I'm Thinking About Playing A Wizard On My Fourth Game

[Bartmanhomer]

Even though it's isn't my fourth game but I still trying to get players for my third game. I already planning making my fourth character a wizard. And yes it's a Drow and the final playing card of the suit: Diamond. I'm going to play a Neutral Good Female Drow Wizard named Sarah Diamond. And here's the twist: She's nine years old. Does anybody have any advice and suggestion on how to make a successful wizard?

[ZamielVanWeber]

First off use savage Drow or lesser Drow to avoid sucking down down painful LA. Otherwise let me recommend the easy bake wizard: http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?325933-Easy-Bake-Wizard-Handbook

[Bartmanhomer]

First off use savage Drow or lesser Drow to avoid sucking down down painful LA. Otherwise let me recommend the easy bake wizard: http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?325933-Easy-Bake-Wizard-Handbook Oh yeah, I follow to mention it was a lesser drow. Thank you for pointing that out! :wink:

[daremetoidareyo]

Isn't a 9 year old elf like a 1 year old human?

[Red Fel]

Even though it's isn't my fourth game but I still trying to get players for my third game. I already planning making my fourth character a wizard. And yes it's a Drow and the final playing card of the suit: Diamond. I'm going to play a Neutral Good Female Drow Wizard named Sarah Diamond. And here's the twist: She's nine years old. Does anybody have any advice and suggestion on how to make a successful wizard?

Step One: Don't plan for your next character while playing your current one, unless you anticipate that your current character or campaign is likely to end soon. It's a slippery slope; some people frequently find themselves more excited about the next character than the current character, which is a problem.

Step Two: Don't play a nine year old. That's not a twist, it's just bad. Particularly in a class like Wizard, which is dependent upon training and practice - fluff-wise, a nine year old lacks these. Oh, and then there's the whole "What band of do-gooders would ever bring a child into peril?" Seriously, unless the campaign specifically supports using child protagonists, I'd avoid it on principle.

Step Three: Interestingly, Drow have a favored class that varies by gender. That is, female Drow have favored class Cleric, while males have Wizard. It's not a decisive point, just an interesting one. That said, if you want to make a successful X, you'd do well to read the X Handbook. Given that you haven't asked anything specific (such as a summoning-oriented Wizard, or a Wizard with ice-themed abilities), and just want to make a "successful Wizard," I'd suggest you go read one of those. Here (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?104002-3-5e-The-Logic-Ninja-s-Guide-to-Wizards-Being-Batman) are (http://brilliantgameologists.com/boards/index.php?topic=394.0) some (http://dictummortuum.blogspot.com/2011/09/wizards-handbook-part-one-attributes.html) options (http://dictummortuum.blogspot.com/2011/09/this-is-second-part-to-wizard-handbook.html). Google is your friend.

[Bartmanhomer]

Isn't a 9 year old elf like a 1 year old human?

Was that a joke?


Step One: Don't plan for your next character while playing your current one, unless you anticipate that your current character or campaign is likely to end soon. It's a slippery slope; some people frequently find themselves more excited about the next character than the current character, which is a problem.

Step Two: Don't play a nine year old. That's not a twist, it's just bad. Particularly in a class like Wizard, which is dependent upon training and practice - fluff-wise, a nine year old lacks these. Oh, and then there's the whole "What band of do-gooders would ever bring a child into peril?" Seriously, unless the campaign specifically supports using child protagonists, I'd avoid it on principle.

Step Three: Interestingly, Drow have a favored class that varies by gender. That is, female Drow have favored class Cleric, while males have Wizard. It's not a decisive point, just an interesting one. That said, if you want to make a successful X, you'd do well to read the X Handbook. Given that you haven't asked anything specific (such as a summoning-oriented Wizard, or a Wizard with ice-themed abilities), and just want to make a "successful Wizard," I'd suggest you go read one of those. Here (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?104002-3-5e-The-Logic-Ninja-s-Guide-to-Wizards-Being-Batman) are (http://brilliantgameologists.com/boards/index.php?topic=394.0) some (http://dictummortuum.blogspot.com/2011/09/wizards-handbook-part-one-attributes.html) options (http://dictummortuum.blogspot.com/2011/09/this-is-second-part-to-wizard-handbook.html). Google is your friend. Oh I haven't start playing my third game yet. So I thought I'll plan ahead. And I thought playing a 9 nine year old lesser drow would be fun. I'm mean on my third game I'm playing a Neutral Good Lesser Drow 10 year old rogue.

