various questions (first time poster looking for answers/suggestions/tips)

[skunk3]

I have read these forums for quite a while to get ideas and info, but I have some questions and I figured that I should ask! These are in no order whatsoever...

1. I am a bit confused when it comes to crafting items / having items crafted for me. I have read that non-epic magic weapons and armor can go above +10 in total, but unless I am mistaken, doesn't the DMG/PHB specifically state that the maximum enhancement bonus for any weapon or armor cannot be above +5, and the total bonus cannot be above +10? The way I understand it, you can only have a max of +10 total including enhancement and +X enchantments, but you can add flat cost enchants on top of those as long as the total price of the item remains under 200k GP. Am I right or am I wrong? I've read in various places that there's no +10 cap at all, and the real cap is the 200k GP limit. Which is true?

2. I am also confused when it comes to damage reduction. This only applies no melee attacks, correct? That's what my DM told me, but it seems weird that the DR wouldn't count towards ALL sources of damage. While I am on the topic of DR, here's a side question: Say I patiently saved up enough GP to buy a Starmantle cloak. This cloak basically lets you attempt a DC15 reflex save to take halved damage from a magical weapon. If I had another item that provided DR, would I still get to apply my DR after the halved damage effect from the cloak? I think so, but if I am wrong I'd like to know. Also, if you are a good character, why is it that most of the good-themed DR items have DR/evil? Doesn't that mean that 'evil' bypasses the DR? Wouldn't a good character want DR/good, since they are presumably not going to be getting into fights with good characters?

3. Ioun stones. Is there a full list of 3.5 Ioun stones available somewhere, aside from the handful I've already seen in the books?
-Can Ioun stones be stolen from you?
--Ioun stones seem pretty weak / easy to destroy. Is it risky purchasing these since they are so fragile?

4. I am also confused when it comes to crafted items that are not armor or weapons. I do not currently have a Natural Armor bonus, so I was considering getting a pair of Crimson Dragonhide Bracers +5, which is 53k GP I believe. Can I go beyond +5?

5. I am currently playing an Eldritch Disciple. What would be some good wands / staffs for me to buy for buffs and other helpful things? Regular or eternal?
-Any tips regarding Eldritch Disciple optimization? For now I am primarily focusing on crowd control, healing, and pew-pew'ing things. I've read some cool stuff about Glaivelocks and Clawlocks but - Clawlocks especially - it seems like it takes a fair amount of specialization to really make them shine, and I already have what I'd consider to be the best feats / invocations picked out all the way through 20th level.

6. Say I have a Handy Haversack or Quiver of Elhonna for wands/rods/staffs/etc. Can I pull one out and use it in the same round? I've seen some debate regarding this.

7. Warlock's Scepter: Is there any way to further enhance it's Warlock-aiding abilities, or am I limited to weapon enchants, which quite frankly, wouldn't really help me at all as I don't plan on getting into melee? I already have a greater chausible of fell power and gloves of eldritch admixture, and would definitely like to beef up my EB dice damage as much as possible... suggestions? (Preferably not feats, as I plan on using those for extra invocations)

[skunk3]

BTW, about my current character:

Gustav Witbier
Human
Chaotic Good
Age: 15 (He is basically "McLovin" from the movie Superbad, lol)

Warlock 3 / Cleric 3 / Eldritch Disciple 2 (soon will be 3)

STR 10
DEX 14 (18)
CON 14
INT 12
WIS 17
CHA 18

Feats so far: Precise Magic, Spell Penetration, Greater Spell Penetration, Mortal Bane (for my Eldritch Blast)
Feats planned: Practiced Spellcaster - Divine (level 9), Extra Invocation - Walk Unseen (Level 12), Extra Invocation - Caustic Mire (Level 15), Extra Invocation - Painful Slumber of the Ages (Level 18)

Invocations known: Eldritch Spear, See the Unseen, Detect Magic, Entropic Warding
Invocations I will take as I level (in order): Fell Flight, Flee The Scene, Brimstone Blast (only taking for Hellfire prereq - will later retrain this to Relentless Dispelling, and after I get Caster's Lament I will retrain to again), Vitriolic Blast, Chilling Tentacles, Eldritch Cone, Caster's Lament

Notable gear: Mithralmist Shirt, Mithral buckler, Ring of Protection +1, Boots of DEX +4, Brute Ring, Gloves of Eldritch Admixture, Bracers of the Entangling Blast, Greater Chausuble of Fell Power

I plan on taking another Warlock level at some point to get Deceive Item, but I am not entirely sure how important it is to have that ability. Thoughts?

