Maximizing Skill Points/Level

[QuickLyRaiNbow]

So I'm gonna be moving in the next few weeks, and with a move comes a new campaign. I'm working on kind of a goofy character concept, and over the next few days I'll be asking the Playground to help me iron out various mechanical wrinkles. First is skill points.

There are really only a few parts of the build that are set in stone, and one of those is the primary* class. I'm going to be playing a Factotum, with the goal of having as many skill points as possible. In an ideal world, our party will never make a check that someone** doesn't have max ranks in. 6+Int skill points*** and all class skills is a good starting point. This character doesn't have to have any combat relevance; in fact, I plan to spend a lot of time falling over, cowering and running away from things.

So I want as many skill points as possible. Some sort of Human would be logical (4+1/level). Nymph's Kiss is an additional 1/level. Jack of All Trades gives me half a rank in all skills, so I can use them untrained and stack bonuses to get reasonable check results. It's not strictly extra points per level but it makes spending points more efficient. There's also Apprenticeship, which gives a one-time bonus of +2, which makes it for my purposes strictly inferior to Open Minded at +5. Primary Contact gives an extra rank, even over the cap, but two feats is probably too steep a cost as I don't know that any of the other benefits would be available. There's also the option of pumping intelligence.

What options have I missed? Are there any races or templates worth using here?

*Depending on the progress of the campaign there may be some multiclassing, but I don't really plan for any.
**Probably me
***I know I want to maximize points/level, but no cross-class skills is more important.

[bjoern]

So I'm gonna be moving in the next few weeks, and with a move comes a new campaign. I'm working on kind of a goofy character concept, and over the next few days I'll be asking the Playground to help me iron out various mechanical wrinkles. First is skill points.

There are really only a few parts of the build that are set in stone, and one of those is the primary* class. I'm going to be playing a Factotum, with the goal of having as many skill points as possible. In an ideal world, our party will never make a check that someone** doesn't have max ranks in. 6+Int skill points*** and all class skills is a good starting point. This character doesn't have to have any combat relevance; in fact, I plan to spend a lot of time falling over, cowering and running away from things.

So I want as many skill points as possible. Some sort of Human would be logical (4+1/level). Nymph's Kiss is an additional 1/level. Jack of All Trades gives me half a rank in all skills, so I can use them untrained and stack bonuses to get reasonable check results. It's not strictly extra points per level but it makes spending points more efficient. There's also Apprenticeship, which gives a one-time bonus of +2, which makes it for my purposes strictly inferior to Open Minded at +5. Primary Contact gives an extra rank, even over the cap, but two feats is probably too steep a cost as I don't know that any of the other benefits would be available. There's also the option of pumping intelligence.

What options have I missed? Are there any races or templates worth using here?

*Depending on the progress of the campaign there may be some multiclassing, but I don't really plan for any.
**Probably me
***I know I want to maximize points/level, but no cross-class skills is more important.

Something that pops in my head is item familiar. With all those skill points pouring ineach level, the bonuses will pile up fast, plus you can give your item ranks in a skill as its special power.

[Vhaidara]

Something that pops in my head is item familiar. With all those skill points pouring ineach level, the bonuses will pile up fast, plus you can give your item ranks in a skill as its special power.

Actually, Item Familiar is useless here. My understanding of the goal is that they want to max as many skills as possible. Item Familiar lets you go up to double ranks in a single skill, but it costs you 4 points/rank. So you get a massive boost to one skil, but instead, you could have maxed 3 other skills.

[snailgosh]

As Human Factotum you could get Able Learner at first level and afterwards level as rogue for more skill points.

[QuickLyRaiNbow]

Yeah, generally I'm looking to go wide rather than deep. And I meant to put something in the OP about Item Familiar; I don't really like it basically for the reasons Zaq talks about in his Truenamer's Handbook (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?214115-In-the-Beginning-Was-the-Word-and-the-Word-Was-Suck-A-Guide-to-Truenamers).

[bjoern]

Actually, Item Familiar is useless here. My understanding of the goal is that they want to max as many skills as possible. Item Familiar lets you go up to double ranks in a single skill, but it costs you 4 points/rank. So you get a massive boost to one skil, but instead, you could have maxed 3 other skills.

You don't "lose" skill points to IF. you just store them there. You still gain and assign skill points like normal.For every 3 skill points you gain, it gives you an untyped +1 to whatever skill you want. Pure profit for the cost of 1 feat. And at level 7 it gives you the alertness feat for free.

[Vhaidara]

You don't "lose" skill points to IF. you just store them there. You still gain and assign skill points like normal.For every 3 skill points you gain, it gives you an untyped +1 to whatever skill you want. Pure profit for the cost of 1 feat. And at level 7 it gives you the alertness feat for free.

