Gardening Help!

[Darkly]

In Dragon #357, there is a bunch of rules for magical plants, which inspired me to make a gardening character. As I'm going to be in an intrigue campaign with a lot of downtime, I thought it would lend some nice flavor. The coolest of these is the Wishfern, which is a plant that grants a wish. It's not nearly as practical as a Candle of Invocation, of course, but I'll go for it. Most of the restrictions can be handled with magic shenanigans, planar traits and whatnot.

But not the skill requirement.

Profession (Gardener) 40.

Planting it I can use Knowledge (Nature), which is easier to bump up. But harvesting requires Profession (Gardener) specifically, and nobody and their mother has optimized Profession (Gardener), because Profession skills are worthless and hard to get regardless.

Obviously I could get the standby magic items of "bump skill check by (x)", "Bump Wis by (y)" and I can always get the Skillmonkey feat (Skill Focus), but other than that, I'm stumped.

So here we go! The person to get the highest Profession (Gardener) check by lvl 20 gets a cookie! Everything is allowed, flaws and Dragon included.

Thanks in advance!

[Biggus]

There are spells which can help a lot. Divine Insight (SpC) can give up to a +15 bonus, and if online content is allowed, Guidance of the Avatar (https://web.archive.org/web/20161101181037/http://archive.wizards.com/dnd/article.asp?x=dnd/sb/sb20010504a) gives a +20 bonus. If you're not a Cleric, get a Minor Ring of Spell Storing and get a Cleric to cast it into it.

If you don't want to spend any skill ranks, get two rings, as the above spells stack with each other.

[Thurbane]

Wait...do you need 40 ranks in Profession, or to make a DC 40 check? Because those are very different things.

[Darkly]

Wait...do you need 40 ranks in Profession, or to make a DC 40 check? Because those are very different things.

A DC 40 check, thank goodness.

[ShurikVch]

Skillful Moment spell (Dragon #350) allow to take 20 on a skill check.
Combine it with aforementioned Guidance of the Avatar for total 41 check result (I mean: you must have at least one rank in Profession skill - unless you take Jack of All Trades)

Unsurprisingly, there are very few ways to boost Profession skill checks

Mentor feat - +2 competence

Mercantile Background feat - +2

Specialized (https://www.d20srd.org/srd/variant/buildingCharacters/characterTraits.htm#specialized) trait +1

And it's about it

If you want to use non-WotC sources, then War of The Lance have the Master class, which - in the "Craftsman" variant - can create tools with up to +10 circumstance bonus

Also, for LA +2, you may take Prodigy (Wisdom) unique ability (Dungeon Master's Guide II) - it would give +2 Wis, and +4 on Wis-based checks (for total +5)

[Eurus]

Does it specify how long the skill check takes? Some buff spells might have problems if it takes a long time.

[Darkly]

There are spells which can help a lot. Divine Insight (SpC) can give up to a +15 bonus, and if online content is allowed, Guidance of the Avatar gives a +20 bonus. If you're not a Cleric, get a Minor Ring of Spell Storing and get a Cleric to cast it into it.

Ah, fair enough! I could absolutely make a Cleric. I'm not sure how I overlooked those spells, I've certainly used them both before.

While this would certainly get me to 40, I'm still interested in seeing what other people might be able to achieve! It would be nice to keep my options open, and the campaign might go from intrigue to apocalyptic (there's been a hint or two), so getting a friendly spellcaster for Spell Storing might not always be an option.

[Darkly]

Skillful Moment spell (Dragon #350) allow to take 20 on a skill check.

What? That's amazing! Why have I never heard of-
Wait a second.
Doesn't taking 20 mean that you fail the check 19 times beforehand, regardless of how many actions it takes? It doesn't say +20 or that your dice is set to 20, it says take 20.

...I'm still using this spell for other dumb optimizations, but that would absolutely kill my plants if read like that.

[Darkly]

Does it specify how long the skill check takes? Some buff spells might have problems if it takes a long time.

Short answer: It's Dragon Magazine, so no.

Long answer: "A tahtaolehti plant only blooms once every 5d100 years, and always on the night of the winter solstice. For that one night, the wishfern wears a flower of unparalleled beauty, a fist-sized blossom of luminous white. The blossom contains incredible power, for if properly harvested without bruise or damage (requiring a DC 40 Profession [gardener] check) it grants one wish, as the spell cast by a 20th-level sorcerer. With the coming of the sun the blossom withers and disintegrates, living behind a single seed, whether or not it granted a wish."


...I'm curious how this plant propagates if it only leaves one seed behind, but whatever...

