PDA

View Full Version : Dragon shaman Varient and spell selection!?!



Lark Ohiya
2007-10-01, 02:37 AM
Hello, some of you may know bunny Rein, or some variant of the name here on the forumes. Well I happen to be a friend and both of us have come up with a slight tweek on the Dragon shaman. I loved the idea, but the dragon shaman in its natural form was a bit... lacking. after using its breath attack and later "laying hands" to heal he doesn't do much other then attack with simple weapons and be beefy.

Well we decided to throw a twist on it. D8 hp instead of D10 and only light armour instead of medium. these reductions also gave access to sorcerer spell casting! only its at a slower progression then strait sorc (thankfully!)

so far its 2 lvls of spell progress and 1 of no progress (unless I remembered wrong and its only half progression again)

All thats well and good, but why am i posting this in the General D20 forumes instead of homebrew? well because I had a question that doesnt really have to do with the varient...


the question: What are some spells that are good to use with a melee class. Or more specificly spells that would work best without depending on caster lvl or resistances.

I have only a limited spell list and for the most part only lvl 1 to 3 spells for most of the game so try and limit it to that.

So far my spell list is:
1st lvl
shield (protection=good)
-burning hands (flavorful and good area damage)
-benign transposition (to move people around in battle and get the clumsy people to hard to reach places)
-ghostly tail (flavorful)
-Enlarge Person (for himself or that lovely fighter you kept in the group)
2nd lvl
-Electric Vengance (electric damage to target after taking melee damage, because he should be getting hit at least a little)
-Tail slap (flavorful again and also decent damage with push back effect)
-touch of idiocy (lowers targets mental stats 1d6)
Animalistic power (raises str dex con by 2 each enhancment bonus)

3rd lvl
-Evard's Menacing Tentacles (grow 2 tentacles that get their own free action attacks at 10 foot reach for a few rounds)
-Warcry (cone blast "cower" on targets)


This might seem like a significant power boost to the dragon shaman, but I only have access to (or will only allow myself to use) my natural claw attacks for weapons as well as progress solely in this new dragon shaman variant. Remember! Let me know some spells that come to mind for this kind of caster. I will make you a happy panda.

Nebo_
2007-10-01, 04:28 AM
Wraith Strike.

serow
2007-10-01, 07:07 AM
Wraith Strike.What he said.

Tempest Fennac
2007-10-01, 07:10 AM
Would those spells really be that useful later on in the game? I would have thought that adding a few extra class features would make the DS more useful if you feel that it's underpowered.

Lark Ohiya
2007-10-01, 10:01 AM
thus is the reason I wanted scalelable or spells that don't depend on caster lvl. enlarge person makes the person large and these bonuses are pretty solid throughout gameplay (where size matters)
As far as class features in place of spells. this wouldn't give much variaty now would it. we wanted to give the DS more flexibility, while more class features is nice it would lead to even more specialization I'd imagine.

One idea I did have was to give him bardic inspiration effects as well. Rein concluded that those are just not strong enough. Regardless I made my DS (or Dragon herald as I flavored it) good at story telling and comedy (to go with his copper dragon totem)

Lark Ohiya
2007-10-01, 10:24 AM
OH. kinda changing the topic on my own threads, but also what exactly does caster level mean? would this DS variant only get caster lvls in the levels it gains more spells or in every level. The books kinda assume your going to play core types and doesn't specify and goes on to even throw doubt in there with "for the most part your caster lvl is your character lvl in a caster class." WAY to be vague wizards...not the first time.

AND one more thing. I got one magic item I wear on my glove slot witch lets me do +1d6 3 times a day with claw attacks. the description says I wear these over my claws so I was wondering if i could enhance these "gloves" with things like +1 effects

OR Is there any other way to boost natural weapons permanently (besides permanency magic fang)

sorry for all the questions at once.