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Tor the Fallen
2007-04-25, 07:32 PM
How many times can you get your charisma to saves?

Takamari
2007-04-25, 07:40 PM
Once, as far as I know. I would assume you are thinking of the paladin feature. If I'm not mistaken, it is a named bonus. I would assume that you could get it multiple times providing the bonus is different.

SpiderBrigade
2007-04-25, 07:44 PM
The only one I know of offhand is stacking the Paladin ability Divine Grace with the Hexblade ability Arcane Resistance, which applies only to saves vs. spells. I think all other instances of Cha-to-saves specify that they don't stack with Divine Grace.

Dhavaer
2007-04-25, 07:45 PM
Hexblade, Blackguard, and a racial ability of some fey would give you three times. There's probably more.

TheOOB
2007-04-25, 07:45 PM
Divine Grace is an untyped bonus, so in theory it stacks with all other abilities.

However, aside from the paladin, I can think of only one other class that gains something similar to divine grace, and that is the blackguard with theri dark blessing ability, which would stack with divine grace if it was possible to get both abilities on the same character.

The wording of the ability seems to imply that divine grace stacks with other similar abilities (even itself if you manage to get two classes with the ability), though I could see argument saying that the ability doesn't stack (as it stands more evidence seems to point twords the "does stack" idea). However, it should be noted that is would be a very poor choice to allow divine grace to stack with similar abilities as a DM, divine grace is a powerful ability, and getting it two or three times with a decently high charisma would essentially make you succeed every saving throw you ever make.

Tor the Fallen
2007-04-25, 07:47 PM
Divine Grace (Su)

At 2nd level, a paladin gains a bonus equal to her Charisma bonus (if any) on all saving throws.


Dark Blessing (Su)

A blackguard applies his Charisma modifier (if positive) as a bonus on all saving throws.

Totally unnamed.

All the variant paladins get divine grace, and I know there are some other classes out there that charisma to saves. I'm trying to think up a gish gestalt build where I get like triple or quadruple to charisma mod to my saves.

Karsh
2007-04-25, 07:51 PM
If you are a Nymph Paladin of Slaughter 3/Hexblade 2/Blackguard 2, you are an ECL 20 character with Charisma to saves 3 times all the time and 4 times against Spells and Spell-like abilities.

brian c
2007-04-25, 08:02 PM
I think Karsh ahs the right idea, use an evil Paladin variant and stack that with Blackguard for the best way. I was gonna say that, but he beat me to it

Tor the Fallen
2007-04-25, 08:06 PM
If you are a Nymph Paladin of Slaughter 3/Hexblade 2/Blackguard 2, you are an ECL 20 character with Charisma to saves 3 times all the time and 4 times against Spells and Spell-like abilities.

Ooh, that's wicked.
Heh. Imagine running into a paladin of slaughter nymph nigh immune to spells.

[edit]
Hexblade 3/Paladin of Slaughter 2 for mettle would be superior. So, so recoculous.

Jasdoif
2007-04-25, 08:15 PM
And don't forget, a nymph's Unearthly Grace gives her a deflection bonus to AC (including touch AC, since it's deflection) as well.

Seffbasilisk
2007-04-25, 08:18 PM
The feat 'Force of Personality' replaces Wis with Cha for Willsaves. Might want to give the Nymph that again, so you can dump Wis and get another use for Cha.

Additionally in a Cha-based thing, there's the Gauntlets of Heartfelt Blows. Add your Cha bonus to melee attack damages.

Tor the Fallen
2007-04-25, 08:21 PM
Now I just need a way to negate the "a 1 is always a failure" so I can sit in that box of Cloudkill for 20 minutes.

Ramza00
2007-04-25, 08:22 PM
http://boards1.wizards.com/showthread.php?t=320889

Inyssius Tor
2007-04-25, 08:22 PM
And hey, it's gestalt. Make that ECL 18, or way less if you use some crazy house-rule for level adjustment and//or racial HD.

Douglas
2007-04-25, 08:58 PM
Let's see, if you can manage to satisfy the various requirements, a Gloura (Underdark, ECL 9) Paladin of Slaughter or Tyranny 2/Blackguard 2/Corrupt Avenger (Heroes of Horror) 3/Hexblade 2 gets charisma to saves 5 times against spells, 4 times against everything else, and is only ECL 18 without gestalt. If alignment weren't an issue it would be possible to add several more without going epic for a gestalt character. A good aligned character has about as many sources of charisma to saves available, but the stacking argument is a lot shakier as most of them are named exactly the same (Divine Grace) and might be considered the same source and therefore not stacking depite the untyped nature of the bonus.

