Tweaking a Shaper/Constructor

[asnys]

I'm building a shaper/constructor, and looking for advice tweaking the build. In particular, I find myself with more feat slots then I know what to do with, which is the absolute inverse of what I'm used to, and could use some advice on filling them. Two flaws are allowed, along with using feat leech to borrow feats from my psicrystal.

I'm planning to use astral construct as my main combat tool; between Boost Construct, Constructor, and being a Tier 2 base class I think I have enough combat mojo. What I'd like to find is more feats and other stuff that let me make stuff. I see this guy as primarily an engineer type, who's long-term goal is to end up founding a mercantile corporation or city or something like that. I wouldn't mind going into another prestige class for the last five levels, either, but I'm not keen on losing more manifesting levels, so it might be best to just stick with Shaper.

Here's the build so far:

Class: Shaper-5/Constructor-10/Shaper-5
Race: Human
Stats (rolled): Str 10, Dex 16, Con 12, Int 17, Wis 13, Cha 16
First-Level Powers: Astral Construct, Psionic Minor Creation, Vigor

Traits: Psigifted (Metacreativity) (homebrew psionic equivalent to spellgifted)

Feats:
1st: Boost Construct, Mercantile Background, Overchannel, Psicrystal Affinity, Talented
1st - Psicrystal: Linked Power
3rd: Psicrystal Containment
3rd - Psicrystal: Metapower (Synchronicity)
5th: ACF: Personal Construct
6th: Psionic Meditation
6th - Psicrystal: Extend Power
9th: Practiced Manifester
9th - Psicrystal: Empty
12th: Empty
12th - Psicrystal: Empty
15th: Empty
15th - Psicrystal: Empty
18th: Empty
18th - Psicrystal: Empty
20th: Empty

So there's a lot of spaces to fill. I thought about getting Psionic Meditation, but I don't really have anything to use my psionic focus on yet. Homebrew and Dragon magazine are allowed as long as they're reasonable. Any advice would be appreciated! :smallsmile:

[prufock]

Overchannel will let you manifest higher-level astral constructs, and Talented will let you do so without taking damage by expending your psionic focus. That opens up Psionic Meditation and/or Psycrystal Containment as useful options.

[Rubik]

Link Power is a feat you'll definitely want to have so you can create Astral Constructs as a standard/swift/immediate action for 1 pp and your focus. That way you won't have to sit around for a full round every round creating constructs. Also works well on powers like Call to Mind, Psionic Identify, and psionic Genesis.

If you take the Synchronicity power and the Metapower feat for Metapower (Synchronicity + Linked Power) you can not only get your standard action back for the round, but the cost for the augment for Linked Power is reduced by 2 pp, which gives you extra pp to spend on boosting your manifestations.

[DrMartin]

can you switch stats around? as a psion you have two good reasons for wis 13+ called psionic meditation and metamorphic transfer (if you decide to acquire metamorphosis through expanded knowledge / chirurgery, which is usually a good idea)

overchannel and talented are really solid...useful metapsionics are linked power, as written above, and extend power.

Craft feats are usually a bit situational so I'd consider using psychic reformation to swap them in when you have downtime, and swap them out again when you resume adventuring.

a small aside, since you mentioned homebrew: Minor Creation has a manifesting time of 1 minute and create a huge volume of stuff...I had a DM who agreed to rule that the power would manifest 1/10 of the full volume every round, making a small precipitating of stuff from the astral plane instead of making it "pop" in one go at the end of the casting time. It was FUN :smallbiggrin: and meant literal showers of drugs, poisons and other fun things over pretty much everybody.

[asnys]

Thanks for everyone's help! I'll edit the original post in a minute to include your suggestions.


Overchannel will let you manifest higher-level astral constructs, and Talented will let you do so without taking damage by expending your psionic focus. That opens up Psionic Meditation and/or Psycrystal Containment as useful options.

Doy. Somehow I had gotten the idea that you couldn't take Talented at level 1. :smallredface:


Link Power is a feat you'll definitely want to have so you can create Astral Constructs as a standard/swift/immediate action for 1 pp and your focus. That way you won't have to sit around for a full round every round creating constructs. Also works well on powers like Call to Mind, Psionic Identify, and psionic Genesis.

If you take the Synchronicity power and the Metapower feat for Metapower (Synchronicity + Linked Power) you can not only get your standard action back for the round, but the cost for the augment for Linked Power is reduced by 2 pp, which gives you extra pp to spend on boosting your manifestations.

Wow. That's kind of nuts. I mean, in a good way.


can you switch stats around?

Yes.

