Primary magic equipment for a level 10 party?

[Xhosant]

I'm trying to make a 'sample' level 10 party: fighter, rogue, wizard and cleric, with generic equipment and feats.

What's the magic item loadout you would expect this 'generic' party to have?

[Biggus]

Core only or all books allowed? What roles do you want the Wizard and Cleric to play? How optimized?

[Xhosant]

I was hoping for something more specific and across-the-board, like '+1 cloak of resistance, +2 weapon and armor,+2 attribute item of their choice' kinda deal.

[Trandir]

I was hoping for something more specific and across-the-board, like '+1 cloak of resistance, +2 weapon and armor,+2 attribute item of their choice' kinda deal.

Ok. Then I have some questions:

You want optimized equipment?

The budget is the WBL of a lv 10 PC for everyone?

There are book limits?

In what are those 4 specialized on?

[Biggus]

I was hoping for something more specific and across-the-board, like '+1 cloak of resistance, +2 weapon and armor,+2 attribute item of their choice' kinda deal.

Ok, so you don't want them to play any particular roles, what about the other two questions?

Optimization level matters, because for example a low-op party might have +2 weapons and armor, but a mid/high-op party would have +1 weapons with Magic Vestment/ Greater Magic Weapon cast on them (just buy the Wizard and Cleric a Lesser Metamagic Extend Rod for 3,000GP each).

[Xhosant]

No book limits, but no need for extreme obscure stuff either.

Working by WBL.

A standard healer/support cleric and blaster/control wizard is what I have in mind.

The main idea in all this is to get a benchmark party to test monsters against for the purposes of CR. So, we're aiming for the most vanilla standard adventurers available, the kind of pregen party found in an one-shot module for lvl10.

[Gauntlet]

WBL for a 10th level character is 49k, so..

Wizard / Arcane Caster:
Item of Casting Stat +4 16000
Ring of Spell-Battle 12000
Cloak of Resistance +3 9000
Lesser Metamagic Rod of Extend 3000
Heward's Fortifying Bedroll 3000
Heward's Handy Haversack 2000
Ring of Protection +1 2000
Wand of Benign Transposition 750
Wand of Silent Image 750
500gp for mundane items / spellbook

Cleric:
Item of Casting Stat +4 16000
+1 Displacement Full Plate 5650
+1 Energy Immunity Heavy Shield 9170
Mantle of Second Chances 6000
Lesser Metamagic Rod of Extend 3000
Tooth of Savnok 2000
Ring of Protection +1 2000
Anklet of Translocation 1400
Vest of Resistance +1 1000
Reliquary Holy Symbol 1000
Wand of Lesser Vigor 750
Restful Crystal 500
530gp for mundane items / weaponry

Rogue:
Collar of Umbral Metamorphosis 22000
Bracers of the Hunter 8500
Gloves of Dexterity +2 4000
Boots of Elvenkind 2500
+1 Mithral Chain Shirt 2200
+1 weapon ~2300
Goggles of Minute Seeing 1250
Cloak of Resistance +1 1000
Wand of Invisibility 4500
Wand of Grave Strike 750
Wand of Golemstrike 750
~250gp for mundane items / additional weapons

Fighter:
Belt of Battle 12000
Cloak of Resistance +3 9000
+1 Keen or Magebane weapon ~8300
+1 Displacement Full Plate 5650
Gauntlets of Ogre Power +2 4000
Amulet of Health +2 4000
Tooth of Savnok 2000
Anklet of Translocation 1400
Lesser Crystal of Return 1000
Restful Crystal 500
~1150gp for mundane items / additional weapons

[Calthropstu]

WBL for a 10th level character is 49k, so..

Wizard / Arcane Caster:
Item of Casting Stat +4 16000
Ring of Spell-Battle 12000
Cloak of Resistance +3 9000
Lesser Metamagic Rod of Extend 3000
Heward's Fortifying Bedroll 3000
Heward's Handy Haversack 2000
Ring of Protection +1 2000
Wand of Benign Transposition 750
Wand of Silent Image 750
500gp for mundane items / spellbook


Given the cost of getting and copying spells, that 500gp is absurdly low. Most wizards I have seen spend about 1/3 of their wbl on their spellbooks.

[Trandir]

The main idea in all this is to get a benchmark party to test monsters against for the purposes of CR. So, we're aiming for the most vanilla standard adventurers available, the kind of pregen party found in an one-shot module for lvl10.


Given the cost of getting and copying spells, that 500gp is absurdly low. Most wizards I have seen spend about 1/3 of their wbl on their spellbooks.