Shhalahr Windrider
2007-04-25, 08:59 PM
No I just need a way to negate the "a 1 is always a failure" so I can sit in that box of Cloudkill for 20 minutes.

Cloudkill? That's a Fort Save. Then all you need is Steadfast Determination, a feat from PH2. It lets you apply your Constitution modifier to Will Saves instead of your Wisdom and it also removes failure on a natural 1 for Fort Saves.

But Cloudkill is Fort Partial, so you'd still be taking Con damage. For 20 minutes, that's 200 Con damage. You'd still be dead.

Falconsflight
2007-04-25, 09:02 PM
Just so you know. You can get both Blackgaurd and Paladin abilities. level 2Paladin/level 2 Blackgaurd-then become Lawful good Via atonement. You gain both, becuase The Blackgaurd doesn't have a "If yuo change alignment/class" restriction on it.

So yeah, do that plus all the other abilities people have lsited.

Douglas
2007-04-25, 09:03 PM
The Knight class from PHBII gets to ignore auto-fail on 1 for all saves, but you have to wait until level 17 in the class to get that feature.

Ramza00
2007-04-25, 09:05 PM
Corrupt Avenger requires non-evil.

Second to make sure you never get a natural 1. Aura of Perfect Order (Crusader 6, IL 11) will allow you to treat once a round a d20 roll as an 11

ImperiousLeader
2007-04-25, 09:10 PM
Cloudkill? That's a Fort Save. Then all you need is Steadfast Determination, a feat from PH2. It lets you apply your Constitution modifier to Will Saves instead of your Wisdom and it also removes failure on a natural 1 for Fort Saves.

But Cloudkill is Fort Partial, so you'd still be taking Con damage. For 20 minutes, that's 200 Con damage. You'd still be dead.

Hmmm, I can't recall, is there a version of evasion for Fort saves, iow, a successful save negates instead of a partial effect? I think there's Mettle, but isn't that just will saves?

storybookknight
2007-04-25, 09:12 PM
You may also (should you have the levels) want to take about 2 levels of rogue for evasion purposes. Mettle + Evasion + saving throws... now all you need is a race with SR!

Edit: and if you took 4 levels of monk, you might as well also take Ascetic Mage to glean charisma to AC again!

Annarrkkii
2007-04-25, 09:13 PM
DROW!

...What? No takers? Slap on the final two levels as Occult Slayer, and invest in some Mage Slayer feats, and you might be set.

TheOOB
2007-04-25, 09:16 PM
Cloudkill? That's a Fort Save. Then all you need is Steadfast Determination, a feat from PH2. It lets you apply your Constitution modifier to Will Saves instead of your Wisdom and it also removes failure on a natural 1 for Fort Saves.

But Cloudkill is Fort Partial, so you'd still be taking Con damage. For 20 minutes, that's 200 Con damage. You'd still be dead.

If you take enough levels in hexblade you get mettle which would help in that situation.

Shhalahr Windrider
2007-04-25, 09:16 PM
Hmmm, I can't recall, is there a version of evasion for Fort saves, iow, a successful save negates instead of a partial effect? I think there's Mettle, but isn't that just will saves?
No, Mettle is both Fort and Will saves.

I forgot about Mettle. Yeah, Steadfast Determination, and an obscenely high Fort Save, and you'll be sitting pretty. No trouble at all with any cloudkill.

Da Beast
2007-04-25, 09:21 PM
This (http://boards1.wizards.com/showthread.php?t=320889) is a list of everything that allows you to add an abilitiy to something.

Dausuul
2007-04-25, 11:30 PM
No I just need a way to negate the "a 1 is always a failure" so I can sit in that box of Cloudkill for 20 minutes.

Wouldn't it be better to find something that would make you immune to poison instead?

Falconsflight
2007-04-25, 11:38 PM
What is Mettle? I've seen people talk about it before. I've never seen it before. What does it do?

Dausuul
2007-04-25, 11:45 PM
What is Mettle? I've seen people talk about it before. I've never seen it before. What does it do?

Basically, it's Evasion for Fort and Will saves. Any time you get hit by an effect that's "Fort partial" or "Will partial" and you make your save, you're unaffected. For instance, if you made your save versus finger of death, you wouldn't take 3d6 + caster level damage.

Tor the Fallen
2007-04-26, 12:08 AM
Cloudkill? That's a Fort Save. Then all you need is Steadfast Determination, a feat from PH2. It lets you apply your Constitution modifier to Will Saves instead of your Wisdom and it also removes failure on a natural 1 for Fort Saves.

But Cloudkill is Fort Partial, so you'd still be taking Con damage. For 20 minutes, that's 200 Con damage. You'd still be dead.

Mettle turns fort patial to fort not at all.

