Is there a way to make the Mole really useful?

[SangoProduction]

http://www.realmshelps.net/charbuild/classes/prestige/general/mole.shtml
So, basically, you turn your character in to a digger. With sneak attack, and super limited spell-likes per day related to digging. Oh, and as a capstone, you can dig through hard rock and such at half speed...which is better than normal burrow, which requires soft ground, normally. So yay.

But is there any benefit that this gives you within combat? Is there a way to optimize this? Clearly burrow is an awesome Siege ability, and basically negates the point of a castle, just like prevalent flight does, but with fewer arrows headed your way. But the number of sieges I've played in campaigns can be counted on 0 hands.

[BowStreetRunner]

I think some of Tucker's Kobolds should definitely look into taking this after they level up from defeating yet another group of adventurers. :smallbiggrin:

[Telonius]

Seems like this could be part of any build that's trying to optimize Sneak Attack dice - easy prereqs, and d6 sneak at first level.

[RaiKirah]

Spring Attack and/or Shot on the Run with a burrow speed and the ability to see above ground gives you total concealment/cover while allowing you to attack a target.

Arguably being able to see through stone satisfies the Line of Sight AND Line of Effect for Baleful Transposition, allowing you to warp people into a rocky grave (burrowing explicitly doesn't leave a tunnel, so they'd likely be crushed), though this is an iffy read of the spell text.

[SangoProduction]

Spring Attack and/or Shot on the Run with a burrow speed and the ability to see above ground gives you total concealment/cover while allowing you to attack a target.

...That is an interesting idea. It's like whack-a-mole, except they go back down before you're even allowed to lift the hammer. Sounds kinda mean. Would you be able to get SA off of unburrowing, since they wouldn't have been able to see you underground?

[RaiKirah]

Would you be able to get SA off of unburrowing, since they wouldn't have been able to see you underground?

Don't see why not, unless they have Tremorsense of the variety that pinpoints location, or lifesense, or mindsight I suppose.

[SangoProduction]

Don't see why not, unless they have Tremorsense of the variety that pinpoints location, or lifesense, or mindsight I suppose.

Lifesense can't see through solid objects, and mindsight, due to acting like blindsight (hahaha, punny) requires line of effect. But I get the idea. Anything that can detect you would ruin the sneak attack.

How does charging work in this situation:
You have 30 land speed, and 20 burrow.
If you come out of a 5ft burrow and charged a creature, and wanted to return 5 feet underground, how close would the creature need to be for this to be a legal move? Or is it not legal in any circumstance?

[RaiKirah]

How does charging work in this situation:
You have 30 land speed, and 20 burrow.
If you come out of a 5ft burrow and charged a creature, and wanted to return 5 feet underground, how close would the creature need to be for this to be a legal move? Or is it not legal in any circumstance?

According to the SRD you cannot charge while burrowing. Luckily (I guess?) You cannot charge while using Spring Attack or Shot on the Run. As for how partial movement in burrow/walking modes work I suspect that's not exactly covered anywhere. I'd probably make you use 5' to surface. But, you might also coint as within base-to-base passing directly beneath someone and never need to emerge at all to attack them. I don't know.

[Nifft]

You can see through several inches of stone, and you have Sneak Attack.

Get a Brilliant Energy spiked chain and surprise people through walls.

[SangoProduction]

You can see through several inches of stone, and you have Sneak Attack.

Get a Brilliant Energy spiked chain and surprise people through walls.

Oh wow. That's just plain mean.

[daremetoidareyo]

There's that vestige that grants bird eye viewing so you don't have to squander too many build resources for line of sight. Malphas!

If you find another d6 sneak attack, you can do the whole assassin death attack in 3 rounds trick before combat even starts...

[SangoProduction]

There's that vestige that grants bird eye viewing so you don't have to squander too many build resources for line of sight. Malphas!

If you find another d6 sneak attack, you can do the whole assassin death attack in 3 rounds trick before combat even starts...

I was thinking about using Replacement Killer, as it seems to just be a better version of the assassin, though with steeper prereqs. But with a 5 level gap between plain rogue and RK, it seems plenty doable. All precisely for the death attack thing.

http://www.realmshelps.net/charbuild/classes/prestige/evil/replacement.shtml

[Nifft]

Oh wow. That's just plain mean.

Brilliant Energy shortbow handles corridors wider than 10 ft., and they're all still flat-footed since they can't see you through the wall (or ceiling, or floor).

Assuming it's an NPC in a fixed location, Stone Shape (Sp) every day to shape blinds for your kill-zones, through which you can snipe.

[Celestia]

You can see through several inches of stone, and you have Sneak Attack.

