Epic level wizard, not strong enough? Help!

[Jarmen4u]

Clickbait title aside, I need some help. I've been playing an IotSV wizard, and man, I'm sure in literally any other game it would be great. But currently, I'm struggling to perform at the godlike level I should be.

The biggest issue is, due to where we are in the game, deity-level enemies aren't uncommon. Another issue which is recurring is a strange black rock that drains a user of their magic (sometimes permanently) if you accidentally cast a spell at it. This includes dust/particulates that could be floating in the air after a gust spell, or settles onto an enemy's body.

Last time I was attacked, I had all 7 veils up and persisted, but the enemy just passed all 7 saves with literally no problem (save bonuses of +60 or thereabouts) and just slapped me around. Said creature also had an AC of about 80, touch around 70.

Anyway, I need some help figuring out what I can do to put up a fight. I can't rely on any other characters in the party to contribute meaningfully enough for the answer to just be "buff the BSF or use BFC"(usually hurts us more than enemies).

Any books are open for pulling spells from. I'm mostly looking for things that ignore saves and don't require hitting AC. Or even other buffs I can persist on myself.

As a sidenote, I have about 5 levels available that I can take in other classes. Generally unless we can find a teacher, it's hard to take a new class, so I've leveled 5 times without taking any classes. Currently I am: Wizard 3/Master Specialist 3/Incantatrix 4/IotSFV 7. Thoughts?

[QuadraticGish]

I'm unfamiliar with epic level play, but have you considered golem or undead meat shields? Has shapechange produced any good results? Another option could be to questwish for the finding or creation of a magic item to protect bypass the anti-mageium. Are the saves like that normally or just against magic?

[Eldariel]

Epic levels are all about:
1) Absurd stat inflation. If your enemies have +100 to saves, just cast an epic spell that gives you +1000 to stat and have them pass DC 500 saves instead. Then just cast stuff that they don't happen to be immune to (might require Shapechanging or whatever, but if you can replicate literally all supernatural abilities in the game, you should be able to find something).
2) Epic spells. Research epic spells, mitigate sufficiently and you can just undo creature or whatever. Mythals in particular are busted. Though this is completely broken by RAW so there should to be some houserules in place and this depends on those.
3) Outsourcing. If you aren't nuking things, make things that can. Already mortal magic enables recreating literally any creature in the game (Simulacrum & Ice Assassin) so make some Phanes or whatever for yourself. Wish for pieces if need be. Then use those to destroy things instead of trying to personally destroy them. Personally doing things is pretty hard. And yeah, Veils get much worse when every save becomes an autosuccess (though if you just cast an epic spell to give yourself a +500 to Int, most things will be autofailing instead).

Just use all the non-epic spell comboes (Delay Death + Beastland Ferocity, Foresight + Contingency/Chain Contingency/Instant Refuge/etc., Celerity + Whatever, Contact Other Plane or Elemental Weird Shapechange, etc.) to become very hard to kill and focus on the "I'm immune"-angle instead of trying to play the numbers game and then just focus on bypassing enemy defenses. Once you're immune to almost everything (see Team Solars (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?188138-Team-Solars-(Archiving)) for a decent buff stack), you don't need to worry overtly much about things doing things to do and if you outsource your offense, things like the black stone hardly matter.


If you have some way to end the enemy in one hit (Shapechange into something appropriate?), you can always use Limited Wish to treat the next attack as an auto-20. Or cast Surge of Fortune off some list-copying thing (maybe Arcane Disciple for Miracle) and take the auto-20 from there instead. As an example. Hitting is trivial, but you of course don't want to be trading blows but if you actually commit to an attack, the enemy should cease to exist.

EDIT: Ah yes, spells that don't give saves. Well, Hail of Stones is the go-to far as damage is concerned - metamagic it enough and make things go boom. Shapechange into a Jovoc [MMII] and nuke yourself (potentially with some Shield Others to some underlings) for epic damage to bypass basically any defense. Or use your familiar or whatever as the carrier to nuke, but it's easier to Delay Death yourself.

[Willie the Duck]

wishboost next to-hit roll, drop a dimensional anchor, and then forcecage? Otherwise summon big nasties.

[Nifft]

Clickbait title aside, I need some help. I've been playing an IotSV wizard, and man, I'm sure in literally any other game it would be great. But currently, I'm struggling to perform at the godlike level I should be.

The biggest issue is, due to where we are in the game, deity-level enemies aren't uncommon. Another issue which is recurring is a strange black rock that drains a user of their magic (sometimes permanently) if you accidentally cast a spell at it. This includes dust/particulates that could be floating in the air after a gust spell, or settles onto an enemy's body.

Last time I was attacked, I had all 7 veils up and persisted, but the enemy just passed all 7 saves with literally no problem (save bonuses of +60 or thereabouts) and just slapped me around. Said creature also had an AC of about 80, touch around 70.

Anyway, I need some help figuring out what I can do to put up a fight. I can't rely on any other characters in the party to contribute meaningfully enough for the answer to just be "buff the BSF or use BFC"(usually hurts us more than enemies).

Any books are open for pulling spells from. I'm mostly looking for things that ignore saves and don't require hitting AC. Or even other buffs I can persist on myself.

As a sidenote, I have about 5 levels available that I can take in other classes. Generally unless we can find a teacher, it's hard to take a new class, so I've leveled 5 times without taking any classes. Currently I am: Wizard 3/Master Specialist 3/Incantatrix 4/IotSFV 7. Thoughts?

So, just a guess looking at your build.

Did you get that build from a forum (perhaps this one), along with tricks to pwn your DM?

Then maybe your DM came to a forum (perhaps this one), to learn how to obviate those specific tricks?

And now you're back at the forum, asking for ways to negate the YOU-specific anti-magic which the DM has created to cope with your web-sourced optimabomination?


My suggestion would be to talk to your DM, not us. It seems like you need to set some reasonable limits for your own exploits and also for the exploits that will be used against you -- including a reasonable limits on NPC save bonus, for example.

I mean, the one-upsmanship arms-race game can be fun, but you're not really playing that game if you're coming to us for advice.

[Bronk]

Another issue which is recurring is a strange black rock that drains a user of their magic (sometimes permanently) if you accidentally cast a spell at it. This includes dust/particulates that could be floating in the air after a gust spell, or settles onto an enemy's body.

Last time I was attacked, I had all 7 veils up and persisted, but the enemy just passed all 7 saves with literally no problem (save bonuses of +60 or thereabouts) and just slapped me around. Said creature also had an AC of about 80, touch around 70.

Thoughts?

I agree with Nifft... You're DM is actively nerfing your character, and the only way out of it is to talk you your DM.

[MeimuHakurei]

I agree with Nifft... You're DM is actively nerfing your character, and the only way out of it is to talk you your DM.

To be fair, anti-magic Phlebotinum will nerf basically everyone at epic levels as everyone not using spells will be far too weak to contribute. Still agree that there's a problem if the table assumes an optimization level far above what the Wizard (and the player) can handle.

[Willie the Duck]

To be fair, anti-magic Phlebotinum will nerf basically everyone at epic levels as everyone not using spells will be far too weak to contribute. Still agree that there's a problem if the table assumes an optimization level far above what the Wizard (and the player) can handle.

I do recall high-level play (it has been a long long time) to be pretty much:
"well I have BUSTA"
"Too bad, I have BUSTA BUSTA"
"Good thing I was prepared and brought BUSTA BUSTA BUSTA along, just in case"

[Remuko]

One of your issues is you have 17 class levels and youre facing threats that expect epic spellcasting which you dont have access to until you "spend" those extra level ups. you definitely need those levels even if you just take more levels in wizard or one of your other pre-existing classes. then you get grab epic spellcasting and actually do whatever you want, as is expected of an actual "epic level wizard"

[MrSandman]

One of your issues is you have 17 class levels and youre facing threats that expect epic spellcasting which you dont have access to until you "spend" those extra level ups. you definitely need those levels even if you just take more levels in wizard or one of your other pre-existing classes. then you get grab epic spellcasting and actually do whatever you want, as is expected of an actual "epic level wizard"

My thoughts exactly. You're basically five levels below where you should be.

[Jarmen4u]

Just going to nip this train of thought in the bud: the DM is a 60 something grognard, the game is a mix of 3.5e and AD&D, and he's been spewing out high lethality encounters for as long as I can remember. None of this is anti-me, in fact the black rock has screwed over other casters much more than me. And as far as we know, it has a deep lore connection we're only just beginning to unravel.

Originally, I wanted to make this character be purely a defensive one, to see if I could just not die. Hence the abjuration focus. It's not working out though.

The last enemy we faced in combat was, and I might be spelling this wrong: Jubilex. Prior to that, a 60+foot wide spider with a beholder head. Granted, we've been on something of an epic quest to attain godlike powers, so enemies around this level were expected. It's just frustrating to never have an answer to them. (The only way we survived the jubi encounter was a mass teleport out of the abyss where he teleported us to.)

As for extra levels, like I said I'm open to suggestions. Yes, the build so far is pretty cookie cutter, as I often consult handbooks for optimization advice. But I've never been that good at doing it myself, which is why I'm asking for help.

[Willie the Duck]

Okay, well, a 60-something guy playing 3.5/1e hybrid and having you fight Jubilex, a 60+foot wide spider with a beholder head, and such sounds like he might be more happy playing Arduin Grimoire era shiny nutso space-wizard D&D (or maybe BECMI immortals). But if he's happy and you're (usually) happy, more power to you.

The thing is, 3e epic-level play is very well built around finding rules exploits or working with your DM to come up with the right epic-level spell to resolve the situation. If he's playing fast and loose (which is to say mixed-with-AD&D) with the rules, we can't really help because we don't know the framework he's working under.

I don't think he's looking for a solution to the problem which involves a stat-block. He wants you to outthink him.

