Oddest optimizations?

[Particle_Man]

What are some of the oddest optimizations you have created or come across? I don’t mean optimizing for power but, say, for movement rate or darkvision range or climbing speed or dwarfiness or something that usually won’t be powerful in itself, but is just something someone decided to optimize for its own sake?

[Jervis]

What are some of the oddest optimizations you have created or come across? I don’t mean optimizing for power but, say, for movement rate or darkvision range or climbing speed or dwarfiness or something that usually won’t be powerful in itself, but is just something someone decided to optimize for its own sake?

I once saw a dude make a 0 max HP wizard with a bunch of feats that let him act at 0. That was weird. Also saw a guy that dumped con on a pair of Barbarian Davati so he could use that one weird Rage ACF to constantly be mad. And someone that made an optimized sky mage that aimed for maximum charisma to get the biggest mount. They then became a ghost and took a bunch of ghost feats to possess said mount and effectively play as it

[Biggus]

I did a move speed-optimized Monk/Cleric/Fist of the Forest, his shtick was that he could move 140ft/rd and Spring Attack/Bounding Assault, so he could do two attacks but start and end his movement 70ft away from the person he attacked, ie out of charging range for a character with move speed 30ft. This was largely because the PCs had a Barbarian with pounce and high damage who just killed most things in 1-2 rounds. Not that the Monk's speed did him much good, the archer rolled well and killed him in round 2 anyway :smalltongue:

[Jervis]

I did a move speed-optimized Monk/Cleric/Fist of the Forest, his shtick was that he could move 140ft/rd and Spring Attack/Bounding Assault, so he could do two attacks but start and end his movement 70ft away from the person he attacked, ie out of charging range for a character with move speed 30ft. This was largely because the PCs had a Barbarian with pounce and high damage who just killed most things in 1-2 rounds. Not that the Monk's speed did him much good, the archer rolled well and killed him in round 2 anyway :smalltongue:

Did you have that one lance item that doubles speed if you hold it?

[Maat Mons]

I remember two instances where I encountered people trying to optimize range on darkvision. They were both disappointed to find out that the spell Superior Darkvision gives infinite range for 1 hour/level. Disheartening to craft a whole build around something, only to find out a 4th-level spell does it better.

[Kurald Galain]

I also did a character optimized for speed, mine was barbarian/hunter. When actually playing him I dropped most of that optimization for something more practical though, I've found that 60' speed is more than enough in most circumstances while still showing your character as "the fast guy".

I've got a sorcerer optimized on using cha for everything (including AC, initiative, and knowledge checks; he has 34 cha now); and likewise an inquisitor optimized on using wis for everything (but he's starting with 17 wis so it won't really be noticeable until level 12 or so).

[Jervis]

Disheartening to craft a whole build around something, only to find out a 4th-level spell does it better.

Many such cases. Every Gish is in a similar situation.


I also did a character optimized for speed, mine was barbarian/hunter. When actually playing him I dropped most of that optimization for something more practical though, I've found that 60' speed is more than enough in most circumstances while still showing your character as "the fast guy".

I've got a sorcerer optimized on using cha for everything (including AC, initiative, and knowledge checks; he has 34 cha now); and likewise an inquisitor optimized on using wis for everything (but he's starting with 17 wis so it won't really be noticeable until level 12 or so).

I made a Sha’ir like that once. I also made a Shaman that added triple their Charisma to saves and had Mettle + Evasion on both them and their mount. I also somehow managed to be a competent mounted Uber charger on top of that.

[Gruftzwerg]

1) My DWK gailvelock build was born out of the silly idea to have a tiny (almost diminutive) gish with a STR score of 1.^^
I mean, what is odder than a melee combatant that can't even lift most weapons and gets constantly overseen because he is so small? He can literary "facetank" enemies (fight flying in your enemies space with enough defenses to stay alive).

2) While it was not the primary aim, my clawlock build features a fly speed of 150 ft.
Together with pounce (charge) it doubles to 300ft. If also flying downwards (which you always do with a flying dive/pounce for at least some of the distance) it gets doubled again up to theoretical 600ft. The build also features the Stagger ability that lets you freely change directions (as often as you want) while charging. Skip the Trash Mobs and kill the BBEG within the first round and let the henchmen beg for mercy^^


3) Recently I made a Master of Flies build (https://forums.giantitp.com/showthread.php?639300-Master-of-Dragonfire-Flies). It's not sole optimized for power but also for additional (cartoonish) swarm fluff.
The "Eat or Die" ability allows the kobold to be always in the mood to eat more. The minimum amount of food needed is measured by the creature's size (can go up to colossal in this build) and there is no limit for how much you can eat.
The other fluff ability is "Frost Fingers". Any object with a hardness of 2 or less needs to make a save roll on first contact or take damage.
The last element is the Morphic Weapon ability to form natural weapons out of the swarm for additional style.
Be a real swarm pest. Eat and destroy anything in your path, just like a cartoon swarm does.

[Maat Mons]

The fastest character I've ever contemplated was a single-classed Barbarian. The specific build would have gotten a +60-foot enhancement bonus to speed while charging from the Fangshields substitution levels, and the ability to move 4 times her speed when charging from the Streetfighter ACF in the Cityscape web enhancement. Perhaps also combined with a Ring of Solar Wings, for a base fly speed of 150 feet. Pouncing from 840 feet away! Eat your heart out cheetah!

[loky1109]

I once tried to make lowest AC.

[ciopo]

I once made a sorcerer 4/mystic 4/cleric1/wizard1/mystic the urge 10 concept that had casting equivalent of level 8/8/7/7 (plus four practiced spellcaster) as a "I wonder how many low level slots I can have to spam"

[daremetoidareyo]

Umm.

In the crimson scourge round, I made a nonlethal catapultist

In blade dancer I built someone optimized for…fertility? And pazuzu worship breaking the 4th wall

In watch detective, I specialized in getting to use combat expertise at any intelligence score.

In peregrine runner I had a spell that digs a well optimized

And then there’s f’lautu lance, who casts spells from their backside

And my crowning achievement: I will built a shining blade

[H_H_F_F]

It's not exactly what you're talking about, but optimizing gender fluidity (https://forums.giantitp.com/showsinglepost.php?p=25019203&postcount=28) is probably the weirdest thing I've ever pulled.