Question: is Ectopic Form any good? In the Psions' Handbook it says you don't get Astral Construct menu choices if you use Ectopic Form, but I can't seem to actually find that anywhere in Complete Psionics. What am I missing?

[Rubik]

Question: is Ectopic Form any good? In the Psions' Handbook it says you don't get Astral Construct menu choices if you use Ectopic Form, but I can't seem to actually find that anywhere in Complete Psionics. What am I missing?You get the ectopic constructs as shown in the monster section of CPsi. They all have pre-chosen menu choices, and there's nothing in the statblocks that indicate that you get to choose any yourself, meaning that they are, by and large, almost entirely inferior to a regular astral construct with the Boost Construct feat available. If your DM allows you to get regular astral construct menu abilities on top of what the stat entries say, by all means, grab one, but avoid them at all costs, if not.

[sleepyphoenixx]

Midnight Augmentation is a solid pick, especially if you're focused on one power. If you're using it on Astral Construct you can get level 9 constructs at level 9 instead of 17.
You can also take Shape Soulmeld(Shedu Crown) and the Open Chakra power to qualify for Mindsight.

Another option is to trade your 5th level bonus feat in for the Personal Construct ACF to get free Quicken Power on a specific Astral Construct - that also means you can stop at Constructor 9 and not lose a second ML.

[asnys]

You get the ectopic constructs as shown in the monster section of CPsi. They all have pre-chosen menu choices, and there's nothing in the statblocks that indicate that you get to choose any yourself, meaning that they are, by and large, almost entirely inferior to a regular astral construct with the Boost Construct feat available. If your DM allows you to get regular astral construct menu abilities on top of what the stat entries say, by all means, grab one, but avoid them at all costs, if not.

Are you sure? Because I don't actually see anywhere where it says that these choices override the choices you can make yourself. I mean, it would make sense that they would, but I just don't see it written down anywhere.


Midnight Augmentation is a solid pick, especially if you're focused on one power. If you're using it on Astral Construct you can get level 9 constructs at level 9 instead of 17.
You can also take Shape Soulmeld(Shedu Crown) and the Open Chakra power to qualify for Mindsight.

Unfortunately, I do not have Magic of Incarnum.


Another option is to trade your 5th level bonus feat in for the Personal Construct ACF to get free Quicken Power on a specific Astral Construct - that also means you can stop at Constructor 9 and not lose a second ML.

Good idea, thanks!

[Rubik]

Are you sure? Because I don't actually see anywhere where it says that these choices override the choices you can make yourself. I mean, it would make sense that they would, but I just don't see it written down anywhere.Ectopic Form allows you to create one of the ectopic constructs as listed in CPsi in lieu of a regular astral construct. None of those constructs has "One ability from Menu X" listed under their Special Qualities or Special Attacks section. If the forms had those, they'd say so.

[asnys]

Ectopic Form allows you to create one of the ectopic constructs as listed in CPsi in lieu of a regular astral construct. None of those constructs has "One ability from Menu X" listed under their Special Qualities or Special Attacks section. If the forms had those, they'd say so.

The basic astral constructs don't have "ability from menu X" either in Complete Psionic...

ETA: So, the description of the Basic Astral Construct says:


The statistics blocks for standard constructs, minus their menu choices as shown on page 185 in Expanded Psionics Handbook, are given below for ease of reference.

The various Ectopic Form constructs are presented following the basic astral constructs. Their statistics blocks are truncated so that they provide only the characteristics that are different from, or in addition to, those of a basic astral construct of a given level.

Since the Ectopic Forms include abilities taken from the astral construct menus, it would make sense that they wouldn't get additional abilities, but I don't see that actually written down anywhere...

[Rubik]

The basic astral constructs don't have "ability from menu X" either in Complete Psionic...They do, however, have them in the XPH, which is primary source and trumps CPsi. Ectopic forms only have the one entry, which doesn't include the menu abilities except the pre-selected ones.

[DrMartin]

The text in complete psi under "basic astral constructs" says explicitly that the stat blocks for the astral constructs "[...] minus their menu choices as shown on page 185 in Expanded Psionics Handbook, are given below for ease of reference.". I read this as the constructs still getting their normal menu choices per XPH, as this is imho a formatting/editing choice rather than a sneak nerf.

It goes on to say that the stat blocks of the individual ectopic forms are "[...] truncated and provide only the characteristics that are different from, or in addition to, those of a basic astral construct of a given level".

reading the whole thing my interpretation is that the ectopic forms gets their normal allotment of menu abilities as a "basic construct of a given level" would get, in addition to their special traits