looking for ideas to make a cook (chief) in 3.5

[Zhepna]

Hi,

I would make a chief. We play 3.5 and start lvl 3. I have no preference for the class. I thought maybe poison mastery could be interesting with the meal making but it's not a necessary. He would look for ingredients while we adventure.

Do you have ideas?

[Efrate]

You can put points in craft cooking or profession chef on pretty much any character, but AFAIK there is no benefit for cooking what you kill. I would recommend a warforged though, or a necropoliton for your race. You gain immunity to poison and disease so none of it affects you, cannot save your party members from the effects however.

[Heavenblade]

There is the trophy hunter feat for ranger, one of it's parts requires you to eat the enemy's heart.

An artificer, or another potion user, could refluff potions as all kinds of pastries and stuff

[NontheistCleric]

Well, you could be a spellcaster who makes calzone golems.

They're found in the free adventure Something's Cooking, though I believe the link currently on the Wizards of the Coast website is broken. To make one, you need to be at least 9th level and able to cast arcane spells. Completing the creation ritual drains 250 XP from the creator and requires the spells burning hands, grease, major creation, and stinking cloud.

[Malphegor]

Ohohoho! you seek to be a culinary master?

First, I would recommend whatever you do, pick up Precocious Apprentice or get arcane levels so you have a 2nd level slot to cast Darsson’s Firery Furnace, the spell was specifically designed to allow someone to cook as if with an oven in a hurry.

Next, I would recommend the Complete Arcane (I think) rules on alternative crafting for potions, essentially rather than make a potion, you make edible foods with magical effects instead. Same thing mechanically, just different delivery mechanism.

Next look at stuff to increase the spells you can put in a potion. Master Alchemist prc from Magic of Faerun does this, and I think there’s a Cauldron somewhere that also does this. gremmas?

Now that you can make magical dishes, we need to sprinkle some stuff to make them better.

Beyond this, it’s a matter of your base class. A supply of spells would be good, I’d say Archivist would do for that since you can learn spells as if you were a wizard from divine sources. Any divine sources. You keep your spells in your personal recipe book of course.

You don’t need that many levels in archivist for the concept really, especially since I’d imagine a professional adventuring chef to be a fairly robust sort who’s ready to carve up a fallen monster and cook it in special oils and gravy. there’s a lot of low level spells that’s viable since the vast majority of divine classes only go up to 4th level spells barring clerics and favoured souls I reckon.

Oh, and cost reduction methods for magic items is key. Maybe consider Alchemist Savant from Eberron too to make your ‘potions’ splash weapons- custard pies perhaps?

Hm. Depends on the kind of chef you want ro be. A Gordon Ramsey type might want to be a barbarian, a Chef Louis from little mermaid type might want to be a throwing weapon specialist, a Chef Gusteau type might need to be a ghost which has LA and feats therof... there’s room here for options based on the kind of chef you are.

Oh and survival is the skill used to harvest stuff I think so pump that up I guess for getting raw materials.

[MaxiDuRaritry]

Wait, do you want a chef or do you want a chief?

I recall there was a build somewhere around here that made magical cookies using Shalantha's delicate disk.

You could always take brew potion and use it to bake pastries with the same effect, only you eat them instead of drink them. Maybe be one of those hoity toity wine and microbrew snobs? Anyway, use craft feats and Craft (Alchemy) to make one-shot foodstuffs out of the various magical and alchemical items. Just change their descriptions while keeping the mechanics the same. Get a gnome calculus to fling alchemist's fire (flaming baked alaska pies-to-the-face) and tanglefoot bags (super gooey toffee), and maybe get some sneak attack to deal additional damage to make them useful at higher levels. Find other ways to make your concoctions more potent and use them creatively.

Perhaps a changeling rogue/factotum/unarmed swordsage/chameleon build? Use swordsage to supplement what you do with the rest of the build, such as teleports and additional sneak attack.

[Falontani]

From Eberron you have the
Dragonmark of Hospitality from the Halflings of House Ghallanda. They run the major inns, taverns, bakeries, etc.
The Dragonmark itself has things like purify food/drink and prestidigitation.

They have an assassin esque prestige class that focuses on ingested poisons.


Then from Masters of the Wild you have the weird infusions, a druid type magical crafting that turns plants into magical items that are used when eaten. Turn a major magical infusion of Greater Heroism into a ground up plant like basil or thyme, sprinkle it into the dish.

[Batcathat]

You can put points in craft cooking or profession chef on pretty much any character, but AFAIK there is no benefit for cooking what you kill. I would recommend a warforged though, or a necropoliton for your race. You gain immunity to poison and disease so none of it affects you, cannot save your party members from the effects however.

A warforged chef reminds me of the Futurama episode where Bender wanted to become a chef, regardless of the fact that as a robot he had no sense of taste. Do warforged have a sense of taste? If not, a warforged chef who can't taste his own food could make a funny character for a lighter campaign or a somewhat tragic character for a more dramatic campaign.

[MaxiDuRaritry]

A warforged chef reminds me of the Futurama episode where Bender wanted to become a chef, regardless of the fact that as a robot he had no sense of taste. Do warforged have a sense of taste? If not, a warforged chef who can't taste his own food could make a funny character for a lighter campaign or a somewhat tragic character for a more dramatic campaign.Especially if said warforged used to be a living human/elf/dwarf/halfling/whatever, and he died, but his soul was tied to a suit of armor. Now he's barred from experiencing what used to be his passion in life. Name him Alphonse.

[Noxangelo]

lesser Dragonmark of Hospitality from the Halflings of House Ghallanda, and take a bag of bounty from the eberron campaign setting.

there is also the ever burning stove and the survival pouches ability to make campfires.

[Falontani]

A warforged chef reminds me of the Futurama episode where Bender wanted to become a chef, regardless of the fact that as a robot he had no sense of taste. Do warforged have a sense of taste? If not, a warforged chef who can't taste his own food could make a funny character for a lighter campaign or a somewhat tragic character for a more dramatic campaign.

According to RAW, no answer. According to Keith Baker (creator of Eberron) they do have a sense of smell and taste, but both are highly muted. The senses are more for avoiding danger than self enjoyment. Considering a warforged is immune to poison, and thus rotten food, I'd expect it to be more muted than even smell. But still there.

[ShurikVch]

How about the Adamantine Chef (https://web.archive.org/web/20070711083929/http://wizo.wizards.com/ka/KnowledgeArcana09.pdf)?