[Nifft]

Just going to nip this train of thought in the bud: the DM is a 60 something grognard, the game is a mix of 3.5e and AD&D, and he's been spewing out high lethality encounters for as long as I can remember. None of this is anti-me, in fact the black rock has screwed over other casters much more than me. And as far as we know, it has a deep lore connection we're only just beginning to unravel.

Originally, I wanted to make this character be purely a defensive one, to see if I could just not die. Hence the abjuration focus. It's not working out though.

The last enemy we faced in combat was, and I might be spelling this wrong: Jubilex. Prior to that, a 60+foot wide spider with a beholder head. Granted, we've been on something of an epic quest to attain godlike powers, so enemies around this level were expected. It's just frustrating to never have an answer to them. (The only way we survived the jubi encounter was a mass teleport out of the abyss where he teleported us to.)

As for extra levels, like I said I'm open to suggestions. Yes, the build so far is pretty cookie cutter, as I often consult handbooks for optimization advice. But I've never been that good at doing it myself, which is why I'm asking for help. You mentioned in the OP being unable to rely on the other members of your party. Can you fix that? Being able to rely on them would increase your tactical options significantly.

Can you take Leadership / Draconic Cohort / etc. and get a reliable ally?


The Faceless Lord's name has several spellings; yours is one of the commonly used ones. Another is "Juiblex". There is no singular correct name for The Faceless Lord. In fact I'd suggest in-character spelling it differently every time just because that kinda suits its nature.


Can you engage with the setting and do research on the anti-magic dust? Can you research a [Metamagic] feat which penetrates that specific type of anti-magic?

[Segev]

With 9th level wizard spell access, defensive measures start to include Contingent Spells. Not just contingency (though a "Plane shift me to my private demiplane if I am hit by an attack that actually hurts me" coupled with a planar binding on something with good healing powers whose job is to hang out in your luxuriously-appointed extraplanar palace and keep you alive if you show up injured is a good thing to have on contingency), but the Craft Contingent Spell variety.

Just LIVING on your personal demiplane and astral projecting into other places is another good anti-death measure.

In general, your defenses should include things that give you high (and/or multiple) miss chances, such as blink, and things which automatically move you out of danger, as well as straight-up immunities.

A fallback clone waiting in a special chamber in your personal fortress - perhaps even a second, backup fortress - with a one-off wish item as part of his funerary garb, sarcophagus, or what-have-you that wishes whatever you were wearing when your death triggered the clone's activation to be transported onto said clone, is also a good idea.

And, yes, if the enemies' numbers are that ludicrous, get to epic spells as fast as possible so you can create an epic spell that gives you +whatever-you-need to your casting stat so they can't make their saves anymore.

[Jarmen4u]

To someone not in the game, I can understand how it would appear "fast and loose," and to some extent, it is. But most of his rulings are based on logic/"realism" so once you figure it out, you can usually account for it. For example, shortly after making this character, he had an issue with my prismatic veil blocking an indefinite amount of rubble from a partial cave-in. He insisted that it would only be able to absorb X tons of material, for example. Eventually, he backed off. Currently, though, he still has a very (wrong) interpretation of how the violet veil works, specifically the term "effect" not meaning literally everything (which it does, RAW) but manifested powers/effects that can be seen. For example, it would stop a ray or fireball or something visible, but a spell with no projectile, like inflict wounds, would pass through it uninhibited. Another example would be that in order to Identify an item, as per the spell, you must use the item yourself. Due to the high amount of cursed items around, we rarely identify more than a handful of items before getting scared and stopping.

Leadership is banned, partially because he's at least partially aware of the abuse that can be done, partially because where we've been, there have been literally no other civilizations for thousands of miles, which has led to any new characters being shoehorned into the story via ancient prisons, stasis chambers in dungeons, etc.

I actually do have an ally in the group who is playing a Shugenja, a class I'm unfamiliar with, who seems to be extremely powerful. He has been combining End of Illusions to make himself immune to attacks from mundane or magical weapons with the drawback of a huge penalty to saves vs spells, with Ring of Air, which essentially makes him immune to any spell or spell-like cast at him. Issue here is that he has been mind-controlled in the past, and killed 2 (almost 3) party members.

As far as actual allies I can trust go, well, my last character, a level 30 warblade/bloodstorm blade (who retired to found a settlement b.c of a deal he made with the mother of all dragons) was dragged out of retirement to help during the spider-holder fight via a gate opened by the party cleric. So currently, I'm juggling both of these characters. Though my wizard has a secret that she is keeping from him and everyone else, so the trust is mostly one-way.

The issue with things like doing research on the anti-magic dust is, there's not really a reliable way to do so. The only epic level artificer we know refuses to even touch the stuff, since that type of thing would require using magic on/around the stone, which he really wants to avoid.

As far as contingent spells go, it's something I'm not too familiar with (pretty new to epic levels, tbh), so it'd be something I would have to learn more about. And regarding epic spells... I have no idea how creating new spells works in the system, so I'd have to ask him about it. As of the last session, my wizard, gifted with the ability to learn a language almost instantly (spent 4 hours with a Rosetta stone of sorts, learned 2 languages from it), recently learned some sort of Titan-rune language, whose alphabet is used to write basically every word of power, including the names of gods, that dragon-mother from earlier, and just about anything else. So I have her requesting tutelage from a magic-user dragon we met, to see if she can master that. Hopefully it will give me an edge, somewhere.

Something else that's always been an issue, and will most likely be an issue with crafting/researching spells, is that we've always been extremely low on gold. There aren't any Magick Marts, or big piles of gold, and the DM ignores WBL entirely, so at most we usually carry around a few hundred/thousand gold at best. If I recall, doesn't most magic research require immense gold investment? I'm not too familiar with the process there either, so I'll have to try to figure out more details.

And pushing this question back to the top again, since I essentially have 5 empty levels, what suggestions are there for a class/classes to pick up?

[Arbane]

Another example would be that in order to Identify an item, as per the spell, you must use the item yourself. Due to the high amount of cursed items around, we rarely identify more than a handful of items before getting scared and stopping.

Can you do Simulacrum? If so, there's your infinite supply of cannon-fodder testers for magic items and the Doom Dust (which I'm going to guess is anti-magic nanobots from a crashed alien ship, just because).



Something else that's always been an issue, and will most likely be an issue with crafting/researching spells, is that we've always been extremely low on gold. There aren't any Magick Marts, or big piles of gold, and the DM ignores WBL entirely, so at most we usually carry around a few hundred/thousand gold at best. If I recall, doesn't most magic research require immense gold investment? I'm not too familiar with the process there either, so I'll have to try to figure out more details.



If the GM's not going to give you any money, they can't complain when you try to do without it. Besides, if there's no civilization anywhere near, what would you be spending it on?

[Jarmen4u]

Can you do Simulacrum? If so, there's your infinite supply of cannon-fodder testers for magic items and the Doom Dust (which I'm going to guess is anti-magic nanobots from a crashed alien ship, just because).




If the GM's not going to give you any money, they can't complain when you try to do without it. Besides, if there's no civilization anywhere near, what would you be spending it on?

I might try Simulacrum, though I really don't like XP costs. Though I could see the DM ruling that if it's not me using the item, it wouldn't help *me* Identify it.

And yeah, but it's more so the "thousands of gold in materials" etc that he would probably say, okay, where did you get XYZ materials from?

[ExLibrisMortis]

You could become a resident of a sentient static timeless plane that hates anyone but you with a vengeance (genesis is a wonderful spell). Static planes have the following annoying property: "Visitors cannot affect living residents of the plane, nor objects that the denizens possess". If you are a resident of a static plane, you can use planar bubble to take it with you wherever you go, and the timeless trait means the planar bubble will never expire. Hell, you can use astral projection from your plane (with planar bubble) to add an extra layer of defence.

[Lotheb]

If you've got a lot of magic items you aren't trying to identify you could try to scavenge them for materials, though your DM sounds like they might rule that any cursed items screw up whatever you are trying to make/do

[Nifft]

Something else that's always been an issue, and will most likely be an issue with crafting/researching spells, is that we've always been extremely low on gold. There aren't any Magick Marts, or big piles of gold, and the DM ignores WBL entirely, so at most we usually carry around a few hundred/thousand gold at best. If I recall, doesn't most magic research require immense gold investment? I'm not too familiar with the process there either, so I'll have to try to figure out more details. http://www.d20srd.org/srd/magicOverview/arcaneSpells.htm#addingSpellstoaWizardsSpellbook


Independent Research
A wizard also can research a spell independently, duplicating an existing spell or creating an entirely new one.

There are guidelines for pricing in various places. Talk to your DM.


And pushing this question back to the top again, since I essentially have 5 empty levels, what suggestions are there for a class/classes to pick up? Why not put more levels into one of your current classes?
- Incantatrix 9 gets you good stuff almost every level
- Master Specialist 8 gets you Evasion, 2 free Abjuration spells, and +1 caster level
- Wizard 5 gets a bonus feat or Spontaneous Divination, which is nice

Are you a Gnome? Shadowcraft Mage is great.
Are you an Elf? Abjurant Champion is solid.
Are you a Changeling? Recaster is awesome.

[Jarmen4u]

You could become a resident of a sentient static timeless plane that hates anyone but you with a vengeance (genesis is a wonderful spell). Static planes have the following annoying property: "Visitors cannot affect living residents of the plane, nor objects that the denizens possess". If you are a resident of a static plane, you can use planar bubble to take it with you wherever you go, and the timeless trait means the planar bubble will never expire. Hell, you can use astral projection from your plane (with planar bubble) to add an extra layer of defence.

I'll see how he does personal planes. I'm pretty sure a few of his personal characters (the DM role gets tossed around sometimes, most of the senior players have at least a couple PCs buried in the universe somewhere) have pocket planes, or pocket-sized expandable fortresses and the like. If I'm planning to use Genesis, would I be able to have a plane that has those traits like you described, but also have it be time-dilated to give me lots of time inside? Especially since the DM has implied that the rune-magic research could take as long as a few years. Expediting that would be really nice.


http://www.d20srd.org/srd/magicOverview/arcaneSpells.htm#addingSpellstoaWizardsSpellbook

There are guidelines for pricing in various places. Talk to your DM.