I will either go: Warlock 3 / Cleric 3 / Eldritch Disciple 10 / Hellfire Warlock 3 / Enlightened Spirit 1

OR I will do the same thing, except throw in another Warlock level in there somewhere and leave out Enlightened Spirit.

If we do end up going into epic levels (which I hope we do) I will take the 3 levels available from Human Paragon for the bonus feat, 2 levels of divine spellcasting, and +2 ability increase. After that I will bounce back and forth between Cleric and Enlightened Spirit. Even though Enlightened Spirit kinda sucks as a prestige class, it thematically fits perfectly with this character, who is all about battling undead and evil outsiders.

[KillianHawkeye]

I might try to tackle some of your other questions later, but I can answer the one about the Damage Reduction.


First of all, DR works against weapon damage. This includes ranged weapons such as bows, not just melee. All types of energy damage (fire, electricity, et cetera) ignore DR, as well as any damage dealt by spells and spell-like abilities (even if it's classed as physical damage, i.e. slashing).


Second, you should still get to apply DR if you have a Starmantle Cloak, but I can't say for sure if you'd apply the DR first or halve the damage first since I'm not too familiar with this item. I've really only heard what it does through second-hand accounts.


Finally, you're right that it seems slightly counter-productive for good and evil protections to be vulnerable to their natural enemies. However, this is intentional. The reasoning here is that the forces of Good and Evil have been fighting for so long that they're literally anathema to one another. In other words, Good is Evil's weakness, and Evil is Good's weakness.

Any creature with an alignment subtype (such as angels and demons/devils) bypasses DR as if their attacks carry that alignment, and many of these creatures have DR that is beaten by their opposite. The result is that powerful Outsiders from the upper and lower planes are protected against the attacks of most mortals, but they are a threat to each other if they ever meet head to head. It's thematic; it makes sense that powerful avatars of Good and Evil should be able to harm each other, and that carries over to whatever spells or items offer similar protections.

In a funny way, this also explains why the Blood War (the eternal cosmological feud between demons and devils over who gets to be the multiverse's Big Bad) always seems to be at a stand-still. They can't get past each other's Damage Reduction! :smallamused::smallwink:

[Kayblis]

I'm not knowledgeable in the Eldritch Disciple and Warlock fields, and KillianHawkeye explained perfectly the good/evil question. So I'll focus on the other ones:

1 - Non-epic, no weapon or armor can exceed +5 enhancement bonus. That is, no longsword can be a +6 Longsword. The +10 limitation refers to the various +X equivalents. So a "+4 Flaming Keen Longsword of Warning" is a +7 equivalent weapon, with a +4 enhancement bonus and +3 equivalent in assorted bonuses. It's priced as a +7 weapon. The hardcap of 200,000gp is a different cap - no item pre-epic can cost over that. Any items over 200k gp are considered Epic Items, are way way rarer and have a x10 modifier slapped on their prices to drive the point home. This means you'll probably never see an Epic item in pre-epic unless your table is about to go into that realm. With that in mind, a +10 weapon is the best you can get pre-epic, and armor can go up to +10(100k gp) and have non-enchantment-equivalent augmentations on top of that (there are some weapon and armor enchants that doesn't count towards that +X maximum, flat costs like +2,000gp for a "Called" armor; those are restricted by the 200k maximum as usual).

2 - Damage Reduction applies whenever you take damage from a weapon. It can be a ranged or natural weapon too. It reduces the final damage you'd recieve on a hit - so your mantle reduces the damage to half, and THEN the DR is applied. It doesn't apply to elemental damage because, other than a balance thing, elemental damage doesn't hurt you in the same way. A Fireball spell deals damage through heat and burning, an Acid Fog corrodes your skin, a Cone of Cold freezes your muscles and joints. Getting used to being hit with a hammer doesn't really protect you from melting or catching fire.

3 - Ioun Stones are slotless items. That's pretty much it. Attacking/stealing one is kinda the same as attacking your opponent's Headband of Intellect or Gloves of Dexterity. Usually people assume your equipped items are part of you, and very rarely you'll see anyone trying to break your wondrous items.
EDIT: You can find the full list of Ioun Stones in the Magic Item Compendium, as well as most 3.5 items.

4 - Wondrous Items are usually listed. You can buy the existing ones in any game provided you have a big enough market to sell it and your DM approves the source. Items that go beyond the usual maximum of listed items are called Custom Items, and require your GM approval to even exist in the first place. There are tables with guidelines in the Magic Item Compendium for custom items, but those are just that - guidelines used to make the listed items. If you want an item that isn't listed in a book, you better talk to your GM and find a price for said item. Usually, flat bonuses are pretty standard and most GMs will let you buy it, but that isn't an actual rule.

