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View Full Version : I Know All, I See All (Paragnostic Apostle Trick)



Jack Mann
2007-06-15, 02:28 AM
I posted this on the Wizards boards, and thought I'd share it here as well.


I'll preface this by saying that this build relies on somewhat questionable wording and interpretation. I think my interpretation fits the literal meaning of the text in question, but others may disagree.

Paragnostic Apostle has the Lore ability, similar to the cloistered cleric or Loremaster. Unlike those classes, you add twice your paragnostic apostle level to the check. If you have another class that grants you lore or bardic knowledge, those levels stack.

It's the last two that interest us, especially that last. The exact wording is, "If you have bardic knowledge or lore ability from another class, your levels in those classes stack with your Paragnostic apostle levels for the purpose of this check." This is important. These levels don't stack with the bonus granted by paragnostic apostle, those levels are not being added to the check, they are stacking specifically with the paragnostic apostle levels, which are doubled.

It's an order of operations question. If I'm right, then a cloistered cleric/paragnostic apostle would figure out his lore check as follows:
2*(CC+PA)+Int+Mods=Lore

This means that by level twenty, you could have a base lore check of +40.

Let's try a cloistered cleric 5/paragnostic apostle 5/loremaster 10. She likes to keep her intelligence high, so we'll give her a 26, which is reasonable by level 20. She tosses five ranks into knowledge (history), for another +2. She purchases a headband of the lorebinder (which she's added her +6 intelligece bonus, as per the MIC rules) and gets another +4.

She now has a Lore check of +54. Given that the highest bardic knowledge DC given is 30, I think it's safe to know that if it's possible for her to know it, she knows it.

Not the most powerful trick, and I doubt anyone would allow it, but still a bit of fun with semantics.

Now, after that, someone suggested mother cyst and necrotic empowerment for another +1 intelligence bonus over a headband. It can be persisted, so we'll go with it.

The rest are ways I found while looking in the books to boost it further.

Now, if we start her off as an Illumian with the naen sigil and have her take enhanced sigils at some point, that's a +3 to intelligence-based checks. Mechanus mind (cast by a friendly wizard, or from a scroll) gives another +2.

She takes the luck domain, so she has access to Moment of Prescience. Using a bead of karma and orange ioun stone, she gets +25 to a single check. She also uses Surge of Fortune. Finally, she uses UMD (class skill for loremasters) with a scroll of improvisation, CL 20.

For one lore check, you have a check of +115. This is almost four times the highest check given in the book for bardic knowledge. Can anyone think of a way to increase it further?

More importantly, can anyone think of what sort of knowledge might require that high a DC?

Like a Lion
2007-06-15, 02:47 AM
More importantly, can anyone think of what sort of knowledge might require that high a DC?

Awareness of the metagame.

Behold_the_Void
2007-06-15, 02:50 AM
As far as increasing it, I don't know, but I have a character much like in the campaign I'm running and here's what I'm going to do with it.

Basically, the campaign is a pretty silly (based on the video game Disgaea, which says a lot to anybody who knows it) campaign that's at level 25 at the moment. I use many variants that are just easier for my bookeeping (people and their schedules have required several in-and-out events which means that several levels were gained in their absence), the relevant rule here being retroactive skill points with intelligence boosts.

So, we have our Wizard/Loremaster/Archmage who has max ranks in just about every available knowledge skill, plus a healthy Lore ability.

The way I'm handling it is he basically knows everything.

Any puzzle the party might encounter he can just figure out. I'll hand his player a detailed explanation of how it works, and whenever the player wants to know about something I'll just tell them what it is (through note cards of course).

As with Diviners, it can make things a lot more challenging for the DM, but having someone with so much knowledge that they just comprehend and can figure out anything just by looking at it is a fun concept I'm looking forward to exploring when the group meets up again next fall.

Yechezkiel
2007-06-15, 02:51 AM
Stone of Good Luck + Ioun Stone for ability check bonuses?

Jack Mann
2007-06-15, 02:58 AM
Sadly, those won't help. Stone of good luck won't stack with improvisation, since they're both luck bonuses. The pale green ioun stone won't stack with mechanus mind, since they're both competence bonuses.

Citizen Joe
2007-06-15, 06:34 AM
Note that for every 5 points you score higher than the target number for a knowledge check you get another piece of information. So, whereas most people just want to know SOMETHING about that rare item, you would be able to give a dissertation on the subject including the life stories of all those involved.

Dhavaer
2007-06-15, 06:58 AM
More importantly, can anyone think of what sort of knowledge might require that high a DC?

Any embarrasing medical issues the BBEG may have. Crabs, for example.

Fax Celestis
2007-06-15, 09:24 AM
How about that CCham spell that lets you treat your next roll as a natural 20?

brian c
2007-06-15, 10:55 AM
Any embarrasing medical issues the BBEG may have. Crabs, for example.

Unfortunately there's no example of Knowledge DCs that high even in the Epic handbook, but that's a pretty good guess.

Jack Mann
2007-06-15, 12:14 PM
How about that CCham spell that lets you treat your next roll as a natural 20?

Surge of fortune. That's how she gets a check of 115.