False.


Whenever a character with an item familiar gains skill points, he may choose to put some or all of those skill points into his item familiar. He assigns the skill points normally, but notes that they now reside in the item familiar. For every 3 ranks he assigns to the item familiar, he gains a +1 bonus that he can apply to any single skill. This bonus can be applied to a skill in which he already has maximum ranks. He can apply multiple bonuses to the same skill, but he may not have more points of bonus in a skill than he has ranks.

You spend 3 skill points to get a +1 to a given skill.

[bjoern]

False.



You spend 3 skill points to get a +1 to a given skill.

Yeah, that's what I said.

If you level up and gain 9 skill points, and invest them all into the IF, you get 3 +1bonuses . You could assign one +1 to spellcraft, another to survival, and the last to tumble . The bonuses are set in stone once assigned, you can't shift them all around , once you put a bonus on a skill its stuck there.

But regardless, OP says they don't want to use IF for arbitrary reasons so its a moot point

[Red Fel]

False.

You spend 3 skill points to get a +1 to a given skill.

Not exactly true. You invest those points in your skills, and gain skill bonuses on top of them. However, the skill points invested (and the skill bonuses) are now tied to the IF; if you lose it, you lose both the bonuses and the invested skill points.

Note the language you quoted: "He assigns the skill points normally, but notes that they now reside in the item familiar." In other words, you assign these skill points to skills, as you would, but tie them to the IF. You then gain the bonuses.

It actually does create something out of nothing.

[Vhaidara]

Yeah, that's what I said.

If you level up and gain 9 skill points, and invest them all into the IF, you get 3 +1bonuses . You could assign one +1 to spellcraft, another to survival, and the last to tumble . The bonuses are set in stone once assigned, you can't shift them all around , once you put a bonus on a skill its stuck there.

But regardless, OP says they don't want to use IF for arbitrary reasons so its a moot point

Just finishing the discussion, you do lose points. You just spent 9 skill points for a net of +3. You could have spent them on actual skills for a net of +9. So you lost 6 ranks worth of bonuses.

[avr]

Human isn't the only option. First level as a changeling rogue using the racial sub level gets you 40 skill points +4*Int, and lets you take 10 on some social skills, and of course gives you their racial change shape ability.

[bjoern]

Just finishing the discussion, you do lose points. You just spent 9 skill points for a net of +3. You could have spent them on actual skills for a net of +9. So you lost 6 ranks worth of bonuses.

Sigh

You invest the skill points normally. So say you gain 9 points

Let's say you already have 9 skills maxed and want to keep them maxed after the level up. You put one point in each skill to keep it maxed but those points are "invested " in the IF. if you lose the IF you lose the ranks. But as long as you have the IF its just a free +1bonus for every 3 skill points you gain per level.

When IF says "assigned to one skill" it means that you can't have a floating +x bonus to whatever you want, that would be broken. Each occurance of the +1 bonus is assigned to one skill.

[SciChronic]

Collector of Stories skill trick should be in your build somewhere along with Knowledge devotion (dip cloistered cleric?). As a factotum with access to all knowledge skills, its too good to pass up, honestly.

As for the item familiar thing, it states you still assign the skill points as normal, the ranks are just in the item, not the character himself, so if you lose the item, you lose the ranks.

[QuickLyRaiNbow]

Collector of Stories will almost certainly be in there; Knowledge Devotion, definitely not. Being competent at hitting things is extremely low on my list of priorities.

[Segev]

It may not be worth the level dip to you, but Incarnate opens up a plethora of skill-boosting soulmelds, and you could take feats to get the essentia to pile them up. Or even use a Factotum spell-faking ability to use that spell which maxes out all your soulmelds for occasional big boosts.

[QuickLyRaiNbow]

That's not a bad idea if I can justify it to myself from a flavor perspective. I plan to use most of my Factotum spell-fakery for spells that give skill bonuses anyway.

[SciChronic]

Collector of Stories will almost certainly be in there; Knowledge Devotion, definitely not. Being competent at hitting things is extremely low on my list of priorities.

even if combat is a low priority, you're probably going to have to shoot a crossbow or something at some point. pulling out a +5 to attack and damage will at least make you mildly annoying.

As a factotum, make your SLA's the spells that boost skills like invisibility for the +20 to hide. Buying a rust monster wand (Complete Scoundrel) will remove the need for ranks in open lock for the most part if you don't care about leaving evidence. Just make sure you feed it.