Also saw a guy that dumped con on a pair of Barbarian Davati so he could use that one weird Rage ACF to constantly be mad.

Just did something along those lines for the last round of Iron Chef E6 addition. Missed an issue with sleep, unfortunately.

[Spore]

Your results are great, I have only seen (Pathfinder) guys optimizing for tripping at the detriment of everything else. And I have optimized for carry weight/strength once, which still did not allow me to pick up a freight train (supplex a train).

Strength is really a **** stat in 3.5

[loky1109]

Just did something along those lines for the last round of Iron Chef E6 addition. Missed an issue with sleep, unfortunately.

Dvati can sleep in turns.

[H_H_F_F]

Dvati can sleep in turns.

Dvati wouldn't have been a possibility with the rules for the E6 comp.

[Kurald Galain]

I once made a sorcerer 4/mystic 4/cleric1/wizard1/mystic the urge 10 concept that had casting equivalent of level 8/8/7/7
That's fun; I did something similar (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showpost.php?p=3945177) once for a build challenge, abusing gestalt rules to end up with something like 9/9/9/4/5/X.


I have only seen (Pathfinder) guys optimizing for tripping at the detriment of everything else.
I'm sure we can show you PF trip optimizing without it being the detriment of everything else, if you want to start a thread on that.

[Rleonardh]

First arcane character I made.
Was core only at time, we didn't have any other books.


Fighter 2/Sorcerer 6/Eldritch Knight 4
Bab of 9
Cl of 9 so level 4 spells

Was longbow and control spells, our ranged character.

Fighter 4/ ranger 4/ rogue 4
guy was jealous of the rouge lol,
As Fighter went falchion, ranger went 2 weapon

Barbarian 12
Cleric 12
Rogue 2/ ranger 4/ rogue 6
Wizard 12
My dude

[Analytica]

I like optimizing for number of languages known.

[SimonMoon6]

In 3.0, I played a wizard who was fairly optimized for AC.

Most of the tricks don't work in 3.5 or Pathfinder, but it was cool while it lasted.

I mean, there are the obvious things like Mage Armor (or maybe bracers) and Shield (when it was +7 to AC). And using Persistent Spell to make Shield last all day. And various tricks to make it harder to dispel the spells this wizard had cast.

And a level of monk to get WIS to AC. And with all the stat boost spells to help boost DEX and WIS.

I think the 3.0 version of Incantatrix helped a lot with some of these shenanigans.

And of course, the most important part was 3.0's original version of "polymorph self" to turn into monsters with crazy AC. But then it got errata-ed even in 3.0 and so my biggest plan (turn into an outsider) wasn't going to work unless I was an outsider. But then I got a wish and was able to change my race to an outsider race and I was back in business.

And so I would become a marilith all day long. Great stats plus natural armor to add onto everything else. Plus, most importantly, 6 arms.

Why are 6 arms important for AC? Well, you have to be able to hold certain items to get AC bonuses. Holding a staff of power gives a +2 luck bonus to AC, for example. Even a staff of power with only one charge left. Plus, we found the artifact known as the Shadowstaff that grants another bonus to AC that stacked with everything else. My other hands were busy holding one of those big old spears we got from killing a salamander.

There may have been a few other tricks I don't recall. It's been like 20 years or something. I know I could easily get an AC up in the 50's. Even some epic monsters would have difficulty hitting me, so I would sometimes "tank" for the group's archer.

[Metastachydium]

I once came up with a build for a low-level character with ALL the movement modes (amphibious badger hengeyokai ape totem barbarian 1/savant 2 with Starspawn as the Talent Lore bonus feat, at a nifty ECL 3). Never got around to trying it, though.


In 3.0, I played a wizard who was fairly optimized for AC.


Heh. A current character of mine has the basic concept of "EVERY stat to AC (except STR; I'm not sure that one's even possible)". Base AC's 60 (or 71 when fighting defensively (or 73 when in total defense (or 81 against AoOs provoked by moving (or 83 for the same, but that's a 3/day deal)))). She has to be small an unencumbered (a great setup when one dropped STR) and must have a light piercing weapon glued to her hand all the time, but it's all worth it as far as I'm concerned.

[Bohandas]

They then became a ghost and took a bunch of ghost feats to possess said mount and effectively play as it

When you say "Ghost Feats" do you mean from Ghostwalk or from Libris Mortis?

[noce]

I did a dwarf with -7 in listen and spot, does it count?

[Jervis]

When you say "Ghost Feats" do you mean from Ghostwalk or from Libris Mortis?

Yeah it was the feats from that line. He ended up with close to 40 charisma without magic items so his mount was a 30 HD purple dragon that he commanded to fail the saves against possession.


I did a dwarf with -7 in listen and spot, does it count?

I also had a dwarf with -20 to diplomacy checks (assuming I rushed). I dumped charisma and took all the items, flaws, and traits I could that hurt those checks. I also took Silvertongue, the feat that lets me influence someone’s opinion towards another creature with a diplomacy check. So If I rolled well(poorly) I could make a enemy hostile towards another enemy

[Blackhawk748]

I didn't do this one but I saw someone try and optimize the suglin (or however that weird polearm from Frostburn is spelt) just to try and make it worth using.

Very amusing.

[Morphic tide]

My contribution is a Changeling or Human Cleric of Tenebrous choosing Trickery and Death, then taking Chameleon 2 to have one less dead feat entering Anima Mage without hard Binder levels to qualify for Tenebrous Apostate (and a level saved over a "standard" Arcane caster), to then use the two's casting advancement to qualify for True Necromancer, with the floating feat used on Heretic of the Faith to float your Domains, "favored weapon", and allow you to be Neutral Good, Lawful Neutral, or Chaotic Neutral despite having an effective patron deity to be treated as Neutral Evil.

How in the Nine Hells you'd justify being a Neutral Good worshipper of Tenebrous I don't know, but Lawful Neutral would be a pretty direct matter of emphasizing the whole Primus fiasco, and Chaotic Neutral comes with the incredibly strange property of Tenebrous-as-deity having the Chaos domain without actually being Chaotic. Biggest reason for the Heretic of the Faith bit is to access Deathbound as needed, because it's one of obscenely few sources giving the ability to revive undead. So your painstakingly-acquired horrorshow of choice can be put back on the road again and again.