[ZamielVanWeber]

Red Fel's talking about playing a child reminded me: Pathfinder has an oracle curse where you a stuck as a child. If you want to play a child look into it. You will also need to do a lot of justifying (as to why a profession that normally takes elves hundreds of years took you merely 9). A curse of youth seems like a good start.

[Bartmanhomer]

Red Fel's talking about playing a child reminded me: Pathfinder has an oracle curse where you a stuck as a child. If you want to play a child look into it. You will also need to do a lot of justifying (as to why a profession that normally takes elves hundreds of years took you merely 9). A curse of youth seems like a good start.
I'll prefer the normal age which is 9. No curse of youth or any of that stuff.

[Red Fel]

Was that a joke?

No, actually. Look over here (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/description.htm#age) at starting ages.

The Human adult age - that is, baseline - is 15 years. The same for an Elf is 110 years - about seven times as much. So a nine year old Elf is the equivalent of a Human infant, just over a year old.

Note also that, when randomizing starting age, you take the baseline and add a dice roll. A starting Elf Wizard takes the 110 year old base, then adds 10d6 - an average of 35 years. So your average starting Elf Wizard is 145 years old.

Yours is nine. Make of that what you will.


Oh I haven't start playing my third game yet. So I thought I'll plan ahead. And I thought playing a 9 nine year old lesser drow would be fun. I'm mean on my third game I'm playing a Neutral Good Lesser Drow 10 year old rogue.

Are you kidding me? You haven't started your third game yet, and you already want to build your fourth?

Didn't we already work on Patrick Club awhile back? Is he already dead? Do you go through characters that quickly? Are your campaigns that lethal?

I'm seriously asking. If you're in an ultra-lethal campaign, I'd understand the desire to plan ahead, but it's really not worth the extra work to put in too much detail. And if you're not, you're really shooting yourself in the foot by planning for your next character rather than simply enjoying this one.


I'll prefer the normal age which is 9. No curse of youth or any of that stuff.

So, you're just going to ignore Zamiel's point about how an infant can have mastered something that takes decades, then?

[The Glyphstone]

The question still remains why you want to play a child. Elves are mature adults by 110 years. 9 years is 8% of that; in human terms you are playing a baby who is about a year and a half old.

[Manyasone]

I'll prefer the normal age which is 9. No curse of youth or any of that stuff.

Children don't have good alignments...Trust me on this. Callous and egotistical, yes, but good? Never

[Bartmanhomer]

No, actually. Look over here (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/description.htm#age) at starting ages.

The Human adult age - that is, baseline - is 15 years. The same for an Elf is 110 years - about seven times as much. So a nine year old Elf is the equivalent of a Human infant, just over a year old.

Note also that, when randomizing starting age, you take the baseline and add a dice roll. A starting Elf Wizard takes the 110 year old base, then adds 10d6 - an average of 35 years. So your average starting Elf Wizard is 145 years old.

Yours is nine. Make of that what you will.



Are you kidding me? You haven't started your third game yet, and you already want to build your fourth?

Didn't we already work on Patrick Club awhile back? Is he already dead? Do you go through characters that quickly? Are your campaigns that lethal?

I'm seriously asking. If you're in an ultra-lethal campaign, I'd understand the desire to plan ahead, but it's really not worth the extra work to put in too much detail. And if you're not, you're really shooting yourself in the foot by planning for your next character rather than simply enjoying this one.



So, you're just going to ignore Zamiel's point about how an infant can have mastered something that takes decades, then? No not yet. And I thought it would be a great idea to plan ahead. And Patrick Club Campaign was a dead end. What I meant by it that the DM have to take care of his adopted child.

[Bartmanhomer]

The question still remains why you want to play a child. Elves are mature adults by 110 years. 9 years is 8% of that; in human terms you are playing a baby who is about a year and a half old.

I'm not understand the concept of a drow baby and child. Can you please explain to me a bit more clearer please?

[Red Fel]

No not yet. And I thought it would be a great idea to plan ahead. And Patrick Club Campaign was a dead end. What I meant by it that the DM have to take care of his adopted child.

This... Barely responds to most of what I said. I'm getting the strongest sense of deja vu right here, and my "Don't feed it" instincts are kicking in.


I'm not understand the concept of a drow baby and child. Can you please explain to me a bit more clearer please?