[edit]
I see that's been addressed.

Tor the Fallen
2007-04-26, 12:19 AM
Gloura's on the wizards site, and holy cow, what a beaut that is. Only LA +2 (and 7 fey hd, bleh) for +10 dex, +4 con, +2 wis, +6 cha, good fly speed 60', and unearthly grace.

The corrupt avenger is any non-evil, so that wouldn't work with the blackguard.
There's also this caveat with grim resolve:

Grim Resolve (Ex): Starting at 3rd level, you gain a bonus equal to your Charisma bonus (if any) on all saving throws. This benefit does not stack with other effects that allow you to add your Charisma bonus to saves (such as divine grace).

BardicDuelist
2007-04-26, 09:30 AM
For help with a natural one, take some good luck feats.

Khoran
2007-04-26, 10:05 AM
If'n you've got the Dragonomicon, I think Platinum Knight (or something to that effect, don't have my book on hand.) gets Cha to Saves and it says that it does stack with divine grace.

Ramza00
2007-04-26, 10:11 AM
Gloura's on the wizards site, and holy cow, what a beaut that is. Only LA +2 (and 7 fey hd, bleh) for +10 dex, +4 con, +2 wis, +6 cha, good fly speed 60', and unearthly grace.


Gloura gets better. It casts as a 7th lvl bard. Thus 1 lvl of bard or virutso and you got bardic music. Followed by 2 lvls of X and 10 lvls of Sublime Chord.

For example this build. (Using LA buyback)

Gloura 7/Bard 1/Paladin of Freedom 2/Sublime Chord 2/Sacred Exorist 3/Abjurant Champion 5
BAB of 16.75
Cha to Saves twice
Cha to AC
Turn Undead (Divine Might anyone)
9th lvl spells with full sublime chord casting.
+10 Dex, +4 Con, +2 Wis, +6 Cha
Fly 60 Good
DR 10/Cold Iron, Darkvison 60 feet

Khoran
2007-04-26, 10:16 AM
Gloura gets better. It casts as a 7th lvl bard. Thus 1 lvl of bard or virutso and you got bardic music. Followed by 2 lvls of X and 10 lvls of Sublime Chord.

For example this build. (Using LA buyback)

Gloura 7/Bard 1/Paladin of Freedom 2/Sublime Chord 2/Sacred Exorist 3/Abjurant Champion 5
BAB of 16.75
Cha to Saves twice
Cha to AC
Turn Undead (Divine Might anyone)
9th lvl spells with full sublime chord casting.
+10 Dex, +4 Con, +2 Wis, +6 Cha
Fly 60 Good
DR 10/Cold Iron, Darkvison 60 feet
Something if off about that build. Gloura takes up 9 levels naturally, since she has the 7 Racial Hit die and the Level Adjustment.

Ramza00
2007-04-26, 10:21 AM
Something if off about that build. Gloura takes up 9 levels naturally, since she has the 7 Racial Hit die and the Level Adjustment.

http://www.d20srd.org/srd/variant/races/reducingLevelAdjustments.htm

You can buyback the 2 LA at these levels
ECL 13 (7+6) you buyback 1 LA, you only now have 1 LA
ECL 16 (7+9) you buyback another 1 LA, you are now LA free

Thus effectively at lvl 20 you are just 12,000+16,000 xp or 28,000 xp different than another 20 lvl character. That is a big chunk, almost 6 wishes, yet at the same time it is worth it.

Mellchia
2007-04-26, 10:44 AM
Khoran:
You're correct about the Draconomicon and the Platinum Knight. It actually explicitly states that it stacks, but only against evil dragons. (Hurray for Palidin 11/PK10).

Roderick_BR
2007-04-26, 01:22 PM
Hmm... I know I had seen a PrC that gives that bonus, but it stated that if you are a paladin, you gain just a +2 bonus added to Divine Grace.
The crusader's ability to add his charisma to his will saves also states that Divine Grace overcomes it, and they don't stack.

Tor the Fallen
2007-04-26, 10:51 PM
Gloura 7/LA 2/monk2/hexblade 3/Paladin of Tyranny 2/Blackguard 2/ Arcane Duelist 2

ECL 20 for charisma to AC 3 times (twice as a deflection bonus, once as a dex bonus), saves 3 times (4 vs spells or spell like abilities), mettle and evasion. BAB isn't great, but with an AC and saves easily in the 60s, you're going to be untouchable 95% of the time. Factor in that 10 DR and even the one in 20 chance of getting hit isn't going to hurt much.

If you could become undead (necropolitan won't work, only humanoid and monstrous humanoid), you could heal yourself with deadly touch.

Other than not getting hurt, I'm not really sure what this build would do.