[Jay R]

I was designing an epic character, at 26th level. [Well, at 325,000 xps. Normally that would be 26th level.] Realizing that total level was less important after you have ninth level spells, I tried to optimize his ability scores instead. This improves his probability of overcoming SR the DC of his spells' saving throws.

So I made a pixie at +4 LA, for the +8 Dexterity, +6 Intelligence, +4 Wisdom, and +6 Charisma (and -4 STR). He was a Sorcerer 1 / Wizard 5 / Ultimate Magus 14 / Incantatrix 4. He had Practiced Spellcaster as a Sorcerer, so the Ultimate Magus level skipped sorcerer instead of wizard the first two times.

I bought off his level adjustment, and used an item familiar to increase xps by 10%, and he wound up at 24th level

Ultimate Magus allowed him use Sorcerer slots to add metamagic to wizard spells (and vice versa) He was a transmutation Focus Caster, which means that once a day, a transmutation spell that added to abilities would give double the benefit.

So every morning he would use a sixth level slot to cast Chasing Perfection, and a sixth level Sorcerer slot to add Persistent Spell to it, for +8 to every ability score.

With a few other adjustments, his active ability scores were STR 18, DEX 32, CON 24, INT 43, WIS 26, and CHA 34.

---

He also was a Domain Wizard with a homebrewed Creation domain. With +16 from his INT, and +1from each of an Ioun stone and a luckstone, a 1-rank Craft skill was at +19. That meant that he could always make a DC20 craft check, and if he cast magecraft, he could always make a DC 25 check. Accordingly, he had 25 different Craft skills, almost all with only 1 rank.

[Bohandas]

Yeah it was the feats from that line.

Which one? Ghostwalk or Libris Mortis?

[Akal Saris]

Some goofy builds that I made:
- Optimizing character weight on a 1st level wizard (obese flaw, willing deformity: obese, etc.) so he can then cast benign transposition to switch with his flying familiar, and drop onto enemies. If the DM is kind enough to count him as an object, he weighed more than enough to deal 20d6 to an opponent.
- Optimizing the 'Poison Healer' feat on a 1st level dwarf so that he could stuff venomous snakes in his pants, and heal from the poison damage when they bit him.

Some fun ones I've come across from my delightful PCs:
- An optimized baker, and the PC took levels in a potion crafting PrC, with the potions refluffed to muffins
- A player that took all of the feats to enhance Darkness on a warlock, and spent every combat cackling maniacally as she summoned darkness and bats everywhere.

I recently saw somebody post a great build that optimized resting times, so he got 8 hours down to about 10 minutes, IIRC.

[Khedrac]

My contribution is a Changeling or Human Cleric of Tenebrous choosing Trickery and Death, then taking Chameleon 2 to have one less dead feat entering Anima Mage without hard Binder levels to qualify for Tenebrous Apostate (and a level saved over a "standard" Arcane caster), to then use the two's casting advancement to qualify for True Necromancer, with the floating feat used on Heretic of the Faith to float your Domains, "favored weapon", and allow you to be Neutral Good, Lawful Neutral, or Chaotic Neutral despite having an effective patron deity to be treated as Neutral Evil.

How in the Nine Hells you'd justify being a Neutral Good worshipper of Tenebrous I don't know, but Lawful Neutral would be a pretty direct matter of emphasizing the whole Primus fiasco, and Chaotic Neutral comes with the incredibly strange property of Tenebrous-as-deity having the Chaos domain without actually being Chaotic. Biggest reason for the Heretic of the Faith bit is to access Deathbound as needed, because it's one of obscenely few sources giving the ability to revive undead. So your painstakingly-acquired horrorshow of choice can be put back on the road again and again.

Sounds fun, but I don't think this one works. Pretty much every feature of Chameleon states that it cannot be used to qualify for another feat's or a prestige class's requirements - indeed chameleon casting can't be used to qualify for prestige class (though it can be boosted by one).

[JyP]

20 years ago, I tried to do a core character with the most core prestige class as soon as possible, then to write its background - it was fun :

ranger 2 / psion 2 / slayer 2 / soulknife 1 / horizon walker 1 / duelist 1

(so it was a hunter in an amazonian jungle, taken into slavery into a psionic theocracy, becoming a guard for a priest into an expedition in a very dangerous rift - he was the only one to survive the journey to the other side, where he found a Venice like city)

[Morphic tide]

Sounds fun, but I don't think this one works. Pretty much every feature of Chameleon states that it cannot be used to qualify for another feat's or a prestige class's requirements - indeed chameleon casting can't be used to qualify for prestige class (though it can be boosted by one).
Re-checking PDF shows the issue: The features do not say any such thing, it's in a header normally used exclusively for descriptive text of the class's "point", not actual mechanics. Though as Tenebrous Apostate only asks for Turn/Rebuke Undead rather than actually needing Divine casting, so Cleric 2/Wizard 3 starts the entry appropriately with no further shenanigans. Think I actually ran into that before, but then the original bout of working on it also involved crowbarring Knight of the Sacred Seal in there...

Though the floating feat actually does work for access, relying on loss of qualification downsides. Which means being locked into the feat for 3 levels of Anima Mage to get "real" 2nd-level Binds to drop the second feat into Binding, because for some reason they wanted Bind Vestige actively become a dead feat if you started to spend hard feats on it, leading to needing to beat RAW upside the head with not actually having levels of Binder to technically get to keep 2nd-level Vestiges after the first level of Anima Mage.

Mercifully, this is not mirrored in Improved Bind Vestige, so if you want to float the feat to item creation for downtime early, it doesn't lock you out. By very obtuse rules-as-written. There is a reason I did not finish the build, I was really set on trying to lean into Tenebrous Apostate with True Necromancer but the progression is just a mess.

[EndlessKng]

20 years ago, I tried to do a core character with the most core prestige class as soon as possible, then to write its background - it was fun :

ranger 2 / psion 2 / slayer 2 / soulknife 1 / horizon walker 1 / duelist 1

(so it was a hunter in an amazonian jungle, taken into slavery into a psionic theocracy, becoming a guard for a priest into an expedition in a very dangerous rift - he was the only one to survive the journey to the other side, where he found a Venice like city)

I've done something similar (and still work on it now), but my focus is on maximizing levels that either granted bonus feats or could grant a feat as an option (i.e. Domain choice - sometimes a Domain power grants a feat, so any chance to grab a domain was viable even if the choice was spent on something else).