If you don't understand the concept of a baby, don't play one. A nine year old Drow is a Drow baby. Picture a one year old Human. That's what your Drow is at age nine. If that's a problem, don't play it. If you can't imagine it, don't play it.

At this point, I'm going to stop feeding it.

[Bartmanhomer]

This... Barely responds to most of what I said. I'm getting the strongest sense of deja vu right here, and my "Don't feed it" instincts are kicking in.



If you don't understand the concept of a baby, don't play one. A nine year old Drow is a Drow baby. Picture a one year old Human. That's what your Drow is at age nine. If that's a problem, don't play it. If you can't imagine it, don't play it.

At this point, I'm going to stop feeding it.

No That not what I mean. What I meant to say is how does a 9 year old Drow compare to a one year old human baby? That's what I meant to say.

[daremetoidareyo]

Imagine a drow giving birth to a baby. From the moment the doctor cuts the cord it takes 9 years for the baby to begin walking. Your drow has to be like 30-45 years old to appear as a 9 year old.

[Bartmanhomer]

Imagine a drow giving birth to a baby. From the moment the doctor cuts the cord it takes 9 years for the baby to begin walking. Your drow has to be like 30-45 years old to appear as a 9 year old. Oh, now I get it. Oh I'm so sorry for the misunderstanding.

[Kelb_Panthera]

To the 9 year old infant comments; am I the only one that reads the fluff bits in the books?

RotW tells how elves physically mature at a rate only just a little slower than a human. By that metric a 9 year old elf would compare comfortably with a human of 5 to 7 years old. They stagnate in adolescence and reach maturity equal to an adult at 110. Yes, that means they get to be *shudder* "teenagers" for around 8 decades.

DotU tells how drow physically mature slightly faster than elves and mentally only a little slower than humans. A 9 year old drow child should be about the same as a 9 year old human raised by insanely strict parents (yay drow society.)

[ZamielVanWeber]

DotU tells how drow physically mature slightly faster than elves and mentally only a little slower than humans. A 9 year old drow child should be about the same as a 9 year old human raised by insanely strict parents (yay drow society.)

Still leaves my question of how a child did in 9 years (not counting years spent learning not to poo themselves) what elves normally take over a century to do.

[Kelb_Panthera]

Still leaves my question of how a child did in 9 years (not counting years spent learning not to poo themselves) what elves normally take over a century to do.

Meh. D&D is a game about the adventures of handful of exceptional characters. This one is just more exceptional than normal by dint of being absurdly talented and precocious. *shrug*

Sure it's absurd. So what? As long as his group's cool, it doesn't really matter. I'd shoot it down as his DM but I'm not his DM and neither is anyone else here, presumably. So let's just get on with helping with the actual wizardry now that this particular possibility has already been layed out.

Who has the links to treantmonk's guide to being god and the other good wizardy handbooks handy?

[radthemad4]

No not yet. And I thought it would be a great idea to plan ahead. And Patrick Club Campaign was a dead end. What I meant by it that the DM have to take care of his adopted child.Why not use him in another game then?

Who has the links to treantmonk's guide to being god and the other good wizardy handbooks handy?

Red Fel already did so. Last four words in the quote below are links.


Given that you haven't asked anything specific (such as a summoning-oriented Wizard, or a Wizard with ice-themed abilities), and just want to make a "successful Wizard," I'd suggest you go read one of those. Here (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?104002-3-5e-The-Logic-Ninja-s-Guide-to-Wizards-Being-Batman) are (http://brilliantgameologists.com/boards/index.php?topic=394.0) some (http://dictummortuum.blogspot.com/2011/09/wizards-handbook-part-one-attributes.html) options (http://dictummortuum.blogspot.com/2011/09/this-is-second-part-to-wizard-handbook.html).
I'll add the familiar handbook: http://dictummortuum.blogspot.qa/2011/08/familiars-handbook.html

Anyway, a Wizard is pretty complicated. If you're in the mood for a lot of handbook reading, keeping track of preparation and spell slots in game, regularly buying spells, etc. great, but if you're in the mood for something simple that casts spells, I'd recommend playing a Beguiler (Enchanty, illusiony caster, Player's Handbook II, p. 6), Warmage (blaster, Complete Arcane, p. 10) or Dread Necromancer (guess :P, Heroes of Horror, p. 84). You should still read the handbooks for those, but they're signficantly smaller and the classes aren't as complex.