[ShurikVch]

Wait a second.
Doesn't taking 20 mean that you fail the check 19 times beforehand, regardless of how many actions it takes? It doesn't say +20 or that your dice is set to 20, it says take 20.
To be more specific:

Upon casting this spell, you channel a future result of one designated course of action into an act you're about to perform. When casting this spell, choose one skill. On the round after you cast this spell you may take 20 the chosen skill as a single standard action. You only gain this benefit on the skill noted at the time of the spell's casting, gaining no bonus to any other skill. If you do not make the skill check in the round immediately following the spell's casting the benefit is lost.
As far as I seen it - it's not the "usual" Taking 20 (https://www.d20srd.org/srd/skills/usingSkills.htm): it takes only one standard actions, so I really doubt it would include 19 failed attempts...

[Darkly]

I'll run Skillful Moment past my DM, but he'll be in a catch-22 either way, really. Either I take the action once and can guarantee successes whenever I get that spell off, or it causes me to make the check 20 times, rolling 19 1's and a 20... which would be amazing for Knowledge checks, since you normally can't take them more than once. With a high enough bonus, I'd get a small amount of information 19 times on my 1's, and then a lot of information for the final roll of 20.

Regardless, for the purposes of gardening, it seems like a rules nightmare. Thanks, Dragon Magazine!

(Edit)
Actually, giving it a little more thought, it wouldn't help with Knowledge skills either. If you can't try again, then you can't try again, right? If read a certain way, then this spell has very little use. It would only succeed in condensing a normal Take 20 into a 6 second increment.

[ShurikVch]

Casting Time: 1 standard action
Range: Personal
Target: You
Duration: 1 round
It takes only 1 standard action to cast, and lasts lasts only 1 round

Maybe, zap it with Bear's Endurance so it would be better in the whole "make DC 12 Fort save"?

[Saintheart]

Don't forget the all-important Masterwork Tools for a +2 to the check. :)

[AvatarVecna]

In order from highest to lowest.

1) Obligatory "Pun-Pun". +Infinite, literally.

2) Give your horse an item of continuous "Delay Death", as well as some way of acting normally below 0 HP. Give yourself an item of continuous "Sadism". Spur your mount. Spurring your mount deals 1 damage to the mount, x2 for each previous round you've spurred your mount in a row. And while this is damage, it's also explicitly an actual doubling rather than +100%. Round 1 deals 1 damage, round 2 deals 2, round 3 deals 4, round 4 deals 8, and so on. By round 20, you're dealing 524288. By round 30, you're dealing 536870912. And each time you deal that damage, the following round you get a luck bonus to all skills checks equal to 1/10th the damage you dealt the previous round. If you spur your mount for 5 minutes and that's the exact moment you ride through your own garden, you can harvest it with a +56 trillion on the check, for example.

3) Hivemind created with many swarms of fine insects. Use your new super-CL and recently-purchased Reserves Of Strength feat to uncap a spell that gives a bonus to skill checks. Use that spell on your gardening skill for something like +1 million. Alternatively, use your super-casting to Gate in more swarms than you currently have to make an even bigger/smarter hivemind with a bigger CL.

4) Items of +X (competence) can be turned into items of +X (any other bonus) by an artificer with the right infusions. You can get pretty big bonuses this way. Arguably infinite, by turning them all to circumstance bonuses, although that gets very expensive since you still need to buy the items. Unless you have arbitrary money, though, I wouldn't expect to see more than +5000 or so pre-epic from this.

[Rebel7284]

- Item Familiar can double your skills ranks in any skill
- Marshal minor aura - motivate Wisdom can add +Charisma to all Wisdom checks. Dipping Marshal yourself works, of course, if you have a high charisma, but you can probably hire a level 1 Marshal quite cheaply too.
- Owl's Insight is a level 5 Druid spell that gives a bonus to Wisdom = 1/2 Caster Level for an hour. This is uncapped, so someone with Circle Magic can give a truly ridiculous bonus to Wisdom (20+)

So for a build I would aim at something like a Archivist/Hathran with the Cohort having at least 1 levels of Marshal. This MIGHT be overkill since with all the bonuses, you're probably hitting a skill check of over 100 by mid-levels, but eh?

edit: IMPROVISATION! Bard 1 spell that gives you a bonus = 1/2 your caster level. Archivists can pick up Divine Bard spells too, right? :smallbiggrin:

[Malphegor]

to fund your garden’s upkeep have you considered having it as a farm? Business rules in dmg2 have got you covered to make it mildly profiteable with a specific Farm type business (it only says you might need to discuss with your dm any changes if it’s a exotic goods farm)


you might also want it to be mobile, which means you’ll probably need an enveloping pit (biggest bag I know of) and some sunlight and water spells to build yourself a mobile greenhouse to take with you while you adventure

[Anthrowhale]

Surge of Fortune allows you to force a 20 on a skill check.