Why not put more levels into one of your current classes?
- Incantatrix 9 gets you good stuff almost every level
- Master Specialist 8 gets you Evasion, 2 free Abjuration spells, and +1 caster level
- Wizard 5 gets a bonus feat or Spontaneous Divination, which is nice

Are you a Gnome? Shadowcraft Mage is great.
Are you an Elf? Abjurant Champion is solid.
Are you a Changeling? Recaster is awesome.

Yeah, she's an Arcane Gnome, so I'll take a look at Shadowcraft Mage. Eep, nevermind. Illusion is one of my restricted schools.

[ExLibrisMortis]

If I'm planning to use Genesis, would I be able to have a plane that has those traits like you described, but also have it be time-dilated to give me lots of time inside?
Yes. The Static trait is independent of any time traits you might add. That's one thing that also carries over through a planar bubble, and has been used to get ten or infinite rounds when your opponents only get one, and all that without time stop or other Spell Stowaway-able effects (the planar bubble comes pre-cast, and so isn't vulnerable to that particular feat). Although I'd count on the infinite actions being nixed by the DM :smalltongue:.

[Telok]

Ask the DM about 'psionics is different' and see if he's using that variant. For example, have illithids been able to mind blast or mind control through Mind Blank (seriously, you're a level 17+ caster, you always have Mind Blank up)? That could be your path through the black stone.

Speaking of mind control, take someone over. Dominate is the typical go-to but there are other options. Then use your puppet to identify stuff. It will work best if you can have full direct mental control or a short term mind swap. Be leery of Magic Jar, this is the sort of DM who could rule that the curse from an item attaches to your soul.

Epic is cheese. Cheese is epic. Go great-guns-gonzo or go cry in a corner. Epic spells take time and money based on the casting DC. Mitigate that sucker down to 1 or even 0 (don't go negative without approval). Epic wizards can create spells just by thinking about it as a free action. They might no be the best spells, but it's doable and can come in handy sometimes.

[RoboEmperor]

http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?527192-Did-I-make-myself-invincible-(Epic-Spells)

See if your DM can do anything to challenge you after you do that.

[Jarmen4u]

Ask the DM about 'psionics is different' and see if he's using that variant. For example, have illithids been able to mind blast or mind control through Mind Blank (seriously, you're a level 17+ caster, you always have Mind Blank up)? That could be your path through the black stone.

Speaking of mind control, take someone over. Dominate is the typical go-to but there are other options. Then use your puppet to identify stuff. It will work best if you can have full direct mental control or a short term mind swap. Be leery of Magic Jar, this is the sort of DM who could rule that the curse from an item attaches to your soul.

Epic is cheese. Cheese is epic. Go great-guns-gonzo or go cry in a corner. Epic spells take time and money based on the casting DC. Mitigate that sucker down to 1 or even 0 (don't go negative without approval). Epic wizards can create spells just by thinking about it as a free action. They might no be the best spells, but it's doable and can come in handy sometimes.

Psionics is a double-edged sword in this game, unfortunately. Firstly, the DM basically has a hard-on for psionic monsters (his old profile picture was an illithid for ages), so those creatures are very commonly behind lots of problems we run into. He's also of the opinion that psionic-capable characters are extremely rare, so it's hard to get one by him. Conversely (I found this out during an OOC chat with him after a player lost his psionic character to an aboleth), there's an innate danger in using psionics. According to him, every time you use a psionic power (or even a SPELL that mimics an existing mind-affecting psionic power), there is a % chance that every powerful psionic creature within x000 miles will become aware of your existence. (Similarly, if you ever say the name of a deity, there's a solid % chance they hear you, and if it's an evil deity, they will ruin your day.)

I was actually messing with the idea of paying off random people to Identify items, but the goody goody cleric refused to allow me to do so. Following that, I doubt I'd be able to get away with dominating anyone.

As an aside, I've been trying to read more about Genesis, but other than the spell itself, I can't find much information on it. Is there a book that goes more in-depth into plane creation?

[Segev]

How does the black stone interact with item-sourced magic? Maybe you can use a Wand of detect magic or arcane sight to scan an area for it. If the spell fizzles because it passed over it, that might just drain the wand rather than you. If the spell doesn't fizzle due to scanning the black stone, then the stone itself should have some telltale effects on magical auras in its vicinity, so you can still detect its presence before casting into it.

[MrSandman]

This is starting to sound like your game master is actively trying to make the game unplayable.

[Willie the Duck]

This is starting to sound like your game master is actively trying to make the game unplayable.

That's certainly a possibility. I'm wondering if he's hoping that the OP and fellow gamers 'rise to the occasion' or 'win by thinking outside the box,' or something like that. I think that might be me merely hoping the scenario isn't as one sided as it feels. Because, yes, it definitely feels like the DM is 'That Guy.' You know, that guy we all played with in high school because we didn't know that many people, or in our 20s because he was the one person willing to put in the hours to be the DM or whatnot. It sounds like he think's he's playing playing on another level, but in reality he's just not thinking about how he expects the PCs to actually ever succeed.

[Jarmen4u]

How does the black stone interact with item-sourced magic? Maybe you can use a Wand of detect magic or arcane sight to scan an area for it. If the spell fizzles because it passed over it, that might just drain the wand rather than you. If the spell doesn't fizzle due to scanning the black stone, then the stone itself should have some telltale effects on magical auras in its vicinity, so you can still detect its presence before casting into it.

We use a mana system in place of spell slots, and essentially the way it has been described is, casting magic at the black material "cuts off your connection to your mana." One PC managed to un-block his mana by burning through his entire pool at once, but another player was unable to replicate it, so it depends on the type of magic used, I suppose.

Since then, one of the PCs has only been casting spells using mana stored in ioun stones or other objects as a safeguard, and since this player often DMs, it's my guess that as long as you're not using the mana in your body to cast, you *should* be safe. So, using items like wands would probably be okay, though the items themselves would probably be drained if used against the stone. One thing we've noticed before is, magic items that get coated in the dust from black rock become inert until cleaned/rinsed with water.

As far as detecting the stone, and using things like detect magic/arcane sight: most of our high level casters (myself included) almost always have both of those up, as well as true seeing. The rock does not ping as magical, nor does it have any auras. At this point, we just avoid casting near any black material. Which, based on your post, leads me to want to clear something up: using a spell like Arcane Sight, and looking at the stone, is not enough to cut your mana off; hell, my character walks around with persisted veils that probably have brushed up against the stone at some point. It's more direct. One player lost his mana by casting a damaging spell (something like fireball, can't remember) at an object near the ground, and the explosion radius included black rock. It has also been made known (I believe) that if you use magic to conjure something, and then that something (no longer directly connected to your mana) touches black rock, it doesn't affect you. So it's the difference between throwing a fireball at black rock vs using Minor Creation to make an object to throw at black rock.


This is starting to sound like your game master is actively trying to make the game unplayable.

Considering the mantle of DM rotates every once in a while, and this guy's been running this setting for 10+ years, I don't think that's really the case. But it's not everyone's cup of tea.

[MrSandman]

Considering the mantle of DM rotates every once in a while, and this guy's been running this setting for 10+ years, I don't think that's really the case. But it's not everyone's cup of tea.

It probably looks a whole lot different from your end than from mine, but this is what I'm hearing:

- Low treasure, you're probably well below your expected wealth level.
- Still expected to face epic challenges.
- Identifying magic items, even the most trivial ones, is very risky.
- Abundance of cursed items (which equals carte blanche to screw characters whenever the game master feels like).
- Using psionics or magic that is similar can screw you up.
- Saying a god's name can screw you up.
- There's a substance that nobody knows how it works but can screw your caster up.

All these things are probably meant to make the game feel dangerous and exciting. But it looks rather frustrating to me. It looks more like a blank check for the game master to screw your character however he feels like.
Probably the game master doesn't mean to make an unplayable game, but so many options are just closed or so dangerous that I would just have my character create a personal demiplane and retire from adventuring, it's just not worth it.

[Segev]

Ah, well, then. Mana stones. Lots of them. That's your solution.

Also, your party should start collecting this stuff, and decorate their gear with it. Not their magical gear, but mundane stuff. Experiment a bit with your ioun stones to see if it keeps you from casting buffs on people, and if so, how far from them it has to be. Just having a footman following PCs around carrying the stuff might be sufficient; your goal here is perfect defense against AOE attacks, without preventing friendly mages from casting important buffs and curative magics.

More use of summoned minions may also be called for. Start looking into summon-able critters with useful spell-like abilities and spell access who you can conjure up to work magic for you.

[Jarmen4u]

It probably looks a whole lot different from your end than from mine, but this is what I'm hearing:

- Low treasure, you're probably well below your expected wealth level.
- Still expected to face epic challenges.
- Identifying magic items, even the most trivial ones, is very risky.
- Abundance of cursed items (which equals carte blanche to screw characters whenever the game master feels like).
- Using psionics or magic that is similar can screw you up.
- Saying a god's name can screw you up.
- There's a substance that nobody knows how it works but can screw your caster up.

All these things are probably meant to make the game feel dangerous and exciting. But it looks rather frustrating to me. It looks more like a blank check for the game master to screw your character however he feels like.
Probably the game master doesn't mean to make an unplayable game, but so many options are just closed or so dangerous that I would just have my character create a personal demiplane and retire from adventuring, it's just not worth it.

Understandable. To be fair, the black rock was a very recent discovery, and since we just went to a different plane(t?), it shouldn't be an issue for the foreseeable future. At least, unless someone decides to go back.

