Best Ways to Get Exploding Minions?

[Palanan]

So, a certain feat from Occult Adventures has been getting a lot of laughs.

But it did get me wondering about how else minions could be rigged to go boom. What are some other options, either in 3.5 or in Pathfinder? I'm looking for feats and spells in particular.

[ExLibrisMortis]

Destruction Retribution, a follow-up to Corpsecrafter, from Libris Mortis.

Each undead you raise or create with any necromancy spell releases a burst of negative energy upon its destruction, dealing 1d6 points of damage plus an additional 1d6 points per 2 Hit Dice to every creature within a 10-foot spread (Reflex DC 15 half). This damage comes from negative energy, and it therefore heals undead creatures.

[Necroticplague]

There's a feat in Libris Mortis who's name I forget that lets your created undead explode in a burst of negative energy when they die. There's also the Necrotic Cyst line, which has a spell that makes an encysted person explode in a shower of pus and putrid flesh (letting you spread around the Cyst more).

[gorfnab]

Feat: Final Strike (SS)

[Jack_Simth]

Book of Vile Darkness: Unliving Weapon, Cleric-3: Hours/level duration: If the target undead is struck for at least one point of damage in the duration, it goes boom (which makes for some interesting tactical options).

Spell Compendium has the Death Throes spell (Cleric/Sorcerer/Wizard-5), that's a personal spell that makes you go boom on death. There's some tricks you can do to plant that on a minion.

You can manufacture minions with various effects. For instance: Take a big block of stone. Cast any Symbol spell on it, with the trigger being that the Polymorph Any Object expires. Then cast Polymorph Any Object on the block of stone to turn it into a Stone Golem (Kingdom["Mineral"], Class ["stone"], Int ["-"] = Permanent with just one casting). Due to the combat section of the golem description, it follows your orders, as you are in all senses it's creator. When something kills it (or if the PaO spell gets dispelled by something that does not also kill the Symbol spell), the Symbol goes off. Can be any Symbol spell you like.

You can Planar Bind things with the Death Throes special ability, although the only one that comes to mind is the balor.

You can equip minions with shields/armour with Symbol spells on them, set to go off on some trigger condition or other.

Edit:
Craft Contingent Spell from Complete Arcane adds lots of nifty options, too. Any trigger you like, any spell you like (although it does have to target the minion).

[noob]

Also I did not have seen anything preventing you from stacking 20 times Unliving Weapon on one undead so that it kills mostly everything around him.

[Sayt]

Pathfinder feat has a Implanted Bomb (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/feats/general-feats/implant-bomb) feat for Alchemists.

[nedz]

Just scribe explosive runes on their chests — no need to stack them.

[Socratov]

I find the best way is to follow ExLibrisMortis's advice and go for undead minions (they don't diminish your ability of rehiring minions, so that's a great idea) and go the undead minonmancy route. With one caveat, go for Warlock to get the "The Dead Walk" invocation. If you are going to blow them up, raising the dead for free (as opposed to using black onyx as spellcomponents) is a great idea. What's more, you have a ranged touch attack to destroy them at your leisure. What's more, you can always choose to not apply your feats and make your undead permanent by jamming a chunk of black onyx in their heads (for when you need flying, or some walking bone armour)...

Don't forget to take all the other corspecrafter feats. They are well worth it. I'd propose:

LE Human Warlock 6

Human: Corpsecrafter
1st: Destruction Retribution
3rd: Nimble Bones
6th: Deadly Chill

And for a bonus, argue for your DM that bones are very breakable and thus that skeletons should be affected by baleful utterance...

Step 1: make undead
step 2: have them wail on the enemy
step 3: kill undead one by one (healing your other skeletons and damaging the enemy)
step 4: see step 3
Step 5: send minions far away to self destruct
Step 6: loot body.

[Dondasch]

Pathfinder allows the creation of Burning Skeletons with animate dead, which explode on death. You may (not sure on legality of combining) be able to create Bloody Burning Skeletons, which would explode on death and reanimate for free an hour later.

[Segev]

Not as good as some of these other options - I particularly am fond of the Necrotic Cyst line for this purpose, because you can use necrotic tumor to enslave your encysted patsies and have them run up to the heroes, begging for help, before detonating them one by one - but there is also the feat in Complete Psionic that lets you summon astral constructs which explode.

[KillianHawkeye]

A guy that used to be in my gaming group played a wizard who would have several pieces of paper with Explosive Runes cast on them. In battle, he would summon a creature such as a celestial monkey, give them the paper, and order them to run next to the enemy, open the page and read the contents. We had a running joke that the character was starting to gain a reputation among the celestial realms under the moniker "the Exploder." :smallamused:

[Hamste]

So, a certain feat from Occult Adventures has been getting a lot of laughs.

But it did get me wondering about how else minions could be rigged to go boom. What are some other options, either in 3.5 or in Pathfinder? I'm looking for feats and spells in particular.

Out of curiosity which feat?

[Extra Anchovies]

Out of curiosity which feat?