This started with a realization that in an E6 game, it was possible to end up with effectively six feats on a martial character by going Samurai (OA) 2/Ranger 2/Fighter 2 (for the Samurai, I count Ancestral Daisho, as it's functionally equivalent to the Ancestral Relic feat - technically better since you can apply the bonuses to two separate weapons). Thus I set out to see how far I could go only taking classes that granted feats. Nowhere near as powerful as a full caster, but you can still do some insane builds going this route. But the challenge after that is then to figure out a story that makes sense for the character, which is a lot harder the longer the build goes.

-

I also recall trying to build a true follower of Mephistopheles - someone who had both the Hellfire Warlock and Disciple of Mephisopheles in 20 levels. From what I tried, there isn't a combination that lets you meet the criteria using standard rules - the only way I found that got it all was to cheat into Eldritch Knight from Warlock via UA's "Text-based Prerequisites" option for the class (using invocations to simulate spellcasting and the Elf race to get enough martial weapons to pass the tests, and a few feats to help out as well). It allowed me to get the EK levels to get both casting and a full BAB in time to get Brimstone Blast AND take the levels of Disciple while building up the skills needed for Hellfire Warlock. But, that rule also is not usually acceptable in a group for good reasons, and no combination I've found hits all the requirements fast enough otherwise.

Then again, it's a bad combo anyways, so it really was just theorycrafting.

[Seward]

GM side -

a CR10 boss for an introduction module (party level 1) who had a bab of 0 and had 10 separate classes.

In a mini-adventure for LG written by myself and my wife, the leader of a bunch of loser thugs trying to shake down a local business was optimized to run away. Monk, run, fleet of foot, deflect arrows, skills and etc chosen to make chasing him in a city adventure a real chore. Plus his other party members would actually obey his order to "cover his retreat" and use battlefield control or just actions to open doors etc. All of this in a city which prized law and order and had a quite effective law enforcement organization (so if PC's are a little too reckless in either apprehension or chase can also be brought up on charges). The adventure was intended to highlight the law enforcement of the region, and the bad guys had different degrees of savvy on that front (one bad guy who knew the laws well carefully divested himself of all lethal damage weapons before the shakedown and makes a point of trying to subdue anybody that one of his allies looks in danger of killing). In practice, that optimized thug leader only got to show his amazing "run away" abilities about half the time, but it is pretty astonishing when you see somebody do a run action, then turn a corner 100' away and keep going...

An awakened dire rat druid with dire rat animal companion was terrorizing villages with various awakened animals. Using its stealthy form and ordinary appearance it wreaked havoc on Pc parties, first ambushing with entangle or similar spells, then precast call lightning bolts blasting away with no real visible source. Only if those ran out and reduced to things like produce flame that gave away its position could PCs easily manage a counterattack. The build of the dire rat was nothing special, just base hit dice plus druid levels plus natural spell but the spell selection and tactics were very carefully chosen to achieve this result. In higher EL's the dire rat could turn into a pretty scary animal (usually a bear variant buffed with all the druid stuff) to surprise the heck out of melee types who thought they'd FINALLY reached the artillery threat and would now end it.

But the best part of this encounter (which had some of the deepest party engagement in the outcome I've ever seen when running at a convention) was that when you were done, you had two dead, completely ordinary looking dire rats. The party stumbles back to the commoners who hired them burned, electrocuted, bit, some maybe with filth fever or other wounds from other druid effects or bear form and completely tapped and exhausted, holding up two dire rat corpses in triumph! The commoners were generally not impressed, although as the attacks ceased the PCs were grudgingly paid eventually.

Related to that but not really optimization as such - when barbarian squid pirates burst out of the river to attack our ship with greataxes (using potions to survive and move outside water) we almost TPKd because the players were laughing so hard we didn't take very effective action and it was hard to take seriously even as the damage mounted. The GM actually apologized before the encounter "yeah, sorry about this one" because it was so silly.

Player Side

In the Bandit Kingdoms, Living Greyhawk, you were rebels wanted by the authorities for basically anything an adventurer was likely to do in his lifetime. Some PC's took pride in becoming as "wanted" as possible but nobody had any desire to be caught. So you would see PC's actually focusing on disguise and misdirection as a serious part of their character build, taking serious precautions against scrying or being tracked and extradimensional storage had an...unusual use there. When at a convention in that region we were playing a module set outside the BK, and all the locals said "ok, we're actually in XXX right? That's like 500 miles from the nearest Boneheart?" GM "um, yes". Everybody started to empty out their extradimensional storage. Turns out removing the head of anybody who saw you prevents not just a raise, but also "speak with dead". A lot of heads were buried that day.

My wife played a dwarf barbarian/Stonelord who just liked rocks, wanted to be a rock etc. Took Terran language, Craft stonemasonry, deeply enjoyed the Meld with Stone and anticipated speak with rocks class abilities, bought every unusual or magical rock she could afford regardless of whether or not it was of any use (although once you HAVE a stone of alarm it turns out to have some uses) and famously lost money in her gold mine because xorns would visit and she'd feed them "because they were hungry" and what they liked was...gold, gems etc. We played her "rage" as actually "paying attention" to what was going on around her instead of just spacing out contemplating rocks, stones, what it would be like to be a rock etc. She was also very, very excited whenever we encountered sentient creatures who were partly or totally made of stone and would fangirl over them in an adorable fashion (in a 4 charisma (lowered from 6 via curse from licking a very obviously evil/cursed obilisk) 20 strength dwarf kind of way)