It definitely was a frustrating and confusing game at first, but now that I've been in it long enough, I've come to appreciate the positives of it as well. Generally, you're rewarded for thinking intelligently, and not just blundering through things. If you have to climb a sheer rock face, for instance, and you just say "I wanna climb this," the DM would have you make a hard DC climb check. But if you explain that you'd be checking for footholds beforehand, or scoping out the easiest path up, or in some way immersing/explaining what it is you're doing, he may lower the DC or handwave (rarely) the check altogether. It's the reason I've stayed for as long as I have. I play in other games occasionally, but this one has held my interest for years.


Ah, well, then. Mana stones. Lots of them. That's your solution.

Also, your party should start collecting this stuff, and decorate their gear with it. Not their magical gear, but mundane stuff. Experiment a bit with your ioun stones to see if it keeps you from casting buffs on people, and if so, how far from them it has to be. Just having a footman following PCs around carrying the stuff might be sufficient; your goal here is perfect defense against AOE attacks, without preventing friendly mages from casting important buffs and curative magics.

More use of summoned minions may also be called for. Start looking into summon-able critters with useful spell-like abilities and spell access who you can conjure up to work magic for you.

We've been thinking about finding ways to incorporate it into armor for a while; the main problem there is, our artificer/armor-crafter is a magic user who really really really doesn't want to lose his magic because of the stuff. So he's been reluctant to try it out.

[Bronk]

Considering the mantle of DM rotates every once in a while, and this guy's been running this setting for 10+ years, I don't think that's really the case. But it's not everyone's cup of tea.

I still think this is a bad situation, same as before, and same as everyone else.

But!

This sounds like your one hope (besides leveling your character, seriously, that's another weird against-the-rules thing) is to take a turn as DM and demand to know what the heck the deal is with all this stuff.

You might need to also take that as an opportunity to fix your character as a DMPC. Who knows how that'll play with the rest of the group, but hey, every single weird additional game mechanic you've mentioned is against you, without exception.

[Jarmen4u]

I still think this is a bad situation, same as before, and same as everyone else.

But!

This sounds like your one hope (besides leveling your character, seriously, that's another weird against-the-rules thing) is to take a turn as DM and demand to know what the heck the deal is with all this stuff.

You might need to also take that as an opportunity to fix your character as a DMPC. Who knows how that'll play with the rest of the group, but hey, every single weird additional game mechanic you've mentioned is against you, without exception.

He's been recommending for a while that I DM, which he only offers to long-time/good-standing players, so I'll take advantage of that eventually. But for the time being, I'm really just looking for in-character solutions, like other spells that aren't illusion/necromancy (restricted schools), or new prestige classes to look at. Are there any specifically that revolve around some kind of rune magic? I could easily tie that in to the new runes I've been learning to use on the side.

--As an aside, it's not just a "you can't level unless someone can teach you"; that's more specifically to *new* *prestige* classes. If you already have a level in a class, generally, you can continue to level in it. But, for example, if you went from being a wizard to an IotSV, he'd want to know how your character came upon the knowledge/ability to manipulate veils like that.

[Willie the Duck]

Generally, you're rewarded for thinking intelligently, and not just blundering through things. If you have to climb a sheer rock face, for instance, and you just say "I wanna climb this," the DM would have you make a hard DC climb check. But if you explain that you'd be checking for footholds beforehand, or scoping out the easiest path up, or in some way immersing/explaining what it is you're doing, he may lower the DC or handwave (rarely) the check altogether. It's the reason I've stayed for as long as I have. I play in other games occasionally, but this one has held my interest for years.

I actually love the idea of a DM that makes you genuinely think intelligently, rather than look for answers on your character sheet or in spell descriptions. That's a wonderful thing to promote.

This specific example, however, isn't that. Looking for footholds and scoping a path is part of being good at climbing. Or, at the very least, it's simply having a shared understanding between player and DM about what part of declaring an action needs to be assumed or not. It reminds me of the DM who will sick a piercer or green slime trap on a dungeon crawler after the player states "I advance slowly through the door, looking for danger" and when the player complains, stating "well, you didn't specify that you were going to look up" -- it's not thinking intelligently, it's just searching for shared verbal cues.

[Jarmen4u]

I actually love the idea of a DM that makes you genuinely think intelligently, rather than look for answers on your character sheet or in spell descriptions. That's a wonderful thing to promote.

This specific example, however, isn't that. Looking for footholds and scoping a path is part of being good at climbing. Or, at the very least, it's simply having a shared understanding between player and DM about what part of declaring an action needs to be assumed or not. It reminds me of the DM who will sick a piercer or green slime trap on a dungeon crawler after the player states "I advance slowly through the door, looking for danger" and when the player complains, stating "well, you didn't specify that you were going to look up" -- it's not thinking intelligently, it's just searching for shared verbal cues.

Well that probably wasn't the best example, it mostly came to mind because that's how the 'rule' was explained. But it's more often used in situations like, if you're rolling diplomacy, you don't just say "I want him to let us in. 27 diplomacy roll!" and that roleplaying is encouraged. To your point, he has been known to pull stupid gotcha's like that, but it's pretty rare, and most of us are paranoid enough at this point to avoid any of them.

[Segev]

Thematically with your rune-focus, you might be interested in the Geometer in Complete Arcane, though I don't recall it being an especially great class. It wasn't bad, just not great.

Incantatrix (or Incantatar, if you're male) is amazing for anybody with metamagic; I forget if you've already got levels of that or not.

...if your character is...particularly focused on the black stone, you might talk to the GM about seeing if you can adapt Green Star Adept to replace the "starmetal" with this "black stone." Maybe it starts off as your character finding ways to adulterate and denature it into something only mildly magic-draining (represented by the half-caster progression), and he's trying to build up an immunity or use it as a training tool to force himself to be better at using mana efficiently. (Like Goku's weighted clothes, or the arc in Magi: The Labyrinth of Magic where Aladdin has his connection to exterior mana cut off and has to learn to use his limited personal supply.)

[Telok]

So it sounds like you may be playing the 'psionics is different' way. Find out if that is the case and if so, how psionics interacts with the black stone. I'm not saying to start a psionic character or anything, I'm saying that if psi is not magic then it may be a way to deal with the stuff.

Planar binding. Look for the weakest critter that can cast Identify or use an item/wand of it.

Also there are occasionally curses that can benefit you. Look for ways to bend cursed items to your benefit (or give them to your enemies). See if you can add enchantments to an item that negate or reduce the curse. See if you can break the curse.

[Jarmen4u]

So it sounds like you may be playing the 'psionics is different' way. Find out if that is the case and if so, how psionics interacts with the black stone. I'm not saying to start a psionic character or anything, I'm saying that if psi is not magic then it may be a way to deal with the stuff.

Planar binding. Look for the weakest critter that can cast Identify or use an item/wand of it.

Also there are occasionally curses that can benefit you. Look for ways to bend cursed items to your benefit (or give them to your enemies). See if you can add enchantments to an item that negate or reduce the curse. See if you can break the curse.

Psionics definitely act differently, and the black stone doesn't affect them, based on an OOC convo I had with the DM. But like I said previously, psionics come with their own dangers. My next character is almost definitely going to be psionic, though, if I can find a way to make a character proficient in both unarmed combat and psionics to be strong enough to survive in this world.

[Bronk]

He's been recommending for a while that I DM, which he only offers to long-time/good-standing players, so I'll take advantage of that eventually.

Awesome, I hope that eventually works out!


But for the time being, I'm really just looking for in-character solutions, like other spells that aren't illusion/necromancy (restricted schools), or new prestige classes to look at. Are there any specifically that revolve around some kind of rune magic? I could easily tie that in to the new runes I've been learning to use on the side.

Hmm, there's the Runecaster, the Runesmith, the Inscribe Rune feat, and the Rune domain... But I don't know how any of them would interact with your DM's extensive house rules. He'll have to admit though, they sound very rune-y!



--As an aside, it's not just a "you can't level unless someone can teach you"; that's more specifically to *new* *prestige* classes. If you already have a level in a class, generally, you can continue to level in it. But, for example, if you went from being a wizard to an IotSV, he'd want to know how your character came upon the knowledge/ability to manipulate veils like that.

I just meant that you're normally not allowed to hold off on leveling up. If you're okay with it though, I guess it isn't a problem.


Understandable. To be fair, the black rock was a very recent discovery, and since we just went to a different plane(t?), it shouldn't be an issue for the foreseeable future. At least, unless someone decides to go back.

It definitely was a frustrating and confusing game at first, but now that I've been in it long enough, I've come to appreciate the positives of it as well. Generally, you're rewarded for thinking intelligently, and not just blundering through things. If you have to climb a sheer rock face, for instance, and you just say "I wanna climb this," the DM would have you make a hard DC climb check. But if you explain that you'd be checking for footholds beforehand, or scoping out the easiest path up, or in some way immersing/explaining what it is you're doing, he may lower the DC or handwave (rarely) the check altogether. It's the reason I've stayed for as long as I have. I play in other games occasionally, but this one has held my interest for years.


I also like imaginative DMs, and I'm not super against house rules or anything either... it just seems like many of this DM's house rules are hidden like mines.

I'm not sure I'd be cool with your specific example though, with the climbing checks. It seems punitive, like he's jacking the DC up if you don't describe your actions blow by blow, or that he'll mess with you somehow if you don't. That can lead to funny moments though (even if they're usually mostly funny for the DM), and it sounds like you're leaning more that way, so that's good at least.

It is good to hear that the black rock is a new mystery, and localized, that puts it in a better light... although it sure sounds like the kind of thing that will never work in your favor. For example, if you do something like what Segev was talking about, just get some of this black rock and hang it around some random minion's neck to act as a magical shield, I can only imagine that it will somehow never work.

I googled around for a while, but didn't come up with any direct references to your rocks. The closest thing I could remember was one of the Greenwood Azoun novels, where Azoun was infected with an anti-magic poison. Is it a new kind of void stone? Could the dust be a shimmerling swarm, where each shimmerling has been transformed into a wee flying tarrasque? Could be anything, I guess. If you ever find out, I hope you let us know. I think I'm hoping that it's from some obscure adventure module from the 70s.