6 - You can always use an item if you have the action needed to use it. If you draw an item, you can use it. The debate around Quiver of Ehlonna and others is whether the drawing action is a free action(as usual for quivers) or a move action(as usual for non-arrow items like rods/wands/staves). Both sides have arguments and the item description seems to lean on the former, but you'll have to ask your GM. The moment you get the item on your hands, you can use it as usual.

[Menzath]

Well some stuff was already touched upon, but I will add my own advice to what I can, also in no specific order.

2) as a side note touch attacks of all types bypass DR even if from a weapon

4) and )7 all items follow a mathematical pricing scheme, it is up to your DM if they wants to allow you to go above what is listed to make higher bonus items, or items with more charges /day or even continuous.

6) I think would be similar to drawing a weapon and would follow the same rules.

5) from personal experience, situational spells that are great that you might not want to prep or that aren't on your spell list such as web, evards tentacles, dark way, and I could probably list 50+ more but you get the gist. Also any and all heals. Easy out of combat heals that are on a rechargable item(s) are fantastic.
And as far as optimizing.. buff that charisma and make sure to grab a nightstick. All day cleric buffs with DMM, and getting more uses of divine patron gift are super handy. Now I think it looks like you'll be maxing the warlock side, which means buffing is going to be a side note, and the CC will be more upfront. Your biggest issue, like most casters, is going to be action economy. Now my fav to bypass this is crafting a staff of body outside body. Your clones can't cast spells or use spell trigger/completion items, but have access to all of your other abilities. This is incredibly useful for making clones just to burst heal every round with healing blast, or to shore up damage with more blasts, not including use of your other invocations to CC or help the party in another way.

[skunk3]

I have more questions!

1. Can you put armor/weapon/shield enchantments on anything other than those items? For example, if I wanted to put Soulfire (+4) on a cloak, is that even possible? I assume the answer is no.

2. Is there any GP cap on non-armor or non-weapon items? For example, say I want to add some magical properties to whatever... a cloak, for example. Can I basically enchant them as much as finances permit? I am planning what I want to buy for each slot, but if it would be cheaper to just enchant a current item with whatever effect I want/need, then I might not even bother buying items for certain slots.

3. Someone once told me something about how if you already have an item with magical properties on it, adding another property costs 1.5x as much as its actual price. Is this correct?

4. If I have say, a luck stone (or stone of good luck), could I later enhance it further to add a +2 luck bonus by paying the difference in cost between a +1 and a +2?

5. Do you guys have any examples (including prices) of custom items that are interesting, or offer a great value for the money? This campaign I am playing in is not flush with gold... and of the loot we've found, pretty much everything was more suited to another member of the party, so I have kept basically nothing aside from a pair of boots of DEX +4. Other party members have gotten some pretty sweet loot and I wanna compensate, even though TBH I feel that my character and our fighter have been the stars of the show. (Our party is myself, a human fighter, a halfling rogue who deals pathetic damage for now, a bard/paladin, and a sorcerer/druid of some prestige class I can't remember.)

The goal for my character is to be as hard to kill as possible. I want survivability. I think that with my invocations that I'll have and my planned purchases, I'll be a real pain to kill, especially once I get invocations like Flee The Scene and Chill Tentacles.

I don't have the money to buy all of this stuff right now, but I'll go ahead and post it for your opinions. This is basically a list of what I would like to buy as the game goes on.

The first thing I will mention is that the matriarch of the city we live in offered us a crazy deal: 50% off any one item. I first thought about using that to pimp out my armor, but I found a homebrew ring online that my DM approved (the ring of the celestial), so I'm going to be saving my money for a while until I can afford that. I am going to make it +5 to deflection and resistance though.

[buckler]


BUCKLER (currently a +1 mithral buckler):
+4 enhancement (+5 total)
superior deflection +4 (homebrew)
death ward +1
durable 500 gp (dungeonscape)
called 2000 gp
daylight 3000 gp
commander 2000 gp
fearsome 15000 gp (get last)
heartening 2000 gp
speed 6000 gp
mindarmor 3000 gp

[armor]

ARMOR (currently a Mithralmist shirt, MIC)
+4 enhancement bonus to AC (+5 total)
empyreal +2
ghost ward (enhancement bonus to touch attacks!) +1
mobility +1
styptic +1
health 11250 gp
mirror image 20k (although wand of mirror image is 4500 gp)
healing and greater healing, 32000 gp total MIC
quickness 5000 gp mic
durable 500 gp (dungeonscape 3.5)
speed 6000 gp
Greater anchoring 15000
called 2000 gp
glamered 2700


[ARMS]
Crimson Dragonhide bracers +5? 53k

[EYES]
Eyes of Charming 56k

[HEAD]
Admiral's Bicorne 51k

[RING]
Ring of Evasion? 20k

[WAIST]
Belt of Battle 13k

[SHOULDER]
Starmantle Cloak 132k

[TORSO]
Tabard of Valor 16k

Also, various wondrous items, rods, staffs, rods of eldritch might, ioun stones, etc.