In Pathfinder I created by accident my most effective tank ever, by my wife trying to create a duelist who didn't suck and then having both of us realize that the "dervish dancer" feat let you actually do damage with dex, not just "to hit" and so the idea of a dex-tank who had enough offense to matter took off. Well, sort of. At the start her offense was similar to a 3/4 bab barbarian armed with a kukri without power attack (str 5 makes that hard). So I started hunting around for ways to improve that, as it was ok in baby levels but wouldn't scale past level 5. Found a feat that let you flurry with a non-monk weapon if it was your deities favored weapon. Cool, but took a level of cleric and monk (two 0 bab classes). Found a feat that let you trade AC for damage if enemy was bigger than you, good for my halfling. Discovered power attack was on a ranger combat style list, so needed 2 levels of ranger, letting me have power attack with a 5 strength. Anyway, after doing all that, with all that multiclassing, plus the choices of barbarian rage powers I discovered not only was my AC sky high, so were my saves, and my damage was keeping up ok with a sword+board type full bab martial and via a ranger ACF had true rogue trapfinding as well, with skills to back it. This character is the only one I've ever created that routinely aced online "solo adventure" challenges, and it was so successful that it only was ever knocked out twice (once at L2 from a poor save roll, once due to having a random wilderness encounter being much more dangerous than expected and her not taking the melee mooks seriously at first). After L7-8 I started consciously choosing stuff that kept saves really high, in addition to AC optimization and adequate offense. She was a Swiss watch of small "+2" advantages of different kinds and took a fair amount of discipline mentally to play well, and could run out of gas on a very long day, and has the honor of being the only character in about a decade of organized play that actually got audited because her numbers seemed unreal (spoiler - she passed the audit, although later I found out the auditor and I had both missed that one save bonus wasn't a luck bonus and her saves were a little higher than they should have been. I promptly bought a luck item out of guilt to even that up). A lot of why she was very effective in tank role was she LOOKED and ACTED exactly like your typical light infantry barbarian who charges into the middle of the enemy and gets chewed up. By the time the enemy realized that wasn't what she was, the battle was usually half over and it was too late.

In the last con my wife played at before Living Greyhawk got shut down, we created characters that we knew would not make it past level 1, with 28 point buy. Mine was a sorcerer with toughening transmutation, message, swift xp retreat and fist of stone with 12 cha 10 dex, 14 con and 18 strength, which had its moments, but hers was a grey elf warmage with 20 int, 16 dex, 12 cha and...8 constitution. Plus toughness feat. 1d3+5 ray of frosts are pretty brutal, as are 1d4+6 magic missiles or 1d4+5 hail of stone in a level 1 adventure, and she tended to go early.

In Pathfinder I played a natural-attack based rogue-mutt whose background was as a smuggler. Had profession smuggler, had weird gear like snorkles/fins, waterproof pouches, hidden pouches and all that kind of thing from level 1, related criminal underworld skills I thought would fit the concept pretty well, animal companion seagull had a trick or two that applied etc. But her crowning moment of smuggling optimization was a simple gear purchase. a "Pathfinder Pouch" is a mini-bag of holding with only 10lb capacity that can turn itself off and become nonmagical to all detection spells short of identify/analyze dwoemer, revealing only an empty normal pouch while the x-d space is still there with stuff in it, but not accessible until you turn the pouch back on. As soon as I had 1000gp scraped together I purchased it. The very next adventure (she's level 2 or maybe just level 3) we were transporting a mc-guffin through some very savvy customs officials. They actually used detect magic+spellcraft to identify extradimensional storage and used detect thoughts to verify you'd actually emptied it out to check contents. Well, I as a humble person with no magical items at all was ignored. We avoided a quite difficult and intended-to-be unavoidable encounter because the party brought a self-professed "smuggler" along to carry their plot-trinket. Later on she spent an unreasonable amount of her current WBL on a cloak that let her turn into a bird or a fish for a few minutes a day. Wildshape isn't on the table for her but she envied their ability to meld gear and gain transport modes.

Theoretical charop

Recently I optimized Flame Arrow, imagining an archer heavy party. By level 6, every archer could expect
(1d6+6)*1.5 fire damage, 1d6 cold, 1d6 acid, 1d6 lightning damage off each arrow until 50 shots were used. By level 9, the number could be increased to about 150 arrows, and the caster was also a pretty good archer herself. By level 12, all of the energy types were empowered, not just the blistering spell flame arrow. By level 15, all were maximized instead, except fire, which was empowered and maximized.


I didn't do this one but I saw someone try and optimize the suglin (or however that weird polearm from Frostburn is spelt) just to try and make it worth using.
Very amusing.

Saw somebody use whirling blade with it once. A grey elf wizard that went over light load just carrying the damn thing. He was muttering about getting darkwood access to fix that, I never saw how that turned out. But...it was pretty damn effective in whirling blade role when it was used.

[Telok]

Did an mid-low npc barbarian once with... about 3 ac? Good hp, nasty attack, zero defense, negative will save. When the pcs fought him someone rolled an attack and said "i missed", had to pester him a bit to give me the number (like 5 or something) and then astounded him by telling him it hit & asking for damage.

Built one for playing a highish level one shot with vampritic touch. Duskblade, cleric, all three ToB base classes, rkvd, and the jade flame ToB prc thingy. Took a spellstoring bloodstone(?) sword, channeled, dropped 3 or 4 empowered vt on the opening strike and 2 eack one after that for about 10 attacks. The thp do 't stack but you get the best one. Also had some insane fort save & the 3/stance save vs damage to not lose tour last hp stance.

[Jervis]

Which one? Ghostwalk or Libris Mortis?

I can never remember, pretty sure it was ghostwalk.

[El Dorado]

I played an overly caffeinated rogue once: combat reflexes, lightning reflexes, improved initiative, improved evasion, 1/day homebrew ability to reroll a failed reflex save. He was . . twitchy.

[Metastachydium]

1/day homebrew ability to reroll a failed reflex save.

Dive for Cover combined with boots of agile leaping (for not staying prone) can do that for every Ref save you make, no homebrew needed, no restrictions involved.

[RaiKirah]

Probably my favorite optimization exercise I've gone through was for the first Game-Warper's Optimization Challenge: E6 Flawed Commoner, where I had a thought experiment build which leveraged the Commoner Feat Pig Bond from the April Fools article to reach a density of pig meat that would easily pass the threshold for fission. Was a lot of fun :)

https://forums.giantitp.com/showsinglepost.php?p=23441751&postcount=110

[nedz]

I built an Horizon Walker with no base class . It was a viable NPC.

I remember we built a character with either one or no stats by stacking a number of templates. It's on this site somewhere but my google-foo failed.

[Wildstag]

I tried optimizing for Diplomacy once upon a time using Celadrin from Dragon 350, poltergeist (fanfare)(Dragon 327), and some way for getting Diplomacy on the Sorcerer list, but it wasn't particularly optimized due to a lack of experience with the task.