[daremetoidareyo]

Get a familiar or açai Crystal to give you the help action With your skill ranks and Shared spells And use the expert help option from rules compendium to get something like a +5 to the check

[Darkly]

to fund your garden’s upkeep have you considered having it as a farm? Business rules in dmg2 have got you covered to make it mildly profiteable with a specific Farm type business (it only says you might need to discuss with your dm any changes if it’s a exotic goods farm)


you might also want it to be mobile, which means you’ll probably need an enveloping pit (biggest bag I know of) and some sunlight and water spells to build yourself a mobile greenhouse to take with you while you adventure

I'm absolutely farming things for profit, yeah! As far as the moving base goes, I think we're snagging a floating island next session (it's in Sharn, so not entirely impossible). The gp cost would be insane, but player shenanigans got a few favors to swing our way. Just big enough for a mansion, a small greenhouse (that will likely overtake the mansion) and a front lawn.

As for questing, I'm not sure we're leaving Sharn anytime soon, so I'm not gonna worry about it too much. Any once **** hits the fan, I'm not sure I'll want to go back to the ground. Whoever gifted my DM the Elder Evils book was a dumbass.

(It was me. I'm the dumbass.)

[Darkly]

In order from highest to lowest.

1) Obligatory "Pun-Pun". +Infinite, literally.

2) Give your horse an item of continuous "Delay Death", as well as some way of acting normally below 0 HP. Give yourself an item of continuous "Sadism". Spur your mount. Spurring your mount deals 1 damage to the mount, x2 for each previous round you've spurred your mount in a row. And while this is damage, it's also explicitly an actual doubling rather than +100%. Round 1 deals 1 damage, round 2 deals 2, round 3 deals 4, round 4 deals 8, and so on. By round 20, you're dealing 524288. By round 30, you're dealing 536870912. And each time you deal that damage, the following round you get a luck bonus to all skills checks equal to 1/10th the damage you dealt the previous round. If you spur your mount for 5 minutes and that's the exact moment you ride through your own garden, you can harvest it with a +56 trillion on the check, for example.

3) Hivemind created with many swarms of fine insects. Use your new super-CL and recently-purchased Reserves Of Strength feat to uncap a spell that gives a bonus to skill checks. Use that spell on your gardening skill for something like +1 million. Alternatively, use your super-casting to Gate in more swarms than you currently have to make an even bigger/smarter hivemind with a bigger CL.

4) Items of +X (competence) can be turned into items of +X (any other bonus) by an artificer with the right infusions. You can get pretty big bonuses this way. Arguably infinite, by turning them all to circumstance bonuses, although that gets very expensive since you still need to buy the items. Unless you have arbitrary money, though, I wouldn't expect to see more than +5000 or so pre-epic from this.

Ah, yes, the classics. Except for the artificer one, actually, I'll give a good hard look into that! I think the DM will hit me with a book if I use any infinite combos though, even if we are usually pretty cheese heavy.

[Darkly]

- Item Familiar can double your skills ranks in any skill
- Marshal minor aura - motivate Wisdom can add +Charisma to all Wisdom checks. Dipping Marshal yourself works, of course, if you have a high charisma, but you can probably hire a level 1 Marshal quite cheaply too.
- Owl's Insight is a level 5 Druid spell that gives a bonus to Wisdom = 1/2 Caster Level for an hour. This is uncapped, so someone with Circle Magic can give a truly ridiculous bonus to Wisdom (20+)

So for a build I would aim at something like a Archivist/Hathran with the Cohort having at least 1 levels of Marshal. This MIGHT be overkill since with all the bonuses, you're probably hitting a skill check of over 100 by mid-levels, but eh?

edit: IMPROVISATION! Bard 1 spell that gives you a bonus = 1/2 your caster level. Archivists can pick up Divine Bard spells too, right? :smallbiggrin:

Yo, Owl's Insight and Improvisation are both nice! My problem is that I just don't play characters that need wisdom very often, so Owl's Insight flew right over my head.

(...Item Familiar scares me...

[Rebel7284]

Yo, Owl's Insight and Improvisation are both nice! My problem is that I just don't play characters that need wisdom very often, so Owl's Insight flew right over my head.

Owls tend to do that. :smallwink:


(...Item Familiar scares me...)

I think if fully abused with special abilities and XP bonuses that it can grant, Item Familiar can certainly paint a target on its head. With that said, if you're only using it for a gardening boost, and take time in effort to make sure it's difficult to lost/remove/sunder, it could be fine in many campaigns. I hear that grafts and Teeth of Dahlver-Nar make good item familiars. Armor also can't be sundered, but is easier to remove than grafts. But ultimately, this is certainly more risky than most other feats.