[PF] Creating the ultimate followers

[Azoth]

I was wondering if you had the ability to craft magic items for free in a negligible amount of time so cost was no option, how deadly could a level one follower granted by Leadership (or its variants) be?

Assume your Crafter's are Simulacra of a level 20 Wizard and a level 19 Cleric. So 4th level Divine Spells and 5th level Wizard spells are easy to come by.

The Arcane Simulacra can qualify for all Item Creation feats by using an Orange Prism Ioun Stone.

Some thoughts I already had:

Tome +5 all stats

+6 enhancement item to every stat

Demonic Senses +8 bonus to Perception

Wicked Wings EX fly speed equal to land speed + Deflect Arrows if not flying.

Demon hide +1NA ER5: Electric

Strangler's Tongue Touch Attack for DC16 Will save or be paralyzed for 1d4 minutes.

[Jack_Simth]

I was wondering if you had the ability to craft magic items for free in a negligible amount of time so cost was no option, how deadly could a level one follower granted by Leadership (or its variants) be?There's very little point in using the followers. Create Trompe L'oeil (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/bestiary/monster-listings/templates/trompe-l-oeil-cr-1/)'s of useful creatures instead. Caster level is not a listed requirement, so it's just a spellcraft check. Animate Objects is out of range, but your Wizard and Cleric minions are just missing one requirement (Animate Objects), so it's DC 10 + the caster level.. which is the hit dice of the creature. A Wizard-10 with all the items he could want is liable to have an Int score of... 18 (base) +2 (racial) + 2 (level up) + 6 (Headband) + 5 (Tome) = 33. That's a +11 right there, a trait for +2, Skill Focus for +6, ten ranks for +10, and a class skill for +3 gives a +32 modifier. So Trompe L'oiel's of 32 HD critters, taking ten. A Great Wyrm Gold Dragon only has 30 hit dice (and makes a nice stepping stone for making even tougher creatures, as it has a caster level of 19, has a base int of 26, has spellcraft as a class skill, can use items, can get divine spells, and can have feats - so that Dragon, tricked out with items and having you select the feats, can have a spellcraft of something like +52 very easily... and only needs to worry about 5+HD for the spellcraft check for making more Trompe L'oeils, so 57 hd critters).

So I suppose you can mount your followers on Great Wyrm Gold Dragons. That deadly enough?

[Azoth]

While I am well aware of Trompe L'oeil, and how ridiculously easy they are to abuse in a variety of fashions...they just lack a certain something.

[Psyren]

You're also guaranteed no control over them, so treating them as "Simulacrum, but better!" has no real basis.

[icefractal]

You're also guaranteed no control over them, so treating them as "Simulacrum, but better!" has no real basis.Questionable - whether the creator has control isn't specified one way or the other, and "created to use as spies or guards" would seem to imply control.

However, I agree they're too ridiculously easy to abuse. I started to work on a PF Tippyverse implementation using TLEs, but there was no challenge at all, it was just "How much power do you want? Ok, you have it."
Using Simulacra instead is more interesting - it's a puzzle to see what you can squeeze in, especially if you don't posit arbitrary-HD base creatures to work from.

[Coidzor]

While I am well aware of Trompe L'oeil, and how ridiculously easy they are to abuse in a variety of fashions...they just lack a certain something.

How about Waxwork Creature mounts, then? All the joy of getting the ability scores of various beasties, and it's at least somewhat more involved to destroy them than other creatures. They can also conveniently double as distractions to make it so that one's followers aren't the primary target.

Of course, one can also use Waxwork Creatures as the basis for Construct armor so that HP damage can't kill your followers unless someone knows to bring Fire damage to bear and is able to do so.

Arm them with high Caster Level Command Word items of Stone Discus for a bunch of touch attack d6s of damage. Or Meteor Swarm.

Or magical reproductions of Technological Weaponry.

Or Technological Weaponry.

Or Firearms that have been massively enhanced and have the Distance property for a greater ability to attack Touch AC.

[Azoth]

I kind of like the idea of construct armor for them.

My original intent was to see how man different ways we could directly upgrade the level 1 follower to make it something scary. Not necessarily how to invalidate them with constructs or other creatures.

Construct Armor was something I had thought of yet. My mind was going something akin to +5 Defiant Heavy Fortification Greater Shadowed Armor, and a +5 Mirrored Defiant Greater Energy Resistance (Fire, Acid, Cold, Electric, Sonic) Mithral Buckler.