Beguiler Handbook (http://www.minmaxboards.com/index.php?topic=363.0)
Warmage Handbook (http://brilliantgameologists.com/boards/index.php?topic=2816.0)
Dread Necromancer Handbook (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?214212-Reanimated-Dread-Necromancer-Handbook)

[Mystral]

I'd suggest you move away from playing a 9 year old drow.

If you really want to play a unusually young elf wizard, you'd likely be looking into one that is the age of a normal human wizard. Like, 25 or so. Physically, it would be the equivalent of a teenager (which would remove the need for any stat altering, as a wizard, you won't be that strong, anyway), and mentally, it could still be very advanced, for an elf. 25 years is certainly enough to learn everything needed to become a fully functioning member of society and the trade of wizard (after all, humans do it, and elfs aren't dumber than humans).

You should come up with a reason why your elf woman is:

a) a wizard
b) good
c) very advanced for her age
d) have a name like Sarah Diamond (though you may wish to change that a little bit, it sounds like a porn star name).

Luckily, all those problems have the same answer: Adoption. Say that your character was the baby child of some evil drows that an adventuring party killed for one reason or another (there is certainly not a lack of reasons to kill drow), and a good human wizard decided to adopt your character because, well, killing babies is not cool, even if they're dark elves. He retired from adventuring and taught his daughter the basics of his wizardry, and thanks to her human environment she matured and learned quickly (though some childish impulses should still remain).

Now she's 25, and her father died of old age or spontaneous combustion or what have you, and she is forced to step into the larger world and rely on the things she has been taught, yadda yadda.

Workable character concept.

[Inevitability]

What is it with you and unlikely young, good-aligned drow named after playing cards?

[daremetoidareyo]

What is it with you and unlikely young, good-aligned drow named after playing cards?

Yu gi drow?

[Inevitability]

Yu gi drow?

Never have I been so torn between irrational anger and heartfelt admiration.

[Bartmanhomer]

Why not use him in another game then?

I could do that? I didn't know about that. :eek:

[Bartmanhomer]

What is it with you and unlikely young, good-aligned drow named after playing cards?

Because it's my characters that's why.

[Recherché]

I could do that? I didn't know about that. :eek:

You can always choose to remake a character you want to play again. Playing the same character every single game might be seen in slightly bad taste but resurrecting a character you like and feel didn't get enough of a chance to shine this first time around, that's perfectly normal and acceptable.

That being said I'm also weirded out by a 9 year old character and might ban them from my table unless there's a really good reason why they're adventuring that young.

[Bartmanhomer]

You can always choose to remake a character you want to play again. Playing the same character every single game might be seen in slightly bad taste but resurrecting a character you like and feel didn't get enough of a chance to shine this first time around, that's perfectly normal and acceptable.

That being said I'm also weirded out by a 9 year old character and might ban them from my table unless there's a really good reason why they're adventuring that young.
Now I feel pretty stupid hearing all this new information you give me. :frown:

[Kelb_Panthera]

Um... Yeah.

While making a clone-copy of a previous character with the serial numbers filed off is generally frowned upon as a lazy and uncreative practice or a thinly veiled attempt at not paying for a res, it's not actually forbidden in the rules anywhere unless your DM explicitly makes it a houserule.

Since you wouldn't even be under the same DM it would, of course, be acceptable as long as it conforms to the new DM's houserules regarding character creation. Just run the sheet by him first and ask to be sure and you should be golden.

[Bartmanhomer]

Um... Yeah.

While making a clone-copy of a previous character with the serial numbers filed off is generally frowned upon as a lazy and uncreative practice or a thinly veiled attempt at not paying for a res, it's not actually forbidden in the rules anywhere unless your DM explicitly makes it a houserule.

Since you wouldn't even be under the same DM it would, of course, be acceptable as long as it conforms to the new DM's houserules regarding character creation. Just run the sheet by him first and ask to be sure and you should be golden.
It sounds a bit unoriginal using the same character in a different game unless if the DM flake out the game.

[Kelb_Panthera]

It sounds a bit unoriginal using the same character in a different game unless if the DM flake out the game.

It is but then "there are no new ideas" so it's acceptable to a certain degree as long as you don't make too much of habit of it.

[AnachroNinja]

Plus reusing that character reduces the overall ratio of "creepy underage elves" vs normal characters. If you're constantly making new ones, it can get out of hand quickly...

[Bartmanhomer]

Plus reusing that character reduces the overall ratio of "creepy underage elves" vs normal characters. If you're constantly making new ones, it can get out of hand quickly...

Thank you for pointing that out.