Astral Caravan Party

[Ursus Spelaeus]

The Astral Caravan power is generally regarded as really lame, but I like the kinds of adventure possibilities it opens up.
http://www.d20srd.org/srd/psionic/powers/astralCaravan.htm

How might one build a low level party optimized for Astral Caravan trips?

First, you will need a psionic character in the party capable of manifesting Astral Caravan. A psion will probably work best for this, but they don't need to be a Nomad. They could just use a power stone, or a dorje, or something. Non-psionic party members could use tattoos of Astral Traveler.

If you encounter monsters in the Astral Plane, it's probably going to be githyanki or astral dreadnoughts. You're probably going to want to just avoid those fights if you can, but some fights can't be avoided. The party has to be able to fight back.

Bear in mind that the entire party will only have two free hands between them. You have to remain in a hand-to-hand chain to avoid being stranded in the Astral Plane. It might be a good idea to bring manacles for everybody to ensure that hand contact is maintained. Only the guy leading the caravan and one guy in the very back will have a hand free. Unless...

1. You have a thr-kreen in the party. Put that guy in the very back and he has three hands available with which to attack or do whatever.

2. You have a raptoran in the party. They don't have extra hands exactly, but they do have feet that end in bony talons. Raptorans can use footbows as martial weapons; all they need is one free hand to load and draw the bow.

3, Tentacles aren't hands, but you can still use them for attacking, and you should be able to use them for some fine manipulation (if you need to administer a potion or something) right? You could have an elan in the party with Deepspawn or Aberration Wild Shape.

So, I guess we're optimizing for maximum number of hands available in an astral caravan.

We also need to consider the conditions of the Astral Plane itself: zero gravity, timelessness (hunger, thirst, and poison don't function, but natural healing doesn't function either), enhanced magic (spells and spell-like abilities are quickened. If magic and psionics are transparent, I guess psionic powers will be quickened as well.)
The caravan won't need to bother packing rations, but they might want to wear weight suits from Planar Handbook. The caravan leader will need a map from the Planar Carographic Society, and maybe a planar atlas. I'm trying to think of other useful items the party might want to bring.

Your thoughts?


*edit*

Some more ideas:

A totemist might be a welcome addition to the party; they can bind the Girallon Arms soulmeld to their totem chakra for an extra pair of clawed limbs.

Characters can fly through the Astral Plane by psychic propulsion at a rate of 30 feet. This means that heavy armor is not a detriment! I would probably put a +1 suit of mechanus gear somewhere as treasure.

Ether harnesses and gravity tents, also from the Planar Handbook, might also prove useful.

[Palanan]

Love the concept. I'm not fond of psionics, but if the experience matched the promise I'd play in this campaign.

Hand-to-hand contact sounds like a crippling requirement, though. Do the other methods you mention (tattoos, etc.) have the same requirement?

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[Ursus Spelaeus]

Love the concept. I'm not fond of psionics, but if the experience matched the promise I'd play in this campaign.

Hand-to-hand contact sounds like a crippling requirement, though. Do the other methods you mention (tattoos, etc.) have the same requirement?

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Psionic tattoos are just the psionic equivalent of potions, except that they are worn on your skin and can be activated mentally. Dorjes are just psionic wands, and power stones are just psionic scrolls. Manifesting Astral Caravan and Astral Traveler through any of these sources will still require the targets to remain in hand contact for the duration of the trip or become stranded. (That in itself can make for an interesting adventure hook, though.)

[Goaty14]

If one of them is an artificer, buying a number of Spare Hands (MiC) can give each member that has one one more effective hand. IIRC, you can use infusions to make it move, so if you have two adjacent party members link spare hands and the deactivate them, then the hands should remain joined unless something breaks one of them.

Girallon Arms, IIRC, is a 4th level SpC cleric spell that hands (ha ha ha) the subject an extra pair of arms. Casting that in combat also gives an effective +2 arms.