2 Breaths of Life/day; ER 30: Fire, Cold, Acid, Electric, Sonic; 75% chance to ignore Cross/precision damage, +5 Touch AC, +15 Stealth. Do it on Chain Shirts + Bucklers and it doesn't matter if it is a commoner there is 0ACP.

Give them +5 Speed Keen Training (weapon Proficiency) weapons. Either Scimitars, Rapiers, or Composite Longbows. If Longbows trade Keen for Adaptable.

[Coidzor]

I kind of like the idea of construct armor for them.

My original intent was to see how man different ways we could directly upgrade the level 1 follower to make it something scary. Not necessarily how to invalidate them with constructs or other creatures.

Construct Armor was something I had thought of yet. My mind was going something akin to +5 Defiant Heavy Fortification Greater Shadowed Armor, and a +5 Mirrored Defiant Greater Energy Resistance (Fire, Acid, Cold, Electric, Sonic) Mithral Buckler.

2 Breaths of Life/day; ER 30: Fire, Cold, Acid, Electric, Sonic; 75% chance to ignore Cross/precision damage, +5 Touch AC, +15 Stealth. Do it on Chain Shirts + Bucklers and it doesn't matter if it is a commoner there is 0ACP.

Give them +5 Speed Keen Training (weapon Proficiency) weapons. Either Scimitars, Rapiers, or Composite Longbows. If Longbows trade Keen for Adaptable.

Are you assuming they're level 1 commoners when you should be able to get level 1 warriors? :smallconfused:

Consider making the magic item that has Breath of Life 2/day into an Intelligent Magic Item, so it can use Breath of Life on its wielder.

[Jack_Simth]

Of course, one can also use Waxwork Creatures as the basis for Construct armor so that HP damage can't kill your followers unless someone knows to bring Fire damage to bear and is able to do so.The problem with this specific application of Construct Armor (www.d20pfsrd.com/magic/building-and-modifying-constructs/#TOC-Construct-Armor) is that it's useable by "the creator" of the construct (as do most of the complex modifications, really - Crafter's Eyes and Construct Limb both reference the creator for use). Might just be an editing issue, but it's worth noting that the DM could easily nix Construct Armor for your minions on that basis.

Ignoring that problem, though, it's of note is that you can add armor properties to a construct per the same page. Really useful to add Greater Energy Resistance (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/magic-items/magic-armor/magic-armor-and-shield-special-abilities/energy-resistance-greater/) to your Waxwork Constructs, especially your Waxwork Construct Armor.

[Psyren]

Questionable - whether the creator has control isn't specified one way or the other, and "created to use as spies or guards" would seem to imply control.

You missed the key qualifier there "can be." Meaning that some unknown percentage aren't - and besides, just because I create something to do X doesn't mean that it will do X. Children disappoint their parents all the time. Also, "spies and guards" does not imply "crafting assistants" either.

The fact is that without explicit control, they are NPCs, and therefore fall under the purview of the GM like all NPCs do.

[Jack_Simth]

Questionable - whether the creator has control isn't specified one way or the other, and "created to use as spies or guards" would seem to imply control.
Definately implied reasonably well... but unlike a golem (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/bestiary/monster-listings/constructs/golem/) or waxwork creature (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/bestiary/monster-listings/templates/sentient-waxwork-cr-0/), there's no explicit language about it. Of course, very few constructs have language about them obeying the creator, and a Trompe L'oeil (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/bestiary/monster-listings/templates/trompe-l-oeil-cr-1/) also has no language about it being independent, either. Nor do most constructs.

So... as far as I can tell, it's generally assumed that a crafted construct obeys it's creator, but not truly stated outside of specific types of constructs. It's probably a safe assumption for most tables that anything without the Berserk quality (or something similarly worded) is under the control of the crafter, but it's technically left up to the DM to decide as part of world building.