With max ranks, and the relevant skill feats, a scaling racial bonus, and a +2 for two cantrips, it could have gotten reasonably high, but the character never got played. It was a fun attempt though.

[Biggus]

to reach a density of pig meat that would easily pass the threshold for fission

See, this is the kind of quality content that keeps me coming back to this site.

[remetagross]

It's a specific niche, but I once built a villain for the Villainous Challenge that managed to not gain a single skill rank above a certain level, so as to keep his skills as low as possible after a set threshold. The trick was to spend all his skill points into a untrained Perform("Insert here a new bizarre and obscure instrument each time you take the skill"), so as to end up with a half-rank (that is, effectively 0 ranks) in, like, 70 different iterations of Perform.

[ShurikVch]

Character which have as much Hide in Plain Sight sources as possible - so, if some of them would be negated (or just inapplicable), they would still be able to use the rest
HiPSter :smallamused:

[Thrice Dead Cat]

That's fun; I did something similar (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showpost.php?p=3945177) once for a build challenge, abusing gestalt rules to end up with something like 9/9/9/4/5/X.

This is a tangent, but your Omnicaster served as inspiration for my Bookkeeper's Spellbook entry years ago. (https://forums.giantitp.com/showthread.php?162387-Potpourri-Creation-Contest-III-Salazar-s-Spellbook-Supreme&p=9080744#post9080744)

As for weird optimization attempts, I once tried to add as many variations of the barbarian's rage class feature as I could find onto one character (e.g., rage, frenzy, shifting, whirling frenzy, etc.). Going from memory, the stub used a Changeling with Racial Emulation to take Half Orc Paragon levels, Barbarian, Berserk, Frenzied Berserker, Bloodclaw Master, Wildrunner, Frozen Berserker, and Fist of the Forest. The GM also gave me explicit permission chain ACFs, so that any place where I gained "Rage," I could instead take a different version of it.

I never did play that character, but it was a fun exercise to see how angry one person could be. He also could have been angrier with others in the party given that Frenzied Berserker and I think a couple of other classes give the option of inspiring frenzy/whatever-their-not!-rage-is-called in their allies. That would help save a few feats, too, given the costs of all of those PrCs.

[Eladrinblade]

Not mine, but: this (https://forums.giantitp.com/showsinglepost.php?p=18594952&postcount=7)

[Blackhawk748]

I suppose you could call it odd, but I wanted to see how much I could jack up Dagger damage reasonably while also going into Assassin. Link (https://forums.giantitp.com/showthread.php?403434-I-got-bored-so-i-made-this-Assassin)
Its not terribly involved but it is entirely reasonable at most tables, as its just a Rogue that deals pretty consistent damage even without Sneak Attack.

[Rleonardh]

Rogue1/wizard5/unseen seer4/arcane trickster 4/unseen seer6
Human able learner feat

Druid3/wizard3/mystic theurge 2/arcane hiropent10/mystic theurge 2
Don't allow dragon magazin unfortunately
Possibly duel practiced spell caster
If wild shaping need THE druid feat also aka Natural Spell tiny fly casting spells.......

Sorcerer or wizard 6/Eldritch Knight 1/spell sword 1/Abjuration Champion 5/Eldritch Knight 7
Human militia feat

Cleric 4/church inquisitor 1/ divine Oracle 1/ Radiant savant of Palor 4/ contemplative 1/ RSoP 6/ divine Oracle 3
Skill focus religion and greater turning feats
Many good domains to consider
Travel trickery magic glory to name a few.


Can go cheesy with persistent spells on some builds if you want.

[H_H_F_F]

Rogue1/wizard5/unseen seer4/arcane trickster 4/unseen seer6
Human able learner feat

Druid3/wizard3/mystic theurge 2/arcane hiropent10/mystic theurge 2
Don't allow dragon magazin unfortunately
Possibly duel practiced spell caster
If wild shaping need THE druid feat also aka Natural Spell tiny fly casting spells.......

Sorcerer or wizard 6/Eldritch Knight 1/spell sword 1/Abjuration Champion 5/Eldritch Knight 7
Human militia feat

Cleric 4/church inquisitor 1/ divine Oracle 1/ Radiant savant of Palor 4/ contemplative 1/ RSoP 6/ divine Oracle 3
Skill focus religion and greater turning feats
Many good domains to consider
Travel trickery magic glory to name a few.


Can go cheesy with persistent spells on some builds if you want.

What are these builds in reference to?

[Rleonardh]

My oddest builds
Usually I stick to clerics or druids as my main character or a simple rouge ranger mix in games as cleric and rouge most times not played.

Plus most dms I used to play with don't allow ton load of muti classing
Current one also.

[Togo]

I created an NPC big bad which was optimsied to see how many times she could get taken down and come back in the same fight. Death Pact, Stalwart Pact, Contingency, Mislead, lots of smoke bombs plus anklets of translocation, etc. etc.

The idea was to have a final boss fight that would be longer, so that everyone would get ample time to contribute.

I toned it down after the playtest, when I realised that actually using all the options would make the fight too frustrating.

[Elkad]

I've taken a T1 wizard and sunk most of my feats and daily abilities into buffing my familiar.

Buffed the rest of the party too of course, and did some BFC stuff opening rounds, but I mostly just played the familiar while my "actual" character would just randomly shoot magic missile wands or something equally ineffective on his turn.

[Azuresun]

It's a specific niche, but I once built a villain for the Villainous Challenge that managed to not gain a single skill rank above a certain level, so as to keep his skills as low as possible after a set threshold. The trick was to spend all his skill points into a untrained Perform("Insert here a new bizarre and obscure instrument each time you take the skill"), so as to end up with a half-rank (that is, effectively 0 ranks) in, like, 70 different iterations of Perform.

I think I was at university with that guy.


I created an NPC big bad which was optimsied to see how many times she could get taken down and come back in the same fight. Death Pact, Stalwart Pact, Contingency, Mislead, lots of smoke bombs plus anklets of translocation, etc. etc.

The idea was to have a final boss fight that would be longer, so that everyone would get ample time to contribute.

I toned it down after the playtest, when I realised that actually using all the options would make the fight too frustrating.

Tell me you had this song in the background (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2H5uWRjFsGc) during the boss battle.