[MaxiDuRaritry]

Psionic manifesters that aren't gishes don't need free hands.

Also, I hate when wording is so humanocentric, just as I do with other unneeded -normative and ablist phrasing. What if my character is an awakened wolf? Or an amputee? Or a naga? Can I not use energy ray while tied up because I can't point my fingertips in the right direction? Can I not use it while incorporeal because I no longer have a body? I thought psionics didn't need somatic components?

Writers are really sloppy about this stuff, and it causes all sorts of stupid, annoying problems.

[Nifft]

Monk-like unarmed strikes don't require hands, so that's another potential bit of utility for someone in the middle. Tashalatora gives Monk attacks to a Psionic character.



From a rules-lawyer standpoint, you must maintain hand-to-hand contact between pairs of participants, but nothing says the hands need to be intact, nor that the hands must be attached to their original owners. Cut off everyone's pinky fingers and sovereign glue them to their party-mates' hands. Boom, unbreakable linkage (until sufficient rot occurs).

For an even more vile solution: create leather gloves from the skin of each others' hands, then somehow regenerate everyones' skin, and wear the gloves at all times.

[MaxiDuRaritry]

Elbow blades, knee blades, boot blades, braid blades, armor spikes, tail scythes/clubs, horned helms, cleats, bite attacks, tail slaps, claw attacks (on feet), gore attacks, eye rays, hoof attacks, overruns, tramples, wing slaps, and so on.

[Ursus Spelaeus]

By RAW, the power says that your fellow travelers are strung out behind you. I don't think the pinky-finger trick would fly (but if it did, you wouldn't have to worry about them decomposing on the Astral Plane due to its timeless quality). The party actually has to form both a psychic and physical chain to avoid being stranded.

How might one optimize the trip itself to ensure a safe and expedient journey?

You want to make those Knowledge (the Planes) checks, of course. Any psion of sufficiently high level to manifest astral caravan should have enough intelligence and enough knowledge ranks to beat the DC if they take 10. An experience nomad-psion with a Planar Cartographer's map, a planar atlas, and a planar touchstone or something should be able to beat a DC of 40. That might reveal the color pool for an obscure demi-plane, or maybe a conduit for faster travel or return.

Astral conduits are risky, but players might use them to get out of the astral plane if they end up stranded. I wonder if the party might use an astral link to shorten the trip? Would everyone in the caravan have to succeed their Will save? Or just the caravan leader?

What precautions might a party take against an astral storm? An astral storm can lengthen a trip, blow the party through random color pools, or cause various mental effects including stun, confusion, fear, or insanity. Astral travelers would be well advised to buff their Will saves.

I want to also point out that hands aren't only useful for attacking. All kinds of debris might be found floating around in the Astral Plane, including valuable treasure. Travelers will need hands to grab these treasures. I'd like to see an adventurer figure out how to put on an enchanted suit of mechanus gear armor without breaking hand contact.

Random encounters are worrying. The Astral Caravan power tells you to make one Knowledge (the Planes) check every 24 hours, and that you arrive at your destination after succeeding six of these checks within 12 days. Manual of the Planes has DM's rolling a 5% chance of random encounters every hour, and some of these encounters look terrifying. 33% of the encounters on table 5-3 look more-or-less benign, but there are some party kills on there.

How do you sneak through the astral plane? I imagine our caravan leader will probably want Concealing Amorpha, and maybe Cloud Mind.

[Nifft]

Psionic manifesters that aren't gishes don't need free hands.

Also, I hate when wording is so humanocentric, just as I do with other unneeded -normative and ablist phrasing. What if my character is an awakened wolf? Or an amputee? Or a naga?

You lose access to a weird niche planar travel method.

But you gain immunity to a scary body-control power, since Control Body only works on critters which are physically humanoid.

So it's not necessarily an oversight, it's just a weird niche thing you can't do in trade for immunity to a different weird niche thing.