For testing monsters and one-shot 2 new spells per level plus one or two copyed are enough.

To play a campaign however you need a spell for every occasion

[Calthropstu]

For testing monsters and one-shot 2 new spells per level plus one or two copyed are enough.

To play a campaign however you need a spell for every occasion

if the goal is "typical one shot ala standardized organized play where you do nothing but fight," sure. If it's a "stndard exlectation of what you can expect in a campaign" not so much.

[Trandir]

if the goal is "typical one shot ala standardized organized play where you do nothing but fight," sure. If it's a "stndard exlectation of what you can expect in a campaign" not so much.

You can fill your spell slot of 3rd level and higher with only combat spells and leave the 2nd 1st and 0s for OoC utility. Also a one shot should have as few spells as possible to not disorient who is not familiar with the class right?

[Biggus]

<snip>

This looks a pretty good list, the only issues I have with it are that as Calthropstu said, it'd be a pretty unusual Wizard who hadn't spent any money to scribe additional spells beyond the two free ones per level into their spellbook, and that there's only supposed to be one Tooth of Savnok in existence, so the Fighter and Cleric shouldn't both be able to have one.

[razorback]

While more generic, this (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?187851-3-5-Lists-of-Necessary-Magic-Items) list shows things you should progress through to stay competitive.

[Xhosant]

WBL for a 10th level character is 49k, so..

Wizard / Arcane Caster:
Item of Casting Stat +4 16000
Ring of Spell-Battle 12000
Cloak of Resistance +3 9000
Lesser Metamagic Rod of Extend 3000
Heward's Fortifying Bedroll 3000
Heward's Handy Haversack 2000
Ring of Protection +1 2000
Wand of Benign Transposition 750
Wand of Silent Image 750
500gp for mundane items / spellbook

Cleric:
Item of Casting Stat +4 16000
+1 Displacement Full Plate 5650
+1 Energy Immunity Heavy Shield 9170
Mantle of Second Chances 6000
Lesser Metamagic Rod of Extend 3000
Tooth of Savnok 2000
Ring of Protection +1 2000
Anklet of Translocation 1400
Vest of Resistance +1 1000
Reliquary Holy Symbol 1000
Wand of Lesser Vigor 750
Restful Crystal 500
530gp for mundane items / weaponry

Rogue:
Collar of Umbral Metamorphosis 22000
Bracers of the Hunter 8500
Gloves of Dexterity +2 4000
Boots of Elvenkind 2500
+1 Mithral Chain Shirt 2200
+1 weapon ~2300
Goggles of Minute Seeing 1250
Cloak of Resistance +1 1000
Wand of Invisibility 4500
Wand of Grave Strike 750
Wand of Golemstrike 750
~250gp for mundane items / additional weapons

Fighter:
Belt of Battle 12000
Cloak of Resistance +3 9000
+1 Keen or Magebane weapon ~8300
+1 Displacement Full Plate 5650
Gauntlets of Ogre Power +2 4000
Amulet of Health +2 4000
Tooth of Savnok 2000
Anklet of Translocation 1400
Lesser Crystal of Return 1000
Restful Crystal 500
~1150gp for mundane items / additional weapons

Bingo, sir, this is exactly the kind of input I was hoping for! And now, my work begins!


While more generic, this (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?187851-3-5-Lists-of-Necessary-Magic-Items) list shows things you should progress through to stay competitive.

While a great list, I never could use it in this capacity. It tells me what special features I might want, and how to get them on a variant budget, but it doesn't serve as any kind of roadmap, nor does it even touch upon numerical bonuses (ac, saves, armor or weapons) or any kind of armaments (how is a smoking armor gauntlet not necessary? :P), and who knows what else (by which I mean, I don't know what else. That's why I went looking for the list in the first place :P)

[Biggus]

One other thing about Gauntlet's list:

There's a 4th-level spell in the Spell Compendium called Greater Resistance, which gives a +3 resistance bonus to all saves, lasts 24hrs and is on both the Wizard and Cleric spell lists. A lot of casters prefer to use a spell slot rather than spend nearly 20% of their wealth on it.

[smasher0404]

The book Enemies and Allies have the "Iconic Characters" appendix with an example NPC for every PHB class at 5 level intervals. You could probably rip their gear list for a set of gear that WoTC expects PCs to have.

[Xhosant]

The book Enemies and Allies have the "Iconic Characters" appendix with an example NPC for every PHB class at 5 level intervals. You could probably rip their gear list for a set of gear that WoTC expects PCs to have.

Oh do you one better, I'll use them wholesale instead of relying on a generator to make a random build per class! Where was that when I started?