Get a Brilliant Energy spiked chain and surprise people through walls.
The only problem with that plan is that you'd definitely be subject to the squeezing rules and get a nasty -4 penalty on all your attack rolls.

[SangoProduction]

The only problem with that plan is that you'd definitely be subject to the squeezing rules and get a nasty -4 penalty on all your attack rolls.

Um....Why would that be the case?

[Celestia]

Um....Why would that be the case?
You're burrowing through the ground, meaning you're hanging out in a tunnel that's only barely big enough to fit your body. If standing in a four foot wide corridor counts as squeezing, then this absolutely does, as well. A less permissible DM might even justifiably claim that you can't attack at all since you wouldn't have the room to move your arms for it.

[Nifft]

You can see through several inches of stone, and you have Sneak Attack.

Get a Brilliant Energy spiked chain and surprise people through walls.


You're burrowing through the ground Since when?

[Celestia]

Since when?
Ah. I misunderstood what you were saying.

[SangoProduction]

You're burrowing through the ground, meaning you're hanging out in a tunnel that's only barely big enough to fit your body. If standing in a four foot wide corridor counts as squeezing, then this absolutely does, as well. A less permissible DM might even justifiably claim that you can't attack at all since you wouldn't have the room to move your arms for it.

That's...a really strange ruling. I always took burrowing as being comfortably capable of clearing space for yourself. In fact, You're so comfortable with it that you're able to traverse rock nearly as fast as someone can walk. The idea that you wouldn't even be able to move your arms is...weird.

So how much 'movement' would one have take to clear a fighting space for themselves, under your ruling? Because, as mentioned, we can move through rock, so surely we can clear them out with the same effort.

Do you have something to back up this idea?

[Nifft]

Ah. I misunderstood what you were saying.

You could probably also stab up through flagstones, if there were parts of the floor less than 5" thick, and a decent-sized area right underneath them.

Name the character Cal Tropic.

[SangoProduction]

You could probably also stab up through flagstones, if there were parts of the floor less than 5" thick, and a decent-sized area right underneath them.

Name the character Cal Tropic.

...The name's probably funnier than it should be at my age.

[Celestia]

That's...a really strange ruling. I always took burrowing as being comfortably capable of clearing space for yourself. In fact, You're so comfortable with it that you're able to traverse rock nearly as fast as someone can walk. The idea that you wouldn't even be able to move your arms is...weird.

So how much 'movement' would one have take to clear a fighting space for themselves, under your ruling? Because, as mentioned, we can move through rock, so surely we can clear them out with the same effort.

Do you have something to back up this idea?
So, you think having a burrow speed allows you to carve out a five foot diameter tunnel in seconds, and you claim my interpretation is strange? You're digging through the ground, not excavating a mine. According to the rules, you don't even make a tunnel when burrowing because you're just moving through the soil. You are literally surrounded on all sides by ground. No amount of movement would give you a space large enough to fight from. If you want that, you'd better pull out a pickaxe and start making Profession (Mining) checks.

[SangoProduction]

So, you think having a burrow speed allows you to carve out a five foot diameter tunnel in seconds, and you claim my interpretation is strange? You're digging through the ground, not excavating a mine. According to the rules, you don't even make a tunnel when burrowing because you're just moving through the soil. You are literally surrounded on all sides by ground. No amount of movement would give you a space large enough to fight from. If you want that, you'd better pull out a pickaxe and start making Profession (Mining) checks.

I mean....squeezing has very clear penalties to movement. You'd think they'd have mentioned that you are squeezing when burrowing, if that was the intent, as it would basically mean your burrow speed is half of what it says on the tin.

And I don't know of any Bulettes who took Profession (Mining). How do they make tunnels? Or even move, if they can't even clear out a five foot diameter tunnel in seconds. What lousy land sharks.

(Also, I could go and counter with "You think having a fly speed allows you to carry multiple hundreds of pounds of equipment on wings barely the span of your arms? And you claim my interpretation is strange," and have the same logical stand as your argument does, which I hope you catch as sarcastic and pointing to the rules that say you can. I did, however, address the problems with the idea that burrowing causes squeezing.)

[Celestia]

I mean....squeezing has very clear penalties to movement. You'd think they'd have mentioned that you are squeezing when burrowing, if that was the intent, as it would basically mean your burrow speed is half of what it says on the tin.

And I don't know of any Bulettes who took Profession (Mining). How do they make tunnels? Or even move, if they can't even clear out a five foot diameter tunnel in seconds. What lousy land sharks.

