Ultimate Magus: To Focus Specialise or not to Focus Specialise?

[JBento]

Greetings, Playground.

I'm about to start playing a new campaign and I'm thinking of going Wizard/Sorcerer/Ultimate Magus. Considering that I'm going partly Sorcerer (so I can get a good number of spells that strike my fancy from the prohibited schools), is it worth it to go Focused Specialist? For reference, these are the available books:

Players handbook
Dungeon Master guide
Monster manual
Magic item compendium
Complete scoundrel
Tome of nine swords
Complete Arcana
Complete mage
Complete Adventurer
Races of the dragon

Besides the main question (to FS or to not FS), is there any advice the Playgorunders would like to share? Thanks :smallsmile:

EDIT: Because so many people have mentioned it, yes, I know Beguiler would probably be the optimal choice for the spontaneous side, but the PHB2 is not on that list (which also burns Abrupt Jaunt, unfortunately). Current plan is to go Focused Conjurer killing Evocation, Enchantment, and Necromancy, and picking up the few good spells from those schools (such as Otiluke's Spheres, Web, Enervation, Bestow Curse, and the like) through the Sorcerer side or consumable items if I'm desperate enough.

[Segev]

Have you considered Focused Illusionist and dropping Evocation and Conjuration, then using Shadow Evocation and Shadow Conjuration and possibly Shadowcraft Mage to recover those schools?

If you go sorcerer on top of it, I suggest Precocious Apprentice so you can enter Ultimate Magus a touch early. An alternative would be to look at one of the highly-focused spontaneous classes that gets every spell on its list instead of Sorcerer. If you drop Evocation but want to keep it, pick up Warmage. If you drop Necromancy, you could pick up Dread Necromancer. If you drop Illusion or Enchantment, you could pick up Beguiler.

[Snowbluff]

The answer is yes, mostly because you can fill in the lost school with your other casting class. Necromancy can be covered by Dread Necro.

I suggest grabbing Versatile Spellcaster and entering UM early.

[macdaddy]

No spell compendium? ouch. That has so many good spells...

No PHB2? ouch, there goes the Beguiler a GREAT class to use in conjunction with Ultimate Magus and wizard because it uses INT for a casting stat instead of CHR.

So, given those restrictions......

I would still go focused specialist conjurer. Ban Evocation, Necromancy, and Enchantment/Charm. You won't miss much. Your sorcerer side can pick up the few spells from those schools that are cool to have, but will more likely focus on spam spells (like nerveskitter, damn which book is that in?).

The reason I think you should go with focused specialist conjurer is that it gives you access to a LOT of spells, and they are all really good ones too. With a decent INT bonus, you will always have at least one bonus spell slot that can be used for non-conjuration spell, but at every level there are always at least 3 good conj spells you will want to have memorized (Grease, benign transposition, glitterdust, web, Dimension step, Evards Tentacles, DDoor, etc al) See http://community.wizards.com/forum/previous-editions-character-optimization/threads/1184126

If you guys are going to play above 12th level, then I would suggest Transmuter instead, as once you get into 6th+ level spells, transmutation starts to become a tad better than conjuration.

Transmutation for buff/debuff, conjuration for battle field control.

[Dusk Eclipse]

I'd probably drop Illusion, Enchantment and Evocation to focus specialize in conjuration or transmutation and pick up the slack with Beguiler levels (which cover the 3 schools you dropped, two naturally and the other through Shadow Evocation)

[docnessuno]

If you can snag access to PHB2 i would strongly suggest Focused specialist Wizard (banning illusion, enchantment and one school of your choice) + Beguiller

INT-sad casting, and Beguiller has probably the best list of all "fixed list" casters.