[Chronos]

I would not recommend Able Learner, here. If you stay entirely in factotum, it'll be completely useless. If you stay mostly in factotum and dabble a bit in rogue or other high-skill classes, it'll probably still be useless, since even if rogue doesn't quite have all skills as class skills, it still has an awful lot of them, easily enough to find class skills to spend all of your points on. The level you take rogue is just the level when you put Autohypnosis or Knowledge skills or whatever on hold for a single level. The only time when Able Learner is really worthwhile is when you're either going for Chameleon, in which case it's a prerequisite, or when you've got a bunch of levels in a class with many skill points but few class skills, such as Cloistered Cleric (plus preferably a dip into something with a lot of class skills).

[QuickLyRaiNbow]

Yeah. The only reason I'll have for picking up Able Learner is if I end up switching into a non-skill-based class. Which might happen but not for a while, so I'm mostly interested in getting all of the skill points as quickly as possible.

What ideas do people have about boosting Int without items or spells?

[SciChronic]

If you're going by RAW, make your first level swordsage for the (6+int mod)*6

[QuickLyRaiNbow]

Ha. I tend to put that in the 1d43 scorpion whip category, but if the DM says it's ok you better believe I'm doing it.

[prufock]

Factotum 3 for Int-synergy and all skills as class skills.
Changeling Rogue for 10 skill points per level at 1, 3, and 8... you may or may not want to go all the way to 8, but 3 levels is decent.
Able Learner to spend only 1 point per rank for all skills.
This assumes the Eberron case for Changelings qualifying for Able Learner is the general case. If not, this is pointless.

Or
Bard with Bardic Knack. Your effective ranks = 1/2 your level.

[Immabozo]

Kinda surprised it hasn't been mentioned yet, take Swordsage, or UA Swordsage, as your first level. 6 + Int x 6 skill points baby!

[QuickLyRaiNbow]

Was mentioned four posts ago!

[bekeleven]

1. Jack of all trades doesn't help, you want a full rank in all skills for factotum anyway. It will be a useless feat by the time you hit level ~5 or so, and mostly useless past ~3.

2. Boosting int: Human Paragon (+2 untyped), Chameleon's ability focus (+6 Competence), +6 Enhance, +5 Inherent, +2 Alchemical (mushroom powder; technically a poison, gives minuses), greater visage of the deity (+2 or 4 untyped), Horseshoes of Flame (+10 untyped) with a permissive DM. Oh, and start middle-aged.

Note that by strict RAW, I am convinced that no named bonus increases your base int (otherwise why would it be named?) and therefore gives you additional skill points on level-up. I think that if you allow named bonuses to give you skill points, you would also gain them from headbands of int. If you restrict it to permanent unnamed bonuses, then only the human paragon on this list would increase ranks. But mine is a minority opinion.

[AvatarVecna]

Human gives an extra skill point per level.

High Int increases skill points per level.

The Changeling Rogue racial ACFs give 10 skill points per lvl. Note that this is only during the specified levels, so the best thing to do is take this at lvl 1 and then go into Factotum.

Nymph's Kiss (BoED) has no pre-reqs and gives +1 skill point per level.

Able Learner makes all cross-class skills cost 1 skill point to increase their rank.

Changelings are (arguably) human-descended. They could take the Human Heritage feat for 4 extra skill points at lvl 1.

If your DM doesn't use the multiclass XP penalty rules from PHB, dip a class with bonus feats and DCS them into Open-Minded or other skill point granting feats. Fighter isn't good for this, but Monk and Ranger are.

Trading away bonus feats via DCS is especially great if you're playing gestalt; one side can be a class getting tons of skill points, while the other is just there to gather bonus feats to be DCS'd away.

[Thurbane]

I seem to recall that Jack of All Trades doesn't work with Factotum abilities. Or maybe I'm thinking of Bardic Knack?

[QuickLyRaiNbow]

I seem to recall that Jack of All Trades doesn't work with Factotum abilities. Or maybe I'm thinking of Bardic Knack?

No, it doesn't work with Factotum. And Elf Dilettante is a bonus rather than ranks, so it's antisynergistic with what I'm trying to do. And I suspect my DM will have issues with the intersection of taking an Exalted feat and using the DCFS.

[Trasilor]

Correct me if I am wrong, but doesn't factototem have all skills as class skills? If so, able learner would be pointless. Once a skill becomes a class skill, it is always a class skill.


Skills
If a skill is a class skill for any of a multiclass character’s classes, then character level determines a skill’s maximum rank. (The maximum rank for a class skill is 3 + character level.)

Which means you may want to sneak in a couple levels of rogue or some other class with 8 sp per level.

The whole item familiar boost does work (every 3 ranks invested in the Item Familiar = a +1 to a skill). Note that you can only invest in the IF you current number of non-IF ranks. Also, should you lose said item familiar, you lose all the invested ranks plus the bonuses.

[Vhaidara]

Cross Class remains a thing for costing 2 points per rank.

[Trasilor]

Cross Class remains a thing for costing 2 points per rank.

you are correct, learn something new :smallamused: