting to see what's being used to cast it on him.

Subtle enough Suggestions could be used to cause the victim to unwittingly do "bad luck" things, such as to take off his coin purse and leave it under the table at the next tavern he goes to. This one is troublesomely language-dependent, so you'd have to Silence it and still work the suggestion itself into conversation. It is oft said that bad luck after being "cursed" is just you being psyched out, though, so mentioning a few possibilities of what might happen (or has happened to others who ignored this chain let--er, I mean, who didn't donate to the well) could suffice. Could even narrate rather than quote: "His list goes on for a few minutes if you let it," so you don't have to spell it out. When they DO suffer a particular effect, and notice its consequences, you can give them an Int check (DC 15 or so, perhaps) to recall that this is in fact one of the specific things he warned the party about.

An invisible Leomund's Tiny Hut cast on their camp when the weather is actually taking a turn for the much colder could cause them to pack up and prepare for a balmy day only to have it snap to bitter after they've already stowed their winter wear.

Secret Page on a wizard's favorite page in his spellbook, or on a map to make it look like a map for a different area, or the like, could cause the party no end of headaches as they can't figure out where the document they want is. This works on "border crossing" papers and writs from nobility, too. Just make sure to say "you can't find it" rather than "it's been changed," unless they have a good reason to know that this particular paper SHOULD be the one they're looking for, rather than simply seeing one more page of not-what-they-want and having to keep looking.

Shrink Item specifically can be used to shrink a burning fire down to a stowable piece of cloth. Pick-pocket one onto the party rogue, wizard, or into the party's supply wagon. In a few days, the spell will end and the burning fire will grow back to normal size and composition, igniting everything flammable it touches.

If he's particularly riled, he could use a Silent Lesser Geas to compel them to donate, though it's again language-dependent and takes a round to cast.

Hallucinatory Terrain can make the party think they're in the wrong place.

Bestow Curse is an obvious one. Get creative. (I once cursed somebody to never be able to find another crowbar. It made sense at the time.)

Contagion is also possible. It's their bad luck they got sick.

Invisible Mind Fog is -10 to will saves and some skill checks with no notable source.

Dream can be used to send "prophetic" or unpleasant dreams to those who irk the !idiot.

Mass Suggestion, obviously, can do what Suggestion can, just to the whole party for one spell.

Control Water to have a river too deep to ford back, or a watering hole dried up.

Sequester can be used on anything or anybody the party wants to find badly enough.