[Bohandas]

There was a thread on this board a while back about how to optimize a first level commoner (https://forums.giantitp.com/showthread.php?232822-The-Commoner-Handbook)

[Elenian]

I've tried to optimize the lethality of the spell sending (first step is to make it into a damaging spell with snowcasting, energy substitution (fire), and blistering spell, but after that you're basically just doing normal arcane thesis nonsense, so arguably not all that innovative)

[Seward]

I've tried to optimize the lethality of the spell sending (first step is to make it into a damaging spell with snowcasting, energy substitution (fire), and blistering spell, but after that you're basically just doing normal arcane thesis nonsense, so arguably not all that innovative)

Huh. Maybe do "Nightmare" instead? Of course immune to mind affecting kind of ruins that, but it seems like a similar idea. Sending does have the advantage that it is no save no SR but being limited to one zap every 10 minutes seems like you're only going to cause spontaneous combustion on relatively weak creatures.

Still, it's an interesting idea. Would certainly be surprising. I guess if you timed it right and were determined you could maybe interrupt rest periods, or spell preparation or a ritual or something by hitting them with a zap every once in a while, but aside from the nuisance value or picking off weak but influential commoners it's hard to see what the point is. (in Crusader Kings 2 this would be a great way to assassinate heirs when they are still children, but that's pretty dark for D&D)

[EndlessKng]

There was a thread on this board a while back about how to optimize a first level commoner (https://forums.giantitp.com/showthread.php?232822-The-Commoner-Handbook)

See, I love this kind of thing. Because I was toying with something similar (but ultimately a different scope/direction), and it's wonderful to have a comparison point that goes over some of the ideas I had and shows me others I hadn't considered, or new angles on those ideas for further development.

[redking]

An awakened dire rat druid with dire rat animal companion was terrorizing villages with various awakened animals.

That's hilarious. Puts a new twist on low levels quests to kill a bunch of rats.

[Seward]

That's hilarious. Puts a new twist on low levels quests to kill a bunch of rats.

That one scaled up to 8th level, although I felt the sweet spot was in the expected party level 4 when running it. And yeah - facing that in a forest setting was both extremely difficult but also not too "swingy" in the sense of TPKs. Parties were VERY proud of themselves when they overcame it. But yeah, the two dead rats was the punchline that made it even funnier to an exhausted but triumphant group of players.

[Elenian]

Huh. Maybe do "Nightmare" instead? Of course immune to mind affecting kind of ruins that, but it seems like a similar idea. Sending does have the advantage that it is no save no SR but being limited to one zap every 10 minutes seems like you're only going to cause spontaneous combustion on relatively weak creatures.

Yeah Nightmare is SR:yes, allows a save, is a mind-affecting illusion, and doesn't work on things that don't sleep (and even if they do sleep, doesn't work until they do.) Obviously the casting time prevents you from using Sending as your go-to combat spell (that's got to be one of the weirdest sentences I've ever typed), unless you can convert it to an SLA or something (which will probably break the metamagic combo you need). The main advantage of Sending, of course, in addition to its near-unstoppability and interplanar range, is that it comes with an attached message so that you can taunt your enemies...

(incidentally, if you use Eldritch Theurge 5's Eldritch Spellweave to cast a repelling heightened snowcast blistering sending at someone, you can knock them 'directly away' from the daemonweb pits or wherever you happen to be. Determining the resultant vector is left as an exercise to the reader.)

[unseenmage]

Over in this thread (https://forums.giantitp.com/showthread.php?470947-Madness-Such-As-This-Clockwork-Spacewhales/page2) towards the end I was optimizing what Constructs to use in a 3rd party lycanthrope Construct affectionately dubbed the golemthrope.
Was probably the most niche thing I've ever tinkered with that required so much WORK.
Both sides had to be Constructs, only one side needed to be golem, and it needed to be CR 12 AFTER template application.
That whole thread was full of weird optimizations.

Most powerful was. TO "game" where optimizing stacked applications of the BoVD Hivemind was used as a telecommunications array.
DYK that a Figurine of Wondrous Power is just a regular animal when transformed? Shenanigans ensue from there.

[EndlessKng]

Most powerful was. TO "game" where optimizing stacked applications of the BoVD Hivemind was used as a telecommunications array.
DYK that a Figurine of Wondrous Power is just a regular animal when transformed? Shenanigans ensue from there.

Oooh... yeah, I can see the shenaniganry ensue from that.

Dumb question/slightly off topic, but what does "TO" mean? I keep seeing it here and in other forums, but can't find a definite meaning - guessing it's a reference to an old forum, but not sure.

[unseenmage]

Oooh... yeah, I can see the shenaniganry ensue from that.

Dumb question/slightly off topic, but what does "TO" mean? I keep seeing it here and in other forums, but can't find a definite meaning - guessing it's a reference to an old forum, but not sure.
Theoretical Optimization. Usually uses to refer to optimization ideas that, while functional by RAW (aka rules as written) are so over the top overpowered or against RAI (aka rules as intended) that they wouldn't be allowed at any reasonable game.

[ShurikVch]

Gnome Tunnel Acrobatics allow to add falling damage you took - while climbing up the wall and falling - to damage you inflicted on an enemy; it count as charge
Thus - optimizing the height you can climb in a round; mitigation of falling damage (without negation - we still need to take it!); and, possibly, acquire methods to create a wall - in case there are no walls in convenient vicinity

[Morphic tide]

Weird concept I've been helping chip at on 4chan:

Fighter 2/Monk 3/Tattooed Monk 10/Drunken Master 5, with Vow of Poverty. This is a lot of stuff often considered actively bad, but they seem to interact with eachother wonderfully. The Chameleon tattoo gives hours/level Alter Self, which can cover the single biggest problem typically cited in Vow of Poverty by letting you fly (or swim or burrow). In turn, Vow of Poverty covers a big problem Drunken Master has by giving an Enhancement bonus and DR/Magic bypass to the Improvised Weapons, and since they can add Unarmed Strike damage to their Improvised Weapons, they get to apply that damage beyond 5 ft. Reach. With a very fuzzy definition of what exactly their reach ends up being, though there's loads of obvious issues past 15 ft.

[Maat Mons]

Arguably, since improvised weapons aren't simple weapons, using one violates your Vow of Poverty. Since the tattoos from Tattooed Monk are noted to be magical and are arguably possessions, those could violate your Vow of Poverty too.