[Jarmen4u]

I'm on mobile now so I can't quote everything I'd like to, but an extremely high amount of inspiration is pulled from, I'd say, anything within the last 50 years of fantasy/sci-fi media. There are diskworlds, spelljammers, pretty much every God/god/"god" in existence, all 12 Swords of Power from the Book of Swords series, and more than I can imagine. The setting has been run since this guy was in Vietnam, and he's been building on it ever since. I honestly do the guy a disservice by saying how difficult he makes stuff; literally anything is possible if you talk to him about it and he likes the idea enough.

Example: I'm very sure this character might die soon, despite my best efforts. So I'm looking at covering the weaknesses of my warblade. So I asked him if there was a way his artificer could make me a weapon I could use to deflect spells, or something similar to the Deflect X feat tree. He told me to ask him in character about a sword called The Dark Child, which will be able to do basically what I want. Based on the name, I'm guessing it's a reference to something, but other than League of Legends, I have never heard that phrase before. (If anyone knows what it's from, I'd love to hear about it.)

I'll check out those rune things, and I'll ask him if any of them could apply here. If there aren't any specific classes that can capitalize on rune magic, I'll probably do what other people suggested, and push archmage or some other classes I've already taken.

[Nifft]

I honestly do the guy a disservice by saying how difficult he makes stuff; literally anything is possible if you talk to him about it and he likes the idea enough.

Well, there you go.

The thing you need to prosper in this game is not our advice, but rather your DM's buy-in.

So come up with an anti-dust hypermagic that terminates the dust's mana-draining effect by severing its 13th dimensional singularity string factor, add technobabble if he likes that, reduce technobabble if he prefers elegant simplicity, and get back to pwning NPCs.

[Sleven]

He has been combining End of Illusions to make himself immune to attacks from mundane or magical weapons with the drawback of a huge penalty to saves vs spells, with Ring of Air, which essentially makes him immune to any spell or spell-like cast at him.

These are spells from Magic of Rokugan, a third-party book.

If that's allowed, look at Kalamar (a second party source that actually has WotC's offical seal) for spells and feats (hint: Irresistible Spell wasn't actually errata'd to just give spells a +10 DC, that's just a homebrew myth). Start "winning" the game with 1st level save-or-die spells. Because DCs are for "normies".

[Jarmen4u]

Well, there you go.

The thing you need to prosper in this game is not our advice, but rather your DM's buy-in.

So come up with an anti-dust hypermagic that terminates the dust's mana-draining effect by severing its 13th dimensional singularity string factor, add technobabble if he likes that, reduce technobabble if he prefers elegant simplicity, and get back to pwning NPCs.

I'm not 100% sure if there *is* something like that that I can do, though. As is current though, it seems like someone or something did what you're suggesting when their problem was "I need a material to make my XYZ out of that's completely immune to magic, and makes people lose their spellcasting if they ever cast at it" and this was the solution. That, or he took it from somewhere. But it seems to be one of those things made to counter something else, which can't be countered. Back and forth arms races are kind of tedious and don't seem to be what the DM enjoys. Despite all of that, it's true that nobody has looked seriously into a way to counter said dark rock with magic, but it might be something I could even do with the rune **** I'm going to be learning.

And I know we've been talking a lot about this rock, but it's really been the least of our problems. I'm more concerned about dealing with possible run-ins with Juiblex-types, or any evil-aligned deity (we just had our last adventure derailed when a player said "Lolth" and rolled poorly on the d%, causing a portal to her plane to open up and spill giant driders all over the place), or the possibility of Cthulhu (he has been sealed up for god knows how long, until about a week ago in-game, a player whose character lost his magic kept trying to get himself killed, and his latest attempt was to do the one thing we were told not to do, and he did it. This thing was cracking the seal on something we were told "would unleash devastation and hell on the entire plane". His response was something along the lines of "well if we're all going to die anyway we might as well make it as terrible and ****ty as possible.")

Possibly weaponizing the rock could work, but as far as just defeating saves of upwards of 100 or so, and hitting/ignoring ACs of similar levels, is my main priority.

[Bronk]

Back and forth arms races are kind of tedious and don't seem to be what the DM enjoys.

If this DM is actually secretly (to us, but not to you) super awesome, and his game is so long running that that he's using old ideas not even on purpose, and has morphed into one big super detailed game (despite letting others DM in it), it's entirely possible that this is either a straight up plot hook or else a magical mishap from one of his previous players. Maybe you're doing exactly what he wants by trying to look into it.

Maybe someone really did polymorph a ton of shimmerlings into tarrasques, then they lost control of them! Maybe that's where all of those crazy giant tauric creatures you mentioned came from...



And I know we've been talking a lot about this rock, but it's really been the least of our problems. I'm more concerned about dealing with possible run-ins with Juiblex-types, or any evil-aligned deity (we just had our last adventure derailed when a player said "Lolth" and rolled poorly on the d%, causing a portal to her plane to open up and spill giant driders all over the place)

This could just be his old school insanity poking through, but it could also be something a previous character did to piss off all the gods, and/or it could be a plot hook for you... Is there a way to calm them all down? Some kind of celestial music or something? Return a stolen item?

[Telok]

anything within the last 50 years of fantasy/sci-fi media. There are diskworlds, spelljammers, pretty much every God/god/"god" in existence, all 12 Swords of Power from the Book of Swords series...

Ok. Everything plus the kitchen sink in sci-fi & fantasy novels (and probably most movies as well) for the past 50 years. That gives us more options. It means that you can go troll TVTropes for ideas, Niven's "Not Long The End" short story is on the table (magic eating tactical nuke), and there are easily identified god-killer weapons floating around.

[Jarmen4u]

I don't think it's gods being pissed off. Sometimes it's a good thing. I recently communed with Boccob with nothing other than a mumbled prayer and a low d% roll. It's just that in his worlds, anything strong enough to be listening in on you, just might be. Hence the percentage dice, there's only about a 10-20% chance of the deity hearing.

As for the breadth of his genre-pulling, my fighter character has a strange hilt with an adjustable dial, which causes the hilt to produce a blade of light as small as a dagger or as large as a longsword. The people who came before us to the world where the black rock is seem mythical, but really they just had technology. They're also very possibly the cause of the rock, as one of the conflicting stories we've heard had to do with them using it to build bases out of. Another story had something to do with extreme evil rituals and sacrifices required to make said stone. Not sure.

[Zanos]

I can't help with your antimagic rock problem, as gross as it is. But Analyze Dweomer might help you with your identifying magic items problem. It specifically works at range, 1 item per round, and requires no interaction.

[Nifft]

And I know we've been talking a lot about this rock, but it's really been the least of our problems. I'm more concerned about dealing with possible run-ins with Juiblex-types, or any evil-aligned deity (we just had our last adventure derailed when a player said "Lolth" and rolled poorly on the d%, causing a portal to her plane to open up and spill giant driders all over the place), or the possibility of Cthulhu (he has been sealed up for god knows how long, until about a week ago in-game, a player whose character lost his magic kept trying to get himself killed, and his latest attempt was to do the one thing we were told not to do, and he did it. This thing was cracking the seal on something we were told "would unleash devastation and hell on the entire plane". His response was something along the lines of "well if we're all going to die anyway we might as well make it as terrible and ****ty as possible.")

I'm getting mixed messages here.

I think that this rock permanently ate this PC's magic and therefore the player has become a disengaged suicidal psycho.

It sounds like this rock which has "really been the least of [y]our problems" seems like it's the root of what you designate as one of your more significant problems. Am I making a bad assumption about the cause?

It also sounded like your earlier difficulties with Lolth / Juiblex / etc. stem from your inability to use magic as a traditional D&D would use magic, which is also rooted in the ways you've adapted your character solely and specifically to compensate for the effects of this rock.

[Jarmen4u]

I can't help with your antimagic rock problem, as gross as it is. But Analyze Dweomer might help you with your identifying magic items problem. It specifically works at range, 1 item per round, and requires no interaction.

That's fine, this thread was never supposed to be about the black rock, it just kind of happened 😂

What's this I hear about a metamagic that removes the saving throw from a spell?

[ExLibrisMortis]

What's this I hear about a metamagic that removes the saving throw from a spell?
Irresistible Spell, Kingdoms of Kalamar. Questionable legality in first-party D&D, but definitely 3.5 OGL content.

[Jarmen4u]

I'm getting mixed messages here.

I think that this rock permanently ate this PC's magic and therefore the player has become a disengaged suicidal psycho.

It sounds like this rock which has "really been the least of [y]our problems" seems like it's the root of what you designate as one of your more significant problems. Am I making a bad assumption about the cause?

It also sounded like your earlier difficulties with Lolth / Juiblex / etc. stem from your inability to use magic as a traditional D&D would use magic, which is also rooted in the ways you've adapted your character solely and specifically to compensate for the effects of this rock.

I'm kind of a mess when it comes to explaining things coherently, so I'll address your concerns directly.

The player threw a fit, and derailed the campaign a bit, but before that, we were already fighting beholder spider and Jubie. It's not that the rock is stopping me from using magic against these enemies, it's that their saves are often close to 80-90, and their ACs are at a similar level. And chances are, there's SR involved. My main reason for making this thread was to find a way to avoid their saves if possible, and which spells would be extremely useful in defeating them. (Unfortunately, no illusion or necro, restricted schools).

This character was made to compensate for the extremely high lethality of the game world as a whole. It's only by luck or a generous DM ruling that the rock hasn't seemed to affect the bubble veils around me when it appeared. Before now, I assumed that the veils would be more than enough to protect me against what kills people the most, which is often idiocy. A player (The DM's wife, and another part-time DM) thought it would be a good idea to break an artifact over her knee as an opening strike against a mindflayer nest that we found, but it ended up killing literally everyone except my warblade, who was literally on the very edge of the blast, had HP buffed up to several hundred, and made his reflex save, and survived with a handful of HP. Said character used a cursed ring of greater wishes to bring everyone back, but that's another story. Point being, lots of things can cause lots of problems, and I wanted to make a character who could survive it all. Unfortunately, the insane saves and ACs of the recent enemies has all but rendered my veils pointless (since all of their major affects require failed saves), so I'm looking for new options.

