Help me Optimized a Dagger-Themed Sorcerer

[Aegis013]

Greetings all,

To be more specific on my request, I'm looking to create a spontaneous caster who defeats his opponents using daggers, looking for something playable from level 7, and high PO (Incantatrix is within reason). Sorcerer is where I'm figuring the start will be, I'm open to suggestions on better base classes, though I don't want to have to prepare spells if it can be avoided.

I'm currently thinking of using Cloud of Knives with metamagic, but with only the singular attack, that won't be sufficient for late game. So, Telekinesis plus sneak attack/craven to launch tons of daggers at an opponent could work, but not until later, and is limited to enemies who are vulnerable to sneak attack, but it'll take until 9th level to be able to use Telekinesis as a 5th level spell.

There's also the need for solid defenses, but ideally they should still be within the theme. So Greater Mirror Image makes it appear as if they're more daggers from Cloud of Knives, so it's solid, while something like Solid Fog really isn't, despite being such a powerful spell.

So what spells, feats, or prestige classes etc would be ideal for this?

All WotC 3.5 material is available, including Dragon Mag as long as it can be sourced to a page number. Specific PF spells or feats can be considered, but assume 3.5 is the underlying game. Homebrew is a no-go.

[Mike Miller]

Do you want to attack with daggers or use spells as daggers? I thought of the daggerspell prcs but you said high optimization and they aren't fantastic. Wraithstrike seems important if you plan on using the former.

[Ramza00]

http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?544290-God-of-Knives

Post number 9 has lots of good spells.

Now there are far more options than this, so many different builds you can make with a full caster, or with some form of gish / shadow pouncer / etc.

[Aegis013]

Do you want to attack with daggers or use spells as daggers? I thought of the daggerspell prcs but you said high optimization and they aren't fantastic. Wraithstrike seems important if you plan on using the former.

Probably spells as daggers. The group this character would be playing in would all be T1 characters, so I'm thinking mail man-esque. Just using daggers instead of orbs. If daggers as melee/thrown would actually turn out stronger overall somehow, then sure.


http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?544290-God-of-Knives

Post number 9 has lots of good spells.

Now there are far more options than this, so many different builds you can make with a full caster, or with some form of gish / shadow pouncer / etc.

Awesome resource. Excellent find, sir. Thank you.
I'd lean towards full caster. But I could be talked into others if they were powerful enough.


This is a great start, though. Especially the idea of persisting a bunch of clouds of knives from that other thread. Thank you for the thoughts, and I'm open to more ideas.

[RoboEmperor]

Grab Spell Thematics to make 100% of your spells look like daggers.

Magic Missile becomes Magic Force Daggers.
Fireball becomes Magic Exploding Fire Dagger
Cone of Cold becomes Cone of Ice Daggers

[Troacctid]

I mean...Daggerspell Mage is a thing.

[Ramza00]

Grab Spell Thematics to make 100% of your spells look like daggers.

Magic Missile becomes Magic Force Daggers.
Fireball becomes Magic Exploding Fire Dagger
Cone of Cold becomes Cone of Ice Daggers

Note you can do this without the Spell Thematics feat. Flavor is mutuable, where one person fireball may be a ball of fire bats that come out of nowhere and disappear, another person may be a wave of fire that then hits in a ball shape, and another person the fireball can look like the Green Goblin throwing a pumpkin only for the pumpkin to expand and become a ball of fire at the center of the spell area.

So while flavor wise all these fireballs may look different without the spell thematic feat what is the difference? Well a spellcraft check (a form of knowledge that is considered a knowledge check but just a skill check with an int modifier booster) will recongize these are the same effects just with different appearances.

Well Spell Thematics (most recent version Player Guide to Faerun) gives you a +4 to the spellcraft check to cost for another player to identify your spell. This applies to all your spells. Furthermore Spell Thematics gives a small selection of your spells a caster level boost of +1 so an 7th level sorcerer can have 7 spells that get this caster level +1 boost.

[TalonOfAnathrax]

Daggerspell mage is cool, but will be weak if you're playing in an environment where Incantatrix is the standard.
You said you're starting at level 7, right?
How about trying a Rogue 3/Sorcerer 2/Unseen Seer 2? Get Hunter's Eye through Advanced Learning and then make a ton of sneak attacks. Use your Sorcerer magic to set-up sneak attacks (Invisibility, Cloud of Knives, Blur, Elemental Darts shaped like daggers of fire...). TWF with daggers if you want, or just use spells like Elemental Darts fluffed as daggers of ice or something.