Edit: swordsaged! :smallmad:

[Windstorm]

I'm going to suggest something that might be controversial, but something that I've personally had huge success with in actual games.

go focused specialist abjurer, and pick up sorcerer instead of beguiler (note: please made sure your int and charisma are both good, or this starts to have issues). banned schools are: Enchantment, Evocation, Illusion

alternate is to ban conjuration in place of illusion and make heavy use of the shadow x spells

reason for grabbing sorcerer is it gives you access to several sorcerer-only metaspells, which you can now cast from a spell-trigger or spell completion item without a UMD check, and/or scribe them into your spellbook on the wizard side.

grab wiz at first level since it has the better skill selection, then grab sorc at second level. grab 3 more wiz levels, taking practiced spellcaster (sorc) at 3rd level feats. this turns UM into a 9/10 wizard spellcasting progression or 8/10 depending on your choice, since the effective caster level of sorcerer is actually higher than wizard at first UM level for all purposes (including the lower level spells known progression)

either as soon as you qualify or after UM progression take 2 (or More) levels of abjurant champion, and 1 more level of wiz taking spontaneous divination ACF, which qualifies your wizard for versatile spellcaster (you need your DM to rule if it applies to divination only or all spells. if the ruling is all spells, take alacritous cogitation instead.) you now auto-quicken most of your spell slots, or can use them to fuel sorcerer metamagic.

you have 2 levels unaccounted for, however if you make sure at least 1 (or 2 if you did 8/10 UM) go to wizard casting, you still get 9th level spells.

then grab a runestaff for whatever utility you need but don't necessarily want to prepare every day that isn't from a banned school (or is and just fuel it with sorc slots :smalltongue:)

if you want to play a UM to peak effectiveness, I highly recommend checking out the Metaspells Handbook (http://www.minmaxboards.com/index.php?topic=10885.0)

the below does assume lenient or nonexistant multiclassing penalties, and can be juggled around slightly. if you must take classes all at once, go sorc>wiz5>um10(will be 8/10 wiz)>abj champ2.

EDIT: borrowing a little from the iron chef thread:
Victorinox UM
{table=head]Level|Class|Base Attack Bonus|Fort Save|Ref Save|Will Save|Skills|Feats|Class Features|Wiz CL|Sorc CL

1st|Wizard|
+0|
+0|
+0|
+2|max ranks K:arc, concentration, spellcraft|Metamagic of your choice|Scribe Scroll, Familiar|1|0

2nd|Sorcerer|
+0|
+0|
+0|
+4|^| | |1|1

3rd|Wizard|
+0|
+0|
+0|
+5|^|Practiced Spellcaster: Sorcerer| |2|3

4th|Wizard|
+1|
+1|
+1|
+5|^| | |3|4

5th|Wizard|
+2|
+1|
+1|
+6|^| | |4|5

6th|Ultimate Magus|
+2|
+1|
+1|
+8|^|Combat Casting|+1 arcane power|6|6

7th|Ultimate Magus|
+3|
+1|
+1|
+9|^|||7|7

8th|Ultimate Magus|
+3|
+2|
+2|
+9|^|||8|8

9th|Ultimate Magus|
+4|
+2|
+2|
+10|^|Open|Arcane Power +2|10|9

10th|Ultimate Magus|
+4|
+2|
+2|
+10|^| | |11|10

11th|Ultimate Magus|
+5|
+3|
+3|
+11|^| | |12|11

12th|Ultimate Magus|
+5|
+3|
+3|
+11|^|Open|Augmented power +3|13|12

13th|Ultimate Magus|
+6|
+3|
+3|
+12|^| ||14|13

14th|Ultimate Magus|
+6|
+4|
+4|
+12|^| ||15|14

15th|Wizard|
+6|
+4|
+4|
+12|^|Versatile Spellcaster |Spontaneous Divination|16|15 (prs:s)

16th|Ultimate Magus|
+7|
+4|
+4|
+13|^| |Augmented Casting 5th|17|16

17th|Abjurant Champion|
+8|
+4|
+4|
+15|^| | |18|17

18th|Abjurant Champion|
+9|
+4|
+4|
+16|^|Open|Quickened Abjuration|19|17
[/table]

[JBento]

I'm actually planning something like that, but with Master Specialist at 5th and topping it all with 5 Archmage levels at 15-20.