[Bronk]

It's not that the rock is stopping me from using magic against these enemies, it's that their saves are often close to 80-90, and their ACs are at a similar level. And chances are, there's SR involved. My main reason for making this thread was to find a way to avoid their saves if possible, and which spells would be extremely useful in defeating them. (Unfortunately, no illusion or necro, restricted schools).

Irresistible Spell is a feat in the Kingdoms of Kalamar Players Guide, page 87, that, for a +4 to spell level, straight up turns spells that allow a saving throw into spells that do not allow a saving throw. You also need to take two prereq feats, Maximize Spell and Envelop the Wall (a feat from the same book that helps a bit against SR).

The book is officially licensed by Wizards of the Coast.

The tricky part is that an errata was eventually released nerfing the feat, but only after the series was no longer licensed. Strictly speaking, the errata doesn't count, but it is still a highly contentious feat.

[Jarmen4u]

Random 5am thought: would it be possible to apply Irresistible Spell to my veils using my Incantatrix ability? That would definitely make them more potent.

[Bronk]

Random 5am thought: would it be possible to apply Irresistible Spell to my veils using my Incantatrix ability? That would definitely make them more potent.

Not normally, because metamagic feats are specifically for spells, and the veils are spell-like abilities, but this is exactly the sort of thing I'd expect your main DM to eventually approve of, after talking with them and a bunch of in game role playing. It seems right up their alley.

[Jarmen4u]

Not normally, because metamagic feats are specifically for spells, and the veils are spell-like abilities, but this is exactly the sort of thing I'd expect your main DM to eventually approve of, after talking with them and a bunch of in game role playing. It seems right up their alley.

The reason I'm asking is because I was under the impression that Incantatrix's Metamagic Effect worked on "spell effects," which could be interpreted as including the veils, since they duplicate the effects of a spell.

[ExLibrisMortis]

The reason I'm asking is because I was under the impression that Incantatrix's Metamagic Effect worked on "spell effects," which could be interpreted as including the veils, since they duplicate the effects of a spell.
You already mentioned that you have Persistent veils, which means you can add metamagic feats to veils. If Irresistible Spell is allowed, then you can make your veils Irresistible, no question. That is, there is nothing in the RAW that would make IotSV veils care about the difference between Persist and Irresistible, assuming both are legal feat choices.

[Bronk]

You already mentioned that you have Persistent veils, which means you can add metamagic feats to veils. If Irresistible Spell is allowed, then you can make your veils Irresistible, no question. That is, there is nothing in the RAW that would make IotSV veils care about the difference between Persist and Irresistible, assuming both are legal feat choices.

Good point. If the OP is allowed to take the feat, there's no logical reason this shouldn't work.

This DM is all over the place though, so I think it's possible he allowed the persistent effect just because he got tired of the OP having to turn them on all the time. Thing is, he might have gotten sick of having to deal with them, so that might also be why the functions of the veils are currently nerfed. For example, we know for sure that the DM doesn't like the 'always works' aspect of the violet veil. Plus, even though all these creatures are passing their saves, they should still be feeling the secondary effects, but it there's no evidence of that. It sounds to me as if the DM feels like he shouldn't have to hit you with specific spells just to hurt your character.

The conversation about allowing the Irresistible Spell feat should be an interesting one! I hope it goes well, but my suggestion is not to get your hopes up too high. I'd imagine that if the DM does allow the feat, and even if it does work like you want, you'll get hit by psionics instead of spells, like your Shugenja teammate (the one you said was immune to spells, but keeps getting mind controlled).

[Jarmen4u]

Good point. If the OP is allowed to take the feat, there's no logical reason this shouldn't work.

This DM is all over the place though, so I think it's possible he allowed the persistent effect just because he got tired of the OP having to turn them on all the time. Thing is, he might have gotten sick of having to deal with them, so that might also be why the functions of the veils are currently nerfed. For example, we know for sure that the DM doesn't like the 'always works' aspect of the violet veil. Plus, even though all these creatures are passing their saves, they should still be feeling the secondary effects, but it there's no evidence of that. It sounds to me as if the DM feels like he shouldn't have to hit you with specific spells just to hurt your character.

The conversation about allowing the Irresistible Spell feat should be an interesting one! I hope it goes well, but my suggestion is not to get your hopes up too high. I'd imagine that if the DM does allow the feat, and even if it does work like you want, you'll get hit by psionics instead of spells, like your Shugenja teammate (the one you said was immune to spells, but keeps getting mind controlled).

Yeah, I don't remember what the details were when that happened. It was a situation where there was a monster (succubus? lamia?) that charmed him and other people walking into the room. I don't remember if he had the ring up, but even if he did, I'm pretty sure the charm effect was an Su ability, not spell or spell-like. On that note though, I didn't ask the DM before doing the persistent veils, I just assumed it was legal and he never protested. Like you said though, he might not like completely not being able to save vs anything though.

As for the veils, the monster still took the handful of fire/acid/lightning damage, but the useful effects (insanity, disintegration, plane shift) are fully negated with a successful save. That's what I'm most worried about.

[Bronk]

As for the veils, the monster still took the handful of fire/acid/lightning damage, but the useful effects (insanity, disintegration, plane shift) are fully negated with a successful save. That's what I'm most worried about.

That's good, at least! He's not completely ignoring your character's abilities!


Yeah, I don't remember what the details were when that happened. It was a situation where there was a monster (succubus? lamia?) that charmed him and other people walking into the room. I don't remember if he had the ring up, but even if he did, I'm pretty sure the charm effect was an Su ability, not spell or spell-like. On that note though, I didn't ask the DM before doing the persistent veils, I just assumed it was legal and he never protested. Like you said though, he might not like completely not being able to save vs anything though.

Yeah, if the DM wants to affect a character, there's nearly always a way to do it. It's just that your DM probably knows how improbable it would seem if a character suddenly had a bunch of super defenses that could only be turned off with a particular method (a series of particular spells in your case), and suddenly if he wants to affect you, he needs every third NPC to be a mage with those exact spells. He's getting around it now by jacking up the main monster's saves, but in the future?

Back to your original post, though, I'd go with 5 additional levels in Incantatrix, because it looks like they get a bonus metamagic feat every few levels.

[Jarmen4u]

That's good, at least! He's not completely ignoring your character's abilities!



Yeah, if the DM wants to affect a character, there's nearly always a way to do it. It's just that your DM probably knows how improbable it would seem if a character suddenly had a bunch of super defenses that could only be turned off with a particular method (a series of particular spells in your case), and suddenly if he wants to affect you, he needs every third NPC to be a mage with those exact spells. He's getting around it now by jacking up the main monster's saves, but in the future?

Back to your original post, though, I'd go with 5 additional levels in Incantatrix, because it looks like they get a bonus metamagic feat every few levels.

I appreciate the feedback. I've said this several times to others in this thread though: the DM isn't making monsters stronger/boosting their saves/AC/whatever because of the players. This is literally how his world has always been. The only difference between before we started making 'OP' characters and now is, we actually have a chance to survive more than a handful of sessions before dying to something stupid. :smallbiggrin:

[DarkSoul]

Incantatrix level 10 essentially gives you an Epic feat for free, about 12 levels early at the most. It should decrease the spellcraft DC for adding metamagic to spell effects through your other class abilities.

Seconding the recommendation of finishing out Incantatrix ASAP.

[Bronk]

I appreciate the feedback. I've said this several times to others in this thread though: the DM isn't making monsters stronger/boosting their saves/AC/whatever because of the players. This is literally how his world has always been. The only difference between before we started making 'OP' characters and now is, we actually have a chance to survive more than a handful of sessions before dying to something stupid. :smallbiggrin:

I realize that. I had more, but I accidentally put it in another thread.

My concern for you is that I'm seeing this game as being so confusing because it's really a jumbled up mishmash of older editions with a veneer of 3.5 on top, rather than a 3.5 game that merely uses older ideas (like my games). Basically, my feeling is that the DM never fully switched over, and doesn't realize or doesn't care that it affects the expectations of his players so much. I had a similar problem, as a player, from the opposite direction, where I and a number of my fellow players who were playing mages in a 3.5 game never seemed to land a spell, after dozens of tries and relatively high DCs! Turns out, the DM was using 4th edition save rules (and badly a that). It was extremely frustrating for me.

(Edit: Or the difference, if you read Knights of the Dinner Table, between BA Felton's game and Nitro's game.)

Anyway, that's where I'm coming from, I hope that's not the case, and I'm super glad you're not frustrated in your game. I hope whatever you decide to do works out, and you let us know. I'm very curious!

[Sleven]

Irresistible Spell is a feat in the Kingdoms of Kalamar Players Guide, page 87, that, for a +4 to spell level, straight up turns spells that allow a saving throw into spells that do not allow a saving throw. You also need to take two prereq feats, Maximize Spell and Envelop the Wall (a feat from the same book that helps a bit against SR).

The book is officially licensed by Wizards of the Coast.

The tricky part is that an errata was eventually released nerfing the feat, but only after the series was no longer licensed. Strictly speaking, the errata doesn't count, but it is still a highly contentious feat.

I'm not sure why this myth persists when Kenzer posts the official errata on their website (https://www.kenzerco.com/errata/KoKPG.pdf) (that links to the official KoKPG errata, btw). I see no mention of an update to Irresistible Spell, and the KoKPG is the official source of the feat.

The real issue is that this feat has no place at any table, under any circumstance ever. And I say that as someone who's played in campaigns where we were expected to essentially do anything and everything short of Pun-Pun at level 1.