(Also, I could go and counter with "You think having a fly speed allows you to carry multiple hundreds of pounds of equipment on wings barely the span of your arms? And you claim my interpretation is strange," and have the same logical stand as your argument does, which I hope you catch as sarcastic and pointing to the rules that say you can.)
link (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/specialAbilities.htm#burrow)

Burrow
A creature with a burrow speed can tunnel through dirt, but not through rock unless the descriptive text says otherwise. Creatures cannot charge or run while burrowing. Most burrowing creatures do not leave behind tunnels other creatures can use (either because the material they tunnel through fills in behind them or because they do not actually dislocate any material when burrowing); see the individual creature descriptions for details.
I'm not sure why you think bringing flight into this is at all relevant. For the record, though, non-magical flight does impose encumbrance limits. You can't fly while carrying more than a light load.

[SangoProduction]

Leaving behind a tunnel (specifically ones for others' use, at that) is not the same as not having the space to act. Also, kinda hard to conceive of a "realistic" situation where something can burrow (even if it just barely does so for itself) through solid rock at a speed faster than a human can swim...yet for some reason, when it tries to make a tunnel, it becomes anemic and no more capable of burrowing than a regular human.

The fact that there is never a point where it specifies when creatures specifically can or cannot leave tunnels is also an issue, as there are several cannon burrowing creatures that leave tunnels, and basically none that have profession (anything at all). They also fail to have an entry in their stat block saying "this creature leaves a tunnel". So...When and how do you determine this ruling? Also, it says "do not" not "can not", although I'll be willing to cede this point.


I bring up the flight to parody your argument, because it runs in to the same type of "it doesn't make sense in our world, so it doesn't make sense here" statement you made. And yes, you can get a bunch of carry capacity enhancers which don't make sense for affecting flight, and carry plenty of hundreds of pounds, even ignoring that the creature itself doesn't count towards this limit (and much, much, much more if you're larger than medium size), on comically small wings. Hell, I don't think the Feathered Wings graft actually changes size if you slap it on to a purple worm.

(Going to bed. I'll respond to you in the morning. Have fun, and happy gaming!)

[ericgrau]

...That is an interesting idea. It's like whack-a-mole, except they go back down before you're even allowed to lift the hammer. Sounds kinda mean. Would you be able to get SA off of unburrowing, since they wouldn't have been able to see you underground?

Actually it is still exactly like whack a mole. People can still hit you with readied actions. But that still means you get at least 1 free hit.

The brilliant energy trick OTOH screws people pretty bad. Casters can't even get line of effect to you. You'll want a high speed too though since people will start to flee from the walls and then try to destroy the wall sections. But if you keep moving to new sections that will become difficult. It's amusing picturing a wizard obliterating a dungeon with disintegrate as he tries to hit the mole. Pretty soon foes will be forced to flee, but perhaps not before your group takes down 1 or 2.

The drawback to brilliant energy is that it is expensive and many foes are immune. You might try one of the two spell buffs that do the same (one is mass) instead for temporary brilliant energy. I think one of the two is called brilliance or something. Both have "brillian" in the name in case you want to search.

[SangoProduction]

Hmm. Seems that there are actually quite a few mole handbooks. Imagine that would come up when searching for burrow speed.

[Darrin]

Spitballing:

Warlock 5/Mole 5, take Obtain Familiar + Improved Familiar, grab a medium-sized earth elemental as a familiar. Use meld into stone to ride inside your familiar. Presumably your earth elemental can earthglide a few inches under the floor, so you can pew-pew your enemies with eldritch blasts from below. Or eldritch glaive for full attack with reach.

Bonded Summoner (Miniatures Handbook) might also work well, upgrading the size of the elemental and allowing you to replace any elemental "sleeves" that get killed by waiting 24 hours instead of 366 days.

[SangoProduction]

Spitballing:

Warlock 5/Mole 5, take Obtain Familiar + Improved Familiar, grab a medium-sized earth elemental as a familiar. Use meld into stone to ride inside your familiar. Presumably your earth elemental can earthglide a few inches under the floor, so you can pew-pew your enemies with eldritch blasts from below. Or eldritch glaive for full attack with reach.

Bonded Summoner (Miniatures Handbook) might also work well, upgrading the size of the elemental and allowing you to replace any elemental "sleeves" that get killed by waiting 24 hours instead of 366 days.

Now...I've never heard of meld into stone being used with earth elementals. Seems kinda funny. Might be the slightest bit difficult to get a DM to declare the elemental to be a single stone large enough for you, without having a significantly larger elemental, though. With Bonded Summoner, you do get that larger elemental, so good idea.

Not positive if the blast needs line of effect. Assuming it doesn't, I think you need to go with a non-touch attack version so that you don't lose out on so much damage for going Mole.