Give it gestalt sorc all the way up the other side, ad hoc it to undead, give it unholy toughness, and you've got a super durable BBEG. Unless someone turns it.

What if I wanted to make a charisma caster gish in gestalt?
I was thinking one side:
Paladin of Tyranny 2/Monk2/Hexblade4 (dark companion variant)/Arcane Duelist 2//Sorc10 (metamagic variant)
Race: Something that boosts dex&charisma, and lacks LA. Probably an elf. Maybe become a necropolitan for eeevil flavor.

Feats: Ascetic Mage (monk uses cha to AC, sorc levels count as monk levels for unnamed monk AC, bonus), Dodge&Mobility(req for arcane duelist).

I get charisma to saves once, and again vs. spells and spell like abilities, and twice to AC. If I could get away with it, two level dip in blackguard, which gives cha to saves. Again.

Should I dip one level in cleric to get turning, or take two more levels of Paladin of Tyranny, and metamagic cheese it up?

Also- other than being a durable full caster, what could I do with the melee side of the build? Weapon finesse + spiked chain + trip? Power attack is required to be a blackguard, so I could two-hand a greatsword, with a near full BAB.

Is there anything to get charisma to attack?

The_Snark
2007-04-26, 11:58 PM
Gloura 7/LA 2/monk2/hexblade 3/Paladin of Tyranny 2/Blackguard 2/ Arcane Duelist 2

ECL 20 for charisma to AC 3 times (twice as a deflection bonus, once as a dex bonus), saves 3 times (4 vs spells or spell like abilities), mettle and evasion. BAB isn't great, but with an AC and saves easily in the 60s, you're going to be untouchable 95% of the time. Factor in that 10 DR and even the one in 20 chance of getting hit isn't going to hurt much.

If you could become undead (necropolitan won't work, only humanoid and monstrous humanoid), you could heal yourself with deadly touch.

Other than not getting hurt, I'm not really sure what this build would do.


Give it gestalt sorc all the way up the other side, ad hoc it to undead, give it unholy toughness, and you've got a super durable BBEG. Unless someone turns it.

What if I wanted to make a charisma caster gish in gestalt?
I was thinking one side:
Paladin of Tyranny 2/Monk2/Hexblade4 (dark companion variant)/Arcane Duelist 2//Sorc10 (metamagic variant)
Race: Something that boosts dex&charisma, and lacks LA. Probably an elf. Maybe become a necropolitan for eeevil flavor.

Feats: Ascetic Mage (monk uses cha to AC, sorc levels count as monk levels for unnamed monk AC, bonus), Dodge&Mobility(req for arcane duelist).

I get charisma to saves once, and again vs. spells and spell like abilities, and twice to AC. If I could get away with it, two level dip in blackguard, which gives cha to saves. Again.

Should I dip one level in cleric to get turning, or take two more levels of Paladin of Tyranny, and metamagic cheese it up?

Also- other than being a durable full caster, what could I do with the melee side of the build? Weapon finesse + spiked chain + trip? Power attack is required to be a blackguard, so I could two-hand a greatsword, with a near full BAB.

Is there anything to get charisma to attack?

Snowflake Wardance, which requires you to have bardic music. I think it might only work with one-handed and light slashing weapons, though.

And two deflection bonuses to AC won't stack.

I rather prefer using the nereid, which can get similar effects at a lower ECL, and that high charisma also powers a save-or-die touch. Free Displacement is never a bad thing either. You miss out on Charisma to saves, though.

Tor the Fallen
2007-04-27, 12:15 AM
Snowflake Wardance, which requires you to have bardic music. I think it might only work with one-handed and light slashing weapons, though.

If I could find that online....


And two deflection bonuses to AC won't stack.

Actually it's defelction (from unearthly grace), unnamed (monk, similar to dex to ac), and unnamed (arcane duelist, similar to dex to ac).

Monk:

When unarmored and unencumbered, the monk adds her Wisdom bonus (if any) to her AC. In addition, a monk gains a +1 bonus to AC at 5th level. This bonus increases by 1 for every five monk levels thereafter (+2 at 10th, +3 at 15th, and +4 at 20th level).

These bonuses to AC apply even against touch attacks or when the monk is flat-footed. She loses these bonuses when she is immobilized or helpless, when she wears any armor, when she carries a shield, or when she carries a medium or heavy load.

Arcane Duelist:

Apparent Defense (Ex): Due to trickery and force of personality, the arcane duelist adds her Charisma bonus to her Armor Class, in addition to her Dexterity bonus. Conditions that cause the arcane duelist to lose her Dexterity bonus to Armor Class also cause the arcane duelist to lose this bonus.