(a series of particular spells in your case), and suddenly if he wants to affect you, he needs every third NPC to be a mage with those exact spells. He's getting around it now by jacking up the main monster's saves

Actually, the DM would just have to use monsters with high SR. Or spellcasters of the same caster level that have a spell that grants them SR. But, based on the other thread where I discuss this as a reason why IoSV isn't that great, people still disagree with me. So, meh.

Regardless, this campaign seems way too homebrewed for anyone here to give you reliable advice. So have fun, and good luck!

[Jarmen4u]

I'm not sure why this myth persists when Kenzer posts the official errata on their website (https://www.kenzerco.com/errata/KoKPG.pdf) (that links to the official KoKPG errata, btw). I see no mention of an update to Irresistible Spell, and the KoKPG is the official source of the feat.

The real issue is that this feat has no place at any table, under any circumstance ever. And I say that as someone who's played in campaigns where we were expected to essentially do anything and everything short of Pun-Pun at level 1.



Actually, the DM would just have to use monsters with high SR. Or spellcasters of the same caster level that have a spell that grants them SR. But, based on the other thread where I discuss this as a reason why IoSV isn't that great, people still disagree with me. So, meh.

Regardless, this campaign seems way too homebrewed for anyone here to give you reliable advice. So have fun, and good luck!

Thanks for the link to errata.

Underlined is your personal opinion, which I disagree with. So, cool.

Most of the monsters already have high SR, which is why this isn't nearly as much of a problem as you think.

I don't know what other thread you're referring to, but okay.

Way too homebrewed? Other than casters using a mana system, everything about the way my character is built is 100% 3.5e. So I'm not sure where you're getting that idea. But thanks for your input, I guess?

[RoboEmperor]

Why exactly aren't you using epic spells?

[Bronk]

I'm not sure why this myth persists when Kenzer posts the official errata on their website (https://www.kenzerco.com/errata/KoKPG.pdf) (that links to the official KoKPG errata, btw). I see no mention of an update to Irresistible Spell, and the KoKPG is the official source of the feat.


You're right, I looked into this and it wasn't updated in the errata, it was reprinted in another book! That book, Player's Guide to the Sovereign Lands, is the one that isn't official Wizards of the Coast material, and the replacement isn't official unless you're using the third party unlicensed book.



The real issue is that this feat has no place at any table, under any circumstance ever. And I say that as someone who's played in campaigns where we were expected to essentially do anything and everything short of Pun-Pun at level 1.


The feat can definitely be problematic.

[Crake]

Last time I was attacked, I had all 7 veils up and persisted, but the enemy just passed all 7 saves with literally no problem (save bonuses of +60 or thereabouts) and just slapped me around. Said creature also had an AC of about 80, touch around 70.

What version of the veils were you using? There's one that literally encompasses nothing but you, meaning an enemy can't just walk through it and then slap you around, each and every slap would have required an entire set of 7 saves. If it hit you 10 times, it should have made 70 saves, and at least ONE of those was going to be a 1.

[Jarmen4u]

Why exactly aren't you using epic spells?

Cause I'm stupid and have never used Epic spells before, and have no idea where I'd even start.


What version of the veils were you using? There's one that literally encompasses nothing but you, meaning an enemy can't just walk through it and then slap you around, each and every slap would have required an entire set of 7 saves. If it hit you 10 times, it should have made 70 saves, and at least ONE of those was going to be a 1.

Yeah, I was using the "personal" sized veils in this case. He didn't walk through it and slap me, he made the saves every time. The giant spider hit me once, made all 7 saves (DC is in the 20's for each; spider save bonus was in the 50's), did most of my HP in damage. Hit me again, made the saves. Second hit would have killed me (threw me deep into the negatives) but I RP'd begging for mercy and the DM rolled back the second hit, in exchange for my character secretly becoming the servant of the spider.

[ExLibrisMortis]

Incidentally, would your DM allow you to take Supernatural Transformation (Warding)? That would allow them to ignore SR.

[Jarmen4u]

Incidentally, would your DM allow you to take Supernatural Transformation (Warding)? That would allow them to ignore SR.

That looks interesting. I wonder how he'd react to me asking for both the ability to ignore SR AND saves.

[Eldariel]

Notably though, save DCs in the 20s sounds suspect. What's your intelligence? On epic levels I'd assume at least 18 + 5 levels + 5 inherent + 6 item casting stat = 34. You could also Polymorph Any Object into a Black Ethergaunt [Fiend Folio] for base 31 Int and then buff that (apply the +5 inherent and +6 item for 42). 42 is +16: this alone would make the save DC 34. You could further add Ability Focus and such but it's probably not worth investing extra resources into this. Just develop an epic spell to buff your Int further if you want more. This wouldn't make them useful here but at least slightly less useless.

The bigger point I'd give you is not using them against enemies themselves anymore, but rather use them against spells, projectiles and such that don't get saves. If enemy moves in to attack you you're best advised to cast an immediate action spell like Celerity or use a Contingency (speaking is a free action that can be taken out of turn so you can trigger Contingencies at will on enemy turns if you bind them to saying something) to not be there in the first place (planar travel abilities or some such) or a flat-out block effect (I mean a real, tangible wall of some kind like Wall of Force or Stone or whatever, or another such option). Just use something that doesn't allow saves: and remember, you can't be attacked if you aren't there in the first place. Mortal magic makes for many other sources of "not being there" such as Astral Projection (accessible through Lesser Planar Binding for a Nightmare pretty easily without using the XP cost; just use Moment of Prescience to win the opposed Charisma-check no matter what and compel the thing into service, adding Mindrape if necessary) and Project Image (not accessible to you, of course).

[RoboEmperor]

Cause I'm stupid and have never used Epic spells before, and have no idea where I'd even start.

Lets make an Epic Spell that permanently turns you into a Tarrasque.
http://www.d20srd.org/srd/monsters/tarrasque.htm
1. You start at Spellcraft DC 0.
2. If you want the Epic Spell to do something, grab an Epic Seed that has the effect you want. In this case it's the Transformation Seed.
http://www.d20srd.org/srd/epic/seeds/transform.htm
3. The Transform Seed has a Spellcraft DC of 21 right off the bat. So now our Spellcraft DC is 21.
4. Read the description. It says if the spell turns you into a different type than your own, add +5 to the Spellcraft DC. We're humanoid, the Tarrasque is a Magical Beast. So now our Spellcraft DC is 26.
5. Read the description. For each Ex and Su ability we are to gain in our new form we need to add +10 to the Spellcraft DC. The Tarrasque has 7 Ex and Su abilities, BUT we ONLY NEED his Regeneration, so only increase the Spellcraft DC by 10, since our spell will ONLY grant Regeneration. Our Spellcraft DC is now 36.
6. Read the description. For each hd above 15 you need to increase your Spellcraft DC by +2. The Tarrasque has 48hd so you need to increase your Spellcraft DC by 66. So now our Spellcraft DC is 102

That's it. To create our Epic Spell, you need to beat a Spellcraft DC of 102, and pay 102 x 9,000 = 918,000gp to make the spell, and 918,000gp/50,000 = 184 days.

Now if you read the Transformation Seed, the duration is PERMANENT, meaning it can be dispelled. What you want is Instantaneous, because Instantaneous spells cannot be dispelled.

When you use two Epic Seeds to create a spell, you use the shortest duration. Instantaneous is shorter than Permanent, so all you need to do is grab an Epic Seed that has duration:Instantaneous.

So...
6. Add the Dispel Seed to the spell. It has a Spellcraft DC of 19, so add that to our current total of 36, and we now have a Spellcraft DC of 121.
7. Read the Description. Since we're adding the seed solely to change our duration, we don't need anything from the Seed, so our Spellcraft DC remains at 121.

That's it. To create our Epic Spell, you need to beat a Spellcraft DC of 121 and pay 55 x 9,000 = 1,089,000gp and it will take 218 days to make the spell.

BUT, according to this
http://www.d20srd.org/srd/epic/developingEpicSpells.htm
We can reduce the Spellcraft DC in a myriad of ways.
Since this is only gonna be cast on you, subtract 2 from the DC to 119.
You can reduce the Spellcraft DC by requiring additional spellcasters to cast the spell with you (Additional Participant). So bind Trumpet Archons, Planetars, or Solars to cast the spell with you. Since Trumpet Archons are easiest to bind, lets use them.
Each Trumpet Archon reduces the Spellcraft DC by 13 since they only have 7th level spells..
119/13 = 10 So Use Planar Binding and Greater Planar Binding to bind 10 Trumpet Archons and have them cast the Epic Spell with you.

So our epic spell will now cost 0 x 9,000gp = 0gp. It will take 0 / 50,000gp = 0 days to develop.

That's it. Spend 0 days developing the Epic Spell, and cast it on yourself in 1 MINUTE with the assistance of 10 Trumpet Archons and now you are a Tarrasque with a Regeneration (Ex) ability that turns 100% of the damage to you nonlethal.


Alternatively, you could instead increase casting time.
Since this is only gonna be an out of combat spell, increase the casting time to 10min which reduces the Spellcraft DC by 9 x 2 = 18. We are now at 101 DC.
After increasing the casting time to 10min, we can now increase the casting time by Days. Increase the Casting time by 51 days. We are now at 0 DC.

That's it. Spend 0 days developing the epic spell, cast it on yourself which takes 51 days, and now you are a Tarrasque with a Regeneration (Ex) ability that turns 100% of the damage to you nonlethal.



Now here's where it gets fun. The TRANSFORM SEED LETS YOU KEEP YOUR (EX) ABILITIES. Regeneration is an (Ex) ability. Therefore if you transform again, YOU KEEP THE TARRASQUE'S REGENERATION.

8. Create another Epic Spell but this time turn yourself into an Adamantine Golem.
http://www.d20srd.org/srd/epic/monsters/golem.htm#adamantineGolem

Everything is identical to steps 1-7, but this time give yourself Magic Immunity (Ex). You are now immune to all Spells, SLAs and Su abilities. Also you need to remove the spell's Verbal Component since Tarrasques can't speak. This is easy, all you need to do is increase the Spellcraft DC by 2.