Parting Blast. It lets you take one point of burn for the day, and then if you die during that day enemies within 5 feet take damage equal to your simple blast and your body is destroyed.
☑Prevents the use of anything except Miracle, Wish, and True Resurrection to bring you back
☑Doesn't affect someone who kills you with a reach weapon
☑Doesn't affect someone who kills you with a ranged attack
☑Deals an average of 1.75 damage per class level
☑You have to spend a point of burn and a feat to get all this
W O R T H W H I L E

[Darrin]

The easiest spell would be fatal flame (Complete Scoundrel, Sor/Wiz 2), but it allows a Will save. I'm not sure if you can order your minions to willingly fail a save (particularly if they know what spell you're casting). Damage = 2 x HD or 2 x CL, max of 20. Death throes (Spell Compendium, Clr/Sor/Wiz 5) is much more impressive: 1d8/CL (no max). You can get around the "Range: Personal" with a Skull Talisman (Frostburn) or Greater Glyph Seal (MIC). The Greater Glyph Seal is reusable, and you can set it up so that the target may not even be aware that you've cast it on them. If you're worried about capture, you can add infallible servant (Exemplars of Evil, Clr/Sor/Wiz 3, Dru 4) to trigger the explosion. Added bonus: save vs. nausea for anyone standing within 30'.

There are also several creatures with Death Throes (or something similar) already built in:

Balor (MM)
Frost Wyrm (MM)
Chraal (MM3)
Conflagration Ooze (MM3, Variant)
Phoelarch (MM3)
Fang Golem (MM4)
Ember Guard (MM5)
Fetid Fungus (MM5)
Magmacore Golem (MM5)
Bladerager Troll (MM5)
Flame Snake, Greater (FF)
Ocularon (FF)
Varrangoin, Lesser (FF)
Gas Spore (LoM)
Dunewinder (Sandstorm)
Porcupine Cactus (Sandstorm)

[Molan]

I know for a stone cold fact that there's a way to do it Psionically. I had a PC who summoned ectoplasmic scarabs (as a wilder) and then detonated them instead of actually using them in combat. It was actually pretty funny and he used it in a lot of clever situations, most notably a jailbreak where the prison was equipped with an anti-magic zone but (I segregate the two types as a DM) nothing to ward against Psionics. He ran out of PP less then halfway through the dungeon but he blew up a number of hostile prisoners, the prison bars, and a good number of Jailors before he was empty.

I can't remember what the specific combo was but he didn't use anything other then EXP and CP in his build.

I have also used explosive runes for suicide soldiers. PCs were defending a mosque (sandstorm setting) and these cultists hit it in waves and used these shirtless suicide soldiers with ERs on them to try and break through. Forced the PCs to create a perimeter and knock out the bombers before they reached anything squishy, then clear out before they auto-detonated. Great fight.

[Ferronach]

Setp 1: Tie a bunch of flasks of alchemical fire and other nastiness to the minion's body. If you have the cash, add a necklace of fireball...
Step 2: Write " I prepared explosive runes this morning" on their breastplate (or other)
Step 3: quickly cover the runes with something that the minion can easily remove in battle as a free action
Step 4: Kamikaze the minion in and have them expose the runes to the baddies
Step 5: Boom! Roll a heck of a lot of damage dice... and laugh :)

[Talionis]

I find the best way is to follow ExLibrisMortis's advice and go for undead minions (they don't diminish your ability of rehiring minions, so that's a great idea) and go the undead minonmancy route. With one caveat, go for Warlock to get the "The Dead Walk" invocation. If you are going to blow them up, raising the dead for free (as opposed to using black onyx as spellcomponents) is a great idea. What's more, you have a ranged touch attack to destroy them at your leisure. What's more, you can always choose to not apply your feats and make your undead permanent by jamming a chunk of black onyx in their heads (for when you need flying, or some walking bone armour)...

Don't forget to take all the other corspecrafter feats. They are well worth it. I'd propose:

LE Human Warlock 6

Human: Corpsecrafter
1st: Destruction Retribution
3rd: Nimble Bones
6th: Deadly Chill

And for a bonus, argue for your DM that bones are very breakable and thus that skeletons should be affected by baleful utterance...

Step 1: make undead
step 2: have them wail on the enemy
step 3: kill undead one by one (healing your other skeletons and damaging the enemy)
step 4: see step 3
Step 5: send minions far away to self destruct
Step 6: loot body.

I don't see why a second level incarnate can't do something similar with the Necrocarnum soul end that binds to the crown chakra. Undead minions just as free, if built right you can blast about as well as a Warlock, but you'll definitely be more versatile.

[Firest Kathon]

Also from Occult Adventures comes the Explode Head (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/magic/all-spells/e/explode-head) spell. Does just what it says on the cover.

[JDL]

A guy that used to be in my gaming group played a wizard who would have several pieces of paper with Explosive Runes cast on them. In battle, he would summon a creature such as a celestial monkey, give them the paper, and order them to run next to the enemy, open the page and read the contents. We had a running joke that the character was starting to gain a reputation among the celestial realms under the moniker "the Exploder." :smallamused:

I'm totally stealing that idea! Sheer brilliance!