[Gruftzwerg]

Arguably, since improvised weapons aren't simple weapons, using one violates your Vow of Poverty. Since the tattoos from Tattooed Monk are noted to be magical and are arguably possessions, those could violate your Vow of Poverty too.

Improvised Weapons and VoP:
Unless you wanna argue that a VoP character may not "use" doorknobs, chairs, ladders and such (the intended way), they should be legal for use as "improvised weapons" too. And if you wanna argue to that extend, VoP becomes unplayable. So pls don't be so harsh with VoP restrictions ;)

Possession in 3.5:
Imho the tattoos from the PRC aren't "items" and as such not possessed in the sense the 3.5 rules work. There is no price attached and it doesn't have an item slot, no weight no nothing. Imho for something to be possessed, you must also be able to "lose" it. If you can't, you don't possess it either. You can get rid of a tattoo (burning it away, cutting the skin or body part off), but you don't "lose" it in a normal way.

[daremetoidareyo]

One of the optimizations that I’m most proud of is weaponizing knowledge (history) checks to create icy Armageddon.

[H_H_F_F]

One of the optimizations that I’m most proud of is weaponizing knowledge (history) checks to create icy Armageddon.

Weaponizing the inability to make such checks, to be more precise.

[Seward]

Re: Vow of poverty/tattoo'd monk.

Just no - those tattoos are a class feature, no different from spells known for a sorcerer. There is no conflict. About the only class feature that could cause such a conflict would be something like the Ruathar "Gift" of a magic item, or various Battlesmith class features that revolve around masterwork items you crafted yourself and then enchanted via those features.

Re: Improvised weapons/vow of poverty. Improvised weapons map to club or dagger in terms of damage, and they're free. Close enough to "simple weapons" in my book. A GM picky enough to disallow them is not one you want to use VoP with ever.

[pabelfly]

One of the optimizations that I’m most proud of is weaponizing knowledge (history) checks to create icy Armageddon.

My Truenamer characters want more details on this.

[H_H_F_F]

My Truenamer characters want more details on this.

The Ultimate Ragus (https://forums.giantitp.com/showthread.php?628809-Iron-Chef-Optimization-Challenge-in-the-Playground-CX&p=24996353&viewfull=1#post24996353) is the build in question. It's not something you'd do in a real game, though.

[pabelfly]

The Ultimate Ragus (https://forums.giantitp.com/showthread.php?628809-Iron-Chef-Optimization-Challenge-in-the-Playground-CX&p=24996353&viewfull=1#post24996353) is the build in question. It's not something you'd do in a real game, though.

That build was rather amusing, even if it didn't quite work legally. Thanks for sharing.

[remetagross]

Weaponizing the inability to make such checks, to be more precise.

Hmmm I think dare is referring to his villain in that Villainous Competition round centered around Elder Evils, and he created this hilarious guy who made everyone around him auto-succeed on a DC 50 Knowledge (History) check to know more about this sorta Elder Evil from the DMGII, Ghulurak. Guys who succeed at that kind of skill check become feverishly obsessed about the Elder Evil and somehow bring about its avatar in the world. So I guess it really was a weaponization of the ability to make the checks, in that case :smallbiggrin:

[H_H_F_F]

Hmmm I think dare is referring to his villain in that Villainous Competition round centered around Elder Evils, and he created this hilarious guy who made everyone around him auto-succeed on a DC 50 Knowledge (History) check to know more about this sorta Elder Evil from the DMGII, Ghulurak. Guys who succeed at that kind of skill check become feverishly obsessed about the Elder Evil and somehow bring about its avatar in the world. So I guess it really was a weaponization of the ability to make the checks, in that case :smallbiggrin:

The one I linked is a Ghulurak build too...

Sneaky Dare, recycling his ideas?

[Zancloufer]

Hmmm I think dare is referring to his villain in that Villainous Competition round centered around Elder Evils, and he created this hilarious guy who made everyone around him auto-succeed on a DC 50 Knowledge (History) check to know more about this sorta Elder Evil from the DMGII, Ghulurak. Guys who succeed at that kind of skill check become feverishly obsessed about the Elder Evil and somehow bring about its avatar in the world. So I guess it really was a weaponization of the ability to make the checks, in that case :smallbiggrin:

So they where a literal sentient information hazard? That has to be pretty out there.


On weird optimization I've done (but will probably never get to play); Character who weaponizes intelligence. In that they hit harder the smarter they are. Pretty much Int+Dex character optimized to hit like a ****ing truck from pure smartness and force of will. Stacked a bunch of things to get crazy reflexes/imitative/damage from things like Intelligence and Concentration. Could straight up put holes through 10ft thick walls with a single unarmed strike.

[daremetoidareyo]

One of my favorite weird optimizations was during that hang gliding dwarf iron Chef round.
The prereqs Required being a gold dwarf. And I posited that I wanted to make a gold elemental that took stoneblessed to get in, but I couldn’t make it fit.

The joke being, “haha devs, you said gold dwarf, Here’s a thing made of gold that counts as a dwarf, that’s what counts right?”

Then another optimization heavyweight on the forum actually read with some focus as opposed to my typical frenzy of build reading. Apparently if you can make gold elemental with less gold you can drop their hit dice.

I could imagine bringing that to a table out of the blue and having a DM rule 0 you, “You are a solid gold monster, these wooden bat wings will not hold you aloft. “ And then I imagined that while E coyote fall from the Grand Canyon.

Teamwork is awesome

[Rleonardh]

Cleric 3/rogue 1/Cleric 6/contemplative 1/cleric 9
Domains:air fire water
H able learner
1 extra turning
3 touch of healing
6 sacred touch
9 divine defiance
12 craft wondrous items
15 extra turning
18 extra turning

Start of game stats and level 3
Str 12
Dex 8
Con 14
Int 16
Wiz 18
Cha 16


Was a build I tried for a rogue less party with me being only cleric.
Had find and disarm traps and umd, blasting spells from the domains and sence it was a low level campaign that we would do a job than have free time craft wondrous items so I could make items that helped on skill checks and other things I needed.
Party did not want to provide gold so they got nothing from my craft ability. Also it was a low level magic item game.
Note the wizard helped with scribe scroll and craft wands so I helped him out with a few items.

Party was
Fighter
Ranger
Paladin
Me
Wizard
Bard