Acquiring spells as an Archivist.

[tadkins]

Started thinking about this earlier; what are some ways an Archivist can go about expanding their spell selection, from an IC standpoint? They're fortunate to be able to add any Divine spell to their books, but I imagine that actually acquiring them would be a pretty tough matter. Most religious organizations would be very protective of their knowledge, and are very likely not keen on the idea of those uninitiated in their order casting their spells.

"Hi there, mister druid. I'm not of your circle. I've never taken the oaths to serve and protect nature. Hell, I'm not even an alignment that a druid is allowed to be. But I just really want to cast your Summon Nature's Ally spells, is that cool with you?"

I know that the Archivist is a DM dependent class to begin with, but what are some ways that they might acquire their spells? These are what I came up with, but I'm sure you guys know of a lot more.

1. Be lucky enough to be partied with an Artificer or Warlock.

2. Raiding the religious sites of your enemies. Your party about to take on that cult of Orcus? Keep a special eye out for their temple scrolls.

3. Dungeon delve as usual, just hope that the previous occupants were considerate enough to leave some Divine scrolls specifically for you.

4. This one I think goes against the spirit of the Archivist a bit, but pick a god to worship. Work for their temple, perform their deities' work. Specific deities of knowledge and magic like Boccob or Wee Jas might be good choices, since they'll likely have a ton of spells to provide you with.

I'm interested in hearing others, particularly in the above example. How would you convince a druid to let you have their spells, for instance?

[Belkarseviltwin]

One thing to note as an Archivist is that you have Scribe Scroll as a bonus feat. The rules for cooperative magic item creation mean that if you can persuade someone to help you, all they need to contribute is a casting of the relevant spell.

NPC Adepts are probably quite likely to be willing to assist you, as Adept spells are unlikely to be considered "secret". There are some very nifty spells on that list- I think it's the only divine source of Web, Scorching Ray, Lightning Bolt and Baleful Polymorph, plus it gets you Heal a level early.

I'm actually currently playing an Archivist. Other party members are a good source of spells, certainly. Wanting the spell for a specific reason that the NPC agrees with (like saving their village) helps.

My Archivist does do the "priest" thing too. It's an Eberron campaign, and he is technically an ordained priest of Aureon (god of knowledge, much like Boccob)- I don't think this jars too much, Heroes of Horror does say that most Archivists are religious after all. Being a priest of Aureon means that priests of gods allied to Aureon (the other 8 members of the Sovereign Host) are likely to help him.

[Renen]

It could be a druid that is selling spells in the city, as per spellcasting setvices rules. Poor druid needs more funds to bribe city officials to stop them from cutting down nearby forest.

[tadkins]

Oh yeah, forgot about Adepts! They can be a good source of magic scrolls, and as NPCs they're probably your typical work-a-day citizen, and would appreciate the money.

I like the freedom of the Archivist in that you don't have to necessarily be a cleric of a deity. I thought to make this thread when I thought back on the Killer Jeweler (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?387154-The-quot-Killer-Jeweler-quot-build) idea I came up with the other day. The character would likely be a Gnome Archivist more resembling a businessperson or tradesman than a priest. Granted, she would likely pay lip service to Garl Glittergold and the rest of the Gnome pantheon, but in the end she would be more focused on her craft, studying the secrets of earth magic, particularly the Gembomb spell, to break the boundaries of what a normal gemcutter could do.

Plus, who doesn't like a walking Pokedex? xD

[Jeff the Green]

Every archivist needs a Quill of Scribing (CM). It allows you to craft a scroll without spending any more time than you would casting it. So while many NPCs (and PCs, for that matter) might balk at spending a day or two crafting a scroll without significant remuneration (I usually say it's a bit less than 30% of the market price, which is the proportion of the cost of a scroll that doesn't go to cover the materials or XP at a 5:1 GP:XP ratio), many more will be willing to spend a standard action a day.

There's an argument to be made that you could even team up with an Artificer as long as you pay for the XP cost. As long as you do so, you're considered the creator and the scroll is divine, not untyped as in the ECS errata. This is a dangerous reading, though, as it allows you to learn literally any spell in the game from any list at the lowest level it appears, and arguably every psionic power and infusion, too.

