Optimizing Level 10 Character?

[Hydracronis]

My DM is turning 21 in the next month, and for his party instead of hitting the bars, he's hosting an arena of sorts between his group in town, and his group from back in his hometown. The rules for character creation are as follows:

"10th level characters, 5v5 parties. Standard gold, NO PSIONS, standard bans for races, no max level adjustment this campaign, NOTHING from dragon magazine, NO HULKING HURLERS, no ability score higher than 26, and no weapons larger than huge size."

I have only been playing 3.5e for about a year or so, so I have some limited experience in character creation. I haven't made anything really out there. His group from his hometown has been playing for about 8 years now, so they'll be able to make some pretty interesting and powerful characters. I was wondering if you guys had any suggestions on creating a powerful character abiding by these rules, or giving me an idea of a direction to look in to make one? Any ideas are welcome.

[Karl Aegis]

What is considered optimal at your table? We could probably go for "curbstomps all opposition with little-to-no effort while drinking tea" or we can go for "will solve the encounter at the end of the third turn". I will assume you don't want to chain time stops while spamming shadow miracles.

[Hydracronis]

Well the idea is that the parties will be going up against each other, arena-style most likely, so curb-stomping would not be a bad thing.

[Karl Aegis]

Did you want any particular theme for your character? Or do you need to control all five party members?

[Hydracronis]

I would probably want to be some form of crowd control so my party can have their way with the other group, and annoying the crap out of everyone at the same time. I am still kind of new to character creation, so I have barely scratched the surface in terms of possibilities with this. Any suggestions are welcome.

[Extra Anchovies]

Bear-spam druid (get a pet bear, turn into a bear (or a hard-to-hit flier), summon bears) is almost always a good choice, and works just fine in core. Especially strong if you have someone else to provide mass buffs, like Bless or Haste.

[ekarney]

It's a good level you've been given there, because martial characters are still relevant and in a situation like this, even battle changing.

You're best of speaking to your team mates about what they're playing if they're playing tier 3 or higher, your best bet is to just take 10 levels of binder. Combine that with a human or Dream Dwarf, take improved binding, Ignore Special requirements and rapid recovery, as well as some combat feats such as rapid reload for a crossbow build, or power attack for a melee build, y'know that sort of stuff.

Alternatively, if you're not needing that much power, or want to go into more of a support role or just enjoy martial classes, I recently threw some ideas around for a Slinging build. You'll need an aptitude Gnome Calculus (Enhancement that allows feats from another weapon to apply to the gnome calculus in this case we'll be choosing the light crossbow.)

You'll wanna take rapid reload, and a myriad of nasty crossbow feats. Take levels in Scout, Barbarian as well as Shot on the Run (or whatever the name is that allows you to move, shoot and move again)
There's a number of Scout/Ranger handbooks around including a Dictum Mortuum called "The Swift Hunter's Handbook" where you could find some useful things to apply here. The benefit of this over an Archer or similar is that you can THROW ALCHEMISTS FIRE AND ACID FLASKS AT LONGER RANGE. And that stuff hurts, a lot.

Oh yeah there's also probably some Wu Jen shenanigans you could get up to.

[Biffoniacus_Furiou]

Human, Wizard (Conjurer) 5/ Incantatrix 4/ Paragnostic Apostle 1

Iron Will via the Otyugh Hole in CS. Martial Wizard (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/variant/classes/variantCharacterClasses.htm#wizard), Improved Initiative at Wizard 1, domain power ACF at Wizard 5 for the Planning domain (Extend Spell). Two flaws (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/variant/buildingCharacters/characterFlaws.htm): Noncombatant and Weak-Willed.

Get Persistent Spell, Item Familiar (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/variant/magic/itemFamiliars.htm), and all the buffs. Be sure to include a few Persistent Fell Drain Cloud of Knives.

[Extra Anchovies]

domain power ACF at Wizard 5 for the Planning domain (Extend Spell).

Or, ya know, take Extend Spell using one of the normal 5th level wizard bonus feats :smalltongue:

[Karl Aegis]

Or, ya know, take Extend Spell using one of the normal 5th level wizard bonus feats :smalltongue:

He already took Martial Wizard and Planning Domain granted power looks better on a character sheet. He values planning so much he has the Planning domain. It adds depth to the character while increasing power.

[Story]

Why Conjurer? For Abrupt Jaunt? Because if so, you should mention that.

Otherwise, Domain Wizard is almost strictly better.