9. Create another Epic Spell but this time turn yourself into an Atropal.
http://www.d20srd.org/srd/epic/monsters/abomination.htm#atropal

End Result:
a. An Atropal is Undead. Undead are immune to nonlethal damage. Tarrasque's Regeneration turns all damage into nonlethal. Therefore, you are now literally immune to all damage.
b. You have Magic Immunty therefore you are immune to all Spells, SLAs, and SU abilities.
c. An Atropal is an Abomination and with it, you are Immune to polymorphing, petrification, and other form-altering attacks; not subject to energy drain, ability drain, ability damage, or death from massive damage; immune to mind-affecting effects; fire resistance 20; cold resistance 20; nondetection; true seeing at will; blindsight 500 ft.; telepathy out to 1,000 ft.
d. An Atropal is Undead and with it, you are Immune to poison, sleep, paralysis, stunning, disease, death effects, necromantic effects, mind-affecting effects, and any effect requiring a Fortitude save unless it also works on objects. Not subject to critical hits, nonlethal damage, ability damage, ability drain, or energy drain. Negative energy heals.

Your DM cannot kill you. He cannot kill you by dropping 1 billion tons of TNT on your head and blowing it all up. He cannot kill you by sending 10 million hecatoncheries in your face. He cannot kill you by sending 10 billion epic wizards.

This is just one out of the many, many, MANY, MAAAAAANY ways to use Epic Spells to destroy the game. So grab it at level 21. And Learn how to use it. You can kill literally everything in existence at level 21 so further epic levels is pointless.

[Jarmen4u]

Notably though, save DCs in the 20s sounds suspect. What's your intelligence? On epic levels I'd assume at least 18 + 5 levels + 5 inherent + 6 item casting stat = 34. You could also Polymorph Any Object into a Black Ethergaunt [Fiend Folio] for base 31 Int and then buff that (apply the +5 inherent and +6 item for 42). 42 is +16: this alone would make the save DC 34. You could further add Ability Focus and such but it's probably not worth investing extra resources into this. Just develop an epic spell to buff your Int further if you want more. This wouldn't make them useful here but at least slightly less useless.

The bigger point I'd give you is not using them against enemies themselves anymore, but rather use them against spells, projectiles and such that don't get saves. If enemy moves in to attack you you're best advised to cast an immediate action spell like Celerity or use a Contingency (speaking is a free action that can be taken out of turn so you can trigger Contingencies at will on enemy turns if you bind them to saying something) to not be there in the first place (planar travel abilities or some such) or a flat-out block effect (I mean a real, tangible wall of some kind like Wall of Force or Stone or whatever, or another such option). Just use something that doesn't allow saves: and remember, you can't be attacked if you aren't there in the first place. Mortal magic makes for many other sources of "not being there" such as Astral Projection (accessible through Lesser Planar Binding for a Nightmare pretty easily without using the XP cost; just use Moment of Prescience to win the opposed Charisma-check no matter what and compel the thing into service, adding Mindrape if necessary) and Project Image (not accessible to you, of course).

My int is 25. 18+2 (arcane gnome), and +5 from levels. I don't have any Int-boosting items, because as I've said, there is no "Magic Mart" where you can just stroll up and buy that +5 tome and +6 Int item.

I don't know how that would work, since when I had a druid character, I could only turn into creatures I had physically seen. Could be possible though, since I have high ranks in Arcana and Planes.

I forgot about that spell though, using it to boost a check would be really useful, especially since the +25 CL cap wouldn't apply. I dunno what the consequences would be for summoning and binding evil creatures to do my bidding might be, though. Not to mention, using an evil spell like Mindrape is just asking to get smited.

[Sleven]

{{Scrubbed}}

[Heliomance]

Psionics definitely act differently, and the black stone doesn't affect them, based on an OOC convo I had with the DM. But like I said previously, psionics come with their own dangers. My next character is almost definitely going to be psionic, though, if I can find a way to make a character proficient in both unarmed combat and psionics to be strong enough to survive in this world.

Tashalatora is the feat you're looking for. It lets Monk levels stack with a psionic class of your choice for the purposes of a bunch of stuff

[Jarmen4u]

{{Scrubbed}}

[Melcar]

Clickbait title aside, I need some help. I've been playing an IotSV wizard, and man, I'm sure in literally any other game it would be great. But currently, I'm struggling to perform at the godlike level I should be.

The biggest issue is, due to where we are in the game, deity-level enemies aren't uncommon. Another issue which is recurring is a strange black rock that drains a user of their magic (sometimes permanently) if you accidentally cast a spell at it. This includes dust/particulates that could be floating in the air after a gust spell, or settles onto an enemy's body.

Last time I was attacked, I had all 7 veils up and persisted, but the enemy just passed all 7 saves with literally no problem (save bonuses of +60 or thereabouts) and just slapped me around. Said creature also had an AC of about 80, touch around 70.

Anyway, I need some help figuring out what I can do to put up a fight. I can't rely on any other characters in the party to contribute meaningfully enough for the answer to just be "buff the BSF or use BFC"(usually hurts us more than enemies).

Any books are open for pulling spells from. I'm mostly looking for things that ignore saves and don't require hitting AC. Or even other buffs I can persist on myself.

As a sidenote, I have about 5 levels available that I can take in other classes. Generally unless we can find a teacher, it's hard to take a new class, so I've leveled 5 times without taking any classes. Currently I am: Wizard 3/Master Specialist 3/Incantatrix 4/IotSFV 7. Thoughts?

If I were at that level.. my level 32 wizards is not, I would look heavily into Team Solar (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?188138-Team-Solars-(Archiving)) for inspiration. If that did not help at all, I would either start getting very creative with Gate... and start calling in some Solars, to gate in solars, to gate in solars... If that did not work either, I would consider creating my own unique spells, if your DM would let you, which could do specific protective things... so you could last longer. If your DM is not down with that, and chain-gating Solars while in Timestop doesn't work, and the Team Solar yielded no insights, you could go down the dark road of Shapechage, turn yourself into a Sarrukh and make your stats 1010 in each... that ought to help! Also give your self every SU-abiliy in the game! But that's real dark magic!

[Segev]

Is item crafting not allowed? You can get around the lack of a magic mart if you have the Craft feats to make what you want/need.

[Eldariel]

My int is 25. 18+2 (arcane gnome), and +5 from levels. I don't have any Int-boosting items, because as I've said, there is no "Magic Mart" where you can just stroll up and buy that +5 tome and +6 Int item.

Eh, you can just get +5 inherent from Wishes and create magic items likewise e.g. with Wish. No need for a magic mart for basic necessities this high up; you can just Wish them into being (or use True Creation or bind something to do it for you or whatever).

[RoboEmperor]

Eh, you can just get +5 inherent from Wishes and create magic items likewise e.g. with Wish. No need for a magic mart for basic necessities this high up; you can just Wish them into being (or use True Creation or bind something to do it for you or whatever).

True Creation cannot make magic items.

[Bronk]

Way back in your OP, you mentioned that it was hard to get into classes you don't already have, because you had to find a trainer. Based on that, I still think raising your Incantatrix level is the way to go, but... If you were able to get into some other classes, have you considered trying to get into Dweomerkeeper?

You should basically already mostly qualify with your skills and feats, all you'd need is to take one level of cleric, then four levels of Dweomerkeeper (while choosing to raise your wizard casting), which would get you one supernatural (no XP, no SR, basically free) spell per day. Long story short, you'd get a free wish once per day (more at higher levels), and you could wish yourself up some magical gear, or improve your gear (along with other wishy stuff).

I'm not sure if your DM would appreciate it (although he is throwing gods at you, so...), but it would be a significant power boost for you to work towards if it were allowed.

[Jarmen4u]

Way back in your OP, you mentioned that it was hard to get into classes you don't already have, because you had to find a trainer. Based on that, I still think raising your Incantatrix level is the way to go, but... If you were able to get into some other classes, have you considered trying to get into Dweomerkeeper?

You should basically already mostly qualify with your skills and feats, all you'd need is to take one level of cleric, then four levels of Dweomerkeeper (while choosing to raise your wizard casting), which would get you one supernatural (no XP, no SR, basically free) spell per day. Long story short, you'd get a free wish once per day (more at higher levels), and you could wish yourself up some magical gear, or improve your gear (along with other wishy stuff).

I'm not sure if your DM would appreciate it (although he is throwing gods at you, so...), but it would be a significant power boost for you to work towards if it were allowed.

Is there a way to gain the "ability to cast divine spells" prereq for that other than taking a level in cleric? I don't like spreading myself too thin with single level dips.

[Sleven]

If you have nothing constructive to contribute, then don't post.

Oh the irony. You do realize I was the one who brought Irresistible Spell up, right?

Anyways... since you have a hard time understanding how countervailing statements can be constructive, I'll happily bow out and take my advice elsewhere. It's not like you'd listen unless I said something you wanted to hear anyways.

So, ciao! :smallsmile:

[Jarmen4u]

Oh the irony. You do realize I was the one who brought Irresistible Spell up, right?

Anyways... since you have a hard time understanding how countervailing statements can be constructive, I'll happily bow out and take my advice elsewhere. It's not like you'd listen unless I said something you wanted to hear anyways.

So, ciao! :smallsmile:

There's nothing ironic about it. Making a suggestion in one post does not give you permission to sh*tpost in another. See yourself out.

[Bronk]

Is there a way to gain the "ability to cast divine spells" prereq for that other than taking a level in cleric? I don't like spreading myself too thin with single level dips.

The 'Southern Magician' feat is a possibility...

[Jarmen4u]

The 'Southern Magician' feat is a possibility...

Hm.. this feat is really interesting, I wonder if it's possible to take without the prereqs (being human). I'd have to swing it by my DM.