However, I agree they're too ridiculously easy to abuse. I started to work on a PF Tippyverse implementation using TLEs, but there was no challenge at all, it was just "How much power do you want? Ok, you have it."
Using Simulacra instead is more interesting - it's a puzzle to see what you can squeeze in, especially if you don't posit arbitrary-HD base creatures to work from.It's not much of a puzzle. You use False Focus (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/feats/general-feats/false-focus/) to make a Lesser Simulacrum (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/magic/all-spells/s/simulacrum/#TOC-Simulacrum-Lesser) of something strong and mostly-humanoid (like an Ogre (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/bestiary/monster-listings/humanoids/giants/ogre/)), possess it with Magic Jar (http://paizo.com/pathfinderRPG/prd/coreRulebook/spells/magicJar.html), and then use the lesser Simulacrum's strength to power Blood Money (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/magic/all-spells/b/blood-money/) to pay for your first full Simulacrum (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/magic/all-spells/s/simulacrum). Blood money on that 21 str Ogre lets you spend 20 points of strength without it crumpling, which turns into 9,999 gp of components - that's good for 19 HD simulacrums (final HD, not starting). A simulacrum of a Great Wyrm Gold Dragon (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/bestiary/monster-listings/dragons/dragon/metallic-gold/gold-dragon-great-wyrm/) would have only 15 hit dice, casts spells, as has a strength of 43. Posses it as a stepping stone and use Blood Money again and you can Sim pretty much anything within your caster level limit. A Simulacrum of a Solar (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/bestiary/monster-listings/outsiders/angel/solar/), on the other hand, would have just 11 hit dice... which is more than the Efreeti (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/bestiary/monster-listings/outsiders/genie/efreeti/), and almost as much as the Glabrezu (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/bestiary/monster-listings/outsiders/demon/glabrezu/), either of which gets Wish. So use the Solar's Wish to make more simulacrums... only downside is that they're under the Solar's control, not yours directly (but you could have the Solar order them to obey all of your orders in both letter and intent, then have it never give them further orders).

So... yeah, you can pretty much use Simulacrum to have as much power as you'd like, too.

[Psyren]

That a Solar has Wish and more HD than an efreet does not mean that a half-HD Solar would still get Wish. Simulacrum cares about the appropriate HD of the creature you're making, not that of every other creature that exists. There's still plenty of room for a GM to say "nice try" and that's exactly the answer you'd get at my table.

[Jack_Simth]

That a Solar has Wish and more HD than an efreet does not mean that a half-HD Solar would still get Wish. Simulacrum cares about the appropriate HD of the creature you're making, not that of every other creature that exists. There's still plenty of room for a GM to say "nice try" and that's exactly the answer you'd get at my table.
Scarcely matters, you can get as many as you want anyway via repeating the first few steps - few critters have more than 38 HD, so your primary limit will be the caster level anyway. It just takes longer is all. Additionally, I don't plan at being at your table any time soon, so your personal call on a fuzzy spell is irrelevant for my purposes.

Besides: Simulacrum (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/magic/all-spells/s/simulacrum/) is made of handwavium anyway. What's "the appropriate hit points, feats, skill ranks, and special abilities for a creature of that level or HD" is up for endless debate, or rather "debate" because all you'll get are opinions. Some will say that the "special abilities" referenced only apply to things clearly tied to HD or class level - such as the special abilities of half a wizard-20 - and that everything else is kept. Others will guess like you just did and cherry-pick things to dump with little rhyme or reason. There's no clear guideline.

Edit: Oh yes, and "most favorable interpretation that stays within RAW" is the usual assumption with most TO exercises (which this should be, as "craft magic items for free in a negligible amount of time" as specified in the OP is something few would do at a real table - ditto for an attempt at a 'Tippyverse implementation' [as specified by icefractal] in most cases). So yes, a Simulacrum Solar does get Wish as a spell-like for this.

[Coidzor]

You missed the key qualifier there "can be." Meaning that some unknown percentage aren't - and besides, just because I create something to do X doesn't mean that it will do X. Children disappoint their parents all the time. Also, "spies and guards" does not imply "crafting assistants" either.

The fact is that without explicit control, they are NPCs, and therefore fall under the purview of the GM like all NPCs do.

It's almost like Trompe L'oeils are part of a horror supplement where they can spontaneously animate from an oil painting without having someone use the Craft Construct feat to make them.

[Psyren]

It's almost like Trompe L'oeils are part of a horror supplement where they can spontaneously animate from an oil painting without having someone use the Craft Construct feat to make them.

Exactly, they're designed for horror. A situation where the player is not in control of everything by definition.

[Coidzor]

Exactly, they're designed for horror. A situation where the player is not in control of everything by definition.

But are also compatible with the general rules for non-horror games, which is where people would actually be making any form of construct as a PC anyway.

Unless one was playing Frankenstein.

Also, non-horror games are the vast majority of games, because, even with horror rules for it, Pathfinder is rubbish at horror.