Obviously, I won't have the money for this stuff any time soon but I at least have a plan :)

[Menzath]

Before I can answer alot of that, I have a question.

Will you be doing the crafting or hiring someone else to do it?
Because if you are crafting invest in a thought bottle early.

And off the top of my head the rules for what constitutes an epic weapon/armor apply to most wonders items.

Magic item compendium (towards the back) has rules for adding bonuses to gear slots that normally wouldn't have them and the recommend price difference(if any).

When upgrading gear I think(and I may very well be wrong) you only pay the difference in material and xp costs between what the item was and what it will become when upgrading. If you hire someone else to upgrade there may be an additional modifier for the price.

[KillianHawkeye]

There's an optional rule somewhere for putting armor enchantments onto Bracers of Armor, but generally you can't put armor/shield/weapon abilities onto random items. Occasionally you'll run into robes that also grant a bonus to AC or a rod or a staff that also counts as a magic weapon, but there really aren't general rules for doing that.

When putting multiple abilities on a single magic item, all but the most expensive one gain a +50% cost modifier. For example, if you had a belt that gave you +4 to Strength and +2 to Constitution, it would have a market price of 16,000 + 1.5*4,000 = 32,000. The item is worth this amount regardless of what order you add the enchantments.

If you're improving an item or adding a new ability to it, you just pay the cost for the difference. Take that belt I just mentioned. Let's say you start out with a Belt of Strength +2. To upgrade it to a +4, you'd pay for the difference. 16,000 - 4,000 = 8,000, so the cost to upgrade is 8,000 to buy or 4,000 and 320 xp to craft. Then when you later add the +2 Constitution, you'd again pay for the difference (the 1.5*4000 part), costing you 6,000 to buy or 3,000 and 240 xp to craft.

[Quertus]

There's an optional rule somewhere for putting armor enchantments onto Bracers of Armor, but generally you can't put armor/shield/weapon abilities onto random items. Occasionally you'll run into robes that also grant a bonus to AC or a rod or a staff that also counts as a magic weapon, but there really aren't general rules for doing that.

When putting multiple abilities on a single magic item, all but the most expensive one gain a +50% cost modifier. For example, if you had a belt that gave you +4 to Strength and +2 to Constitution, it would have a market price of 16,000 + 1.5*4,000 = 32,000. The item is worth this amount regardless of what order you add the enchantments.

If you're improving an item or adding a new ability to it, you just pay the cost for the difference. Take that belt I just mentioned. Let's say you start out with a Belt of Strength +2. To upgrade it to a +4, you'd pay for the difference. 16,000 - 4,000 = 8,000, so the cost to upgrade is 8,000 to buy or 4,000 and 320 xp to craft. Then when you later add the +2 Constitution, you'd again pay for the difference (the 1.5*4000 part), costing you 6,000 to buy or 3,000 and 240 xp to craft.

Um, a few points.

First off, per MIC, your most common enchantments - stat boosts, deflection, resistance, and a few others - are never subject to the x1.5 price increase.

Second, although I cannot prove out (AFB), I believe adding armor enchantment to robes or Wesson enchantment to weapons (like quarter staves or armor spikes) is standardized.

Lastly, 16-4=12.

But, yes, cost based (all standard bonuses) + (most expensive other enchantment) + ((other other enhancements) x 1.5), pay the difference between what you have paid and what it would cost to build from scratch when upgrading existing items.

[KillianHawkeye]

First off, per MIC, your most common enchantments - stat boosts, deflection, resistance, and a few others - are never subject to the x1.5 price increase.

Yeah, I forgot to mention that, and then I went and used those kinds of enchantments in my example just because I could remember their cost off the top of my head.


Lastly, 16-4=12.

Oops LMAO :smallsigh::smallsigh::smallsigh:

This is what I get for trying to multitask.

[skunk3]

Thanks guys! For now I will be having someone else craft my stuff, but eventually as I go up in Warlock levels (which will be quite some time from now), I will start crafting my own stuff!