[JoshuaZ]

Started thinking about this earlier; what are some ways an Archivist can go about expanding their spell selection, from an IC standpoint? They're fortunate to be able to add any Divine spell to their books, but I imagine that actually acquiring them would be a pretty tough matter. Most religious organizations would be very protective of their knowledge, and are very likely not keen on the idea of those uninitiated in their order casting their spells.

"Hi there, mister druid. I'm not of your circle. I've never taken the oaths to serve and protect nature. Hell, I'm not even an alignment that a druid is allowed to be. But I just really want to cast your Summon Nature's Ally spells, is that cool with you?"



"Hi mister druid, no we don't see always eye to eye, but I'm trying to deal with X and this would really help." where X is some problem that the druid also should see as a problem (e.g. the big bad lich that is trying to take over, or destroy the world, etc."

"Hi mister druid, if you let me copy the spell, I'll make 2 extra copies of the same scroll for you which could come in handy."

"Hi mister druid, I may not be the same alignment but I care deeply about protecting nature and X" where "X" is some theologically specific thing to there druidic circle. This may require some decent bluff check and a knowledge(religion) check.

[tadkins]

Was talking over this with a friend earlier and we agreed; archivists are well served having some social skills.

[deuxhero]

A Chameleon can prepare any 6th level or lower Divine Spell from nothing IIRC (and using his floating feat for extra spell, can do the same for arcane).

[Optimator]

Max ranks in Diplomacy helps.

[Crake]

Every archivist needs a Quill of Scribing (CM). It allows you to craft a scroll without spending any more time than you would casting it. So while many NPCs (and PCs, for that matter) might balk at spending a day or two crafting a scroll without significant remuneration (I usually say it's a bit less than 30% of the market price, which is the proportion of the cost of a scroll that doesn't go to cover the materials or XP at a 5:1 GP:XP ratio), many more will be willing to spend a standard action a day.

There's an argument to be made that you could even team up with an Artificer as long as you pay for the XP cost. As long as you do so, you're considered the creator and the scroll is divine, not untyped as in the ECS errata. This is a dangerous reading, though, as it allows you to learn literally any spell in the game from any list at the lowest level it appears, and arguably every psionic power and infusion, too.

The quill of scribing only crafts spells for you that you know already, so that's not quite useful for this situation, although it would be quite useful for making useful scrolls of spells that you might not necessarily want to prepare every day.

[Bullet06320]

http://www.minmaxboards.com/index.php?topic=185.msg613#msg613

the archivist handbook

[Jeff the Green]

The quill of scribing only crafts spells for you that you know already, so that's not quite useful for this situation, although it would be quite useful for making useful scrolls of spells that you might not necessarily want to prepare every day.

That's why the other caster uses the quill while you provide the XP and Scribe Scroll. Then you provide the feat prerequisite.

The fact that Scribe Scroll limits you to something you know is completely irrelevant because the rules for creating magic items don't actually interact with the feats except for being prerequisites for certain items. You could replace all the text under all the feats with gibberish and they'd still work.

[sleepyphoenixx]

That's what trade is for. Most campaign settings assume that magic is common enough for all but the smallest villages having at least a hedge wizard or low-level cleric or adept.
All of them can use more gold, especially since all they give up when they help you scribe a scroll is a few hours of their time.

Unless you'd kill each other on sight anyway there's really no reason why someone wouldn't exchange those 8 hours for a few hundred (or a few thousand) gold, especially when they're selling their spellcasting services anyway.

[Chronos]

It also depends on how common archivists are in the world. If they're common, then you can trade spells with other friendly archivists, or loot books from fallen archivist foes. Eventually, if you trace it back, that spell must ultimately have come from an adept, or a runescarred berserker, or a cleric with the whatchamacallit domain, but for practical purposes, it's now just an archivist spell, found in archivist books.

[Fouredged Sword]

Well, you can just dominate a druid into a pliable servant who teaches you all you want to know. Archivists can be evil too you know.